Islamic jihad: the genocide in the Sudan

Oh, come on, Rick, Buz made the point very nicely. The Bible has nothing in it to provoke violence in the world today; it has a message based on God's actions through ancient Israel for a limited and specific purpose in the very distant past. The Quran on the other hand advocates ongoing present action against unbelievers in our world today (at least as the terrorist factions read it -- and there are a lot of them, and such action against Christians and other religions is going on in the Sudan and all over the Eastern world as we speak). And you reduce that to your silly little formula? Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

But your thinking is all speculative, based on nothing but your own imagination. How many psychotics can there be over there anyway? There are a LOT of terrorist recruits, and most of them pass in the world, in the West too, as quite normal, even personable guys. No, Mod, this is ideological. I'm sure there must be some personal predisposing factors, but I don't think those are anything too bizarre in the context of Islam. Their willingness to kill and die for the killing comes from their belief that God will reward them for it. {Edit: And psychotics don't usually act in concert with others either}.Let us know what "The Making of a Terrorist" has to say though.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Well, not quite. My thinking comes from reading and listening to the reports of experts in the field. I only discussed a limited number of scenarios (one in particular). Psychotics were a small subset of the scenario. I was mostly talking about pissed off people with an axe to grind. Yes. But their motivation comes from elsewhere, and the reason why they don't realise that their God won't reward them for it is psychological in nature...they don't want to - their anger clouds their mind. Whether that anger comes from something specific like a family member (or friend of the family) being killed, or just general disaffection enflamed by charismatic rhetoric from our Masterminds. I even mentioned greed (Masterminds paying the terrorists families a handsome sum).Muslims don't just look at the Qu'ran and say 'Oh right, I'll blow myself up then'. Why do you think these masterminds spend so much time trying to recruit new members? You mentioned Wahabbi infiltration into US Mosques. Why do that? Because then they can begin with the grand sounding rhetoric, sewing the seeds of discontent before offering a way to fix things. All the while trying to convince people that it is justified/encouraged by their holy book. It doesn't matter whether or not it is...as long as they can convince people it is.You asked a question - why don't these people see through all of this brainwashing and realise that their God doesn't say this or that. The answer is most of them do, but the masterminds don't need to convince everybody, just a percentage of angry, gullible, or homicidal people will do. Most people that are already homicidal do this anyway...but I don't think that terrorists start as homicidal. I think they are angry and possibly they would like to kill people for it, but in an abstract way that most people do when they have been wronged. If you catch someone like this at the right time, and give them the means, most of the time it won't happen. But even a 1% success rate will result in a legion of terrorists.Plenty of people have killed and died crying "Deus Vult!" and similar things - in spite of the fact that the religious texts in question don't actually say that He will it at all.You know that 1% of people are schizophrenic, as many as 5% are sociopathic and about the same amount of psychopathic. I wasn't using the technical term for psychotic...I was just using it as a synonym for 'nutter' 'loon' 'maniac' 'extremely antisocial. That is to say I was talking about something more akin to sociopaths/psychopaths rather than psychotic. Heh - if it didn't cost $300 I would, I'll have to hope someone buys it for my birthday.

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You know that one of the favoured recruitment centres for extremists is in prison: Why prison? Could it be filled with anti-social dissaffected people? And more: from here. The theme wherever I look at experts on terrorism is not "Islam teaches violences that's why", but "Islam can easily be used to justify violence and it is easier to squeeze a radical message from the Qu'ran...so people who are dissafected, anti-social and willing to commit violence (violent criminals for example), find the Imam's words make sense..."The question is - why do they need to do all this to recruit terrorists...why can the Qu'ran not speak for itself? The reason is because the Qu'ran does not proscribe such acts, but a charismatic orator can convince a certain percentage of a certain kind of audience that the Qu'ran does tell people to commit terrorism. Voila!Edited by Modulous, : a few clarifications is all

Can you get around to answering Message 55? You keep asserting that the Qur'an is a call to violence, you even provided a specific quote, but so far have totally failed to back up your specific quote. Is this just another example of you misrepresenting stuff or is this actually one that you will support.In Message 54 Faith wrote: We are now near the mid point of this thread and you still have not supported your assertion.

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Aslan is not a Tame Lion

You may continue to wait impatiently as you prefer.

