Posted on 06/15/2016 10:03:03 PM PDT by sparklite2
Many Western analysts of terrorism, and of Middle Eastern politics, are bad at religion. They prefer empirical explanations for individual and group actions, and so they’d rather avoid wrestling with God. They’re also likely to see religion as infinitely adaptable, an “epiphenomenal” cover for political or economic grievance—or fertile ground for the mentally unhinged.
Many in the secular West cannot imagine that a religion can meaningfully differ from privatized, post-Enlightenment Protestantism, which usually serves as their template for all public religion. Since Islam and Islamism today behave differently from Christianity in the West, these Westerners assume God’s obstinate presence in Middle Eastern politics is the result of some other process. Whether this stems from a lack of imagination, or from a belief that examining Islam’s theological particulars constitutes bigotry, the consequence is a refusal to consider religion on its own terms whenever it bleeds into the news.
In other words, they fail to think like jihadis.
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalinterest.org ...
Islam is a race. 0bakq says so.
Sorry, this guy yaks on and on.
You can easily say it in a sentence;
Islam is a political system masquerading as religion to make uneducated people obey.
So, that said there are plenty of ‘educated’ people who seem to find solace in being ordered on pain of death to do things any sane person would find abhorrent.
Liberalism is also a mental disorder.
Feel free to repeat as necessary.
Why is the erudite author unable to complete the circle? Timidity? or fear?
The missing arc is that one thing is crucially left unexamined.
In order to enlighten the reluctant, the fact that it is essential that the "uneducated," read 'ignorant,' significantly outnumber the educated, who then go along with the irrational "religion" out of physical fear, is necessary.
And the "uneducated" must be culturally attuned to prevail through lethal force.
Since human nature tends, like energy, towards entropy* (the tendency to disorder, the path of least energy expenditure), the path of least expenditure of social energy must always result in vastly more of the uneducated.
The existence of a muslim culture consisting entirely of rational, educated and knowledgeable individuals is a permanent impossibility.
Islam is a form of government, that masquerades as a religion.
Good analysis.
When anyone talks about Islam as a “religion”, it only proves that the speaker does not grasp “Islam 101”.
No it is not. Obama is wrong as always.
If we have freedom of religion and a religion advocates violence, conquest, child abuse, the subjugation of women and mass murder, I guess there is nothing we can or should do about it. /s
I believe the first amendment is at fault in saying that Congress shall make no laws restricting the EXERCISE of religion. And they’re taking full advantage of that.
Part of Muslims exercise of their religion is to get rid of all other religions by whatever mean at their disposal.
That portion of the first amendment needs to be amended.
No the fault is accepting the premise that Islam is a religion.
I am honored that you took time to respond to me.
My intent with brevity was to avoid redundancy.
I agree with your extension of my comment. Chopping, raping, burning alive, stoning, killing innocents and like activities are all things sane people avoid.
I have no doubt left some out but people who are not sociopathic are able to fill in the parts they would not like done to them and thereby know not to do them to others.
Your comment on entropy is too true, especially these days. The America that went to the moon is submerged in PC thought and active suppression through government ‘education’ and ‘help’ by destroying the concept of self-reliance.
I am hopeful in any case. I am a glass half full kind of person.
As the coins on the chessboard, influence one a day with a smile and a cheerful thought and things will improve remarkably.
Thanks
Exactly.
A picture is worth a thousand words; proven once again.
” No the fault is accepting the premise that Islam is a religion.”
One billion plus and growing say it is and nowhere in the constitution does it define what religion is. Even pastafarians have won court cases using the first amendment as their defense.
The fault is exactly in the constitution. I imagine the founders didn’t have Islam in mind when they wrote those words.
Normally, people expect a “religion” to be about goodness in some manner. This is, at least outwardly, the case with most world faiths.
Islam, however, manages to be bad more effectively than even Satanism does. Satanism is mostly about self indulgence while usually not being overtly bothersome.
Could there be “badder” faiths? Maybe there are, in darkest Africa or some locale like that, but we typically do not hear about them because the number of followers is so little. Islam has managed to achieve a maximum of badness multiplied by number of adherents.
Exactly. You put me in mind of a new tv series called LUCIFER. The main character is not evil and he fears his Father but, as you said, suffers from selfishness. His journey is about becoming more aware of others. In any case, there was an episode where he confronted a group of Satanists and relentlessly mocked them. So, yes, absolutely agree about Islam - it is the darkest of theocratic viruses and the moderates (a few of them, friends of mine) are irrelevant. This virus will come to a head.
The devil has managed to play this situation up to a pretty fair degree of badness.
Getting the sons of Ishmael involved may be part of the curse being reaped. A permission to the demonic may be involved which might not be granted with respect to another people group. It’s a living illustration of the tragedy of Abraham’s impatience, and by implication the impatience of believers in general. There aren’t any valid short cuts in saving faith. Attempts to create them only open various doors to evil in a belief system that is religious but it isn’t godly.
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