Islam and violence

[HeyCameron]

Today I saw a news story about an Indonesian family that suicide-bombed Christian churches in Java, killing 10 people. Indonesia is a majority-Muslim country that is peaceful and stable compared to many of the more familiar Muslim countries in the Middle East, but even it isn't immune from bombings and religious violence.

Obviously violence can be committed by people of any religion, just look at the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar where a Buddhist majority is committing genocide against a Muslim minority.

But it does seem like there's more violence in the name of Islam in the modern world than any other religion. You don't hear about Hindu or Christian extremist groups with global reach. Why is that? Is it just political or ethnic violence with religion used as an excuse? Or is that just an excuse?

Just curious. Not here to condemn Islam or any other religion.

[mattsmith48]

Today I saw a news story about an Indonesian family that suicide-bombed Christian churches in Java, killing 10 people. Indonesia is a majority-Muslim country that is peaceful and stable compared to many of the more familiar Muslim countries in the Middle East, but even it isn't immune from bombings and religious violence.

Obviously violence can be committed by people of any religion, just look at the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar where a Buddhist majority is committing genocide against a Muslim minority.

But it does seem like there's more violence in the name of Islam in the modern world than any other religion. You don't hear about Hindu or Christian extremist groups with global reach. Why is that? Is it just political or ethnic violence with religion used as an excuse? Or is that just an excuse?

Just curious. Not here to condemn Islam or any other religion.

All religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions. In the Middle East the political climate, caused by certain country overthrowing dictators they didn't like, made it easier for extremist groups to come out and gain popularity using religion to justify their actions, it could have been any religion, it just ended up being Islam because that's the main religion there.

For the global reach, first the media is at fault for the way they report on an attacked by a Muslim compared to a Christian.

Also groups like ISIS are very good at using social media to promote their views and recruit people, you can see it a lot with fascists and racists groups too, like neo-nazis.

[lliam]

I too guess that education-resistant fundamentalists can be found in every society. And most of them are the ones who are easily can be radicalized.

Looking back at our time in a hundred or two hundred years, it will hardly be obvious that radical Islamic believers were more inclined to such suicidal actions than dudes from other religions.

For now, just blame the medias.

Or blame even the entire West, because of that we nowadays occasionally dealing with suicide bombers and such may be due to political decisions made by Western politicians in the last decades..

[NewLeafsFan]

I think that it is because of cultural issues. If you look at the middle east, many countries follow Islamic Law and won't let women drive, or ban alcohol but this is when their religion and culture creates a toxic combination.

Unfortunately, very few people study a religion in hopes of learning about it. People to often believe what they were brainwashed by their parents into believing (I speak for all faiths on that). They go through reverent books like the Bible, Torah, etc and pick out what matches their own beliefs. Things that Muhammad taught includes acceptance and the equal rights of women.

All religions have committed acts of violence historically. Christians and Muslims during the Crusades. Catholics and Protestants in Ireland. Countries where leaders ban holy books. Jews in Israel breaking human rights on a daily bases against the Palestinians. The current issues with Islamic terrorist groups just happens to be in our own backyard right now.

Also, we hear less from the eastern religions because often they are more of a philosophy than a religion meaning that you can be a Christian and follow their ideas as well.

[sobi99]

"But it does seem like there's more violence in the name of Islam in the modern world than any other religion. You don't hear about Hindu or Christian extremist groups with global reach. Why is that? Is it just political or ethnic violence with religion used as an excuse? Or is that just an excuse?"

it's probably because the media is biased with its coverage and chooses to report acts of violence committed by so-called muslims more than those committed by other faiths.

i mean, these people CLAIM to be following Islam, but that in no way means they are actually following it.

their actions are justified by loose, extreme, and uneducated interpretations of islamic scriptures. i don't want to discuss that here too much on this forum but islam is a peaceful religion and a lot of the terrorism that is going on just boils down to extreme ideologies.

[trackinglife]

"But it does seem like there's more violence in the name of Islam in the modern world than any other religion. You don't hear about Hindu or Christian extremist groups with global reach. Why is that? Is it just political or ethnic violence with religion used as an excuse? Or is that just an excuse?"

it's probably because the media is biased with its coverage and chooses to report acts of violence committed by so-called muslims more than those committed by other faiths.

i mean, these people CLAIM to be following Islam, but that in no way means they are actually following it.

their actions are justified by loose, extreme, and uneducated interpretations of islamic scriptures. i don't want to discuss that here too much on this forum but islam is a peaceful religion and a lot of the terrorism that is going on just boils down to extreme ideologies.

So when Muhammad put people to the sword, took slaves, raped women, married a child, was he also not following the Muslim religion? Keep in mind all of that happened after he founded it and he would really have been able to do any of it without the religion.....

[ShineintheDark]

So when Muhammad put people to the sword, took slaves, raped women, married a child, was he also not following the Muslim religion? Keep in mind all of that happened after he founded it and he would really have been able to do any of it without the religion.....
Islam condones many medieval practices and actions that are in no way compatible with modern ethical codes and standards, anyone who denies that is not being truthful. However, this current trend of violence and friction has only really occurred within the past few decades and very much since the rise of the Wahhabi sect under the influence of the House of Saud. Before the rise of Saudi Arabia as a state and therefore a global influence, Arabic traditions and their forms of Islam were very much on the track to modernisation in line with potential Western allies. Hell, the influence of the Soviet Union in the mid-20th century posed a genuine threat of pushing secularism and atheism into the Middle East. However, this was ultimately not the path that history followed. Contrary to the belief that Islam in particular is amazingly resistant to modernisation and change, Islam has followed the same path to modernisation as every other major faith in the region: the majorly retarding influence that has stopped women driving, kept gays being thrown off of buildings, kept adulterers being stoned and drinkers being lashed and continued to influence suicide bombers has been, believe it or not, the Western-backed nation of Saudi Arabia.

[trackinglife]

Islam condones many medieval practices and actions that are in no way compatible with modern ethical codes and standards, anyone who denies that is not being truthful. However, this current trend of violence and friction has only really occurred within the past few decades and very much since the rise of the Wahhabi sect under the influence of the House of Saud. Before the rise of Saudi Arabia as a state and therefore a global influence, Arabic traditions and their forms of Islam were very much on the track to modernisation in line with potential Western allies. Hell, the influence of the Soviet Union in the mid-20th century posed a genuine threat of pushing secularism and atheism into the Middle East. However, this was ultimately not the path that history followed. Contrary to the belief that Islam in particular is amazingly resistant to modernisation and change, Islam has followed the same path to modernisation as every other major faith in the region: the majorly retarding influence that has stopped women driving, kept gays being thrown off of buildings, kept adulterers being stoned and drinkers being lashed and continued to influence suicide bombers has been, believe it or not, the Western-backed nation of Saudi Arabia.

Your statements suggest your ignorance concerning how brutal the Ottoman Empire was....

[Jinglebottom]

Here in this country, when you hear about religious and political violence, 99% of the time it involves Muslims of different sects. Which is funny because Muslims make up about 55% of the population, but you rarely hear about the remaining 45%. And we have Sunni Muslims, Shia Muslims, Catholics, Greek and Armenian Orthodox Christians and more, but the first two are the most problematic and need to chill out.

[ShineintheDark]

Your statements suggest your ignorance concerning how brutal the Ottoman Empire was.... Yours suggest your ignorance concerning the Sharif of Mecca (who we backstabbed). Nor the creeping modernisation of Iran pre-Islamic Revolution (which we also caused). Or Pakistan under Zulfikar Bhutto. Your statements ignore the socio-political influences of colonial rule that created an environment hostile to change and modernisation, which extends beyond Islamic nations, into India, Jamaica, Ethiopia etc. Modern trends and issues stem from more than just a single cause and if we focus on only one of them, allowing the others to continue to flourish then we will never solve the problem, only allow it to fester.

[trackinglife]

Yours suggest your ignorance concerning the Sharif of Mecca (who we backstabbed). Nor the creeping modernisation of Iran pre-Islamic Revolution (which we also caused). Or Pakistan under Zulfikar Bhutto. Your statements ignore the socio-political influences of colonial rule that created an environment hostile to change and modernisation, which extends beyond Islamic nations, into India, Jamaica, Ethiopia etc. Modern trends and issues stem from more than just a single cause and if we focus on only one of them, allowing the others to continue to flourish then we will never solve the problem, only allow it to fester.

The Ottoman empire predates Colonialism really.....

[ShineintheDark]

The Ottoman empire predates Colonialism really..... The Ottoman empire is also gone. Taken down with the help of the previously mentioned Sharif of Mecca and his forces who could have modernised the Middle East if the Sykes-Picot Agreement didn't destabilise and delegitimise his power and influence in favour of the House of Saud and therefore the extremely conservative sect of Wahhabbism. But, ya know, Ottomans trump everything, right?

[inactiveguy678]

The Ottoman empire is also gone. Taken down with the help of the previously mentioned Sharif of Mecca and his forces who could have modernised the Middle East if the Sykes-Picot Agreement didn't destabilise and delegitimise his power and influence in favour of the House of Saud and therefore the extremely conservative sect of Wahhabbism. But, ya know, Ottomans trump everything, right?

The Ottoman Empire during that time isn’t as powerful as it used to be (started its decline in the 1800’s I think). The fact that a white woman from the United Kingdom, Gertrude Bell (1920’s) helped divide this might have caused even more schism between the Middle East and the Western World.

[trackinglife]

Is your point that the only reason Islam has ever been violent is because of European aggression? Because I gotta tell you all the Crusades and in fact most of the clashes with Islamic forces were defensive actions by Europeans. Including America's first clash with them which was against the Barbary Pirates....