You cannot possibly know this. This is sheer speculation. "Don't realize that their God won't reward them" is not a personal psychological state, it's part of the culture, and they believe it is the truth. You can't insist that their minds are merely clouded to what YOU believe to be the truth. Same goes for any researchers who are trying to prove this. A person's being "disaffected" says nothing whatever about the religious belief itself.I personally think that the personal motivations, even from some of your quotes, have more to do with the cockeyed idealism of murdering people you think God is against rather than any motivation of their own to murder them. Serving God is their motivation, not the murders in other words. Whatever God wants, they want to be man enough for that. Of course "masterminds" are involved, but all they are is very zealous followers of their idea of God inspiring the same zeal in their recruits.I wish you had quoted me about this supposed brainwashing becasue I don't recognize it and I don't have the patience to hunt it down right now. I don't expect them to raise questions about their belief or see through the "brainwashing." In a way that's what I'm saying, too, but you seem to think the ultimate goal is murder for murder's sake, and I don't. I see the whole thing as the product of the teachings of Islam about what Allah wants, and it doesn't matter what sorts of experiences have made a person willing to kill and die for it, the ideology of doing God's will is what drives the whole shebang. Again you have this idea that the leaders are motivated by something other than serving their idea of God and I just don't. I believe they are sincerely following what they make of the Quran and aiming to inspire others to their own zeal. This doesn't preclude other motives coming from frustrated lives to fuel the endeavor, and of course that would be the most likely pool of recruits, but they ALL share belief in the Quran and it remains the fundamental reason for the acts.Deliver us from armchair psychologists I say.BY THE WAY, the word PROSCRIBE means to PROHIBIT. People seem to be using it to mean its opposite, "PREscribe" or "advocate" instead.Page not found - Dictionary.com

The same answer applies to this statement as it did the last time. This is based on the reports of experts in terrorism that I have seen. No, which is why not all Terrorists are Muslim. Terrorists can be Christian (IRA), Jewish (Irgun), Hindu (Tamil Tigers) or mixed (LRA/UPDCA). One thing you'll find in common with all these groups is some kind of political agenda by the masterminds. You may also find a strong element of dissaffection with authority. Yes - exactly, that is what I am saying. These people do think that they are murdering people God is against. The question you asked was why do these people not realise that their Holy Book does not condone such actions. No, not at all. What I am saying is that these people want to attack America/authority because they are really upset about them. Islam and corrupt imam's give them an excuse, the means, and the encouragement to give their anger form and make those that hurt them pay. I quoted you earlier - you didn't mention the brainwashing specifically, but I was putting your question into context of my posts. The exact quote I was responding to was:

quote:

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If you think you can separate terrorism from the teachings, why can't the terrorists? They are absolutely convinced that they are obeying Allah, and it looks to me like they have good reason to think so.

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And my response can be found in Message 121 where I introduced the idea that they are convinced they are obeying Allah because of the brainwashing (I don't like the term 'brainwashing' incidentally, because it sounds so vague, that's why I detailed a specific scenario rather than a generic brainwashing. For convenience I shortened it to brainwashing later). Almost identical opinion here - the difference is that it is a corrupted and twisted teaching of Islam about what Allah wants (in my opinion, and in the opinion of many millions of Muslims) that requries out of context quotes and charismatic rhetoric to stand up - the recruits are often ignorant of the historical context of the verses quoted (like what happens when people quote the Bible out of historical context), or don't care to look into it. That is to say: the people who are given this twisted lesson believe it because they want to believe it, not because it is true. Perhaps it is a sincere belief. I think its more like both. A political belief that has stemmed from their culture and religion. A bit like some Televangelists - I believe they are truly sincere in their belief of God...yet they still make a profit from it all. Many Christians would say that these televangelists are twisting the Bible for their own ends - yet they may still sincerely believe what they are saying. Touche, and with that joint concession we should turn it over to the terrorism experts and let the Qu'ran speak for itself. I've looked to the experts, and reported what they say, and quoted the Qu'ran and what it says. So far I've seen nothing from terrorism experts or the Qu'ran which says anything about Islam being murderous/rapist in nature. True. I noticed the error after my edit and didn't feel like doing another one. It's one of those words where a spelling error (no - I'm not going to pretend it was a typo) can change the intended meaning drastically. I figured you would know what I meant though

I meant to correct that to mean that those reports could only have been based on speculation, as I didn't mean you were speculating. They observe this and that and conclude that it is causal when they are just guessing. THEY couldn't possibly know this.I'll try to get back to more of what you said later. SO happy to hear you know what "proscribe" means -- it's been wrongly used so often at EvC lately it was getting to me. This is either ethnocentrism that is projecting Western views on to them, or political correctness, the fear of appearing to arrogantly judge millions of people, which leads them to dangerously false whitewashing conclusions. If you don't understand your enemy you can't deal with him efficiently. But I realize I have still to produce the evidence. Thing is I thought it's been produced so many times here and nobody pays attention anyway what's the point. But later later. I hate doing that kind of research. It's hard to find, my files are a mess etc.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.Edited by Faith, : No reason given.

