[OT] - Interview with a former Jihadist

[farwest1]

noisetonepause:

Point well taken. People are the problem, but I would argue that certain religions make bad people worse. I'd rather have the whole world Buddhist (though still not a religion in my book) than Islamic or Christian.

Incidentally, Hitler was raised as a Lutheran and a large component of Nazism was Lutheranism. And his entire program was based around the mastery of one religion over another.

Secular humanism isn't perfect, certainly, but I would argue that if you practice it intelligently, it's far more moral and accepting than the monotheistic religions.

[robtronik]

what i am saying to you is that a small portion of the population is nopt a threat to us until we engender them with the ammunition they need to gain popular sympathy.


the strength of radical islam is partially our problem in this regard. You choose to believe that we are 100% innocent of provoking this response. I think that that is just as dangerous and close mined a view as that of radical islam.


i am a mystic.

i believe that we are all of the same source.

i believe that all of the basic common people of the world share the same enemy.

I believe that none of the common people of this world ever truly want war.

unfortunately i also believe that they are easily duped into believing a lot of nonsense by a small group of greedy men who rule the world's nations (on all sides).




you see me as not wanting to have dialog with you. That is not the case, i just believe the dialog must be on an entirely different level. How can i begin to speak with someone who truly believe that they are 100% in the right?



.lm.

of course, this is where the meme occurs where it is "our" fault because we provided them the causation for their attacks... (the bolded part above).

You've stated your POV on how you approach these arguments (apparently on a higher level than us), so why don't you apply your POV to the points being made specifically so you can add to the discussion?

I think we all agree that ideology is the problem. Where that ideology eminated from is probably the source of much debate - most of the causes right in thier own way (a little bit of this reason, a bit of that reason).

But all of the forces gathered to allow it to fester have occured. It's here now.

So, what do we do about it?

It is clearly at odds with our way of life, beliefs, and principles (assuming you believe in liberal, westernized principles and how they've manifested themselves in our various socieities), so the question is: what do we do from here?

Clearly there is not enough western literature & philosophy available in these places where our ideas on self rule, tolerance, etc. can be read and helped to understand why we have come to live the way we have. Secondly, an opposite vision of our preferred way of life is preached to those who really need to hear how life can be lived in tolerance, equality, acceptance of others despite reasonable religious differences (i.e. you know, we should necessarily accept devil killing children worshipers out of religious tolerance, there is a line )...

It is a war of ideas, and all the fighting is just a by-product of the real problem.

rob.

[noisetonepause]

Secular humanism isn't perfect, certainly, but I would argue that if you practice it intelligently, it's far more moral and accepting than the monotheistic religions.

Yeah, well, you like Richard Dawkins.

[leisuremuffin]

sir, you talk about ideology being the problem while excluding your own from scrutiny.


all i can say is this:

use whatever you want to justify the violence, but i can tell you this: Violence will never end violence unless it is so great that it snuffs out every last life.



examine your motivations, examine our motivations as a nation and you may find that they are not without flaw either. that's what i'm saying.


look, i know what you're going to say next. You'll say, OK, well you're living in a fantasy world, in the real world violence does solve problems. Well, we've fought the war to end wars twice now. Are you ready for the third?



.lm.

[farwest1]

noisetonepause:

didn't quite get that Dawkins comment.....

[ethios4]

well, nothing happens in a vacuum, thats for sure.

Did radical Islamism spring up because it was fed by the foreign policy of the west?

Did the crusades happen because they were fed by the violence of the Muslim world?

That radically violent politicized Islam exists as a lifestyle for some people is pretty hard to dispute. What to do about it is where the question lies, to me.

For me, Rob and Monty's posts have helped me to better understand the reality of this situation, but I strongly disagree with what the Bush administration, the US Congress, and the US people have done about it.

To me, it is very clear that either a) Bush,Cheney,Rumsfeld, et al are truly, severely incompetent to an unbelievable degree or b) their private motivations are totally different than their public motivations.

I don't believe a, because Cheny and Rumsfeld have proven themselves to be quite brilliant in the past, so I tend towards b. What they have done is just about the worst things they could have reasonably done, imo. The fact that mo is shared by hundreds of millions of people and experts around the world lends credence to the accuracy of mo.

Reading Rumsfeld's bio on wikipedia last night was pretty scary....reading about the "swine flu epidemic" of the mid-70's....eerily like the "bird flu epidemic". And what about him sitting go n the board of the company that sold a light-water reactor to North Korea in 2000? Or him trying to get people stirred up about the immediate threat of WMDs in Iraq for 15+ years? The guy just keeps going around in circles....

What to do about it is the question.

[b0unce]

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[robtronik]

sir, you talk about ideology being the problem while excluding your own from scrutiny.


all i can say is this:

use whatever you want to justify the violence, but i can tell you this: Violence will never end violence unless it is so great that it snuffs out every last life.



examine your motivations, examine our motivations as a nation and you may find that they are not without flaw either. that's what i'm saying.


look, i know what you're going to say next. You'll say, OK, well you're living in a fantasy world, in the real world violence does solve problems. Well, we've fought the war to end wars twice now. Are you ready for the third?



.lm.

well, you are clearly not reading what I wrote. How can one win the war of ideology through violence except by mass genocide of those that believe differently than you?

You can't. And this is an approach that is abhorrent to me - killing those that disagree with you based on different ideas.

You know, the old saying: I may disagree with you, but I will fight to the death for your RIGHT to disagree with me.

