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The Forum > Article Comments > Defining Islamophobia > Comments

Defining Islamophobia : Comments

By Alice Aslan, published 8/1/2009

The use of essentialist statements about Islam and Muslims block dialogue and debate.

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Absolutely correct. Well written and explained. Good work.
I would add the recalcitrant obsession that people can be defines by ancient religious interpretive texts. When in reality everyone’s view of religion is dependent on the individual.

Warning: Now comes those who hide behind 'freedom of speech' with their perversions of what the article is about.
We will be treated to varying displays hysterical Islamophobia rather than discussion.

Despite the coming tirades this article is one I'll keep for its insightful explanations.
Posted by examinator, Thursday, 8 January 2009 9:43:01 AM
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The article is indeed insightful. However, it would have been better if it had not concluded with the questionable platitude:

"Most important of all, we always need to remember that in this society everyone has something to say, and every culture has something to offer."

We recently have had the One Nation party. I think the general conclusion is that they had something to say and what they had to say was not worthwhile saying.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 8 January 2009 9:54:11 AM
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Welcome Back David F....:)

Exammy... ur too easy :) can spot you a mile off.

Nursels primary error is that she uses the term 'ISLAM-ophobia' for what she should be describing as "MUSLIM-ophobia".

Fear and loathing (and in my view the eradication of) of Islams doctrines is very valid.
-Child sexual abuse.
-Sexual abuse of Captive women.
-Inciting hatred against Christians and Jews. Pathalogical hatred of atheists. "hate what Allah hates"
-Seditious and warlike (Fight those who do not believe. 9:29)

But Muslims? aah..then we have to take into account the various 'shades' of Muslim.

a)Cultural/nominal
b)Sincere but moderate.
c)Sincere and Radical.
d)Consumed with anger, hate, violent intent and radical.

As a general rule, I don't believe in discrimination against Muslims in most of the areas of life but this worries me about those who might have access to information on us.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24826017-5001561,00.html

<<In a note given to NSW Supreme Court judge Anthony Whealy on November 26, one juror wrote that the woman had followed some jurors to their cars on two instances; on the second occasion, she stood behind the car writing notes in a book before making a mobile phone call.>>

Have fun that ...I'm sure some will.

NURSUL lays out all the legitimate concerns of non Muslims almost in list form....then she goes into the twighlight zone of surreal double talk and speaks as if she had just said the opposite.

LESSONS FOR NURSUL.

1/ Correct Terminology "Muslimophobia" not 'Islam'aphobia.

2/ "Islam" as a set of doctrines IS violent and evil. Care to debate this at the State library Vic in public with a large PA system ?

3/ Muslims generally don't see Islam in this way, same as Most nominal Christians don't know much about their own faith.

The correct social position to have is. (my opinion)

1) Rational fear of Islam, and working towards measures to eliminate it. (IICor 10:4)
2) Compassionate treatment of deluded nominal Muslims, with a view to restoring their lost humanity. (John 3:16)

"deluded"...hmmm is that word too strong about another faith?

Quran, Surah 9:30 "they (Christians) are deluded"
Posted by Polycarp, Thursday, 8 January 2009 11:07:20 AM
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Dear Polycarp,

Thank you for your welcome.

With the barbaric actions of Christianity such as the Inquisition, the Crusades, the Holocaust, the Wars of the Reformation etc. there is far more reason for Christianophobia than there is for Islamophobia. However, Christians have done quite a bit of good and some of them are very fine human beings in spite of the horrors of their religion and the nonsense of belief in a humanoid God. The same is true for Islam. Muslims are also human beings. Most of their countries at the beginning of the twentieth century were colonies of imperialist Christian Europe who were there through brutality and force.

It is reasonable to hate neither Christianity nor Islam as members of both faiths are human beings. However, the record of Christianity is far worse. Some of the fruits of Christianity are intolerance, persecution and murder. Maybe look at your own nonsense and evil before you show your hate for human beings who believe nonsense different from yours.

Happy New Year.
Posted by david f, Thursday, 8 January 2009 11:22:11 AM
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David, well done. You've proven Polycarp's point, in your illinformed post above.

The mere fact that you need to mention the inquisitions when trying to show that we should be just as scared of Christianity as Islam is really evidence of how little justification there is for your position.

The inquisition happened hundreds of years ago and resulted in very few deaths, far fewer than popular belief or perception.

Compare this to the modern world- Islamic terrorists have been responsible for over TWELVE AND A HALF THOUSAND ATTACKS, in the name of their religion in the PAST SEVEN YEARS. I wonder how many Christian terrorist attacks there have been in the same timeframe?

And of course, when talking about whether we should be "scared' of a religion we need to consider all the good they do as well. Considering that the vast majority of aid organisations in the Western World are either explicitly Christian, or were started by Christians (and are now officially secular in the name of PC and inclusivity), I'd say the world would have more to be scared of if Christianity did NOT exist, wouldn't you!?
Posted by Trav, Thursday, 8 January 2009 12:13:35 PM
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David

I have not heard of someone saying our Christian god will give me 50 virgins, once I kill hundreds of people.

I think the problem of Islam and the reason for Islamophobia, is the fact that the teachers and Leader of Islam does not fight this evil, they are often silent when evil happened in the name of Islam. In fact many of them seem in support of the deed of these evil people in society. Ie after Sept 11, many of them said America caused it/deserved it.

Since the Leader of Islam does not fight evil, we are left with the conclusion that Islam is an evil religion and something we should be in fear of.

So Islamophobia in my opinion, is caused be Islam and we are right to be frighten by Islam
Posted by dovif2, Thursday, 8 January 2009 1:49:29 PM
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Trav,
I think you missed the point of davidf post.
He was simply saying that neither side of the divide is pure enough to throw stones.
As for your comment about the abuses of Christianity is a long time past is unsubstantiated in fact.
South Africa's Apartied was essentially christian based, the stolen people, child abuse in the churches all in living memory et al.
Let's not forget the 'race' (read religious) riots all over the world.
The only difference is the way the antisocial behaviour is portrayed.
The truth is that wrong is wrong no matter which side perpetrated the crime.

Davidf,
One nation does have something to say to the public if only that there is such ignorance and kneejerk reactionary absurdity in this country.It says a lot about the failure of democracy as opposed to mob rule.

PolyCarp
Your arguments are wasted on me as I reject your premise for your didactic absolutist approach.
I have concluded that you don't want discussion and I don't want to be converted so I guess we are at an impasse.
I ask to engage in discussion if and when you ever decide to discuss rather than attempt indoctrination.
Examinator.
Posted by examinator, Thursday, 8 January 2009 1:53:52 PM
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Completely agree with the examinator about One Nation - I saw on TV the hysterical intolerant, crowds outside a venue where Pauline Hansen was speaking, harassing people who wanted to attend - I'm assuming the same crowds who squeal about freedom of speech and "culture wars" when it suits them, I could be wrong though.

