Fighting Ideas with Ideas

[VinceC]

Islam won't. It can't. It is an algorithm of hermetically sealed thought that has no foundation within it for synthesis or argument with itself. It enforces itself by death sentences. It's ideological base is fundamentally opposed to the value set we of the West depend on for democracy and our way of life. Islam, just like Communism, must be confronted head-on at its roots, and the message needs to be repeated over and over again.

Interesting. Christianity spent between 500 and 1,000 years in this kind of inflexible character. I believe the last religious-based death sentences in Europe took place less than 200 years ago. In post-Moorish Spain, it was not illegal to be Jewish or Muslim. The principal targets of the Inquisition were the large numbers of Conversos, and to relapse was punishable by death.

Many non-Christians find tenets of Christianity to be disturbing, particularly its powerful insistance on conversion, which has had the multiple effects of self-rightiousness, intolerance and the overwhelming of local cultures.

For 1,000 years, the most religiously, culturally tolerant empires were those that followed the Islamic conquests. Much of Western antiquity was preserved by these empires and rediscovered by Christian invaders during the Crusades, laying the foundations of the Western Renaissance.

To see Islam synthesized with the modern world, I recommend visiting Cairo, Istanbul, Sarajevo, Baku, Jakarta, even Tehran (where the current populist president was elected in opposition to the more moderate candidate preferred by the powerful religious elite).

[Rex Brynen]

Interesting. Christianity spent between 500 and 1,000 years in this kind of inflexible character. I believe the last religious-based death sentences in Europe took place less than 200 years ago.

Although hardly involving the death penalty, the last successful legal prosecution for religious (Christian) blasphemy in the UK was in..... 1977.

[Brian Hanley]

Interesting. Christianity spent between 500 and 1,000 years in this kind of inflexible character. I believe the last religious-based death sentences in Europe took place less than 200 years ago. In post-Moorish Spain, it was not illegal to be Jewish or Muslim. The principal targets of the Inquisition were the large numbers of Conversos, and to relapse was punishable by death.

A total of some 3,000 or so over hundreds of years. Compare that to a single one of many under the various Muslim empires which killed all men between 15 and 45? Last one was in Europe in Belgrade AFAIK. Additionally, since Jesus very clearly did not support killing in this way, it was not supported by doctrine, rather by politics. (Post revolutionary politics. Compare with Russia circa 1930's.) That is the reverse of what Islam has in doctrine. Doctrine matters. In point of fact, the Moors violated Koran by not allowing Christians to convert to Islam, probably because they needed the tax base to support the Muslim overlords in the style to which they were accustomed.

Many non-Christians find tenets of Christianity to be disturbing, particularly its powerful insistance on conversion, which has had the multiple effects of self-rightiousness, intolerance and the overwhelming of local cultures.

Do they now? And how many have found the choice between conversion to Islam or death disturbing? And how many have found the choice between conversion to Islam and life as a marked formally second class citizen or slave disturbing? How many have found the choice between remaining in their religion and being charged a head tax as a dhimmi to the point they had to give away their children disturbing?

For 1,000 years, the most religiously, culturally tolerant empires were those that followed the Islamic conquests. Much of Western antiquity was preserved by these empires and rediscovered by Christian invaders during the Crusades, laying the foundations of the Western Renaissance.

Invaders during the Crusades? Let's see. 600 years of brutal conquest starting in the Arabian peninsula and radiating out across North Africa and into Europe and across Turkey and into Europe responded to by a few brief sallies into the "holy land"?

Yes, there was a time that ended with the Abassid Caliph, when Islam was marginally more tolerant and valued learning. There was a time when parts of Europe did not. But it was based on a system of economics that disallowed lending money for interest. Consequently, when the empire stopped expanding and the net real interest rate went negative because conquest wasn't bringing fresh booty in, there was a recession/depression that lasted for almost 1000 years. This coincided with the death of the Abassid Caliph who ruled that Koran was the word of man, not god.

Besides, I thought it was the Irish that saved civilization? (There's a book by that name.)

To see Islam synthesized with the modern world, I recommend visiting Cairo, Istanbul, Sarajevo, Baku, Jakarta, even Tehran (where the current populist president was elected in opposition to the more moderate candidate preferred by the powerful religious elite).

You think I haven't seen some of them? Cairo, the city were fathers have recently cut the heads off their daughters and paraded around with them on poles, with no legal action taken. Istanbul, the capital that elected Gul, an Islamist who is pushing the Army into "doing something" to show those Americans - turning back the clock as we speak. Tehran, a place where non-Muslims are allowed to live if they pay the jizya and don't convert anyone. I suggest that you look at the streets, their poverty, and pay attention to the undercurrent that has been hacking away underneath the militarily enforced secularism descended from Ataturk.

Perhaps you are unaware that there is no democracy in the entire Muslim world that does not exist as a pageant controlled by military rule to enforce secularism. (Iran is an odd one, it is a democracy that exists within the militarily enforced religious rule of the Ayatollahs, the descendents of Ali.)