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Source: (consider it)
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Thread: Islam and violence
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
....These are heavily sponsored, organised and supported.... funded and supported by thousands, millions even, of people?
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
Can you show this is the level of support for ISIS for instance?
quote:
Originally posted by Mudfrog:
Erm, the fact that they can sweep across a country and take over whole towns rather suggests a fair bit of support and external resourcing, don't you think?
Erm, not to the tune of millions of people, no. Certainly tens of thousands, but as I say above the existence of tens of thousands of fighters out of billions of Muslims doesn't prove much. Certainly no more than the IRA and UVF did for Christianity.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
that's not what I see being argued here by some-it was that Christianity is just as violent -"just look at the LRA".
It's simplistic to make a direct causal link, that's what I tried to say way up earlier in the thread
Who do you see saying that?
I introduced the LRA from the OP, in which Saul the Apostle suggested that asking whether Islam was inherently violent was the way to move on from the Paris terrorist attacks. I contend that this is the wrong question, and said:
quote:
That makes about as much sense as taking the Lord's Resistance Army as representative of Christianity.
The LRA was then mentioned again in response to Mudfrog's challenge to find anyone perpetrating atrocities in the name of the Christian God. He has so far failed to respond to that.
My point was not to demonstrate a link of cause and effect but to highlight the futility of trying to draw conclusions about Islam from terrorists of the ilk active in Paris last week.
Doing so is playing into their hands.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Evangeline
Shipmate
# 7002
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Leorning Cniht:
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
Of course it can when you're talking about people's experience of violence within their own nation.
Using either your personal experience or the reporting in your local press as a basis for drawing conclusions about a worldwide religion with something in the region of one and a half billion adherents is far from logical.
It is understandable if people in Sydney are scared of being attacked by a Muslim, but it's not logical. You are at greater risk cycling around Sydney than you are of being attacked by a Muslim.
I am not making a case that Islam is inherently violent-I said that clearly on page 1. What I've been trying to say here is you can't deny that there is a link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam and you are not improving society by ignoring the link
I was talking about why people in Australia link Islam with violence but they don't do the same with Christianity when groups like the LRA commit violence-my point remains the LRA don't threaten Australians with violence and nor do Australian Christians give them material support or commit violence in Australia in their name.
Being killed in a motor vehicle accident (not necessarily cycling though), is as I acknowledged upthread, for an Australian, a much greater risk-than dying at the hands of an Islamic terrorist-that's got nothing to do with violence though, which is what we're discussing.
It's a tangent and I'm not making any claims about Islam and violence on the basis of these stats, but as you raised it, your assertion about cycling in Sydney being more likely than being attacked by a Muslim depends on how you look at the stats. In 2002, 34 Australian cyclists died in road crashes but 88 Australians were murdered by Muslim terrorists.
Posts: 2871 | From: "A capsule of modernity afloat in a wild sea" | Registered: May 2004
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
...you can't deny that there is a link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam and you are not improving society by ignoring the link
How does looking at the link improve society?
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Kaplan Corday:
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
How does 347-504 unarmed civilians rate?
Ah, My Lai, the gift that keeps on giving!
Hundreds killed in an inexcusable and unofficial massacre, and despite the fact that it was acknowledged by America, and its perpetrators openly tried and (however inadequately) punished, it still gets regularly trotted out to satisfy the needs of knee-jerk anti-Americanism.
I did not "trot this out" to satisfy any "knee-jerk anti-Americanism". I posted the link because Mudfrog said quote:
And I haven't seen any evidence of any US soldiers marching into a village and killing 2000 children and their mothers
and I felt My Lai was close enough.
I also conceded your point, before you posted, that Western democracies have their fair share of atrocities and also concede that they often deal with the aftermath better than others - which is why I said I think democracy is the least bad alterative and the real debate is about how to preserve it, not about the intrinsic violence of this or that religion.
What will not get us any further is people ignoring or explaining away the atrocities perpetrated by their own "side", or refusing to take into account the way those atrocities are perceived by those who identify with the victims.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Evangeline
Shipmate
# 7002
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
...you can't deny that there is a link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam and you are not improving society by ignoring the link
How does looking at the link improve society?
The same way any honest examination of a social problem is helpful. As it stands if you have terrorists claiming to act on behalf of Islam surely it is warranted to look at that claim rather than blindly believe it or deny it out of hand. Muslims are part of Australian society, we do ourselves a disservice if we do not try to understand their religion.
Posts: 2871 | From: "A capsule of modernity afloat in a wild sea" | Registered: May 2004
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
Muslims are part of Australian society, we do ourselves a disservice if we do not try to understand their religion.
That I can see, but I can't see that it would be a helpful way into understanding Islam by starting with a focus on the links with violence. That to me seems more likely to generate fear and separation.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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Evangeline
Shipmate
# 7002
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
Muslims are part of Australian society, we do ourselves a disservice if we do not try to understand their religion.
