Let's Have Another Argument about Islam

[Walkie]

I don't know if direct stats are available on this, but the kind of stats  that would really interst me, are not "terrorism" stats as such but something more along the lines of "Acts of aggression against feedom of speech,  freedom of religion etc"

Obviously, some Islamist terrorist attacks would equally come under that heading eg the attack on Charlie Hebdo
Blowing up that statue of Buddha  would count
The fatwa against Salman Rushdie would count.
And bviously a lot of of acts by other religious groups  would count too.

IMO, the Islamist terror attacks have been very different from the IRA terror attacks on England. The IRA message was "Withdraw your troops from Northern Ireland". There was actually a lot of sympathy for their cause amongst the English, if not for the methods.   ( I know. I was there. I had Irish Catholic friends with IRA sympathies. A lot of people did. ) . It put  the English on the horns of one hellova   dilemma, but it was (arguably) a reasonable demand

Where there's been a discernible message from Islamist terrorists, it's usually been more along the lines of "Stop disrespecting the Prophet".  It;s that demand  makes the attacks so deeply threatening , not the number of people killed.  We've been reminded ad nauseam that our chance of being killed in a terror attack is minute, compared to our chances of being killed crossing the road. and I alway think, so what?   The cars and trucks are not threatening my freedom .

That's why so many people all over the world stood up and declared "I am Charlie" . We were all saying : we will not be intimidated into giving up any of our freedoms. And the freedom to mock a religion is every bit as important as the freedom to practice that  religion.

I think Tim Minchin expressed that better than anyone (if you can't get along with his style of comedy , do skip to the serious part of the monologue , starting around 4.15)

[odeon]

Actually, Walkie, Muslims are the new Jews, not the disabled. How many populist politicians do you see trying to ban the disabled from entering the country or accuse them of taking our jobs? Where are the disabled in the headlines? The sad fact is that the disabled just aren't that important.

Excuse me for "ignoring" some earlier posts. This one as a little bit meat to it , whilst remaining short and sweet enough that I can dissect the spurious assumptions, without writing an encyclopedia...I think.

Muslims are the new Jews..you could certyainly make a case for that, and I would take that case  seriously, if only you didn't assume that excludes other people from sharing that dubious honour.  One could also make a case for the same old Jews being the new Jews. I'm quite disturbed by that one, cos it's relatively neglected; and a rise in Islamist power surely entails a corresponding rise in Anti semitism? (Methinks the Germans have created a rather paraxoxical situation for themselves, by taking in horfdes of anti-Semites in their desperate efforts to avoid repeating previous  mistakes .  It's hilarious right now, but I'm not sure it will go on being quite so funny)

As for the case of disabled British people, this really hinges on prejudive against "benefits scroungers"  , as I said. Not many  people are prejudiced against the disabled as such , but the vast majority of us are only pretending to be disabled , so we can sponge off the State instead of working , don't you know? This logic, in turn,  justifies a savage series of" Welfare reforms" which put all disabled people in an increasingly difficult (to understate it)position. Hence the numerous suicides.

As in Nazi Germnany,m every body knows aone "deserving" genuinely disabled , just as everybody knew one "decent Jew" . Equally, as in Nazi Germany, everybody knows any number of "underserving" cases who serve to justify that harsh treatment (i actually said the bit in bold to someone the other day , and they said "oh! yes, and went off on a rant against  the evil scroungers. i had to call them to a halt, and say "i didn't mean that the undeserving are really underserving, ;it's just prejudice , that;'s all. But given that said person already knew about the prejudice I'd faced to that effect, I was shocked. That goes to show how very deeply that response is ingrained)

I know that anecdotal evidence isn't your favourite sort of evidence , odeon, and I understand the reasons. But anyone can haul out relevant stats, inasmuch as they're available.  I think my personal strength is my store of personal experience , and only I can draw on that. So I'll carry on doing so. I;'ve already asked if others will handle the stats side of it, and i'll be sursprised if there's nobody here who is willing to do that.

In the meantime maybe I should link you with DPAC ?  There is loads of info there, and you can surely expect it to have a predictable bias.  But it's considerably better than nothing, I should think. And, hanfg on,   you could equally expect my own selection to be biased, huh?

