crank wrote:I get so disgusted by this issue. You have both sides getting so vitriolic when they are in essence on the same side, for the most part. It's possible to be adamantly against fundamentalist, extremist Islam, while still not wanting to paint all muslims with that brush. And to also recognize the rise of all of the extremist Islamic forces is the result of the West's meddling in the region. It isn't hard to show how this rise pretty closely follows the rise of the meddling. Nor is it hard to show the Saudis have aided in fomenting the extremism, or that the US was right in there with them. We'll get to see some really juicy info about it if they declassify the redacted pages of the 9/11 report. To point at Islam as the root cause of the violence is not only wrong, it is unhelpful. For one thing, it impedes any progress in woman's rights, which have steadily improved in the developing world, especially after women have been allowed education. Giving them an enemy to point to that appears to be waging jihad against muslims, an idea Bush so intelligently helped immensely with his idiotic natterings, only serves to harden their religious affiliations.

crank wrote:

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

crank wrote:And to also recognize the rise of all of the extremist Islamic forces is the result of the West's meddling in the region.

Seriously? Islamic extremism predates the founding of the United States, and Western meddling...Islam was "extremist" right from the start. It has had periods when there were more enlightened leaders, but extremism in Islam goes right back to the beginning.

Seriously? We're going all the way back to Muhammad? Then why not go after Dark-Age Christianity when the Muslim wold was flourished in culture and science?

That the west is the source is well known and understood. It's been established in numerous ways, even the Defence Dept. published a report back in 2004 saying this, ordered by Rumsfeld no less. I've linked to it in at least 2 previous threads I'm pretty sure, but I'll do so again in case anyone else is ignorant of such a important fact about the War of Terror we're waging over there and around the globe. I've highlighted some key info in the quotes below. You can find it here.

Report of the
Defense Science Board Task Force
on
Strategic Communication
September 2004
Office of the Under Secretary of Defense
For Acquisition, Technology, and Logistics
Washington, D.C. 20301-3140

2.3 What is the Problem? Who Are We Dealing With?

The information campaign — or as some still would have it, “the war of ideas,” or the
struggle for “hearts and minds” — is important to every war effort. In this war it is an
essential objective, because the larger goals of U.S. strategy depend on separating the
vast majority of non-violent Muslims from the radical-militant Islamist-Jihadists. But
American efforts have not only failed in this respect: they may also have achieved the
opposite of what they intended.
American direct intervention in the Muslim World has paradoxically elevated the stature
of and support for radical Islamists, while diminishing support for the United States to
single-digits in some Arab societies.
• Muslims do not “hate our freedom,” but rather, they hate our policies. The
overwhelming majority voice their objections to what they see as one-sided support in
favor of Israel and against Palestinian rights, and the longstanding, even increasing
support for what Muslims collectively see as tyrannies, most notably Egypt, Saudi
Arabia, Jordan, Pakistan, and the Gulf states.
• Thus when American public diplomacy talks about bringing democracy to Islamic
societies, this is seen as no more than self-serving hypocrisy. Moreover, saying that
“freedom is the future of the Middle East” is seen as patronizing, suggesting that
Arabs are like the enslaved peoples of the old Communist World — but Muslims do
not feel this way: they feel oppressed, but not enslaved.
• Furthermore, in the eyes of Muslims, American occupation of Afghanistan and Iraq
has not led to democracy there, but only more chaos and suffering. U.S. actions
appear in contrast to be motivated by ulterior motives, and deliberately controlled in
order to best serve American national interests at the expense of truly Muslim self determination.

• Therefore, the dramatic narrative since 9/11 has essentially borne out the entire
radical Islamist bill of particulars. American actions and the flow of events have
elevated the authority of the Jihadi insurgents and tended to ratify their legitimacy
among Muslims. Fighting groups portray themselves as the true defenders of an
Ummah (the entire Muslim community) invaded and under attack — to broad public
support.
• What was a marginal network is now an Ummah-wide movement of fighting groups.
Not only has there been a proliferation of “terrorist” groups: the unifying context of a
shared cause creates a sense of affiliation across the many cultural and sectarian
boundaries that divide Islam.
• Finally, Muslims see Americans as strangely narcissistic — namely, that the war is all
about us. As the Muslims see it, everything about the war is — for Americans —
really no more than an extension of American domestic politics and its great game.
This perception is of course necessarily heightened by election-year atmospherics, but
nonetheless sustains their impression that when Americans talk to Muslims they are
really just talking to themselves.

How does anyone not understand at this late a date that Islam and religion are not the root cause of the terrorism? Surely you've heard about the prevalence of 'Islam for Dummies' and 'The Koran for Dummies' bought by folk off to join ISIS? It has to be willful ignorance, that's the only thing that makes sense. Or gullibility, someone who believes the utterly compromised MSM. Considering this has been established in previous threads, and I think maybe I've had this same argument or something quite similar with you a while back, the willful ignorance explanation seems more likely.

Anyone could spend about 20 minutes on the google and figure this out for themselves, though it's kinda obvious when you consider how little truth you get out of Washington, how often we find out the exact opposite of what they've been telling us. Here, take a look at a recent Foreign Policy Institute piece, ISIS: The “unintended consequences” of the US-led war on Iraq

Warnings that trying to defeat ISIS by doing more of the same of what led to its rise in the first place are falling on deaf ears.



