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Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 2:53 am
by dandad
As I pointed out in my other post, I live smack dab in the middle of around 30,000 Muslims in around a 15 city block area here in the Bevo area of St. Louis City.. Most Bosnian's in this area are Muslims. I would think if most Muslims were evil, as Trump alludes to and many republicans seem to think, then I might have noticed something in the 17 years I have lived surrounded by them. I am not scared of them. In fact, I have often thought if the shit hit the fan, a lot of these older war hardened Bosnians would be some bad ass mothers , and good people to be in with. After all, they fought for at least a decade during the genocides in their homelands.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 8:27 am
by tc556guy
For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Islam is simply not compatible with Western values
For Muslims who are not so devout, and not following Islam quite as closely as others, they can become Westernized, but then you run the risk that they'll be here in our midst and THEN radicalize like the shooter in CA
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 8:49 am
by wifesbane
tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Islam is simply not compatible with Western values
For Muslims who are not so devout, and not following Islam quite as closely as others, they can become Westernized, but then you run the risk that they'll be here in our midst and THEN radicalize like the shooter in CA
That can be said of just about every group that has its own doctrine - tree huggers, street gangs, KKK, neo-nazis, christians, musicians, Boy Scouts and the notorious math teachers.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 8:51 am
by KnightsFan
tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Bullshit, that is a Trump size load.
Quran 2:256 wrote:Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.
Jews and Christians were long able to live peacefully under Muslim rule, they merely had to pay a tax and could worship in their own spaces and refrain from proselytizing. In fact, until the 30s Baghdad and Tehran had thriving Jewish and Christian populations. The Levant was a peaceful area full if different religions mixing and interacting.
It's only been since the Wahhabi movement joined with the al-Saud family that destruction of Christianity and Judaism has been encouraged. And that's just a front to get the little people to fight on behalf of the Saud family. Hell we're really just seeing the Crusades in reverse.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 9:04 am
by tc556guy
KnightsFan wrote:tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Bullshit, that is a Trump size load.
Quran 2:256 wrote:Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.
Early quran quotes are meaningless in a document that requires the believer to discard earlier sections when they conflict with later sections
There's the early friendlier quran and then the not so friendly evolution into something else
I know the folks who embrace islam like to quote the earlier peaceful sections
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 9:36 am
by pdoggeth
Let me alter what you said just a tad
tc556guy wrote:
Later Bible quotes are meaningless in a document that requires the believer to discard earlier sections when they conflict with later sections
There's the later friendlier new testament and then the not so friendly old testament.
I know the folks who embrace Christianity like to quote the earlier peaceful sections
Look, you will get plenty of kooky radicals in almost any religion doing pretty sh*tty stuff.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 9:41 am
by KnightsFan
The Quran is pretty specific about protecting Christians and Jews throughout. In fact, scholars have come to the conclusion that not only did the Prophet have a separation of his spiritual and earthly duties, he didn't expel the Jewish tribes until they tried to overthrow him.
And the violent sections of the Quran are very specific in context.
Besides, you can't ignore the millenia of relatively peaceful lives Christians and Jews lived in the Middle East under the Muslim rulers.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 10:06 am
by TrueTexan
KnightsFan wrote:tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Bullshit, that is a Trump size load.
Quran 2:256 wrote:Let there be no compulsion in religion: Truth stands out clear from Error: whoever rejects evil and believes in Allah hath grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold, that never breaks. And Allah heareth and knoweth all things.
Jews and Christians were long able to live peacefully under Muslim rule, they merely had to pay a tax and could worship in their own spaces and refrain from proselytizing. In fact, until the 30s Baghdad and Tehran had thriving Jewish and Christian populations. The Levant was a peaceful area full if different religions mixing and interacting.
It's only been since the Wahhabi movement joined with the al-Saud family that destruction of Christianity and Judaism has been encouraged. And that's just a front to get the little people to fight on behalf of the Saud family. Hell we're really just seeing the Crusades in reverse.
We have to realize that Allah is the same God as the God of Abraham, the Hebrew and Christian God. The ones that were put to the sword was the idol worshippers.
