Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

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Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#1  Postby DanDare » Mar 21, 2010 12:52 am

When I was head of a local community association I was asked to seek a banning of minarets in my little part of Queensland. They did do it in Switzerland. My converted to Catholicism brother sent a mail to my dad about Dr. Peter Hammond's book: Slavery, Terrorism and Islam. If you google it you will find pages and pages of rabid christian web sites extolling the truth of the book and how evil Islam is. Here is a reader's digest version of the books thesis:

As long as the Muslim population remains around or under 2% in any given country, they will be for the most part be regarded as a peace-loving minority, and not as a threat to other citizens. This is the case in [snip]

At 2% to 5%, they begin to proselytize from other ethnic minorities and disaffected groups, often with major recruiting from the jails and among street gangs. This is happening in [snip]

From 5% on, they exercise an inordinate influence in proportion to their percentage of the population. For example, they will push for the introduction of halal (clean by Islamic standards) food, thereby securing food preparation jobs for Muslims. They will increase pressure on supermarket chains to feature halal on their shelves -- along with threats for failure to comply. This is occurring in [snip]

At this point, they will work to get the ruling government to allow them to rule themselves (within their ghettos) under Sharia, the Islamic Law.

The ultimate goal of Islamists is to establish Sharia law over the entire world.

When Muslims approach 10% of the population, they tend to increase lawlessness as a means of complaint about their conditions. In Paris, we are already seeing car-burnings. Any non-Muslim action offends Islam and results in uprisings and threats, such as in Amsterdam, with opposition to Mohammed cartoons and films about Islam. Such tensions are seen daily, particularly in Muslim sections in [snip]

After reaching 20%, nations can expect hair-trigger rioting, jihad militia formations, sporadic killings, and the burnings of Christian churches and Jewish synagogues, such as in [snip]

At 40%, nations experience widespread massacres, chronic terror attacks, and ongoing militia warfare, such as in [snip]

From 60%, nations experience unfettered persecution of non-believers of all other religions (including non-conforming Muslims), sporadic ethnic cleansing (genocide), use of Sharia Law as a weapon, and Jizya, the tax placed on infidels, such as in [snip]

After 80%, expect daily intimidation and violent jihad, some State-run ethnic cleansing, and even some genocide, as these nations drive out the infidels, and move toward 100% Muslim, such as has been experienced and in some ways is on-going in [snip]

100% will usher in the peace of 'Dar-es-Salaam' -- the Islamic House of Peace. Here there's supposed to be peace, because everybody is a Muslim, the Madrasses are the only schools, and the Koran is the only word..[snip]

Unfortunately, peace is never achieved, as in these 100% states the most radical Muslims intimidate and spew hatred, and satisfy their blood lust by killing less radical Muslims, for a variety of reasons.

'Before I was nine I had learned the basic canon of Arab life. It was me against my brother; me and my brother against our father; my family against my cousins and the clan; the clan against the tribe; the tribe against the world, and all of us against the infidel. -- Leon Uris, 'The Haj'

It is important to understand that in some countries, with well under 100% Muslim populations, such as France, the minority Muslim populations live in ghettos, within which they are 100% Muslim, and within which they live by Sharia Law. The national police do not even enter these ghettos. There are no national courts, nor schools, nor non-Muslim religious facilities. In such situations, Muslims do not integrate into the community at large. The children attend madrasses. They learn only the Koran. To even associate with an infidel is a crime punishable with death. Therefore, in some areas of certain nations, Muslim Imams and extremists exercise more power than the national average would indicate.

Today's 1.5 billion Muslims make up 22% of the world's population. But their birth rates dwarf the birth rates of Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Jews, and all other believers.

Muslims will exceed 50% of the world's population by the end of this century.


Note the mention of birth rates, as if people of different religions were also different species that could only produce children of the same religion.

Even if this analysis were entirely true and proper its foolish for the rabid christians to get all wild eyed and zealous about it because the proper solution is secularism.

Religious laws hold no weight, only state law is acceptable. That means sharia law can get stuffed. That means that catholic church hierarchy dealing with rape by hiding it from legal authorities is a crime.

There should be no faith schools, only secular schools, public or private, and home schooling should only be for where there is a great obstacle, such as distance or health, to a child being sent to a secular school. That gets rid of madrasses and also christian schools and jewish schools and creationist schools.

No one should be allowed to make noise pollution or fill the air with calls to prayer. That gets rid of the call from minarets and church bells as well.

Men and women should not be forced to act as subservient to anyone else. Husbands and wives do not have rights to harm or abuse one another. That gets rid of a lot of religious practices, not just muslim ones.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#2  Postby King Hazza » Mar 21, 2010 5:32 am

And strangely enough- broadcasting such laws for the world to see would greatly discourage such types of people from coming here.
Nice one!
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#3  Postby DanDare » Mar 21, 2010 8:01 am

King Hazza wrote:And strangely enough- broadcasting such laws for the world to see would greatly discourage such types of people from coming here.
Nice one!

I don't know that it would. Perhaps it would filter out extremists but I find it hard to imagine. My hope is more that it would stop them foisting rubbish on school kids and propagating sexism as some kind of spiritual privilege.

For the record I was against banning minarets and still am. That's banning an incidental symptom that wastes energy and emotion.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#4  Postby katja z » Mar 21, 2010 12:44 pm

Hammond's book is utter nonsense. Islamic schools in France? That alone told me enough of the value of his "data".