It's absurdly easy to dismiss disabled people as frauds. The standard model disabled person has a set of wheels underneath himn...and he'd better not be seen  getting out of that chair.  My ex had that problem, before he became permanently wheelchair bound (as the result of a  very slow, erratic,  degenerative  process, as usual) . We heard neighbours loudly opine "He ain't disabled. I've seen him wealking about"...meaning that they'd seen him hobble the 50 yard to his parked motability car, for instance" that was 20-odd years ago. Nowadays he would never have got  that motability vehicle. His ability to hobble 50 yards most days would have totally destroyed his clain for enhanced Mobility allowance. People like him mostly stay indoors now, because said ability isn't that useful without private transport. Not that losing their vehicles is the worst thing, that just goes to illustrate how unreasonable things have become. You don't even have to have what one would normally call a "hidden disability" for that disabilty to be effectively invisible .   People make facile judgments based on fleeting  impressions and disinterest.  Neurological disablity? - alcoholic/junkie (that's the one I've very often  had thrown at me. And when tyou're facing eviction due to having your bebnefits stopped, that's the thing that stings deepest:Not your utterly bleak future prospects, but the venom you hrear from your neighbours, and the prejudice you hear on the evening news) ,

So, OK, hopefuully that also demonstrates (if you're troubling to read) how banning people from entering a country or accusing them of taking jobs isn;'t the only form that prejudice takes?

Indeed I'd quibble with both of thosde as soloid evidence of prejudice at all. It all depends. i'bve bben part of a group (Agency wokers) who really were taking people's jobs. That statemebnt is not based on prejudice. You call surely call some of the treatment I received as "prejuduiced " though. Want to cast around for somthing to blame? Don't blame the statement. the statement is innocent.  You could credibly blame "Free movemebnt iof labour" as an inflammatory factor. Oh ! but hang on that's to talk about banning people from entering the country , isn't it? Which is racist , isn;t it?  Do you begin to se how discussing real uissues, and the search for real solutions is impeded by that thoughtless anti- discrimination  rhetoric?

There are all sorts of reasons for people wanting immigration control;s. Prejudice mif=ght sometimes be one of them , But you've just made a typical , spurious equation bwetween the two , as do too many people. One reason in Britain is shortage of housing, and too many people living on the streets already. It's pretty natural and logical that more people coming in will mean more people living on the street as well as more people losing their jobs. Never mind which specific groupp of people are getting// losing  the houses and the jobs. That's pretty much irrelevant.   And just because some people see some groups as having an advantage in that respect, that's no reason at all to slur the whole population as "prejudiced"  Nor to think that you know exactly what the prejudice is all about.

Oh! one last thing. You do know don't you that disabled people went into those death camps along with the Jews? Autistic people, even? we didn't matter much back then , either.  Indeed, we matter  so little that history barely ever pauses to recall that. you think not mattering will save us>? 

I'm not saying the disabled aren't getting the short end of the stick. Of course they are. Yes, they were in the death camps, too, as were Gypsies, homosexuals and pretty much any other group the Nazis wanted to get rid of.

I'm not saying they aren't treated bad, at all, because they are. I am saying, however, that they are a far cry from being the new Jews. They don't have the visibility or the importance of a useful group to be blamed for society's misfortunes, so they won't be primary targets.

Muslims, on the other hand, are being targeted all over the western world.

[odeon]

PS. Thing is, I might not have put it that way, but I actually decided this worth a new thread because I took the statement I quoted as sincere.  I therefore anticipated a sincere argument, and thus far, I feel pretty damned disappointed , but I'm willing to think that A) perhaps I asked for it? and B) it's recoverable?

In what way do you think my reply was anything less than sincere?

I know...I know...because you are ideologically criticising with the intent to win and shoutdown rather than to actually understand the position of your opponent. You have already cast Walkie and me and others as anti-Muslim and as you as the only defender and so anything we say will be misrepresented in your ideologically skewed pea brain , into an anti-Muslim slur that you will defend. There is no sincerity in that.

