Where in the Quran does it say that those guys quoted as “authorities” in your post had any such position?[/quote]
Lixy, Lixy, Lixy. Religious minorities/apostates/heretics and women are suffering greatly in many parts of the Muslim world. You can try to play tit for tat with me all day. However, one only needs to visit the plethora of human rights, women rights, and religious rights organizations monitoring the very real impact Islam has in the muslim world. Whether it’s the adulterer stoned to death in Iran, women arrested for not dressing according to Islamic law in Iran, the shockingly huge numbers of women raped and beaten within marriage in Pakistan, the oppression and violence committed against Copts in Egypt, etc., etc…
Islam has serious issues presently. Just admit it, Islam needs a serious and widespread reformation. Feel free to debate all these muslim scholars that disagree with you. Unfortunately, their interpretation is winning out all too often.
[quote]vroom wrote:
That people call for death of apostates is not exactly the same as the religion itself mandating it, even if it has been interpreted in that way at times, or currently.
What is needed is that we get rid of those that are pushing a murderous form of fundamentalism due to their own beliefs and hatreds.[/quote]
Hey, that’s all I’m saying. A widespread and serious reformation is seriously needed. Let the muslim scholars debate it all they want, but the reformation is needed.
Sloth, I think something Lixy might find illuminating would be to consider the fact that he would be risking his life if he tried to direct his pacifistic ideals towards Islam by criticizing Muslim actions… whereas directing criticism at America and the West is safe.
[quote]Zap Branigan wrote:
lixy wrote:
orion wrote:
Well, if it says for example that anyone converting from Islam to Christianity unfortunately has to die…
It doesn’t.
There are millions of Muslims that disagree with your assessment of what the Quran does and does not say.
Why wasn’t Allah more clear when he dictated it?[/quote]
Seems like he was pretty clear what he wanted to have happen to those that turned their back on Islam whether they become Christian or not. Curious to hear the spin.
Qur’an 4:89 “They wish that you would reject Faith, as they have, and thus be on the same footing: Do not be friends with them until they leave their homes in Allah’s Cause. But if they turn back from Islam, becoming renegades, seize them and kill them wherever you find them.”
[quote]vroom wrote:
Sloth, I think something Lixy might find illuminating would be to consider the fact that he would be risking his life if he tried to direct his pacifistic ideals towards Islam by criticizing Muslim actions… whereas directing criticism at America and the West is safe.[/quote]
And that is telling. Look, you can lampoon Bush, and the US in general, in political cartoons all day long. Everyone has seen plenty of those. Jesus is lampooned in South Park and other media. I don’t get the impression that any of these writers and artists are thinking, “Oh my, we did that out in the open, there’ll be riots and fatawas issued for our deaths!” The present reality demonstrates the severity of the problem.
Islams problem with democracy? Islam has a problem with anything not islamic.
The problem is, more than anything else, a complete lack of responsibility on the part of muslims. They have allowed the inmates to run the asylum and now this radicalism is runnning amuck, causing deep divisions in islam. Instead of taking resposiblity and oustings these nut bags, they instead participate in excusism, blaming the U.S. Or Israel or cartoons or some made-up intolerance of Islam.
It’s all just bullshit, the problem is with in islam and no where else; the house is dirty and needs to be cleaned. They are, however, so engrossed the blame game that they haven’t noticed their ass deep in shit. It’s maddening, really. No matter what atrocities they commit, they blame somebody else for it. They were driven out of desperation to be horrible and kill lots of people. Well, people of islam, you are in control of your own behaviour; nobody else, period. Clean up you own mess and shut the fuck up until you do. Bunch of fucking whiners.
Ahhh, yet there are smatterings were the silent moderates are starting not to be so silent. Divisions are starting to run deep and the radicals, I believe, are starting to lose their monopoly on Islamic ideology. I guess better late then never. It is still to small a number. I still see mostly muslims blaming everybody else in the world for thier problems. Like begging the jailer for the key in your own pocket.
I haven’t read Quran myself, but it seems to have a lot of contradicting directives. If it was said there that an apostate has to be killed, how would it be different? That is a word of G-d and hence it’s the way life should be lived. What, in the end, do you use to judge the “morality” of action? An obscure book written long time ago that can be interpreted millions ways or your own thinking? What is written in Quran is not as relevant as the actions of people who follow it.
