Paris terrorist attacks

Harry Lime said:
Aha! Well, there you go y'see, falling into the old theo-philosophical trap set by the monotheistic Abrahamic religions, who cunningly divorce the divine entity from the sociological root of the religion, replacing the vacuum created thereby with the concept of an earthly entity such as a prophet or messianic figure. Now, if you consider that in the context of Durkheim's hypothesis of primitive religion being a simple expression of tribal conformity, then......

........hang on a minute!

........So, erm, shim clearances guys :-D

Absolutely right 'Arry !.
 
henry said:
then you have to ask yourself the questions:

what motivates them
are they following the dictates/guidelines of their faith

lothar, by lumping all this in together you show that you plainly don't know anything about these events or how they were conducted.
south america was introduced to christianity by the catholic church at one of it's worst periods in history (as the reformation swept through europe) mostly under jesuit control - a lot of things were done very wrong, these we hear about, but not all, these we don't hear about.

africa came much later and had a great deal of protestant input. the catholic church seemed rather to slumber which is why islam spread south. there were many dreadful things done by the colonial powers, but i'm not aware of any great violence used by the church per se to bring christianity to the continent. many african countries had their own great preachers, africans, not european at all.

India was first introduced to christianity by one man, thomas the doubter, the very one of the disciples who said he wouldn't believe until he could put his hands into the wounds. it seems he finished up in what is now the state of tamil nadu this is why there were so many christians in s. india especially, when the european explorers finally got there. unfortunately for them, they weren't catholic so the catholic church organised a massacre of them to negate any potential threat. the scriptural support for this was found in 1st imaginations and 2nd and 3rd george. the british and french put a stop to it while they had a little competition to see who would control the place. the british were the winners which is why the anglicans, methodists, plymouth brethren, and many other protestant denominations were so active. as far as i'm aware swords, muskets and cannon were the preserve of the govt. not the church

Hello Henry,

first of all I did not differentiate between the different christian churches, and that was by intention, as I did not want to go  into all that detail but simply show that christianization was done by sword, too. And basically, you confirmed that point.

Point is, that there was always a group of people who forced their will to other people by violence, brutality and braking laws and human rights. Even within the catholic church, murder, betrayal and other crimes happen. In the 70's, at least one pope was poisoned and it is not for nothing the current pope uses the public cantina, especially after his speech to his team... My first reaction was that he won't survive that for long... 

I am not at all defending the terrorist actions or anything that has to do with it. My point always was and still is that there are a fairly small group of people within a religion that can make a whole thing bad. Think of that Bischof in Germany that spent 30 Million for the renovation of his house, 10.000? just for his bath tube. This caused a lot of people leave the church. One person causing a big, big damage...

The moslems I know are all very kind and civilized people that simply want to live in peace. With roughly 4 Million Moslems in Germany and 230 known to be radical we either have a secret service issue or it is not the Islam that is dangerous, but what fanatic misled people make of it.

We need to find out who they are, observe their actions and arrest them before they cause issues. Else we need to openly communicate with Jews, Moslems and other religious groups and respect their believes (as long as they are peaceful, else put them in the other group and monitor their actions).

I am personally no fan of any religion but this discussion would lead us to far. I respect people who do believe in anything and pray. As someone here said: I am not scared of people who talk to their god. I am scared of people who think their god talks to them...
 
Hi Liz,

I fully agree with what he said, too. As said before, it is a minority of moslem people that are extremists. these need to be taken care of if they do not leave us alone in peace, and in that case really with everything we have to get this situation under control. However, we also need to be open to those that escape from areas where these extreme muslims try to build their Caliphate State. We also need to help countries that get intruded and where innocent, non extreme people get killed (no matter if they are moslem, jews or christians or what ever). We can not turn around and say "not our problem", as it will be our problem sooner or later as history tells. Fanatic conqueror never stop until they get stopped. We have a lot of western civilization examples for that, too...

I am not sure why mankind can't live in peace, but it seems to be deeply implemented in our gens to fight and kill each other. Very sad.
 
Friends,

  Not all of Americans are ignorant NRA members driving pickups and watching FOX.  And some of us have even traveled afar and learned your languages.    Many of us grew up hunting and fishing for sport, as well as riding motorcycles.  Doesn't make us murderers. 
  Many of you show crass ignorance of my beloved country.  Shame on you.  :(
  Do some homework.  Google the statistics and you will sadly find that a scary amount of American murders are black on black and drug related.

