(January 3, 2010 at 8:25 am)Pippy Wrote: Submission to the will of Allah though, not submission to other people. It is not about being slaves, it is about being humble and appreciative of being allowed to be alive. Submission can of course be a good thing, as much as it can be a bad one. Submit to the fact that there are things we can't control. Submit to the fact that there are things we can control, but we should not. And what you are left with is the things you can and should control.Let me stop you right there - splitting hairs while the ox is on fire helps no one but only serves to distract. As someone who read the holy Qu'ran and still clutches his head whenever Muslims talk about the "science" of the Qu'ran, submission to Allah and their behaviors is expected to be what your life is about. Sure, you can kill, maim and butcher your opposition on the side, but only a fool lets Islam, and by extension Allah, fall to the wayside.
Don't forget too that everyone who isn't Muslim is partially Muslim - they just haven't accepted it yet, and agents who turn away from Islam (apostates) are the encouraged targets to serve holy justice. The Christian Bible contains similar material, but has a (thankful for this one) schizophrenia that combines stone age thunder and lightning with conflicting stories about Jesus the nice guy and Jesus the preacher.
The Qu'ran doesn't really have that - by far the most boring book I've ever read because it was so damn monotonous and predictable. Finding "nice" Qu'ran quotes is like fishing for a single line of fun amid dozens of similarly phrased lines about submission. Just submission.
After a while, you start wondering where submission starts and ends. And no, it is not explicitly spelled out.
(January 3, 2010 at 8:25 am)Pippy Wrote: Islam is misunderstood and demonized nowadays, but it is untrue and part of an agenda of misinformation. It is "divide and conquer' bullshit.
I have met many Muslims, may be a few hundred, and have yet to meet one who is dangerous or hateful.
Were the vigilant exhortations of the masses whipped up by their imams to behead the Danish cartoonist's misunderstood? How about the many people who died in the frenzy? Huh? What about the exhortations to kill the unbelievers, which go on for pages and, because the Qu'ran is so short, comprise a significant percentage of that fuckin book. Let's confront the stagnation of Islamic research in the 15th century due to recurrent fundamentalism that plagues us on a wide scale 6 centuries later.
Islam is about as misunderstood as a bee sting on a patient in anaphylactic shock. It is a religion of suppression, a religion of submission, a religion that restricts the fundamental desire to be free.
(January 3, 2010 at 8:25 am)Pippy Wrote: And yes, I think Adrian did tip over a little there. It is like the Hitler argument in the sense that you can't blame a man's beliefs (or especially others who share similar beleifs) for his own shortcomings. If an Atheist is bound to be responsible for his own actions, so is a Theist.
I don't let god be an excuse, you disbelievers certainly should not as well.
Yes you can blame to degrees that beliefs are to blame. Hate speech and fighting words are great examples of how the fundamentally intangible can cause incredible harm and violence. The man who preaches hate is held doubly accountable when he commits a crime - because while you cannot punish the idea, you can punish the man. But the hate still remains unless confronted and judged upon.
