[ExI] Religions and violence [Was Re: Sarah Palin]

John Clark jonkc at bellsouth.net
Thu Jul 22 17:01:36 UTC 2010


On Jul 21, 2010, at 3:43 PM, Damien Sullivan wrote:

>  Max More wrote:
> 
>> point -- there *is* something about the Muslim religion that commands 
>> Muslims to go out and kill the infidel. 
> 
> Many Muslims seems to disagree about that very point

Where do these "many Muslims" show that they disagree with killing the infidel? Yes, they will give lip service to it and will tell you that Islam means peace (or perhaps submission, apparently they aren't sure), but what Islamic person stood up and said that a novelist and a cartoonist shouldn't be murdered for exercising their trade? Well I can think of one, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, but she could only do that from the "safety" of a Western country and even then she received so many death threats from those peace loving Muslims (including one note pinned to the body of her friend with a knife that penetrated his heart) that she's going to have to live in hiding for the rest of her life.

> And historically... for centuries Christians were rather prone to forcible conversion of the heathens,
> while for a long time, Muslims coexisted with Jews and Christians rather better than Christians did with anyone else.

Its interesting that whenever anybody uses examples to demonstrate the glories and fair-mindedness of Islamic culture the examples cited always come before the year 1500, usually centuries before.

> If this has changed recently

Recently?! In the year 900 Islamic culture was one of the most advanced in the world, superior to anything found in the west, but it's been straight downhill from there; it has contributed little of value to the world in centuries. For example, out of a pool of 1.4 Billion people, 20% of the world's population, they have produced only 6 Nobel prizes, and 3 of them were for peace and given to people like Yasser Arafat which must embarrass the Nobel organization today; in comparison out of a pool of only 12 million jews, .2% of the world's population, have produced 165 Noble prizes. This despite the fact that recent genetic studies have shown that Jews and Arabs are virtually identical, so some other factor must explain this anomaly and I think we both know what that factor is. In fact, off the top of my head I can't think of any recent Islamic person that I really admire and think will be fondly remembered for generations that mainstream Islamic culture isn't trying to kill.

> in the brief Maccabean period, they seem to have forcibly converted a neighboring kingdom, Edom.
> Or conquered and forced to live by Jewish laws 

Who cares.

  John K Clark 



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