On the article, I can only quote Ayaan Hirsi Ali, "tolerance of intolerance is cowardice", we should not be tolerating any of the religious or political intolerance that we end up tolerating, usually due to bullying, which we don't tolerate in schoolyards any longer, thankfully. Perhaps our next generation will be less tolerant of intolerance.
Posted by rpg, Thursday, 8 January 2009 2:54:34 PM
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Yes, an excellent article from Nursel Guzeldeniz, but one that has evidently (but unsurprisingly) gone over the heads of several Islamophobes. I agree with Guzeldeniz that Islamophobia is an apt term to describe what she calls a new form of "cultural racism", indeed it's a point I've made here many times. It is an unfortunate trait shared by many people that they apparently need an "Other" over whom they can feel superior, and upon whom they can project their insecurities of identity.

As it is no longer acceptable to project these fears on to "Blacks", Asians or people from non-Anglo ethnicities and cultures, the recent rise of Islamism as a politico-religious extremist movement has provided a convenient postmodern object for those less-evolved Westerners whose overt expresssion of racism has been suppressed by the global discourse on human rights. They are joined by primarily Christian religious extremists whose Islamophobia also derives from competition for believers among the credulous.

Porkycrap is a good example of the latter type - while he claims that his fear of Islam has a doctrinal basis, he often lapses into language that vilifies all Muslims, rather than his fundamentalist counterparts who subscribe to Islamism. The other Islamophobes who've commented are good examples of the "cultural racist" variety, as is evident in their ignorantly pejorative comments about Islam.

While I'm no fan of Islam nor any other religion, to claim that there are no Islamic aid organisations is patently false, as is the "100 virgins" fantasy that is regularly trotted out by Islamophobes.
Posted by CJ Morgan, Thursday, 8 January 2009 3:09:01 PM
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Great article, and nicely restrained comments too!
I actually think it is sort of refreshing to have a prejudice based on ideas and behavior rather than on skin color, sex or birthplace.
Without getting into the historical arguments of which religion is more evil (Pick your period in history that suits your creed I guess), I'd say that as a Humanist, all the "Big Man in the sky" religions are equally scary. Not because religious rubbish is any more dangerous then secular rubbish, but only because secular Leadership is less powerful and more accountable than religious leadership.
Most current day Islamophobia was drummed up by the US to justify their post 911 regrettable behavior. When you kill that many civilians you have better got a good excuse. Fighting Evil lets you forgive anything. The more horrid you are prepared to behave, the more horrid "evil" you must imagine to justify it.
Posted by Ozandy, Thursday, 8 January 2009 3:26:09 PM
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Nursel Guzeldeniz,

What is the justification of re-defining prejudice against Moslems as "racism". Islam is an ideology not an ethnicity,it is an abstraction. Is prejudice against Christians, Jews and Hindus by Moslems "racism", I'll bet it isn't. We could analyse "Islamophobia" anthropologically or we could suspect it is sometimes used as a political device in an attempt to silence legitimate critics of its beliefs and practices by Moslems unfamiliar with the real parameters and consequences of free speech.

"Islamism invokes the ghost of puritanical Christianity, well it might, however there is plenty for us to fear from contemporary Islam here and now based on the oppressive nature of Moslem dominated nations.

" Criticism and free speech are very important" Wrong! Criticism and free speech are essential to democracy, people in the West paid very dearly for these rights.I think Islam is a ridiculous superstition, but I defend you right to believe, unless the practice of your religion threatens my freedom. I suggest you read "On Liberty" by J.S. Mill, it's all in that book.

I agree that the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan are crimes against the people of those nations and Western support of Israel is morally indefensible. Please note that many Christians are appalled by both wars.

As for most Moslems desiring democracy. Is their version of democracy the same as the West's? Is there a similar debate developing in regard to "Kuffarphobia" in Moslem nations?
Posted by mac, Thursday, 8 January 2009 4:06:37 PM
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Nursel: <<Furthermore, Islam is compatible with democracy and human rights like any other religion>>

Nursel based her reasoning on a survey that, majority Muslims value freedom and democracy in the West. This is wrong thinking.

"Majority Muslims like freedom in the West" is not the same as "Islam is compatible with freedom in the West". They are two completely separate matters.

A Muslim who likes freedom in the West should seriously consider leaving Islam.
Posted by MGC Pal, Thursday, 8 January 2009 4:31:22 PM
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Polycarp, I'd like you to do something.

Firstly, drop the patronising act. When you make statements like "lessons for Nursul" you are trying to position yourself as a teacher. It comes across as very patronising to people who think you're so invested in scripture that you can't operate within any kind of framework without it.

In fact, I don't think I've really seen any discussions on OLO where you can reason for yourself without resorting to either the bible or the qu'ran.

Now - here's something you should try, just for one week:

Forget all of that scriptural voodoo.

All of it.

Just, dump it. Or at least, realise that sensible people, today, don't give a damn.

I know you make the point that "THEY care, so WE should care."

Actually, 'they' believe many different things. Each is a different person. Many of them make use of that scriptural pap to control others, which is a damn shame.

Many don't.

So, how is this for an idea - for one week, try to live without thinking of the bible, or the qu'ran. Try to use the mind you have been giften with.

Just, for a week or so, see if your moral compass can function without resorting to the instruction manual you've chosen to support yours, (or the instruction manual you use to attack others).
Posted by TurnRightThenLeft, Thursday, 8 January 2009 4:40:41 PM
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Examinator,
I think you might have missed Trav's point. People here keep thinking it is ok to be fearful of Christian fruitcakes, but the same people here call others "Islamophobic" for fearing Islamic fruitcakes. The author's and other contributors here keep insisting that calling people Islamophobic is somehow going to help the situation. The term "Islamophobia" is just as inaccurate as "Christophobia". Both have been wordsmithed to end discussion.

I have friends who live in Indonesia. Some of them call themselves muslims, but inside they hate Islam. They have discovered for themselves the insanity that Islam perpetuates. But for fear of ostricism ond retribution, they keep calling themselves muslim. So according to the author and many other contributors here, these Indonesian friends of mine are Islamophobic. Gee that's a big help.
Posted by Bassam, Thursday, 8 January 2009 4:49:46 PM
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"Criticism and free speach are very important and should be encouraged for social progress" says the auther in one spot, and

"Furthermore Islam is compatible with democracy and human rights like any other religion" in another.

Then how would the author reconcile her two statements, with this:

http://www.melaniephillips.com/articles-new/?p=635&print=1
Posted by bigmal, Thursday, 8 January 2009 8:06:32 PM
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Nursel, you stereotype Christianity while condemning stereotyping of Muslims.

For perhaps the majority of Christians and Muslims their religion is a merely a cultural identity. In Australia no one begrudges a person who wishes to draw spiritual nourishment from Islamic tradition.

What is of public concern are Muslim doctrines, ie the content of the religion – particularly concerning establishment of religion, jihad, and status of non-Muslims in Muslim States. A cursory look at current Islamic countries will show you this is a real problem, and a problem for immigrant Muslim communities also, for example in Victoria.

http://www.saltshakers.org.au/pdf/313278_VCAT_-_DOCUMENTS_RELATIN.pdf

Attempting to whitewash these genuine issues with charges of racism is mindless really. There are many different races who profess to be Muslim. It doesn’t make sense. I don’t think you have cared to take religion seriously and considered the distinctiveness of Islam.

There are scholars who are working hard on Islamic theology trying to adapt it to modern civil society but their cause is not helped when honest criticism is confused with racism. It means that Muslims themselves who wish to speak out receive no public support from non Muslims who have been silenced by politically correct speech codes.

