Islam - How Awful Is It?

[Forty Two]

My tense was off there. I'm talking about places that have hate speech laws covering religion, and what Canada may become. Luckily, in the US, our college leftists have so far been relegated to college, not Congress.

[JimC]

My tense was off there. I'm talking about places that have hate speech laws covering religion, and what Canada may become. Luckily, in the US, our college leftists have so far been relegated to college, not Congress.

But you do have a tendency to assume that the rants of a few college extremists presage whole-scale changes in US society in this area, which seems extremely unlikely...

[JimC]

And should those who think it's awful be allowed to say so in public to the same extent as those who like it are allowed to say how great they think it is?

You get an emphatic yes to both from me.

I do think that most of those who complain about islamophobia are actually objecting to morons seeing each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified and treating them as such.

In a way, they are the evil of Islam.

In other words you belong to the group of people I mentioned above who see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified. Forum rules forbid that I go on...

I think that you are a little off the mark here in ascribing to 42 "see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified". Some of our anti-islamic hate groups seem to do just that, but I suspect that 42 would see ordinary muslims as worryingly deluded, but not automatically evil...

At least I hope so...

[Hermit]

And should those who think it's awful be allowed to say so in public to the same extent as those who like it are allowed to say how great they think it is?

You get an emphatic yes to both from me.

I do think that most of those who complain about islamophobia are actually objecting to morons seeing each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified and treating them as such.

In a way, they are the evil of Islam.

In other words you belong to the group of people I mentioned above who see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified. Forum rules forbid that I go on...

I think that you are a little off the mark here in ascribing to 42 "see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified". Some of our anti-islamic hate groups seem to do just that, but I suspect that 42 would see ordinary muslims as worryingly deluded, but not automatically evil...

At least I hope so...

"In a way, they are the evil of Islam" looks to me all but identical to the proposition that "each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified". 42 certainly did not reply with anything like the words you put in his mouth, which describe "ordinary Muslims as worryingly deluded, but not automatically evil".

[JimC]

I was hoping that the "in a way" was a form of qualification...

Perhaps I am seeing him through rose-coloured glasses...

[Hermit]

I was hoping that the "in a way" was a form of qualification...

In the absence of clarification they are weasel words pure and simple. I expect 42, should he choose to explain what he means with them, come up with a reply that can be summarised as "No, each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah are not the evil of Islam personified, but yes, they are. In short, obfuscation.

[Animavore]

Edit: wrong thread.

[pErvinalia]

It sounds like 42's argument is a bit like the Marxists and their railing against the petite burgeousieoueiesuoue. The moderates allow the extremists to exist. There's probably a bit of truth to that. But as the example of Christianity over the last couple of hundred years shows, the teeth of the extremists can be pulled to a reasonable degree.

[Brian Peacock]

It sounds like 42's argument is a bit like the Marxists and their railing against the petite burgeousieoueiesuoue. The moderates allow the extremists to exist. There's probably a bit of truth to that. But as the example of Christianity over the last couple of hundred years shows, the teeth of the extremists can be pulled to a reasonable degree.

Yeah, in the West the trenchant branch of Christianity has mostly been quelled, unless you need an abortion in Alabama or Northern Ireland. If you're a gay man in Uganda though Christianity still has teeth sharp enough to kill you.

Religious moderate might not be flying planes into building or actively working to create the conditions which will fulfil some apocalyptic Bronze Age prophecy, but they still want religious faith, mostly their own admittedly, to be acknowledged and, importantly, protected. They still think that Faith--believing and holding something to be true for literally no good reason at all--is a personal virtue. They still think that raising their children to be 'good' members of their faith is an ethical obligation. And because they maintain that such personal virtues and ethical obligations are goods in themselves they expect everyone else to respect the principles on which they order their lives - after all, "We're the good people," they say - and on the whole they probably mostly are 'good people'.

