Islam vs. the Western World: off-topic posts from a Religion thread

[quadraphonics]

Anti-Muslim sentiments have been present in Muslim countries ever since Islam was established. There are still now a great number of anti-Islamic writers busy in countries with a large Muslim population, and yet, no protests such as we saw during the Rushdie affair. Fact of the matter is that Pipes and Hitchens have nothing on the real intellectuals that are actually present in Islamic countries and engaged in active debate with Muslims and vice versa.

It's interesting how you confuse the presence of (and acceptance of) certain sentiments amongst nonbelievers in "Muslim countries," with the presence of said sentiments in Muslims themselves.

All im saying that its typical for people that havent read his book to defend the book under freedom of speech.

And where are these people?

Not here, as far as I can tell.

That s the crux of the matter and something which you wont understand, since it wasnt your people that were being oppressedd and slaughtered and colonised.

Wait, weren't Rushdie's people the ones being colonized? I seem to recall India being a colony when he was born there, and him writing a book or two that might have mentioned this stuff in passing...

I'm confused about how a relatively liberal Indian intellectual got on the same list as Daniel Pipes here...

And I'm troubled by the way you conflate his criticism of traditionalism and tribalism with attacks on Islam as a whole.

Fact of the matter is that no one is condoning any fatwa (Which you probably dont even know the meaning of), no one is supporting any killing of him, yet we keep getting labelled that way when we say the reaction was understandable.

"The reaction" included the fatwa, and killing. If you are not condoning it by saying it was "understandable," (and generally portraying him as an evil person), then what are you implying?

Are you going to label Roald Dahl as well because he said the reaction was inevitable and Rushdie knew it?

"Inevitable" is far short of "understandable," so I'd label him a "coward" or perhaps "weakling." But what can you expect from someone who writes children's novels...

Are you going to wonder why Rushdie jeered the judges and the winner when one of his books didnt win a prize?

What in the hell does that have to do with anything?

Are you going to ask yourself why it is that Rushdie got a play cancelled because he was offended by it?

See above.

Are you going to ask yourself why a film was banned, even is now, for blasphemy that came out right after Rushdies book?

No idea what you're talking about here. We don't ban films for blasphemy where I live, so I don't always hear about these things...

Are you going to ask yourself why so many books, films and games arebanned in the West?

I'm starting to ask myself if you have any handle on reality at all...

Are you going to ask yourself why there have been 7-8 isntances of book bunings in the West AFTER the Rushdie affair?

Who cares? The problem isn't that people want to purchase copies of his book for use as fuel, but that they want to threaten anyone in the world who would dare express ideas they dislike with death. And as long as the wacko groups that burn books are kept safely in check by the authorities, they don't impinge on anyone's right to freedom of speech or conscience.

There are other places, though, where the book burners are encouraged by the auhtorities, who conspire with them to do violence against those who disagree. These places tend to have 7-8 book burnings in any given weekend. At least when they can find some foreign tome none of them have read to get mad about; they don't tend to produce (or translate) many books themselves.

A lot of people read it and a lot of people understood the reaction, even though they did not condone the killings in any way.

A lack of understanding of the situation is not the reason I am troubled by it. Quite the opposite, actually.

Ofcourse it will reinforce that, since everything Rushdie attacked means absolutely squat to you.

Untrue. He also goes after many Western sacred cows, such as naive ideas about multiculturalism, arrogant ideations of foreigners, and any number of social conventions.

You havent even read the book.

Who is it that you are addressing again? There is nobody here who hasn't read the book arguing with you. You should stop haranguing this straw man, and come back to reality.

 

[Baron Max]

Ofcourse, America always acts in the interests of Pakistan and Aghanistan. See: US Predator drones kill atleast 100 civilians a month in Afghanistan and Pakistan since 2008, governments in both countries condemn attacks as counter-productive.

None of that matters, DH, we're there and we're gonna' stay there. Ain't nothing you say here is gonna' matter and we damned sure ain't gonna' leave just 'cause you say so.

Go ahead, do what Muslim extremists always do ....rattle your scimitars, bluster and scream, burn cars and buildings, threaten to exact your revenge on the USA, but it ain't gonna' change nothin'!

The USA is in Afghanistan and Iraq, and there ain't nothing you can do about it. Live with it.

Baron Max

 

[Arsalan]

It's got nothing whatsoever to do with colonization. Besides, if anything, the Muslims taught colonization to the Europeans, they did it first.

Not really. The colonisation practised by the Western World on the poorer countries was something that the Muslims hadnt done before.