You do violence to immigrant Muslim communities Nursel.

The shallowness of your religious knowledge shows with your parroting of popular prejudices against Christianity that with a little will and a half an hour of research could dispel; and you want us to take seriously your understanding of the nature of the problems of Islam and public life?

If you really want to contribute to a justly ordered community and want to, in charity, inform the ignorant, you simply have to do some work. If you want to talk about religion there is no substitute for honest inquiry. Please read from a variety of sources.

Dont' be afraid.

Godbless.
Posted by Martin Ibn Warriq, Thursday, 8 January 2009 8:49:26 PM
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Oh one more thing - it is obscene to attempt to equate morally the deliberate murder of civilians (New York, Bali, Madrid, London, Mumbai, Beslan, Africa) and the accidental death of civilians while targeting armed combatants (who often use civilians as a shield).
Posted by Martin Ibn Warriq, Thursday, 8 January 2009 8:56:21 PM
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The article makes a good point about extremism in both religions being oppressive.

"anti-essentialism; cultural relativism; tolerance of difference; freedom of speech; secularism; separation of state and religion; sexual permissiveness; human rights; women’s rights; homosexual rights; minority rights."

These are all freedoms the rest of us would lose if fundamentalists from either side had their way. Plenty of Islam-free discussions on these issues at this site have seen upper case Christians in condemnation mode. Both sides see Western society as inherently evil.

Between fundamentalists of both sides it boils down to which side gets to oppress the rest of us. One does it by stealth, infiltrating our systems and institutions, the other by blowing people up.

Different tactics and strategy, but with the same goal of sending us back to the dark ages.
Posted by chainsmoker, Friday, 9 January 2009 10:46:54 AM
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Polycarp,

You just don't get it, do you? Probably incapable now of letting go your hatred long enough to try to understand any writing that is even mildly supportive of the religion you hate (your supposed distinction between Islamophobia and Muslimophobia is spurious).

And your ever-present hypocrisy continues to escape your consciousness: you fear and hate Islamic doctrines because (inter alia) they incite 'hatred against Christians and Jews'. You can't see the irony of that.

Your list of various 'shades' of Muslim can be exactly replicated in your own religion. It seems you inhabit 'the twighlight zone of surreal double talk' to quote your misspelled babble.

"As a general rule", you say, "I don't believe in discrimination against Muslims in most of the areas of life..." and then immediately recommend we should discriminate against "...those who might have access to information on us." And, as usual, it's a single anecdote intended to generate fear based on an isolated instance and to be applied to all people of that faith.

LESSONS FOR POLYCOM:

1. Your kind of fear is the antithesis of 'rational'.

2. Don't use words like 'compassion' when you have none.

3. 'Deluded' is exactly the right word for all religious nutters who claim to be omniscient when it come to God.

4. A little thoughtful uncertainty and even humility might be useful if you grand design is to 'restore lost humanity'.
Posted by Spikey, Friday, 9 January 2009 1:46:02 PM
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Defining Islamophobia

Trav wrote:

I wonder how many Christian terrorist attacks there have been in the same timeframe?

Dear Trav,

German churches backed Hitler’s Christian Germany for the most part. The Nazi murders took place in an atmosphere of hate supported by Christian Jew-hating propaganda. More lives were lost than in all the Islamic terrorist attacks. The Holocaust remains an act of Christian terrorism far outweighing Islamic acts. Even anti-Nazi Christian countries participated by denying refuge to most of those fleeing the Nazi terror. Christians remain in denial as to the guilt of their religion in that great terror.

The second greatest terrorist attack in US history was the blowing up of the Murtagh building in Oklahoma City killing 168 people by the Christian fundamentalist terrorist, Timothy McVeigh. Christian terrorists bomb abortion clinics and murder doctors providing that service.

Christian terrorists don’t even get named correctly. Speight and his allies took over in Fiji and turfed out Choudhury the democratically elected prime minister of Indian descent while Christian groups sang hymns on Parliament Lawn. He was a Christian terrorist, but I never saw him named as such.

Christians United for Israel (CUFI) in the US maintain Israeli government policies must never be criticized because Israel is doing God's will. But they do criticise any Israeli government which tries to bring peace, witness how Rabin and Barak were so attacked. They are radical Dispensationalists who believe in the imminent end of the world. They will go straight to Heaven without dying, while the rest of the human race, including Jews who don't convert, will be wiped out with great suffering.

Both Christianity and Islam are alike in being missionary religions seeking to spread their delusional systems and blind to their own evil. I believe the world would be better off if all missionary religions would disappear. All religions are delusional systems, but missionary Christianity and Islam have done more damage than the others
Posted by david f, Friday, 9 January 2009 2:16:48 PM
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davidf, your post is full of errors on almost every line. I've discussed issues like this with people like you before, and it makes me wonder whether to bother with you. In the interests of not prioritising my personal time on people with a biased, hateful agenda (as is clear from your post above) I'll make this short.

- Timothy McVeigh- I don't know much about this situation, so I briefly skimmed wikipedia for 2 minutes and found your ridiculous charge of 'Christian terrorist' to be completely false and misleading.

McVeigh claims to be a Catholic, but nowhere is there ANY indication whatsoever that his religious beliefs had anything to do with his motivation for the attacks. This is a massive contrast from Muslims who claim they are doing the work of God. To even compare the two would be a complete category error.

McVeigh is a deluded fool who committed the atrocity for who knows what reasons, The 9/11 bombers were doing something they believed full well to be divinely inspired- as are the other cases on The Religion of Peace website- who points out the 12 1/2 thousand in last 7 years stat.

In fact, there's even a link between McVeigh's Co-conspirator and ISLAMIC terrorists, if you read the wiki entry.

- Nazi Germany- where to start!? Again, a quick reading of wiki will show that you're way out of line. The Nazi party banned church seminaries in 1937 and aimed to control or destroy all churches. Does this seem like the world of a Christian party to you!? If anything, the overall goals of the Nazi regime were atheistic (wiping religion off the map) rather than religious.

Speight and CUFI- don't have time to look into these specific examples, but as you're talking tripe with the other two, and they're of limited significance in the discussion anyway, I won't bother.

"I believe the world would be better off if all missionary religions would disappear."

Have a read of this article, and tell me what you think:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/columnists/matthew_parris/article5400568.ece
Posted by Trav, Friday, 9 January 2009 3:40:58 PM
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As the above article is actually relevant to some of the discussions going on here, I'll just fill you all in on what it is. basically it's written by an atheist, who thinks that the world of Evangelical Christian Missionaries in Africa is positively awesome.

"Now a confirmed atheist, I've become convinced of the enormous contribution that Christian evangelism makes in Africa: sharply distinct from the work of secular NGOs, government projects and international aid efforts. These alone will not do. Education and training alone will not do. In Africa Christianity changes people's hearts. It brings a spiritual transformation. The rebirth is real. The change is good."

"I used to avoid this truth by applauding - as you can - the practical work of mission churches in Africa. It's a pity, I would say, that salvation is part of the package, but Christians black and white, working in Africa, do heal the sick, do teach people to read and write; and only the severest kind of secularist could see a mission hospital or school and say the world would be better without it
Posted by Trav, Friday, 9 January 2009 3:43:51 PM
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Dear Trav,

I read the article about the missionaries in Africa and admit they have done great work and made life better for a lot of people. I also admit to being wrong about Timothy McVeigh.