But when someone criticises their religion for authorising some atrocity or other self-justified turpitude moderates go, "Hey. You can't say that about my religion. My religion is good. I'm good. Cut that shit out." In response to (any and all) criticism of their religion they force the issue that society should, in acknowledgement of their own non-extremism, automatically afford some respect for their religious faith. This goes the same for criticising religious holy books or religious cultural traditions: "Hey! The Bible is sacred. You can't say that about it. It's 'The Good Book' for chrissakes. My religion is good. I'm good. Cut that shit out." - "Hey! Ritual scaring of the genitals is a sacred act for us..." etc etc.

By this religious moderates give cover to extremists who affiliate under the same logo, and when these calls go up from a variety of sources the cumulative effect is to form a kind of general religious consensus - one that declares religiosity itself is worthy of default respect and protection. This consensus also stops people of one religion criticising the members of another, if only to forestall the finger being pointed back the other way.

So yeah, moderates do allow extremists to exists, to some extent - though it's worth noting that according to the utopian ideals of the religious extremist that courtesy would not necessarily be reciprocated.

The trouble is that the moderate and the extremist hold to exactly the same basic ideals on exactly the same basis - which is where I think this distinction between so-called religious moderates and so-called religious extremists becomes a bit misleading. We may consider the actions of jihadists or abortion doctor killers extreme, because they are, but their religious perspectives are not religiously extreme but religiously fundamental.

The fundamentalist carries the doctrine of their creed to it's logical conclusion. Once you are committed to the principle that Faith is a personal virtue, and that adhering to a religion's prescriptive doctrine necessitates ethical obligations, then ordering and living one's life by those principles, to the fullest extent, kind of becomes an act of intellectual and moral honesty.

What differentiates the moderate from the fundamentalist is not their core beliefs, or their basic reasons for believing them, but the degree to which they prepared to establish and enact those beliefs, both in terms of their private lives and in terms of the communities and cultures in which they are embedded - and sometimes even in terms of cultures they have no direct relationship with.

No-one can say that non-violence is a core belief of Islam, or any of the big three monotheisms. In fact violence is a foundational principle of the big thress that is written into all the holy books over and over again: a capricious and violent god inspiring capricious and violent acts its votaries and acolytes, acts that will hopefully qualify them for a spectacularly massive reward - not being subject to the capricious violence of their god. Those who live in the perpetual fear which death-cult religions inspire think that fear is not just the norm, but that it is ennobling, and that everybody should be just a fearful for exactly the same reasons. The fundamentalist is just the person who is prepared to put the fear of god into you in order to save their own pathetic soul.

God/Allah/YHWH is the biggest terrorist of all time. Sure, Islam is a really fucking awful religion, but it's no more or less awful than any of the big three - so let's not single it out for special treatment while ignoring the other elephants in the room.

[Forty Two]

My tense was off there. I'm talking about places that have hate speech laws covering religion, and what Canada may become. Luckily, in the US, our college leftists have so far been relegated to college, not Congress.

But you do have a tendency to assume that the rants of a few college extremists presage whole-scale changes in US society in this area, which seems extremely unlikely...

Don't be so sure. There are large swaths of people in our under-30 crowd who believe that the first amendment to our constitution, protecting the individual right of freedom of speech, and of the press, and of religion and of association, does not not protect hate speech (hate speech including sexist things, racist things, transphobic things, homophobic things, fat shaming, etc.).

I think it's true that the majority of Americans still think that freedom of speech is very broad to encompass hateful ideas, or racist/sexist ideas. However, there are enough lurking out there that would take away that right to make it a concern. I liken it to the religious folks. The majority in America take a freedom of religion for all, including the nonreligious, point of view, and look for a sense of equal treatment and government neutrality. However, there are enough out there working to undermine that, that we must be forever vigilant against them.

[Forty Two]

And should those who think it's awful be allowed to say so in public to the same extent as those who like it are allowed to say how great they think it is?

You get an emphatic yes to both from me.

I do think that most of those who complain about islamophobia are actually objecting to morons seeing each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified and treating them as such.

