Dylan Ratigan: A most excellent rant on 'War with Islam'

[Archangel M]

Abortion clinic bombers and abortion doctor assassins have been avowed Christians, carrying out what they thought was God's law. They are not representative of all Christians, but perhaps of their subset fringe sect. Same for fringe Wahabists who support terrorists. They are Muslims, but they don't represent all Islam.

Individual criminals are a far cry from large organizations like Al Queda, Hezbollah or fundamentalist Islamic nations who have been conducting terror operations with a Muslim "flavor" since the 70's. Jihad..Fatwas..Paris riots...Slamon Rushdie...9/11...Beslan...Moscow Theater...Madrid..Paris Metro...London bombings...Lebanon....Mumbai.

Compare those to an individual nut doing an abortion clinic bombing??

Please.

 

[WC_lun]

I know I'm probably not going to get a real answer to this, but what makes some people have such a strong urge to paint a large group of people in such a negative light? What does it accomplish? I can't really think of any personality trait that I would attribute to a social group of a billion plus people, but that seems to be what is happening. That leads me to believe ther is a reason for it. Surely it can't just be fear, can it?

 

[Archangel M]

And pointing at people who say "Islam has a problem with terrorists" and accusing them of "painting ALL Muslims as terrorists", is an easy out. Of course not all Muslims are terrorists, but practitioners of that religion sure are cranking out a LOT of violence lately. Large scale, organized and funded violence. To say otherwise is willful ignorance.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Compare those to an individual nut doing an abortion clinic bombing??

Please.

Crusades?

But seriously, I'm NOT comparing them. I'm pointing out that the acts of extremists are not the acts of the groups they claim membership in. That's all. The abortion clinic bomber isn't representative of all Christianity, and the suicide bomber isn't representative of all Islam.

I'm also agreeing with Dylan Ratigan. He notes correctly that the 9/11 bombers were all Saudi Arabians, all members of a Wahhabi sect of Islam, and that trying to 'go to war with Islam' is both stupid and non-winnable.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

And pointing at people who say "Islam has a problem with terrorists" and accusing them of "painting ALL Muslims as terrorists", is an easy out. Of course not all Muslims are terrorists, but practitioners of that religion sure are cranking out a LOT of violence lately. Large scale, organized and funded violence. To say otherwise is willful ignorance.

Nobody is saying otherwise. What is it that YOU are saying? That's the part that we're unclear on. Yes, the terrorists we're fighting are all Muslims. There are a bunch of them. And what is your point, please?

 

[Big Don]

Nobody is saying otherwise. What is it that YOU are saying? That's the part that we're unclear on. Yes, the terrorists we're fighting are all Muslims. There are a bunch of them. And what is your point, please?

How about this:
A guy wearing a red jacket, red pants and red shoes runs all over the state robbing stores, homes, and little old ladies.
Rather than focus the dragnet on a guy wearing red shoes, pants and jacket, the police look for a man with no other description given or allowed and any attempt to point out that the robber wears red shoes, pants and jackets at all times is shouted down as biased, bigoted and possibly stupid, meanwhile the man in the red outfit continues to rob everyone he can.
You can not ignore part of your adversary's existence.
How about an MA analogy. You have a sparring match coming up, but, you ignore the fact that your opponent is left handed and poo poo anyone who tries to tell you he is left handed, the right side of your face and body are going to be pretty bruised...

The terrorists we are fighting are Muslim, to ignore this simple fact, is foolish in the extreme.
Imagine if during WWII, the US and UK ignored the fact that the Nazis were German...

 

[WC_lun]

How about this:
A guy wearing a red jacket, red pants and red shoes runs all over the state robbing stores, homes, and little old ladies.
Rather than focus the dragnet on a guy wearing red shoes, pants and jacket, the police look for a man with no other description given or allowed and any attempt to point out that the robber wears red shoes, pants and jackets at all times is shouted down as biased, bigoted and possibly stupid, meanwhile the man in the red outfit continues to rob everyone he can.
You can not ignore part of your adversary's existence.
How about an MA analogy. You have a sparring match coming up, but, you ignore the fact that your opponent is left handed and poo poo anyone who tries to tell you he is left handed, the right side of your face and body are going to be pretty bruised...