You've been completely unable to question your own views and ideologies ever since I first had enough of your intellectual dishonesty against Zegh, so you should probably shut up and keep a low profile. Pot kettle and all that. But this is the one thing you will always be unable to do because you simply lack the open-mindedness that is required.

And I mean that quite literally. You lack both "open" and "mind".

Undoubtedly you will now produce another one of your failed hypotheticals, so have at it. We all need a laugh.

Ah! thanks, IQ. OK , maybe you don't have a lot to add , but t least that looks like a genuine, just  saying-what-I -mean comment 

Hey, Al! Maybe we can just talk as if Odeon's not here? No ned to address him, if he's not playing ball, is there?

I posted in this thread yesterday and again today. But feel free to ignore me if you only want friendly nods instead of actual discussion.

You are not making "actual discussion" you are too busy "defending Muslims" here when no one is attacking Muslims. That is not a discussion because an actual discussion needs both party NOT to talk at cross purposes.  I know the thought of being a moral defender gives you a thrill up your leg BUT it is redundant in "actual discussions".

In a bigot's world, it's never about attacking, is it? So yeah, it's obvious that you don't see it.

[odeon]

Had to plus Al for
A) noticing that I'm struggling to keep up, and answering some snarks on my behalf (  pretty well too!)
B) well, if this is a point-scoring exercise instead of a discussion, Al's actually scoring way  more points in terms cogent, honest, to the-the-point. You can only reallty fault him on grammar and style, as usual (which is not exactly fair)
 
So , that's very much appreciated , Al

As for Odeon, seems to be that his basic position is stated elsewhere on this board, and comprises a number of  complaints about how intensely tedious his job is  just lately (had to sypathise there) culminating in:

Thinking I have less tolerance for idiots today than I did yesterday.

Bearing all  that in mind , I 've resisted reacting  to his snarks ...ummm, more often than not, that is.  But what the heck, we're human too, 

It's a futile exercise, mind. Ya can;'t discuss things with somebody with somebody who's gonna lose patience with you 23.805 times per day (Post stats) 

I thought you wanted "another argument about Islam", but maybe I was wrong? As for having Al speak for you, I would advise against that because I don't take his opinions seriously and I skip most of his longer posts because they just aren't worth the trouble. He is far too verbose and he doesn't argue well, mostly because he isn't as smart as he thinks he is.

If you have something to say about Islam, say it yourself. Address my points.

[odeon]

Has anyone uttered a word why Muslims might be 'prejudiced' against non-Muslims?  Does anyone actually think they hate us 'becozzz werrr freeee'?  We've been destroying the Middle East for decades, blocking democracy and supporting brutal regimes as well as stealing their resources and blowing them up.  But when we do it, we don't call it terrorism.  Does anyone actually believe the narrative that we went into Afghanistan to 'liberate women', to find Bin Laden and knock out Al Qaeda and the Taliban?  When the US supported Jihadists in the 80's that threw acid into women's faces, they never charged Bin Laden with 9/11 and the US supports Al Qaeda.  Or went into Iraq because Saddam had connections with Al Qaeda, and because he was a horrible person and because we love democracy so much?  When this was all a lie spewed out from Israeli intelligence, and we supported Saddam through his worst crimes.   

Did anyone think it would be a good idea to flood the West with people from the Middle East while we destroyed the Middle East?

The establishment have done this intentionally, they're not that stupid.  They want people to support their wars against the Muslim world and support Israel.   

What a shame. I found myself agreeing with some of your post until you sawed off the branch you were sitting on.

I don't care whether you agree with me or not.  Obviously it's going to be difficult for you to agree with stuff that goes over your head.

Personally found it to be one of your best posts.

He had the makings of a good post but the tinfoil hat is hard to ignore.

[odeon]

Walkie- Yes, we let the wars in the Middle East happen, only the people can stop this all.  And the establishment have played tricks on the people.  It is true though that people ought to wise up and see through the propaganda. 

