1351. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196530 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 5:55 am

decius

I don't need to have a workable alternative to be critical of something which isn't working.

Hmmm... Except, from where I'm sitting, it seems to be working damn well. Defeating fascism and Nazism, preventing Communism from enslaving the world, settling the hash of Saddam and Milosevic... this seems to me to be a functional definition of working.

Unless you have some other system that, say, would have prevented the Soviets from gobbling up Europe, then this is what you have. And, more importantly, what other nation is capable of opposing the Jihad?

1352. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196524 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 5:30 am

I sometimes get the feeling that I'm in a remake of Jaws. Specifically, I'm the Great White, and Vin - and others - is one of the dimwit teenagers who thinks that it's safe to go back into the water.

Point: The International Criminal Court recently issued warrants for the arrest for Ahmed Haroun, the minister for humanitarian affairs of Sudan (a phrase that ought to make your head explode), and Ali Kosheib, a member of the janjaweed. The charges include 'severe deprivation of liberty', which is to say slavery.

Link here:
http://www.icc-cpi.int/press/pressreleases/241.html

Egypt's Al-Ahram weekly observes 'slavery, sanctioned by religious zealots, ravaged the southern parts of the country and much of the west as well."

Link:
http://weekly.ahram.org.eg/2007/843/re81.htm

There's even a group called CASMAS, the Coalition Against Slavery in Mauritania and Sudan:
http://members.aol.com/casmasalc/newpage8.htm

And the BBC noted that slave raids are commonplace in that country:

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/6455365.stm

So, tell me, Vin ever get tired of being wrong?

*cue music, as the great beast retreats to it's depths, awaiting the next foolhardy challenger*


------------------------------------------

decius you still haven't answered what exactly your great alternative to the Pax Americana is.

1353. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196495 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 3:41 am

I can only say that your blank statement "international law is a chimera" is very surprising, particularly given the fact that you don't explain why. Also, you seem to imply that without enforceability there shouldn't be a juridical system at all, which is a red herring.

I thought I had explained why. And I didn't say that there 'shouldn't' be a judicial system at all without enforceability, I said that without enforceability no judicial system is possible, period.

Mind you I'd love to have an international judicial system that works. That embargoes all countries known to engage in the slave trade, and stops down hard on the Janjaweed. I'd also like to find the cure for cancer, solve cold fusion, and end aging. Unlikely. In fact, those last three are more likely than the first.

Denying reality, no matter what the reason, only ever leads to disaster. This is what's wrong with pretending that something like International Law exists. In Dar Fur we have an obvious evil, and also an excellent opportunity to strike at the Jihad, to break and weaken the dar al-Islam. Yet thanks to the UN fetishists, the only power in the world capable of doing that is going the UN route, and the UN will produce a stern condemnation about two weeks after everyone's dead.

I am sorry, but your perception of the Pax Americana through your particular family history doesn't really impress me.

Good. It's not supposed to. The case that I argue is supposed to provoke thought, however. You don't like the Pax Americana? Fine. What are you going to put in its place?

That's the rock on which all UN fetishism falters.

1354. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196475 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 2:44 am

decius I am eager to hear your comments on my comments - if you have any.

1355. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196466 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 2:35 am

decius, I've said this before, and I will say it again, the very concept of 'international law' is a chimera. Nonexistent in any meaningful sense.

A law - any law, whether it's the just and rational laws of the Western democracies, or the nightmarish law of the Shariah - is only a law if it can be enforced. If there is, backing it up, the threat of force, of physical violence, on those who break it.

So how can 'international law' of the type the UN represents exist? The UN lacks troops, lacks the power to enforce its edicts. When it wants something done, it needs to turn to others to provide that force that makes law law.

And here lies the problem. If you want not just international law, but a just, a sane, international law, you need a powerful, civilized state willing to back it up. There is one, and only one, state that is capable of fulfilling that roll: the United States of America.

You may complain about this or that American fiasco as much as you want, but the fact is that they're the best there is. Whom else would you give the responsibility of policing the world? Russia? China? A desiccated European Union unable to even defend itself?

Any rational plea for 'international law' is a plea for American hegemony. Now, personally, I have no problems with that. The Pax Americana has allowed hundreds of millions to escape from the hideous law of the jungle that is the norm for human civilization. And it has saved my own life, and that of my family more than once.

This is not what the UN wants, nor what its ardent supporters want. They want to be able to enforce international law - without force. They want civilized power imposed on the world, while they hate to acknowledge the civilization or the power or the imposition.

And so they fall to pieces, content themselves with spitting at Israel, America and the West, and sleep fine in the comforting smug superiority while the murderers of this world continue undeterred, while the Janajaweed kill two million non-Muslims, and when those have run out, start on the black Muslims (because there is no way Arab Muslims will ever acknowledge non-Arabs, let alone Blacks, as equals). While China remains a tyranny, while women are oppressed reduced to slavery. While actual slaves are sold in Khartoum, and taken to Dubai and Saudi Arabia to live lives of fear, hunger and unending misery.

This doesn't disturb their dreams, not in the slightest. Smug self-satisfaction is harder than diamond,

1356. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196429 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 12:24 am

Have to disagree with you there King of NH, you can be a good religious scholar. You can study religious literature, comparative religion, influence, philosophical trends - the whole enchilada.

Vis a viz Islam, Ibn Warraq, Robert Spencer, Hugh FitzGerald, Ali Sina - they all qualify as good scholars.

It's the phrase 'theologian' that's a little strange.

1357. Muslim countries win concession regarding religious debates

Comment #196425 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 20, 2008 at 12:15 am

And so it goes. One more step towards criminalizing all discussion of Islam so the Jihad can advance unhindered.

HA.... if the UN took a firm stance on anything ,they would prolapse their colons.

Oh, but they do, 8teist. When it comes to condemning Israel, or defending international terrorism, or protecting child-rapists, the UN is right there.

It's just they are always wrong.

The Human Rights Council doesn't include the United States? Why is that?

keith it's because "UN Human Rights Commission" is a phrase like "the Religion of Peace" or "the Ministry of Truth". It's not even meaningless, it's the exact opposite of what it says.


On the bright if these maggots can do nothing in Darfur, or to stop the Khmer Rouge, or the genocide of East Timor, do you think they'll be able to stop people like me saying what we want about Islam? They're invited to try.

EDIT: My new slogan: 'Secceding from the UN: Is there any argument against it?'

1358. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #195222 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 18, 2008 at 12:08 am

Why am I not suprised that there's no indecency lastgreekstanding will not stoop to?

Then, Hirsi Ali (or whatever your real name is), grab your gun!

It may have escaped your notice, but Ayaan Hirsi Ali is under the kind of constant threat that not even soldiers in the military are. they can come home, and they are heavily trained, and equipped with good weaponry, and surrounded by people they trust who fight alongside them.

