[KevinTheOmnivore]

Originally Posted by mburbank

It's GONE through it? You're certain about that? I mean, I'm not predicting a return to auto dafe I think you're being pretty cocky. Everybody always thinks the way things are in their time is hwere everything has always been headed and that history can just stop changing now.

Ugh. Okay, this moral equivalence crap is getting silly.

"Oh yeah! Oh yeah! They have suicide bombings and codified oppression of women!? Well what about Pat Robertson and anti-gay legislation!!?? IT'S ALL THE SAME!!"



If we can't get away from citing the fucking Crusades every time we talk about a suicide bombing that happened YESTERDAY, then this argument is pointless. I also think it's in fact a discredit to intelligent and peaceful muslims all over the world.

"okay, so this muslim ran into a coffee shop in Israel and blew up some children....BUT, what VERSION of the Koran was he reading, huh?????"

!!!!!!!!!

This is crazy. I feel like I'm taking crazy pills.

AND if it was correct to determine that a religion had something inherently evil in it, would you agree that Christianity should have thrown out with the bathwater during the Inquisition?

No, I didn't say there was anything evil about anything. My point was that you can believe all sorts of crazy religious texts, and take them at their most literal meaning, but it's how you choose to act on it that defines you. I think that's what separates Christianity in America today from Islam in the Middle East today, for example.

But there's barbarism a plenty in most of your religous texts, and even when there isn't much, there are always swaths of people ready to read it in.

Right, that's what I said.

Right now all three branches of government are controlled by a party headed by a man who does not seem to think the church/state divide is all that important and at very least is due for some serious ventilation.

Oh, come on Max. This isn't fair, it doesn't even belong in a conversation about the Koran being used to codify law in the Middle East.

When Bush says something that seems even remotely Christian, or seems to cross that church/state line, there are millions of Americans, led by Jon Stewart, who will jump on him for it. It'll get debated in the press. It'll be the punch line on Letterman. It simply isn't the same.

do you honestly believe that Christianity would be way more civil just do to it's inherent goodness?

I dunno, and you're probably right about colonialism and stuff, but we need to play the cards we're handed, no? Because white Europeans colonized the Middle East, should we stick our heads in the sand (no pun intended) and say "hey, sure they're killing Jews and locking up their women, but someone who looks like me killed someone who looks like them 200 years ago, so I need to stay quiet"?

I think violent fundamentalism is a problem all it's own, a poisonous, contageous mental sickness that grafts itself to religion. I think historically there is evidence that strong religous belief makes people vulnerable to fundamentalism. But religion isn't all it likes. It likes nationalism too, and even patriotism.

Certainly, and this is basically all I'm trying to say. I'm not trying to judge Islam, but I am saying that the problem with Islam isn't colonialists, or Israel, or America, or the Lawrence. It's a problem that will ultimately only be solved by Muslims.