Islam is not a religion. It's a cult. A large cult. Soon to have nuclear weapons.
Everything you need to know about Islam can be found in "Gunga Din" (the 1930's movie). Substitute Muslims for Thugees -- all the rest of it fits.
"But I have a huge problem with the mob mentality that screams for the blood of individuals for either a perceived or real action by someone against their religion." When a religion is a total fabrication from men's minds, then men have to go to extremes for their god ... it's self-aggrandizement don'tchaknow.
It looks like the fuze didn't go off on the last message so let's try again:
>We have seen some disturbing instances lately concerning the perception of defilement of the Quran. First and foremost, I >do not condone defilement of any holy book. It serves no purpose, and it is inconsiderate.
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>However, do those who do such things merit death? This is something about Islam I have never been able to understand, from >the death warrant on Salman Rushdie to others in Islamic nations who have been put to death for supposedly blaspheming >Islam, to the riots we see around the world presently for an irresponsible act of journalism.
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"However, do those who do such things merit death?" The same way that heresy merited death for some Christians - mainly because it challenged the established order and property, and with 'The Church' being a big power-holder, Bishops ruling over their own Bishopbrics, then challenge to that order was more serious that challenge to mere dogma - it meant loss of cash.
>Even if what was reported was true, the deaths and mayhem that followed shows the world the heart of Islam. Now I will >most certainly receive a lot of emails from Muslims claiming this is not Islam, but depending on which Quran they >themselves read, they may also be guilty of not adhering to Islam according to many scholars in their own religion.
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Religion is a vehicle. It is seen in the image of the beholder.
No-one runs their life by the theology, even the fundamentalists ie those who think they have a higher quantity of the theology in their lives than non-fundamentalists.
The theology was constructed by the theologians. If you ran it as a program in a computer, it would crash all the time because of the contradictions and ambiguities.
This is why theology is such a good servant and such a poor master. It serves the beholders. Not governs them.
There is not need to examine just Islam in this respect. Any religion will do.
>I believe every human has the right to protest if they feel an injustice was done to them. I have no problem with people >being angry if they feel their religion was slammed. But I have a huge problem with the mob mentality that screams for the >blood of individuals for either a perceived or real action by someone against their religion.
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You have misread the current news. In Afghanistan for example, the protests were organized. And ready to take off-the-shelf. They were not spontaneous. The expose was posted on freerepublic. Hamid Karzai mentioned on his visit to the West.
The 'protests' are the same mechanism that the liberals had with their anti-war protests. These people did not find the call to arms in the invasion of Irak. They had a life-long campaign against the Imperialist oppressors and this was just a good opportunity to further it.
>And I will also no doubt receive many emails telling me that the West has committed atrocities against Muslims. And no >doubt they have. However, the emails I receive never claim the Western culture as the villain, but Christians and Jews, >specifically as a religious entity, not a culture.
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I simply don't follow this bit. Western Culture ? Too vague to be of any use.
>And I always need to reply stating that if a Western nation goes to war or does something horrible, they never do it while >screaming “God is great”! or “Death to the unbelievers!”, they simply are going the way of mankind and doing what they do >for their own self interest.
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So it's OK as long as you don't shout anything while charging someone else's trenches or firebombing a foreign city ?
>But Islam seems to differ greatly from the other great religions in this respect. The emails this last year I have >received also solidify my feelings on this issue, because many have been quite biting and violent. Yes, I am a Christian. >And many times in my life I have heard people bad mouth God. I have seen people desecrate the Bible. I have been told >religion is for the weak and stupid. I have been told there is no God. I have laughed at, I have heard the skeptics rail >on the Bible, and I have heard the worst of what man can think about God, Christianity, Judaism, and the Bible.
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Oh I get it ... Christianity is different because it's in your image while Islam is rotten because it's in theirs.
>I have also seen Buddhists and Jews endure the same treatment of their religion and God, as well as Hindus. But Between >Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, and Buddhism, we all seem to take the position that all people have a right to believe >what they desire, and all will bear the consequences of their beliefs and actions either in the hereafter, or in the next >life however it is perceived.