Ayaan has none of these things. You should be ashamed of yourself.

For the record, talking with Iran is a waste of time, so we'd better destroy those centrifuges or be prepared for a nuclear war.

I may have been reading too much into this. It's also possible that you're just fed up (and rightly so) with the things coming out of the Middle East these days (well, years actually) and that comes out more in your posts. I do, however, enjoy reading your posts as they are always well thought out and full of information.

Not to quibble, but I am more fed up with what is coming out of London these days (such as our brilliant court's decisions to cut Al Qaeda's number one man in Europe loose) or what's heard in the Mosques across Europe and America. This problem would not be an existential one if we had a sane immigration policy - and by sane I mean 'No Muslims need apply'.

1359. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #194651 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 6:15 am

al, I agree up to a point:

Christianity isn't the answer. There is no answer to radical Islam.

And that point is that the most secular societies were originally Christian, so it's worth considering a 'half-way house' idea.

Six million apostates a year isn't to be sneezed at.

1360. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #194637 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 5:54 am

al, I appreciate all of that. But the fact is that we know Christianity can be reformed, and it, in fact, has been reformed, and it has nothing like the history of Islam.

Like I said there's a difference between a cold and the flu.

qomak, do you mean FGM?

EDIT: That aside though, I think that it may be easier to get Muslims to turn atheist than to turn Christian, not to mention that fundie Christians have this tendency towards marginalization that doesn't exactly help getting the message out.

1361. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #194606 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 3:55 am

Okay, let me amend that statement:

Is there anyone serious who wouldn't heave a huge sigh of relief?

1362. Breaking the Silence

Comment #194575 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 1:23 am

huzonfirst you lie down with the dogs, you get fleas. The left's response to Islam has been pathetic (the right's is nothing to write home about, but at least some righties get the problem). Sorry, but that's the way things are.

And thinking that Bush and bin Laden are moral equals is, not to put to fine a point on it, nuts. Round the bend. Not playing with a full deck. A few sticks short of a bundle. A few bricks shy of a stack. Nuts.

1363. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #194574 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 1:12 am

Furthermore, how do you not find dangerous wanting to convert everyone to christianity? I can understand less dangerous than wanting to convert everyone to islam, but you specifically said "Now that's not a dangerous view, and in fact may be a very helpful one".

Sorry, RamizD, I'll just answer this bit: imagine if tomorrow all the Muslims in the world had adopted Christianity, even Bible-pounding, Pat Robertson style Christianity. Is there anyone who wouldn't heave a huge sight of relief? And Shoebat's missionary activities are focused on Muslims.

You know the saying: 'the enemy of my enemy...'

EDIT: Anyway, my point was about this asinine smearing of all anti-jihadists as 'neocons', whatever that is.

1364. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194573 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 17, 2008 at 1:06 am

First, spare me your snide and denigrating tone

Oh, do I have to?

one denies they're a very serious problem, but they don't have the structure or means to overthrow governments of first world powers, to wage Blitzkrieg and take control of countries not already under their control in a matter of weeks or days, they don't have an organized Armed force that acts so systematically as to make this possible.

Unfortunately, that is, not to put to fine a point on it, all wrong. We are one coup or assassination away from radical Muslims having possession of nuclear weapons. They can't wage Blitzkrieg you say? Well, they seem to be managing well in Darfur (and, yes, that is an Islamic issue - Islam is a vessel of Arab supremacism), not to mention what they did to the Christians of East Timor.

Now, as regards your 'First World Nation' qualification, how sure are you? Because Europe is turning into Eurabia thanks to what the United Nations calls 'the fastest demographic transformation in human history'. France isn't worried about Iran becoming the second Islamic nuclear power because it is well on its way to becoming the third.

Nationalism is pride in one's country or culture, often excessive in nature, it is unquestioning idealization of the nation (an artificial entity unlike the aggregate of people itself) with beliefs in its superiority and devaluation of foreigners

Sez you. Why shouldn't Americans take pride in their own nation? After all, America is number one in the world in all fields of science and technology, has one of the longest histories of sustained constitutional evolution and has the best track record of being on the right side of the conflicts between civilization and tyranny (WWII and the Cold War, just to mention a few little details...). As regards 'devaluation of foreigners' my impression from the Americans I know - and, remember, I hang out with the right-wing hawks - is that they are sick to death of the hysterical anti-Americanism of guys like Chirac. I can't say I blame them; when it comes to 'devaluing' people, Americans have nothing on Europe's chattering classes.

systematic torture

Ah yes, the old complainst about Gitmo - where noone has died, and every inmate emerges with one new pair of genes, one new Koran, and an average fifteen pounds weight gain.

de-humanizing one's enemies in the mindset of the people engaged in the operation

You mean the way Bush and sundry keep harping on this lunacy that Islam is a religion of peace? Or the way they urged, directly after the most vicious attack on American soil, that Muslims should, under no circumstances, be held accountable? Or the deference they instruct their troops to show Mosques and holy places in Iraq?

Sorry, you have that backwards. The problem is that they insist on assigning humanity to an enemy that has thoroughly dehumanized himself.

enying even potential (not confirmed) enemies basic human rights

The 'not confirmed' has a little something to do with the fact that the Jihadis fight outside of uniform, making it impossible for anyone to tell the difference. Anyway, when three hundred million Muslims say they're okay with 9/11 it's hard to see how the enemy is 'not confirmed'.

disregard for Genever convention

Hmmmm... According to the Geneva convention, those fighting outside uniform have no rights whatsoever. There is a very good reason for this. A soldier fighting outside of uniform exposes the civilian populace to appalling risk. Here's a good article on the subject:

http://www.ejectejecteject.com/archives/000125.html

executions

Such as? As I said, noone in Gitmo has died, which is a pity, because the only rational and just response to the Jihadis is to shoot them like rats. And, yes, this is just: if it was clear that those fighting in uniform will be accorded full rights, but those using civilians as shields will be shown no mercy, then there would be a decrease in those tactics.

restricting the rights and liberties of one's people

During the Civil War, habeus corpus was suspended. The Czechs expelled the Sudeten Germans at the start of WWII because they were a dangerous fifth column, and, frankly, there was far less indication that they were than there is with our Muslim populations today.

This is war. Got a better way of fighting it - one that will work? I doubt it.

Waging a war of aggression (not Afghanistan, but Iraq)

Ah yes, Iraq, the nation that had renounced its sovereignity by every standard of the United Nations, violated the genocide convention whose signatories are mandated to take action...

Sorry, you were saying?

The Christian's destroyed the Library of Alexandria as well.
...
Don't forget the mass-murders and miseries inflicted by the almighty Roman Catholic Church.

