You just can’t help yourself, can you? You can’t even bring yourself to post the debate question by itself without throwing in something insulting everyone else and saying that they are afraid to debate you. The reason people are flinging shit at you is because your posts contained a debate question buried in a pile of prejudice and abuse. Try again: post your debate question (a) without making abusive comments about Muslims and (b) without making false accusations about the motivations of your fellow posters. Then, perhaps, people will take you seriously.
ETA–And don’t assume that we won’t accept criticism of Muslims. For example, I just started reading Sam Harris’s The End of Faith, which is quite critical of Islam. But there is a difference between unreasoning abuse and reasoned criticism.
No, actually, I don’t think you want to debate these points. Rather I am quite firmly convinced that you want to use the above as a cover for you to elucidate in great detail as to exactly why you believe Islam is un-western and barbaric. Or in other words I believe airing your talking points are much more important to you than actual debate.
Liberal is far more charitable of your motives than I am. But I guess we all have our personality flaws and one of mine is a suspicious nature.
The reason few Muslims have engaged in religious debate on the SDMB has already been explained:
1.) It is a tiny minority religion in the English speaking countries that make up 99.9% ( or whatever ) of the membership here. Hence there have been few Muslim posters, period.
2.) Not every poster has a burning need to debate/defend their personal faith on a message board. I’m sure there are more than a few devout Christians on the SDMB that have no great interest in participated in Christian-oriented debates either. Others are simply not equipped to do so - they have sincere beliefs, but don’t have a host of cites handy and thus aren’t armed for debate.
3.) Most folks get tired of being in the constant defensive position a Muslim on the SDMB would have to assume in the face of continual attacks and ‘No True Scotsmen’ arguments.
There you have it.
There is no such thing universal “Islamic” or “Western” culture in such broad terms and there is no pretending otherwise. Are Bosnian Muslims “Western” or “Islamic”?
Yeah, well, like I said you’re a charitable person in this regard. I’m not. We’ll leave aside the fact that I think the very notion that our few Muslim posters don’t feel called upon to continuously interject themselves in relgious debates on the SDMB because they are inherently different in mindset, what with their notions that freedom and democracy being weird and their inherent submission to authoritarian beliefs, is both ridiculous and insulting as hell. Might as well just spit in the face of every Muslim member of the SDMB, past and present.
The simple fact is that while Valteron may be a perfectly decent person in other respects, IMO this a well-documented blind spot of his. Am I making assumptions about where he is headed with this? Yep. But I feel pretty comfortable doing so.
Case in point. We know there are fairly few openly Muslim posters here, and you started this thread a mere 12 hours ago. You’re assuming a lack of a Muslim response illustrates some larger point about Muslim culture, but your conclusion is unsupported by evidence. It could simply be that of the Muslim members (already a small group) few have noticed this thread, fewer opened it and fewer still responded to it. Your behaviour could easily be discouraging responses, either pro or con. You’re not giving them any incentive to offer their opinions, not even the merest sign that you’d give their views the slightest respect.
I suggest you’re merely seeking to claim reinforcement for beliefs you already hold, rather than seeking new insight.
I think that thread was rather cool. And some of them really didn’t sound that stupid to me, even though the SDMB posters liked to claim so. I think one of them scored here:
“If my ancestors are from africa, then I should benefit from some affirmative action law or quota system that I have heard so much about and paid so many taxes to finance.”
I’m down with saying that both of them are “insane”.
Also, hie thee to the “Ask the…” threads. They’ll give you more information and if you don’t come off as such a combative individual, then maybe something can be discussed.
Actually, a rational person can also simply state that there is not sufficient information to draw a conclusion for either statement, and thus refuse to dismiss either; a rational person can also claim that they personally lack sufficient knowledge about either belief system to dismiss either at this time (though the information might be available if one sought hard enough); or there’s the third option that the rational person doesn’t care about the issue enough to waste time thinking about it at all, and thus refrains from even considering the assertions, much less dismissing them.
So, I think you have a wee bit of excluded middle here. Just like with your “Muslims must be incapable of rational argument, or they’d be here!” line of thought.
Both of them seem to say the same thing. They have no desire to debate.
Angua’a argument is one I have heard often from religious people. Your mind and heart are closed to the truth so I will not bother to present it to you.
You can even find passage after passage in the Koran about how Allah hardens the heart of unbelievers so that Satan can lead them to Hell for having rejected the truth of Islam. (Leading me to wonder how responsible I can be for my unbelief if Allah planned it that way. )
I remember a Mormon woman telling me something similar. Anyone besides a Mormon can see that the Book of Mormon is a bunch of made-up junk invented by Joseph Smith. Everyone knows there is not a scrap of evidence that there was a huge civilization of millions of people speaking “reformed Egyptian” and practicing the Christian Relgion in America between 33 and 500 A.D.
But this woman simply said, “Even if we were to find insciptions in reformed Egyptian saying welcome to (one of the cities mentioned in the B of M) you still would not believe.”
Muslims have told me much the same thing. How bloody convenient. In other words, “oh yeah, we have scads and scads of evidence to prove our beliefs, but you ain’t gonna get to see them because your heart is hardened against belief. So there.”
I don’t see anything in her post that suggest she isn’t willing to debate with people who disagree with her. She’s just not prepared to debate with you specifically, on the general ideas (as I understand it) that there would be no point in doing so.
In other words - it’s not because she’s a Muslim. It’s not because she’s religious. It’s because you wouldn’t argue in good faith. And I, an atheist, pretty much agree with her.
Raza suggests that he too doesn’t want to debate; but again, not because he doesn’t want to discuss religion, but because he doesn’t really like debating that much. I certainly haven’t seen his name all that much in GD. So again, the reason behind not debating is not religious in nature.
I put it to you that either you can’t read, or you have no interest in truly listening to those you fein interest in talking to. Frankly, under those circumstances, I wouldn’t want to debate with you either. So (aside from if you choose to address this post) I believe I shall not in the future.
You already gave somebody else this spiel. Still, what he said is exactly what people predicted: your tone is exceedingly hostile and shows you aren’t really interested in debate. Yeah, the “you wouldn’t listen” argument can be a weak cop-out, but sometimes it’s true. Everybody eventually runs out of patience when talking to someone who won’t listen.
Except it’s not just the Muslims in this thread who are saying there is no point in arguing with you; it is also atheists like me and Revenant Threshold. There is a lesson in this, if you will learn it.
It’s worth adding the modifier that they have no desire to debate you. I contend that had you taken a more mature approach, you had a much better shot at a detailed response, especially from Angua. I don’t know if Angua will confirm or deny this, so it’s just a hypothesis for now. The gist is that the fault is not theirs, but yours. It’s very much like calling someone an easily angered asshole, and using their angry response to prove your claim. Reason is entirely disconnected from your posts.
Ah, you’re right, this statement of yours bears no resemblance whatsoever to ‘Muslims must be incapable of rational argument, or they’d be here!’
Except, no, wait - it does. Unless you specifically are referring to freewheeling, democratic, irrational debates?
I do not feel that I was misrepresenting you. And you’re definitely suffering quite badly from excluded middle - understanding “the concept of of participating in a freewheeling, democratic debate” does not imply that they want to engage in a freewheeling, democratic debate. Or a muslim-bashing session, for that matter.
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