Please check on Speight and CUFI.

However, although Hitler and the Nazis were in general not religious they used the hatred of Jews promoted by Christianity to further their aims. From Wikipedia:

On the Jews and Their Lies (German: Von den Jüden und iren Lügen; in modern spelling Von den Juden und ihren Lügen) is a 65,000-word treatise written by German Reformation leader Martin Luther in 1543.
In the treatise, Luther writes that the Jews are a "base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth." Luther wrote that they are "full of the devil's feces ... which they wallow in like swine," and the synagogue is an "incorrigible whore and an evil slut ..." He argues that their synagogues and schools be set on fire, their prayer books destroyed, rabbis forbidden to preach, homes razed, and property and money confiscated. They should be shown no mercy or kindness, afforded no legal protection, and these "poisonous envenomed worms" should be drafted into forced labor or expelled for all time. He also seems to advocate their murder, writing "[w]e are at fault in not slaying them."
The prevailing scholarly view since the Second World War is that the treatise exercised a major and persistent influence on Germany's attitude toward its Jewish citizens in the centuries between the Reformation and the Holocaust. Four hundred years after it was written, the National Socialists displayed On the Jews and Their Lies during Nuremberg rallies, and the city of Nuremberg presented a first edition to Julius Streicher, editor of the Nazi newspaper Der Stürmer, the newspaper describing it as the most radically antisemitic tract ever published..
Posted by david f, Friday, 9 January 2009 4:31:39 PM
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Dear DAvid F

on Luther:

<<the Jews are a "base, whoring people, that is, no people of God, and their boast of lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth." they are "full of the devil's feces ... which they wallow in like swine,">>

Choice words eh... but might I just point out, they are LUTHERS words..not those of Jesus nor the apostles. Now.. if some secular person like...hmmm.. POL POT.. aaah yes.. a good example.. decided that we will now have 'Day zero' and a new start with Cambodian humanity..cleansed of the old order an in with the new... surely.. SURELY.. you would not then equally condemn all atheists nor would you say "Atheism did these terrible things in Cambodia"...would you?

I hope not. I grow weary of your use of the term 'Christianity' .. in connections such as these. "Christianity" is the name of the faith..referring to the teaching/beliefs of the faith, not an adjective for the behavior of those claiming to be adherents.

APOSTLE PAUL'S WORDS. (about Jews)

<<Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. 5Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.>>

TRTL.. as I've said to some recently .. ur too easy :) I deliberately act in a 'charicature' manner at times.. crikey it would be rather boring if not no? But I do have the power of reason. It's just that it led me to where I am.. why not allow me the freedom of speech you so love yourself?

SPIKEY.. I've been missing you :) But my concerns are quite rational I assure you. Fear? nah..I was a lone pro Israel voice with a sign saying "Hamas are genocidal terrorists" among many Palestinian supporters last sunday.. trust me..I'm not 'scared'. But I do wish to change the political/cultural landscape.
Posted by Polycarp, Friday, 9 January 2009 6:45:59 PM
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Polycarp wrote:

I grow weary of your use of the term 'Christianity' .. in connections such as these. "Christianity" is the name of the faith..referring to the teaching/beliefs of the faith, not an adjective for the behavior of those claiming to be adherents.

Dear Polycarp,

I grow weary of your protestations, your lack of knowledge of grammar and your idiosyncratic definition of the word, Christianity. ‘Christianity’ is a noun, not an adjective. My computer dictionary defines the noun, Christianity, as:

“The religion based on the person and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth, or its beliefs and practices.”

I grow weary of your attempts to redefine Christianity by eliminating the second part of the definition. That won’t do at all. I see no reason why I should use your definition in preference to that of the dictionary.

There is one simple way to settle the matter. One can merely recognize that Jesus was not a Christian but a Jew, get rid of the system of nonsense called Christianity and return to the faith of Jesus. It will be difficult for Judaism to deal the multitudes returning but there are many branches of Judaism for them to choose from, and I am sure they will do their best to handle the expansion.

Might as well return to the original nonsense and get rid of the additional nonsense. Judaism has enough nonsense without adding the additional nonsense of Christianity. The sadistic God who asked Abraham to murder his son is more than enough. We do not need the psychopath of the New Testament who condemned his own son to a hideous death.
Posted by david f, Saturday, 10 January 2009 3:56:25 PM
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Polycarp:

"But my concerns are quite rational I assure you." A characteristic of the delusional, I'm sad to say.

Polycarp:

"I was a lone pro Israel voice with a sign saying "Hamas are genocidal terrorists" among many Palestinian supporters last sunday." Trust you to take sides and then to get it all wrong.

Polycarp:

"I do wish to change the political/cultural landscape." Delusions of grandeur, you silly old bugger!

Poly, are you sure you're going to be able to get through 2009? It's only January and I'm already feeling sorry for you
Posted by Spikey, Saturday, 10 January 2009 7:33:11 PM
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I'm sick of hearing about Islam.Born out of human fear/ignorance like most religions,it is designed to enslave people.Don't define anything,just ignore this stupidity.There are better things to do with our lives.
Posted by Arjay, Saturday, 10 January 2009 7:33:13 PM
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Hi there Spikey

thanx for your concerns about this 'silly old bugger' :)

Who knows.. if people on the street manifest the same hatred and evil that HAMAS is.... I might not make it afterall. But I have insurance :)
and assurance both temperal and eternal.

You say I got it "wrong"..... hmm r u prepared to debate that claim seriously?

MY CLAIM "Hamas are genocidal terrorists"

HISTORIES CLAIM- The "HAMAS charter", repeatedly referenced in the Media lately... as you well know.. states "Israel will exist until Islam Obliterates it".. now..either you are in sad denial or plain dull.

Of all the people in this world.. no one knows better what those types of words mean for Jews. There are ample images of death camps and ovens on line for your illumination and persuasion.

I'm wondering Spikey whether your reaction is just the usual "Raw and immediate emotion" typical of the blinkered Islamist or bigoted Palestinian, or are you simply uninformed?

SOME HISTORY.

1948 JEWS accept a partition plan. Arabs (stirred up by Grand Mufti Husseini, in the pay of Hitler(until Hitler died)) reacted with violence and war. Arabs were defeated. (stiff bickies..they picked the fight) Thus, the (Palestinian) Arabs showed early on that they were not interested in any kind of 2 state solution and wanted Israel not to exist. Hence...they forfeited their right by any measure of reason to territory in Palestine. What was given to them thereafter was pure 'grace'...(underserved)
Then...shock horror... after being defeated, they whined about "Israel not complying with the UN partition" (which they had rejected)

http://www.mideastweb.org/zionism.htm
http://www.un.org/Depts/dpi/palestine/ch2.pdf

The West has EVERY right to give land to Jews, as 'we' Crusaders slaughtered around 300,000 of them in the 12th century. Most Jews have NEVER abandoned their ties to the Holy Land from the time of Abraham to now.