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"that all people have a right to believe what they desire" Again you are merely one of this people who are emailing you telling you that their version of Islam is not someone else's:
We had the Inquisition and the Albigensian Crusades and the death sentence handed out to heretics like Giordano Bruno.
It's just occurred to me that a lot of people will not realize that the Albigensian Crusades took place in Europe and were so that heretics could be exterminated by Christians.
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Perhaps you'd like to claim that their Christianity is not your Christianity. Feel bad that murders are being committed in your name ? Feel you're being tarred with the same brush ? That's just too bad.
>We feel our God can not only defend Himself without our petty interference, but He is also the only worthy judge of our >lives and actions. Though we may strive for a more holy lifestyle, we all recognize our weaknesses and attempt to better >ourselves while creating no harm to others.
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"Though we may strive for a more holy lifestyle, we all recognize our weaknesses and attempt to better >ourselves while creating no harm to others"
Just like most Muslims.
>And we all watch as Islamists world wide are running rampant in the streets without even knowing for sure if the story they >heard was true or not.
Now we're into propaganda rather than fact and analysis. BILLIONS of Muslims stayed at home.
>It will not even matter to them that the story has been retracted. They now have a reason to Jihad, >and Jihad they will.
Yeah yeah the sky's falling in.
>The truth matters not, the fire has been lit and the violent protests have begun.
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Excellent - real rabble rousing stuff. You're on a roll ! Keep going !
Stop ! Wait ! I can hear they coming down the street now !
>It also seems not >to matter that some Muslims claim the Quran condemns killing and mayhem. They will simply take the other verses that >condone those actions and run with them.
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Just like all believers everywhere. See above paragraphs.
>And people will die. Homes and property will be destroyed, lives ruined. And all due to a supposed blaspheming of the >Quran. Now I may be wrong, but my idea of blasphemy was that a god or entity had to be spoken of irreverently, not a book >or religion itself.
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What's the difference ?
>But Fatwah have been issued worldwide because someone either blasphemed Islam, the Quran, Muhammad, or Allah. People have >been murdered for speaking against a religion that I have been told hundreds of times is NOT a religion of compulsion.
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Islam is a religion of compulsion to those who want it to be that way. It is their vehicle. Others see it differently. All are wrong.
>They have been ostracized for not believing, killed for leaving, and beheaded for Islam or their take against it.
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>And I am not talking about the period of the Crusades, or any other time in history where the medieval mind ruled.
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Bzzzzzt .... Islamic countries differ from the Middle Ages in that they now have telex. That's it. The medieval mind (frequently) rules.
Western countries, of course, differ from the Middle Ages in that they don't wear colorful uniforms and can slaughter each other's civilian population in their thousands from 22,000 feet. The 20thC was the most barbarous yet in European history. And it's all so far behind us ... like five years behind us.
Muslim small boy: "Daddy, why are the Westerners so barbarous, slaughtering all those innocent women and children like they did ?"
Muslim Dad: "I don't know son, they're just barbarians I guess."
But wait I hear you cry ! That was not us kind-hearted Freedonian Christians ! It was the wicked black-hearted Sylvanian Christians.
Muslim Dad: "Don't listen to him son. They're all the same these Christians"
>I am >talking now, 2005 in an age of information, an age of education, mass media, telecommunications, and on and on.
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What's this got to do with it ? None of these things are prevalent in Islamic countries - information is controlled. It's difficult enough to find out what's really happening from the US media - do you think they can make a better go of it ?
>And I see not one Western Muslim entity who claims Islam is peace over in Saudi Arabia, Afghanistan, Iran, Sudan, or anywhere en masse in a huge effort to educate their brethren in what they consider a peaceful religion.
Don't understand this sentence.
>I have heard a spattering of >imams decrying terror and murder, but with 2 billion people worldwide, one might think perhaps that the story we keep >hearing of terrorists being the minority in Islam is nothing more than a fairy tale.