Muslims have it the worst at the moment.  Millions of people across the Middle East and Africa have been killed because of our war on Islam.  Disabled people have been the most persecuted people throughout history, they were being persecuted long before Judaism was established.  Jews are generally disliked because of their actions, well as a whole because of the actions of some or many of them.  Disabled people were put in death camps by the Nazis and there's evidence that there was an extermination policy against the disabled under Nazi rule.

Proof?

[odeon]

I don't know if direct stats are available on this, but the kind of stats  that would really interst me, are not "terrorism" stats as such but something more along the lines of "Acts of aggression against feedom of speech,  freedom of religion etc"

http://economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Global-Terrorism-Index-2015.pdf

Some of the things you are looking for are there, but as you point out yourself, most wouldn't be classified as terrorism. Charlie Hebdo, Salman Rushdie and the like are a mere footnote when compared to the systematic repression of free speech in many parts of the world.

Obviously, some Islamist terrorist attacks would equally come under that heading eg the attack on Charlie Hebdo
Blowing up that statue of Buddha  would count
The fatwa against Salman Rushdie would count.
And bviously a lot of of acts by other religious groups  would count too.

IMO, the Islamist terror attacks have been very different from the IRA terror attacks on England. The IRA message was "Withdraw your troops from Northern Ireland". There was actually a lot of sympathy for their cause amongst the English, if not for the methods.   ( I know. I was there. I had Irish Catholic friends with IRA sympathies. A lot of people did. ) . It put  the English on the horns of one hellova   dilemma, but it was (arguably) a reasonable demand

I see where you're coming from but would argue that groups like Al Qaeda have similar messages (i.e. GTFO of the Middle East), and actually, so do ISIS, even though their idea seems to be to expand to a worldwide caliphate. The differences between them and IRA are in how they define and allow the use of political violence.

Where there's been a discernible message from Islamist terrorists, it's usually been more along the lines of "Stop disrespecting the Prophet". 

I disagree. The main message is still "GTFO of the Middle East" with some variations. The nutjobs who want to behead people for drawing the prophet are relatively few but highly visible, and they, too, enact the political violence as "authorised" by the radical groups they claim allegiance to.

It;s that demand  makes the attacks so deeply threatening , not the number of people killed.  We've been reminded ad nauseam that our chance of being killed in a terror attack is minute, compared to our chances of being killed crossing the road. and I alway think, so what?   The cars and trucks are not threatening my freedom .

And neither are the Muslims, even though that is the message brought to you by the populist politicians and media.

That's why so many people all over the world stood up and declared "I am Charlie" . We were all saying : we will not be intimidated into giving up any of our freedoms. And the freedom to mock a religion is every bit as important as the freedom to practice that  religion.

And I fully agree. But where is their support when less visible but far more serious threats against these freedoms pop up in places like Poland, Hungary, France or (obviously) Russia?

In all fairness, when Trump was elected, protests erupted because enough people see through him. In all fairness, it's why some Jews now say they will register as Muslims if Trump goes ahead with the Muslim database.

I think Tim Minchin expressed that better than anyone (if you can't get along with his style of comedy , do skip to the serious part of the monologue , starting around 4.15)

I'll watch it later. I don't tend to watch videos posted here when I'm posting.

[Walkie]

Had to plus Al for
A) noticing that I'm struggling to keep up, and answering some snarks on my behalf (  pretty well too!)
B) well, if this is a point-scoring exercise instead of a discussion, Al's actually scoring way  more points in terms cogent, honest, to the-the-point. You can only reallty fault him on grammar and style, as usual (which is not exactly fair)
 
So , that's very much appreciated , Al

As for Odeon, seems to be that his basic position is stated elsewhere on this board, and comprises a number of  complaints about how intensely tedious his job is  just lately (had to sypathise there) culminating in:

Thinking I have less tolerance for idiots today than I did yesterday.

Bearing all  that in mind , I 've resisted reacting  to his snarks ...ummm, more often than not, that is.  But what the heck, we're human too, 

It's a futile exercise, mind. Ya can;'t discuss things with somebody with somebody who's gonna lose patience with you 23.805 times per day (Post stats) 

I thought you wanted "another argument about Islam", but maybe I was wrong? As for having Al speak for you, I would advise against that because I don't take his opinions seriously and I skip most of his longer posts because they just aren't worth the trouble. He is far too verbose and he doesn't argue well, mostly because he isn't as smart as he thinks he is.

