For how many Muslims is this true?
According to a reader, Serge Trifkovic made this point in Sword of the Prophet. I can believe that after reading this excellent must read article by the same author. I will buy and read the book.
posted by von Schlichtningen @ 11:11
6 comments
6 Comments:
Thanks and oops
The spell check failed once more.
Now it should be ok.
Serge Trifkovic made this point in Sword of the Prophet, which I read a few months after 9/11. I've been wary of Muslims ever since.
How many Westerners understand this dangerous allegiance? Do any of our leaders???
always,
Thanks. I was trying to find out where the quote is from.
It seems correct from what I have so far learned about Islam if you really read the Quran literally.
Excuse me for pointing out the (not so?) obvious. Wouldn't that be true for almost any religion? Don't all religious people believe that "the word of God" is infallible and above all manmade laws?
If you take USA as an example, isn't there a lot of christians who are demonstrating because they want their religion as law? The anti-abortionists is just one example...
Also, would you call Indonesia a democracy? It is the biggest muslim country in the world and they have free elections...
/Martin (in here again ;-)
Hi Martin - nice to have you here again.
Yes it is true of some radical (fanatic) Christians - and also our culture and laws are to a degree based on Christian morality.
But there is a major difference. Most people in the West belive in separating religion and politics. All Western constitutions, as far as I know, acknowledge this entirely or nearly. Thus we all live in secular societies.
We have laws that superseede religion - that is accepted by a large majority and always carried out. Not so in Muslim countries.
Furthermore all Western countries belive in the charter of human rights. And Muslim countries? Islamists believ in death for apostasy and homosexuality. Legalized torture. Stoning for adultery. Female slavery.
- It makes any Westerner sick.
No priests, male and female, in the West have a direct saying in politics or in the the law. We have no religious police.
Not so in Muslim countries with Shari'a law.
Few Christians claim that the bible consists literally of the words of God. Most Christian interpret the bible. Also the bible, and the new testament, especially, is a message of love as long as you respect God. Not so with the Quran.
Also there is a large percentage of Westerners with other faiths or none. Not so in Muslim countries.
In Western countries there is a large degree of criticism allowed and expected of religion. Not so in Muslim countries.
Finally Christian based morality and culture continues to evolve. We have had revolutions such as the Reformation and we have had a period of so called Enlightenment. Not so with Islam.
I could go on and on.
You mention Indonesia as a democracy. Yes on paper. But I sure would not like it to be my democracy. Malaysia is a better example. But for every example I can give you 10 horror stories.
Except for Sweden ;) all Western countries have pretty much real democracies and no censorship. Old ones too - except for a few Southern European countries.
The sentence I put is also a question. How many Muslims can or will never be democrats? I hope the number is small. But how come then that we never see Muslim demonstrations for peace or against terrorism?
I saw a statistic stating 1% of all Muslims support terrorism to the point of being willing to participate - but 30% support it morally. I sure hope that is wrong. Otherwise we have 400.000.000 potential enemies.
Take care,
Peter
Ok, one of these debates again :-D
I guess I'll take it step by step then.
Once again you keep talking about muslim countries when you actually mean dictatorships who use islam as a way of oppressing people (I hope you do at least ;-).
"Furthermore all Western countries belive in the charter of human rights."
Hrm, I wish...If that was the case we wouldn't constantly be reminded of how USA is handling the Iraq war, how Danish/British/American soldiers torture people, how the Swedish government are accomplises with the CIA when torturing prisoners, how most western governments try to impose laws to lessen our civil liberties and so on...
Just taking USA as an example again (yes, I know...I always use them), I'd say the christian right has a deep influence on how the government does it's job. Especially since president Bush is lobbying for intelligent design to be taught in biology class!!
And that the government is appointing close to fanatic christians to be judges (Sam Alito)in the supreme court which will have implications on the legal system for a long time...
And also that all the money for aid that the USA is giving to other countries has to be to organizations with "christian values" i.e. they are not allowed to promote any use of prophylactics or abortion...
Also legalized torture, stoning and such is part of most totalitarian regimes and has nothing to do with their religion. Ex. Russia, Cuba etc.
I don't know if I've had bad luck talking with a lot of christians, but I've heard quite a few who'd say the bible IS the word of God (Truth be told, a lot of them were part of Jehovas witnessess). But this is just personal experience, I have no idea how great part of all christians who actually believe this. And I do agree to the new testament being a book promoting love and compassion, but the old testament?? no way, in there God is a vengeful God...an eye for an eye and all that...
What do you base the part about the Quran not being a message about love? Then what would it be about?
Again, if you look at countries who are not despotic, other religions then islam are allowed and practised. Once again I give Indonesia and Malaysia ;-) as examples.
When talking about critisism about religion being allowed or not, I still have to say that in despotic countries no critisism of the government or state-religion is allowed, but if you just browse through for example the Jakarta Post (largest english speaking paper in Indonesia), it's allowed as long as it's constructive critisism...
http://www.thejakartapost.com/
I did have an article in mind that I read there a couple of months ago but I couldn't find it again, I'll get back with a proper link if I find it...
I'm a bit dusty when it comes to historical knowledge, but didn't islam have their enlightenment and reformation during our "dark ages"?
I'd like you to give me 10 examples of muslim countries who are not despotic and still have legalized torture and other horror stories...(USA is still my example ;-)
When you talk about censorship, I'd say a lot of western countries have some kind of censorship. A lot more visible since 9/11. USA has the Patriot Act I & II, GB, Spain, Sweden, France, Germany etc have all newly installed laws that both lowers the legal protection and the freedom of expression of their own citizens. EU might pass laws that make it possible for police to put bugs on people who are not even suspected for any crime (thanks to horrible Swedish minister Bodström).
If you look, again, at the USA during the Iraq war where all the reporters had to be embedded with the american troops if they were to report at all, isn't that censorship? American media today are not allowed to show pictures of all the coffins with american soldiers coming into the country daily...
I think I said in a different comment that the main reason (I believe) why we don't see more pictures of muslims demonstrating for peace is that it's not as "newsworthy" as violence...it doesn't sell...
About your statistics. I do wonder where you got it from. It's hard to say whether there's any truth to it if I don't know how the numbers are collected. And it's also, in my opinion, not very nice to put forward numbers like this without ant reference as to where it's from as it only leads to more misinformation and more confrontations.
Oh, that's a lot of text. Hope you'll be patient enough to read it all, otherwise it probably doesn't matter anyway since I'm mostly just sitting here, bored at work, and rambling :-D
/Martin
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