Muslims

Regular people or messed up religion? I'd hate to say the latter (especially because half of my family is Islamic), but no religious group seems to cause as much problems or, rather, to be as volatile as Islamics.
Anyways, I'd like to hear other people's opinions on this.
What do you peoples think it is??!

The problem isn't with the religion itself, it's with people who will twist any system of belief into a hate or violence. For instance, there's many different interpretations of what Jihad is supposed to mean and not all Muslims go by the more literal meaning. Regardless, don't just blame Muslims for religious violence, go back and look up the bloody history of Christians, Egyptians, Mayans, etc. People will use anything they can as a tool to manipulate people to war for them, so blame the whole process and the people who fall for such stupidity and blind faith, or at least a culture that supports this, not the religion itself as it wouldn't have any power without the people.

[quote]Muslims

boooo

No, but I don't find anything wrong with the religion. Like gay rawr said (jk luv u) it's about the people. People have twisted up religions, not just Islam, in many ways. It's up to the discretion of the person to interpret what the meaning is.

So, whatever.

I thought Muslim people made up half or more of the religious people in the world. I read that somewhere.

Muslims only cause problems now that they're in the spotlight. Christians made more of a ruckus before 9/11.

lol different cultures trying to understand each other by comparing them to only what they know and have experienced.


But yeah, what Gar said for the most part. Every religion is the same at its core, it's just the people who ruin it. If you think Muslims are the only ones to do something like this than open a history text some time.

Those terrorist attacks from before 9/11 were barely covered. It was more like "they just happened to be Muslim". Discrimination against Muslim religion and Middle Eastern types weren't even close to as bad as it was following 9/11, so you can take that "ignorance is bliss" crap and shove it. Just because it happened before by the same "types" of people doesn't mean the effects are the same. They weren't insignificant, they just weren't popular. Understand? I hope so.

Christians are causing a ruckus right now, actually. :cookie:

[quote]Im not going to claim that all muslims are terrorists, but most terrorists, to my knowledge, have been muslim.

Not even close, Spec.

The largest number of terrorist acts, by a wide margin [url=http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Terrorincidents2001atlas.jpg]according to the US state department reports on terrorism[/url] (at least until 2004 or so when they were discontinued because the figures were becoming embarassing) happen in Colombia and revolve around (I assume) the drug trade and the ongoing civil conflicts there.

India is second highest, again by a substantial margin, and terrorism is by no means restricted to Muslims there either, but also involves a whole rainbow of secession movements, tribal groups and even a Maoist insurgency.

These days I imagine Iraq is right up the list too, but then that's kinda our fault...

descrimination against muslims huh? Oh please, if anything the only thing going on in America is REVERSE discrimination. You say one word about The war, or the terrorist bombings, or anything like that anywhere even remotly near a muslim and your discriminating right?

And im sorry, but the news failing to cover those stories was ignorance. Actually the coverage wasnt too bad, you just dont rember any of it because you probably werent alive or very old when It happened.

"racial profiling", the great evil of America, as the ACLU will tell you, is probably the most effective tool we have in terms of battling terrorist cells. How many uppermiddle class white Americans have hijacked a plane and smashed it into a building? How many mormons, or cathlics, or christians are burying bombs by the side of the road and blowing people up? Racial Profiling is nothing short of common sense, UNDERSTAND? I hope so...

[quote]"racial profiling", the great evil of America, as the ACLU will tell you, is probably the most effective tool we have in terms of battling terrorist cells. How many uppermiddle class white Americans have hijacked a plane and smashed it into a building? How many mormons, or cathlics, or christians are burying bombs by the side of the road and blowing people up? Racial Profiling is nothing short of common sense, UNDERSTAND? I hope so...

Virtually zero. But then, virtually zero Muslims are doing that either, unless you're going to claim that Iraq and America are somehow similar. That, plus Muslims come in all races and aren't an actual ethnicity or race. I'm sure you'll recall that John Walker Lindh was actually a upper-middle-class white guy? The 9-11 hijackers weren't particularly swarthy (Arabs are Caucasian so they tend to have similar facial structures to Europeans) and wore western haircuts and suits? And the London bombers were British-born kids from the 'burbs...

Now, you have to define EXACTLY what you mean by "racial profiling" because there are a lot of different meanings to it, most of which are either draconian or useless. What measures would you take? Maybe we could put a crescent moon on their passports and drivers licenses?