I believe in that whole heartedly. The problem is, the radicalized islamic jihadists do not agree with that principle. They would rather wipe out a way of life than allow it to continue (re: Taliban blows up ancient buddhist statues in Afghanistan, when they clearly are historical artifacts and not threatening religious symbols, etc.). This wiping out also includes at best, segregating those who aren't adherents to their islamic belief, and at worst, killing those who don't convert.

Examine my own beliefs? I didn't realize that my own beliefs were worth examining - unless you think my beliefs that support enfranchisement, liberalized democracy, principles of equality and tolerance of others who would do me no harm are subject to examining. By all means, I guess, go ahead - but I find that examining the motivations, causations, and principles of those who WOULD KILL ME for being who I am quite worth critical examination.

As a general rule, U.S. and western based democracies are internally fighting TOWARDS making a better life for all within based on increasingly progressive values like the one's I mention above.

Where in Sharia law does this occur except for true believers? Where does this progressive stance take place with people that will blow themselves up and kill others around them (in the name of their cause) exist? Are they fighting for the rights of those around them? Do they care if their women work or go to school or get equal pay? Do they protect the rights of those that practice a different religion than them? Are the tolerant of Jews, Christians, and citizens of other countries that are not muslim?

Clearly the answer is no. But this applies to a small number of muslims who have politicized their religion and have decided that they are at WAR with western values and the countries that uphold them.

And the great sadness to all of this, is that what we call western values, really are human values worth promoting and supporting and protecting - and spreading since they are, at heart, about finding ways to live amongst each other even with our differences.

That has been the great American experiment in self rule and, although not perfect by any stretch of the imagination, we've done a lot within our country to try to reach those ideals over the last 230+ years. Is that worth protecting?

Yes.

Is it worth hoping that others can live a life based on those principles?

Yes.

Is it worth fighting against those who would eliminate those gains we've made and wish to share?

Yes.

The question is HOW? I'd love to hear what you think about that.

rob.

[b0unce]

***SplooOoo0o0oooOo0ooOo0oOOGEEE***

Yo Contra, mop that shit up with your beard.
Yo Rob, mop that shit off your face with Contra's beard.
Yo M breqs, how was Anti-Islam camp today ? did you play pin-the-missle-on-osama ? and eat the toasted marshmallows of israel ? and take a nap in the blanky of stars and stripes ? and did the scarey brown man wake you up with a hose ?

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[robtronik]

[rtopia]

Violence will never end violence unless it is so great that it snuffs out every last life.

"violence" will never end

Well, we've fought the war to end wars twice now.
Are you ready for the third?

The point is moot - we're already fighting the 3rd.

It's just a matter of time and further diplomatic miscalculation until we go from "playoffs" to the "world cup"

- r

[Contra]

***SplooOoo0o0oooOo0ooOo0oOOGEEE***

Yo Contra, mop that shit up with your beard.
Yo Rob, mop that shit off your face with Contra's beard.
Yo M breqs, how was Anti-Islam camp today ? did you play pin-the-missle-on-osama ? and eat the toasted marshmallows of israel ? and take a nap in the blanky of stars and stripes ? and did the scarey brown man wake you up with a hose ?

*tug*
*tug*
*tug*

ol nasty ass....

[M. Bréqs]

the quoted article at the beginning of this thread made a claim that is truly weird "Stop asking what you have done wrong. Stop it! They're slaughtering you like sheep and you still look within. You criticize your history, your institutions, your churches. Why can't you realize that it has nothing to do with what you have done but with what they want."

In my opinion that's the worst thing to do, to ignore all the problems that israel with the help pf the US has brought to the middle east and blaim the whole thing on some book.

There has been polls when people are asked what do they fear the most, and not surprisingly the answer was, the US, that's the major issue of our times, a country so powerfull that can kill us all and then blaim us for it.

The US isn't the problem here. Global powers (The Arab world, certain former colonialist European states, China) all have a vested economic interest in checking US power. They're not coordinating or conspiring, but a junction of mutual interest has given them the motivation to "take the US down a peg". So what you're seeing is a concerted psychological warfare campaign to discredit the US unfortunately.

I strongly believe that the US does more good than harm in the world, and that people who wish the US would pull up stakes and fuck off, should be careful what they wish for...

A neo-isolationist USA would be the worst thing that could befall this planet, I assure you. Just try and enjoy making electronic music in a maoist dictatorship, a theocratic hell or if you're the bottom rung of a caste system.

So for what it's worth, I'll take the good Doctor's advice and I have stopped asking what my society has done wrong - we're inthe right here, and those who can't see that are fooling themselves.

[M. Bréqs]

You, and the others have no excuse for being uninformed. The only thing I come back to is pure vanity.

I'll assume you don't include me in that "others" group there MW... I know it's hard for some people to accept that disagreement does not necessarily equal ignorance. I'm quite well read in leftist / anti-US / anti-war / anti-globalization / anti-commercialist / environmentalist literature.

[M. Bréqs]

www.abrahamic-faith.org

www.yourarmstoisrael.org

search for world war 3 : unmasking the end time beast.

Anyways, Contra; I read a fair amount at the above sites from the links you posted, and I gotta say I don't agree with you at all. Religious Jewish extremism is just as wacky as what these jihadist assholes believe, sorry. Apocalyptic prophesy isn't going to help anything.

What we need is a secularization of Islam, and only people like Ishrad Manji and Dr. Tawfik Hamid can do that.