The main question is: what IS the essence of Islam as a way of life/ordering society? All “not-so-good” side effects of Islam that surface are being dismissed as a wrong interpretation of a holy book by crazy fundamentalists.
[quote]vroom wrote:
Sloth, I think something Lixy might find illuminating would be to consider the fact that he would be risking his life if he tried to direct his pacifistic ideals towards Islam by criticizing Muslim actions… whereas directing criticism at America and the West is safe.[/quote]
Very true. Maybe that will make him realize that it is not always our policies- maybe their is something inherently wrong with that way of thinking, and, consequentially, Islam.
EDIT: I was going to change my post to say, “The more radical form of Islam”, but when those cartoons came out and the riots started, those folks were not all fundamentalists. So I am keeping it the way it is.
Islam’s policies regarding freedom of speech have really turned my view on the entire religion. I went from more of a pacifist in regards to them, to far more worrisome that this line of thinking must not be allowed to spread.
[quote]lixy wrote:
FightinIrish26 wrote:
No, sorry boss, that one doesn’t work. I don’t walk out of a bar and say to myself, “Hm, I think I’ll rape someone tonight.” If you do something like that, it has nothing to do with the booze and everything to do with serious mental issues. That example is absolutely terrible and is not an an analogy to what I’m talking about.
Ok boss, you don’t feel like raping someone when walking out of a bar, but it still happens with for some. I don’t feel like blowing up anyone when walking out of a mosque, and neither do the hundreds of millions that do so everyday. But exceptions happen, and they should be treated as such.
[/quote]
It’s still a shitty analogy trying to compare one to one acts with the massive acts of murder that the fundamentalist Islamic people commit. It is not the same.
A better one would be people thinking all North Jersey Italians being in the mob… although there are many Italian-American groups that decry this stereotype… something that moderate Muslims have yet to catch up on, being as they never seem to make a peep.
No I don’t. But you’re the one trying to say that other cultures commit the same kind of war on the West, when in reality all you can come up with is a drunk at a bar and gang members on crack. Weak dude.
[quote]
Weak examples. Grand Theft Auto vs. conditioning from a sect of religion that believes you must kill infidels?
I agree that the analogy is weak here. But it’s still conditioning. My point, in case you missed it, was that you can’t blame the abuse on Grand Theft Auto anymore than you can blame it on pubs or Mosques.[/quote]
Bullshit. You throw God in the mix, and you put the internal human fear of going to hell, or missing out on afterlife, in the forefront. Neither beer nor a video game does that, or says that you will go to hell if you do not kill the infidel.
Weak analogies equal a losing argument, and you just lost this one.
[quote]Sifu wrote:
pookie wrote:
Sifu wrote:
it is supposed to be “the devil” they are throwing stones at, but this is ritualized mob violence. Haj is the great religious experience of a lifetime for a muslim, that ends in a mob throwing stones and slitting the throats of sheep.
Mob violence? Throwing stones? Killing sheeps?
Damn. Why didn’t my religion have any of these fun activities?
No wonder Islam is booming.
Well pookie you are in the wrong country then. You should move to Nigeria where the sharia courts hand down death by stoning sentences all the time.[/quote]
Now the question is: would Pookie mind getting stoned?
[quote]lixy wrote:
FightinIrish26 wrote:
No, sorry boss, that one doesn’t work. I don’t walk out of a bar and say to myself, “Hm, I think I’ll rape someone tonight.” If you do something like that, it has nothing to do with the booze and everything to do with serious mental issues. That example is absolutely terrible and is not an an analogy to what I’m talking about.
Ok boss, you don’t feel like raping someone when walking out of a bar, but it still happens with for some. I don’t feel like blowing up anyone when walking out of a mosque, and neither do the hundreds of millions that do so everyday. But exceptions happen, and they should be treated as such.
You talk about “serious mental issues”, yet fail to apply it to the bastards that blew up the WTC. Why is that? Do you think they had all their mental health?
What’s the excuse for Muslim suicide bombers? You can’t blame that on Old Grandad.
You tell me.
Weak examples. Grand Theft Auto vs. conditioning from a sect of religion that believes you must kill infidels?
I agree that the analogy is weak here. But it’s still conditioning. My point, in case you missed it, was that you can’t blame the abuse on Grand Theft Auto anymore than you can blame it on pubs or Mosques.[/quote]
[quote]lixy wrote:
You really don’t have a clue, now do you? Where does it say in the Quran that admiring a painting is not OK? Tell me.[/quote]
Ok, so I was wrong. The Quran bans the images of Allah.
