Pericles,

If you could please show me where in my post I attacked Muslims or Islam as a whole to back up your “whack a mozzie” claim. If you could also show me where I suggested that attacking Islam was different to attacking Muslims. You do seem to have an awful habit of making things up.

You say >> “If you believe that i) that list is exhaustive and ii) that the results have not been skewed”

I beg your pardon? If you are attempting to suggest that there has not been an upsurge in terrorist action by Islamist groups then you are off your rocker. I would like to see your evidence for that conclusion. I provided you with some basic statistics. If you have an issue with their veracity, provide your own.

You say >> “You have problems categorizing the Afghan hostilities as guerrilla warfare. Have quick look at this http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/28/afghanistan.defence”

I’m not sure what you think this proves? Just because the Guardian (a left wing rag if ever there was one) doesn’t mention terrorism in regards to the Taliban in one article, means NOTHING. How this one article proves your point that the Taliban do not commit acts of terrorism is beyond me.

The idea that the Taliban’s operations are singular in their methods is simplistic and naïve. Some of what they do could be considered guerilla warfare. But plenty of their operations are pure terrorism.

You say >> “And please, if you have any Spanish friends, don't repeat this to them. They will not be at all impressed:”

SO WHAT?? ??. The truth hurts and most people don’t like hearing it, big deal?

You say>> “Control over government policy? That is an utter nonsense. They achieved a knee-jerk reaction, that's all.”

The terrorists had a goal they were attempting to achieve. Their methods achieved that goal. Simple.

TBC

Cont,

You say >> “The question, … was "where do Islamo-Fascists have the experience of the Middle East to show them that majority rules democracy is not necessary to rule a country?"

It seems you have trouble with comprehension. The “experience” in the above sentence belongs to the Middle East, not to the Islamo-Facists. If I had said that the Islamo-Facists had experience IN the middle east to show them … then you would be justified in your reading.

However, I did NOT say the Islamo-Facists have the experience of other Islamo-Facist organizations in the Middle East, because that is NOT what I meant.

What I meant, and what can be gleaned from a literal reading of my statement is that the Islamo-Facists can draw from the experience of many regimes in the middle east of differing persuasions who have operated successfully without the majority support of the people. The experience of the Middle East has been overwhelmingly of dictatorships, monarchies and theocracy’s. The political outlook is irrelevant in a dictatorship run by fear and oppression.

You can see now why your confusion over my position on Saddam Hussein, the Baathist regime and their secular outlook, was inappropriate. I was never suggesting that Saddam was an Islamo-Facist. That is simply a logical consequence of your misreading of what I wrote.

you say >> "Tell me, do you personally today feel under threat from terrorists more, or less, than in any of the previous seven years?

I'm not sure how that is relevant to this discussion. But it seems to me that we are safer today, in part because we are more aware of the danger and our security apparatus are more sharply focussed, but more importantly, because we are fighting (in conjunction with most of the rest of the world) the Islamo-Facists wherever we find them, preferably on their own turf. This has been the real key to reducing their threat to us in the West.

A distasteful task, in anyone's language, Paul.L

>>Pericles, If you could please show me where in my post I attacked Muslims or Islam as a whole to back up your “whack a mozzie” claim.<<

Here's a quick sample from the last few months:

"Islam can and is seen as a way of life in which politics is indivisible. Those supporting Sharia for example see Islam in this way. Islamic head hackers are hard at work on just about every continent. From Sudan and Nigeria, Kenya and Tanzania, across the whole of the middle east, Britain, France, Spain, Netherlands, Denmark, Germany, through Former soviet republics like Chechnya, South Ossetia, Georgia and Azerbaijan, Afghanistan, In Asia, India, Pakistan, the Phillipines, Indonesia, Malaysia and more recently in Canada, the US and Australia. The death lovers are everywhere and there not going to wait quietly for the demographic changes that will inevitably deliver them more political power. The insurgencies across the globe are, so they say, acting in the name of Islam. Nearly 40% of Muslims aged between 16 and 24 would rather live under sharia law. And nearly a third believed in decapitation for apostasy. Indeed the prevalence of fundamentalism among the west’s young Muslims clearly illustrates that poverty and oppression has an almost negligible role in radicalizing young people. The problem as many of us see it, is that our western way of life is under the concerted assault of islamification by stealth. There have also been calls for an introduction of sharia law and for Muslim holidays to become British national holidays. British flags are no longer flown in many places as muslims are offended by St Georges cross and its links to the crusaders . The larger the muslim population gets the more it wants to shape society in a manner acceptable to muslims. How can we in the west accept the danger that this poses to our way of life? What can we do? We have no influence on this situation beyond limiting muslim immigration”

Every word is your own.

