(December 7, 2014 at 2:06 pm)Pickup_shonuff Wrote: Look, you can't overstate the fact that we contributed to the defeat and humiliation of an empire that had existed since 1299. Then we literally took a ruler to a map and divided up land, placed it under European control, while national, fascist, and communistic sentiments were at the peak, displaced thousands of peoples and transferred them to the countries we thought they should belong, and imported our styles of government, its symbols, into their culture, which, instead of Christian or white supremacy associations, became incorporated with their language which predominately revolves around Islam. The West persists as foreign agitators to this day.
And to take it back further, Christianity (the West) and Islam have always been at odds. The United States, if you want to call it secular is irreverent, is justly associated with the Christian scourge in its side that has existed since the conception of Islam as a religion that, like Judaism, is primarily a social doctrine and attitude. I agree that, like Judaism, and Christianity, it needs reformation, but like any culture that has clung to a basic set of rules for hundreds or thousands of years, it is going to inevitably be stubborn. Hell, the U.S., we're less than a century ahead of the Middle East when it comes to modern sensibilities on women's rights, we're STILL in the process of recognizing the equal status of homosexuals and minorities. It terms of human rights, are we better for droning farms and weddings instead of beheading their persons individually? Let's not even get into our culture's vain fascination with celebrities and petty gossip, the drug war, or THE FACT THAT WE HAVE MORE PEOPLE IN CAGES THAN CHINA. We're gonna thumb our noses at who now?
The consequence of the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire at the end of WWI as a contributing factor is overstated. The Ottoman Empire peaked in the 16th/17th century and quickly lost its ability centrally control its inhabitants. Essentially, the Ottoman Empire would influence foreign affairs, but local tribes were in complete control of regional governance.
Wahhabism developed in the 18th century. Its intolerance for other Muslims and use of violence for propagation was established long before WWI. The Ottoman Empire was able to limit its spread in the 19th century; however, the Wahhabist Sauds had reestablished themselves on the Arabian peninsula prior to WWI. The key thing to understand here is that the Wahhabis were enemies of the Ottoman Empire so the idea that their continued violence is somehow caused by the humiliation of a once proud empire is misplaced. If anything, post WWI partitioning of the Ottoman Empire served to solidify the regional claims of the Wahhabis.
You are right to point out our continued failures relative to human/civil rights, particularly if the point is to raise awareness, determine its causes, and propose solutions. I agree with your assessment; however, pouring them into this conversation comes across as a tu quoque argument.
The equivocation that attends the comparisons is also quite hideous. It won't be long before the LBGT community faces no marriage prohibitions anywhere in the U.S. Care to discuss the penalty for being homosexual in KSA? Another distressing aspect of the comparison is that the angst in the U.S. on the issue of LBGT rights is mostly driven by Christian religious sensibilities yet some seem hell bent on giving religion a pass when it comes to assessing motivation for intolerance and discrimination.