All I know is I have a friend who has a relative who is a Muslim and he told me that everytime this relative comes over she makes him put his family photos face down because images offend this person. That’s where I got it from.
This is a few pages old, as I have been away, but I will try and be brief so we don’t lose track of the most recent stuff:
[quote]lixy wrote:
The “project” in the case this forum, is create an atmosphere where exchange of ideas flourishes, and where everyone comes out more enriched intellectually than when he came in.
I really can’t recall where I stepped out of line. Maybe you can help by giving me examples where I didn’t assume good faith, so that I can work on avoiding that behavior in the future.[/quote]
This was covered extensively in my last paragraph(s) discussing your methodology - and you avoided the issue entirely.
Your problem, Lixy - stated again - is that you don’t/won’t engage in the kind of dialogue necessary to have an “exchange of ideas” because you refuse to acknowledge empirical information that causes problems in the ideological points you try to make. You sidestep it, and stick to regurgitated bullet points that make conclusory statements that often were directly refuted by the information.
That makes you look like you aren’t interested in “intellectual exchange” at all - it makes you look like a propagandist just making noise on an internet forum.
Actually, it might very well - why assume that it doesn’t?
You keep referencing Islam’s “Golden Age” - what happened to it? It wasn’t democratic - and it did not build upon itself. You desperately want Islam to have a history it simply doesn’t have.
Let’s stop playing games, you and I - Islam never had anything approaching an Enlightenment, and that represents an enormous problem in its history. After all, you attend university in the West - there is a reason. Islam does not have the historical philosophical underpinning to have democracy blossom, it is that simple. And the original question was why Islam struggled with having democracy - not having the basic engine is a straightforward reason to anyone paying attention.
The real problem here is that you are defensive about it - it is a source of shame for you that Islam did not share in anything like the Enlightenment. But it doesn’t have to be that way - Islam is due for a Reformation - what is to say that Islamic cultures can’t undergo one now? You think I am “attacking” Islam and you have to defend it - stop thinking that way. I would love for the Islamic world to undergo such a change - I am just skeptical if it can anytime soon. It doesn’t mean I don’t support the idea.
Absolutely not in the sense in the development of liberal thought regarding the individual. Where in the canon is there a commitment to freedom of speech and freedom of religion?
I notice something interesting going on. When we are talking about something good - like the creation of algebra or other cultural success - you have no problem attributing it to Islam without qualification. When we talk about something bad - lack of human rights, lack of development of liberal secular government or other liberties - you always seek an escape hatch by saying “that wasn’t Islam, that was people doing bad things who just happen to be Muslims”.
You can’t have it both ways. Islam and Islamic civilization are largely inseparable, because, after all, you say that the Islamic Word of God demands fealty and is not the work of man, so there is not room for varying interpretations of law.
It is clear you want Islam to get all the credit when something good happens in history, but none of the blame for the woes of Islamic civilization. It is not much of an argument, and it shows a tendency on your part to not be willing to have an objective discussion on where Islam is today.
You make the point for me - no one makes the distinction between the religious world and the secular one in Islam, an important distinction developed in the Enlightenment that gave us liberal democracy in its current form. You stated it correctly - Islam does not separate the two into “the church” and “the state” - so there can be no debate on the two as separate spheres that serve separate needs. God’s law is all the law - so there is no need for democracy, which would entail that people would differ and many ideas on what should be law would be in a big mixer with the “best idea” winning the majority.
Democracy means, at a minimum, recognizing that there will be different ideas on what the law should be. Islam, by your own account, allows no such debate, so again, we see a straightforward reason why Islam has not embraced democracy.
And that should be the end of the debate, right there - you say Islam does not permit that question “does it makes sense for us to do that anymore?”…
…and that is the very question every functioning democracy must always have on the table among its people.
Could it be any clearer why democracy and Islam simply aren’t fellow travelers?
That is your call to make.
You’re getting fussy for no reason - your defensiveness is showing - and it is clear my argument is not the way you characterized it in the preceding paragraph.
What you need to recognize is that Islamic civilizations and the religion itself has problems that must be addressed. You won’t do that - and once again we see that you lack the requisite objectivity to see this concern through.