The terrorists we are fighting are Muslim, to ignore this simple fact, is foolish in the extreme.
Imagine if during WWII, the US and UK ignored the fact that the Nazis were German...

Sorry, no. Your analogy is flawed. If a guy wearing all red committed those crimes, then you are looking for an individual in red when most people would not dress like that. What you are doing is looking for an indiviual dressed in red while 1.8 BILLION innocent people are also dressed in red. In that case, perhaps it would be wise to focus on other descriptors of the criminal, don't you think? ...and you want to call other people foolish.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

How about this:
A guy wearing a red jacket, red pants and red shoes runs all over the state robbing stores, homes, and little old ladies.
Rather than focus the dragnet on a guy wearing red shoes, pants and jacket, the police look for a man with no other description given or allowed and any attempt to point out that the robber wears red shoes, pants and jackets at all times is shouted down as biased, bigoted and possibly stupid, meanwhile the man in the red outfit continues to rob everyone he can.
You can not ignore part of your adversary's existence.
How about an MA analogy. You have a sparring match coming up, but, you ignore the fact that your opponent is left handed and poo poo anyone who tries to tell you he is left handed, the right side of your face and body are going to be pretty bruised...

The terrorists we are fighting are Muslim, to ignore this simple fact, is foolish in the extreme.
Imagine if during WWII, the US and UK ignored the fact that the Nazis were German...

Who suggested ignoring the fact that the terrorists we're fighting are Muslims? In fact, the suggestion is that we pay attention to the fact that they are a particular extremist subset of Islam, known as Wahhabi, so that we don't find ourselves chasing after the wrong guys!

"All Muslims" is about 1.4 billion people. Anything we can use to legitimately narrow that down strikes me as a good thing. But no, you want us to be tracking ALL Muslims because hey, the 9/11 terrorists were all Muslims.

 

[Bruno@MT]

The difference is, the standard commentary, "They don't represent all Islam" in it's many forms, is repeated ad naseum, to the point it has lost all meaning. While any time a Christian, commits a crime, that same idea that they aren't representative of all crap isn't part of the news

Of course it isn't. The reason is that most Americans are Christians or are at least familiar enough with Christianity to know that it isn't true and because they know that they themselves are not terrorists, so the 2 are not linked.

Otoh there seem to be plenty of Americans willing to make the immediate jump from Islam to terrorist because they don't know it, they don't feel any connection with it and thus it is foreign and easy to fall into the trap of jumping to conclusions.

And from what we've seen so far, the above really needs saying because there are still plenty of Americans who don't seem to understand.

 

[Bill Mattocks]

And from what we've seen so far, the above really needs saying because there are still plenty of Americans who don't seem to understand.

Or don't want to.

 

[Archangel M]

Crusades?

Dude the Crusades were what 700-800 years ago? People have to stop using that old meme, it has nothing to do with todays situation. My examples were from the 20th-21st century, not from the 13th.

May as well blame the Romans for something while we are at it. My grandparents generation rounded up the Japanese and put them in camps. We have come a long way since then. How much more so since the 1200's??

 

[Cryozombie]

It's funny people here are very quick to decry groups like the tea party as a whole, stating things like The Majority is responsible for the Racists because they do nothing about them at the rallies, or that Christians as a whole are idiots because a specific group of them believe there were no dinosaurs and that the earth is 6000 years old, but have nothing to say about the THOUSANDS of Muslims who stood in the streets celebrating, ululating, and cheering the fall of the towers we were presented images of on TV the day of 9-11.

THAT was clearly ok, for some reason.

