Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 02:35 pm:
This really got some legs.
The 'mosque' isn't even a mosque. A mosque can ONLY be used for prayer, and while this complex will have a prayer center, it won't be it's sole purpose. The mosque is 2 blocks away from the trade center location. There are already other mosques that exist in the same vicinity.
I know some Muslims. They haven't tried to kill me, yet.
I'll be honest, I do have some reservation on a few of the fundamental building blocks of the Islamic faith and the actions of many of its followers, but this is f***ing America, for God's sake. Live and let live.
I used to take issue with this building, but now I just don't care. Who does it affect on this board directly? Would it alarm you to know that those living in Manhattan take least issue with this than anywhere else in the country?
Let them build it, it's their right so long as things are done legally. And for those worried that it will be a hotbed for terrorist activity, you can bet your arse that the CIA will be all over that joint, 25/7.
It's no secret to anywhere here that I'm no fan of Obama, but giving (limited) support to a mosque while encouraging someone to not burn holy books seems extremely logical in my book.
There are too many issues to bother to keep writing about, but keep in mind that nearly all religions, including the big three, preach peace, love and tolerance. All of them had acted in the complete opposite manner at one time or another.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 03:37 pm:
If burning qu'rans in Gainesville is the answer, what is the question?
If building an islamic center near Ground Zero is the answer, what is the question?
6 X 7 !!! Oh crap...sorry I was still trying to figure out the question for the life, universe and everything...that Damn 42 keeps coming back up again....
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 03:59 pm:
And, what 'blood' pray-tell, exactly is Christianity, in its purest form, teaching, and not the BS 'parrot preaching' from the past?
What is so wrong with Christianity, that makes Muslim Extremism so excusable?
Just because it happened in the past doesn't mean it never happened.
And the point was that Islamic Extremism is no better or worse than Christian Extremism - the same folks who beat up gays, lynch blacks and blow up planned parenthoods.
Neither is excusable.
I'm not defending either - in fact, criticizing both.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 04:00 pm:
I hear the White House may try to contact the Gainesville pastor and stop this offensive burning. Were I Jones, and the POTUS his very self gets on the line, I'd offer to ratchet things back if BO would pray with me for all those in the muslim world who have been hurt by Islamic terrorists, the Taliban, etc., as well as the Christian victims worldwide who have suffered for their faith.
I 'spect Barry would tinkle backwards before joining in.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 04:28 pm:
And the point was that Islamic Extremism is no better or worse than Christian Extremism - the same folks who beat up gays, lynch blacks and blow up planned parenthoods.
Really, THESE are the examples?
Talk about blood:
For the first time I have seen the estimate of Islamic death toll in an interview with Bill Warner, the director of the Center for the Study of Political Islam. I have put the numbers into the context of other well know brutal world atrocities.
Sources:
Africans Thomas Sowell estimates that eleven million slaves were shipped across the Atlantic and fourteen million were sent to the Islamic nations of North Africa and the Middle East. [1] David Livingstone estimated that for every slave who reached the plantation, five others died by being killed in the raid or died on the forced march from illness and privation. [2] So, for 25 million slaves delivered to the market, we have the collateral death of about 120 million people. Muslims ran all the wholesale slave trade in Africa. Death toll: 120 million Africans
Christians The number of Christians martyred by Islam is nine million.[3] A rough estimate by Raphael Moore in History of Asia Minor is that another fifty million died in wars by jihad. So to account for the one million African Christians killed in the 20th century we have: 60 million Christians
Hindus Koenard Elst in Negationism in India [4] gives an estimate of eighty million Hindus killed in the total jihad against India. The country of India today is only half the size of ancient India, due to jihad. Death toll: 80 million Hindus
Buddhists Jihad killed the Buddhists in Turkey, Afghanistan, along the Silk Route, and in India. The total is roughly ten million. [5] Death toll: 10 million Buddhists
Jews The jihad in Arabia was 100 percent effective but the numbers were in the thousands, not millions. After that the Jews submitted and became the dhimmis (servants and second class citizens) of Islam and did not have geographic political power.
This gives a rough estimate of 270 million killed by jihad.
1) Thomas Sowell, Race and Culture, BasicBooks, 1994, p. 188. 2) Woman’s Presbyterian Board of Missions, David Livingstone, p. 62, 1888. 3) David B. Barrett, Todd M. Johnson, World Christian Trends AD 30-AD 2200, William Carey Library, 2001, p. 230, table 4-10. 4) Koenard Elst, Negationism in India, Voice of India, New Delhi, 2002, pg. 34. 5) Barrett and Johnson, table 4 World War 2 - List and Detailed Death Tolls for the Twentieth Century Hemoclysm World War 1 -Twentieth Century Atlas. Retrieved 2008-12-21. Communism - Foundation for the investigation of communist crimes Crusades – Charles Mackay, Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and Madness of Crowds
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 05:06 pm:
Well, I jumped into the Quick Board to check the latest 1190RS thread and came across this. I must have gone wide out of the turn.