[Spooky_Eli]

Today I saw a news story about an Indonesian family that suicide-bombed Christian churches in Java, killing 10 people. Indonesia is a majority-Muslim country that is peaceful and stable compared to many of the more familiar Muslim countries in the Middle East, but even it isn't immune from bombings and religious violence.

Obviously violence can be committed by people of any religion, just look at the Rohingya genocide in Myanmar where a Buddhist majority is committing genocide against a Muslim minority.

But it does seem like there's more violence in the name of Islam in the modern world than any other religion. You don't hear about Hindu or Christian extremist groups with global reach. Why is that? Is it just political or ethnic violence with religion used as an excuse? Or is that just an excuse?

Just curious. Not here to condemn Islam or any other religion.idk anything about the hindu religion but, the reason you don't see Christian extremist groups with global reach is because christianity, unlike islam, has experienced its own enlightenment(the 60's MLKJ, blah blah blah)
islam on the other hand has no such enlightenment(the religion is also has far more violent "holy book" than Christianity to begin with)

[Uniquemind]

idk anything about the hindu religion but, the reason you don't see Christian extremist groups with global reach is because christianity, unlike islam, has experienced its own enlightenment(the 60's MLKJ, blah blah blah)
islam on the other hand has no such enlightenment(the religion is also has far more violent "holy book" than Christianity to begin with)

Not only enlightenment, but both the UK and USA separates Religion from mankind’s lawful court and civil rights procedures.


That’s a specific detail en mass, that’s vastly different from Islamic countries. They mix religious law with various civil laws, and emotional reactions like protests stem from that, making every civil debate an inherent religious one, and hence diff factions of Islam war with each other.

Yes USA and UK have clusters of groups who believe God’s law in Christianity should shape or be the same as Earthly civil laws (this is the abortion debate for example), but they remain on the fringe and not a view accepted even my many Christians.


The Christian extremism did and does exist, but it hadn’t it’s emotionally unstable years when we had bows And arrows swords, and rode on horseback.

[HeyCameron]

Good points, all. This has been very interesting to read :)

[Leprous]

All religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions. In the Middle East the political climate, caused by certain country overthrowing dictators they didn't like, made it easier for extremist groups to come out and gain popularity using religion to justify their actions, it could have been any religion, it just ended up being Islam because that's the main religion there.

I wouldn't go as far as saying all religions are equally bad. While it is certainly true there aren't any truely peaceful religions Islam is still the one that seems to cause the most violence in modern times. There are certainly cases where the Muslims are the one beings murdered (see Myanmar), but in the West Muslim extremism is still the most common when it comes to religious terror.



For the global reach, first the media is at fault for the way they report on an attacked by a Muslim compared to a Christian.

True to an extent, the media knows articles about Muslims will get them more attetion. Whenever a car crashes into people by accident they will make the title clickbait enough to the braindead tabloid readers instantly assume it's a Muslim terror attack, making their image even worse than it already is. When a Christian blows up an airport in Brussels though I'm sure it will be reported on just as much as when a Muslim does it.

Also groups like ISIS are very good at using social media to promote their views and recruit people, you can see it a lot with fascists and racists groups too, like neo-nazis.

ISIS is the best marketing campaign since Coca-Cola.

[ShineintheDark]

Is your point that the only reason Islam has ever been violent is because of European aggression? Because I gotta tell you all the Crusades and in fact most of the clashes with Islamic forces were defensive actions by Europeans. Including America's first clash with them which was against the Barbary Pirates....
That is in no way my argument, religious clashes with both parties at fault are way more common than one-sided situations. My argument as that the most infamous 'religious' conflicts are actually just trumped up average wars. The Crusades were only about religion on the surface: the pope was much more concerned about the weakening Byzantine Empire that could no longer protect Christian interests in the East and therefore wanted to reinforce them with European allies. Otherwise, Europe had been trading with and through the Middle East since the dawn of civilisation and the Catholic church wouldn't have given a damn what faith their trading partners followed since it didn't hugely affect them. The Islamic empires of that period weren't interested in expansion into Europe because religion told them to: they wanted to expand and attack Europe because that's what medieval states did and continued to do, even when their faiths aligned. It's the same with 9/11. Al Qaeda didn't attack the Twin Towers because the Quran guided them to do so, they did it as their own twisted retaliation to US exploits in the Middle East. It was the hostile environment that followed that allowed religious fanatics such as ISIS to ultimately hijack it and create an Islamist narrative that persists to the modern age. You can argue till the cows come home about whose religious dogma the least violent but to claim that all of the violence that we're dealing with today is purely down to religious differences ignores hundreds of years of irreligious dichotomies and friction.

[trackinglife]

That is in no way my argument, religious clashes with both parties at fault are way more common than one-sided situations. My argument as that the most infamous 'religious' conflicts are actually just trumped up average wars. The Crusades were only about religion on the surface: the pope was much more concerned about the weakening Byzantine Empire that could no longer protect Christian interests in the East and therefore wanted to reinforce them with European allies. Otherwise, Europe had been trading with and through the Middle East since the dawn of civilisation and the Catholic church wouldn't have given a damn what faith their trading partners followed since it didn't hugely affect them. The Islamic empires of that period weren't interested in expansion into Europe because religion told them to: they wanted to expand and attack Europe because that's what medieval states did and continued to do, even when their faiths aligned. It's the same with 9/11. Al Qaeda didn't attack the Twin Towers because the Quran guided them to do so, they did it as their own twisted retaliation to US exploits in the Middle East. It was the hostile environment that followed that allowed religious fanatics such as ISIS to ultimately hijack it and create an Islamist narrative that persists to the modern age. You can argue till the cows come home about whose religious dogma the least violent but to claim that all of the violence that we're dealing with today is purely down to religious differences ignores hundreds of years of irreligious dichotomies and friction.

I appreciate what you're saying and I think you're right to an extent....its just that...well the founders of Christianity were all peaceful. The founders of Islam were not. So when Christian Crusaders said they were fighting for God it is more easy for me to accept they were lying and actually not being Christianly at all. Whereas when the Islamic forces claimed they were doing it for Allah it was much easier to believe they were telling the truth......because well their founder claimed the same thing.

Now that being said there is almost always MORE than ONE reason for any conflict. But to say religion played little to no role is also false.

[inactiveguy678]

I appreciate what you're saying and I think you're right to an extent....its just that...well the founders of Christianity were all peaceful. The founders of Islam were not. So when Christian Crusaders said they were fighting for God it is more easy for me to accept they were lying and actually not being Christianly at all. Whereas when the Islamic forces claimed they were doing it for Allah it was much easier to believe they were telling the truth......because well their founder claimed the same thing.

Now that being said there is almost always MORE than ONE reason for any conflict. But to say religion played little to no role is also false.

Ok this one I think I have to dispute.

Where exactly in the founding of Islam was it that they were inherently violent? Is it their desire to defend Medina from external threats after being originally discriminated upon by the Meccans (which forced them to Migrate to Medina in the first place)?

You do know that modern Christianity (as we know it) thats sprung from Emperor Theodocius declaring the religion as the State Church of the Roman empire was a result of him exercising a political manoeuvre to placate the masses who were slowly converting to Christianity after Constantine decreed a state for tolerance for Christians. Meaning Christianity as we know it only had peaceful intentions on the surface but it was actually a product of subtle political dominance and manoeuvring.

This part of history was taught in our Catholic school as a way to make us realise that religions at its tenets may be infallible but the same cannot be said for human motive. Hence, discernment is usually taught and developed in catechism to create morally sound and conscionable constituents.

[trackinglife]

Ok this one I think I have to dispute.

Where exactly in the founding of Islam was it that they were inherently violent? Is it their desire to defend Medina from external threats after being originally discriminated upon by the Meccans (which forced them to Migrate to Medina in the first place)?

You do know that modern Christianity (as we know it) thats sprung from Emperor Theodocius declaring the religion as the State Church of the Roman empire was a result of him exercising a political manoeuvre to placate the masses who were slowly converting to Christianity after Constantine decreed a state for tolerance for Christians. Meaning Christianity as we know it only had peaceful intentions on the surface but it was actually a product of subtle political dominance and manoeuvring.

This part of history was taught in our Catholic school as a way to make us realise that religions at its tenets may be infallible but the same cannot be said for human motive. Hence, discernment is usually taught and developed in catechism to create morally sound and conscionable constituents.


Modern Christianity as we know it? I understand why you are pushing this the way you are but the fact is the Protestants split from the Catholics hundreds of years ago in an ATTEMPT to return to Apostolic teaching. When I talk about the Founders of the Church I am referring to Jesus and His Apostles all of whom were peaceful. Except Paul when he was known as Saul was quite violent but his violence was towards Christians. Once he converted he also became peaceful. More importantly it is their writings and THEIR life experiences that Christians around the world PRIMARILY look to for guidance in how to live their own lives. They don't look to any of the Emperors of Rome let alone the specific Emperor Theodocius. If we did look to him as an example you might have a point but we don't.

Islam looks to Muhammad primarily as the example for how to live. Muhammad himself was a violent man and he did more than just fight defensively. Yes he was cast out of Mecca largely because he was a rabble rouser even there. I am not saying they were right to cast him out but I understand why they did. Anyway some of his first military actions were actually bandit like. Yes it was against the Meccans caravans so he sold it to some people as just revenge for his mistreatment in Mecca....but it was not defensive it was vengeful and offensive in nature. And he went overboard especially by modern day moral standards. He allowed rape, slavery etc. I am not saying Christian Crusaders didn't do the same. I AM Saying Jesus and His apostles did not do the same. And again I do not look to Crusaders as a guide for how I should live my life. I look to Jesus primarily and His apostles after Him. If you want to judge the inherent teachings of a religion doesn't it make sense to look at their FOUNDERS rather than people who came later and may have distorted their original message? With Christians lots have distorted it but the original message can still be found there in the NT. With Muhammad his original message contained lots of violence. There is no distortion happening. He was a warlord plain and simple.