I'll give up my motorcycles when you pry them from my cold, dead fingers.    :P


 
madliz said:
The mayor of Rotterdam sums it up perfectly for me:

https://news.vice.com/article/mayor-of-rotterdam-tells-muslim-extremists-in-the-netherlands-to-fuck-off

After the terror attacks last week in Paris, the Muslim mayor of Rotterdam took a harsh tone with Islamic hardliners in the Netherlands, essentially saying that people who take issue with certain Western ideals and satirical newspapers can "fuck off."

i don't know anything about this man specifically, maybe he means it, but generally this is what is called taqiyya:

taqiyya: a concept of deceit the idea of which is to lie to non muslims on behalf of the islamic faith to decieve them into thinking something other than the truth. it is a koranic principle.
 
One thing is certain, at the attack on Charlie Hebdo, some Moslems were also killed by the two brothers Kouachi, in the principle that they thought they were "infidels of Interior" (Interior infidels ?), just citizens practicing their religion with moderation

Maybe Certainly the mayor of Rotterdam do not use taqiyya, unlike use by some extremists ...
 
Xav said:
One thing is certain, at the attack on Charlie Hebdo, some Moslems were also killed by the two brothers Kouachi, in the principle that they thought they were "infidels of Interior" (Interior infidels ?), just citizens practicing their religion with moderation

Maybe Certainly the mayor of Rotterdam do not use taqiyya, unlike use by some extremists ...

as i said already, it's not the people themselves that are the problem (deep down inside everyone knows right from wrong) it's their book which sanctions and encourages lying and deceit, so who do you trust/not trust, it's something of a dilemma?
 
Oh, come on Henry, it's not the book.  Most of those extremists probably can't even read it, they just do as they're told after being brainwashed.  Or it is the only thing they can read.  Does an instruction manual come with every Kalashnikov?

Much of the Iranian intelligence fled when the Mullahs took over, got to know quite a few that ended up driving a cab in Cologne because of rigid german immigration and asylum legislation.  Doctors, lawyers, scientists, all extremely learned and very pleasant people that saw no future for themselves under islamic rule.

General, widespread education is the prime enemy of religious fanatics, real intelligence  even more so.  Once this gets a foothold in the poverty-riddled countries that spawn all this shit, religious fanatism will dwindle, with luck, it may even disappear!  Best example is Europe... Christianity certainly has had its' dark moments.  But, as widespread education became available, religion lost much of its' influence on politics.  For sure, it took a few centuries, but we're getting there (not so sure about Bavaria though... :D).

The words of Nobel peace prize winner Malala Yousafzai could not be more fitting.  "Why is it so easy to give them guns, yet so hard to give them books?"  Does not apply only to children. :(

But, on the other hand, perhaps there's a lot to gain by giving selling them guns... ::)

piet
 
it all comes from the book, piet, whether they are told it or read it for themselves (and you're right, many don't read it), but go get yourself a copy and see if you can wade through it and see for yourself. those muslims who are a bit more enlightened and have the ability to think for themselves (don't forget, islam is all about submission, it means to throw yourself down in submission, so don't question what you are told by those who know, it's not allowed), they may well see the reality, but even they will not officially leave it because the koran says clearly, "He who leaves the religion shall be killed" or as cat stevens put it "He who leaves the faith shall die" and he didn't mean spiritually.

you're right about education, but if it can be dumbed down here in the west (and it has) how much easier where it has never been very good?

truly enlightened muslims are very few and far between, but there are some and they even speak out sometimes, but until the book is dealt with it will always spawn events like last week, sadly it always has, from its very beginnings in about 620 AD
 
Well, the terrorists achieved one thing at least. They raised the status of Charlie Hebdo from a relatively unknown little French journal with a circulation of 60,000 to an international publication that sold 5 million copies of its last "Survivors" edition. The courageous folks at Charlie Hebdo could probably sell another 5 million if they were to print them.

Why don't these terrorist idiots ever realise that violent opression almost always leads to the exact opposite outcome that they're trying to achieve. Now everyone in the world has seen the "offensive" cartoons of Mohammed that they took such exception to. Well done dickheads.
 
Perhaps our saviour could be the internet!
Everywhere I go in the Middle East and SE Asia, people are all tap tap tapping away on their phones or whatever other device they have. They aren't all on Facebook all of the time. They have a huge resource of information to them and hopefully, slowly but surely, the majority will see that it actually is better over on the other side away from fundamentalism.

Information is power and for sure the internet will just get bigger and better and smart phones cheaper too.

Cheers

DoC!

PS: Henry. That is a superb video you posted about the wise and honest Arab. Many thanks. Towards the end he says quite openly what has anyone learned from the Arab world? The development of the world has come from the West and we should learn from that.
 