That I can see, but I can't see that it would be a helpful way into understanding Islam by starting with a focus on the links with violence. That to me seems more likely to generate fear and separation.
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
Sure, and perhaps technically that's true, but often when people use that form of expression it means that another option is better.
One aim for an improved society could be that people recognized that their Muslim neighbours were not members of an inherently violent religion. Whether you get there by ignoring or focusing on a link with violence isn't obvious to me.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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Demas
Ship's Deserter
# 24
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
One aim for an improved society could be that people recognized that their Muslim neighbours were not members of an inherently violent religion.
That depends on whether they are Hizb ut-Tahrir members of course...
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They did not appear very religious; that is, they were not melancholy; and I therefore suspected they had not much piety - Life of Rev John Murray
Posts: 1894 | From: Thessalonica | Registered: May 2004
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
One aim for an improved society could be that people recognized that their Muslim neighbours were not members of an inherently violent religion.
That depends on whether they are Hizb ut-Tahrir members of course...
Which might make them members of an inherently violent organisation.
Which is exactly what we might say about members of the Ku Klux Klan or some such.
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Demas
Ship's Deserter
# 24
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Posted
Just like the KKK, Hizb ut-Tahrir members believe in an inherently violent form of their religion, in this case Islam.
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They did not appear very religious; that is, they were not melancholy; and I therefore suspected they had not much piety - Life of Rev John Murray
Posts: 1894 | From: Thessalonica | Registered: May 2004
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
The fact that a minority of adherents of a particular religion take a view that it encourages violence doesn't mean we can apply the term "inherently violent" unless we provide so many qualifiers including the terms "minority" and "sect" and "view of" that do extreme violence to the term "inherently".
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Yes, I'm an unreconstructed Guardian-reading woolly liberal when it comes to my political stance.
And proud of it.
I find myself in broad agreement with Gary Younge in his column yesterday.
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/11/charie-hebdo-danger-polarised-debate-paris-attacks
I think there's something very reductionist in trying to boil down any religion to try to determine whether it is inherently violent or not.
That's not the point.
Even if it were, even it could be proven beyond any shadow of doubt that Islam was intrinsically violent how would that help us in any way?
All it would do would be to create a state of paranoia. Which is exactly what the terrorists want to achieve.
As a Christian I am convinced that the Gospel is the 'power of God unto salvation for all who believe.'
Equally, that doesn't mean I'm blind to the fact that some people won't take advantage of its salvific impetus - if that's the right term - but channel it into all manner of unacceptable ways and behaviour - be it the dreaded extreme 'Constantinian' or Erastian stances that have bedevilled some parts of Christendom ... or be it the kind of holier-than-thou and judgmental attitudes we see displayed by all too many of us - whether right or left, whether liberal or conservative in our theology.
The same sun that melts the wax hardens the clay, as the old-time Pentecostals I knew used to say.
Of course there are links between aspects and elements within Islam and extremist violence.
It'd be naive to claim otherwise.
Likewise, it would be equally naive to turn a blind-eye to the way that people operating from within a Christian paradigm can go to the bad ... be it the Lord's Resistance Army, Jonestown, Waco or extreme Ulster Protestants or whacko-jacko Russian Orthodox nationalists.
I don't believe it's a concession to 'comparative religion'/all religions are the same to acknowledge - along with Gary Younge that those who claim that Islam is inherently violent are no 'less nonsensical' than those who claim that it is 'inherently' peaceful.
You can read his full quote and article on the link I provided.
Ok, so he does claim that those who consider Islam to be 'inherently' violent are 'more hateful' than those who consider it 'inherently' peaceful ... which is more emotive than I would be.
I would simply suggest that they are both equally misguided - and/or driven by a particular agenda.
I don't see the need to make value judgments about the adherents of other religions in order to bolster my belief that Christianity is true.
According to Gary Younge, 'Islam, like any religion isn't "inherently" anything but what people make of it. A small but significant minority have decided to make it violent.'
With some caveats, I would agree with him. We can all of us make a balls-up of any system or belief, no matter how good, bad or indifferent the principles of that belief system are.
Look what a mess we've made of our own faith walk. I'd rather point the finger at my own sins and shortcomings than issue blanket condemnations at everyone else who believes differently to me.
The main point, though, is what do we do about it?
Like Kelly Alves, Orfeo and Eutychus, I would rather attempt to find common ground with people of good-will and moderate views - whatever their religion or ideology - rather than adopting a kind of binary, Manichaean view of the world.
Also, I don't think that tit-for-tat comparisons between this, that or the other atrocity takes us very far. Which seems to be how Kaplan and Mudfrog are interpreting any suggestion that Christianity can harbour and foster unacceptable behaviours under the necessary conditions for things to turn sour.
We've also got to remember to compare like with like.
Boko Haram are a militant, Islamist sect bent on creating a separatist caliphate in northern Nigeria. I'm sure they have friends in high places, but largely they are some kind of whacky outgrowth of a particular form of virulent extremism.