Also since you shared a little known fact about Emperor Theodocius. Let me share one with you about Muhammad. We all know the story of the angel visiting him in a cave right? Did you know originally he thought it was a demon? It was his first wife that convinced him it was an angel sent by God. Interesting that he first thought it was a demon especially considering the apostle Paul in his letter to the Galatians wrote that "if anyone comes to you preaching a different gospel than the one we have preached to you be they angel or man, anathema be upon them." (English translation obviously) This was written hundreds of years before Muhammad was visited by an "angel" that preached to him a different gospel. It's almost as if Paul knew it would happen because in fact it was also happening back during his time in other places. I don't know if angels were visiting others but there were certainly men preaching different gospels at the time.

Lastly the one question I want to ask any Muslims (not that I know if you are one or not) is if you believe his story about being visited by an angel with a new revelation and there were no other eye witnesses to this event....why not also believe Joseph Smith the founder of Mormonism who was visited by the angel Moroni? The two stories are so similar and have roughly the same amount of evidence supporting except Mormons claim they actually had more eye witnesses to the Golden plates at the very least.....and the writings about him were much closer in time to the event in question than the writings about Muhammad are....so why believe Muhammad but not Joseph Smith? It makes no sense to me.

[inactiveguy678]

Modern Christianity as we know it? I understand why you are pushing this the way you are but the fact is the Protestants split from the Catholics hundreds of years ago in an ATTEMPT to return to Apostolic teaching. When I talk about the Founders of the Church I am referring to Jesus and His Apostles all of whom were peaceful. Except Paul when he was known as Saul was quite violent but his violence was towards Christians. Once he converted he also became peaceful. More importantly it is their writings and THEIR life experiences that Christians around the world PRIMARILY look to for guidance in how to live their own lives. They don't look to any of the Emperors of Rome let alone the specific Emperor Theodocius. If we did look to him as an example you might have a point but we don't.

Islam looks to Muhammad primarily as the example for how to live. Muhammad himself was a violent man and he did more than just fight defensively. Yes he was cast out of Mecca largely because he was a rabble rouser even there. I am not saying they were right to cast him out but I understand why they did. Anyway some of his first military actions were actually bandit like. Yes it was against the Meccans caravans so he sold it to some people as just revenge for his mistreatment in Mecca....but it was not defensive it was vengeful and offensive in nature. And he went overboard especially by modern day moral standards. He allowed rape, slavery etc. I am not saying Christian Crusaders didn't do the same. I AM Saying Jesus and His apostles did not do the same. And again I do not look to Crusaders as a guide for how I should live my life. I look to Jesus primarily and His apostles after Him. If you want to judge the inherent teachings of a religion doesn't it make sense to look at their FOUNDERS rather than people who came later and may have distorted their original message? With Christians lots have distorted it but the original message can still be found there in the NT. With Muhammad his original message contained lots of violence. There is no distortion happening. He was a warlord plain and simple.

Also since you shared a little known fact about Emperor Theodocius. Let me share one with you about Muhammad. We all know the story of the angel visiting him in a cave right? Did you know originally he thought it was a demon? It was his first wife that convinced him it was an angel sent by God. Interesting that he first thought it was a demon especially considering the apostle Paul in his letter to the Galatians wrote that "if anyone comes to you preaching a different gospel than the one we have preached to you be they angel or man, anathema be upon them." (English translation obviously) This was written hundreds of years before Muhammad was visited by an "angel" that preached to him a different gospel. It's almost as if Paul knew it would happen because in fact it was also happening back during his time in other places. I don't know if angels were visiting others but there were certainly men preaching different gospels at the time.

Lastly the one question I want to ask any Muslims (not that I know if you are one or not) is if you believe his story about being visited by an angel with a new revelation and there were no other eye witnesses to this event....why not also believe Joseph Smith the founder of Mormonism who was visited by the angel Moroni? The two stories are so similar and have roughly the same amount of evidence supporting except Mormons claim they actually had more eye witnesses to the Golden plates at the very least.....and the writings about him were much closer in time to the event in question than the writings about Muhammad are....so why believe Muhammad but not Joseph Smith? It makes no sense to me.

Lets not disagree too much on the Protestant vs Catholic thing since I was only consolidating them since even separate with Protestant (being as you said faith based Apostolic) and Catholicism usually focusing on praxis (action based form of worship) they still share many teachings. But to be honest if we are talking about the closest Christianity to being founded as you described it. Orthodox Christianity is actually the closest sect to what you describe as the core Christian experience so I don't know how that fits in hence why I brought up the first "enlightenment of Christianity since it shares more similar characteristics to these regions as we know it that the ones that diverged from Judaism.

I see your points about the criticism of Mohammad. Not only was he an advocate of slavery but isn't he also a pedophile in the sense that he pushes for child marriages. But whats important to note here is that flaws of character do not necessarily translate into violent intentions of the founding a religion. Its like saying just because a person stole something once and never felt genuinely sorry/repentant for the act that all good deeds moving forward are tainted with negative intent or any belief idea or organisation founded by an unrepentant thief is focused on ones flaw or sin in this case thievery.

In connection to this, wasn't the whole idea of Jesus being crucified was because he was considered a rabble rouser by the Roman Empire in the first place. He disrupted tax collection, he advocated for the poor, he shunned merchants who were using His father's house as a place of business. Regardless if the approach was subjectively right or not he was still considered a disruptive element by the secular body. So i think if history is be taken into context I think its fair to say that the political systems at the time also considered Jesus to be a trouble maker.

With regards to the visions of an Angel again its a little bit hard to impose standards of interpreting visions just because one teaching (from St. Paul in this case) came before another chronologically. I mean isn't this reaction more of a justification of why he established a new religion in the first place logically speaking? Divine revelation is an undisputed catholic teaching so if you start to have problems accepting fallibility of such teachings and writing inspired by Divine revelation in the first place I don't think its impossible to imagine that he felt it might not apply to him.

Wont answer the last one because I'm not a Muslim. So I hope you understand why I'm piecing things together from a historical logical standpoint since I am not a believer nor had first hand experiences with Islam.

[trackinglife]

Lets not disagree too much on the Protestant vs Catholic thing since I was only consolidating them since even separate with Protestant (being as you said faith based Apostolic) and Catholicism usually focusing on praxis (action based form of worship) they still share many teachings. But to be honest if we are talking about the closest Christianity to being founded as you described it. Orthodox Christianity is actually the closest sect to what you describe as the core Christian experience so I don't know how that fits in hence why I brought up the first "enlightenment of Christianity since it shares more similar characteristics to these regions as we know it that the ones that diverged from Judaism.

I see your points about the criticism of Mohammad. Not only was he an advocate of slavery but isn't he also a pedophile in the sense that he pushes for child marriages. But whats important to note here is that flaws of character do not necessarily translate into violent intentions of the founding a religion. Its like saying just because a person stole something once and never felt genuinely sorry/repentant for the act that all good deeds moving forward are tainted with negative intent or any belief idea or organisation founded by an unrepentant thief is focused on ones flaw or sin in this case thievery.

In connection to this, wasn't the whole idea of Jesus being crucified was because he was considered a rabble rouser by the Roman Empire in the first place. He disrupted tax collection, he advocated for the poor, he shunned merchants who were using His father's house as a place of business. Regardless if the approach was subjectively right or not he was still considered a disruptive element by the secular body. So i think if history is be taken into context I think its fair to say that the political systems at the time also considered Jesus to be a trouble maker.

With regards to the visions of an Angel again its a little bit hard to impose standards of interpreting visions just because one teaching (from St. Paul in this case) came before another chronologically. I mean isn't this reaction more of a justification of why he established a new religion in the first place logically speaking? Divine revelation is an undisputed catholic teaching so if you start to have problems accepting fallibility of such teachings and writing inspired by Divine revelation in the first place I don't think its impossible to imagine that he felt it might not apply to him.

Wont answer the last one because I'm not a Muslim. So I hope you understand why I'm piecing things together from a historical logical standpoint since I am not a believer nor had first hand experiences with Islam.

I would never suggest that the evil a person does cancels out any good they might do. But you have to understand the Muslim doctrine of abrogation. Basically Muhammad's later teachings and the Qua'rans later verses supersede anything written earlier. As it turns out the most violent teachings were later on in his life. SO yes early on he was very peaceful in Mecca. Then he goes to Medina and gets more political but still pretty peaceful. Then he starts attacking caravans for money and resources (and in my opinion that money is really what won followers to his religious cause) and he then got progressively more violent and started teaching that to his followers. If you can find examples of where Jesus or His apostles did this then we can compare the two...but I think you will find they didn't do this sort of stuff. Even the most violent verses they tend to offer were generally hyperbolic and self inflicted. Such as "cut off your hand if it causes you to sin." And notice despite the apostles admitting they were still sinners none of them actually cut off their hands at least not to our knowledge.

Back to the angel visions. I do not discount all spiritual experiences. But I do tend to take them with a grain of salt. The biggest reason I am a Christian is because there were 500 witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus, along with prophecies about Him that were fulfilled going by the evidence we have anyway, and if you read the OT and then the NT it is all cohesive.