But if you are telling me there are “tough questions” being asked, why are they asking them? If Islam has no problems to fix - which has been your argument throughout - then whey are the “tough questioners” asking any questions at all?
Once again, you have run into one of your contradictions - if Islam is fine, why are you acknowledging that people are asking “tough questions”?
And, as a corollary, if they are asking tough questions, so can the rest of us.
But you need to make up your mind. Is Islam fine? Or do tough questions need to be asked? You have argued the former and now acknowledge the latter. I think tough questions need to be asked - do you?
But it has been your contention that there is little need to ask “does it make sense for us to do that anymore?” - if Islam is a-ok, why is there such a large list of “question askers”?
And to my broader point - the questions need to be raised within Islam to a degree that some reform might be achieved. Are these “agitators” there? I suspect not.
Are you an adult?
Irrelevant red herrings. We are focused on Islam and its history.
…see the next point…
You are losing focus in getting defensive. It isn’t helping you, and you should address the substantive points.
[quote]The Wiki’s power stems from properly referencing the information presented and the shear number of scrutinizing eyes.
What someone wrote makes it true when they have sources. In this case, there wasn’t no reference. Heck, nobody ever brought it up in Talk. Already taken care of, and thanks for pointing it out. [/quote]
Informing me how Wiki works isn’t relevant - what is relevant is that it is really undisputed that Islamic law does not allow for a competing secular law to run parallel with it within a sovereignty.
See above w/r/t the debate needing to be within Islam enough to spur reform.
That said, let’s have another look at your position shift again - why would tough questions have to be asked if Islam didn’t need reform, per your position?
But there would be no need for “debate on a gazillion issues” if Islam wasn’t in need of reform and no one gets to ask the question “does it make sense for us to do that anymore?”
You said so yourself. You are speaking out of two mouths, Lixy.
Not surprising you would decline such an offer - it being impossible - and, although you want it not to be, it has everything to do with whether Islam has a problem with democracy or not.
If you have no evidence of said constitutions protecting human rights in Islamic countries, there must be a reason. I have outlined all kinds of reasons, the most relevant being Islam civilization never had any to begin with, nor did it even have the “starter kit” of thinking such guarantees in law were a good idea.
Don’t let your irrational hatred of Israel force you into more red herrings - what Israel, the only Western-style democracy in the Middle East, does has nothing to do with the failure of Islamic civilization to develop liberal democracies.
When you get pressed, your go-to move is to try and slur your despised Israel. It is irrelevant to the discussion, and it is an error.
This has little to do with the fact that Islamic civilization built its grand scale by the sins of imperialism, so it makes little sense to suggest whatever ills it suffers stems from being victimized by a practice it mastered while creating its wealth.
And further, your paragraph has really nothing to do with the point - it talks of the “American dream”, but the issue on point is how Islamic civilization rose to its height on the backs of those it conquered.
If this were completely true, I am wondering why those areas once colonized by the Islamic nations have done so superbly in becoming “free and modern”.
Wrong - I didn’t say that Islam had a problem with democracy because it grew by conquest. I simply refuted your “victim theory” by showing how Islamic civilization clearly didn’t think colonialism was a bad practice and thus weren’t held back by it - they simply took their turn at the other side of the spear.
Islamic society has a problem with democracy for all the other reasons listed - and it happened to be an imperialist power for centuries, so the “victim theory” fails on its own merits.
Back to square one. Since Islam can’t have several interpretations and is the undisputed text of God, the tribal rivalries can’t co-exist and must shred perceived apostates - each thinks they own the undisputed Truth and the Islamic law that governs must be theirs or else it is heresy. Until there is reform, these tribal rivalries will always be inherent in Islam - there can only be one Absolute Truth in Islam and Islamic law, and as long as that maxim is in play (which you have assured me there is), Islam will have a problem with democracy, which definitionally permits different viewpoints.
This is why it is hard to take you seriously - now, you are trying to argue there is no “women’s rights” problem in Islamic civilization. This, despite centuries of oppression. This, despite, even in this modern age, honor-killings, stonings, lack of political and civil rights, lack of economic rights, etc.
Who do you take us for, Lixy? No doubt there are anecodotal exceptions - but everyone knows full well Islamic societies engage in gender apartheid.
Why try and fight that fact, when everyone takes notice of it as obvious and undisputed?
