I am an Islamophobe. If you are not, you might not be a moral person.

[Walker]

But where muslims might soon be.

Add together all the non-whites in this country and you don't even get to 13%. Take just the Pakistanis(presumably the main Muslim population) and you just about get 2%. So no, not soon at all.

Is it true that it's illegal to burn a koran in England, but not a bible?

No. But I'm guessing you'd fall foul of incitement laws.

Statistics.

It’s a matter of focused purpose, which is done by focusing the population, both with intent and location. And since birds of a feather flock together, that isn’t so difficult.
- Example: the mayor of London.
- Example: Osho’s minions legally took over a town in the USofA, or maybe it was a whole county.
- Example: political power to influence laws and regulations, based on the unlikely agenda of sexual identification. Or, maybe it’s called gender identification.
- Example: In the USA, Obama’s political projects were unpopular. The country did not want the monster stimulus package, cash for clunkers, or an overhaul of the healthcare system. So, how was he successful? He did it with ruthless, focused political will and purpose; sweeping aside the legislative process of negotiation among the representives of the people, and by railroading legislation during a short, two-year period when his party had the majority. And he did it by telling really big shameless lies, knowing they were lies, and looking right into that camera eye. This was all tacitly supported by big media, and there was little investigation into his actions. There was little investigation into his history.

Christianity is not forced upon people.
- It is offered.
- Sometimes it is offered with food in one hand, and a bible in the other.

It is not offered with food in one hand, and a sword in the other.
- A Christian will not not say convert or die.
- A Christian will not say that because you did not convert, time to die.
- Not even soldiers who are Christian holler "Praise Jesus!" as they go about their secular duties.
- The moral authority for the one who says those things is found in the tenets of a religion that kills Christians, because they are Christians.
- The question is, how devout to the tenets is any particular follower?

Although Christians kill, the moral authority to kill is not taken from the tenets of Christianity.
- The moral authority is either ego, or secular. (Greetings! You have been conscripted.)

From what I’ve heard, at least one religion is forced and enforced under threat of penality.
- This is accomplished by making the religion the equilivant of secular law, according to the tenets of the religion.
- This is done even in this day and age, so far removed from the middle ages. Imagine that.
- Rather backwards, wot?
- Imagine a religion legally meting out taxation, shunning, corporeal punishment varying in severity, and even death. Most folks will say, sign me up for the religion that doesn’t do that to me.

The difference between Christianity, and the other one that wants to kill Christianity, is:
- The second is a totalitarian outlook.
- The first is not.
- Thus, the affinity of the second religion with the old axis that was on a conquest spree.
- That was war conquest spree.
- Invasion is another method of conquest.

Do you think people put political analysis above fitting in with the crowd?
- I don't think so.

I think the media tell people what to think in a lot of ways.
- And then people think that way.

[vegetariantaxidermy]

But where muslims might soon be.

Add together all the non-whites in this country and you don't even get to 13%. Take just the Pakistanis(presumably the main Muslim population) and you just about get 2%. So no, not soon at all.

Is it true that it's illegal to burn a koran in England, but not a bible?

No. But I'm guessing you'd fall foul of incitement laws.

Statistics.

It’s a matter of focused purpose, which is done by focusing the population, both with intent and location. And since birds of a feather flock together, that isn’t so difficult.
- Example: the mayor of London.
- Example: Osho’s minions legally took over a town in the USofA, or maybe it was a whole county.
- Example: political power to influence laws and regulations, based on the unlikely agenda of sexual identification. Or, maybe it’s called gender identification.
- Example: In the USA, Obama’s political projects were unpopular. The country did not want the monster stimulus package, cash for clunkers, or an overhaul of the healthcare system. So, how was he successful? He did it with ruthless, focused political will and purpose; sweeping aside the legislative process of negotiation among the representives of the people, and by railroading legislation during a short, two-year period when his party had the majority. And he did it by telling really big shameless lies, knowing they were lies, and looking right into that camera eye. This was all tacitly supported by big media, and there was little investigation into his actions. There was little investigation into his history.

Christianity is not forced upon people.
- It is offered.
- Sometimes it is offered with food in one hand, and a bible in the other.

It is not offered with food in one hand, and a sword in the other.
- A Christian will not not say convert or die.
- A Christian will not say that because you did not convert, time to die.
- Not even soldiers who are Christian holler "Praise Jesus!" as they go about their secular duties.
- The moral authority for the one who says those things is found in the tenets of a religion that kills Christians, because they are Christians.
- The question is, how devout to the tenets is any particular follower?