In a recent interview with Shane Smith, the founder of VICE News, President Barack Obama said: “ISIL is a direct outgrowth of Al Qaeda in Iraq that grew out of our invasion, which is an example of unintended consequences.” This admission is evidence of the general causality between Western military interventionism in the Muslim world, and the rise of reactionary armed militia groups. In this particular case, the US-led invasion of Iraq undoubtedly paved the way for the rise of the self-professed ‘Islamic State’, better known as ISIS. Depending on who highlights this “unintended consequence” when commenting on recent events in Iraq and Syria, it is usually given very little importance or completely dismissed. Understandably, the pro-war policymakers in Washington and London who orchestrated the invasion of a sovereign state based on false intelligence, would rather focus on how to “degrade and destroy” the monster they created, as opposed to acknowledging fault and accepting blame.
...

It's so bad, even the president is admitting it now, though anyone with half a brain understood this more than a decade and a half ago.

crank wrote:I haven't heard the tulips and algebra books rationale

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I recall another dumb remark about how, if social assistance hadn't been available, the guy who killed Theo Van Gogh would have had a job and been at work and Van Gogh would be alive.

She's a neocon. It doesn't cause me to dismiss her thoughts and opinions on everything but I certainly dismiss her opinions on certain topics! She's like anyone else - terrific in some respects and so wrong in others.

Arjan Dirkse wrote:

I do agree the Western influence has mostly been very bad the last couple of decades. Especially supporting the Saudis, the coup against Mosadegh, the propping up of the Taliban and the Iraq war.

Thomas Eshuis wrote:the notion that radical Islam, specifically, is the greatest threat to liberal values is black and white nonsense.

surreptitious57 wrote:She knows far more about Islam than Western liberals since she used to be a Muslim. Though that aside
they may still be reluctant to criticise it for fear of being labelled racist whereas she can do so without
being labelled one. Both of these reasons may be while she angers them. The first is justifiable but the
second not so because legitimate criticism of Islam does not equate to racism under any circumstances

Ven. Kwan Tam Woo wrote:

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I recall another dumb remark about how, if social assistance hadn't been available, the guy who killed Theo Van Gogh would have had a job and been at work and Van Gogh would be alive.

How is that a dumb remark? If that piece of shit was busy finding or holding down a job, then at the very least he'd have had less time to pursue his ambition to become the Netherlands's most violent film critic.

She's a neocon. It doesn't cause me to dismiss her thoughts and opinions on everything but I certainly dismiss her opinions on certain topics! She's like anyone else - terrific in some respects and so wrong in others.

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:Enter tantrumming white knight!

Ven. Kwan Tam Woo wrote:

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I recall another dumb remark about how, if social assistance hadn't been available, the guy who killed Theo Van Gogh would have had a job and been at work and Van Gogh would be alive.

How is that a dumb remark? If that piece of shit was busy finding or holding down a job, then at the very least he'd have had less time to pursue his ambition to become the Netherlands's most violent film critic.

Lol, a lack of social assistance doesn't result in lower levels of unemployment. Derp. The notion social assistance was the difference between Theo Van Gogh being murdered or not is based on a false assumption.

It's not like having a job would have prevented him from murdering the dude anyways.

She's a neocon. It doesn't cause me to dismiss her thoughts and opinions on everything but I certainly dismiss her opinions on certain topics! She's like anyone else - terrific in some respects and so wrong in others.

How is she a neocon? And why is that sufficient justification for dismissing her views on "certain topics"?

Because neoconservatism is, in the literal sense of the world, retarded. Opinions based on unreliable, dumb, ignorrant philosophies should be dismissed.

I see you're not at all familiar with the AEI, at which she's been a fellow, but you're welcome to educate yourself! I just have better things to do than teach the bigotted.

Ven. Kwan Tam Woo wrote:

Rachel Bronwyn wrote:I recall another dumb remark about how, if social assistance hadn't been available, the guy who killed Theo Van Gogh would have had a job and been at work and Van Gogh would be alive.

How is that a dumb remark? If that piece of shit was busy finding or holding down a job, then at the very least he'd have had less time to pursue his ambition to become the Netherlands's most violent film critic.

Ven. Kwan Tam Woo wrote:

surreptitious57 wrote:She knows far more about Islam than Western liberals since she used to be a Muslim. Though that aside
they may still be reluctant to criticise it for fear of being labelled racist whereas she can do so without
being labelled one. Both of these reasons may be while she angers them. The first is justifiable but the
second not so because legitimate criticism of Islam does not equate to racism under any circumstances

Lefties are all about Big Government and wealth redistribution. Islam is all about Big Government and wealth redistribution - indeed Islam is about as 'Big Government' as you can get. Islam hates Christianity and the Jews, as does the Left. Couple this with the unacknowledged Christ Complex that lefties collectively have which causes them to equate criticism of Islam with racism against poor defenseless little "brown people", and it's no wonder that they fulminate with sanctimonious indignation when Hirsi dares to tell the truth about Islam.

Ven. Kwan Tam Woo wrote:

surreptitious57 wrote:She knows far more about Islam than Western liberals since she used to be a Muslim. Though that aside
they may still be reluctant to criticise it for fear of being labelled racist whereas she can do so without
being labelled one. Both of these reasons may be while she angers them. The first is justifiable but the
second not so because legitimate criticism of Islam does not equate to racism under any circumstances

Lefties are all about Big Government and wealth redistribution. Islam is all about Big Government and wealth redistribution

- indeed some versions of Islam is about as 'Big Government' as you can get. some versions of Islam hates some versions of Christianity and some versions of the Jews, as does some versions of the Left.

Couple this with the unacknowledged Christ Complex that some versions of lefties collectively have which causes them to equate criticism of Islam with racism against poor defenseless little "brown people", and it's no wonder that they fulminate with sanctimonious indignation when Hirsi dares to tell the truth about Islam.

In fact, in 2003, Harper said he found "vile and disgusting" the notion that same-sex marriage might be a civil rights issue.