Monday, March 1, 2010

The Terror Apologists at Answering Muslims

They're outraged over at Answering Muslims about the Ft. Hood massacre. And it is a tragedy. There's no denying that. If it had been a few years back it could have been my brother Bill, who was in the military and was deployed in Iraq. I would have been devastated.

As painful as that thought is I can imagine the pain that Iraqis, Afghans, and Palestinians are going through right now. It's not just 13 dead in a given month in Iraq. It's more like thousands. I find it strange that while at Answering Muslims they are quick to express outrage over the death of 13 at Ft. Hood when you ask them about the tens of thousands killed in southeastern Turkey with U.S. weaponry, the millions driven from their homes, the untold misery carnage and devastation reigned down upon them, it seems they've never heard of it.

I ask them these questions. I ask them why, if they think Islamic fundamentalism is so bad now, why didn't they think it was bad when Indonesia, the most populous Muslim country in the world, was slaughtering hundreds of thousands of the indigenous people in East Timor? Why is radical Islamic fundamentalism only a problem when it's associated with enemies of the state, but not a problem when death comes at a far higher scale from friends of the state? Is the problem really Islamic fundamentalism? Or is the problem just the fact that certain Muslims don't do U.S. bidding?

But then they've never heard of East Timor and the critical role the U.S. played in perpetuating that crime. Why is that? George Orwell noticed the same thing:
The nationalist not only does not disapprove of atrocities committed by his own side, but he has a remarkable capacity for not even hearing about them.

7 comments:

Anthony Rogers said...

There are more than a few inaccuracies in Jon's account. For instance, no artificial distinction is made between "radical Islamic fundamentalism" and mainstream Islam over at Answering Muslims. There is no great disparity between what we see "radical" Muslims doing and what we know about the practice of Muhammad and his early companions. Jon assumes that his ignorance of Islamic sources is shared by everyone at Answering Muslims. It isn't.

Ironically, while Jon arbitrarily assumes such a distinction between radical Islam and mainstream Islam, he virtually assumes an identity between the United States and the Christian Church. I've always been told by atheists like Jon that America is a secular nation. If that is so, then the actions Jon deplores need to be laid at his doorstep. He needs to take the beam from his eye and then see what he can do to help others remove any beam that might be in their eyes.

Without the aforementioned false assumptions (and others that could be mentioned), Jon's criticisms are all up in the air with nothing to stand on.

BTW, I also find it more than a little problematic that Jon wants to lambast people for criticizing one atrocity without mentioning another or every other atrocity. That's an absurd criticism just on the face of it. We might just as well say that Jon must have no problem with any other atrocity in history since he didn't mention all of them. It is also passing strange, if I may have the benefit of reasoning like Jon, that he didn't say anything about the (non-human) animals that have died as a result of all these wars. Is Jon guilty of specieism here? It would seem so.

Jon said...

Semper, your first paragraph seems entirely unrelated to what I wrote. I didn't distinguish between radical Islamic fundamentalism and mainstream Islam in this post. This distinction is in no way relevant to what I've written here. So how does this entail an inaccuracy on my part? Your first paragraph looks to be irrelevant.

In your second paragraph you assert that I see no distinction between Christianity and the United States, but provide no evidence. The fact is at Answering Muslims I've offered high praise for Christians and Christianity despite my own rejection of Christianity. I quote Jesus' words approvingly and frequently. I point to the Christians that have stood against U.S. imperialism. Despite the falsity of your assertions, they still have no bearing on my claims and no bearing on my post here. Thus your second paragraph is irrelevant.

Your third paragraph is a conclusion based on the above irrelevant paragraphs you had written. It's hard to imagine how you draw such conclusions based on such irrelevancies. It's almost like you don't even know what I wrote.

Your final paragraph at least makes an argument that seems sort of relevant to the discussion, so let me reply to it. My claim, which I've expressed many times and I think is just elementary moral reasoning (and I'll expect you to take that claim and chase some rabbit trail such as how can an atheist talk about morals but anyway) is that the first atrocities you should consider are the ones you are responsible for and/or can control. If you have a child and that child has a conflict with another child you should first focus on the things your child did wrong. Even if the other child was in the wrong you should consider what your child has done first and you should correct it. You can't make another child do what is right, but you can make your child do what is right.