The first rule of moral equivalence - the Christians did some bad things, so the Muslims are excused. Except that even as glib equivalence it doesn't work. Let's take that non-plus ultra of Catholic atrocity, the Inquisition. It killed about three to five thousand people, over about two hundred and sixty years. Muslim fanatics kill more than that every year.

n the middle-ages, when Islam had its enlightenment, it was Christianity that held back Europe, and much of scientific (almost all of the medical-anatomic for example) knowledge came from the Muslim world.

This is an old and tired myth. It dates from the time when Muslims ruled of huge swathes of non-Muslims, or recent converts who had not yet been thoroughly Arabized. What they had in terms of knowledge was literally stolen from the civilizations of Byzantium, Persia etc. The few original thoughts came from those who were essentially heretics: Omar Khayyam, Averroes etc.

A very good book on the subject:

Islam and the Psychology of the Musulman by Andre Servier
http://musulmanbook.blogspot.com/

The greatest threat to the Western world right now is its own ignorance, including the flames it fans around the world, creating more instability.

Right in the first portion, wrong in the second. The problem is widespread ignorance of what Islam is, what it preaches, what it invariably does to societies once it gets its claws in. The flames are rising because more and more Infidels are learning about Islam. It's knowledge that inspires my ire, not ignorance.

We do need more and more people who understand Islam, and in understanding that there is nothing, repeat nothing whatsoever, that they can threaten us with that's any worse than what they will do anyway, will take up the fight.

EDIT: My inner Saint-Just is not someone you want to rouse.

1365. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194530 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 10:59 pm

ha I know! But lets agree to disagree! It's ok. We're essentially still on the same side.

Okies. But if I were you, I'd duck in a few minutes, because MPhil here has managed to awaken my inner Saint-Just:

Sadly, for the American right (at least those in power and those supporting them), your number 3 applies perfectly.

Tell me about it. Though to be fair to them, it's not deceit so much as ignorance; they really don't seem to have the first clue about what Islam is or what harsh measures are esential for the continuation of civilisation. Believe me, I wish they'd get their act together and stop nancying around and disguising the problem.

But I get the feeling this isn't what you meant:

Is flat out not true. The Radical Muslims are not "the new Hitler" or Stalin, or Khmer Rouge.

Of course. I mean it isn't like they've committed genocide (actually, they have, and more than just about any other movement), or want to impose their totalitarian vision of the world (actually they do), or are fiercely and aggressively militaristic (whoops, they're that too), or inflict poverty and degredation on hundreds of millions (Rats - Strike Four!), or... er, what's left?

Oh, I know: the word 'new'. Correct, they're not the 'new' Hitler. But take a moment to ask yourself this: If I ask you to think of two leaders who believed they were guided by a higher power, brought a book with explanations to a broken and divided people, preached a totalitarian system of government, combined with a fearful rejection of reason and worship of militarism, and the view that a woman's place is Children, Kitchen, Church - which two names come to you?

Because you are right - the radical Muslims are not 'the new Hitler'. Hitler was the new Muhammad.

Which brings me to what is wrong with this nonsense:

Nationalism is always naive and never justified. Not only is it notoriously exploitable in order to get people to support gruesome acts, it is always a de-valuation of others.

Now, back in the real world there's a wee problem: Nationalism is a form of the 'group feeling' described by Ibn Khaldun, the feeling of solidarity that can be called onto to rouse large numbers to fight, to go to war.
I'm sure you don't care about that. But here's the problem: war isn't an aberration, it's the human condition. Which means, when one group decides to make use of the old tools of ruthlessness and tribal solidarity, you'd better hope like hell you have a strong group with strong group feeling - a nation animated by nationalism for preference - to stand alongside, otherwise you - and all who think like you - will go extinct. Be obliterated.

They are willing to use sink to the level of their enemies.

Refresh my memory - when was the last time a US marine bombed a Mosque, or hacked the head off a 9-year old girl, or shot... Am I going to have to go on like this, or are you going to drop the inane moral equivalence?

In fact, I would go as far as to say that the Bush-government has had a far broader and more severe effect on the global human rights situation than the Islamist - partially by creating more of the latter, partially by completely throwing human rights and freedoms and international law out of the window.

I'll try to control my Saint-Just because I think I see where's the problem: you seem to think that only the terrorists themselves are the problem, when the truth is that Jihad advances by various other methods.


First of all, there's no such thing as 'Islamists' or 'Islamism'. There are Muslims and there is Islam. Basta. And these have been waging the bloodiest war in human history, a Jihad that has lasted fourteen hundred years and is now once again at high tide.
'Created more of them' - this is causistry. Listen, here's what's wrong with that argument: I'm german (well, half-german). No people in recent history have suffered as much as the Jews did at the hands of the Germans. Not one single Jew has taken recourse to terrorism against German civilians in vengance.
Further, the jihadis are principally turning their guns on non-Americans and non-Westerners, because these are less likely to fight back - Hindus in the Kashmir, Christians in Africa etc. etc.

Finally, Islam is the single greatest retrograde force in human history. If it were not for the blight of Islam, all of the Middle East and North Africa would now be First World (having inherited the Graeco-Latin civilisation as much, or more so than Europe), and we would have been spared the endless genocides and miseries inflicted by Islam. Also, given that the Muslims helped plunge us into the Dark Ages by burning the Library of Alexandria, I think it's safe to say that Islam's influence has been far more terrible than (gasp!) Bush's.

1366. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194226 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 2:40 pm

*nods* Precisely thewhitepearl. It's nice to agree on something for a change.

1367. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194215 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 2:32 pm

I think this is what we commonly refer to as a figure of speech. He was just making a point. Just read between the lines. Not all things are to be taken so literally and seriously...

I am reminded of the religious apologists who say that you shouldn't take the commands about stoning adulteresses or raping nine-year old girls literally. No. It means exactly what it says. Michael Moore is an apologist and frontman for the most evil murderers this world has ever seen.

Does he realise this? Does he understand it? Of course not. Moore is too narcissistic and lazy to get off his fat butt and actually learn something, anything about those he defends - their ideology, their methodology, anything.

Fanusi Khiyal, you should probably source any quote that inflammatory- I flat out don't believe he said that about 9/11.

My source for this is How Mumbo Jumbo Conquered the World by Francis Wheen, a writer of impeccable leftist credentials.

I meant that solely with regards to being highly critical of nationalism and right-wing politics.

1) Given that Moore is an apologist for the most reactionary medieval barbarism, it's hard to see how that's relevant.

2) This begs the question of whether thse things should be opposed. Nationalism, true, was at a high in Germany, Italy and Spain during WWII. It was also at a high in Britain and America. As for right-wing - a term that these days encompasses everyone from me at one end, to Ayaan Hirsi Ali, to Sam Harris at the other - it would appear that we 'right-wingers' are the only ones with the moral clarity to take on Islam, so nuts to that criticism.

