Islamic Jihadists ISIS

[seafoid]

Latecomer to the thread here.

I've always noticed that religious people tend to play down the role of religion in conflict. They point to the other causes of division and insist that that is the real cause. Anti-religious people tend to play up the role of religion in conflict. The late lamented Christopher Hitchens maintained that Islamic terrorists carry out unspeakable acts not because they deviate from their religious doctrine but because they adhere to it quite literally. Sam Harris wrote about it in The End of Faith where he devoted several pages to quoting from Islamic holy texts one instruction after another to kill, punish, or at least despise infidels. There are hundreds of them.

My take on it is that there are numerous factors in these conflicts, and while religion might not be the only root of each one, it certainly magnifies problems. When people are divided on ethnic or nationalist lines, that division gets even sharper when people adhere to a belief system that denigrates an "evil other" group out of fear of what'll happen to them in the afterlife if they're too friendly with the enemy. Religion is a very handy tool for recruiting extremists, and it can make people commit atrocities that would never be committed by a non-believer. There's no atheist equivalent of the seventeen virgin sex slaves awaiting them in heaven as a reward for carrying out a suicide bombing.

As others have alluded to, the late unlamented Ian Paisley was a master of hijacking religion as a means of motivating the mobs to attack innocent Catholics and keeping society divided according to which type of church people attended. Widespread belief in a divine imperative makes it a lot easier to recruit angry young men with an axe to grind, particularly if they live in sexually-frustrated gender-segregated societies like they have in the middle east.

There are those who play the whatabout game and point to historic wrongdoing in the name of religions other than Islam. The problem with that is Islam is different in being the youngest of the big three desert religions. Judaism went through its adolescent hissy fit a long time ago, Christianity went through its tantrum around the time of the Inquisition. Islam is going through its pain-in-the-neck teenage years now, and with modern weapons that's a big problem.  The Inquisition was awful, but imagine how much worse it would have been if automatic guns had existed at the time.

Since Islam is convulsing with rage at the minute, I think it does deserve to be singled out as being a bigger problem than other religions, particularly when its most violent adherents are armed with twenty-first century weapons.

Would abolishing religion also abolish conflict? Probably not. But it would tone things down a bit and make it a lot less violent and less dangerous IMHO.

Is Islam responsible for violence? Probably not per se, but let's not play down its role in fanning the flames of conflict and making solutions harder to find. Obama's claim that ISIS is "not Islamic" is a bit like saying that the Inquisition was not Catholic. We have to confront the elephant in the room and stop making excuses for religion.

This war and the inquisition were driven by economics. It's always the same.
Islam is not inherently violent.
Neither are northern Irish catholics btw

[Mike Sheehy]

Latecomer to the thread here.

I've always noticed that religious people tend to play down the role of religion in conflict. They point to the other causes of division and insist that that is the real cause. Anti-religious people tend to play up the role of religion in conflict. The late lamented Christopher Hitchens maintained that Islamic terrorists carry out unspeakable acts not because they deviate from their religious doctrine but because they adhere to it quite literally. Sam Harris wrote about it in The End of Faith where he devoted several pages to quoting from Islamic holy texts one instruction after another to kill, punish, or at least despise infidels. There are hundreds of them.

My take on it is that there are numerous factors in these conflicts, and while religion might not be the only root of each one, it certainly magnifies problems. When people are divided on ethnic or nationalist lines, that division gets even sharper when people adhere to a belief system that denigrates an "evil other" group out of fear of what'll happen to them in the afterlife if they're too friendly with the enemy. Religion is a very handy tool for recruiting extremists, and it can make people commit atrocities that would never be committed by a non-believer. There's no atheist equivalent of the seventeen virgin sex slaves awaiting them in heaven as a reward for carrying out a suicide bombing.

As others have alluded to, the late unlamented Ian Paisley was a master of hijacking religion as a means of motivating the mobs to attack innocent Catholics and keeping society divided according to which type of church people attended. Widespread belief in a divine imperative makes it a lot easier to recruit angry young men with an axe to grind, particularly if they live in sexually-frustrated gender-segregated societies like they have in the middle east.

There are those who play the whatabout game and point to historic wrongdoing in the name of religions other than Islam. The problem with that is Islam is different in being the youngest of the big three desert religions. Judaism went through its adolescent hissy fit a long time ago, Christianity went through its tantrum around the time of the Inquisition. Islam is going through its pain-in-the-neck teenage years now, and with modern weapons that's a big problem.  The Inquisition was awful, but imagine how much worse it would have been if automatic guns had existed at the time.

Since Islam is convulsing with rage at the minute, I think it does deserve to be singled out as being a bigger problem than other religions, particularly when its most violent adherents are armed with twenty-first century weapons.

Would abolishing religion also abolish conflict? Probably not. But it would tone things down a bit and make it a lot less violent and less dangerous IMHO.

Is Islam responsible for violence? Probably not per se, but let's not play down its role in fanning the flames of conflict and making solutions harder to find. Obama's claim that ISIS is "not Islamic" is a bit like saying that the Inquisition was not Catholic. We have to confront the elephant in the room and stop making excuses for religion.

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

[Eamonnca1]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

[seafoid]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

When did Pakistanis start hating America? Anything to do with the war in Afghanistan ? How many Pakistanis have been murdered in drone attacks ? Are they supposed to clap?