So they are not directly comparable with, say, US forces in Vietnam - although I take the point Eutychus was making.
Incidentally, it does seem as if the death toll in their recent outrage may be closer to 600 than 2,000 but that doesn't make it any less reprehensible or less of an outrage.
The point, though, is what do we DO about it?
Bombs and drones don't seem to be working.
What practical suggestions does anyone have?
Dialogue - such as that advocated by Eutychus and others - strikes me as one route.
What other possibilities are there?
Pointing the finger at Islam in a reductionist way and accusing it of being inherently violent doesn't take us anywhere it seems to me.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Demas
Ship's Deserter
# 24
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
The fact that a minority of adherents of a particular religion take a view that it encourages violence doesn't mean we can apply the term "inherently violent" unless we provide so many qualifiers including the terms "minority" and "sect" and "view of" that do extreme violence to the term "inherently".
There are many conceptions of Islam just like there are many conceptions of Christianity.
Hizb ut-Tahrir believe in a violent and supremacist Islam. Most Muslims believe in other Islams.
Since I don't believe any of these 'Islams' are true, all I can say is that the Islam of Hizb ut-Tahrir is thankfully less common than other, nicer, Islams.
There simply isn't one monolithic platonic 'true' Islam. There just isn't.
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They did not appear very religious; that is, they were not melancholy; and I therefore suspected they had not much piety - Life of Rev John Murray
Posts: 1894 | From: Thessalonica | Registered: May 2004
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
Just like the KKK, Hizb ut-Tahrir members believe in an inherently violent form of their religion, in this case Islam.
Yes, and some Americans believe that Neil Armstrong was never really on the moon. Am I supposed to take them as defining the scientific achievements of the United States?
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
Orfeo - you missed the next bit of Demas's post, 'Most Muslims believe in other Islams'.
I didn't read Demas's post as a blanket condemnation of all 'Islams'.
Sure, he's said that he doesn't believe that any of the 'Islams' are true - which is something different.
People can say that they don't believe that Christianity is true, or that Judaisism is true or Hinduism, Buddhism or anything else without necessarily being guilty of 'hate' towards any of those belief systems or their adherents.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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sesto
Apprentice
# 18322
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Posted
I don't think religion is inherently peaceful or violent. People bring their own circumstances & ideas & apply them to religion.
The West, a predominately Christian part of the world, is relatively comfortable; we have space to take from religion Jesus the healer & preacher of love. But I'm sure that some people with more chaotic lives in Latin America take from the scriptures the Jesus who wanted to lay his Kingdom over the oppressive Roman empire, Jesus the political leader.
The Muslim world is HUGE, billions strong, and we need to stop discussing it like it's a tiny, self-contained entity. Relatively well adjusted Muslim countries like Indonesia, Turkey, Malaysia are not centres of this Islamic Violence; but rather the turmoil is coming from countries whose citizens are suffering, like Nigeria, or the Middle East (in which people are suffering in part because of extensive harmful Western intervention).
This is a very complicated issue & it won't do to put it all in simple terms when those terms hurt real people. Any religion can be articulated in violent terms & actions, there is plenty of Buddhist violence you can read about, & we must never use it to cast aspersions on the overwhelming majority of peaceful, normal people who draw great contentment & strength from their faith. Muslims are being stamped upon enough all over the world as it is.
The Christians of Norway do not have to apologise for Breivik's atrocities, and neither should the world's Muslim community be held responsible for the extremist strains interpreting scripture to their own ends.
[ 13. January 2015, 08:16: Message edited by: sesto ]
Posts: 1 | Registered: Jan 2015
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
There simply isn't one monolithic platonic 'true' Islam. There just isn't.
But there is a general entity described as Islam. It might not be monolithic or platonic, but we can still use the term Islam to describe a religion with certain characteristics, the evidence being that violence does not seem to be a necessary consequence of subscribing to it.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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mdijon
Shipmate
# 8520
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Orfeo - you missed the next bit of Demas's post, 'Most Muslims believe in other Islams'.
I didn't read Demas's post as a blanket condemnation of all 'Islams'.
Which is fine, but we got here from;
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
One aim for an improved society could be that people recognized that their Muslim neighbours were not members of an inherently violent religion.
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
That depends on whether they are Hizb ut-Tahrir members of course...
Which isn't fine. The fact that those individuals *believe* Islam is inherently violent does not alter the fact that most Muslims are not violent and therefore as a general statement Islam does not appear to be inherently violent.
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mdijon nojidm uoɿıqɯ ɯqıɿou
ɯqıɿou uoɿıqɯ nojidm mdijon
Posts: 12277 | From: UK | Registered: Sep 2004
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
What practical suggestions does anyone have?
Dialogue - such as that advocated by Eutychus and others - strikes me as one route.
What other possibilities are there?
From a Christian perspective, I think we need to consider this in our capacity as human beings, as citizens, and as Christians. If anyone is interested, here is my on-the-fly translation of my sermon last Sunday which looks at this a little.