 

[Arsalan]

Um, the people we are bombing are destabilizing Pakistan, they are an existential threat to it's government. Without interference, they would try to gain hold of power and nuclear weapons, and they are friends with Al Quida!

And if you could see what the pakistanis are saying then you would see that it is exactly this bombing that is part of the destabilizing that Pakistan is experiencing. It is not up to you to decide when other people are destabilizing their own country.

 

[spidergoat]

They don't consider themselves part of Pakistan! They want their own sharia law. Pakistan is occupying their ancient tribal region.

 

[Arsalan]

It's interesting how you confuse the presence of (and acceptance of) certain sentiments amongst nonbelievers in "Muslim countries," with the presence of said sentiments in Muslims themselves.

A Muslims with anti-Muslim sentiments is kind of like a self-hating Jew, You wont find many. There have been numerous books written in Muslim countries that look at Islam in a critical way and ask questions. But then, thats not enough is it?

And where are these people?

Not here, as far as I can tell.

I believe it was Ice.

Wait, weren't Rushdie's people the ones being colonized? I seem to recall India being a colony when he was born there, and him writing a book or two that might have mentioned this stuff in passing...

Yep they were and it was exactly those people who reacted.

I'm confused about how a relatively liberal Indian intellectual got on the same list as Daniel Pipes here...

And I'm troubled by the way you conflate his criticism of traditionalism and tribalism with attacks on Islam as a whole.

It was building up. His contributions to the overall imperialistic material angered people

"The reaction" included the fatwa, and killing. If you are not condoning it by saying it was "understandable," (and generally portraying him as an evil person), then what are you implying?

And no one supports those. However, we do support the dozens of articles and books that were written in response to his books and imperialism in general

"Inevitable" is far short of "understandable," so I'd label him a "coward" or perhaps "weakling." But what can you expect from someone who writes children's novels...

Ofcourse, pick and choose which author you want to support.

What in the hell does that have to do with anything?

See above.

No idea what you're talking about here. We don't ban films for blasphemy where I live, so I don't always hear about these things...

I'm starting to ask myself if you have any handle on reality at all...

The point is that all those things can somehow be excused by people like you without looking at his character and his overall intentions. To the people he hurt however, those are characteristics that portray the real Rushdie, which is not the icon of Freedom of Speech the west adorns him as.

Who cares? The problem isn't that people want to purchase copies of his book for use as fuel, but that they want to threaten anyone in the world who would dare express ideas they dislike with death. And as long as the wacko groups that burn books are kept safely in check by the authorities, they don't impinge on anyone's right to freedom of speech or conscience.

Ofcourse, but are they shown as regularly as those burnings of Rushdies books? No.

Untrue. He also goes after many Western sacred cows, such as naive ideas about multiculturalism, arrogant ideations of foreigners, and any number of social conventions.

Until he mocks 9/11, 7/7, Kitty Genovese and all these other events there isnt a comparison.

Who is it that you are addressing again? There is nobody here who hasn't read the book arguing with you. You should stop haranguing this straw man, and come back to reality.

I believe it was aimed at Ice

 

[Arsalan]

They don't consider themselves part of Pakistan! They want their own sharia law. Pakistan is occupying their ancient tribal region.

It doesnt matter. If 2 people in a country hate eachother and fight eachother, and you go in and bomb them, they will unite against you. It doesnt matter what differences they have among themselves, you will become their common enemy. Even Iranian intellectuals have warned the West that any war started with Iran would mean that they would have to fight the intellectuals as well.

 

[Baron Max]

It doesnt matter. If 2 people in a country hate eachother and fight eachother, and you go in and bomb them, they will unite against you. .....

And fight from behind the skirts of their women and use their own children as shields! ....and then whine and cry if those same women and kids get hurt.

Baron Max

 

[Arsalan]

And fight from behind the skirts of their women and use their own children as shields! ....and then whine and cry if those same women and kids get hurt.

Baron Max

They dont fight from behind the skirts of women and or use children as shields.

 

[Baron Max]

They dont fight from behind the skirts of women and or use children as shields.

The reports from the front lines in Afghanistan universally remark about the same things .....hiding in houses and homes, firing on the soldiers, then when the soldiers return fire, the Muslims of the world claim that everyone in the homes were innocent civilians!!

Good tactic for Muslim extremist propaganda, but it's kinda hard on the women and children who are forced into such situations.