If instead ONE guy came along and said he had all these experiences I would probably write him off. That is what happened with Mormonism and Islam. But with Christianity and to a lesser extent Judaism, it was far more than one guy. I don't know specifically how many for the OT but when you take the NT and OT together it was written by 40 different authors (possibly more) over a period of 1,500 years on three different continents. And yet there is cohesion to it. People talk about contradictions in the Bible but I haven't found any. Any time people point to one it generally turns out it is a paradox rather than a contradiction. Paradoxes are logically possible and can be true. Contradictions cannot be true. I find more contradictions in the Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great price and other Mormon doctrinal texts and I certainly find more in Islamic documents than I do in Christian documents.

Anyway I understand you're not a believer and I am not attempting to convert anyone here but I am just saying it makes more sense to judge a religion or ideology by it's founder than by it's later followers who may not be living up to or may in fact be distorting it's message. Jesus's primary message was one of peace even up to and including laying down your life for others. His message was to LOVE God. Muhammad's primary message was SUBMIT to God. And he was willing to use whatever means necessary to get people to submit. Keep in mind too Islam does not offer hope. Even if you do everything right under Islamic teaching Allah on a whim can still send you to hell. The two religions just aren't comparable when it comes to peace, hope, love, joy, and kindness.

[inactiveguy678]

I would never suggest that the evil a person does cancels out any good they might do. But you have to understand the Muslim doctrine of abrogation. Basically Muhammad's later teachings and the Qua'rans later verses supersede anything written earlier. As it turns out the most violent teachings were later on in his life. SO yes early on he was very peaceful in Mecca. Then he goes to Medina and gets more political but still pretty peaceful. Then he starts attacking caravans for money and resources (and in my opinion that money is really what won followers to his religious cause) and he then got progressively more violent and started teaching that to his followers. If you can find examples of where Jesus or His apostles did this then we can compare the two...but I think you will find they didn't do this sort of stuff. Even the most violent verses they tend to offer were generally hyperbolic and self inflicted. Such as "cut off your hand if it causes you to sin." And notice despite the apostles admitting they were still sinners none of them actually cut off their hands at least not to our knowledge.


Back to the angel visions. I do not discount all spiritual experiences. But I do tend to take them with a grain of salt. The biggest reason I am a Christian is because there were 500 witnesses to the resurrection of Jesus, along with prophecies about Him that were fulfilled going by the evidence we have anyway, and if you read the OT and then the NT it is all cohesive.

If instead ONE guy came along and said he had all these experiences I would probably write him off. That is what happened with Mormonism and Islam. But with Christianity and to a lesser extent Judaism, it was far more than one guy. I don't know specifically how many for the OT but when you take the NT and OT together it was written by 40 different authors (possibly more) over a period of 1,500 years on three different continents. And yet there is cohesion to it. People talk about contradictions in the Bible but I haven't found any. Any time people point to one it generally turns out it is a paradox rather than a contradiction. Paradoxes are logically possible and can be true. Contradictions cannot be true. I find more contradictions in the Book of Mormon, The Pearl of Great price and other Mormon doctrinal texts and I certainly find more in Islamic documents than I do in Christian documents.

Anyway I understand you're not a believer and I am not attempting to convert anyone here but I am just saying it makes more sense to judge a religion or ideology by it's founder than by it's later followers who may not be living up to or may in fact be distorting it's message. Jesus's primary message was one of peace even up to and including laying down your life for others. His message was to LOVE God. Muhammad's primary message was SUBMIT to God. And he was willing to use whatever means necessary to get people to submit. Keep in mind too Islam does not offer hope. Even if you do everything right under Islamic teaching Allah on a whim can still send you to hell. The two religions just aren't comparable when it comes to peace, hope, love, joy, and kindness.

Umm so given the above because with what you just said now and the taking into consideration previous response it seems like it wasn't founded on violence if those violent teachings came later. I don't know what else to say if thats the case.

Edit
The point is you mentioned earlier that your basis of being founded is at the chronological start of the religion. This argument now says the violent teaching came later so doesn't this contradict you definition earlier.

[mattsmith48]

I wouldn't go as far as saying all religions are equally bad.

Fine they some are worst than others, but this thread isn't about Scientology

While it is certainly true there aren't any truely peaceful religions Islam is still the one that seems to cause the most violence in modern times. There are certainly cases where the Muslims are the one beings murdered (see Myanmar), but in the West Muslim extremism is still the most common when it comes to religious terror.

Not really its more the way the media and the right portrait Islam and extremism. If what the right says about Islam and terrorism was true we would all be dead by now. In reality it is not as widely spread some people believe we just ear more about it. Statistically it is very unlikely you will be murdered by an extremist no matter where in the west you are

True to an extent, the media knows articles about Muslims will get them more attetion. Whenever a car crashes into people by accident they will make the title clickbait enough to the braindead tabloid readers instantly assume it's a Muslim terror attack, making their image even worse than it already is. When a Christian blows up an airport in Brussels though I'm sure it will be reported on just as much as when a Muslim does it.

When there is a terrorist attack, if the suspect is a non-muslim, it is very rare the media will call it terrorism.

[HeyCameron]

Anyway I understand you're not a believer and I am not attempting to convert anyone here but I am just saying it makes more sense to judge a religion or ideology by it's founder than by it's later followers who may not be living up to or may in fact be distorting it's message. Jesus's primary message was one of peace even up to and including laying down your life for others. His message was to LOVE God. Muhammad's primary message was SUBMIT to God. And he was willing to use whatever means necessary to get people to submit. Keep in mind too Islam does not offer hope. Even if you do everything right under Islamic teaching Allah on a whim can still send you to hell. The two religions just aren't comparable when it comes to peace, hope, love, joy, and kindness.

Judging a religion by its founder only makes sense if a religion is necessarily a static, never-evolving thing, but the fact is that religions do and have changed over time and are subject to interpretation (hence the different sects and schools). I don't think you can just say "well, Muhammad was more violent than Jesus, so it makes sense that Islam is more violent". That can't explain all the violence that's committed in the name of Islam today or the fact that Islamic terrorism was really not a thing before the late 20th century or the fact that there has been plenty of violence committed in the name of Christianity historically (and Judaism--there are many violent passages of conquest in the OT). People who commit religious violence will always find a way to justify it.

A religion isn't just its founder. It's the sum total of people, teachings, tradition, history, culture, and the founder.

[inactiveguy678]

Judging a religion by its founder only makes sense if a religion is necessarily a static, never-evolving thing, but the fact is that religions do and have changed over time and are subject to interpretation (hence the different sects and schools). I don't think you can just say "well, Muhammad was more violent than Jesus, so it makes sense that Islam is more violent". That can't explain all the violence that's committed in the name of Islam today or the fact that Islamic terrorism was really not a thing before the late 20th century or the fact that there has been plenty of violence committed in the name of Christianity historically (and Judaism--there are many violent passages of conquest in the OT). People who commit religious violence will always find a way to justify it.

Thanks for this this was my gist of my arguments I just gave it a historical context as proof.

But I think the argument Christians use to defends the violent passages in the Bible especially if its vs Judaism is 1. the Old Testament is labeled Old for a reason (mostly there because of faith based implications of God’s wonder and splendour is how most Catholics put it) 2. The violence used as God’s punishment to the sinners 3. The violence is not that of man but God and since God is infallible it is justified.

Plus theology exists for a reason because if you follow religions to the letter majority of which would be applicable to the modern world. Case in point, Christians can’t use contraceptions even to prevent the spread of diseases which again wasn’t a considered scenario back in the day. Homosexuality is as sin etc etc. Again these might not be physical violence but it could lead into it if interpreted “alternatively”

For the sword verses of the Quran. I would interpret it as not violence through the means of a sword but through something that causes change like genuine assertive activism. And this even parallels Matthew 10:34 "Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword.” and of course the Catholic interpretation of this is being an active change agent that is not afraid of disrupting the wrongs of society but at face value it reads like a threat from Jesus.

The above is the only outright violent passage I know aside from the vendors in the Temple that I know of.

[HeyCameron]

Yeah, the arguments I've heard from Muslims about the violent passages in the Qur'an are similar: it's historical, it's defensive, jihad is a spiritual struggle, etc. The arguments from both religions are similar. They acknowledge that there's violence in the past, but that doesn't mean that the holy texts command and support violence in the present, even if the people who are violent now use those texts to justify it. During the Crusades, lines about the sword and Paul's "armor of God" were used to justify the violent conquest of the Holy Land. There's always a way to manipulate the text to say what you want it to say.

[inactiveguy678]

Exactly, and this is real even know with the Israeli Palestinian conflict wherein the issue of the religious homeland is causing all this defensive action against each other.

[Leprous]

Fine they some are worst than others, but this thread isn't about Scientology

Yeah Scientology is the worst religion and then have the largest record of violence out there. Yeah I believe you, very reasonable.

Not really its more the way the media and the right portrait Islam and extremism. If what the right says about Islam and terrorism was true we would all be dead by now. In reality it is not as widely spread some people believe we just ear more about it. Statistically it is very unlikely you will be murdered by an extremist no matter where in the west you are

It is very true that the media benefit greatly from these attacks. It gets a lot of attention and makes them money. You do say "the right portrait Islam AND extremism", in what way would you like them to report on extremism then?

Also you're automatically assuming what the right says about Islam and terrorism is a lie. I hope you know that not all right winged people are like Trump and that we actually do check our facts. However it does not mean that because sometimes the reports on these attacks are not as good as they should be that we shouldn't care. I'm slowly starting to think you don't see terrorism as a problem. Just because it's unlikely does not mean that it isn't a threat, schools shootings aren't extremely likely to happen either. I know you live in Canada but over here where our airport already got blown up we like to think differently.