 

[Big Don]

It's funny people here are very quick to decry groups like the tea party as a whole, stating things like The Majority is responsible for the Racists because they do nothing about them at the rallies, or that Christians as a whole are idiots because a specific group of them believe there were no dinosaurs and that the earth is 6000 years old, but have nothing to say about the THOUSANDS of Muslims who stood in the streets celebrating, ululating, and cheering the fall of the towers we were presented images of on TV the day of 9-11.

THAT was clearly ok, for some reason.

Clearly OK, and, not at all representative...

 

[Big Don]

LANGUAGE WARNING:
Penn Jillette:
Are there any groups you won’t go after? And we haven’t tacked Islam because we have families.
Meaning, you won’t attack Islam because you’re afraid it’ll attack back … Right, and I think the worst thing you can say about a group in a free society is that you’re afraid to talk about it—I can’t think of anything more horrific.

 

[WC_lun]

LANGUAGE WARNING:
Penn Jillette:
Are there any groups you won’t go after? And we haven’t tacked Islam because we have families.
Meaning, you won’t attack Islam because you’re afraid it’ll attack back … Right, and I think the worst thing you can say about a group in a free society is that you’re afraid to talk about it—I can’t think of anything more horrific.

Let me get this straight...you are using Penn Jillette as source material to make your point? ... LOL

 

[Bill Mattocks]

Dude the Crusades were what 700-800 years ago? People have to stop using that old meme, it has nothing to do with todays situation. My examples were from the 20th-21st century, not from the 13th.

May as well blame the Romans for something while we are at it. My grandparents generation rounded up the Japanese and put them in camps. We have come a long way since then. How much more so since the 1200's??

The point I made is the same, regardless of when it happened. We do not hold all Christians responsible for the Crusades. All Muslims are not responsible for the 9/11 attacks. It really is that simple. Why that is difficult to grasp, I fail to understand.

 

[Big Don]

Let me get this straight...you are using Penn Jillette as source material to make your point? ... LOL

You can tell Christian jokes, Jew jokes, but, if you tell a Muslim joke, the feces WILL hit the oscillator...

 

[Archangel M]

Christians as a group still seem to be "held to task" over the Crusades ("Well you Christians were responsible for the Crusades! So there! Neyh!")..that happened in the 12-13th Cent. While saying anything about the associations between Islam and RECENT religious violence gets you slapped with a "bigot" label ricky-tick.

 

[WC_lun]

Christians as a group still seem to be "held to task" over the Crusades ("Well you Christians were responsible for the Crusades! So there! Neyh!")..that happened in the 12-13th Cent. While saying anything about the associations between Islam and RECENT religious violence gets you slapped with a "bigot" label ricky-tick.

No, it just seeems many people want thier cake and to eat it too. They don't want all Christians held to task for things such as the Crusades, the inquisition, abortion doctor killings, child abuse, etc. and you are right in that. At the same time they want to paint 911 as an act supported by an entire religion. It really isn't difficult to understand why the hypocritical nature of this is being called out. It seems the only ones that don't understand this are people who have some interest in stoling the hatred.

 

[5-0 Kenpo]

I'm also agreeing with Dylan Ratigan. He notes correctly that the 9/11 bombers were all Saudi Arabians, all members of a Wahhabi sect of Islam, and that trying to 'go to war with Islam' is both stupid and non-winnable.

He also says that Whabbi Muslim extremists are the "only ones that have ever killed us."

That's just not true. Why should I believe the other stuff that he says.

The question has to be asked in terms of causation. Did the terrorists do what they did based on the fact that they were men? No. Did they do it based on the fact that they spoke English? No. Did they do it based on the fact that they were Muslim? Again, no. Did they do it based on the fact that they belonged to an extremist sect of Islam, which taught the validity of violent jihad? Yes.

This is just spin. These people did it because of their Muslim faith. Why you think they did it is irrelevent. The only reason that you take it the one step further is because it suits what you believe.

The truer question is not what you pose, but do they represent the majority of the Islamic faith. To me, that answer is the one that has yet to be satisfactorily given.