Baron Max

 

[spidergoat]

It doesnt matter. If 2 people in a country hate eachother and fight eachother, and you go in and bomb them, they will unite against you. It doesnt matter what differences they have among themselves, you will become their common enemy. Even Iranian intellectuals have warned the West that any war started with Iran would mean that they would have to fight the intellectuals as well.

There is that factor I agree. But our attacks are also exaggerated for propaganda purposes.

 

[Arsalan]

The reports from the front lines in Afghanistan universally remark about the same things .....hiding in houses and homes, firing on the soldiers, then when the soldiers return fire, the Muslims of the world claim that everyone in the homes were innocent civilians!!

Good tactic for Muslim extremist propaganda, but it's kinda hard on the women and children who are forced into such situations.

Baron Max

There would be no situation if there wasnt an invading force attacking them. besides, how many times have the US forces engaged targes they considered to be hostile when they were near civilians?

 

[Baron Max]

There would be no situation if there wasnt an invading force attacking them.

There would have been no invasion if the Afghanis had given up ObL and the leaders of the Taliban when requested.

besides, how many times have the US forces engaged targes they considered to be hostile when they were near civilians?

As many times as they are fired upon by those same targets. It's not nice to fire on US soldiers when you're standing behind your wife and kids!!

Baron Max

 

[Arsalan]

There would have been no invasion if the Afghanis had given up ObL and the leaders of the Taliban when requested.

As if the Taliban have control over Al Qaeda. Its like saying to the CIA to hand over the FBI

As many times as they are fired upon by those same targets. It's not nice to fire on US soldiers when you're standing behind your wife and kids!!

Baron Max

Nope. Try as you may your argument that Afghanis somehow make sure their family dies before they do so they can fight doesnt stand up in reality. Provide proof

 

[Baron Max]

As if the Taliban have control over Al Qaeda.

Now you're admitting that the Taliban and the Afghanis have no control over their own country! Damn, no wonder we had to go in there .....it's a lawless wasteland of killing and terrorism!

Baron Max

 

[quadraphonics]

A Muslims with anti-Muslim sentiments is kind of like a self-hating Jew, You wont find many.

Hey, you're the one who keeps insisting these sentiments are "Anti-Muslim." It is actually possible to criticize beliefs and institutions, even strongly, without calling your basic identity into question.

Or rather, it is in places where speech is free. Unrelenting criticism of America's failings is considered a patriotic duty by a great many citizens.

There have been numerous books written in Muslim countries that look at Islam in a critical way and ask questions. But then, thats not enough is it?

Again, the nationality of the authors is less salient than their religion, but no, it's not enough. It is required that ANY book be tolerated (in the sense of not seeking to murder the author, and intimidate others into silence), not just the ones that those being scrutinized deem acceptable.

I believe it was Ice.

Then you believe wrong. As he's pointed out to you repeatedly now, he's not defending the contents of the book, but attacking the reaction to it.

Those are two completely separate things.

Yep they were and it was exactly those people who reacted.

Strange, I seem to recall certain people in Iran doing most of the really noteworthy reacting... or are all Muslims indistinguishable in this sense?

It was building up. His contributions to the overall imperialistic material angered people

You should understand that lumping Rushdie in with the "imperialists" makes you look flat-out crazy. You need to take a deep breath and try to get a realistic hold on what you're going to ascribe to "imperialism."

And no one supports those.

And yet, here you are writing page after page hounding people who had a problem with those responses. If we agree that the fatwa and murders and intimidation are unacceptable, and that Rushdie should be protected by free speech, then what exactly is your disagreement?

However, we do support the dozens of articles and books that were written in response to his books and imperialism in general

Okay. Why don't you try linking to those instead of berating people?

Ofcourse, pick and choose which author you want to support.

I support Dahl's right to free speech every bit as much as I support Rushdie's. As far as supporting their actual ideas and writings, I will indeed pick and choose, as I hope will you.

The point is that all those things can somehow be excused by people like you without looking at his character and his overall intentions.

They don't need to be excused, because they aren't problems in the first place.

To the people he hurt however, those are characteristics that portray the real Rushdie, which is not the icon of Freedom of Speech the west adorns him as.

He is not an icon of free speech because of his character, or his intentions, or his ideas, or the content of his books. He is an icon of free speech because he spent years living underground to withstand an international terror conspiracy designed to kill him and so silence others. Many icons of free speech are far more problematic than he, in terms of their speech. Larry Flynt, for example. And it is exactly this that puts them in such a position: nobody persecutes uncontroversial speech, and by ensuring that controversial speech is protected, we thereby protect all speech.

Ofcourse, but are they shown as regularly as those burnings of Rushdies books? No.