When there is a terrorist attack, if the suspect is a non-muslim, it is very rare the media will call it terrorism.

Again, the media benefits much more from reporting on a Muslim terrorist than a white lone wolf. Las Vegas was just as much a terror attack as Brussels was.

[mattsmith48]

Yeah Scientology is the worst religion and then have the largest record of violence out there. Yeah I believe you, very reasonable.

That was a joke.

It is very true that the media benefit greatly from these attacks. It gets a lot of attention and makes them money. You do say "the right portrait Islam AND extremism", in what way would you like them to report on extremism then?


Also you're automatically assuming what the right says about Islam and terrorism is a lie. I hope you know that not all right winged people are like Trump and that we actually do check our facts. However it does not mean that because sometimes the reports on these attacks are not as good as they should be that we shouldn't care. I'm slowly starting to think you don't see terrorism as a problem. Just because it's unlikely does not mean that it isn't a threat, schools shootings aren't extremely likely to happen either. I know you live in Canada but over here where our airport already got blown up we like to think differently.

Trump is not the only one thinking this way, he's just more vocal and extreme about it. I'm not saying all conservatives are thinking this way, but when you ear fear mongering about Muslims it always comes from the right.

Again, the media benefits much more from reporting on a Muslim terrorist than a white lone wolf. Las Vegas was just as much a terror attack as Brussels was.

And thats why the media shouldn't be for profit. Its the same thing when people say the media should stop giving celebrity to mass shooters or they should stop constantly talking about Donald Trump. If they have to make money they'll show what sells so to make as much money off of it as possible they'll over cover some things giving the public a view of the world that isn't really reality, like in this case with Muslims and terrorism.

[trackinglife]

Umm so given the above because with what you just said now and the taking into consideration previous response it seems like it wasn't founded on violence if those violent teachings came later. I don't know what else to say if thats the case.

Edit
The point is you mentioned earlier that your basis of being founded is at the chronological start of the religion. This argument now says the violent teaching came later so doesn't this contradict you definition earlier.

No the founding isn't based on the earliest start of the religion per se. It is based on what the FOUNDERS taught. Islam only had one founder. Though if you want to consider Muhammads direct followers to be founders too that is fine it just doesn't help your case all of them were violent as well. In fact the first split in Islam happened after his death because Muslims couldn't agree on who the next leader should be and thus Shia and Sunni was born.

SO what I mean here is I am not basing Christianities founding on the first words Jesus said and then ignoring all the rest. Nor am I doing that with Muhammad regarding Islam. I am taking the full example they set over their lifetime. Jesus lived an entire life of peace. Muhammad simply didn't. Jesus's apostles lived lives of peace. Muhammad's disciples didn't. Muhammad had sex with a 9 year old. Jesus didn't. Nor did his apostles.

I am also pointing out that MUSLIMS teach the later words and/or actions of Muhammad are more important than the former. Basically if there are two verses that seem to contradict in the Hadiths or Qua'ran then you are to follow whichever came later.

Let me put it another way. As a Christian you are called to follow Jesus's example. Meaning act as he acted do as he did. Obviously all of us fall short of that mark.

Muslims teach to follow the example of Muhammad. If you kill, rape, enslave you CAN be and ARE following the example of Muhammad. It isn't that, that is the ONLY way to follow his example. I mean he also ate food and provided food and shelter for his family for example....(well the family members he didn't kill anyway). So if you do those things yes you are also following his example. More importantly even Muhammad acknowledged Jesus as peaceful and a good teacher but he believed that Jesus's ministry ultimately failed and that his ministry was superior in every way to Jesus's. So since his ministry included violence essentially he taught that forcing people to submit to Allah is a SUPERIOR teaching to that of Jesus's more peaceful approach. This is why I believe Islam is INHERENTLY more violent because of it's teachings saying that Muhammad's violent example was better than Jesus's peaceful one.

[Leprous]

That was a joke.



Trump is not the only one thinking this way, he's just more vocal and extreme about it. I'm not saying all conservatives are thinking this way, but when you hear fear mongering about Muslims it always comes from the right.


While yes the media certainly portrays Muslims as extreme monsters who blow the instant you laugh at their religion but do keep in mind that the left also does this, in fact, newspapers don't care about their own political views when they can make money with clickbait, so it's not just the right.

And thats why the media shouldn't be for profit. Its the same thing when people say the media should stop giving celebrity to mass shooters or they should stop constantly talking about Donald Trump. If they have to make money they'll show what sells so to make as much money off of it as possible they'll over cover some things giving the public a view of the world that isn't really reality, like in this case with Muslims and terrorism.

Yeah good luck on convincing massive companies to stop using tacticts to make money.

[trackinglife]

Yeah, the arguments I've heard from Muslims about the violent passages in the Qur'an are similar: it's historical, it's defensive, jihad is a spiritual struggle, etc. The arguments from both religions are similar. They acknowledge that there's violence in the past, but that doesn't mean that the holy texts command and support violence in the present, even if the people who are violent now use those texts to justify it. During the Crusades, lines about the sword and Paul's "armor of God" were used to justify the violent conquest of the Holy Land. There's always a way to manipulate the text to say what you want it to say.

Not exactly true. So in the Bible the verses were for a specific time and place. Go wipe out the Caananites. Mission accomplished there are none left now. I mean there are descendants of them but they are no longer known by that name and you would have trouble figuring who they are. There is no hard and fast limit on the Qua'ranic verses. Now some think there were limits and there are still debates about it but if there are limits then they were implied rather than explicitly stated which is the whole problem of course. More importantly Muhammad didn't LIVE out those standards.....Wouldn't you agree it makes more sense to judge him by his actions and not just his words?

[trackinglife]

Judging a religion by its founder only makes sense if a religion is necessarily a static, never-evolving thing, but the fact is that religions do and have changed over time and are subject to interpretation (hence the different sects and schools). I don't think you can just say "well, Muhammad was more violent than Jesus, so it makes sense that Islam is more violent". That can't explain all the violence that's committed in the name of Islam today or the fact that Islamic terrorism was really not a thing before the late 20th century or the fact that there has been plenty of violence committed in the name of Christianity historically (and Judaism--there are many violent passages of conquest in the OT). People who commit religious violence will always find a way to justify it.

A religion isn't just its founder. It's the sum total of people, teachings, tradition, history, culture, and the founder.

Yeah I stopped listening after you said Islamic terrorism was really not a thing before the late 20th century. That is untrue. They were murdering Pilgrims before the First Crusade.....it is the reason the Pope at least USED for the First Crusade.....and the murders definitely did happen the only debateable point is whether it was the Pope's real reason for the war.

[ShineintheDark]

Yeah I stopped listening after you said Islamic terrorism was really not a thing before the late 20th century. That is untrue. They were murdering Pilgrims before the First Crusade.....it is the reason the Pope at least USED for the First Crusade.....and the murders definitely did happen the only debateable point is whether it was the Pope's real reason for the war.
The example you use is weak at best. Jerusalem was in the hands of the Arabs and therefore they ultimately controlled who could enter and leave. The fact that their attitude and treatment of Judeo-Christian pilgrims so rapidly and inexplicably changed is an argument for another time but the murder of pilgrims was not to further any political goal, it was seen as protecting their lands from foreigners. It's the medieval version of border control.

[mattsmith48]

While yes the media certainly portrays Muslims as extreme monsters who blow the instant you laugh at their religion but do keep in mind that the left also does this, in fact, newspapers don't care about their own political views when they can make money with clickbait, so it's not just the right.

The only ''political views'' of the media are the truth or profit. The ones doing the over-covering and fear mongering are on the profit side.

Yeah good luck on convincing massive companies to stop using tacticts to make money.

Easy you regulate the media companies to eliminate the profit motive without tempering with their freedom of press rights

[sqishy]

All religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions.

I : What information brings you to this conclusion ?

II : What metric are you using to equate the magnitude of badness across all religions ?

III : Is Wicca as equally bad as Buddhism , Buddhism as equally bad as Salafi Islam , Salafi Islam as equally bad as Mormonism , Mormonism equally as bad as Kabbalist Judaism ?

IV : Have the same number of people been injured or killed by the actions of all religions mentioned above ?

V : Has the same amount of psychological harm been done by them ?

VI : Do religions act independently of the presence of people who adhere to them ?

VII : Are such adherents categorically suffering from a psychological pathology ?

IX : Do your religious relatives need to get psychiatric care for their allegedly great proclivity to violence ?


In the Middle East the political climate, caused by certain country overthrowing dictators they didn't like, made it easier for extremist groups to come out and gain popularity using religion to justify their actions, it could have been any religion, it just ended up being Islam because that's the main religion there.

Would it be justified to infer that you are saying the social content of Islam’s doctrine is therefore irrelevant to its corrupt manifestations in Syria and such in recent years, as you are saying it could have been any religion?


For the global reach, first the media is at fault for the way they report on an attacked by a Muslim compared to a Christian.

Are there statistics reporting attacks by Christian extremists in the West as of having similar number and damage done as the Islamic extremists?


Also groups like ISIS are very good at using social media to promote their views and recruit people, you can see it a lot with fascists and racists groups too, like neo-nazis.

This is true.

[PlasmaHam]

In the Middle East the political climate, caused by certain country overthrowing dictators they didn't like, made it easier for extremist groups to come out and gain popularity using religion to justify their actions, it could have been any religion, it just ended up being Islam because that's the main religion there.
Would you mind explaining to me how, lets say, Mormon extremists would be able to gain such a foothold if Mormonism was the primary religion in the region?