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Bzzzzzttt.... as per other paragraphs. People do not speak their mind in police states. And there has never been a time when they could.
>If Allah needs his people to kidnap for him, murder for him, riot for him, and if the Quran needs to be shown to the world >as a Holy book using the same methods, how will this world ever see Islam, Allah, and the Quran as anything else than a >bloody entity?
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Millions of Muslims do none of the above. You make them sound like a 50s Sci-Fi plague.
>Yet the so called peaceful Muslims try and talk to those who are not Muslim, and try to teach us the more peaceful ways of >Islam they claim exist.
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Rhetoric.
>But it is not us who need to hear these things. We are not the ones kidnapping, murdering, raping, >beheading, all the while screaming out the name of our God.
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Neither are millions of Muslims.
>Governments may do these things. But I do not see people >screaming out the name of Jesus or Krishna, or Buddha while performing deplorable acts of evil.
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Again - you seem to focus on keeping quiet while you are committing atrocities. I'm all for keeping the noise down, but fail to see the significance of this point. I posted a paragraph showing instances of Christians doing that.
>It is Islam itself that needs to be educated by you peaceful Muslims.
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No doubt it will happen in the same way that Christian got over its period of murdering non-believers, burning alive those who uttered contradicitons to established orthodoxy, mounting Holy Wars against those Christians who differed in their interpretation.
>Not the rest of us. We see what we see, and we know >what we know, and whether you believe it or not, many of us have read the Quran and felt it was not for us and perhaps >chose another religion. But our former religion did not have us killed or ordered to be put to death for leaving. Some >have even left our religions and become Satanists. Sad as it may be to the followers of the God of Abraham, we believe >they have their choice and will face God Himself. We truly believe our God is strong enough and holy enough to defend >Himself and to rightly judge others. He does not want us to, or need us to commit acts of evil to show the world He is >Holy and Just. Some will mock Him, mock the Bible, and our ways. But we have no right to slaughter those who do so.
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"But we have no right to slaughter those who do so" Oh wait. So when did this happen ? I'm not always up on current affaires and might have missed it. I suppose it was the Reformation when the last big slaughter on minor religious differences took place.
And a lot of people in Northern Ireland have a different view to yours.
>Muslims, teach your own. Go into the world and put your faith to the test. Go to the aforementioned nations and get on >those loud speakers yourselves. Decry those actions and diffuse this madness through your teachings and outreach to >Muslims who have been deceived. And perhaps the world will believe your message when we see that happen.
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>Or are you afraid perhaps that those passages they use from the Quran can not be debated? And perhaps by teaching peace >and love, compassion and truth, that you yourself may be the next blasphemer and sentenced to death?
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>I often wonder why those who proclaim peace in Islam never seem to take the message to where the violence is. They simply >seem to try and tell us that the atrocities we see in the name of Islam are not what Islam espouses.
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Murder is a (capital) offense in these countries.
>But I say, images and actions speak louder than opinion. Until you allow Allah to fight his own battles, your people and >religion will always be suspect.
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So the entire group of millions of Muslims are suspect ? Perhaps we should take Aleric, the Pope's representative, at the massacre at Bezier in France: "Kill them all God will know his own !" - Oh but wait - he was a Christian. Oh dashit - it's all so complicated.
>Pete Fisher is a concerned citizen in the Chicago area who has written several articles on the economy, educational >system, politics, and religion. He has been feature on several sites such as RenewAmerica.us, Blessedcause.com, >Michnews.com, RichardMullenax.com, The Rant.us, and has been circulated on various other sites worldwide. He is a 6 year >veteran of the Armed Forces.
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You, my friend, are just as bad as the rabble-rousing Immams which you criticize in your text. The terrorists who camouflage their own psychopathogens in Islam don't worry me. I can deal with them with a three 230 grain JHPs, two to the body, one to the head. But people like you are a much more subtle customer, and while not dangerous in yourself, you could well bring about, possibly well-meaning, but ultimately ignorant actions in others. I hope enlightenment is visited upon you.