Richard said:
Friends,

  Not all of Americans are ignorant NRA members driving pickups and watching FOX.  And some of us have even traveled afar and learned your languages.    Many of us grew up hunting and fishing for sport, as well as riding motorcycles.  Doesn't make us murderers. 
  Many of you show crass ignorance of my beloved country.  Shame on you.  :(
  Do some homework.  Google the statistics and you will sadly find that a scary amount of American murders are black on black and drug related.

I'll give up my motorcycles when you pry them from my cold, dead fingers.    :P

Hello Richard,

I am not sure if you had me in mind when you wrote that above and if so, I apologize if I sounded as if I generalized it. What I said though was that I mean those who are a combination of maybe 2 out of three: republican party members or supporters, Fox viewers and/or NRA members or supporters. I think also you would agree that these are mostly also quite loving their guns, mostly are into conspiracy theories and are threatened by them.

I am working for american companies since 1996. I have seen a lot of americans from almost all states, mostly east or westcoast or texas, but some even coming from other states. I found all of them very polite, gentle and friendly. At least until you say anything against america, the international actions or against the right to have guns though... Anyway...

for sure there are a lot of guns used for hunting. With 250 Million People in USA and 90/100 having a gun, that makes 225 Million guns. How many dears would be left over if they really would all be used for hunting only, please? It is a weak argument in my eyes, I am sorry. I need also to search on your theory that its mostly black shooting black more. If that's the case, one would need to think about why and how to change that...

But that leads away from the original discussion to much.
 
It is already, remember the Arab Spring? The internet has helped open up the Arab world and caused the huge uprising a few years ago. They, the Arabs, have access to the WWW and are seeing how we live and now they want it as well.

Piet makes a very important point when he says the religious fanatics/radical moslems don't want intelligent educated people around to threaten their power base. How do you think the Republicans historically have had any power in the USA? They have helped dumb down the population through commercial media, encouraging ethnic/economic slums and then added low wages into the mix so they can isolate a proportion of the voting block. If your not part of the political process i.e. being aware and having an opinion you're probably too busy surviving. We all a have strong middle class who are better educated, better informed and better employed which is why there are a lot of Australians, Kiwis, hopeless rugby playing Pommy bastards, hopeless cricket playing Scots and lots of Europeans on here. Oh and only a handful of Yanks who must be ok because they're on here.

Same result in both the West and the Middle East, just slightly different processes at work.
 
DoC! said:
Towards the end he says quite openly what has anyone learned from the Arab world? The development of the world has come from the West and we should learn from that.

How short and selective our memory, eh? remember a time called the "Dark Ages"? Nah, thought not. If it hadn't been for Arabic learning and the transfer of that knowledge to Europe as we came out of the dark ages we would not have modern medicine, mathematics, in fact most of our science and literature. The poor bloody arabs however have not made much of an advance in societal issues and are still living in tribal feudalism.
 
henry said:
it all comes from the book, piet, whether they are told it or read it for themselves (and you're right, many don't read it), but go get yourself a copy and see if you can wade through it and see for yourself. those muslims who are a bit more enlightened and have the ability to think for themselves (don't forget, islam is all about submission, it means to throw yourself down in submission, so don't question what you are told by those who know, it's not allowed), they may well see the reality, but even they will not officially leave it because the koran says clearly, "He who leaves the religion shall be killed" or as cat stevens put it "He who leaves the faith shall die" and he didn't mean spiritually.

you're right about education, but if it can be dumbed down here in the west (and it has) how much easier where it has never been very good?

truly enlightened muslims are very few and far between, but there are some and they even speak out sometimes, but until the book is dealt with it will always spawn events like last week, sadly it always has, from its very beginnings in about 620 AD


It seems to me, unless I am mistaken, that since centuries, all religions are working on the interpretation of their own sacred texts

We see that it is difficult to have a real similar approach, and that there are some internal clonflits about it

A simple reading of the Bible, the Koran or the Torah, for example would it not insuffisente for understanding these texts and to interpret it ?

Xavier
 
No, it is still difficult, as the books have all been translated several times, interpreted, re-printed etc. etc. etc. Seeing also, that there were way more gospels written than the ones in the new testament exist today simply shows that there was a selection process of what has to go into the bible and what not. The old testament f.e. is a bunch of stories that were long time told from parents to children over decades and for sure have been altered, added or some points have been forgotten, until someone took the time to actually write it down (keep in mind that many of the stories in the old testament happened when there was no written word existing or at least not commonly understood...).

For me basically, the 10 commandments - maybe with the exception of the first - are nothing else than basic human rights and basic guidelines to avoid big conflicts. If everyone would always stick to them, we would have no killing, no crime, 95% less problems in the world. But that is my interpretation, right?  ;)

However, to think that mankind would ever come to a point where everyone would stick to that 10 (or better 9) simple rules, is pure illusion.
 
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