Take it..or debate it...the choice is yours.
Posted by Polycarp, Sunday, 11 January 2009 7:40:51 AM
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Why all this debate about Hamas? They appear to have been listed as a terrorist organization for agea, and still are. So why would anyone in Aus think they are worthy of support?

http://www.nationalsecurity.gov.au/agd/www/nationalsecurity.nsf/AllDocs/95FB057CA3DECF30CA256FAB001F7FBD?OpenDocument
Posted by Banjo, Sunday, 11 January 2009 8:24:33 AM
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Of course, if there was any substance at all to Porkycrap's "rational" Islamophobia, he wouldn't still be with us, able to write:

<< I was a lone pro Israel voice with a sign saying "Hamas are genocidal terrorists" among many Palestinian supporters last sunday >>

If these Muslims are so inherently dangerous and violent towards unbelievers and political opponents, one would expect that at least some of them would have expressed that violent predisposition towards the silly old bugger.

On the other hand, if they're not the evil terrorists he wants us to think they are, they probably recognised him for the obvious frootloop that he is and left him alone out of human compassion and pity.
Posted by CJ Morgan, Sunday, 11 January 2009 8:44:26 AM
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Spikey, CJ
I see polycarp in a new light (perhaps).
If he actually did do as he says (ie how did he know that it was taking place? perhaps on "Todays_protest_marches for_the_pahelogically_minded.com.au\melbourne")
One must admire his dedication if not his reasoning skills or pragatism (what did he hope to achieve?).
Do you think he was hoping to get beat up so he could go on TV and claim proof that Muslims are violent? Nah that's too convoluted and contrived even for him.
Perhaps he was hoping to be a TV vox pop because he was the token religious bigot at the march.....sounds more plausible.
One can now wonder how many farmers wind mills are safe from him?
Sorry PC I just couldn't resist.
Posted by examinator, Sunday, 11 January 2009 9:38:37 AM
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Polycarp wrote:

1948 JEWS accept a partition plan. Arabs (stirred up by Grand Mufti Husseini, in the pay of Hitler(until Hitler died)) reacted with violence and war. Arabs were defeated. (stiff bickies..they picked the fight) Thus, the (Palestinian) Arabs showed early on that they were not interested in any kind of 2 state solution and wanted Israel not to exist. Hence...they forfeited their right by any measure of reason to territory in Palestine. What was given to them thereafter was pure 'grace'...(underserved)
Then...shock horror... after being defeated, they whined about "Israel not complying with the UN partition" (which they had rejected)

Dear Polycarp,

The above is incomplete. There were actually two wars in 1948. One was between Jews and Palestinian Arabs. That was not much of a contest. The other was between Jews and five Arab armies trying to wipe out the new state. The Egyptian armies were trained and officered by the English. The 50,000 strong Jordanian Arab Legion was commended by Glubb, an Englishman and supported by England.

Between 1948 and 1967 Jordan occupied the West Bank, and Egypt occupied Gaza. The Palestinians may have wanted a state, but the Arab occupiers did not allow the Palestinians any say.

One really should not lump all Palestinian Arabs together. Palestinian Arab Christians are discriminated against by Hamas which is an Islamic organization. The proportion of the Arab population that is Christian has been declining as they see no good future. Hamas is not interested in two states as they want to eliminate Israel. However, some Muslim Palestinians who are not Hamas might be quite interested in a Palestinian state.

Two conflicting parties are fighting over the same territory. The reasonable solution would be for all to share it in peace with one state neither Muslim nor Jewish and paying no attention to the ethnicity or religion of its citizens. That won’t happen. Another solution would be for all religions to vanish. Unfortunately there doesn’t seem to be a cure for those delusional systems.

We need nuclear-free, religion-free and ideology-free zones.
Posted by david f, Sunday, 11 January 2009 9:54:44 AM
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Polycarp,

You got it wrong by asserting that the crisis has a singular cause...the one that suits your monotonous and singular anti-Islam prejudice.

If it were that simple, the issue would have been sorted decades ago.

You might actually find it a wholesome and refreshing change to analyse the Middle East situation from multiple perspectives. It's about balance and assessing ALL the evidence.

I know that's beyond your capacities and predilections, but that's what a proper debate would entail.
Posted by Spikey, Sunday, 11 January 2009 12:35:12 PM
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'Islamism evokes the ghost of puritanical Christianity and its constant attacks on the permissive society; the Crusaders; European sectarian wars; the Inquisition; moral crusades. Thus the opposition to Islam and Muslim minorities in Europe and in other Western countries is in fact resistance to the return of puritanical Christianity and the Church - metaphorically the Grand Inquisitor- which the Europeans struggled against for a long time and made tremendous sacrifices to overthrow, in the form of political Islam.'

Well done Nursel Guzeldeniz for the above excellent paragraph. However, I do not see it as being irrational to equate Islam with the 'puritanical Christianity' of the Middle Ages. One only has to look at contempory Muslim societies to see that they suffer the same horrible problems that Europe used to when the Popes and Kings ruled the serfs.

Islam (and 'puritanical Christianity') in Europe and other Western societies only behaves itself because it has to. The commercial media and greater public opinion ensures that the totalitarian ideology of monotheism is kept on a leash. However, whenever Islam gains any significant political power then its 'sweet smiles' vanish. For both Islam and 'puritanical Christianity' are monoliths who exist for only one purpose. To oppose, depose, and then persecute, all other cultural diversities.
Posted by TR, Monday, 12 January 2009 12:17:04 PM
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david f's delusions re the holocaust being somehow Christian is more an indication of wishful thinking on his part. Better not let the truth get in the way of a bigoted theory.
Posted by Francis, Monday, 12 January 2009 12:46:30 PM
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The statement from Nursel that: "The use of essentialist statements about Islam and Muslims block dialogue and debate" is irrational.

Going to the essence of things is where you find a standard measure or objectivity by which to form a judgment.

Muslims who are serious about their religion will tell you that Islam has definite teachings. It is not 'up to the individual'. That is a post modernist statement of no relevance for most of the world's largest religions.

There are some good objective measures by which to definitely make a clear judgment about Islam:
http://www.catholicapologetics.info/apologetics/islam/index.htm
Posted by Uncle Pete, Monday, 12 January 2009 9:41:40 PM
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Refuting cautions about "essentialist statements" by making yet another essentialist statement ("that is a post-modernist statement")? As if making an "essentialist statement" necessarily means "going to the essence of things" - and with little or no analysis. No wonder the discussion ran aground.

One of the most dangerous aspects in the widespread promotion for more tunnel-visioned and less discussed or analyzed religion in this context is such ideologies' usefulness for inciting war for the benefit of decadent oligarchs. For this reason, the feudal banking networks in and around Saudi keep pushing salafi doctrine with big incentives, while their UK backers keep giving the thumbs up. That is why Pakistan is a main focus, while Iran continues to be demonized as a target of priority. It is also why so many leading terrorist financiers and organizers have been based for years in the UK.

Do not be at all surprised when salafis - like their born-again fundy christian mirrors - become a haven for the truly irrational and hypocritical evangelists for apocalyptic war. I believe that such danger prompts thoughtful writers like Nursel to caution against "essentialism" here; to claim some simplistically raw, basic, unambiguous and fundamental knowledge of Islam is precisely the trap that the salafists fall into themselves.