It pisses me off when I hear the Right Wing Evangelical money grabbers stand up and preach that Moslems worship the false god and not the God of Christians and Jews.
Much of what has gone one in the Middle East has been fostered by the House of Saud as a way to maintain and grab more power. We can put the blame on the British for this mess as they put the House of Saud in power after the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI. It was also the British with BP oil that talked the CIA into causing the revolution in Iran in the early 1950s. It was also the Balfour Declaration by the British Prime Minister in the 1920s that set the stage to bring about the division of Palestine and the creation of Israel.
The British have been meddling in the Middle East since the Crusades and we just follow along saying yes ma'am to the mother country wishes.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 10:14 am
by KnightsFan
TrueTexan wrote:
Much of what has gone one in the Middle East has been fostered by the House of Saud as a way to maintain and grab more power. We can put the blame on the British for this mess as they put the House of Saud in power after the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI. It was also the British with BP oil that talked the CIA into causing the revolution in Iran in the early 1950s. It was also the Balfour Declaration by the British Prime Minister in the 1920s that set the stage to bring about the division of Palestine and the creation of Israel.
The British have been meddling in the Middle East since the Crusades and we just follow along saying yes ma'am to the mother country wishes.
To paraphrase this and quote an old professor of mine: "England put one foot in the Mediterranean one foot in India and took a crap."
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 10:41 am
by SailDesign
KnightsFan wrote:TrueTexan wrote:
Much of what has gone one in the Middle East has been fostered by the House of Saud as a way to maintain and grab more power. We can put the blame on the British for this mess as they put the House of Saud in power after the fall of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI. It was also the British with BP oil that talked the CIA into causing the revolution in Iran in the early 1950s. It was also the Balfour Declaration by the British Prime Minister in the 1920s that set the stage to bring about the division of Palestine and the creation of Israel.
The British have been meddling in the Middle East since the Crusades and we just follow along saying yes ma'am to the mother country wishes.
To paraphrase this and quote an old professor of mine: "England put one foot in the Mediterranean one foot in India and took a crap."
And for some inexplicable reason, the rest of the world has been sifting through that crap ever since.....
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 10:48 am
by Stiff
tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Load of bull. Citation needed.
Quran 109:6 "For you is your religion, and for me is my religion."
Islam is simply not compatible with Western values
For Muslims who are not so devout, and not following Islam quite as closely as others, they can become Westernized, but then you run the risk that they'll be here in our midst and THEN radicalize like the shooter in CA
What do you mean by "western values"? You mean Democracy? Look up the world's third largest democracy.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 12:21 pm
by Bacchus
tc556guy wrote:For devout Muslims, I would say no. Islam requires that they convert non-Muslims, by force if need be.
Islam is simply not compatible with Western values
For Muslims who are not so devout, and not following Islam quite as closely as others, they can become Westernized, but then you run the risk that they'll be here in our midst and THEN radicalize like the shooter in CA
It strikes me the logic is backward on this. It is the rule that blows your argument, not the exception, for one may as well say there ought not to be Christians here when one goes bonkers and turns into a mass murderer. It is easy to have narrow views when one stays isolated in the echo chamber.
The logic you use, that we're in danger because 'they're' here is the same logic the gun banners use: Guns are inherently dangerous - more guns = more danger - and so we should get rid of them to eliminate the danger. See, doesn't work, does it? If Muslims were inherently dangerous, and as there are millions here, we would expect to see the entire country aflame. Yet it isn't. You ignore the fact that millions are here already, having jobs, paying taxes, owning businesses, proudly serving our country in the military, and praying to God. The fact that a few turn into murderers doesn't mark their group any more than Timothy McVeigh makes all Christians like him.
I therefore suggest you are overstating the risk. Or you could explain more fully.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 5:00 pm
by Merkwuerdigliebe
I've been reading recently more about Islam and found some interesting parallels to many historical conflicts that existed in Christianity. The Sunni's are basically the literalists and the Shia more amenable to incorporating new revelations into current faith. So Sunni's roughly correspond to Christian Fundamentalism and Shia are similar to Roman Catholicism. There is a lot of built in tension between the two branches and much of the internecine conflict between them is historically very similar to the Reformation that occurred in Christianity.