To end, I reiterate a point I made that you refused to address: you start with an ideological conclusion you want and work backward. You selectively ignore information that hurts your position. You won’t even acknowledge basic ground-level points that aren’t disputed - like the problem of women in Islamic society.
Regrettably, your inability/unwillingness to resolve this problem is likely to get worse, rather than better. As such, “intellectual exchanges” usually wind up being not very worthwhile or fun.
Back to square one. Since Islam can’t have several interpretations and is the undisputed text of God, the tribal rivalries can’t co-exist and must shred perceived apostates - each thinks they own the undisputed Truth and the Islamic law that governs must be theirs or else it is heresy. Until there is reform, these tribal rivalries will always be inherent in Islam - there can only be one Absolute Truth in Islam and Islamic law, and as long as that maxim is in play (which you have assured me there is), Islam will have a problem with democracy, which definitionally permits different viewpoints.
[/quote]
Excellent explanation. Many religions have a similar problem thus the original point of the thread being that separation of church and state being so crucial to democracies.
Thunderbolts idea is sound. A massive reformation and an enlightenment of new ideas that weaken religious power structures are easy to identify and are a crucial part of the process of developing a modern liberal state. Historically this is exactly how it has played out in the west.
I don’t think Lixy is wrong in stating that many who follow Islam are not opposed to democracy.
However rulers and ruling classes are fairly well documented to usually oppose deliberately undermining the base of their authority.
If I were an astute ruler of a Muslim nation that claimed a divine mandate I would certainly take notice that democracy is notorious for undermining the practice of all types of religion.
Opposing such a thing could be viewed as both a religious duty to my faith as well as a good way to ensure my own personal interest.
The entire issue is complicated though. The cultural and political heartland of Islam could easily be argued to be the nations of Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Iraq. The strategic importance of that region is immense. In many ways that region was even more contested during the cold war than the European front although it is much less obvious to the casual historian or news junkie.
In the era of a lone U.S. superpower the battle for the “hearts and minds” of that region has become even more apparent. This is more than just a question of colonialism and wars of succession. Every major player on the world stage is in one way or another focusing immense pressure on the Heart of Islam. Including of course the Islamic leadership within.
This pressure was certainly not present in the west during its modernization. The power of the interest that all nations have in the fate of the Heartland of Islam is historically unprecedented.
Empirical evidence certainly suggest that Islamic culture is not the most fertile ground for democratic emergence. Obvious evidence also prevents us from discounting the influence of the many powerful nations that are all interested in the Islamic world.
[quote]thunderbolt23 wrote:
To end, I reiterate a point I made that you refused to address: you start with an ideological conclusion you want and work backward. You selectively ignore information that hurts your position. You won’t even acknowledge basic ground-level points that aren’t disputed - like the problem of women in Islamic society.
Regrettably, your inability/unwillingness to resolve this problem is likely to get worse, rather than better. As such, “intellectual exchanges” usually wind up being not very worthwhile or fun.[/quote]
I don’t think a persons inability to reverse their entire worldview after a few short discussions represents an unwillingness to have an intellectual exchange. Here in the West we grew up with a series of understandings concerning morality that are quite simply different in other cultures.
I really don’t know where Lixy came from, but based on his assumptions of who is doing wrong, it seems that most of his news, or peer based discussions of news, originated in the Arabic world. However, when people here start showing a wider willingness to admit the US actions have been pissing off the Arabic world for generations, perhaps we’ll get a chance to see the Arabic world realize that it also can’t simply blame the US for everything.
Both sides are entrenched. Neither side is going to flip it’s viewpoint to that of the other side overnight – and it is not necessary in order for dialogue to be productive. The areas where discussion breaks down show us where world viewpoints are colliding. For example, one clear collision is “the US can do no wrong” vs “the US can do no right”. Interestingly, both extremes are expressed here on the forums and presumably neither is right.
[quote]Sloth wrote:
Islam has serious issues presently. [/quote]
No. Many of the regimes in place in Muslim-majority countries have serious issues.
Islam’s got nothing to do with it.
What do you mean “Islam needs a reformation”? Islam is not a religion where some dude on a balcony decrees what’s right and wrong. It’s an individual thing.
That’s not the fault of Islam. It’s the fault of the ass-backwards dictators that enforce such “interpretations” to give them more power. If you wanna know what interpretation is winning, go around the 40+ Muslim-majority countries and ask people on the streets.