Islamophobes probably do more to sponsor salafist/Wahabbist dogma than they realize; they certainly help such causes more than they would admit. The rest of us remain to take responsibility for dealing with the mess caused by such simplistic thinking.
Posted by mil-observer, Wednesday, 14 January 2009 4:32:53 PM
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'Islamophobes probably do more to sponsor salafist/Wahabbist dogma than they realize; they certainly help such causes more than they would admit. The rest of us remain to take responsibility for dealing with the mess caused by such simplistic thinking.'

Actually no. The monolith of Islam itself is the prime foundation and sponsor of Salafist/Wahabbist dogma.

Moderates create Islam - Islamofascists thrive in it.

The only way to break the above cycle is to do what Dawkins and Dennett do. Point out the inherent delusions, fantasies, and impossibilities of monotheistic theology. Education is the key.
Posted by TR, Thursday, 15 January 2009 9:40:46 PM
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Confusion from TR.

Then why did salafist and Wahabbist dogma arise in the first place, but so long after the Koran?

"Islam" as "sponsor": how can I get "Islam" to sponsor me in my walkathon? Or maybe you mean "Yusuf Islam" f.k.a. "Cat Stevens"?

Then: "moderates create Islam"? So now you would seem to hold that the main founder of Islam is "moderate"? Unusual that an avowed liberalist (variously "sceptic", "anti-monotheistic", but consistently Islamophobic) would vilify such moderates as being criminals, insane, etc. (see: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=8326&page=0)
Posted by mil-observer, Friday, 16 January 2009 6:07:50 AM
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No milobserver. Wahhabi like extremism has been around since Islam's beginning - for extremism follows Islam like a mangy dog. Othman was murdered by gang of thugs, as was Ali. This is turn led to a Shia-Sunni civil war that still goes on today. Hussein was evetually killed by the Umayyad Caliphate. Then we had the persection of the Mutazilis who fought the Umayyad theologians, until the wheel turned full circle and the Mutazilis were able to wield their own brutal political power........till 2009.

And all the while, the general Muslim population - made up of Mr and Mrs Average - does not have the intelligence or the guts to walk away and say "Goodbye!". They just keep copping the obuse like a hopeless addict to their drug.
Posted by TR, Friday, 16 January 2009 9:08:01 PM
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OK, so "Wahabbism" is like "extremism", which is like "a mangy dog", all of which are like political violence among rival theocratic organizations. Then "the general Muslim population" are "like a hopeless addict to their drug".

You just don't like Islam or Muslims at all do you? That is like so Islamophobic.
Posted by mil-observer, Saturday, 17 January 2009 5:55:33 AM
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I don't like Islam in the same way I don't like all the other monolithic totalitarianisms.

However, it would be irrational to dislike Mr and Mrs Average Muslim (or Mr and Mrs Average North Korean, to use another example) purely because they are trapped in a certain ideology.

If a non-Muslim is to criticise Islam then it should be reserved for the ideology itself, or the clerics who perpetuate the whole sordid system.
Posted by TR, Saturday, 17 January 2009 6:41:43 AM
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Which "certain ideology" traps Muslims? Wahabbism? Salafism? Sufism, perhaps (most of which pre-dates those fundies)? If you just mean - essentially, lazily and indiscriminately - "Islam" as the trapping device, does that mean 85% of the largest Muslim-majority nation Indonesia is "totalitarian" by default, or are such people merely predisposed to being totalitarian by being Muslim, but somehow deficient or even transgressive by not realizing Islam's "totalitarian nature"?

Is Indonesia's mainly Muslim leadership just not really Muslim either because it either fails to enact, or even opposes, totalitarianism in practice? Are they not really Muslims because they initiate and sustain democratic processes at all levels (as sometimes done centuries earlier at local levels among many pre-colonial Muslim Indonesians)? And what of the role played by many Indonesian Islamic political parties? Does their generally corresponding complicity in non- or anti-totalitarianism actually disqualify them too from being considered properly "Islamic"?

Or, like the more ethno-/"race"-minded Islamophobes, do you believe that the largest Muslim-majority nation - Indonesia - cannot be really "Muslim" because it is not "Arab" (and despite widespread mastery of the relevant classical Arabic)? Such judgement would confuse many in Iran, Turkey, Nigeria and Bangladesh too, for example.

So which is it? Are most Muslims "like a hopeless addict to their drug" or just "trapped, innocent victims" to be pitied and "liberated" as in Iraq War propaganda? You've insisted repeatedly that any Muslim leaders - "the clerics" - must be power-hungry totalitarian fiends or demons, among other things. Would that judgement cover Muslim politicians in Indonesia too, for example (ex-president Gus Dur fits both labels "cleric" and "politician")?

The only thing that resembles a monolith here is "Islamophobia": a dark, ugly, awkward structure built on a foundation of various irrationalities, but all of them propping the same tower of hatred, ignorance, arrogance and alienation.

You were correct on your first point about the supposed "Islam trap": "it would be irrational to dislike Mr and Mrs Average Muslim". And that is exactly how your patronizing caricatures of Muslims and Islam read: irrational, hence Islamophobic vitriol.
Posted by mil-observer, Saturday, 17 January 2009 12:52:39 PM
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'Which "certain ideology" traps Muslims? Wahabbism? Salafism? Sufism, perhaps (most of which pre-dates those fundies)? If you just mean - essentially, lazily and indiscriminately - "Islam" as the trapping device, does that mean 85% of the largest Muslim-majority nation Indonesia is "totalitarian" by default, or are such people merely predisposed to being totalitarian by being Muslim, but somehow deficient or even transgressive by not realizing Islam's "totalitarian nature"?'

All forms of Islam are totalitarian to the individual in that Islam (if practised properly) effects every last facet of someones life. Any true Muslim hands over their minds and their bodies to the clerics who interpret the orthopraxis of the Koran + Hadith.

All forms of Islam are totalitarian in the political sense. Islam seeks to makes itself the prime ideology of the State such that all political and judicial systems are subserviant to the clerics who interpret the Koran + Hadith.

Anyone non-Muslim who has travelled to Indonesia or any other State dominated by Islam will feel suffocated because the religion has left the private sphere and dominates the public sphere. Public discourse inevitably revolves around whether the peoples behaviour corresponds to the dictates of the clercs who interpret the Koran + Hadith.

Yes, all States currently dominated by the Islamic religion are monolithic and totalitarian just like the various European fascist states of the 1930's - every public system is geared to serving the central ideological dogma.
Posted by TR, Friday, 23 January 2009 1:18:40 PM
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So now you claim omniscience, claiming to know how every non-Muslim visitor feels when in Indonesia. Indeed, you claim predictive certainty as if knowing not only how they DO feel, but how they WILL feel too. That's not just patronizing, but very silly.

And just who are these omnipotent clerics you keep going on about? Is that a contract they draft when Muslims hand over their "minds and bodies"? That smacks of some dark de Sade or S&M fantasy: you should get it checked out.

And if these "cleric"/bad guys are so absolutely powerful, how come so many of them get slammed into jail by secular authorities (as in Indonesia), especially when some of them may be accused of inciting inter-religious hatred? Now there's an idea: "jail for those who incite inter-religious hatred" (steer yourselves clear of Indonesia Islamophobes)...