These are all interesting points, but I think most of them miss the bigger point, except for the comment about who has the bigger God, that was amusing...
Ok, now I just backspaced through 4 paragraphs because I do have some very strong OPINIONS about all of this. They're just that, MY opinions. They're not worth much. So I'll just pose a question instead...
What will you do when the enemy is at the gates?
Yes, that's rhetorical. I don't want an answer, just something to think about. I've spent too much of my life in combat zones to think this isn't going to get worse. I have no doubt that stupid people are going to keep doing stupid things to antagonize "the other side" until all hell breaks loose. Just sayin'.
Two things killing our country from the inside: 1. Political Correctness is out of control. 2. Our education system is teaching kids how to pass a standardized test, not how to think.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 05:19 pm:
Schools don't teach kids how to think, they teach them what to think.
I don't know, it seems to me that if you pass the standardized math test, you must be able to do math. Same with reading comprehension. Before standardized testing a significant percentage of graduating seniors were functionally illiterate, depending on what school you graduated from. Not sure what the rate is now, but if you can't read, you won't pass the test. Theoretically that means there are zero illiterate graduates.
The appalling illiteracy rates were the impetus for standardized testing.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 06:08 pm:
Mark (xl1200r),
Are you really trying to draw a moral equivalence between islamism and Christianity today? Really?
Wake up.
>>> And the point was that Islamic Extremism is no better or worse than Christian Extremism - the same folks who beat up gays, lynch blacks and blow up planned parenthoods.
How many gays have been beat up and how many blacks have been lynched in the name of furthering Christianity? Where in the Bible does it command such actions, and for Christians, where in the New Testament teachings of Jesus does it mandate any such behavior? You don't appear to be educated in recent history or the teachings of Jesus Christ.
How many millions have been slaughtered in the name of islamism in the past thirty years?
You are equating the two?
>>> You can't control the messenger.
Muhammed apparently can. The messengers are simply conveying the words straight out of the koran and the hadith, the statements of their "beloved prophet", muhammed.
Qur'an (9:29) - "Fight those who believe not in Allah nor the Last Day, nor hold that forbidden which hath been forbidden by Allah and His Messenger, nor acknowledge the religion of Truth, (even if they are) of the People of the Book (Jews & Christians), until they pay the Jizya (extra tax) with willing submission, and feel themselves subdued."
"People of the Book" refers to Christians and Jews. This was one of the final "revelations" from Allah and it set in motion the tenacious military expansion, in which Muhammad's companions managed to conquer two-thirds of the Christian world in just the next 100 years. Islam is intended to dominate all other people and faiths.
Interesting interview on the religion of peace with an expert on the issue...
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 06:19 pm:
Hootowl, I could go on at length about this subject, but I won't here. Let's just say standardized testing is like anything else in the government these days. It can't be taken at face value. Want proof, Google "Augusta AYP Cheat". But I will say, I got a much better education than what kids are getting today.
Tina (her full name was Palestina) was the last daughter at home and the most American of the family. She had lived in Brazil, Puerto Rico and on the West Bank, but she was happiest in St. Louis. An honor student, she played high school soccer over her father's objections. Again over his objections, she went to the junior prom, only to be taken away by family members.
On the night of her death, Tina's parents express anger on the tape that she was at work, then seem not to believe that she was at work at all. Then Tina's father says: "Here, listen, my dear daughter, do you know that this is the last day. Tonight, you're going to die?"
Tina responds: "Huh?"
Zein Isa replies: "Do you know that you are going to die tonight?"
The girl's mother asks her questions about items in her schoolbag. In the midst of her conversation with her mother, Tina begins to shriek in fear.
"Keep still, Tina!" says her father.
"Mother, please help me!"
"Huh? What do you mean?" the mother says.
"Help! Help!"
"What help?" the mother responds.
Tina screams, and Maria says: "Are you going to listen? Are you going to listen?"
Screaming louder, Tina gasps: "Yes! Yes! Yes, I am!" then coughs and adds, "No. Please!"
Six Wounds in Chest
The mother says, "Shut up!"
Tina continues to cry, but her voice is unintelligible.
"Die! Die quickly! Die quickly!" the father says.
The girl moans, seems to quiet, then screams one last time.
"Quiet, little one! Die my daughter, die!" the father says.
Tina was stabbed six times in the chest with a boning knife, which pierced her heart, one lung, and liver, investigators said.
