Issues with Islam that need to be addressed

[icehorse]

No, it's something that most Muslims who aware of current events will vehemently agree on

Apart from a few groups like the Muslim Reform Movement and a few folks like Maaiid Nawaz, Ibn Warraq, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, I hear vanishingly few Muslims acknowledge the problematic nature of the Quran and Muhammad's life. What I mostly hear when Islam is attacked is deflection. So, if you can point me to stats or widespread examples of Muslims vehemently agreeing, I would be very appreciative. Believe me, I'd rather think that this issue was being given the attention it deserves, so i could move on to more pressing concerns.

 

[icehorse]

But then I also understand that you're not interested in actually tackling the religion because your attention to it is only interested in political and social concerns.

Yes! I will be happy to cop to that! I'm primarily concerned with today's political and social concerns. I do not disparage those who want to study the religion - more power to you. But I'm concerned with the political and social.

 

[Firemorphic]

Yes! I will be happy to cop to that! I'm primarily concerned with today's political and social concerns. I do not disparage those who want to study the religion - more power to you. But I'm concerned with the political and social.

This puts you now in full acknowledgement of your circular reasoning with a very specific set determined conclusion, nothing that fits the conclusion gets any valid attention is automatically discredited by category.

 

[Firemorphic]

Apart from a few groups like the Muslim Reform Movement and a few folks like Maaiid Nawaz, Ibn Warraq, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali, I hear vanishingly few Muslims acknowledge the problematic nature of the Quran and Muhammad's life.

Again, discussing the problem and not it's root - beating the same bush again. Your view of the Qur'an and Muhammad is obviously not theirs (nor mine), yet you don't want to acknowledge their strong detesting and condemnation of such crimes.

What I mostly hear when Islam is attacked is deflection.

The issue here is when the source of the problem is deliberately misconstrued and the wider gradient that falls under it's umbrella is equated as an objective measurement to the true source of the problem (obscuring the actual subject), you yourself end up becoming the one doing the deflecting, not the regular Muslims who do not embody the totalitarian ideals you associate with them, or me for that matter.

 

[Jim]

@icehorse I’ve decided to abandon this thread also. Is it okay if I PM you?

 

[Jim]

I’ve changed my mind about abandoning this thread. I have some new ideas of what people might be thinking sometimes, when they raise alarms about Islam. I think that actually different people are thinking different things. In other words, denunciation of Islam and Muslims is not a monolithic entity! Especially in the solutions that are proposed. Even if all of it does rely on the same misrepresentations of skewed opinion polls to prop it up.

One possible way of thinking that I see behind alarms being raised about Islam, is that the worst kind of Islam is more influential, and dangerous to all people everywhere, than most people want to admit. I think that might actually be true. Another thought behind those alarms might be that the reasons for the influence of the worst kind of Islam, and the danger in it, are in the Quran itself, and some stories about Muhammad, and the ways they are deified by Muslims. I see some possible truth in that also.

When people feel that they are not being heard, sometimes in their desperation to be heard, they lose coherence and say foolish and extravagant things. I know, because it happens to me sometimes.

 

[Jim]

@dybmh @The_Fisher_King please see my previous post in this thread.

I’ve convinced myself now that there are some alarms that need to be raised about Islam, and it looks to me like they are being persistently brushed aside in responses to people raising them.

 

[dybmh]

@dybmh @The_Fisher_King please see my previous post in this thread.

I’ve convinced myself now that there are some alarms that need to be raised about Islam, and it looks to me like they are being persistently brushed aside in responses to people raising them.

You have the floor, my friend. If you want to post those concerns here, or in one of your other threads, I will certainly listen and try not to contradict you.

 

[Jim]

I will certainly listen and try not to contradict you.

I’ll be glad for you to listen, but I need you to contradict me. I need you to tell me what you disagree with in this post my post above the one you quoted, and your reasons for disagreeing with it.

 

[Jim]

@dybmh Sorry for the broken link. I’d like you to tell me what you disagree with in my post above the one where I tagged you, and your reasons for disagreeing.

 

[dybmh]

@Jim, I think each Islam critic has their own reasons for being passionate about it. I'm not sure how to respond beyond that. Maybe that's why i didn't comment on your post the first time I read it.

Regarding this part:

When people feel that they are not being heard, sometimes in their desperation to be heard, they lose coherence and say foolish and extravagant things.

That is not what I am observing. I don't know man, I can't really point to anything specific here. I think each conversation is a little different. I haven't noticed a pattern like you're describing here. And potentially it's a little insulting, maybe, to say people lose coherence.