On a day-to-day level, I think our individual actions and attitudes count. It's why I marched on Sunday; but there are many other more mundane, but also more challenging ways we can take a stand.
On a broader level, theological reflection also has a part to play, as does prayer, but I persist in thinking the best way forward is to view this as a political and sociological issue.
The fact that the tactics of terrorism are not confined to a given ideology suggests that looking in such places for the root causes is a wild goose chase.
The NI problem was addressed by seeing it as a political, not a religious issue, and by seeing who would eventually sit round a table and negotiate. I don't think many people would have guessed, back in the day, that Gerry Adams would.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Demas
Ship's Deserter
# 24
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by mdijonmost Muslims are not violent and therefore as a general statement Islam does not appear to be inherently violent.
I agree and have not said anything to the contrary, although I would phrase it as "the most common conceptions of Islam do not appear to be inherently violent"
Some, thankfully less common, conceptions of Islam are distinctly violent and supremacist.
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They did not appear very religious; that is, they were not melancholy; and I therefore suspected they had not much piety - Life of Rev John Murray
Posts: 1894 | From: Thessalonica | Registered: May 2004
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Gamaliel:
Orfeo - you missed the next bit of Demas's post, 'Most Muslims believe in other Islams'.
I didn't read Demas's post as a blanket condemnation of all 'Islams'.
Well, neither did I. I've actually appreciated Demas' contributions to this thread greatly. My question wasn't really intended to suggest that Demas was saying anything about Islam in general. It was a rhetorical device.
The point I'm trying to make in the last couple of posts is that there's a significant difference between describing something about an organisation and describing something about a religion.
Because really, a religion is a terribly abstract thing. As is any belief, or philosophy. When we talk about a religion in this way, we're not describing concrete practices (worship on a Sunday or a Friday, what people do when praying, the dates of festivals). We're basically discussing the theology. And theology is extremely broad, abstract, covering life the universe and everything stuff.
We're still actually being a LITTLE bit abstract if we start talking about a specific organisation, but organisations have stated goals, policy statements (we call them "mission statements" for companies a lot of the time), and organisational structures. They can have office holders and official representatives.
It doesn't matter whether we're talking about the Ku Klux Klan or the Roman Catholic Church, there's a significant conceptual difference between talking about a Christian organisation - one that asserts that it's values and actions are based on Christianity - and talking about Christianity itself. It's abundantly clear just from that pair of organisations that you can have radically different organisations that claim for themselves a basis in the same text. They've got very different things out of it.
So it is with Islam. A person or organisation saying that they are Muslim is really just a statement that they read/study/take as a basis for living their life the Quran rather than the Bible or some other starting text. What they actually get out of that text and all the traditions surrounding it can vary wildly.
Whereas a given organisation is far more likely to have a more specific grounding, a statement that members are expected to sign up to. The Church of England has 39 Articles that are an example of this.
[ 13. January 2015, 08:46: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
Posts: 18173 | From: Under | Registered: Jul 2008
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
quote:
Originally posted by mdijon:
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
Muslims are part of Australian society, we do ourselves a disservice if we do not try to understand their religion.
That I can see, but I can't see that it would be a helpful way into understanding Islam by starting with a focus on the links with violence. That to me seems more likely to generate fear and separation.
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
You keep talking about this link. But what is it? I can't see one.
Mudfrog seems to be saying that there is an essential link: that Islam is essentially violent, but as yet, Mudfrog has not demonstrated that.
Simply listing a number of Islamist groups who practice violence does not show that Islam is essentially violent, nor even, in fact, that Islamism is. There have been plenty of moderate Islamist parties around the world.
There are plenty of French racists today - so is there a link between being French and racism? I would say not a logical one.
Similarly people have cited various violent Christian groups or actions - does this demonstrate an inevitable link? Again, not at all.
[ 13. January 2015, 09:28: Message edited by: quetzalcoatl ]
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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orfeo
Ship's Musical Counterpoint
# 13878
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Posted
The things that occur to me while making dinner...
You know, we could run this entire argument on the basis that most terrorist acts are committed by men.
Seriously. We could have a thread on "Men and violence". We could have a long discussion about whether there was something inherent in men that made them violent. Someone could provide us with a list of bad men. Others could then attempt to say that this list was hardly representative of all men everywhere.
We might get accusations of someone being an apologist for men's violence, and then responding by making a distinction between attempting to explain motivations and justifying those motivations.
Someone could point out that women are also capable of violence, and provide examples, before being countered with the fact that we don't encounter as many threats from women.
Who knows? Maybe there's almost overwhelmingly female message board somewhere that is engaging in that very exercise.
Worth thinking about. Personally, makes me wonder why exactly it is I've accepted Islam as the proper basis for defining the discussion. Just because the latest violent man said something about a particular man in his excuse for his violence?
[ 13. January 2015, 09:30: Message edited by: orfeo ]
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Technology has brought us all closer together. Turns out a lot of the people you meet as a result are complete idiots.