It now seems yet clearer just who is totalitarian-minded, and weighed under some mental monolith of sorts; that's how irrational fears and hatreds work on people's minds. For this latest Islamophobic contribution we can redefine the phenomenon to: "hysterical Islamophobic hyperbole".
Posted by mil-observer, Friday, 23 January 2009 2:45:22 PM
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'And if these "cleric"/bad guys are so absolutely powerful, how come so many of them get slammed into jail by secular authorities (as in Indonesia), especially when some of them may be accused of inciting inter-religious hatred? Now there's an idea: "jail for those who incite inter-religious hatred" (steer yourselves clear of Indonesia Islamophobes)...'

The Muslim minority group Ahmadiyah would think you delusional mil-observer.

Last year the 'Indonesian Ulemas Council made up of the usual array of clerical nutters heaped so much pressure on Yudhoyono's government that they placed an official ban on the "deviant sect". Such a ban was bound to happen without too much fuss as only 6 mainstream religions are offically legal in Indonesia anyway. The Muslims of Indonesia aren't that tolerant.

But appeasing the IUC does not seem to be making life easier for non-Mulsims and "deviant" Muslims in Indonesia. The Jakata Post wrote this headline recently;

'Religious intolerance getting worse, says report'

...... “The increase is spurred by the rising persecution against the Jamaah Ahmadiyah by Islamic organizations to pressure the government to issue a presidential decree banning the minority sect,” the report said.

Last year, the government issued a joint ministerial decree forbidding Ahmadiyah from spreading its religious teachings, bowing to pressure from extremist groups that had attacked its followers, their mosques and houses across the country.

Out of the 265 incidents, the institute recorded 367 violations against freedom of religion and faith.

“Of the 367 violations, the state was involved in 188 cases of violence both by ‘commission and omission’,” Hendardi said.

The report said police were involved in 121 cases of religious intolerance, regents and mayors
in 28 cases while 52 others involved courts and regional legislative councils.

“What is worrying is that more individuals and unidentified groups launched sporadic religious attacks, which reached 91 cases last year,” Hendardi said.

The report blamed the radical Islamic Defender Front (FPI) and the Indonesian Ulama Council (MUI) as the main actors in the religious violence.....

http://www.thejakartapost.com/news/2009/01/14/religious-intolerance-getting-worse-says-report.html

As Hitchens rightly claims - 'religion poisons everthing.'
Posted by TR, Friday, 23 January 2009 7:50:04 PM
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Q: Why does the west still refuse asylum to oppressed Ahmadiyah followers who strangely incorporate a Greco-Roman “Jesus” prophet? ;-)
A: In the hope that they can still serve to either destabilize or, at least, act as proxy agents for their masters.

And more rubbish posing as insight into Indonesian politics. Clerics never pressured SBY et al into banning Ahmadiyah: submissions by such bodies as MUI simply follow the “usual channels” in those cases. SBY, his senior ministers and army colleagues know exactly what they're dealing with in Ahmadiyah. And if any clerics truly try to “pressure” those guys, such clerics will soon feel direct pressure from bayonets, or less direct pressure via street thugs' machetes.

The liberalist "tolerance" mantra just doesn't work: as I explained elsewhere on OLO, it's as mealy-mouthed as most middle-class euphemisms, but with the added stench of hypocrisy ("We 'tolerate'/put up with the catholic family renting in our street, but we stigmatize them and their church, deny them work, get the cops to harass them", etc. "Tolerance": another fake virtue for those who make their art from nastiness and bigotry, but without the guts to express it openly - a filter for all kinds of hatred, including Islamophobia.

“Tolerance” evokes the same mentality as that silly distinction “African-American”, held by pretentious snobs as a meaningfully important term, while “n|gg*r” or even “black American” are deemed racist! The essential meanings – and the intrinsic discriminatory concepts – are identical.

But on Ahmadiyah itself: Indonesia's conservative and protective approach to its own established religions is a healthy stance of self-defence and self-respect, like Chinese responses to the western-based, billionaire-sponsored Falun Gong cult. Ahmadiyah in Indonesia isn't some natural growth like bamboo: Indonesian nationalists know the threat it poses by potentially corroding a great portion of local identity and sowing division, distrust and inter-religious hatred.

So, I'm under no delusion or illusion about Ahmadiyah, Saudi-branded Wahabbist evangelism, Al Arqam, Falun Gong, the Dalai Lama, or any other religious infiltration sponsored deliberately to destabilize countries whose independent sovereignty still defies imperialist domination and world enslavement.
Posted by mil-observer, Saturday, 24 January 2009 9:28:24 AM
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'And more rubbish posing as insight into Indonesian politics. Clerics never pressured SBY et al into banning Ahmadiyah: submissions by such bodies as MUI simply follow the “usual channels” in those cases. SBY, his senior ministers and army colleagues know exactly what they're dealing with in Ahmadiyah. And if any clerics truly try to “pressure” those guys, such clerics will soon feel direct pressure from bayonets, or less direct pressure via street thugs' machetes.'

Wrong yet again mil-observer;

'Indonesians Want Ahmadiyyah Ban'

http://www.islamonline.net/servlet/Satellite?c=Article_C&cid=1203759199644&pagename=Zone-English-News/NWELayout

'But on Ahmadiyah itself: Indonesia's conservative and protective approach to its own established religions is a healthy stance of self-defence and self-respect, like Chinese responses to the western-based, billionaire-sponsored Falun Gong cult. Ahmadiyah in Indonesia isn't some natural growth like bamboo: Indonesian nationalists know the threat it poses by potentially corroding a great portion of local identity and sowing division, distrust and inter-religious hatred.'

Your gross hypocrisy in the above paragraph is mind-blowing. Somehow, it is OK for Muslims to use threat and intimidation to protect 'local identity' but then you complain and whinge when non-Muslims like myself use peaceful arguments to uphold their secular ideals and challenge the mania and delusion of monotheism.

It is Muslims like yourself that justify such criticism of Islam. Take a good look in the mirror.
Posted by TR, Sunday, 25 January 2009 7:58:14 AM
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This subject's already a few light years beyond your tabloid, Islamophobic "research". You use the link in unanalyzed riposte, but it's nothing more substantial than your previous superficial Jakarta Post reference.

Indonesia's state functions here like it did when seeing off the threat of secessionist "christian" rebels in some eastern provinces: the civil war sparked off in late 1998 by rival gangsters, but soon became a full-blown tit-for-tat of violent social and demographic engineering a.k.a. "ethnic cleansing". In that case (often known as the Maluku War), warring parties' home bases and funding sources were mainly in Jakarta on the one side, and the Netherlands on the other. Indonesia's government apparatus gave tacit and logistical support to jihadi volunteers, while military and police authorities tied themselves into both sides' battle lines to keep a really tight lid on the situation. That scenario is bizarre to many outsiders, but it describes the overlapping intensity and demographic closeness in Indonesian security operations. The volunteer "grass roots" nature of that war echoed many other recent cases, but also the much earlier incursions against Malaysia under Soekarno, when leftists volunteered as proxies with military backing. The Ahmadiyah case is not an actual shooting war, but the processes are much the same, as activists demonstrate to pretend some determining influence over the ruling government.

In fact, the processes are the other way around. But you would miss that with your cherry-picking distractions. You may as well supply a transcript of yourself with idol Hitchens in a gin/viagra-fuelled seminar about how the Iraq War is a just cause (or was that "enduring freedom"), with its bodycount of 1.2 million+, nearly all civilians.