How about Buddhists? Or Anabaptists? What about Jehovah Witnesses, are they going to wear suicide vests under their suits now when they come to your door? And what of pagans and Wiccans? Would our Voice of Reason mind explaining his vast, unsupported statements on the equity of religious violence?

[mattsmith48]

I : What information brings you to this conclusion ?

II : What metric are you using to equate the magnitude of badness across all religions ?

III : Is Wicca as equally bad as Buddhism , Buddhism as equally bad as Salafi Islam , Salafi Islam as equally bad as Mormonism , Mormonism equally as bad as Kabbalist Judaism ?

IV : Have the same number of people been injured or killed by the actions of all religions mentioned above ?

V : Has the same amount of psychological harm been done by them ?

VI : Do religions act independently of the presence of people who adhere to them ?

VII : Are such adherents categorically suffering from a psychological pathology ?

IX : Do your religious relatives need to get psychiatric care for their allegedly great proclivity to violence ?




Would it be justified to infer that you are saying the social content of Islam’s doctrine is therefore irrelevant to its corrupt manifestations in Syria and such in recent years, as you are saying it could have been any religion?




Are there statistics reporting attacks by Christian extremists in the West as of having similar number and damage done as the Islamic extremists?




This is true.

There is more to how bad a religion is then violence caused by a certain religion. A religion is brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit. Violence and other acts done in the name of a religion is the effect of the brainwashing of the person.

Would you mind explaining to me how, lets say, Mormon extremists would be able to gain such a foothold if Mormonism was the primary religion in the region?


How about Buddhists? Or Anabaptists? What about Jehovah Witnesses, are they going to wear suicide vests under their suits now when they come to your door? And what of pagans and Wiccans? Would our Voice of Reason mind explaining his vast, unsupported statements on the equity of religious violence?

Mormonism is basically a sequel to the New Testament so like other religion based off Christianity they have a lot of options justify violence. I'm not an expert in Buddhism so I couldn't say exactly what, but they do have a violent past and while it is less extreme and prominent than the other main religions like Christianity, Islam or Judaism it is still there.

[PlasmaHam]

There is more to how bad a religion is then violence caused by a certain religion.
Do you then deny your earlier statement, and I quote, "All religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions." You clearly said that all religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions Now, unless I am mistaken, you are now saying that religions are not equally violent, and that the "badness" of a religion is that they "brainwash" people. However, you are also saying that all religions are equally prone to terrorism. You seem to be making yourself a web of contradictions here, Mr Voice of Reason.

Also, please be respectful and answer all of the questions presented unto you. Candorgen brought up some intelligent points. Please be reasonable and answer them in a similar intelligent fashion, or atleast try if that is too difficult for the VT Voice of Reason.


Mormonism is basically a sequel to the New Testament so like other religion based off Christianity they have a lot of options justify violence.
Please explain how Mormons would be just as prone as Muslims to become terrorists, if Mormonism was the main religion in the Middle East and not Islam. You claimed that any religion would become just as extreme as ISIS if it was the majority religion in the Middle East, so I am simply asking you to back up your claim. As someone who claims to be a Voice of Reason, you should recognize the importance of being able to back-up your claims.

I'm not an expert in Buddhism so I couldn't say exactly what, but they do have a violent past and while it is less extreme and prominent than the other main religions like Christianity, Islam or Judaism it is still there.
So, are you saying that Buddhism is not as bad as the Abrahamic religions? Or simply not as violent? But doesn't that invalidate your claim that all religions are equally bad and violent? Is Buddhism and Christianity equal violent then? What about Buddhism and Islam? If not, then why I should I believe you when you claim that all religions are equally violent whenever a Muslim commits a terrorist attack?

[inactiveguy678]

There is more to how bad a religion is then violence caused by a certain religion. A religion is brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit. Violence and other acts done in the name of a religion is the effect of the brainwashing of the person.



Mormonism is basically a sequel to the New Testament so like other religion based off Christianity they have a lot of options justify violence. I'm not an expert in Buddhism so I couldn't say exactly what, but they do have a violent past and while it is less extreme and prominent than the other main religions like Christianity, Islam or Judaism it is still there.

I can speak for Taoism and Budhism since relatives are of those denomination but Taoism doesn't perform similar to organised religion. Its very ritual based and the teachings are rules about humility. Problem is no diaspora Chinese who are identifying on that religion are not really humble. Successful Chinese usually humblebrag trust me I know. Most do rituals and ask for very selfish things like success or money. Plus, rituals like feng shui are highly commercialised. If you ask a master to fix your house for you it can easily cost anything from 25,000 USD to 100,000 USD.

Budhism on the other hand I only know of the one heavily meshed with Taoism since that is usually the Budhism Chinese people are (this shares some from Mahayana but it also deviates from it). Sexism is still a thing for women monks though one very rich and well funded organisation here has a female monk for a leader. But you have to remember Budhism was not really founded as a religion per se. Wasn't it based on Budhha's reaction to the general apathy of Hinduism to the poor and neglected caste of India? Anyway, for me the only thing I find problematic are some superstitions aren't really dispelled and since its more or less run as a teaching/ way of life. So again one can easily be taken advantage of by certain Monks who commercialise advice teachings etc. One can make a career of being a Monk to be honest.

EDIT
Superstitions are usually related to omens and spirits. These are not AFAIK part of Budhism but since Monks are highly regarded they only have moral incentive on them as leaders to teach against these corruptions or additions. It hard to explain but again this whole aspect is cause by the lack of organisational structure compared to Abrahamic religions.

[Uniquemind]

I would have to say it is flawed to embark on a position of discussion to conflate all religions and beliefs as equal, and therefore equal to seed violence.

Comparing faiths are even more meta, because you’d have to take the stories out of the faiths and examine their structure and effects on society.


And to go to a meta-meta level, you’d have to beyond that and look at human psychology in terms of group behavior and try to discern why one faith structure arose in one time and geographical region of earth VS another.

And tangent to that we should discuss how objective competitive variables have shaped faith justifications for survivalist actions over natural resources (including breeding opportunities) and if religious stories were simply a facade to make war against other factions, OR if perhaps those populations inherently believed those stories as fact and did indeed make war based on genuine supernatural-divine belief.


So this is where I think we should discuss things further lest we avoid circular logical debate on a topic where let’s face it, religion isn’t a scientific friendly way to vett it because spiritual things can’t be observed and tested the way biology or chemistry can.


—

I think a case can be made that religion, is a product rather than cause of violence and that true origin of degradation of decency and peace messages in any faith over a set amount of time is deeply rooted in the way the human brain evolved, environment can midigate some of the effects, but all faiths turn into dogma of a corrupt religion over time, like a game of telephone written or verbal, oe because time changes moral paradoxical problems due to technological advances.

Like in Christianity, IVF and IVG fertility and abortion moral debate around personhood wouldn’t exist 2000 years ago, but because the faith didn’t foresee writing s clause about this in the past, it leaves room for grey interrogation to modern day pastors ministers fathers, rabbis and immams to confusion and varied advice.

The modern way boys and girls and men and women date and choose partners is inherently heretical to ancient times, fornication everywhere, and women have more sexual freedom.

In fact all abrahamic faiths fail here, or they rely on black and white answers.

—-

I’d also like to add that I heard about. The prophet of Islam make a historical agreement with Christians that no muslin was supposed to hurt them and that Islam was not against them and any Muslim who did hurt a Christian would be in trouble with God.

But I rarely see people mention that. Since nobody else has I though I’d add it to the record.


Now I can’t believe in Mohammad because as I said in a different thread I lack verification that Islam’s prophet was indeed contacted by the angel Gabriel that got the whole process of Islam’s founding going.

[Leprous]

There is more to how bad a religion is then violence caused by a certain religion. A religion is brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit. Violence and other acts done in the name of a religion is the effect of the brainwashing of the person.


While I am not religious at all I do disagree with this to a certain extent. You seem to write off every religion as garbage while I don't think you seem to understand why people go to religion. Religion is a place where people can find peace with themselves and it in a lot of cases helps these people cope with struggles in their life. While of course in extreme cases it gets out of control in the cases where people find happines in religion I don't think it should be called "brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit". Religious people nor atheists are right nor wrong, for neither have enough proof at this moment. If a religious person would call atheism bullshit, you wouldn't like that very much now would you?

As for the violence, I feel like in a lot of cases these violent individuals (for example the Muslims running off to Syria to murder people) are already damaged and often times use religion as an excuse. While this certainly does not justify any of their actions often times they aren't as religious as you might suspect.

[Uniquemind]

My uncle is atheist.

I’m just gonna say it here; as scientific as I am.

I don’t discount religion. Why you might ask?


I’ve actually had 3 supernatural experiences that current scientific explanation can’t explain

I’ve had 2 encounters with ghosts/invisible spirit like entity (both friendly)

I’ve seen psychokinesis (aka: telekinesis at work) a friend did it in a scientific controlled environment of my choosing eliminating electro-static and magnetic and wind forces in an inside building, on a small pinwheel like device.

Another experience I won’t share yet as this site isn’t https secure and it’s more detailed and I can’t verify who else outside of the site is watching, and it is alien related prayer defended off the experience, I’m the only case I know of based on my research.

[mattsmith48]

Do you then deny your earlier statement, and I quote, "All religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions." You clearly said that all religions are equally bad and violent without exceptions Now, unless I am mistaken, you are now saying that religions are not equally violent, and that the "badness" of a religion is that they "brainwash" people. However, you are also saying that all religions are equally prone to terrorism. You seem to be making yourself a web of contradictions here, Mr Voice of Reason.