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
romanlion, lilBuddha
The Hell Board exists for pissed off venting as you know. Looks like that particular vent is over here so keep it that way please. Others please note. Next warning will be with my Host Hat on and will get offenders a reference to Admin.
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by orfeo:
Worth thinking about. Personally, makes me wonder why exactly it is I've accepted Islam as the proper basis for defining the discussion. Just because the latest violent man said something about a particular man in his excuse for his violence?
I really don't think it is as controversial as you imagine to suggest that testosterone plays a role in terrorist violence. And it really doesn't do any favours to moderate and reformist Islam to pretend that there is no link between extremist, radical Islam and violence. Not least if you divide the world up into 'us' and 'them' then you are storing up a whole world of trouble which then gets attached to each and every grievance whether real or imagined.
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Demas
Ship's Deserter
# 24
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
You keep talking about this link. But what is it? I can't see one.
I find this a bit mystifying to be honest.
ISIL seem to me to be a concrete political manifestation of a particular vision of Islam. It may not be the Islam that most other Muslims follow, but it professes a clear and coherent theology, is led by a PhD in Islamic studies, and attempts to justify its horrific actions in terms of the Wahhabist strain of Sunni jurisprudence.
As a flawed analogy, many people have analysed the English civil war from perspectives of class, nationality etc but I'm not aware of anyone claiming that they couldn't see any link between the puritans, Cromwell and Christianity.
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They did not appear very religious; that is, they were not melancholy; and I therefore suspected they had not much piety - Life of Rev John Murray
Posts: 1894 | From: Thessalonica | Registered: May 2004
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Spawn
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# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
You keep talking about this link. But what is it? I can't see one.
I find this a bit mystifying to be honest.
ISIL seem to me to be a concrete political manifestation of a particular vision of Islam. It may not be the Islam that most other Muslims follow, but it professes a clear and coherent theology, is led by a PhD in Islamic studies, and attempts to justify its horrific actions in terms of the Wahhabist strain of Sunni jurisprudence.
As a flawed analogy, many people have analysed the English civil war from perspectives of class, nationality etc but I'm not aware of anyone claiming that they couldn't see any link between the puritans, Cromwell and Christianity.
I think disingenuous is the term I would use rather than mystifying. The problem I think is that it is now a matter of left wing tribalism to say that there is no link to Islam because to do so would concede ground to the right.
In fact there is a perfectly respectable movement on the left, including Charlie Hebdo which strongly opposes Islamism and is in some cases allied to reform movements in Islam.
Very happy today that both the Guardian and the BBC Newsnight have shown the latest Charlie Hebdo front page with 'blasphemous' drawing of Muhammad. In contrast the Telegraph have cropped the image.
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Teufelchen
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# 10158
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
Teufelchen, thanks for your reply and I concur to an extent but that's a horrifying assumption that you make about "needing" to commit acts of terrorism. I don't believe anybody in Australia needs to commit acts of terrorism. WOW, that really sounds like justifying violence. My point was not that the Christian white majority don't commit terrorism but that groups like the dispossessed and marginally and mistreated Australian indigenous population DON"T, nor do the migrants from SE Asia or the Pacific Islands.
If you think I'm justifying terrorism, you did not read my post enough.
My point was that you form part of a society which the the beneficiary of past acts of mass violence that would put Boko Haram in the shade. (So do I, albeit a different one.) It's a bloody good thing that more oppressed groups don't respond in horrible ways, but I still think that if you want to know what motivates the foot soldiers of terrorism, you can look firstly to economic deprivation and political oppression. Religion is often used as the tool to bring them together, and there is usually a rich and/or well-educated outsider directing the action. (Osama bin Laden, for example, was a rich Saudi exile sending lots of Pakistanis and Afghans to their deaths.)
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Little devil
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quetzalcoatl
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# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
You keep talking about this link. But what is it? I can't see one.
I find this a bit mystifying to be honest.
ISIL seem to me to be a concrete political manifestation of a particular vision of Islam. It may not be the Islam that most other Muslims follow, but it professes a clear and coherent theology, is led by a PhD in Islamic studies, and attempts to justify its horrific actions in terms of the Wahhabist strain of Sunni jurisprudence.
As a flawed analogy, many people have analysed the English civil war from perspectives of class, nationality etc but I'm not aware of anyone claiming that they couldn't see any link between the puritans, Cromwell and Christianity.
Well, people keep talking about a link between Islam and violence. So what is it? As yet, no-one has demonstrated this, but have simply asserted it.
Listing a number of violent Islamist groups does not even demonstrate that Islamism is essentially violent, let alone Islam.
It's also the logic of Al Quaeda - who say that since the West is using violence against the Middle East, therefore the West is inherently violent, and in fact, Westerners are also. False logic, yet people here are using the same logic.
Well, Mudfrog is nailing his colours to the mast, and saying that Islam is essentially violent - but again, this is pure assertion.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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Spawn
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# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Well, people keep talking about a link between Islam and violence. So what is it? As yet, no-one has demonstrated this, but have simply asserted it.