Considering how violent the Reformation got to be between nations, I think we are in for a rough ride over the long term. It kind of presages a decades long turmoil developing in the Middle East. Monarchs, feudal states, warloards, Imams, and tons of oil money -- oy vey! The Reformation lasted more than two hundred years with multiple conflagrations that devestated whole countries.
The new Saudi royals are showing themselves to be much more willing for active engagement in the conflicts, and exhibiting their own aspirations to form and lead a new Caliphate. A primary source of support for ISIS comes from Sunni Wahhabis. The German Vice Chancellor recently made comments to Bild am Sonnatag reporters that the Saudi Royal Family is funding Islamic extremism in the West through establishment of Wahhabi Mosques throughout the West.
There is not going to be a short term solution to these issues, which I think it is important to keep in mind with all the political posturing going on today about how to handle ISIS. It may well prove to be akin to the mythical hydra, and everytime we chop off a head, two more organizations form.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 5:34 pm
by comedian
Islam is not incompatible with Western " values" ( whatever the fuck they are- imperialism and genocide? ) if by that it is meant that they can peacefully exist within a Western culture.
But Wahabbist Islam? No way.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 6:09 pm
by spara
This thread needs to be nuked from orbit, it's the only way we can be sure.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 6:11 pm
by Inquisitor
It does raise certain questions of intent.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 6:21 pm
by SailDesign
spara wrote:This thread needs to be nuked from orbit, it's the only way we can be sure.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 7:11 pm
by Merkwuerdigliebe
SailDesign wrote:spara wrote:This thread needs to be nuked from orbit, it's the only way we can be sure.
Better? Or something else? I didn't mean for the title to be so divisive. Only reflective of a issue being discussed in the political news of the day.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 8:35 pm
by Coach
KnightsFan wrote:Jews and Christians were long able to live peacefully under Muslim rule, they merely had to pay a tax and could worship in their own spaces and refrain from proselytizing. In fact, until the 30s Baghdad and Tehran had thriving Jewish and Christian populations. The Levant was a peaceful area full if different religions mixing and interacting.
It's only been since the Wahhabi movement joined with the al-Saud family that destruction of Christianity and Judaism has been encouraged. And that's just a front to get the little people to fight on behalf of the Saud family. Hell we're really just seeing the Crusades in reverse.
Well, that ain't exactly so...
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... tment.html
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Martian Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 9:40 pm
by shinzen
Linky seems to be broken, but I seem to have something in my mind that's wrong about that as well for some reason.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Martian Civilization?
Posted: Tue Dec 08, 2015 9:52 pm
by Coach
shinzen wrote:Linky seems to be broken, but I seem to have something in my mind that's wrong about that as well for some reason.
Fixed it.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Wed Dec 09, 2015 6:34 am
by comedian
Coach wrote:KnightsFan wrote:Jews and Christians were long able to live peacefully under Muslim rule, they merely had to pay a tax and could worship in their own spaces and refrain from proselytizing. In fact, until the 30s Baghdad and Tehran had thriving Jewish and Christian populations. The Levant was a peaceful area full if different religions mixing and interacting.
It's only been since the Wahhabi movement joined with the al-Saud family that destruction of Christianity and Judaism has been encouraged. And that's just a front to get the little people to fight on behalf of the Saud family. Hell we're really just seeing the Crusades in reverse.
Well, that ain't exactly so...
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... tment.html
While the website contains some truth - the best propaganda usually does- most of the myths the authors claim to debunk are themselves distortions or outright lies.
Let's take on the great granddaddy of all pro- Israel talking points= that from the beginning Islam was hostile towards the Jews and Mohammed personally oversaw the execution of the Banu Quraya and several other Jewish Arab tribes. The Zionist version states that the Muslims executed the men and enslaved the women of these tribes simply because they hated Jews. But, as usual, the reality is a bit more complicated.
The historical record shows that these tribes of Arab Jews were originally allies of Mohammed and the Muslims, but later they switched sides to the pagan Arabs of Mecca, who were the Muslim's bitterest foes. After a battle and siege the pagans and Jews were defeated and the Muslims killed all of the men and took the women captive.