You shouldn't judge a religion only based on how violent some of their followers are, all religions without exception are based on making people believe non-sense or bullshit. That second part is what makes all region equally bad and bring all religions to be prone to be used to justify violence.


Please explain how Mormons would be just as prone as Muslims to become terrorists, if Mormonism was the main religion in the Middle East and not Islam. You claimed that any religion would become just as extreme as ISIS if it was the majority religion in the Middle East, so I am simply asking you to back up your claim. As someone who claims to be a Voice of Reason, you should recognize the importance of being able to back-up your claims.

The reason groups like ISIS are formed is because of political instability and to fill a void left by the overthrowing of dictators by a certain western country. Islam is used by ISIS to justify their actions because it is the main religion there. If Mormonism was the main religion they would find a way to use Mormonism to justify their actions

So, are you saying that Buddhism is not as bad as the Abrahamic religions? Or simply not as violent? But doesn't that invalidate your claim that all religions are equally bad and violent? Is Buddhism and Christianity equal violent then? What about Buddhism and Islam? If not, then why I should I believe you when you claim that all religions are equally violent whenever a Muslim commits a terrorist attack?

I explained earlier why they are all equally bad. Buddhism as a violent past its because it is less talked about or that it didn't go to the extreme length Christianity or Islam went doesn't mean Buddhism should be treated as less violent or bad then other religions.

While I am not religious at all I do disagree with this to a certain extent. You seem to write off every religion as garbage while I don't think you seem to understand why people go to religion. Religion is a place where people can find peace with themselves and it in a lot of cases helps these people cope with struggles in their life. While of course in extreme cases it gets out of control in the cases where people find happines in religion I don't think it should be called "brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit".

Religions helping some people through struggles and hard times doesn't change they are all bad or that it is bullshit and they are brainwashing people. Those people could be helped without the use of religions.

Religious people nor atheists are right nor wrong, for neither have enough proof at this moment. If a religious person would call atheism bullshit, you wouldn't like that very much now would you?

Atheists are right in the sense that you need to provide reproducible evidence that your religion isn't bullshit. It is impossible to prove a negative, you can't prove someone didn't commit the murder it is your job to prove he did it and as long as you can't prove the person did it he is innocent. That's what the concept of Atheism is, until you provide reproducible evidence of a God exist, there is no God or the odds of one existing are very low.

As for the violence, I feel like in a lot of cases these violent individuals (for example the Muslims running off to Syria to murder people) are already damaged and often times use religion as an excuse. While this certainly does not justify any of their actions often times they aren't as religious as you might suspect.

Essentially that's what I said

[sqishy]

There is more to how bad a religion is then violence caused by a certain religion.

Yes, there certainly is.


A religion is brainwashing people into believing in their bullshit.

That is not what defines the essence of a religion. That is just a central feature of a corrupt dogmatic organisation or movement.

“Make America Great Again!” Is not a slogan for a religion, nor is Marxism or Capitalism, nor is excessive fandom of Twilight or Star Wars (all of which have debate on how wasteful to society their presences may be or not).

Find another definition.


Violence and other acts done in the name of a religion is the effect of the brainwashing of the person.

Brainwashing someone does not necessitate making them violent. Hypnosis or delusional beliefs don’t have their content exclusively about enacting violence.

The fundamental nature of reality is more relevant to religions than violence is. Even anti-religious mindsets should realise that a set of desires (in this case aligning in some way with alleged absolute order) is required prior to any means of enacting those desires into manifestation.

Actions are always done with some end in mind, subconsciously or consciously. This is what defines actions apart from passive behaviours.

Furthermore, if religious people were all brainwashed, one wonders why you act resentfully toward them, if it’s not their fault that they act in the supposedly violent way they do. It appears as though you are finding as many ways as possible to attack the nature of religion without realising, at the least, that some ways exclude others (e.g. brainwashing vs intentional evil).


Mormonism is basically a sequel to the New Testament [...]

The Book of Mormon can be seen that way, yes, though Mormonism has its unique take on the realms one can enter after death, along with the nature of God, Christ and the Holy Spirit. It’s more than a simple add-on.


[...] so like other religion based off Christianity they have a lot of options justify violence.

You are being blatantly irresponsible to say this without actually reading any content or being aware of any context where applicable.

I would hope you would be disappointed in me if I said that all physics theories these days posit an absolute space and time simply because they are based off Newtonian Mechanics one way or another.

While the topic here is clearly relevant, it’s your behaviour with regards to it that is more problematic than the topic itself.

Don’t speak of the content of e.g. Mormonism unless you have actual responsibility to be right or wrong about what you are saying.


I'm not an expert in Buddhism so I couldn't say exactly what, [...]

You’d be better off to be consistent and also say this about ‘classical Christianity’, Mormonism, Islam, and so on. This is not a demand to have you read huge swathes of their ‘sacred texts’ to finally have any say in anything.

It is an observation that it is arrogance, not knowledge or any form of educated guess, that floats your opinion on a belief system you have not investigated in any significant way beyond first impressions.


but they do have a violent past and while it is less extreme and prominent than the other main religions like Christianity, Islam or Judaism it is still there.

It is clear that humanity has a proclivity to violence, massive in both magnitude and complexity. Belief systems are large-scale abstract structures that suggest there are better ways to interact with reality over time than other ways for the sake of what it means to have optimal existence. Religions take this to the level of making absolute reality relevant to its mapping.

Like all entities of technological value, the presence of a religion in itself is not the bringing about of actual evil and suffering. Some models work better than others, both in execution of desires and in suitability of the desires themselves in the world. Suggestions can be wrong. No system created with a finite spatiotemporal region of reality of application in mind will have eternal perfect validity across all of space and time. This is why judgement needs to be regularly placed on systems to evaluate what aspects of them should change for the better and what aspects of them should stay. You would be insane to keep everything of a system and similarly also insane to get rid of everything.

If you are going to reduce potential for harm in religions (which necessitates doing the same for all materially rooted technology, like atomic bombs, vaccines, computers), then you are freeing responsibility from people themselves, and it is people who actualise harm, as well as good, not what which only helps them do so. ‘Stop’ signs don’t stop cars - the drivers do.

We have to do work in many overlapping senses to reduce our potential for evil by acting on it less. It is people who have the power. Structures of our own creation cannot do anything moral or immoral without our presence. Structures magnify certain actions over others, that is one of the reasons they are there at all.

Absolving people of responsibility is a serious mistake. This might as well be an understatement.


Atheists are right in the sense that you need to provide reproducible evidence that your religion isn't bullshit.

While you are using the current meaning of atheism and religion as terms which are mutually exclusive, it’s not necessarily that way. The central worldview tenets of a religion regarding absolute order to reality can theoretically be valid while the social aspects of that religion can be corrupt in form and/or execution.

The distinction between atheism and antitheism is also important here. Atheists indeed can, as atheists, demand positive evidence in support for there being some specific theistic aspect to reality.

Atheists cannot, however (as atheists), go further to say the absence of evidence for the presence of X means there is presence of evidence for the absence of X. It is antitheists who go this far. All antitheists are atheists but not necessarily the other way around. Many people are atheistic by virtue of them just not making theism (or religion, to use the de facto usage) relevant to their life. For this reason you are not an atheist, you are an antitheist.


That's what the concept of Atheism is, until you provide reproducible evidence of a God exist, there is no God [...]

Wrong. That is antitheism, in context of the response above.


[...] or the odds of one existing are very low.

I’ve got a special kind of frustration with these sorts of probabilistic judgements in this topic. It’s as though you think God could be found in some literal sense analogous to the chance of finding a certain kind of electron after 1000 particle accelerator tests, like God is indeed a literal He of some embodied or disembodied human-like mind who is also a big old man probably somewhere in the sky.

There is a vast array of concepts on what it means for there to be absolute order to reality, or for there to be an absolute reality at all. Heavily ‘humanised’ ideas of God are a tiny subset of this, and it is shameful to see this subset be over-represented (beyond justification) to be so sloppily strawmanned by some self-proclaimed atheists who are actually antitheists, and perhaps not even good antitheists at that.

Perhaps being an honest atheist is more your thing than whatever sort of incoherent antitheism this is. I’m not saying the thousands of ideas of God mean that there is a better chance one of them is right, because that feeds back into this stupid probabilistic judgement that excessively simplifies what it would mean to literally or metaphorically find (a) God. The number of ideas makes no difference to an atheist in the sense that they can simply not intend to make them relevant in their life, and if they can do a genuinely great task of it and help others without a need to consciously involve alignment with greater existence, more power to them. There are many takes on absolute reality that we may do far better without. Your actions here are nothing like those of such genuinely wise atheists. This is incoherent theatre where you are an example of what you are saying you believe you are linearly against.

Linear opposition in the greater world is illusory opposition. It’s the misplaced concept that ‘wild’ reality beyond the frames of games is an environment where acting in the same way with functionally inverse tools will perfectly cancel things out. To use a crude but sufficient example, you don’t go running with a drum of liquid nitrogen (e.g. scientism) to put out some thermite lit by another (e.g. gnosticism). It just makes more of a mess, and, like I said before, it seriously devalues the role of the people here and seriously overlooks their similar actions, and it is people themselves who are of greatest importance.

[HeyCameron]

In general I reject any argument that tries to portray all religions as being the same, either from a negative standpoint (namely, mattsmith's "brainwashing bullshit" judgment) or from a positive standpoint ("religion of peace"). I've yet to find a religion that doesn't preach peace but also leave some room for justifiable violence, usually defensive. The problem comes with determining what is justifiable violence. My original question was simply about whether Islam leaves more "wiggle room" for the justification of violence than other religions OR if there is actually little difference and the reasons for Islamic violence are more tied to politics and ethnic strife than to any "broader" definition of justifiable violence in its religious doctrine.