3) The idea that 'good causes' can justify mass deceit only ever leads to one end.

Here is Christopher Hitchens's commentary on the Mountain of Mendacity:

http://www.slate.com/id/2102723/

1368. Breaking the Silence

Comment #194107 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 12:30 pm

Thanks for the compliment, al. However, I do have alot to do (and you wouldn't believe - not literally, you would not believe - some of it).

I. am. getting. so. sick. of. Islam.

1369. Breaking the Silence

Comment #194094 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 12:12 pm

Count, thanks for the video clips. I especially noted what the other guy with Dr. Sultan said - that the reason noone has issued a fatwa against bin Laden is that the majority of Sheikhs support him.

So bloody much for the 'tiny minority of extremists'

EDIT: She also says what I have said for a while - you can't reform Islam. You can contain it, control it, and ultimately destroy it, but never reform it.

1370. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #194077 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 11:56 am

*claws out*

Michael Moore is largely on the right side, but his methods are despicable and his claims often not substantiated by the evidence he presents.

On the right side? May I remind you that this is the man who said that the only problem with 9/11 is that it didn't incinerate Bush voters? That the jihadists in Iraq are 'minutemen' - heroes, the resistance? And these are the same ones who will hack the heads off eight year old girls, who will shoot schoolchildren for being too western in their dress?

No. Michael Moore is absolutely, and without question, on the wrong side, and he doesn't even have the courage of knowing it. He is a parasite, and nothing more.

The means determine the ends. There is never any reason for lying if your cause is virtuous. It is only the evil who need institutionalized lying.

I am sorry that we will be oblidged to save his goddamn neck in the process of saving ours.

1371. Vatican bans Dan Brown film Angels & Demons from Rome churches

Comment #193968 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 8:52 am

I will never understand the ability of the religious to score own goals.

Come on people: after the Da Vinci Code, membership in Opus Dei skyrocketed. And who really takes Dan Brown seriously on anything?

Unless - they are counting for a repeat if the DVC syndrome; sending people to the film so they come back harder Catholics then before... Who knows?

1372. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #193721 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 16, 2008 at 12:17 am

I mean, calling out another religion for all the harms its done yet espousing radical views of another religion is prime hypocrisy. There are definitely ulterior motives to his speaking out against islam.

Sorry to be pedantic, but there's nothing 'ulterior' about his motives. Ulterior means concealed. He's made it very clear that he'd be happy to see all Muslims become Christians (presumably the rest of us to). Now that's not a dangerous view, and in fact may be a very helpful one.

I respect that he has managed to fight his way out of the mental prison of Islam and Jihad. What's difficult to understand about that?

Listening to one of those videos on YouTube, he actually claims that there has never been a rape of a Palestinian woman by an Israeli soldier. How delusional does one have to be to claim that after 40 years of military occupation that certain injustice has never been committed? Shoebat is neither intelligent nor rational.

I will just point out that Walid Shoebat actually grew up in the palestinian areas, and was a member of the PLO, so I find his words on the subject more believable than yours. Period.

His views on the whole Christian eschatology may not be rational, but he is intelligent, and he is in the right.

1373. Breaking the Silence

Comment #193679 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 15, 2008 at 10:29 pm

Sure thing shaun. Here's the original clip:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=2WLoasfOLpQ

Now, the way I see is that she calls it the way she sees it with no mealy-mouthed equivocation.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Wafa Sultan, Nonie Darwish - it is nice to know that there are a few real feminists left.

1374. Breaking the Silence

Comment #193662 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 15, 2008 at 10:03 pm

shaunfletcher

"Wafa was careful not to be openly critical of religion, instead questioning an interpretation of Islam that seemed to breed terrorists and wife-beaters

I really don't know where they got this stuff. From watching her on Al-Jazeera, I thought she named the problem perfectly: Islam itself.

There's a horrible tendency to try and 'tone down' her message when it's written about, this isn't the first time. Case in point:

for many moderate Muslims, a model of courage.

The thing is that she's not a 'moderate Muslim' (something of a mythical creature), she's an atheist.

"I am not a Christian, a Muslim, or a Jew," Dr Sultan told her interrogator. "I am a secular human being who does not believe in the supernatural…"

And so it goes. Mark Steyn wrote a good collumn, "The Mod Squad", where he pointed out that those who honestly try to 'reform' Islam end up rejecting it completely.

Here's the article:

http://www.websitetoolbox.com/tool/post/sterlingtimes/vpost?id=2688972

1375. As the world becomes smaller, the need to understand each other's faith grows

Comment #193435 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 15, 2008 at 3:34 pm

Anyone else remember the wonderful ecumenecism by which the Vatican, the Sephardic Council of Jews, the Archbisho of Canterbury etc. joined together to denounce the Danish cartoons?

The sound you hear is me banging my head against a wall.

1376. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #193405 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 15, 2008 at 2:16 pm

didn't see an apology in there for calling her a "lickspittle tu quoque apologist"...which she hardly is, and she was offended by it.

*dryly* Well, she accused me of 'bringing a jihad' and I find that offensive, so we're quits.

Oh, as regards my screen name, it's from the Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam; it's the name of the magic lantern common at that time. I just liked the sound.

The reason I referred to her is that her reaction to this revelation was 'Oh, what about the Bible?'. I've seen this so many times and I am fed up with it. It's never anything more than an excuse to avoid judgement and the obligation thereof.

all wars waged by Muslims are waged because of Islam, including their participation in both World Wars, but to treat Christianity the same way is laughable for reasons he never deigns to explain

I do get tired of being misquoted. I've never denied that the Crusades were inspired by Chritianity, it's just I don't have a problem with them, given that they were a defensive conflict. Similarly, the Inquisition etc.

However, what I note is that the Islamic wars of expansion are always and invariably justified with reference to the core texts of Islam. Now there is a difference - and pay attention, this is important - between a religion that on occaision has been an accessory to fascism, and one that is fascist in and of itself. This is why we have millions of Christians - even the fundies - who will fight against any attempt to mix Christianity with politics, but few Muslims who will protest the same thing about Islam.

Fanusi falls down because he has reacted extremely to what he has learned and abandoned rationality. He has simplified the whole problem to 'muslims = bad and must be destroyed'

Actually, it's 'Islam=bad and must be destroyed'. The reason I don't give a fig about the Palestinian situation was neatly stated by Churchill when he said that if Hitler invaded Hell, he - churchill - would find some good things to say about Satan.

1377. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #193382 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 15, 2008 at 1:44 pm

'Scuse me, I was away for the weekend.