Your sloppy double standards and genocidal self-righteousness show clearly that your mind is well and truly blown. Get out and stop trying to poison people with your mischievous spread of hatred and pomposity.

And while you try to marginalize with your narrow, primitive politics of imperialist domination, you may as well apply any of the tags "Chinese nationalist", "Iraqi nationalist", "Russian nationalist", "Australian nationalist" as well as "Catholic", "Jew" or "Hindu" as much as "Muslim".
Posted by mil-observer, Sunday, 25 January 2009 4:29:05 PM
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'And while you try to marginalize with your narrow, primitive politics of imperialist domination, you may as well apply any of the tags "Chinese nationalist", "Iraqi nationalist", "Russian nationalist", "Australian nationalist" as well as "Catholic", "Jew" or "Hindu" as much as "Muslim".'

I'm glad that you mentioned 'tags' because Muslims use them ad nauseum. So we have, Muslim/Kafir, Muslim/Polytheist, Muslim/People of the Book, Dar al Islam/Dar al Harb, and so on and on....

No other religious ideology creates such a woeful "US" and "THEM" dichotomy. Indeed, Islam is probably the most devisive ideology ever devised by the human-mind with the possible exception of Nazism.

Such devisiveness might be acceptable if Mohammed really conversed with a talking angel (Gabriel) because some credibility could be given to the existence and xenophobia of a jealous deity.

However, the general supernatural beliefs of Islam (like its counterparts, Judaism and Christianity) are so daft as to be a total waste of time.
Posted by TR, Monday, 26 January 2009 7:28:17 AM
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Yep, more vilification and provocation as a way of feeling superior. You're simply immature, which was also apparent from the fact that you repeatedly fail to engage with the specific subject matter that you yourself introduced - in this case Ahmadiyah in Indonesia.

When I say "get out" I actually mean "get out of my country". Try out your bravado openly and have a crack at spreading your hatred somewhere else, like in Indonesia, where you'll face either deportation, jail, or both.

When Australia faces more serious risk of unrest during this financial systemic disintegration, enforcement of existing law should apply similar penalties for such anti-social incitement here too.
Posted by mil-observer, Monday, 26 January 2009 10:39:31 AM
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Well, at this point I think we safely declare Nursel Guzeldenis thesis busted.

Yet again, we have a self declared Islamic 'moderate' resorting to 'bully pulpit' tactics when faced with criticism. Hence, the only thing blocking dialogue and debate is the hyper-inflated ego-mania of Islam itself.

'Try out your bravado openly and have a crack at spreading your hatred somewhere else, like in Indonesia, where you'll face either deportation, jail, or both.'

With the above statement mil-observer we conclude that you must have an extremely sore foot - because you've just shot it clean off.

Yet again a Muslim has demonstrated why Islamo-sceptics must keep challenging such a barbaric ideology. An ideology that resorts time and time again to threat and violence in order to protect its own selfish interests.
Posted by TR, Monday, 26 January 2009 8:03:54 PM
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To be "outed" as a "Muslim" by an Islamophobe is indeed a great honor. I'll aim to be labelled "Sikh" too the next time that community gets caught up in this widespread collateral damage of racism, Islamophobia and imperialistic warmongering. From my own witnessing, and what I hear via my Indian friends here, I probably won't have to wait too long either. Right now in my city many innocent people - Muslims, Sikhs, and superficially similar non-whites - are being harassed, vilified, humiliated and savagely assaulted largely because of the spurious racism and imperialist filth promoted by Islamophobes like TR's own vile, anti-social persona.

To now claim smugly to have nailed a "Muslim" while boasting of victimhood betrays that persona's hateful, wish-fulfilling agenda. The "Muslim" tag's meant to marginalize and stigmatize, tabloid-style, but the only tag actually confirmed from this exchange is that of "pompous and effete Islamophobic bigot and provocateur".

I make no threat at all but TR, consistent with the primitive tactics of other psychopathic, imperialist warmongers, keeps provoking enmity to try "proving" both passive innocence and vulnerability as validation for Islamophobic aggression. I merely highlighted an overseas case of wise judicial response to such incitement, in order that TR could perhaps indicate any courage or other moral principle to match purported "convictions" of belief. Of course, my suggestion was wasted because TR's character is nowhere near the task, instead seeming to prefer inciting from afar in relative safety, but with an ego rush typical for those alienated, divisive and ambitious manipulators given their green light from cynical political bosses.

My understanding about Islamic scripture, its historical contexts and spirituality is possibly as limited as that about Christian, Jewish, Hindu and Buddhist counterparts. I claim no special expertise there, but I do understand with firm confidence the clearly necessary moral foundations and historically valid precedence justifying - and properly uniting - all such religious traditions as an overwhelmingly positive common cause supporting, protecting and advancing all civilized humanity. To so flagrantly and gratuitously vilify such life-affirming traditions is to promote instead an alienated, individualistic and liberalist barbarism.

[cont.]
Posted by mil-observer, Wednesday, 28 January 2009 12:16:32 PM
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Indonesian cleric-politician Gus Dur knows these life-affirming religious truths too, better than I do, and with more eloquence. But such ecumenical Muslim peacemakers as Gus Dur (a "Muslim cleric") are instead repeatedly and gratuitously vilified by vicious Islamophobes like TR.

For the record, my relativist perspective probably earns me at best the tag "comparative religionist" more than that of any single religious faith. But for Islamophobes like TR, I very proudly wear their label "Muslim". The last time I was near a public attack on innocent, gentle Muslims was when I happened late on a scene of a vicious stabbing of young African students. I'd actually feel deeply honored if my sympathy, humane solidarity and zeal for justice then qualified inadvertent rights to "Islamic" identity. I look forward to better opportunities to earn such rights to that and other labels, but Islamophobes like TR will obviously be far away, free from any responsibility for the violence and offence they delight in provoking and watching for their perverse entertainment [for explicit psychopathological evidence, see: http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=8326&page=0#132207]

TR's own incitements consistently disprove Islamophobes' claims to "criticism" and "Islamo-scepticism" as false, empty advertisements of "freethinking" and "intellectual credibility".

Thus does TR's fake virtue "tolerance" too undergo thorough tests here to be exposed for its hypocrisies, fundamentalist inflexibility, and mischievous dishonesty. As with such provocateurs' narcissism and exhibitionism in Holland and Denmark (and more revealingly in UK figure-cum-TR idol Hitchens), Islamophobes' caricatures and superficiality around Islam feed from and into that same cycle of fanaticism nourishing such aberrations as: aggressive conversions by missionary Christianity; lavishly funded Saudi Wahabbist and related Muslim counterparts, and; diverse arrays of Ponzi-style "false prophets" among charismatic and New-Age-style hocus-pocus cults.

Perhaps Nursel Guzeldeniz agrees: people like TR can see only an Islam of simpletons, reductionists and sensationalists because people like TR are themselves simpletons, reductionists and/or sensationalists. That's no mysterious profundity or revelation of psychological insight. By any further exploration into definitions of "Islamophobia", the kernel of Islamophobes' affliction is obviously their fear of some dark, unconscious monolith within their own monstrous psyches.
Posted by mil-observer, Wednesday, 28 January 2009 12:17:11 PM
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