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Muslims kill and persecute Christians in their home countries, while demanding their religious freedoms in the civilized world.
this is a fact
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Every day in America, a majority Christian nation, people do and say things that are sacreligous or diametrically opposed to the tenants of Christianity, and no one bats an eyeball.
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In Islamic societies, even small variances from radical dogma will get you tortured and killed.
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If he had done something similar in Saudi Arabia, he'd have been castrated and set on fire in the public square.
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Christians make death threats, just like Muslims do.
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No one bats an eyeball, eh West Horn?
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You can't address the topic so you sidetrack into other matters.
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Does it bother you that you can't just say "Christianity" and that you have to say "modern Christianity"?
Doesn't it make my argument for me?
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Nothing is identical, but the idea that there are strong fundamental differences is ridiculous.
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We have similar fundamentalist relgious movements who value violence and extreme nationalism. We just have a lot better weapons, more money and we're a lot safer in our homes. Those are the real differences.
Strict adherence to utopian ideals, be they Christian or Muslim, have deleterious effects on societies, especially if they act militarily to attempt to achieve these utopias.
Islam is on a different part of the cycle than Christianity at this point in time, but both ridiculous mindsets that, throughout their histories, have fluctuated in what they considered proper to spread their fantasy stories.
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Can you dispute anything I have said or do you have nothing but ad hominem to lean against?
I can't wait for your next hyper-intellectual counter-argument. Let me see if I can get it started "I am laughing because you're so dumb!"
You would be fantastic in a real debate, the whole "You're wrong because you're a stupid-face" thing really goes over well in formal debate.
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As soon as any moron could actually read the New Testament it became obvious that Christians are not encouraged to commit acts of violence in God's name.
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Did you google "muslim mob" yet?
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Reasonable people can and do disagree about how to deal with radical Islam (i.e.,whether a militaristic approach is best, whether we should have invaded Iraq, etc).
But the moral equivalency you've argued is simply not taken seriously in public discourse because it is ridiculous on its face. I'm sort of ashamed that I wasted so much time arguing it.....I feel like I've been debating with someone who believes the Earth is flat.
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I have refuted the point that radical Islam and the US/Christianity are not two sides of the same coin in previous posts.
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Every day in America, a majority Christian nation, people do and say things that are sacrilegous or diametrically opposed to the tenants of Christianity, and no one bats an eyeball, because we are a free society. In Islamic societies, even small variances from radical dogma will get you tortured and killed.
"Piss Christ" was a big story because it was funded with taxpayer money. The artist is likely still smoking pot in the Village and churning out "provocative" tripe. That's America. If he had done something similar in Saudi Arabia, he'd have been castrated and set on fire in the public square. That's the difference.
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Radical Muslims want the world to be the kind of place where women are beaten with razor wire for stepping outside without a male family member. They also believe that it is their mission as Muslims to spark a religious war to kill everyone on the planet who does not believe in those views. 9-11 was the first major shot in that war.
If Christians are engaging in similar acts I'm unaware; you'll have to clue me in.
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You're just being a moron when you group these two theologies together. Aside from being monotheistic and having an origin in judaism, there is a huge divergence between the two. This is true even if it doesn't fit into your personal worldview and theories on organized religion.
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BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq’s top *****e cleric condemned the publication of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammed as angry Muslims protested across Asia on Friday. Several European newspapers defiantly reprinted the cartoons.
Iraq’s Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, however, made no call for protests and suggested that militant Muslims were partly to blame for distorting Islam’s image.
“We strongly denounce and condemn this horrific action,” al-Sistani said, alluding to the caricatures in remarks posted on his Web site and dated Jan. 31.
But al-Sistani, who wields enormous influence over Iraq’s majority *****es, also referred to “misguided and oppressive” segments of the Muslim community and said their actions “projected a distorted and dark image of the faith of justice, love and brotherhood.”
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it sits having no real effect on life as people get dressed up and go to church to gossip about other people and form/break friendships and cry, mistaking the communal emotional release of a human collective for the invisble hand of god;
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The only real difference is what the adherents do. They are both ridiculous fantasy stories that tell the followers that they are going to heaven and the rest are hell-bound scum (and that all are worthless scum compared to the fictional deity). The entire point is dehumanization and the devaluation of human life, since all life exists at the whim of a fictional deity. They each contradict themselves in tone and theme, allowing adherents to pick and choose what they want and allowing for large apologetics movements within each.
A Christian can jump and shout "eye for an eye" then 2 minutes later talk about "turn the other cheek" and a Muslim can do the same stupid thing because they are placing their reliance not on intellect or common sense but on satisfying immediate, animalistic emotional desires with backing from fiction books.
You and I are horrified to see journalists kidnapped and killed abroad.
Many Muslism are horrified to see American soldiers driving tanks through their homeland.
I am not saying those two things are moral equivalents, but I am saying that the world is full of insanity and many people's solution to sorting things out is by ratcheting up the insanity by pounding their fiction book even harder.
Do you think it is coincidence that fundamentalist, emotionalist evangelical Christian movements are shooting through the roof right now?
Is it coincidence that the youth of Iran went from moving towards secular democracy to going right back to anti-West pro-Islamist sentiment during the exact same period of time?
All the while leaders from both sides constantly talk about all of this violence being signs of the end of time and return of whatever fictional being they claim fealty to?
Strict and unwavering adherence to utopian fantasy is a cancer in the human mind; call it Christian, call it Muslim, call it Communist Panacea.
Usually this cancer is benign, it sits having no real effect on life as people get dressed up and go to church to gossip about other people and form/break friendships and cry, mistaking the communal emotional release of a human collective for the invisble hand of god; a social function that helps lube the gears of society. One of the best ways of keeping people together is to tell that group they are special and better than other groups.
But when practical concerns lead to anger and violence it is often used to lube the gears of war to lead to more death and destruction; 70 virgins or a lifetime at Christ's right hand it's all the same when the goal is to pump yourself up and dehumanize your practical enemy.
That's why democracy is great, because every individual is, ideally, given the same amount of power no matter what they believe and if a lot of people believe the same thing then things move their way but things can easily shift the other way. Religion is antithetical to this, Soviet-style loyalty to political parties are also antithetical to this.
People should be allowed to believe whatever damned fool fantasy story they want to, but in times like these I do not feel it necessary to pretend that it is anything but counter-productive lunacy.
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People should be allowed to believe whatever damned fool fantasy story they want to, but in times like these I do not feel it necessary to pretend that it is anything but counter-productive lunacy.
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For a "progressive" thinker you sure rely on stereotypes.