"Shown regularly?" That stuff hasn't been reported since back when it happened. Rushdie is more likely to appear in the media in background material on Padma Lakshmi, than in anything to do with literature or speech or religion.

Until he mocks 9/11, 7/7, Kitty Genovese and all these other events there isnt a comparison.

Are you unaware that many people in the West have made highly inflammatory speech about all of those subjects, repeatedly, in public and in print, without having contracts put on their head by despots on the other side of the world? Or even having to worry about the impact of said speech on their safety in the first place?

Also, it seems like your searching for pretenses to invoke emotionally charged material here, which is always a troubling sign.

 

[copernicus66]

Theres a difference between understanding why people react the way they do and supporting it.

I don't understand why an easily offended Muslim would obtain a book which is reputed for offending Muslims. After after obtaining it, they *read* the first ten or twenty pages, find it offensive, and *continue reading* the offensive material. If Rushdie's book was indeed such a blight on the face of the Islamic world, why not simply *stop reading the book*, thus preventing any outrage in the first place? Do Muslims go out of their way to take offensive to every little thing? Perhaps they just like to play the eternal victim, seething and raging at every perceived slight they go out of their way to identify.

We have a saying in the West whenever someone tries to censor a television program. "If you don't like it, don't watch it." Perhaps your Muslim barbarian friends with a short temper could take this advice. Instead of seeking out literature which they know will offend them and cause them to issue death threats, they could demonstrate a little self control.

The sad fact of the matter here is that we are talking right past you, because you can't grasp progressive Western values. We don't care that as a Muslim, you find the book offensive. At the end of the day, it's a relatively obscure work of fiction, and no matter how 'offended' your Muslim brethen might be, that's no excuse to go issuing death threats and making attempts with censorship.

Of course, you're just going to brush off what I've said with "But, but, but, it's offensive to the previously colonised Muslims! Boo hoo hoo."

Tough shit. Nobody told them to read it.

 

[copernicus66]

Are you unaware that many people in the West have made highly inflammatory speech about all of those subjects, repeatedly, in public and in print, without having contracts put on their head by despots on the other side of the world? Or even having to worry about the impact of said speech on their safety in the first place?

Yah.

 

[DiamondHearts]

They don't consider themselves part of Pakistan! They want their own sharia law. Pakistan is occupying their ancient tribal region.

This is what happens when Zionists who have no clue about Pakistan or Afghanistan attempt to preach to us about our societies. LOL. Seriously, this post made me laugh. First of all they are criminals, now they are an oppressed minority. Make up your mind.

The Pukhtoon are Pakistan, there are 30 million of them in Pakistan and they have lived in this region for nearly 3,000 years (probably longer). They very much consider themselves a part of Pakistan, there is no doubt about that. They have shariah, and had this lay system ever since the Mughal empire, and you call check out a recent thread specifically addressed to this topic. As I stated, Pakistan cannot be occupying their own territory, because the Pukhtoons are Pakistan, thus this doesn't follow.

Now it is time for you to make up your mind. Are the Pukhtoons villians whom US predator drones in Pakistan should bomb and the burning of their villages in Afghanistan by US forces should be encouraged, or are they an oppressed people for whom the US should secure with peace and diplomacy?

Naturally, if people with zero knowledge of the situation and ground reality of the region continue to make such preposterous notions, then there really is nothing left of value in this forum.

 

[Buffalo Roam]

The Pukhtoon are Pakistan, there are 30 million of them in Pakistan and they have lived in this region for nearly 3,000 years (probably longer). They very much consider themselves a part of Pakistan, there is no doubt about that. They have shariah, and had this lay system ever since the Mughal empire, and you call check out a recent thread specifically addressed to this topic. As I stated, Pakistan cannot be occupying their own territory, because the Pukhtoons are Pakistan, thus this doesn't follow.

Now it is time for you to make up your mind. Are the Pukhtoons villians whom US predator drones in Pakistan should bomb and the burning of their villages in Afghanistan by US forces should be encouraged, or are they an oppressed people for whom the US should secure with peace and diplomacy?

Naturally, if people with zero knowledge of the situation and ground reality of the region continue to make such preposterous notions, then there really is nothing left of value in this forum.

Seems to be you who has no knowledge of what he speaks of;

Pasto Academy
University of Peshawar

http://pashto.upesh.edu.pk/pashtoon.htm

There are estimated to be about 7,500,000 Pukhtoon in Afghanistan and 14,000,000 in Pakistan

Only 14 million of them in Pakistan, not 30 million, the simpliest of errors.