All I did was to put some sentences together.

Dear Paul L (puts arm around Pauls shoulder in sympathy) .. you are beginning to see what I've been dealing with for a few years now from Pericles.

<Sorry what? Whack a mozzie. Where exactly did I attack Muslims as a whole?>

He answers later in his post thus:

<You are reduced to channelling Boaz, if you believe that attacking Islam is somehow different from attacking Muslims.>

And there you have it.. unfolded, laid out.. spread in complete nakedness before us all... Pericles inability to criticize ideas (except those he personally finds distasteful..such as 'does God exist' or.. "Are the bible documents reliable" oh.. then he is in rip roaring/getupandgo/take no prisoners/drag em down.. fix bayonets... attack.

So.. when someone legitimately points out that the Quran contains some detestable ideas such as fighting against non Muslims until they are subjected (9:29) and the outright cursing of Christians and Jews by name (9:30) then.... if we criticize these ideas, we are guilty of whack-a-mozzie rather than whack bad/evil ideas.

This is my cross and your load (choose your shape) that we are to be faced with. This irrationality of brother Pericles which defies reason.

You see.. I could accept it if it was just me The Christian in his sights but now you see it is also you the atheist (if I read your other position statements correctly)....

It worries Pericles terribly (it would seem) that both atheists and religionists see the same things. This upsets his mental orthodoxy that Islam is only bashed by Christians because it is a competing religion rather than by rational people because it contains evil ideas.

If we followed Pericles dictum about bashing Islam=bashing all Muslims, then we better forget any political comment or he will sik the hounds on us for Labor/Liberal/Green/FF/ bashing.

Pericles,

I see you couldn't do it. You couldn't show me where on this thread I whacked Islam or Mozzies. There's a reason for that. It's because I didn't. However, I won't be holding my breath for a retraction.

It seems you are unable to adress an argument at face value, and need to resort to ad hominem attacks to prop up your case.

Is that really the best you can do?

Boaz, you insist upon connecting unrelated concepts, and then saying "aha, gotcha", as if the connection were meaningful.

>>So.. when someone legitimately points out that the Quran contains some detestable ideas such as fighting against non Muslims until they are subjected (9:29) and the outright cursing of Christians and Jews by name (9:30) then.... if we criticize these ideas, we are guilty of whack-a-mozzie rather than whack bad/evil ideas.<<

The problem, Boaz, is not that you criticize the ideas.

It is quite clearly a necessary part of your personal approach to religion. To find as much fault as you can with other faiths, so that you can boast about your own.

This much is clear.

If you confined yourself to this level of criticism and self-congratulation, no-one - not even I - would have a problem with it. Instead, you insist that these verses guide the actions and intentions of every Muslim, and by extension, you regard them as objects of hatred and fear. Not satisfied with that, you trumpet your fear and loathing to the world, inciting others to share your views, and to act upon them.

That's the whack-a-mozzie bit, in case you are still in doubt.

I have mentioned this before, but it might bear repeating here so that I can copy-and-paste as required in future.

I am not anti-Christian, nor am I anti-religion. I am not pro-Muslim either, since I hold no religious beliefs at all. I understand that religion is important to some people, and I respect that - whatever their leanings may be.

What I object to, and will continue to object to, is the use of religion as a weapon.

To me, it is the flimsiest, and most reprehensible of excuses to fight. This objection is not limited to you, Boaz, but to anyone who decides that another's religious views are abhorrent, and makes it their business to incite others to share this abhorrence.

Standing on a soap-box, and telling the world that they should all share the fear, ensures that the process of religious confrontation never ends.

Is that your objective?