Banning minarets is ridiculous - at least as long as we have all those bell towers around.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#5  Postby Teshi » Mar 21, 2010 1:40 pm

Religious laws hold no weight, only state law is acceptable. That means sharia law can get stuffed.


I feel that this is the most important of your suggestions. I'm not on board with banning religious infrastructure like churches, synagogues and mosques. If we have church towers, minarets should be allowed. I also don't have a problem with Church Bells or calls to prayer, wearing crosses, stars or headscarfs. To me, all those things are about freedom. If I expect to be allowed to wear a shirt that says, "there is no God", other people should be able to wear something that effectively says, "there is one".

However, allowing religious law destroys the point of having secular law and breaks down the divide between church and state. A place or country should not have two laws for two different sets of people. The idea is that everybody gets the same law. If you want to follow Islamic standards of living, you are free to do so. If you don't want to anymore, you are free to do that, provided you still follow the standards of living expected by your country, state, province and/or county and city.

That is what living in a secular country means to me. Freedom to follow and ignore religious law as you like and not be convicted by it, even if at some point you checked a box that said that you would allow yourself to be.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#6  Postby Sigmund » Mar 21, 2010 6:14 pm

>If I expect to be allowed to wear a shirt that says, "there is no God", other people should be able to wear something that effectively says, "there is one".

Is it that simple? I know this is an extreme comparison, but 'shoot all black people' is not an acceptable t-shirt slogan, while 'don't shoot all black people' is (though perhaps a rather strange one). From the basic atheist point of view, the t-shirt that proclaims God exists is simply wrong. Freedom to pursue a religion is all very well, but let's not forget that religion in a secular state tends to be considerably watered down. Never mind Sharia, if we lived by strict Biblical law I 'sure as hell' wouldn't be writing this. I'd have been stoned by my neighbours a long time ago.

In our more 'relaxed' climate (with all these new-fangled human rights and equality and whatnot), we should not forget that religion is a fundamentally dangerous and damaging influence on society. It is morally and intellectually stultifying - to present it as even potentially harmless is misguided. We prohibit the encouragement of destructive impulses (for instance incitement to hatred in the form of homophobia, racism, sexism etc.), religion should not be excused from this practice. (And, as it happens, it is homophobic, racist and staggeringly sexist.)
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#7  Postby King Hazza » Mar 22, 2010 4:51 am

DanDare wrote:
King Hazza wrote:And strangely enough- broadcasting such laws for the world to see would greatly discourage such types of people from coming here.
Nice one!

I don't know that it would. Perhaps it would filter out extremists but I find it hard to imagine. My hope is more that it would stop them foisting rubbish on school kids and propagating sexism as some kind of spiritual privilege.

For the record I was against banning minarets and still am. That's banning an incidental symptom that wastes energy and emotion.

I disagree- I think spreading awareness worldwide about what kind of standards your society tolerates and not (and what kind of people) actually would weigh into the consideration of moving to these countries and staying if it is made clear that certain practices and ritual pieces they consider important are opposed or banned by the society.
To use an inappropriate example, after John Howard's anti-refugee declaration the boats quickly stopped coming up until he was thrown out of power and a party with a history of advocating more for refugee rights came in.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#8  Postby DanDare » Mar 22, 2010 6:29 am

King Hazza wrote:
DanDare wrote:
King Hazza wrote:And strangely enough- broadcasting such laws for the world to see would greatly discourage such types of people from coming here.
Nice one!

I don't know that it would. Perhaps it would filter out extremists but I find it hard to imagine. My hope is more that it would stop them foisting rubbish on school kids and propagating sexism as some kind of spiritual privilege.

For the record I was against banning minarets and still am. That's banning an incidental symptom that wastes energy and emotion.

I disagree- I think spreading awareness worldwide about what kind of standards your society tolerates and not (and what kind of people) actually would weigh into the consideration of moving to these countries and staying if it is made clear that certain practices and ritual pieces they consider important are opposed or banned by the society.
To use an inappropriate example, after John Howard's anti-refugee declaration the boats quickly stopped coming up until he was thrown out of power and a party with a history of advocating more for refugee rights came in.

That may be so but don't you think that the anti-secularists might also push more people our way with the idea of fostering an "insurgency"?
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#9  Postby Sigmund » Mar 22, 2010 12:09 pm

Ooh, 'tolerance', hate that concept. It's something 'between' acceptable and unacceptable, reinforcing our resistance to social change in the act of encouraging its acceptance. We don't 'tolerate' homosexuals, black people and women's rights, although we would have been encouraged to do so at different times in the last century. 'Tolerance' is the friction created in the process of moral evolution, a shadowy preliminary to acceptance because we haven't quite made up our minds or come to terms...
Religion is an attempt to get control over the sensory world, in which we are placed, by means of the wish-world, which we have developed inside us as a result of biological and psychological necessities.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#10  Postby DanDare » Mar 23, 2010 4:00 am

Tolerance is putting up with something that you don't really like. That is a minimal base line I guess. I prefer to revel in diversity but that can't be made a requirement.
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Re: Evil Muslims, Bad Christians and Secularism

#11  Postby jaydot » Mar 27, 2010 6:04 am

the article presupposes that all people who grow up with islam remain faithful thereto. it fails to take into consideration that many muslims are not only disenchanted with the heirarchy, they are also disenchanted with the dogma. wafa sultan has written a book, 'the god who hates'. the article is deliberately too simplistic a view because that's the way to write propoganda.
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