What I propose, thewhitepearl and others is that we get our priorities straight. Islam is a civilisational threat, and quite possibly a threat to human existence itself. Yes, I mean that literally. Imagine say ten or twenty years down the road a nuclear armed Iran and also nuclear Sunni powers. Now, how long would it take for them to start hurling nukes at each other?

Christianity is not a civilisational threat, or, to be more specific, it is only a civilisational threat where it impacts with Islam.

To give one example, this 'End of Days' nonsense has been around for millenia. The only situation where it could prove truly dangerous is if we are in a nuclear game of chicken with the Islamic World. Which we may find ourselves soon. Another example would be Bush's fatuous comment on 'the desire for freedom that God has placed in every human heart'. Why did noone call him on this? The evidence is screamingly the other way: nonfreedom is the normal state of human life. Freedom is the product of an incredibly long and complex evolution, and it might never have developed. Further, the idea that a Muslim Arab state will achieve freedom is insane, and, worse, it wouldn't help the dar al-Harb even if it were possible.

Third, and most worryingly, is what could happen in the case of further catastrophic terror in the West, or when - not if, but when - one of Europe's countries crashes into civil war with its Muslim population. Sam Harris has observed that it is the religious lunatics of the US, and the fascists of Europe (there are some exceptions, such as Geert Wilders and Pim Fortuyn) have the clearest eyes about Islam.

If we - atheists, humanists, whatever - have not demonstrated our ability to stand up against Islam, to not just denounce it in some abstract way, but to actually take the fight to it, then we are cooked. It will be the Religious Right in America that takes power, because it is they who are capable of providing the widescale fanaticism that is necessary in such a war.

This is the problem with your idea that sanding shoulder to shoulder with the Christians when it comes to Islam is tantamount to surrender. If we can't do that, then we can kiss any hopes of a rational society goodbye.

Finally, and I will stress this again, the inability to understand Islam is what lead to the Iraq cockup. If Islam's 'just another religion' for good (as many think) or for ill (as we think), then why wouldn't the project work? After all we have democracies with the faiths of Christian, Hindu, Sikh, Buddhist, Taoist ones, Shinto etc.

The reason is that Islam isn't 'just a religion'. It's something far more sinister than just a religion. It's a Total System; every - and I mean every - aspect of life falls under its sway. Once a society has become Islamized, it changes profoundly, and always for the worse, to resemble, to varying degrees, seventh century Arabia. The depth of Islamic fervour - not Bush's incompentence, not Halliburton, not anything else - made the Iraq-Light-Unto-the-Muslim-World project insane.

Further, it leads us to ignore the catastrophic implications of allowing millions of Muslims to settle in the dar al-Harb. Again, if it was 'just a religion', where's the beef? Hindu and Sikh immigrants manage fine; some crazies, but overall they do fine. But a Muslim is much more than a professor of a religion - he's a member of the Ummah, which is a Nation . This is Sam Harris's point about 'reflexive religious solidarity'.

Now, why do I think that this asinine lumping together of religions is bad? Again, Sam Harris made the point in the AAI lecture:

The second reason to be attentive to the differences among the world's religions is that these differences are actually a matter of life and death. There are very few of us who lie awake at night worrying about the Amish. This is not an accident. While I have no doubt that the Amish are mistreating their children, by not educating them adequately, they are not likely to hijack aircraft and fly them into buildings. But consider how we, as atheists, tend to talk about Islam. Christians often complain that atheists, and the secular world generally, balance every criticism of Muslim extremism with a mention of Christian extremism. The usual approach is to say that they have their jihadists, and we have people who kill abortion doctors. Our Christian neighbors, even the craziest of them, are right to be outraged by this pretense of even-handedness, because the truth is that Islam is quite a bit scarier and more culpable for needless human misery, than Christianity has been for a very, very long time. And the world must wake up to this fact.
...

To be even-handed when talking about the problem of Islam is to misconstrue the problem. The refrain, "all religions have their extremists," is bullshit�quot;and it is putting the West to sleep. All religions don't have these extremists. Some religions have never had these extremists. And in the Muslim world, support for extremism is not extreme in the sense of being rare. A recent poll showed that about a third of young British Muslims want to live under sharia law and believe that apostates should be killed for leaving the faith. These are British Muslims. Sixty-eight percent of British Muslims feel that their neighbors who insult Islam should be arrested and prosecuted, and seventy-eight percent think that the Danish cartoonists should be brought to justice. These people don't have a clue about what constitutes a civil society. Reports of this kind coming out of the Muslim communities living in the West should worry us, before anything else about religion worries us.

My emphasis. As I said, this is not abstract. It's life and death. We need every man and woman we can get in this fight, and I think it is lunacy to decry the aid of Christians like Walid Shoebat or Robert Spencer because they are Christian.

Of course I hope to see the world free of religion. But let's get real. I'll see a cure for cancer before I see that. I may see man colonize Mars before that. This is what I mean about the adult virtue of Reason: I won't live to see a world devoid of religious lunacy. I might, if I am incredibly fortunate, live to see a world where the problem of Islam is contained and controlled. Where the West has managed to avoid a bloody re-primivitization.

It is also insane not to recognise that Christianity is in many ways saving our necks here. Six million African Muslims abandon Islam for Christianity every single year . When the Pope baptizes a Muslim convert to Chrisianity, he's sending a far stronger message that the West won't back down than many of our governments are willing to do.

Once Islam has been dealt with, we can fight out religious troubles with the Christians. This doesn't mean saying that Christianity is a good or positive influence, or showing bogus 'respect'. It means being Just.

Which brings me to the point raised ad nauseum by Naked Celt that it doesn't matter that Christ was a pacifist and that Muhammad was a psychotic warlord because people 'interpret'. Really. Well a) not one single interpretation of Islam has managed to decry violence and tyranny without being driven out as heretical. b) the ways of interpreting Islam have been fixed for a thousand years, and it doesn't look like it's changing. c) There is no way to interpret the Qur'an, Hadith and Sira so that they yield nonviolence or tolerance. None. Two thirds of the Qur'an is railing against the kafirs (that would be us). It also extolls Muhammad as an 'excellent example' of conduct, and there is no way that striking the heads off bound captives, or crucifying them, or rapind nine-year old girls can be 'interpreted' away.

There's an endless hope for a Muslim reformation. The reformation's been, and the Jihad is it. That's why it's called Islamic 'fundamentalism' - it's back-to-basics.

The Enlightenment was possible thanks to deep fault lines within Christianity, most significantly the separation of Church and State. Hoping that Muslims will become 'westernized' or reform or any of these other pipe-dreams is a fools hope, and it is driving us of the cliff.

But these hopes would be rational if Islam and Christianity were the same. They're not.

Okay, this has gotten long, but I hope that my general jist has been recieved.

1378. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #192791 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 14, 2008 at 1:17 am

RamizD I have made this point before, specifically in connection with those clips: I consider Shoebat's comments about the End of Days or Satanic inspiration of the Qur'an to be crackpot.

