Aswad
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quote:
ORIGINAL: StrangerThan
Having traveled in Saudi Arabia, South Yemen, a good part of North Africa, Bahrain, UAE, and a handful of other arab states, not to mention being invited to Beirut yesterday to teach, personal experience indicates your synopsis is piss-poor.
My synopsis was a brief attempt at outlining some differences between a straight forward interpretation of the source text of the Qu'ran vs the perceptions of the poster to which I replied, not an attempt at a detailed, exhaustive or even vaguely rigorous treatment of the matter. If you would care to apply more effort in addressing her views, I will rejoice, but I did not find much in her post to suggest that she would benefit from a thorough treatment of Islam as a religion, or of the cultures where it is prevalent.
Incidentally, Arab states are not the only places where Islam figures prominently, nor have you included Jordan, which is a decent example of a region which is rapidly undergoing a transition that parallells what has already transpired in the West with our own religious history. As a side note, my personal experience with adherents of Islam is principally with those that originate in Eastern Europe, Turkey and Somalia. That does cover a fairly wide gamut, to which we may add various converts that obviously tend to cluster around more 'modern' interpretations.
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It generalizes as much as what you are attempting to rebut.
Comparing the generalizations I have made (e.g. a brief synopsis of some of the scriptural treatment of the relations that men and women should have) to her statements to the effect that all muslims have an apalling view of women, or a long series of common prejudices qualified by "I have heard", does not exactly raise the standard. At the very least, be more specific about your criticism. I addressed the points she raised. You can no doubt afford me the same courtesy.
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You chastise for lumping muslims together on the bad side, then do exactly that on the flip.
Hell, no. I have plenty of criticism to offer, foremost that it's a sodding poor choice of location on account of precisely the current emotional responses of the local population. It just happens to be the case that this thread was pretty well covered as far as the stereotypical 'us-them' thing goes. These are Americans, wanting to build on American soil, and other Americans are responding as if these have all got bombs sewn into their underwear, which just reinforces (some might go so far ast to say 'justifies', but I would not) the conflict which caused this attitude.
You're isolating a part of your population and all but labelling them the enemy.
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It is no different than equating all Christians as good or all as bad, when in reality, what is practiced often depends on the person, how they were raised, what they were and are being taught.
Which is what I have emphasized, first and foremost: the importance of culture in the equation.
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I have no idea where you live, where you were born nor how you were raised.
1 · Norway, West Coast.
2 · Norway, Bergen, HUS.
3 · Well, by most accounts.
Any other questions?
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But I have seen behavior you attribute to Somalia and Afghanistan in other countries.
I have not attributed behavior to them.
On the contrary, I have attributed popular perceptions of these behaviors to the media coverage their cultural practices have gathered, with the media failing to portray a more nuanced picture of what Islam looks like around the world. Those two are by no means the only countries where objectionable practices (by a mainstream western worldview, anyhow) exist, nor the only ones where those practices are claimed to have a religious basis.
Then again, neither are the British Isles the only place where Catholics and Protestants claim religion as a factor in a civil war. Nor is South America the only place where Baptists claim religion as a factor in violent prejudice against gays¹, or blacks, or women, or whatever. People will look for a justification for, or way to rationalize, whatever their feelings are compelling them to do, and religion offers a very traditional scapegoat (pardon the pun).
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I've also seen women in mini-skirts sitting next to those garbed head to toe in black.
Quite familiar sight around these parts. And, as we have both said, neither is motivated by religion.
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The truth of the matter however, is that if you can't understand the emotional attachment to place where thousands lost loved ones and friends, where sons, mothers, daughters, fathers and children died, where a nation was attacked and offended, and how the building of a mosque near the site offends some, then the stripes of your diversity are showing the same slant they so often show among those who exhort those particular tenets, but discriminate in how they live them.
I can understand that attachment quite well. Which is why I note that it's not a good choice of location, as it will simply cause an irrational response that damages relations between a minority group and the majority without gaining anything significant in the long term. And, conversely, I hope you can understand the attachment others feel to the sites where the US has attacked and offended, or supported, harbored or protected those who have attacked and offended.
And, of course I understand how a mosque can offend.
It offends the same way black skin does...
... by triggering prejudice.
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Being religious does not inherently make anyone bad.
I know. Religion didn't make me bad. I was born bad. Religion came later. 
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Nor is the Christianity of today so ardently attacked for its violent past the same Christianity that existed then. For every bloodletting you can conjure, I reckon I can conjure something as heinous and injurious on the other side.
Which is pretty much what I've consistently said on just about every thread I've seen dealing with religion, atheism, etc., on this board. You may want to check your assumptions regarding my views.
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Besides, weren't New Yorkers subjected to a muslim TV guy seeking to counter stereotypes not long ago who then whacked off his wife's head?
You'd have to ask a New Yorker about that.
TV coverage is hardly a metric for anything. The secessionist retardess who was up for the vice presidency still gets screen time, despite the decent probability that she would have done more damage to your country than the world population of Muslims could have done with an airplane each. And still gets a fair bit of support from living, talking stereotypes around the country. So, what's your point?
Health,
al-Aswad.
¹ Before anyone starts suggesting that gaybashing has anything to do with the religion these people profess, answer me this: do they eat regular bread, pork, oysters, or other unclean foodstuffs? ... how about menses? ... stone any rebel kid lately? Those are from the same source.
< Message edited by Aswad -- 8/13/2010 5:47:39 PM >
_____________________________
"If God saw what any of us did that night, he didn't seem to mind.
From then on I knew: God doesn't make the world this way.
We do." -- Rorschack, Watchmen.
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RE: N.Y. bus ad showing mosque, burning WTC towers OK'd - 
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