Listing a number of violent Islamist groups does not even demonstrate that Islamism is essentially violent, let alone Islam.
The onus is on you to provide proof. The fact is that all these Al-Quaeda, and ISIL-linked terrorists claim to be inspired by their extremist version of Islam. Why do you discount their own testimony by saying there is no link between their faith and their violence?
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Are you willing to subject the LRA (see above) to the same standard of proof?
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
The fact is that all these Al-Quaeda, and ISIL-linked terrorists claim to be inspired by their extremist version of Islam. Why do you discount their own testimony by saying there is no link between their faith and their violence?
There quite clearly is a link. They self identify with Islam, they use language derived from Islamic literature to express the intent of their actions, to attempt to justify their actions to others, and to recruit new members.
But, a link does not mean that there is causality. Are these organisations violent because they are Islamic with the primary driver towards violence being their faith? Or, are these organisations violent for other reasons, and their Islamic identity secondary to those other reasons in the actions they choose to pursue?
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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Spawn
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# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
Are you willing to subject the LRA (see above) to the same standard of proof?
I think that the beliefs of the Lord's Resistance Army should be taken seriously and countered just like any ideology which does harm. Christians have a particular responsibility to distance themselves from such groups and condemn and argue against ideologies which claim to be inspired by Christianity. Mainstream churches have spent huge amounts of time rebutting seriously bad theologies such as the prosperity gospel, racist theologies and hateful fringe cults like the Westboro baptists. We could just say, 'nothing to do with us' and walk by on the other side but we don't.
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
But, a link does not mean that there is causality. Are these organisations violent because they are Islamic with the primary driver towards violence being their faith? Or, are these organisations violent for other reasons, and their Islamic identity secondary to those other reasons in the actions they choose to pursue?
There are a mixture of factors involved. Who is to say whether the religious element is primary or secondary (that might depend on individual motives as much as group motives). My consistent point is that the religious factor is part of the mix and that one of the ways of countering such violence is to starve it of religious justification.
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
Spawn: What I take from your response is that if there is a link between islamic terrorism and Islam, it is up to muslim scholars and theologians to untangle that link, in much the same way as you see it primarily as the responsibility of Christians to do so for the LRA.
The apparent absence of Muslims on this thread has been deplored, and unless anyone wishes to share any special credentials I get the feeling there are no really informed experts here on this subject.
From this I conclude that the best way forward in real life in this respect is to get together with some informed Muslims who, as expressed earlier, are willing to express their faith in the context of pluralistic Western society.
However, I also repeat my contention that attempting to explain this in religious terms is entirely the wrong place to start if a pragmatic solution in Western democracies is to be found.
The right place to start would be to discuss the causes and catalysts of terrorism, in which religious belief could play a role (and undoubtedly sometimes, but not always does).
[x-post]
[ 13. January 2015, 12:13: Message edited by: Eutychus ]
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Eutychus:
However, I also repeat my contention that attempting to explain this in religious terms is entirely the wrong place to start if a pragmatic solution in Western democracies is to be found.
To the early part of your post, it's not my job as a Christian to advocate peaceful, mainstream views of Islam. That is the job of Muslims within their community.
But attempting to deal with lslamist terrorist without reference to religion is pointless. You cannot defeat such violence without seeking to address the religious causes and justification of violence with the Muslim community. This is not the same as blaming Islam or tarring all Muslims but it is to say that it is lazy and wrong to engage in denial of any sort of link.
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Alan Cresswell
Mad Scientist 先生
# 31
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
My consistent point is that the religious factor is part of the mix and that one of the ways of countering such violence is to starve it of religious justification.
But, how do you starve violent organisations of religious justification? As Christians, we can make as much noise as we want to say we don't consider the actions of the KKK, the LRA, Phelps gang, the paramilitaries in NI etc to be Christian. It doesn't stop other Christians, to a greater or lesser extent, to provide justification for their actions. And, it doesn't stop the media jumping on the ramblings of the lunatic fringe and splashing them across headlines and ignoring the mainstream.
I've very little knowledge of Islam. But, I would be surprised if a similar dynamic doesn't exist there. With those pursuing violent action having people who can supply some level of justification, and the voices of the lunatic fringe getting coverage and the moderate majority being largely unheard.
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Don't cling to a mistake just because you spent a lot of time making it.
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
Well, people keep talking about a link between Islam and violence. So what is it? As yet, no-one has demonstrated this, but have simply asserted it.
Listing a number of violent Islamist groups does not even demonstrate that Islamism is essentially violent, let alone Islam.
The onus is on you to provide proof. The fact is that all these Al-Quaeda, and ISIL-linked terrorists claim to be inspired by their extremist version of Islam. Why do you discount their own testimony by saying there is no link between their faith and their violence?
Ah, but now you are rather cleverly shifting ground. You are saying that 'their extremist version of Islam' provides them with justification - I have no quarrel with that.