If you have something to say about Islam, say it yourself. Address my points.

OK I'm only gonna give this kind of post my attention every so often, cos I'm just not naturally prolific, like some, and I don't wanna get tied up in tedious self-justification etc.

As I said, I thought maybe I asked for some snarking responses from you. By which I meant that my approach was probably too combative. That approach was really tongue -in-cheek,  on my part , as is the title of this thread, though I more than half expect it to be an accurate.descriptor. Indeed, it is a more than halfway accurate descriptor already    but an Aspie being tongue-in-cheek on an Aspie forum ? weeeell  they are taking one heck of a risk there, OFC

As you maybe noticed (?) I generally do prefer discussion to debate, and I'm really not at inclined to make an exception of this issue, though in all probability it will just go up in flames , ofc.  C'est la Vie . I figure we might manage to sneak a little bit off civilised discussion in, anyway.  Still aiming for that.    By civilised discussion I mean something that has more than two sides to it.  I find the traditional debate format (and all it's offshoots) so freaking artificial, it's hard to get it to seriously  reflect  real life.

In real life, the truth matters whole lot more than who exactly says it, and the truth has a thousand different facets. So, if Al or anyone responds to a snark on my behalf, i think "Good, that's the really pointless bit out of the way" (if only it were quite that easy). But credit where credit's due , he did it well and scored more points than you, if I'm any judge. If you can't be arsed with reading Al's posts, that's really not my problem.

I have aimed to answer your points, where the points were relevant and interesting.  I haven't coveered everything, but hey! there's a whole forum full of people here, and it's clearly not all down to me.  This is not a call-out, though i do concede that it might have looked rather too much like a call-out.

Is that enough of the mea culpa stuff now? 

[Walkie]

obviously , I posted the above, prior to finding Odeon's thoughtful, closely-reasoned post above it.

for that one, Odeon. This thread is improving

[Jack]

Has anyone uttered a word why Muslims might be 'prejudiced' against non-Muslims?  Does anyone actually think they hate us 'becozzz werrr freeee'?  We've been destroying the Middle East for decades, blocking democracy and supporting brutal regimes as well as stealing their resources and blowing them up.  But when we do it, we don't call it terrorism.  Does anyone actually believe the narrative that we went into Afghanistan to 'liberate women', to find Bin Laden and knock out Al Qaeda and the Taliban?  When the US supported Jihadists in the 80's that threw acid into women's faces, they never charged Bin Laden with 9/11 and the US supports Al Qaeda.  Or went into Iraq because Saddam had connections with Al Qaeda, and because he was a horrible person and because we love democracy so much?  When this was all a lie spewed out from Israeli intelligence, and we supported Saddam through his worst crimes.   

Did anyone think it would be a good idea to flood the West with people from the Middle East while we destroyed the Middle East?

The establishment have done this intentionally, they're not that stupid.  They want people to support their wars against the Muslim world and support Israel.   

What a shame. I found myself agreeing with some of your post until you sawed off the branch you were sitting on.

I don't care whether you agree with me or not.  Obviously it's going to be difficult for you to agree with stuff that goes over your head.

Personally found it to be one of your best posts.

He had the makings of a good post but the tinfoil hat is hard to ignore.

My tinfoil hat has fashion and flair.

[Al Swearegen]

PS. Thing is, I might not have put it that way, but I actually decided this worth a new thread because I took the statement I quoted as sincere.  I therefore anticipated a sincere argument, and thus far, I feel pretty damned disappointed , but I'm willing to think that A) perhaps I asked for it? and B) it's recoverable?

In what way do you think my reply was anything less than sincere?

I know...I know...because you are ideologically criticising with the intent to win and shoutdown rather than to actually understand the position of your opponent. You have already cast Walkie and me and others as anti-Muslim and as you as the only defender and so anything we say will be misrepresented in your ideologically skewed pea brain , into an anti-Muslim slur that you will defend. There is no sincerity in that.