Although Christians kill, the moral authority to kill is not taken from the tenets of Christianity.
- The moral authority is either ego, or secular. (Greetings! You have been conscripted.)

From what I’ve heard, at least one religion is forced and enforced under threat of penality.
- This is accomplished by making the religion the equilivant of secular law, according to the tenets of the religion.
- This is done even in this day and age, so far removed from the middle ages. Imagine that.
- Rather backwards, wot?
- Imagine a religion legally meting out taxation, shunning, corporeal punishment varying in severity, and even death. Most folks will say, sign me up for the religion that doesn’t do that to me.

The difference between Christianity, and the other one that wants to kill Christianity, is:
- The second is a totalitarian outlook.
- The first is not.
- Thus, the affinity of the second religion with the old axis that was on a conquest spree.
- That was war conquest spree.
- Invasion is another method of conquest.

Do you think people put political analysis above fitting in with the crowd?
- I don't think so.

I think the media tell people what to think in a lot of ways.
- And then people think that way.

You don't know much about kristianity then.

[Walker]

Cripes, don't knock yourself out with the effort or anything.

Thanks for the opinion for what it's worth, just as mine was starting to change a bit.

*

You know, it all quickly goes down the digital memory hole.
- Some say flush.

For the brief moment we’re here, our being defines the realm in which we are.
- That is, the Buddhist realms, which are also psychological states of being.

A bit more sticky than moods. But that’s okay.
- Dog paddling in the shallows is good to stay alive, to continue existing as words, and life is the measure of coming and going.

The Wind-Up shallowness …
- Does it belong to the demi-god, or god?
- I’m fairly certain it is not animal, hell-being, or ghost.
- Maybe it’s human. Hooman.

Or I could say … Huh? Waddya mean, VT?
- Or, possibly dwell in another realm of being, seeking buttons to push, and … look at me, telling you. How silly.

(Well I'll be darned. Here's a little diamond not oft considered. Buddha didn't include AI in the realms, did he. This has implications.)

[Immanuel Can]

You must be careful when ascribing the actions of some people, who claim to be of a certain religion, to that religion, especially when those acts are contrary to the teachings of that religion. In those instances the person claiming to be of a certain religion is not acting in accord with the teachings of that religion, and those acts should not be attributed to that religion.

Good point. You can only blame a "religion" for what its adherence do when they are actually obeying it. What they do when they disobey, or contradict, or disregard it, well, that has to be on the individuals in question. Likewise, not everybody who claims a religious affiliation or title has a great deal of seriousness about practicing that religion. Some are just hangers-on, who like the name, or were born into the tradition of something, or who joined for the social aspects or ceremonial comforts of the religion...but they tend to have no deep commitment to or understanding of anything in the tradition they espouse. Those people are also not the fault of the "religion" in question.

On the flip side, the problem for the dismissers of "religion" (e.g. the Atheist set) is that, having already dismissed it, they aren't interested in an honest look at "religion." Perhaps because they believe in nothing fervently themselves (or at least they think they don't) most seem to have already decided "religion" is like unicorn farming -- and what more can be said about something so fictive, a thing that they have already written off in their own minds permanently? It never seems to occur to them that people DO believe things, and believe them strongly.

Unfortunately for the West right now, we're discovering that for some people, their "religion" is far more compelling to them then we secular types are capable of imagining, and that what these people believe is really something they'll kill for. If nothing else, a spirit of self-preservation ought to kick in, and the secular West should become very interested in knowing what they're really dealing with...before it's too late.

However, I fear that their casual contempt for "religion" will keep them asleep until it's too late. That, and the myth of the equivalency of all "religions." If they really understood what they're dealing with, I think they'd deal more circumspectly.

I think maybe you have to have lived in a culture where an ideology like Islam dominates to know exactly how awful, miserable and dangerous such places are...particularly for women and dissenters. We lack the imagination, in the West, to get our heads around the idea that other people have no modicum of our post-Protestant assumptions about tolerance and conscience. We can't believe that when they see us, they won't want to be us.

But they've seen us. They do not like what they see. Only a minority is attracted to some aspects of our lifestyle, statistically the majority -- and almost all their leaders -- are against Western values with a visceral antipathy.

[Vendetta]

Good point. You can only blame a "religion" for what its adherence do when they are actually obeying it. What they do when they disobey, or contradict, or disregard it, well, that has to be on the individuals in question. Likewise, not everybody who claims a religious affiliation or title has a great deal of seriousness about practicing that religion. Some are just hangers-on, who like the name, or were born into the tradition of something, or who joined for the social aspects or ceremonial comforts of the religion...but they tend to have no deep commitment to or understanding of anything in the tradition they espouse. Those people are also not the fault of the "religion" in question.