Now all you have to do now is demonstrate that that version flows automatically from Islam itself.
I have friends who say that Islam is a religion of peace and mercy, and I say to them, no, it isn't. That's what you make of it, but it is not essentially anything.
Religions and ideologies are chameleons, they adapt to their context.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
Posts: 9878 | From: UK | Registered: Oct 2011
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quetzalcoatl
Shipmate
# 16740
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
quote:
Originally posted by Demas:
quote:
Originally posted by quetzalcoatl:
quote:
I said that you're not improving society by ignoring the link between ISIL, Al-Quaeda and Islam. I claimed nothing more than that.
You keep talking about this link. But what is it? I can't see one.
I find this a bit mystifying to be honest.
ISIL seem to me to be a concrete political manifestation of a particular vision of Islam. It may not be the Islam that most other Muslims follow, but it professes a clear and coherent theology, is led by a PhD in Islamic studies, and attempts to justify its horrific actions in terms of the Wahhabist strain of Sunni jurisprudence.
As a flawed analogy, many people have analysed the English civil war from perspectives of class, nationality etc but I'm not aware of anyone claiming that they couldn't see any link between the puritans, Cromwell and Christianity.
I think disingenuous is the term I would use rather than mystifying. The problem I think is that it is now a matter of left wing tribalism to say that there is no link to Islam because to do so would concede ground to the right.
In fact there is a perfectly respectable movement on the left, including Charlie Hebdo which strongly opposes Islamism and is in some cases allied to reform movements in Islam.
Very happy today that both the Guardian and the BBC Newsnight have shown the latest Charlie Hebdo front page with 'blasphemous' drawing of Muhammad. In contrast the Telegraph have cropped the image.
I am arguing against essentialist views of history, which are always post hoc and ad hoc. In fact, they tend to follow the Texas sharpshooter fallacy, or the clustering illusion. Oh, look, here's a cluster of data, there must be some causation there. See under vaccination.
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I can't talk to you today; I talked to two people yesterday.
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
attempting to deal with lslamist terrorist without reference to religion is pointless
Of course "reference needs to be made" to religion when it is invoked in terrorism (just as in Northern Ireland). Is anyone here disputing this? quote:
it is lazy and wrong to engage in denial of any sort of link.
I think that wording is really unhelpful here. As has been pointed out "link" seems to be being used by some to mean "direct causality" and/or "primary cause". I don't think anybody here is denying this terrorism and Islam are somehow connected, but not a few of us are having trouble with "link" because it often looks like a loaded term being used to drive an agenda.
The most "denial" I can see here, albeit implicitly, is Mudfrog's refusal to admit that examples of the behaviour he challenged people to produce (to disprove his claims) have been forthcoming, and he has so far not acknowledged that at all.
I can't see any way that kind of attitude is going to help.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
Posts: 17944 | From: 528491 | Registered: Jul 2002
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Alan Cresswell:
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
My consistent point is that the religious factor is part of the mix and that one of the ways of countering such violence is to starve it of religious justification.
But, how do you starve violent organisations of religious justification? As Christians, we can make as much noise as we want to say we don't consider the actions of the KKK, the LRA, Phelps gang, the paramilitaries in NI etc to be Christian. It doesn't stop other Christians, to a greater or lesser extent, to provide justification for their actions. And, it doesn't stop the media jumping on the ramblings of the lunatic fringe and splashing them across headlines and ignoring the mainstream.
I've very little knowledge of Islam. But, I would be surprised if a similar dynamic doesn't exist there. With those pursuing violent action having people who can supply some level of justification, and the voices of the lunatic fringe getting coverage and the moderate majority being largely unheard.
When society, the media, community leaders, opinion formers, and politicians present a consistent view in opposition to racism, for example, then over time views within communities change considerably. Similarly in the Church things have changed when leaders decided to change teaching. Even in the Dutch Reformed Church views on apartheid are entirely different to what they were 15-20 years ago. When you get rid of a 'them' and 'us' mentality which is often caused/influenced/supported by rigid social or religious beliefs then you can find things changing relatively quickly.
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Eutychus
From the edge
# 3081
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Spawn:
When you get rid of a 'them' and 'us' mentality which is often caused/influenced/supported by rigid social or religious beliefs then you can find things changing relatively quickly.
I agree with this bit. The challenge for Islam in France, as a relatively recent arrival in any numbers, is to find the sort of platform and consensus-building process that can facilitate this. It has taken the Church centuries to develop that.
As I've said before, one of the best foreseeable outcomes of the current situation here would be to give religion in general and Islam in particular a public voice within France's secular framework that it has not had before.
Unfortunately I don't think this view goes down very well in the largely evangelical Christian circles in which I (sometimes) move, but it's one of my big prayers.
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Let's remember that we are to build the Kingdom of God, not drive people away - pastor Frank Pomeroy
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
Really can't see what 'essentialism' or bad science has to do with it. The Kouachi brothers believed they were inspired by a particular version of radical, political Islam. Are you seriously telling me that their actions had no connection to these beliefs? For example, their choice of target? Their rhetoric?