Mr. Zein admitted on the witness stand that he put his foot on his daughter's mouth to quiet her. His wife did not testify.
. . .
After the verdicts were read, an agitated family friend who would give her name only as Mrs. Abraham expressed her dismay at what she saw as the jury's failure to acknowledge the Palestinian culture. "I feel it's not right. We follow our religion," said Mrs. Abraham. She said the Isas had to discipline their daughter or lose respect. "They'd be embarrassed in front of everybody in the country like somebody when they go without their clothes outside."
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 06:29 pm:
I'm not equaling the two, merely pointing out that there are whackos on all sides.
I know the teachings of Christ, I know that at it's root, CHristianity is a peaceful religion. I also know that the "messenger" has twisted the word and resulted in any number of un-Christian acts on a variety of scales.
I freely admit that I'm not an expert on Islam, but the facts I gather I do try to take with a grain of salt due to the current social climate. I do know that there are flaws with Islam when aligned with 'peace' (as I pointed out above). I know that Islam has been a militaristic religion from the start, however I did not know the extent until reading what Ft_ had posted. I know how the treatment of women is in some sects. I believe it to be a crude and ill-concieved religion that was completely self-serving for those who created it. I also believe that not every single Muslim in the world is capable of front-page-worthy murdering sprees. That is where the complication lies.
I also know that the teachings of the Church are entirely self-serving to the Church, despite the teachings of Christ being pure. (and by "Church", I generally point to the Catholic church and those "as seen on TV" miracle healers).
If you can't tell, I have a distaste for religion as a whole.
The graph above is surely eye-opening, but playing devil's advocate, I have to ask how many death have been attributed not only to Christianity, but to Western culture as a whole? Islam is as much a cultural thing as it is religious.
Not saying one is better than the other, just trying to get some facts.
And believe me, all this said and not wanting to wish death on any innocent person, if there were no more Muslims in the world a lot of problems would be solved, and many others avoided.
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 06:30 pm:
When is the last time a mother and father held down and stabbed to death their little girl and friends excused the act by admonishing "we follow our religion" or that it was excusable because they had to discipline their daughter or lose respect, that "they'd be embarrassed in front of everybody in the country like somebody when they go without their clothes outside"?
The littany of such "honor" killings is horrific anywhere islam takes root. It happened in Dallas recently to two young girls, murdered by their father. It happens every day in the islamist world. It's part of their culture? Be tolerant? It's no different from Christianity?
Posted on Thursday, September 09, 2010 - 06:32 pm:
Madduck, yeah, it's the old one I read and am looking for. His Kama Sutra is good too, once you get past the old dialect.
The Richard Burton version has 1 verse per page, 1st in arabic, then english. Then there is a gloss actually circling the verse, explaining the context, then a second gloss circling the first with the historical context for the context. ( where the battles were, who won, etc. )
With many history books, the old versions have far more actual facts than current ones. True, there is bias, I wouldn't expect a 1922 history text to be kind to the Kaiser, for example. You also have to notice where years later, new facts come out with the death of famous guy's protected legacies. ( best recent example, Deep Throat... still more to learn about that as time passes....and people's dying wishes are ignored or followed )
And I have the maturity of a 14 year old, thank you very much.
I beg your pardon. ( don't tell him 14yr olds actually lose maturity points until puberty finally ends. Usually about 45 )
People simply aren't interested in where the trains headed East are going.
So true. So damnably true.
I think I better start building my legions of naked dancing around the tree people..
I think you'll find the fun loving pagans don't organize well. I know, I'm one of them. ( have no fear...I don't dance naked. 1. knees are shot, 2. no one wants to see me naked including the gods. Angelina Jolie, now, !! )
So, just to clarify. 1. The imam & the pastor jerks both have a right under U.S. law to build their screw you mosque, & burn a pile of books. ( though the book burning is an abomination in the eyes of the greenies who follow the Prophet Gore )
2. everyone more mature than 14 yrs old agrees both jerks are rude to do so.
So far so good, right? Everyone agrees on 1 & 2????
Why is the "media" so fascinated with the jerk in Florida?
Ft-Bastard, I dispute the numbers for Communism. Much, much higher. Recently Mao alone has been credited with 80 million+ who were deliberately starved to death when Mao send grain to the Soviet Union in return for arms, to prove the superiority of his rule. Remember, unlike the Nazi's who kept careful records of each murder, the Soviets and Maoists routinely lie about ever killing anyone at all, ever. My guess is closer to 1 billion total, but that includes the spinoff cults like N. Korea, which arguably are communist in name only.
Ah, for the good old days of the Mongols. "to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women"
sure it has little to do with the discussion at hand.....but Conan certainly wouldn't defend Christians now, would he?