[mattsmith48]

That is not what defines the essence of a religion. That is just a central feature of a corrupt dogmatic organisation or movement.

“Make America Great Again!” Is not a slogan for a religion, nor is Marxism or Capitalism, nor is excessive fandom of Twilight or Star Wars (all of which have debate on how wasteful to society their presences may be or not).

Find another definition.

Excessive fan of science fiction franchises are not trying to ''brainwash people into believing their bullshit''. Also you could make an argument that Marxism, Capitalism and Trumpism are religions.

Brainwashing someone does not necessitate making them violent. Hypnosis or delusional beliefs don’t have their content exclusively about enacting violence.

But if there is violence justified by the religion it is because of the brainwashing.

The fundamental nature of reality is more relevant to religions than violence is. Even anti-religious mindsets should realise that a set of desires (in this case aligning in some way with alleged absolute order) is required prior to any means of enacting those desires into manifestation.

Actions are always done with some end in mind, subconsciously or consciously. This is what defines actions apart from passive behaviours.

Furthermore, if religious people were all brainwashed, one wonders why you act resentfully toward them, if it’s not their fault that they act in the supposedly violent way they do. It appears as though you are finding as many ways as possible to attack the nature of religion without realising, at the least, that some ways exclude others (e.g. brainwashing vs intentional evil).

People leaves religions all the time, by criticizing religions and the actions of their followers you may help some religious people make an informed decision and leave the religion. Most religious people were raised in the religion they believe, the brainwashing beginning at birth, and never saw what the other options were about including leaving. So by putting the criticism and the information out there you can help those people. I was raised Catholic but as I grew up I started asking questions, did some research and found out it was all bullshit. Giving information and openly criticizing all religions equally can help others do the same.


The Book of Mormon can be seen that way, yes, though Mormonism has its unique take on the realms one can enter after death, along with the nature of God, Christ and the Holy Spirit. It’s more than a simple add-on.

Its like any sequel presenting new information contradicting the old information from previous movies or books.

You are being blatantly irresponsible to say this without actually reading any content or being aware of any context where applicable.

I would hope you would be disappointed in me if I said that all physics theories these days posit an absolute space and time simply because they are based off Newtonian Mechanics one way or another.

While the topic here is clearly relevant, it’s your behaviour with regards to it that is more problematic than the topic itself.

Don’t speak of the content of e.g. Mormonism unless you have actual responsibility to be right or wrong about what you are saying.




You’d be better off to be consistent and also say this about ‘classical Christianity’, Mormonism, Islam, and so on. This is not a demand to have you read huge swathes of their ‘sacred texts’ to finally have any say in anything.

It is an observation that it is arrogance, not knowledge or any form of educated guess, that floats your opinion on a belief system you have not investigated in any significant way beyond first impressions.

What are you talking about? I know a lot about Christianity, Mormonism and Islam.

It is clear that humanity has a proclivity to violence, massive in both magnitude and complexity. Belief systems are large-scale abstract structures that suggest there are better ways to interact with reality over time than other ways for the sake of what it means to have optimal existence. Religions take this to the level of making absolute reality relevant to its mapping.

Like all entities of technological value, the presence of a religion in itself is not the bringing about of actual evil and suffering. Some models work better than others, both in execution of desires and in suitability of the desires themselves in the world. Suggestions can be wrong. No system created with a finite spatiotemporal region of reality of application in mind will have eternal perfect validity across all of space and time. This is why judgement needs to be regularly placed on systems to evaluate what aspects of them should change for the better and what aspects of them should stay. You would be insane to keep everything of a system and similarly also insane to get rid of everything.

If you are going to reduce potential for harm in religions (which necessitates doing the same for all materially rooted technology, like atomic bombs, vaccines, computers), then you are freeing responsibility from people themselves, and it is people who actualise harm, as well as good, not what which only helps them do so. ‘Stop’ signs don’t stop cars - the drivers do.

We have to do work in many overlapping senses to reduce our potential for evil by acting on it less. It is people who have the power. Structures of our own creation cannot do anything moral or immoral without our presence. Structures magnify certain actions over others, that is one of the reasons they are there at all.

Absolving people of responsibility is a serious mistake. This might as well be an understatement.

I never said people are not responsible for their actions, what I'm saying is every religion without exception are prone to be used to justify violence.

[Spooky_Eli]

Excessive fan of science fiction franchises are not trying to ''brainwash people into believing their bullshit''. Also you could make an argument that Marxism, Capitalism and Trumpism are religions.

no. no you could not. Marxism and capitalism (and whatever the fuck trumpism is) say nothing about the existence of a higher power or supernatural deity, nor to they attempt to establish one. they also do not use a deity to justify there ideas about how people should live.


What are you talking about? I know a lot about Christianity, Mormonism and Islam.


hahahaha, thanks matt, you made my day with this.

not all religions are made equal. islam is the only religion on planet earth that sets up clear instructions within its doctrine on how to billed a society with islam intrinsically tied into said society in every way, it also sets out rules about eliminating all those who do not believe in islam and to clearly and stigmaticlly oppress women and other minority's. no other religon is like this.

[HeyCameron]

That's one thing that does set Islam apart, and part of my initial question. Islam is unique in having at its foundation a means of establishing a theocratic state. Other religions do not have this. That could be a unique factor in contributing to Islamic violence.

There's no "render unto Caesar" in Islam. That's a fundamental difference between Islam and Christianity.

[inactiveguy678]

That's one thing that does set Islam apart, and part of my initial question. Islam is unique in having at its foundation a means of establishing a theocratic state. Other religions do not have this. That could be a unique factor in contributing to Islamic violence.

I think this was pointed out earlier in the discussion when many responders including I pointed out that Islam was constantly under threat through various sources and reasons (mostly territorial disputes).

To clarify Cameron's question about the wiggle room and etc having an effect or causing this turn to a more rigid and violent atmosphere you really have to remember that Christianity evolved very differently including a highly transposed situation when the Roman Empire used it as a state religion after being a target of its campaigns previously (like evangelists being used a the opening acts for gladiator battles and fed to the lions etc).

[HeyCameron]

Sure, I can understand why it arose and how Islam started out in a more militant environment. I guess it's factors like that I wonder if they contribute to the modern-day violence, even if such accounts of early violence in the foundation of the religion (as I mentioned, there are similar accounts in the Jewish history) are not being taken into proper context.

But it's not as if Christianity didn't have its own violent spread; there was plenty of that during the colonization of the Americas.

[inactiveguy678]

But again the purpose of the violence was different. Both started as being oppressed while one was taken up by a dominant force under their banner a considerable powerful empire (Christianity) earlier in history than other. So of course by this mentality it could affect how this violence was justified.

Edit made a mistake about excluding Ottoman Empire

[HeyCameron]

Re: the modern violence and how it relates. Islam is not really an "underdog" anymore, and the messages of conquest and caliphates and subjugation of the modern terrorism movement seem to be notably less defensive in nature.

That's why my original question referenced Indonesia, a Muslim country that is not as turbulent as the Middle East, but still is sometimes subjected to Islamic violence. Why does it happen there too?

[Spooky_Eli]

But it's not as if Christianity didn't have its own violent spread; there was plenty of that during the colonization of the Americas.YES, but none of the violence from Christianity was actually sanctioned by its doctrine unlike islam

[Spooky_Eli]

That's why my original question referenced Indonesia, a Muslim country that is not as turbulent as the Middle East, but still is sometimes subjected to Islamic violence. Why does it happen there too?
because the followers of islam are told by there doctrine to commit violent acts.

[inactiveguy678]

Re: the modern violence and how it relates. Islam is not really an "underdog" anymore, and the messages of conquest and caliphates and subjugation of the modern terrorism movement seem to be notably less defensive in nature.

That's why my original question referenced Indonesia, a Muslim country that is not as turbulent as the Middle East, but still is sometimes subjected to Islamic violence. Why does it happen there too?

You forget that Indonesian attempted a massacre against the Chinese during during 1965-1966 because some Chinese refused the total assimilation of minorities with the dominant Muslim culture. Or in 1998 when Chinese were massacred and blamed for the political woes of Indonesia.

I don't think using Indonesia as less turbulent is very apt because they do a lot of these things against the Chinese in their own backyard. For the sake of simplicity, I' m going to restrict the argument there and not include more recent radical forms of terrorism occurring in the region.

And with regards to the underdog status. My mistake, I had to correct it when I excluded the Ottoman empire. But remember, during the fall of the Ottoman empire a white Christian woman created the borders of Iraq and Jordan and that itself was a huge blow in the status of Islam being part of a dominant geographic power. Which is what I am bringing as a point of possible consideration and not presenting it as a factual reason for cause and effect.

[letters0numbers]

As Christians have branches like Catholic, Anglican, and Orthodox, Islam does too. As far as I know, they have two branches. All this bombing issue you guys talking about comes from one of them. They believe that they have to spread the religion EVERYWHERE to EVERYONE and anyone that does not follow them is a sinner, useless, and should die. They also do this with the conquering method, war. Yes, this is disturbing but it is what they believe in. Not all Muslim are like this anyway. Most of the entire Muslim population practices the other, much calmer branch of Islam. I am from Malaysia and I'm still alive. I'm a Catholic who live with Muslims my entire life (and people of other religions and races too) and no one has attack us directly. The Prime Minister is a Muslim and he appears on the tv wishing everyone having a happy festive everytime there's a known festive of a random culture happening. Which reminds me, Happy Aidilfitri to all Muslims! My stomach will be filled with food by the end of this festive season.