There was a thing in the FT a while ago about "America's enemies in north west frontier province ". Why would NWF inhabitants be enemies of America ?  Answers on a postcard. 

[Mike Sheehy]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

One of the biggest problems when dealing with religious extremism is that rational thought is suspended. A child living in relative comfort and and stability in Saudi Arabia or Oman is told that he has a duty to fight the "great satan" because of what is happening thousands of miles away in Pakistan. He is never told about the innocents that were killed , supposedly in his name, which caused the "great satan" to get involved on Pakistan in the first place. There is never any context.That is the problem.

It is a tragic cycle of violence.

[Mike Sheehy]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

When did Pakistanis start hating America? Anything to do with the war in Afghanistan ? How many Pakistanis have been murdered in drone attacks ? Are they supposed to clap?

There was a thing in the FT a while ago about "America's enemies in north west frontier province ". Why would NWF inhabitants be enemies of America ?  Answers on a postcard.

We are trying to have a discussion here that focuses on Islamic extremism. Why don't you, for once, suspend your knee jerk hatred of America and accept that arab/muslim states bear some responsibility for what happens within their own borders ?

Or do you think Muslims are so incapable of self control/governance that anything that happens in the arab/muslim world is the fault of somebody else  ?

[Mike Sheehy]

To illustrate the point...........

"Everyone in Norway became a theoretical krone millionaire on Wednesday in a milestone for the world's biggest sovereign wealth fund that has ballooned thanks to high oil and gas prices."

http://www.cnbc.com/id/101321953#

why is ownership of natural resources such a contentious issue in some countries and not in others ? People want oil, you have oil, you sell your oil to the countries that don't have it and you educate your kids with the proceeds.

Why does Allah need to get in the way ?

[Eamonnca1]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

When did Pakistanis start hating America? Anything to do with the war in Afghanistan ? How many Pakistanis have been murdered in drone attacks ? Are they supposed to clap?

There was a thing in the FT a while ago about "America's enemies in north west frontier province ". Why would NWF inhabitants be enemies of America ?  Answers on a postcard.

No, it's been going on since before the war in Afghanistan.

Drone attacks don't help, I'll give you that, but let's not subscribe to the convenient "let's blame the west for everything" doctrine. You can hardly blame the west for the 1999 coup that put Musharraf in power.

[Mike Sheehy]

One of the biggest problems is the way political/Religious leaders in the middle east cynically manipulate their constituencies into believing that all their problems are the fault of the west. Religion is an extremely powerful tool in this propaganda exercise.

Yup. Kids in Pakistani public schools are taught to hate America before they can even locate the place on a map.

When did Pakistanis start hating America? Anything to do with the war in Afghanistan ? How many Pakistanis have been murdered in drone attacks ? Are they supposed to clap?

There was a thing in the FT a while ago about "America's enemies in north west frontier province ". Why would NWF inhabitants be enemies of America ?  Answers on a postcard.

No, it's been going on since before the war in Afghanistan.

Drone attacks don't help, I'll give you that, but let's not subscribe to the convenient "let's blame the west for everything" doctrine. You can hardly blame the west for the 1999 coup that put Musharraf in power.

One thing you have to understand is that people like Seafoid think the US and the west  is somehow to blame for the failure of the Muslim world to accomplish a clean sucession to Mohammad in 632. That is the extent of their hatred. For 1000 years before the US existed these idiots have been trying to wipe each other out and , now, suddenly it is the US and the wests fault that some savages are beheading people.

[Mike Sheehy]

One thing to remember lads. Seafoid was very vocal around the time of the gaza offensive but I have yet
to see him condemn the beheading of westerners by ISIL. Why is that so ? 

This barbarism needs to be confronted.

[Arthur_Friend]

Well for one thing Mike, everybody is condemning ISIL including the Western media but when the Israelis behead Palestininan men, women and children excuses are made. See the difference?

[theskull1]

One thing to remember lads. Seafoid was very vocal around the time of the gaza offensive but I have yet
to see him condemn the beheading of westerners by ISIL. Why is that so ? 

This barbarism needs to be confronted.

Do you deny that America had any part to play in the Frankenstein creation of Islamic State to destabilise Assad?

They are indeed a barbaric organisation that need to be stopped.

[seafoid]

It's despicable to behead people for PR purposes. Nobody should die like that. The campaign  seems to have worked like a dream however

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/a93b58cc-3a8f-11e4-a3f3-00144feabdc0.html

The turning point was the beheadings last month of two US journalists by members of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant, or Isis. Once videos of their killings were posted on the internet by Isis, their deaths amounted to virtual public executions.
Bill McInturff, a Republican-aligned pollster who along with a Democratic colleague conducts the closely watched Wall Street Journal/NBC poll, said the change in public opinion had been "sudden". That poll showed 61 per cent of respondents thought military action against Isis was in America's national interest.

Obviously it would be far more civilised  to kill the people with white phosphorous and depleted uranium  .

[seafoid]

One thing to remember lads. Seafoid was very vocal around the time of the gaza offensive but I have yet
to see him condemn the beheading of westerners by ISIL. Why is that so ? 

This barbarism needs to be confronted.

the Russell Tribunal has been investigating war crimes by Israel in Gaza

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZaF8lVbQNG8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWrOuGNrzZc

World's most moral army my arse

[johnneycool]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PzusSqcotDw

Reza Aslan educating people on Islam.