You've been completely unable to question your own views and ideologies ever since I first had enough of your intellectual dishonesty against Zegh, so you should probably shut up and keep a low profile. Pot kettle and all that. But this is the one thing you will always be unable to do because you simply lack the open-mindedness that is required.

And I mean that quite literally. You lack both "open" and "mind".

Undoubtedly you will now produce another one of your failed hypotheticals, so have at it. We all need a laugh.

I should shut up. Hate to burst your bubble, but that is not going to happen and your opinion in respect to this and your judgment is hardly with a snort of derision, much less actual consideration.

The amount of projection here in this reply is outstanding. Ironic.

Even now when I point out your hypocrisy (and bold it to try and handhold and lead you to it) you stumble over it and past it and project your faults on me. Its not cute nor is it upsetting. It is damning only on you. All I will do at these moments is shine a torch on it.

Odeon the Projectionist.

Ah! thanks, IQ. OK , maybe you don't have a lot to add , but t least that looks like a genuine, just  saying-what-I -mean comment 

Hey, Al! Maybe we can just talk as if Odeon's not here? No ned to address him, if he's not playing ball, is there?

I posted in this thread yesterday and again today. But feel free to ignore me if you only want friendly nods instead of actual discussion.

You are not making "actual discussion" you are too busy "defending Muslims" here when no one is attacking Muslims. That is not a discussion because an actual discussion needs both party NOT to talk at cross purposes.  I know the thought of being a moral defender gives you a thrill up your leg BUT it is redundant in "actual discussions".

In a bigot's world, it's never about attacking, is it? So yeah, it's obvious that you don't see it.

It could well be being that I am not a bigot and presumably neither are any of the people here talking about radical Muslim extremism or Muslims in general, you have really failed to make a point. Who amoung us have been critical of Islam? Who has said that Muslims are all rasdicalised and dangerous? For God's sake, what position do you think you are actually defending and from whom?

[DirtDawg]

I the "Indians" had given the pilgrims a donkey instead of a turkey, then we might all enjoy a piece of ass during this season.

 

(seemed to fit)

[Al Swearegen]

I don't know if direct stats are available on this, but the kind of stats  that would really interst me, are not "terrorism" stats as such but something more along the lines of "Acts of aggression against feedom of speech,  freedom of religion etc"

http://economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Global-Terrorism-Index-2015.pdf

Some of the things you are looking for are there, but as you point out yourself, most wouldn't be classified as terrorism. Charlie Hebdo, Salman Rushdie and the like are a mere footnote when compared to the systematic repression of free speech in many parts of the world.

The problem in what you are saying (which superficially looks fine btw) is your use of "many parts of the world". In Thailand, try saying anything aloud disrespectful of the King. You will have your right to free speech respected. That is THEIR custom.
So how is that different to Radical Muslim extremists? They also would not respect free speech to criticise Muhammad.
So what will the Thai people (or indeed any subset or groups within the Thai people) do to you in YOUR country if you criticise or parody their King? Now make the same argument for what radicalised Muslim extremists will do for criticising or parodying Muhammed. If you are struggling, start with Charlie Hebdo and go from there.

When Walkie talks about the threat of free speech and you seem to agree in principle and then talk about other places in the world, it waters down entirely what she is talking about and I think you do this deliberately. There is no direct equivalence in threat to free speech from the Thais nor the Russians nor any group within such countries that absolutely have recognisable inhibitions on free speech. Let's stick to where the problems ACTUALLY lay.
 

Obviously, some Islamist terrorist attacks would equally come under that heading eg the attack on Charlie Hebdo
Blowing up that statue of Buddha  would count
The fatwa against Salman Rushdie would count.
And bviously a lot of of acts by other religious groups  would count too.

IMO, the Islamist terror attacks have been very different from the IRA terror attacks on England. The IRA message was "Withdraw your troops from Northern Ireland". There was actually a lot of sympathy for their cause amongst the English, if not for the methods.   ( I know. I was there. I had Irish Catholic friends with IRA sympathies. A lot of people did. ) . It put  the English on the horns of one hellova   dilemma, but it was (arguably) a reasonable demand

I see where you're coming from but would argue that groups like Al Qaeda have similar messages (i.e. GTFO of the Middle East), and actually, so do ISIS, even though their idea seems to be to expand to a worldwide caliphate. The differences between them and IRA are in how they define and allow the use of political violence.