 

[Jim]

@dybmh @The_Fisher_King
I see a very important and urgent issue here, that I see being persistently brushed aside, in response to alarms being raised about Islam:

... the Quran advises Muslims, in literally scores of different ways, to think badly of non-Muslims.

The last time I started reading the Quran, it was to find counter-arguments against denunciations of Islam. I was looking for examples of the Quran promoting good character, and instead all I saw, page after page after page, was denouncing unbelievers and promoting war against them. It was very hard for me to see it any other way. I don’t think that anyone would deny that anyone who calls herself a Muslim is implicitly endorsing all of that as coming from God, Himself. I see a problem there that needs to be addressed much better than I’ve seen it being addressed, in any of the responses I’ve seen to alarms being raised about Islam. It all looks like wishful thinking to me.

 

[Jim]

@dybmh Thank you. Do you disagree with any of this?

One possible way of thinking that I see behind alarms being raised about Islam, is that the worst kind of Islam is more influential, and dangerous to all people everywhere, than most people want to admit. I think that might actually be true. Another thought behind those alarms might be that the reasons for the influence of the worst kind of Islam, and the danger in it, are in the Quran itself, and some stories about Muhammad, and the ways they are deified by Muslims. I see some possible truth in that also.

 

[sooda]

Maybe what some people are trying to say is that there's a lot more danger from Islam than most people think, and that what makes it dangerous is what Muslims believe about the Quran. That creates concerns that decision makers and policy makers don't understand the dangers, and consequently are not doing what needs to be done, to protect us from them. If that's true, does anyone have any ideas about what any of us here might be able to do about it?

Have you ever been out of the US?

Why do you think you know more than policy makers?

 

[dybmh]

the worst kind of Islam is more influential, and dangerous to all people everywhere, than most people want to admit.

OK. I agree that it's dangerous. How is "the worst kind of Islam" influential?

worst kind of Islam, and the danger in it, are in the Quran itself

This part, I respectfully disagree. However, I don't need to prove it. If that is how you're reading it, then that probably means you're not a Muslim. And that's OK. It's not for everyone.

 

[Jim]

Why do you think you know more than policy makers?

I don’t think that I know more than policy makers.

 

[Jim]

Have you ever been out of the US

I lived in Martinique for 14 years, and I’m currently living in China, where I’ve lived for almost 11 years.

 

[icehorse]

The issue here is when the source of the problem is deliberately misconstrued and the wider gradient that falls under it's umbrella is equated as an objective measurement to the true source of the problem (obscuring the actual subject), you yourself end up becoming the one doing the deflecting, not the regular Muslims who do not embody the totalitarian ideals you associate with them, or me for that matter.

It heartens me a little bit when you say "the regular Muslims who do not embody the totalitarian ideals", and I agree that there many Muslims of that ilk. The data I've seen says that about half are as you say they are. But I'm not sure how you can declare that your half are the "regular" Muslims?

As to your point about the source of the problem. I have never said that the Quran and Muhammad are the ONLY sources of the problem. I don't think they are. But they're obviously a significant factor. They have both been around since day one of Islam, and we hear "in the name of" a lot.

 

[icehorse]

This puts you now in full acknowledgement of your circular reasoning with a very specific set determined conclusion, nothing that fits the conclusion gets any valid attention is automatically discredited by category.

We all know the phrase "correlation does not imply causation", and that seems to be the argument you're making? But correlation sprinkled with a little common sense is often the starting place to determine causation, and in many cases we find that the two are indeed linked.

Many critics of Islam see correlations between the messages in the Quran and the biographies of Muhammad and how Muslims believe and behave in the world. Seeing this correlation is hardly my invention. And there is a lot of evidence that supports this correlation. But if it makes you happy, I could agree that this correlation is not yet a scientific law.

 

[Jim]

@dybmh Thanks for helping me with this.

One possible way of thinking that I see behind alarms being raised about Islam, is that the worst kind of Islam is more influential, and dangerous to all people everywhere, than most people want to admit. I think that might actually be true.

OK. I agree that it's dangerous. How is "the worst kind of Islam" influential?

Because I think that most Muslims think that everything the Quran says is directly from God, and there might be a lot more of them than you think, who think that it endorses the worst kinds of Islam.

Another thought behind those alarms might be that the reasons for the influence of the worst kind of Islam, and the danger in it, are in the Quran itself, and some stories about Muhammad, and the ways they are deified by Muslims. I see some possible truth in that also.

This part, I respectfully disagree. However, I don't need to prove it. If that is how you're reading it, then that probably means you're not a Muslim.

Do you think that there are not multitudes of Muslims who think that the Quran endorses the worst excesses that we’ve been seeing in the name of Islam? If so, what are your reasons for thinking that?