On the flip side, the problem for the dismissers of "religion" (e.g. the Atheist set) is that, having already dismissed it, they aren't interested in an honest look at "religion." Perhaps because they believe in nothing fervently themselves (or at least they think they don't) most seem to have already decided "religion" is like unicorn farming -- and what more can be said about something so fictive, a thing that they have already written off in their own minds permanently? It never seems to occur to them that people DO believe things, and believe them strongly.

Unfortunately for the West right now, we're discovering that for some people, their "religion" is far more compelling to them then we secular types are capable of imagining, and that what these people believe is really something they'll kill for. If nothing else, a spirit of self-preservation ought to kick in, and the secular West should become very interested in knowing what they're really dealing with...before it's too late.

However, I fear that their casual contempt for "religion" will keep them asleep until it's too late. That, and the myth of the equivalency of all "religions." If they really understood what they're dealing with, I think they'd deal more circumspectly.

An excellent point. Perhaps before writing religion off as violent and inherently flawed we should take a good honest look at the parts of it that cause people to believe in theirs so ardently and understand why that is so and where their followers might have been misled to believe that committing destructive acts is what the religion seeks. Instead of elimatinating religion, what if we attempted to fix it? Obviously people believe these things for a reason. So why? Why is it that these people become so devoted to these causes that they feel the need to initiate violence in their name? What is it that makes certain beliefs so compelling?

[Immanuel Can]

An excellent point. Perhaps before writing religion off as violent and inherently flawed we should take a good honest look at the parts of it that cause people to believe in theirs so ardently and understand why that is so and where their followers might have been misled to believe that committing destructive acts is what the religion seeks. Instead of elimatinating religion, what if we attempted to fix it? Obviously people believe these things for a reason. So why? Why is it that these people become so devoted to these causes that they feel the need to initiate violence in their name? What is it that makes certain beliefs so compelling?

Absolutely.

We should want to study what all kinds of people believe -- both secularly and "religiously". We should want to know why they believe it, and what actions are produced by particular beliefs. You would think we'd know a lot about that by now...but as I said, visceral contempt for anything is a poor incentive to scholarship -- or even to common sense. What we have is mostly a stock of rather dismissive platitudes, not a very realistic portrait of how people form or sustain meaning in their own lives.

We've never needed good studies of belief -- secular or religious -- as a phenomenon any more than we do today.

[Vendetta]

An excellent point. Perhaps before writing religion off as violent and inherently flawed we should take a good honest look at the parts of it that cause people to believe in theirs so ardently and understand why that is so and where their followers might have been misled to believe that committing destructive acts is what the religion seeks. Instead of elimatinating religion, what if we attempted to fix it? Obviously people believe these things for a reason. So why? Why is it that these people become so devoted to these causes that they feel the need to initiate violence in their name? What is it that makes certain beliefs so compelling?

Absolutely.

We should want to study what all kinds of people believe -- both secularly and "religiously". We should want to know why they believe it, and what actions are produced by particular beliefs. You would think we'd know a lot about that by now...but as I said, visceral contempt for anything is a poor incentive to scholarship -- or even to common sense. What we have is mostly a stock of rather dismissive platitudes, not a very realistic portrait of how people form or sustain meaning in their own lives.

We've never needed good studies of belief -- secular or religious -- as a phenomenon any more than we do today.

Exactly. Constant, repetitive and dismissive platitudes. That is just not enough in terms of explanation. What we need is a willingness to suspend disbelief. Our desire to understand must outweigh our need to defend our own beliefs.
Hmm..I think I'm​ going to look more into this.

[Greatest I am]

In which era?

The only era with first hand information.

Here and now.

Regards
DL

Then I prefer to live in my country where Christians are not the majority.

That was not the question.

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

You are correct in that I miss-used the word, partly to show my Canadian and American friends who are presently thinking of outlawing the term, to define it better.

Indeed. It should be rejected. It's not informative of the position taken by those who are hesitant about the value of Islam.

I have a fear that the ideology of Islam and Sharia, which is a slave owning ideology that does not recognize equality under the law, should ever infest the Western world.

My suggestion about that would not be to reject Muslims per se, and certainly not as people. Nor is it necessary to ban the private practice and belief in Islam, if people would like to do that; but right resistance should coalesce resistance around the core issue of Sharia. It should be written into every Western constitution that the compelling of people to practice Sharia and the abusing of people who do not practice it should be made permanently illegal by constitutional fiat. Any attempt to enshrine Sharia in public policy or law should be ruled out by constitutional law.