Of course not, indeed if we want to push it I don't think anybody can possibly know anything.However, we can look at what the masterminds are saying by sitting in and listening. We can learn their tactics by confiscating the CD-ROMS and booklets. We can observe what is happening and make conclusions based on it.Its not KNOWING something, but they are the most educated hypothesis based on evidence that we have...better than your uninformed 'armchair' opinion of terrorism. These experts are the ones who earn a living combating and understanding the recruitment techniques of terrorists. The recruitment techniques are fairly well documented - but I suppose it could all be misinformation placed by the evil Islamists to make leftish politically correct secular atheists sympathize so much with them that it cripples the political process used to combat them. Or some other explanation. I don't think that's the case though.But we'll never know. No - its the truth. I have seen nothing from terrorism experts or the Qu'ran which says anything about Islam being murderous/rapist in nature. Maybe you are suggesting these people who spend all their time trying to apprehend terrorists, and the people that read terrorist literature and listen to terrorists speeches are fearful of judging people, and are wracked with pcness.I don't think that is true, but you are entitled to your opinion. Precisely. And when you are trying to understand your enemy I find it is dangerous to settle on the first and most obvious conclusion: They are Muslims so it must be their religion.I tend to try and look past such Fisher-Price answers. Such things are generally massively complex and religion is just one factor. In almost every case of religiously inspired extremism we find that the religion in question has been twisted and torn into a perversion. I don't see any reason to treat Islam any differently. Well - I've tried to find it, but all I see are a bunch of people taking single lines of the Qu'ran horribly out of context. I've seen a few people bring up translations which has been mangled deliberately to incite violence or smear Islam. I am very skeptical about jumping to the conclusion that Islam is as crazy as people make it out to be, and I've read the Qu'ran and seen none of it.I won't special plead - I consider other religions in the same way. I assume extremism comes from perverting the Holy Books, not from the Holy Books themselves, until evidence is provided to the contrary. I have been lied to by Muslims about what the Qu'ran says, in an attempt to convert me (and it almost succeeded), so you can trust that I have no love for Islam, and do not take the word of a Muslim about what the Qu'ran says without double checking for myself. No worries, Faith, I'm not going to chase you all over the place about it. I'm genuinley interested in the subject and would happily change my mind - but I'm a tough cookie to convince. Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

Jazzns, why don't you tell me what the jihadis claim to justify these acts?You are asserting you have an understanding of Islam. What are these Muslims claiming>?

All I saw were appeals to Old Testament scripture when Jesus clearly taught a new dispensation..."the law and the prophets were until John" and "from now on, the gospel of the kingdom is preached."Mohammed was a conquering general. Jesus eschewed the use of forced conversion and physical violence.Big difference and not answered yet, imo.

You never heard of the Waldensians, the Albingensians, the Donatists long before them, or the cathari?Backlash? Heck, millions of Christians stood up to the Pope and died for it. You need to get your head screwed on straight if you are acting like the Christian community simply went along with the Pope and his radical policies.

The problem for me is that all my sources are conservative. Not Christian, Conservative. And they tend to be automatically dismissed at EvC, in scornful tones, just BECAUSE they are Conservative. That's ad hominem but it's common here.It's not dead center but this search page on how the Canada plot was Muslim but was covered up is typical of my sources. And to me it looks like good stuff and I just don't feel like hearing the ridicule the lefties heap on these worthies.Sucuri WebSite Firewall - Access Denied

I don't dismiss something for being conservative, though I do tend to question sources that are trying to advance some kind of opinion/political point using empty good sounding rhetoric. The source you listed was fine (it might be wrong it might right, I didn't care to look into it), and I don't doubt that people that are self-proclaimed Muslims engage in Bad Things.However, I find equating Islam with the brutal theocracies that were/are self-proclaimed Islamic states is not good. Likewise with extremists. The question with Islam centres around only one thing, the Qu'ran - the written Word of God according to Muslims. Everything else in Islam is ancillary. Unfortunately, over the centuries some very bad people who claim to be an authority on the issue have used the religion to their own ends to increase their power or wealth. This has left us with a right royal mess. But the Qu'ran says that if we quarrel about anything we should refer it to Allah and the Apostle.It's difficult to generate any kind of trust given the issues under debate here, but all I can do is give you my assurances that all I seek is the truth in this regard and have no desire to be all nice and whitewashy with any religion since I disagree with them all equally (except one, of course). I am against anti-Jewish propaganda and anti-Christianity propaganda just as much as I am anti-Islam propaganda.Edited by Modulous, : No reason given.

That's not really true. Sharia is considered holy and so it's not just the Koran but the traditions within Sharia.