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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lilBuddha
Shipmate
# 14333
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Posted
Spawn,
That again goes straight to Christianity being a cause of heinous crimes. If you wish the tree to cease its growth, you must stop feeding the roots. And the nourishment of this violence is not Islam. This tree gains its shape and gets its food from the Christian west. Whose religion is then to blame?
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I put on my rockin' shoes in the morning
Hallellou, hallellou
Posts: 17627 | From: the round earth's imagined corners | Registered: Dec 2008
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Spawn
Shipmate
# 4867
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by lilBuddha:
Spawn,
That again goes straight to Christianity being a cause of heinous crimes. If you wish the tree to cease its growth, you must stop feeding the roots. And the nourishment of this violence is not Islam. This tree gains its shape and gets its food from the Christian west. Whose religion is then to blame?
You are going to have to explain what you mean. Christians are responsible for enough crimes of their own without taking responsibility for crimes committed by Muslims.
Posts: 3447 | From: North Devon | Registered: Aug 2003
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Barnabas62
Shipmate
# 9110
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Posted
@ sesto
Welcome to the Ship and thanks for dipping your toe into the rather troubled waters of this thread. I hope you find the place stimulating and useful. Perhaps you can see already why the ethos is unrest, and also why we have the 10C's and board guidelines?
Barnabas62
Purgatory Host
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Who is it that you seek? How then shall we live? How shall we sing the Lord's song in a strange land?
Posts: 21397 | From: Norfolk UK | Registered: Feb 2005
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Gamaliel
Shipmate
# 812
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Posted
I think it's one of these both/and things again ...
I agree that there's a kind of knee-jerk reaction on the left, 'It can't possibly be anything at all intrinsically wrong within radical Islam itself, it's all the fault of nefarious Western capitalism ...'
Equally - and I think we've seen examples on this thread and elsewhere on other threads where Islam has been the topic - there's a kind of knee-jerk reaction from the right - which essentially boils down to not finding any redeeming features at all within Islam - whether radical or otherwise - lest to do so is somehow to concede defeat to relativism and liberalism.
I suspect that the insistence by many conservatively inclined Christians here - whether evangelicals, Orthodox or whatever else - is partly based on this.
It's far easier to deal with something we don't understand if we demonise it in some way - either by denying that there's any semblance of truth there at all - 'they are worshipping a false god, an idol' - or by making cultural (or even racist) judgements - 'They're different to us ... they're back in the middle ages, they're this, they're that, they're the other ...'
Neither of which helps in my view.
I don't think it helps matters by ignoring or downplaying the links between radical and extreme forms of Islamism and the kind of brutal violence we're seeing in various quarters - IS, Northern Nigeria, the Taliban attacks inside Pakistan and also continuing in Afghanistan, the recent terrorist atrocities in Paris etc.
Neither does it help by failing to acknowledge the links between particular fundamentalist Christian beliefs and attitudes and bad practices.
Over on the other Islam thread there's been some consideration as to whether 'fundamentalism' is the right word to use in connection with these things.
Whether it is or isn't, there are common factors, I would suggest, behind both the insane rampages of the Boko Haram's of this world and the ravages of the Lord's Resistance Army.
Whether 'fundamentalism' is the right term for this common factor, I don't know ... but the common ground is there irrespective of the belief system behind it and the paradigm out of which they each arise - be it an Islamic one or a Christian one.
What is this common ground?
Well, a tendency to 'other' other people is one factor. There are also the various political and sociological factors that Eutychus has mentioned ... throw in a particularly inflexible interpretation of one's religious texts and practices and voila - there is your toxic mix for extremism and religious violence.
A toxic mix, I would argue, that can erupt in any soil - be it Hindu, Buddhist, Christian, Jewish, Islamic or atheist.
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Let us with a gladsome mind
Praise the Lord for He is kind.
http://philthebard.blogspot.com
Posts: 15997 | From: Cheshire, UK | Registered: Jul 2001
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Leorning Cniht
Shipmate
# 17564
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Posted
quote:
Originally posted by Evangeline:
I was talking about why people in Australia link Islam with violence but they don't do the same with Christianity when groups like the LRA commit violence
Yes. I agree with you that people do draw such links based on their own experience, and that many people whose only exposure to terrorism is of the Islamist kind are more likely to see terrorism as a uniquely Islamic activity.
I don't agree with your assertion that this is in any way logical behaviour. This kind of thought is an example of the seductive falsehoods that humans are prone to, and the role of logical rational thought is to defend against that. (It may not be as false as cherry-picking the year of the Bali bombing in order to count dead Australians, though.)
I stand by my assertion that the existence, or otherwise, and the nature of the links between Islam and violence, the level of support for Islamist terror in the wider Muslim community and so on does not in any way depend on the Australianness of the observer.
Posts: 5026 | From: USA | Registered: Feb 2013
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