But that has no bearing whatsoever on his knowledge of Islam, or on the violence and tyranny that it preaches, or on the genocidal intentions of the palestinians that he observed.

My point in listing those names is this: a number of intelligent people, of the most varying political and philosophical and religious backgrounds and positions have all come to the same conclusion about Islam. Yet they're all slammed as 'neocons'. Who's being irrational here?

1379. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #192736 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 14, 2008 at 12:19 am

Wodecki, it's the presentation, the key omissions that drive my bloodpressure up:

Just 11 years after she arrived in the Netherlands from Africa, she rode into parliament on a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment, only to leave again last year, this time for America, after an uproar over lies she had told to obtain asylum.

Pay attention to these word: "rode into parliment on a wave of anti-immigrant sentiment"? Okay, first of all, I think we can all guess what kind of immigrant people were worried about.

Here is the real story:

Ayaan Hirsi Ali was elected to parliment because of her work attempting to secure the rights of Muslim women, and opposing such practices as forced marriage, who had previously been ignored, only to be chased out because she lied about her last name in order to escape a forced marriage herself

The implication behind that drivel the Economist is that Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a base opportunist, exploiting ignorant fears about 'immigrants', whereas what she really is is one of the bravest and most principled women of our time.

Even the title of her new autobiography reflects her talent for reinvention. In the Netherlands, where Ms Hirsi Ali got her start campaigning against the oppression of Muslim women, the book has been published under the title "My Freedom". But in Britain and in America, where she now has a fellowship at the conservative American Enterprise Institute, it is called "Infidel".

'Her capacity for reinvention'? This makes Ayaan appear like some showbiz celebrity. And what exactly is wrong with the book having different names in different languages? The CAged Virgin in Germany is called I will bring accusation (bear with me; German's a bit hard to translate), so how is this relevant?

This is a masterpiece of smearing.

1380. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #192713 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 11:47 pm

lastgreekstanding thank you for giving me another reason to detest The Economist. In the interests of justice, I will hope that you don't agree with that filth.

BeyondBelief the 'neocon' smear is used against anyone who has had it up to here with Islam, and doesn't tolerate what it keeps doing throughout the world. Here is a good video that explains it thoroughly:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=eNaBztTkg6k

The thing is that the contraction 'neo-con' gives an impression of suited, machiavellian, sinister figures, and nothing else. It's an Orwellian use of the word.

You see, once you've called someone a 'neocon', you've save yourself the bother of having to deal with what they have to say. They're neocons; why would you listen to them? This is why Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a neocon; save you from having to deal with the uncomfortable truths she raises.

We're all neocons, you know? All of us who see Islam for what it is, or even see a glimpse, we're all neocons: Sam Harris, Ali Sina, Ibn Warraq, Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Walid Shoebat, Robert Spencer, Hugh FitzGerald, Geert Wilders, Pim Fortuyn.. Oh, the list goes on and on. That's what the Giant Citadels of Conscience of the Guardian and the BBC have decided, you know?

1381. Divine Impulses: Ayaan Hirsi Ali

Comment #192610 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 3:41 pm

Ayaan looks as though the relentless persecution is finally getting to her.

This is an absolute disgrace.

1382. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192570 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 12:21 pm

The Christians visited horrible atrocities upon the populations they encountered. No question about it.

I don't question it. I simply state that if it were not for the Crusades and for men like Charles Martel our civilisation would not be possible.

1383. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192561 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 11:41 am

Well I have a problem with this kind of telelogical reasoning. No one would have foreseen the Enlightenment, the Abolition and Industrial Revolution during the Crusade's time.

Of course not. But the crucial elements of Graeco-Roman civilization were preserved by the Christian West, even as it sweltered through the Dark Ages, and if it had not been for the crusades, the world would never have emerged from that time. Read Stephen J. Gould on 'contingency' and you'll see where I'm coming from.

In historical context the Crusaders were the barbarians. The Christian Kings during the Crusade were more pious and had far less respect for learning and reason than their Muslim counterparts

Actually, they weren't. They really weren't. The Muslims overran two-thirds of Christendom before they were stopped, and you can see the blight they have visted on the once hellenized and civilized North Africa.

The depiction of the Muslims of that time as civilised is, ironically, a relic of the Crusaders themselves, who were a largely rustic sort and couldn't believe the opulence and decadence of the Muslim courts. However, what the official histories don't tell you about is the endless train of slave-boys, seized and shipped off to be some Sultan's catamite, and how 90% of the died en route at the hands of their Muslim masters.

However, there's no denying that the Crusaders were a rough bunch. There are records of them seizing the children of Turkish nobles, impaling them on pikes and crying "These hostages will never harm Christians!" Rough, no? But those were rough times. If the Muslims hadn't wanted trouble, they shouldn't have started it. And during the Second World War the allies had no compunction about incinerating entire cities of innocents with Phosphorus in order to defeat Hitler. I'm glad they did; squeamishness would have had us living in the world of Robert Harris's Fatherland .

That's war. That's the reality of the world we live in. It isn't nice, or pretty, or pleasant, or easy. It's just the way things are. And like the law of gravity, or the action of diseases, you can hate it or rage at it all you want, but it doens't make a blind bit of difference.

1384. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192434 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 3:53 am

So you'd like us to be at war with islam? Let's see, which of the following muslim dominated countries should we attack first? Malaysia, Turkey, Kosovo maybe? How about Bangladesh? Lots of muslims there. Nigeria? And they have oil too. Indonesia, Egypt, Jordon?

Saying we are at war with Islam doesn't make it necessary to go after the Muslims worldwide since they will, with little encouragement, do it for us. Take Iraq. If we get out of there, or only support Kurdistan, the Sunni and Shia will rip each other apart, draining away resources from the Jihad. There's other ways too: we could support the anti-Janjaweed forces in Darfur, making it clear to the black Muslims that what they suffer is due to the Arab supremacism that is part and parcel of Islam. A free, independent Kurdistan would be a powerful way of demonstrating that. There are other ways too: support Iranian - Persian - nationalism as a powerful antidote to Islam, extend similar programs to the Berbers and other groups who may be Muslim, but will never be accepted as the real deal, being non-Arabs.

Declaring that we are at war with Islam gives us a large number of options, not least being to expel large numbers of the Muslims in our own societies who are a dangerous fifth column and to keep a close eye on the rest - restricting their ability to preach in prisons, or to enter the armed forces, for example.

Oh, there are many ways, many indeed, of tearing apart the dar al-Islam and wooing its members away from the Total System that's ruining their lives. All of that, though, requires the kind of hard-nosed realism about, and understanding of, Islam, which people like yourself seem to be hell-bent on resisting.