And this is especially true if your child's actions were about a thousand times more egregious. Suppose Jeffrey Dahmer in the midst of his crime sprees spent a lot of time complaining about the fact that a neighbor robbed and beat him once. That's fine. Dahmer is right. Robbing and beating is wrong. But that's kind of ridiculous in light of the fact that Dahmer has a dozen corpses in his back yard right now. The fact that he only notices the crimes of others and ignores his own crimes is a moral defect that he should correct.

Anthony Rogers said...

At AM you have constantly assumed the distinction and the identity I mentioned.

The first is evident from your post:

"...Islamic fundamentalism....radical Islamic fundamentalism....Islamic fundamentalism..." (third paragraph)

If you weren't implying such a distinction, your remarks are misleading and entirely redundant.

As for the second, it appears from the fact that you want to lay such crimes at our doorstep. In fact, you did it once again in your latest response. Why assume that the "crimes" of the secular America your atheist betters have been fighting for are things done by "our child" and that we are responsible to discipline him?

If you want to deny responsibility and want us to clean up the mess, then call on your fellow comrades to back out of politics. They have royally screwed things up according to you. Since America wishes to deny the standards proclaimed by the Christian Church as set forth in the Bible, we can't seriously be blamed for everything America does (whether I agree or disagree with every particular example you bring up and call a "crime". Indeed, as you anticipated, I don't even know what you could possibly mean by calling something a "crime". Whose law is the US violating when it does the things you don't like?)?

In light of this, we shouldn't be faulted for seeing the connection between terrorism and Islam and pointing this out to Muslims. Our observation here is on point and far from hypocritical. We don't believe in spreading Christianity by the sword. Muslims seek world domination through miliatary (as well as other) means.

Do you have anything to say about your evident speciesism? How does that comport with your naturalistic and evolutionary assumptions about the origin of man?

Anthony Rogers said...

In fact, it is well to remind you of the name: Answering Muslims...not Answering Americans.

If we were constantly addressing the issues you want us to address, the name would be a misnomer. It would be like calling the site Evangelical Agnosticism and then spending an inordinate amount of time talking about civics. :)

Jon said...

Constantly distinguishing between strains of Islam, eh? Where's the evidence? And why does it matter? Show how the distinction plays a role in the argument I'm making here or an argument I've made anywhere for that matter. Maybe you could start by showing what my argument is. Do you understand what I wrote and what I'm arguing?

By laying crimes at your doorstep I'm creating an identity between the United States and the Christian Church? Does this actually make sense to you within your own mind? To me your thinking is completely chaotic. Almost incoherent.

You say "we can't seriously be blamed for everything America does (whether I agree or disagree with every particular example you bring up and call a "crime"."

Oooo-kayyy. What are you talking about? Who says you are to be blamed for everything America does? What does this have to do with my post here.

"We don't believe in spreading Christianity by the sword. Muslims seek world domination through miliatary (as well as other) means."

Good for you. You're probably right that there are a lot of Muslims that want to spread Islam by the sword and seek world domination. I don't agree with them. But if you want to reduce it, why not encourage your government to stop engaging in the very behavior that our intelligence agencies predicted would exacerbate the problem? Do you want to reduce Islamic terrorism or not?

No, I don't have anything to say about speciesism. A typical boring rabbit trail that doesn't interest me.

I don't care what you call your blog. If you encourage the kind of behavior that exacerbates terrorism in Muslims and if you decry the minuscule terrorism of those not listening while ignoring the vastly more extensive terrorism of those you can influence I think it is worth pointing it out.

Anthony Rogers said...

Jon,

I didn't expect you to understand. I also didn't expect you to "care" about your real underlying problem. I just popped in to make sure your followers know the real scoop. Some of them will get it. You will continue to hide behind your rhetoric and pretend that something perfectly intelligible doesn't make sense to you. That's fine. I hope you are able to reign your child in before you die an it no longer matters to you.

Jesus is Lord,

Anthony Rogers

Anonymous said...

YO JON,

Type in TruthTube.tv on the Internet & have a great time researching Islam.