According to the rules of war of the time, in Christian Europe as well as the Middle East, if an enemy city underwent a siege and it fell then the inhabitants' lives were forfeit and could be disposed of in any manner the conqueror saw fit. Execution of POWs and enslavement of the non- combatants was the usual fate of the defeated. Add to this the stain of betrayal and it is no surprise the Muslim forces acted in this manner.
http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Invasion_of_Banu_Qurayza
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Martian Civilization?
Posted: Wed Dec 09, 2015 9:28 am
by KnightsFan
That whole link is full of modern examples. And anything coming out of the Saud family should be taken with a grain of salt. Everything they have done and said since they allied with the Wahhabi movement is questionable. In fact, they try and example of the powerful using religion to control the masses. Anything they say is to enhance their own power, not spread Islam.
So yes, they would lie about Judaism and the Quranic laws regarding killing the people of the book since it would get them more power since it would bring them closer to the antisemitic Europeans and maybe convince them not to allow the zionists to resettle.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Western Civilization?
Posted: Wed Dec 09, 2015 10:33 am
by begemot
Coach wrote:KnightsFan wrote:Jews and Christians were long able to live peacefully under Muslim rule, they merely had to pay a tax and could worship in their own spaces and refrain from proselytizing. In fact, until the 30s Baghdad and Tehran had thriving Jewish and Christian populations. The Levant was a peaceful area full if different religions mixing and interacting.
It's only been since the Wahhabi movement joined with the al-Saud family that destruction of Christianity and Judaism has been encouraged. And that's just a front to get the little people to fight on behalf of the Saud family. Hell we're really just seeing the Crusades in reverse.
Well, that ain't exactly so...
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jso ... tment.html
You're correct. It's not so. For those that will inevitably claim that JVL is the Jewish version of garbage like electronicintifada, JVL is a reliable, balanced source of information, widely-accepted and referenced by academia and media. Their tendency to defend Israel and counteract media bias is undeniable, but they do it it with facts and solid research instead of baseless propaganda.
A PBS web page for the film The Jewish Americans lists the JVL as a resource "For Statistics and Analysis About Jews in America Today", with the description, "A division of the American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise, the Jewish Virtual Library is a comprehensive online Jewish encyclopedia, covering everything from Antisemitism to Zionism. More than 13,000 articles and 6,000 photographs and maps have been integrated into the site. Their Vital Statistics section has an exhaustive list of current statistics and comparative data."[16]
The Jewish Virtual Library has been cited by CNN,[17] New York Times,[18] BBC,[19] CBS News,[20] Fox News,[21] The Los Angeles Times,[22] USA Today,[23] Bloomberg,[24] among others. It is listed as reference by academic libraries at Pennsylvania State University,[25] Michigan State University,[13] University of Washington,[26] King's College, London,[27] and the University of Delaware.
JVL states that it has received awards from Britannica Internet Guide Selection, USA Today Hot Site, and the Best of the Jewish Web from the Jewish Agency for Israel, the Academic Excellence Award from Study Web and others.[28]
John Jaeger, in an article published by the Association of College and Research Libraries, said of the JVL: "This library, once it is entered, is more like a living encyclopedia than it is anything else. One has options to click on, such as history, women, biography, politics, Israel, maps, and Judaic Treasures at the Library of Congress, with each launching a person into a different realm. The site is extremely well put together."[29] Karen Evans of Indiana State University wrote that the site is comprehensive, with "easily accessible, balanced information".[30]
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Virtual_Library
Telling the truth is important, but I don't see how any one can draw any conclusions about Islam, Judaism, or anything else based on these facts. Antediluvian superstitious fools brutalized other superstitious fools for whatever reasons. What else is new? Who cares.
Re: Can Muslims Be Assimilated Into Martian Civilization?
Posted: Wed Dec 09, 2015 10:44 am
by shinzen
Antediluvian superstitious fools brutalized other superstitious fools for whatever reasons.
This. And how it's still managing to impact relations 1400 years later is beyond comprehension. Drop the damned grudge. FFS.