Indeed there is ABSOLUTELY an element of this and I know people like Benji and myself have absolutely been critical of the West and more specifically the US and its allies in starting wars and conflicts and trying to nation build and interfere with World Policing.

They have made a rod for their own backs.

But it is not hypocrisy nor being disingenuous that I can be critical of the interfering and world policing (and can even see how people from such regions may hate us collectively for said interfering) and yet condemn what they believe is adequate response when it comes to the treatment of radicalised Muslim extremists and their attacks at Westerners.

One does not make the other right.

ISIS is absolutely about setting up a new caliphate. They Absolutely want to spread Islamic rule. They are absolutely opposed to Western values and Western people. They are absolutely a danger and talk of their justifications or differences in culture or alluding to any efforts to stop them being bigoted as to it possibly impacting on decent Muslims is both stupid and disingenuous.

It;s that demand  makes the attacks so deeply threatening , not the number of people killed.  We've been reminded ad nauseam that our chance of being killed in a terror attack is minute, compared to our chances of being killed crossing the road. and I alway think, so what?   The cars and trucks are not threatening my freedom .

And neither are the Muslims, even though that is the message brought to you by the populist politicians and media.

Not that any of us ARE talking about Muslims and you are not too stupid to not computer this right. "Our" gripe is ONLY (read that) for the radicalised Muslim extremists. So its cute and all that you steer away from these groups to constantly talk about Muslims as a whole and pretend that is what you were responding to. But you are not fooling us and you are not apply that point to what was saying specifically. (I'd give it up were I you because I am not even sure you believe it).

That's why so many people all over the world stood up and declared "I am Charlie" . We were all saying : we will not be intimidated into giving up any of our freedoms. And the freedom to mock a religion is every bit as important as the freedom to practice that  religion.

And I fully agree. But where is their support when less visible but far more serious threats against these freedoms pop up in places like Poland, Hungary, France or (obviously) Russia?

In all fairness, when Trump was elected, protests erupted because enough people see through him. In all fairness, it's why some Jews now say they will register as Muslims if Trump goes ahead with the Muslim database.

More serious threats? Fail.

When Trump was elected, people had been whipped up into a frenzy that they believed that he was a threat and so when they had the double whammy of Hillary not winning like they were promised and him being a leader like they had all been taught to fear through the fearmongering media, they protested in fear.

It was NOT that they were basing this on anything more than zealous ideology. "He is Literally Hitler. He is going to go from home to home with immigration deportations squads and set up deportation detention centres and even send Black Africans "back" to Africa." Yes this is not hyperbole. People ACTUALLY believe that and not from what Trump said, but what they were told by the Press, the DNC tasking heads, community leaders and Academic institutions.

Pretending that:

protests erupted because enough people see through him

is just disingenuous, and believing it is idiotic.

As for registers...and? Some Jews believe what exactly about registers or databases recording Muslims from these areas? Do you know why it is that Muslims coming from Iraq are NOW able to be vetted but Muslims from Libya or Syria aren't? What is the one reason? Intel. What kind of intel? Registers of all the Iraqi based Muslims are now thorough enough to account for enough of the threats as to be marginal.

See that is the problem. People see the word "register and suddenly let their imaginations run in conspiratorial directions because they feel a negative undercurrent which makes them fearful that the person using said register will do so to do harm. What if said register is simply not a sword but a shield. It is just recording who is who so that the nastier elements are able to be identified and contained? what if identifying the bad elements means that the decent Muslims who are NOT radical extremists are NOT restricted from access to America and not otherwise inhibited? Wouldn't that be swell?

[Walkie]

There are quite a few statements on this thread that I would like to take issue with , but right now, in the wake of Al's last post, I think the thing that really needs saying right now, is that identifying the radical extremists and keeping them out of America is not actually a solution.