So Muslims can immigrate and practice their beliefs privately, unmolested. But no precept of Sharia should ever be allowed to form the public practice, the educational system, or the collective laws and policies of any country. Period.

That would clear up the issues, while removing any scurrilous charges of "racism" or "Islamophobia."

I could not say this better.

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

all in the name of God people do rottenness and demand conformity.

and that's their sincerity.

God would rather take in total strangers that were upright and knew not God than seek the worship of evil bastards who were faithful to a false standard.

to me it's all a matter of what a person decides to be in their am and has nothing to do with beliefs or convictions as to finding heaven.

heaven will be full of naturalists who were honest and all the devout religious and faithful will find themselves in a hell of their own doing.

Your love is pushing your hate to want to move the markers. Duty calls.

There are more like us daily.

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

Is it not unfair to assign much of the blame for religious violence in the world to Muslims when there have been horrible acts done in the name of God by members of all religions? I think what should be called into question here is the concept of religion itself.

I do call into question the full concept of religion. It does not take long for posters to recognize that what they are saying of one idol worshiping religion or cults can be said of then all.

I like the wisdom seeking traditions, I do not see any good in the idol worshiping religions like our misogynous and homophobic Christianity and Islam.

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

Is it not unfair to assign much of the blame for religious violence in the world to Muslims when there have been horrible acts done in the name of God by members of all religions? I think what should be called into question here is the concept of religion itself.

You must be careful when ascribing the actions of some people, who claim to be of a certain religion, to that religion, especially when those acts are contrary to the teachings of that religion. In those instances the person claiming to be of a certain religion is not acting in accord with the teachings of that religion, and those acts should not be attributed to that religion.

Nor should one ignore the religious roots that justify Jihad and Inquisitions.

If you fly the flag that the Jihadist or Inquisitor does, you are helping promote the slavery inherent in both religions, along with their homophobia and misogyny.

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

An excellent point. Perhaps before writing religion off as violent and inherently flawed we should take a good honest look at the parts of it that cause people to believe in theirs so ardently and understand why that is so and where their followers might have been misled to believe that committing destructive acts is what the religion seeks. Instead of elimatinating religion, what if we attempted to fix it? Obviously people believe these things for a reason. So why? Why is it that these people become so devoted to these causes that they feel the need to initiate violence in their name? What is it that makes certain beliefs so compelling?

Absolutely.

We should want to study what all kinds of people believe -- both secularly and "religiously". We should want to know why they believe it, and what actions are produced by particular beliefs. You would think we'd know a lot about that by now...but as I said, visceral contempt for anything is a poor incentive to scholarship -- or even to common sense. What we have is mostly a stock of rather dismissive platitudes, not a very realistic portrait of how people form or sustain meaning in their own lives.

We've never needed good studies of belief -- secular or religious -- as a phenomenon any more than we do today.

People do not always take well to the truth. They fear Gnosis and reality without their supernatural crutch.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LNSe4Ff ... r_embedded

Regards
DL

[Greatest I am]

An excellent point. Perhaps before writing religion off as violent and inherently flawed we should take a good honest look at the parts of it that cause people to believe in theirs so ardently and understand why that is so and where their followers might have been misled to believe that committing destructive acts is what the religion seeks. Instead of elimatinating religion, what if we attempted to fix it? Obviously people believe these things for a reason. So why? Why is it that these people become so devoted to these causes that they feel the need to initiate violence in their name? What is it that makes certain beliefs so compelling?

Absolutely.

We should want to study what all kinds of people believe -- both secularly and "religiously". We should want to know why they believe it, and what actions are produced by particular beliefs. You would think we'd know a lot about that by now...but as I said, visceral contempt for anything is a poor incentive to scholarship -- or even to common sense. What we have is mostly a stock of rather dismissive platitudes, not a very realistic portrait of how people form or sustain meaning in their own lives.

We've never needed good studies of belief -- secular or religious -- as a phenomenon any more than we do today.

Exactly. Constant, repetitive and dismissive platitudes. That is just not enough in terms of explanation. What we need is a willingness to suspend disbelief. Our desire to understand must outweigh our need to defend our own beliefs.
Hmm..I think I'm​ going to look more into this.

Martin Luther.
“Faith must trample under foot all reason, sense, and understanding.”
“Reason is a whore, the greatest enemy that faith has.”

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.
Galileo Galilee

Regards
DL

[Immanuel Can]

...That would clear up the issues, while removing any scurrilous charges of "racism" or "Islamophobia."

I could not say this better.

Regards
DL

Thanks. I think it's the solution. Focus on eliminating Sharia. It's the core of what we don't want and what nobody needs.