The fact that Falwell and Robertson had direct lines to the White House probably had something to do with it. The fact that the fundies got their president elected is what got us into Iraq. If you read about the neocons and their thinking about building democracies in muslim nations, how if we started on in Iraq, it would spread to the rest of the middle east, how they had these plans before 9/11 , then you'd know why were in Iraq.

Actually, I made the point myself. It's easy to sneer at Bush, but what did his critics do? Call him out on the subject of Islam? About how it is utterly incompatible with democracy? About how Muslim populations within democracies are giving rise to jihadists, so how is a democratic Iraq - even if it could be achieved, which it can't - going to help infidel interests? Did anyone point out the millenial feud of the Shia and Sunni or the role Baghdad plays in their mythical mindsets.

No, no, no, and no. No, the real arguments all depended on truths that the simpering 'anti-War' critics have no stomach for, as it would hurt their precious self-image as Defenders of the Poor, Huddled, Brown Masses. And what profiteth it an anti-war protestor if he be effective but looseth his self image?

Instead we had endless, empty screechings about Halliburton, and 'No War for Oil', and the Zionist lobby, and how the trillions spent trying to build up Iraq were all an exercise of Evil Amerikan Imperialism, and Bushitler - an ocean of indecency, an orgy of mental self-gratification, a display of public onanism of which Diogenes would be ashamed.

Sure. Pat yourself on the back about how moral you are, how your views are so 'enlightened'. But it was the abject failure to learn anything about Islam that caused this fiasco, and the burden of guilt lies heaviest for those who opposed the war, since they should have learned more and made the case. But they didn't.

For the record:

You want to start a crusade, that worked out well previously.

Actually, it did. The Crusades reduced the power and effectiveness of the Jihad, and put a serious blunt in Muslim self-assertion (though they were nothing compared to what the Golden Horde did). And if Charles Martel had not defeated the Muslims before Tours, then there would have been no Enlightenment, no Abolition, no Industrial Revolution, nothing but an endless Dark Ages.

1385. Unlike Others, U.S. Defends Freedom to Offend in Speech

Comment #192397 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 1:40 am

BeyondBelief, in response to:

Is it just me, or is there a complete lack of discussion in this article as to whether or not the content of Steyn's article is hate speech.

Okay:

a) No, his article isn't hate speech
b) The point is that these 'hate speech' laws are cretinous.

1386. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192395 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 13, 2008 at 1:35 am

thewhitepearl

For the record I was not taking the "tu quoque" approach.

You follow this with:

And once again I'm not going to sit here and argue about which religion is MORE dangerous because they all are. I'm not going to put one above the other. They all breed hate, they all breed intolerance, and intolerance breeds murders, suicides, and wars.

Do you really not see the contradiction?

Obviously we both agree that religion shouldn't be taken lightly but once again I think you're being childish sitting here trying to debate which religion should be taken more seriously. I'm not big on the "NO MINE IS" argument that four year olds are so fond of.

Actually the name for being able to distinguish and assign blame and respect is something that no four-year mentality seems to understand: Justice. There's another adult virtue that I believe in, namely looking hard at the world and seeing what's there: Reason.

The reason I get up on my soapbox about this is that it is first of all monstrously unjust to lump Christianity in with Islam, and secondly it leads to all sorts of suicidal idiocy. If Christianity and Islam are just as bad, if they 'both have their fundamentalists', what's to worry about? If the worst that Islam had to offer was Pat Robertson or Jerry Falwell style fundamentalism, no one would be particularly worried. Yet compare, say, even the worst of Robertson and Falwell's writings with the great moderate hope of Iraq, Ali Sistani. See a difference?

This sort of equivalence is what got us into the nation-building, light-unto-the-Muslim-world fiasco in Iraq. If Islam really weren't any different from Christianity, or not significantly more tyrannical and evil, then the project would make more sense. However, once you've understood Islam, you recognize the fact that getting a Muslim country, let alone an arab muslim country to be democratic is insane.

So, congrats pearl, your kind of thinking helped get us into the Iraq mess.

As for the 'we're not officially at war with Islam', that's something that should be corrected immediately. Ayaan Hirsi Ali said so: directly after 9/11 Western governments, and particularly the US, should have said: We are up against Islam.

1387. Unlike Others, U.S. Defends Freedom to Offend in Speech

Comment #192244 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:21 pm

Al, I'm just curious, but what the heck were you doing in that hellhole?

1388. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192239 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:17 pm

Can someone please explain to me who is going to close this school? I don't see any legal ability to do this if it is a privately funded school

I'd say it falls under 'sedition in a time of war'. Basta.

1389. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192237 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:16 pm

Fair enough, al. As I said, I'm still reading the book. Thanks for the info.

1390. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192232 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:14 pm

If it's free speech, it's free speech. Doesn't matter. I think it was TWP ... Whack a mole. Suppress it here, it'll pop up there or it won't pop up and it'll blow up somewhere else

Not really - this nonsense only sprouts up in the Islamic community. If we keep expelling these guys, the rest will get the message - or we'll expell the lot of them, and problem solved. We'd never have tolerated the Emperor Hirohito academy during WWII, or a Mein Kampf reading kindergarten.

1391. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192229 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:10 pm

Hmm, al, I'd love to get some more textual criticism on this book, 'cause Charles Allen lists Sayed Ahmed and his intellectual offspring as Wahhabi.

t it together grouch!

Sorry, things like this bring out my inner Saint-Just. Which brings me to point two:

What about US citizens, where do we expel them to?

Saudi Arabia. Pakistan. The bottom of the Mariana Trench for all I care. As long as they aren't allowed to remain behind our lines in the dar al-Harb.

1392. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192226 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 3:05 pm

So what you're trying to prove to me that Islam is more dangerous than Christianity? Go right ahead and try to win that battle as I could care less which one tells more horror stories or breeds more hate.

Perhaps you should. Because there's a difference between a cold and the flu, and there's a difference between the flu and malaria. Perhaps you should care a bit more, since this is information directly relevant to your future, your life, your freedom. All of that depends on large numbers of Infidels learning the truths that you despise.

And obviously you didnt read my entire comment, cause if you had perhaps it would have hit you with the accurate point I was making.

Sorry, I did - all two lines of it. Your point was that there's some nasty stuff in the Bible, and therefore you are excused from trying to learn about the difference, or to actually do something in defence of civilisation. Because this is going to be a long, brutal, nasty struggle, one where you'll have to find your allies where you can get them, and some of those may even be (gasp!) those nasty, nasty Christians.

This isn't abstract theory. This isn't academic discussion over coffee in the Oxford Union. This is a matter of life and death. Literally. Don't believe me? Ask those poor devils who took the tube one morning.

1393. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192222 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 2:58 pm

Vin:

Yet they managed to invent the most revolting psychologically sick concept of eternal Hell.