Yeah, but that gets done based on a whole bevy of things. Age and gender (ie young males), for example, I bet are in higher relation to the terrorist and criminal demographics than any ethnic cues

Islam's been stuck in the same state since the Crusades. We got all our Crusadin' out of our systems hundreds of years ago, but they never really got over it, imo.

Regular people. I really want to try to explain/defend the reputation my faith in a civilized manner - though I am afraid that I might go into a huge flame war with all you folks which would prove your point [possibly mine's as well]. :rolleyes:

lol who cares?

they're sand ******s

kill em all!

I didn't read too much of the thread, so I'll say this: the Catholics had the crusades which were brutal, because they involved pulling people apart on the racks and burning the "witches" alive, among other unpleasant things. Not to mention the forced labor of indian peoples and the more recent fighting with protestants under the IRA (Christians hating Christians lol, like Sunnis hating Shi-tes).

It's the warped interpretations of religion that cause all of this to happen, I think.

Careful though... very little of the Irish troubles have been directly about religion, it's more that the catholic/protestant divide roughly corresponds to the republican/loyalist divide and the historical irish/anglo divide and so religious affiliation serves as a useful proxy and identifying factor in dividing people.

That said, Reverend Ian Paisley still says the Pope is the anti-christ so there's still something to it.

I'm pretty sure spec meant to say "centuries ago", so nobody give him crap about a screwup like that.

Well if that's the case I'm free to call you two retarded hicks since I'm drunk as well.

Grand.

I really don't know. Because of this 9/11 crap, I can't count how many times I've been stopped in an airport because I look 'middle eastern' (I'm Christian Lebanese and Caribbean black, with a little bit of Berber-unfortunately for me now, I look the latter), and I cant begin to tell you how frusterating it is. However, I've had to be more careful visiting an Islamic country than any other kind of country-I had to even dress like them to avoid being raped in Mauritania.
And, back in France, some Algerian girl got up in my face out of nowhere because I was 'staring' at an extremist woman.
(Though, I probably was staring)

One terrorist attack and the insitutionalised racism of airport security isnt a valid a reason to generalize an entire race.

Which is probably how they girl felt when you were staring at that girl.

I thought it was cute how bebop generalized people who generalize.

I hate all sweeping statements
[spoiler]lol[/spoiler]

I see what you did there.

Muslims are people. Some are ****ed up, most would rather no strap a bomb to themselves, and wouldnt even want to get near someone who would. Theres idiots in every part of the world, in evewry segment of every population, in every demographic. Are some more willing to turn to violence due to differing cultural mores? You bet. Does that mean that the mosques that *** vandlized in my home town were full of the same nutjob wackos that are strapping bombs to themselves overseas just because they claim to love hte same ***? Nope. If you want to be ****ed at people blowing themselves and other innocents up, fine, im right there with you. Extend that anger, and daresay, hatred to anyone who shares a background with them, and thats when you look like a nutjob youreself.

Also, if you really think that its just muslims that are ****ed up, then you really need to pay attention to whats going on in america. There is an increasingly larg enumber of people believing in literal interpretations of the bible, and pushing that sort of rot into public areas. This sort of thing is becoming disturbingly common, and doesnt really show any signs of fading.Just try having a logical conversation with a devote christian sometime and then tell me that only muslims are nutjobs.

And I beheld another beast coming up out of the earth; and he had two horns like a lamb, and he spake as a dragon. And he exerciseth all the power of the first beast before him, and causeth the earth and them which dwell therein to worship the first beast, whose deadly wound was healed. And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men, And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live. And he had power to give life unto the image of the beast, that the image of the beast should both speak, and cause that as many as would not worship the image of the beast should be killed. And he causeth all, both small and great, rich and poor, free and bond, to receive a mark in their right hand, or in their foreheads: And that no man might buy or sell, save he that had the mark, or the name of the beast, or the number of his name. Here is wisdom. Let him that hath understanding count the number of the beast: for it is the number of a man; and his number is Six hundred threescore and six.

Amazing post/sig combination.

Praise Allah! All of you

The religion that normal muslims follow is very different to the religion that extremists follow. You have to differentiate between the two.

And, how 'extreme' extremists behave can depend on the current situation. For example, lots of extremists have discovered that they can twist facts to blame stuff on the US somehow, and get other extremists angry about it.

When it comes to politics, leave it to Sapphire Rose to come in with the "sand ******s" content. You really shouldn't bother with him.

Sapphire Rose > Fate.