In a way, they are the evil of Islam.

In other words you belong to the group of people I mentioned above who see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified. Forum rules forbid that I go on...

I think that you are a little off the mark here in ascribing to 42 "see each and all persons who believe in the existence of Allah as the evil of Islam personified". Some of our anti-islamic hate groups seem to do just that, but I suspect that 42 would see ordinary muslims as worryingly deluded, but not automatically evil...

At least I hope so...

Well, I don't really believe in an inherent evilness or goodness of people. So, religious people of whatever stripe are not evil or good. They're people. They do things we can judge moral or immoral, good or bad, based on given premises. However,they personally are not Orcs in the Lord of the Rings, biologically evil, or evil by nature. Real life is not Dungeons and Dragons where a character has a position on the evil to goodness spectrum and that's where he or she is.

That being said, finding the entirety of religious belief or a religious belief to be wrong-headed, damaging, a poor moral guide, etc., or to find faith itself to be not a virtue but a vice, is not, in my view, seeing all people who believe in the existence of Allah as "evil."

Finding Islam repulsive because of judgments made about the dogma of Islam is not racist. It's not phobic. It's not declaring anybody to be "evil." It's no different than when folks line up against Catholicism, or some protestant denomination, and declare them to be oppressive, sexist, racist, homophobic, etc. sets of ideas - that's making a negative judgment about those religions. Does that mean that all the members of those religions are "evil?" Is there something wrong with challenging, ridiculing, criticizing or holding those religions in contempt based on their dogmas?

[Forty Two]

It sounds like 42's argument is a bit like the Marxists and their railing against the petite burgeousieoueiesuoue. The moderates allow the extremists to exist. There's probably a bit of truth to that. But as the example of Christianity over the last couple of hundred years shows, the teeth of the extremists can be pulled to a reasonable degree.

Certainly, there is the argument that moderates who sympathize with the fundamental views of a religion give cover to the extremists who advocate violence (which of course, is a moral imperative sometimes, according to various folks these days...). However, there is also the argument that religion itself is a problem. That Islam, for example, is itself a problem as a belief system. Like a bad philosophy, it's a set of dogmas, an ideology, and a very bad one at that. And, there is also the argument that the underlying, foundational aspect of religion "belief without evidence," "belief based on authority and received wisdom," or even "belief IN SPITE OF evidence to the contrary..." are very bad ideas -- bad things to have as the foundation of ones moral compass.

I reject the notion that we can say that some forms of Islam, the really really extreme kind ,are bad, but we have to say that Islam itself - run of the mill - Joe Six-Pack Islam - is o.k. and good. No. Islam itself is conceptually, foundationally bad because (a) it's not true or completely unsubstantiated by fact or evidence - it's fundamental claims are not true, or must be taken as true without proof or evidence, (b) it's moral claims are highly questionable, at best, and even in its moderate forms contains and advocates ideas which are not good moral guides.

I reject any law or other compulsion that I must respect it or refrain from offending those who subscribe to it.

[NineBerry]

You must respect that people are free to follow this faith in the bounds of general law. And you must refrain from inciting hatred against persons based on their membership in a cultural group like the Muslim communities. Both restrictions are based on the Declaration of Human Rights.

[pErvinalia]

I reject the notion that we can say that some forms of Islam, the really really extreme kind ,are bad, but we have to say that Islam itself - run of the mill - Joe Six-Pack Islam - is o.k. and good. No. Islam itself is conceptually, foundationally bad because (a) it's not true or completely unsubstantiated by fact or evidence - it's fundamental claims are not true, or must be taken as true without proof or evidence, (b) it's moral claims are highly questionable, at best, and even in its moderate forms contains and advocates ideas which are not good moral guides.

I certainly agree with this. But my views on religion aren't limited to Islam. The same applies to Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism and probably a fuckton more religions that I am yet to know the full details of.

[NineBerry]

Also applies to religious atheism