And I have defended this - where? Islam emphasizes hell far more and far more terribly. I notice you don't even try to challenge my other points.

People usually "tu quoque" for a good reason

No, they don't.

1394. Unlike Others, U.S. Defends Freedom to Offend in Speech

Comment #192214 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 2:53 pm

I don't believe I need to explain my staunchly pro-American stance any further. The defence rests.

Americans are far more indiviualistic than Europeans, Europeans tend to look down there nose at Americans, until some thug dictator over runs their country at which point they get very happy at the sight of American flags. Twice American fat lazy losers have come to Europe to trounce some evil ass holes. You're welcome

Hey, not all of us, al, not all of us. Then again, I'm probably just an American who got born somewhere else by mistake.

Barry Pearson I think you've got that wrong. This law specifically was introduced to prevent criticism of Islam. You see, they hauled Nick Griffin of the BNP up before one of these tribunals on 'race hate' charges, and he made the point that Islam isn't a race. So they pushed this monstrosity through.

Now I don't like Nick Griffin, but that's not what this is about. I have no problem with him stating whatever his case is, as long as I have the right to say what I think about him - or anyone else, or any idea, in any place, at any time.

I don't like these Mandarins saying that I cannot criticise what I like, when I like, how I like. And I really don't like seeing laws that, all b.s. aside, are intended to protect Islam. Honestly, why don't they just import the Mutaween and be done with it? Then we could at least rise up with a clear conscience.

1395. Report: Troubling texts at Va. Islamic school

Comment #192193 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 2:31 pm

Stop the presses! Islamic schools are teaching Islamic tenets! Shock! Horror! Who could have seen this coming?

Why is this stuff tolerated? Why aren't the whole bloody mess of instructors kicked out of the country, the school's assets seized, and the place torn down? What is it going to take for us to say enough?

All the usual suspects heard from:

The incompetent politicos who can't be bothered to find out even a little of what Islam is:

The commission's findings issued come a month after the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to extend the academy's lease for its main campus, which sits on county property.

The apologetics:

"I would be less than frank if I didn't tell you that the curriculum does contain references to the Quran, which, if taken out of context and read literally, would cause come concern," Hyland said at the meeting at which the lease was extended.

And, of course, the lickspittle tu-quoque apologists:

And this differs from the bible how

Oh, I don't know thewhitepearl. Maybe because the main character in the Bible, the guy whose words override anything else that may be written in there, was an absolute pacifist? Maybe that the Bible contains no, that is absolutely no open-ended commands to wage ware on Infidels and enslave them? Yes, you heard that right: the horrors of the Old Testament are descriptive, and not perscriptive, which is to say, unless you happen to be an ammonite or Midianite or whatever, you have nothing to worry about?

And above all, this minor fact: just about all Christians do not teach anything even remotely aproximating this barbarity.

-------------------------------------------

Al, he may have been referring to the various Wahabi uprisings in the subcontinent. I'm currently reading 'God's Terrorists' and while it insists on this ludicrous idea that it's only Wahabism that's the problem, it's got alot of good historical data.

1396. Couple charged in Norway over genital mutilation of daughters

Comment #192132 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 1:31 pm

Hmmm... According to the Wikipedia articel, Bilal Abdullah:

A resident of Neuk Crescent, Houston, outside Glasgow, Bilal Abdullah was born September 17, 1980[5] in Aylesbury, Buckinghamshire,[6] where his father, also a doctor, worked. He qualified in Baghdad in 2004 and first registered as a doctor in the UK in 2006. He was given limited registration by the General Medical Council (GMC) from 5 August 2006 to 11 August 2007.[7] He worked at the Royal Alexandra Hospital, Ward 10, in Paisley as a locum house-officer in the diabetes department, dealing with outpatients at a drop-in clinic and obstetric clinics.[8] [

Born and raised in England. Became a doctor, the most standard middle class profession imaginable. And then he heard the call to return to the faith:

he had been radicalized by the teachings of al Qaeda and al-Zarqawi.

Etc. Not to mention the numbers of young converts who became fully fledged jihadis.

Well technically chistianity or judaism as this person said is incapatible with democracy

I'm a scientist. One thing we scientists do is look at data rather than empty rationalizations. Now, according to the data - the actual lives going on out there - are Judaisim and Christianity compatible with democracy? Why yes, yes they are. There are actually some very sound theological reasons for this, which I could go into at great length - in fact I did in the Blind Faiths thread - but the fact is you just need to look at the data: overwhelmingly christian populations can form democracies. So can overwhelmingly Jewsih populations. Overwhelmingly Islamic populations? Not a chance - in fact, of those countries that are 20% Islamic, only three qualify as 'free' according to the UN.

1397. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #191988 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 9:00 am

Cartomancer my own two cents on the subject:

Books 'dramatizing atheism' are usually a difficult idea, principally because its essentially impossible to make lack of belief interesting. It's one of the reasons that the film of The Golden Compass sucked so much (and, no, I don't find the books much better).

If you are talking about, say, book's dramatizing human emancipation, then you are getting somewhere. I'd start by including everything that Victor Hugo has ever written, especially Les Miserables which has a magnificent introductory section on the breaking of Church Power during the revolution. More modern media, the Lucifer series of graphic novels is very good, and, if you are brave enough, the japanese manga Angel Sanctuary . Though that last series goes a lot further than just challenging belief in God in challenging fundamental assumptions. I'm a bit hesitant to recommend it, because so many people who read it, get it wrong.

1398. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #191859 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 2:29 am

Actually, a little, mainly because that's where Mark Steyn get's posted. Which reminds me of something he said about the wierdness of opposition to Islam being a 'right-wing agenda': "It should be a Leftist issue. I'm a 'social conservative'. When the Mullahs take over, I'll grow my beard out, get a couple of extra wives and keep my head down. It's the gays and the feminists who'll have a tougher time of it."

Though, since we are talking about the Telegraph's sheets, have their professional news staff - not people who leave comments, or blog there, but their professional staff - ever brought up such terms as hudna? taqqiya? jiyza? All of which are indispensable to understanding the Muslim world.

1399. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #191853 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 2:03 am

Noted, Goldy.

Though seriously, I do have to wonder: given the amount about Islam I've learned, while being a working scientist and a bigmouth Infidel in my spare time, it beggars belief that all the Grand Poohbahs in our media and politics haven't bothered to find somethings out for themselves. To crack open a book by, Robert Spencer Say, or Ibn Warraq, or Ayaan Hirsi Ali. Or even go back to the classic studies by men like Schacht.

1400. Discussion between Richard Dawkins and Paula Kirby

Comment #191843 by Fanusi Khiyal on June 12, 2008 at 1:22 am

'Ahm on it. Letter sent.