I don't have an alternative solution to propose. If such a thing as a real solution exists then I don't believe anybody is going to find it without  first facing up to a plethora  of uncomfortable facts, the chief of which  would be: it's not that simple. I'm not claiming to to know all the relevant uncomfortable facts, but I'm pretty damned sure that the dialogue on this issue  (world over)  is dominated by prejudice, and that prejudice is always apt to find spurious solutions, via facile analysis of problems.

Unfortunately the SJW are as prejudiced as everybody else is . I'm not trying to use the word "prejudice" as a pejorative. Prejudice is a natural human condition, arising from our inabilty to process every little bit of information that comes our way; we just have to live with that somehow, and figure out ways of preventing it from having catastrophic effects .  You certainly can't legislate against it. The best that  legislation can do is displace one set of social prejudices with another, as the dominant "politically correct" norm. Ofc, education is effective, but I use that term broadly. If "education" is all about absorbing societal norms from any culture whatsoever , then it will serve to deepen prejudice, nort undermine it. Education has to equate to that old-fashioned English notion of "broadening the mind". (I call that old fasdhioned because i really didn't see that happening at my English grammar school, back in the seventies. I saw much lip-service to that idea, and a curriculum that more often  worked to the opposite effect. But at least , back then, that defect appeared to be unintentional. Nowadays, the whole concept of broadening the mind appears to have been left behind- at least in the State sector -  in favour of making education "relevant") . In practice, then, I guess that has to mean self-education

I do very much like like that the "liberal"  bigotry is being effectively challenged. It had become really dangerous, IMO .But it's no use challenging that in isolation, as if some other form of bigotry would make a better job of things. I'm not even convinced that the powers-that-be really care what kind of bigotry we adopt, just so long as it distracts our attention, and keeps the little guy attacking  some other little guy.

I do believe Islam is a problem , and needs to be acknowleged as such. But it would need to acknowleged as such, even if it wasn't any part of the problem, because you can't just suppress a commonly-held point-of-view without creating worse problems than the ones you might expect to resolve in that way. (Hey! maybe we should make  Psychology a compulsory  subject in schools? That might work to curtail the widespread enthusiasm for naive, simplistic solurtions that don't work, mightn't it? )

Arguably, Trump is that "worse problem" , in America.   But my point  is that the "Islam problem" has been defined in such a way that idfentifying "radical exteremists" and refusing them admittance to Amnerica   can be profferred as a credible solution.

It's not hard to find reasons why that couldn't possibly make much of a difference to anything (beyond increasing righteous indignation in various quarters) . Here's the the one that's uppermost in my mind right now (mostly because I think it's inarguable)

The Muslim  terrorists and jihadists in Britain have repeatedly turned out to be home-grown. That is native British Citizens, not from "over there" at all. Nor are they the offspring of radical Muslim parents.  The parents most often turn out to liberal , and sometimes even non-Muslim.   Maybe that pattern has yet to emerge in other countries, where Muslim imnmigration is a relatively novel phenomenon? I don't know. But it's very clear , here.

I hesitated to say that, because, personally, i don't think terrorism and jihadism  are the real issues any way, just another ugly symptom of a bunch of deeper , more complex problems, few of which are specifically  Islamic.  Also, it's probably easy to find a credibible hypothesis as to why that occurs, and run with that hypothesis straight into some other spurious solution. There are loads of theories, and we're always too fast to get behind them, because nobody likes to think that they "just don't know", do they?  We all like to think that we know exactly what 's going wrong, and exactly how to fix it.

Anyway, be that as it may, this idea of screening immigrants is surely a spurious solution.

[Al Swearegen]

I do not think it is either an either/or solution. I think it is entirely reasonable to suggest that trying to keep out a bad minority of radicalised extremists is not requiring that all home grown extremists are taken care of first or visa versa.

I think there is a much bigger reason to shoot holes in that plan. IF "people from that area" are temporarily stopped from coming into America then surely that would move through Europe and say they were from somewhere not from that area. If it was applied to Muslims only, why not say you were Christian or Buddhist or something else? IF they do this then ironically the only people whop would really be affected would be the people that America (presumably) would not mind immigrating.