[General Battuta]

Seriously. It's a shame to see Kosh succumbing to the same hysteria he so recently condemned.

The fact is that most of the world's Muslims are not significantly more radical than most of the world's anything elses. Were Islam even ten times as likely to produce radicals as any other religion, the vast majority would still be normal, healthy people.

[Sushi]

Modded +1 Flamebait.

Oh, this isn't Slashdot? Lock this puppy, I don't see any reasonable discussion coming out of this. I don't really have any more to say, since I pretty much agree 100% with Battuta.

[Nuclear1]

Islam in the Middle East as it stands doesn't belong in this century.

Same goes for Baptists from Kansas.

The religion itself isn't a problem.  Demagogues exploiting a poverty-stricken downtrodden people through their dearly-beloved religion to carry out evil acts don't belong in this or any century.

[Thaeris]

I'm not Islamic, but I can tell you that any decent Moslem (or Christian, for that matter) will tell you that violent acts against one's neighbor is unacceptable in most every case. The title of this thread is really friggin' poor. Anyone looking at this thread will most likely be immediately prompted to shoot you down, Kosh. I can't say I disagree...

Now, if you cite something like "Doctrinal Issues in Fanatical Islam" as a subject to name your thread, you might be able to carry on this discussion in a civilized manner. As that didn't happen, well...  

Now you, Zack: watch your generalizations and blaming specific groups. Last time I checked, homosexuality wasn't well recieved by ANY culture until recently... Ancient Greece and Rome have long since passed. This sort of behavior is going to take a while to be accepted, and will concievably never be accepted in certain regions, regardless of the group doing the wrong.

Doctrines in religions, governments, and societies ALL have a way of enforcing patterns of thought or conduct - no one here is free from that effect for better or worse. Religious fanatics have a great way of emphasizing one part of their teaching while disregarding others - this is flawed doctrine of the worst order. Even worse with regard to the bad, religion tends to maintain a degree of coherency throughout its body, so the poor aspects of a cult or docrine in the body may linger about for quite a while. I feel this happening in the Islamic community, especially in poorer regions. That's bloody obvious, of course, but there you go. Until the surrounding populace takes a strong stand by thinking for themselves and determining that violence is not the way, a good deal of these problems will continue to spread. Again, obvious...

[iamzack]

Now you, Zack: watch your generalizations and blaming specific groups.

Guess I wasn't clear enough. I was mostly just pointing out that Islam isn't the only major religion that produces hoards of violent, evil people who kill over silly things, so Kosh's statement can be applied to Christianity just as well. The homosexuality thing was just a random example that came to mind.

[Herra Tohtori]

The only difference between Christianity and Islam is that in western countries, secular authorities are held in higher regard than religious authorities. On both governmental and popular level, on average.

There are islamic countries where secular governmental power is in theory above the religious/ideological authorities, but if the religious authorities decide to cause problems a large percentage of the people will follow.

This is mainly caused by lousy educational levels which are often highly correlating with religious tendencies and - more importantly - the tendency to blindly follow figures of authority as a group without question, just because everyone else does. That is caused by the fact that the majority of approved schools are Quran schools which apart from being largely a tool of indoctrination, don't as a rule allow female pupils who thus are left without even that meager dose of schooling, which of course leaves them handily dependant of the males in the society.

Of course, the religious authorities in these countries aren't dumb. They know that they will only stay in the upper echelons of power as long as the population remains ignorant and unequal.

It's not religions by large that are "bad" or don't belong to 21st century, it's the people in positions of power that have a tremendous temptation and possibility to misuse their authority for their own gain.

Where religions don't belong is in the legislative, judicial and executive branches of power in any government or comparative organization. If any of these main branches of power are controlled by religious authorities or any other "always right" ideology, then it is very probable that in a very short time, the regime will stop representing what is best for the people. In Adama's immortal words... police and the military both have a duty to protect the people from the enemies of the state, but when the military becomes the police, the people tend to become enemies of the state. Not exact analogy, but you get the picture.

In other words, religions with excessive authority have historically been rather bad for those who happen to disagree.

Note that same can be said about any other regime with a totalitarian form of government. Which quite well showcases the fact that it's not the message of the religion/ideology/[insert noun here] that is bad as a rule, it's the people in charge of said organization and how they manage it.

Of course I personally disagree to any religion or ideology being indoctrinated into young children practically from birth, but each religion and ideology has their fundamentalists. There are christian fundamentalists who are, in ideology, as bad as islamic fundamentalists, it's just that it's not acceptable for them to act on their ideas, whereas in many islamic countries - especially the backwater areas -  the religious authorities condone of such activities or points of views, if not outright encourage them.

Which brings us back to the point on how to prevent it. Make developing countries invest on their education beyond those damned Quran schools, and make them educate the females.

[Mongoose]

Islam in the Middle East as it stands doesn't belong in this century.

Same goes for Baptists from Kansas.

But I think the kicker here is that the state of Kansas does not view such actions as generally tolerable or acceptable, and prosecutes said actions as hate crimes when they are taken to extremes.  In contrast, certain countries in the Middle East and Southeast Asia have enshrined the intolerance and bloodshed of Sharia as the sovereign law of the land, with all that that entails.  Evil actions can be undertaken in the name of any institution under the sun by its constituent fanatics, but fundamental Islam represents a unique area of concern due to its thorough intermingling with the secular in many unstable portions of the globe.

No, I don't agree with Kosh's phrasing in the thread title.  Yes, Christianity has committed far more than its share of institutionalized injustices throughout the past two millennia, and yes, injustices are still committed in the name of "Christianity" today.  And as Battuta said, there are certainly socioeconomic factors at play in particular regions of the world, and it's a safe bet that there are a whole lot of people out there paying lip service to Islam as a means of achieving their own ends.  But all of that having been said, there is a significant fraction of Islam as it is practiced today that is far out-of-line with the generally-accepted principles of civilized life in the 21st century, and there are notable members of the most prominent of Muslim clerics preaching a doctrine of hate and murder who are looked upon as being infallible by their followers.  While it may have been a far more likely circumstance several centuries ago, in this day and age, you won't find the Pope or the Archbishop of Canterbury advocating a flat-out holy war against the Jewish people...sadly, one cannot say the same for the clerics of Iran.

No, Islam as a whole is not at fault, and the majority of the world's Muslims are just as decent human beings (if not more so) than any one of us here.  But we can't hide our heads in the sand and deny that not-insignificant portions of institutionalized Islam need to do a few centuries' worth of evolving before large portions of the globe can have a feasible shot at living in peace.

Edit: Also, what Herra said, particularly about keeping any sort of religious doctrine out of the scope of civil authority.

[General Battuta]

The fact remains that the 'problems with Islam' could as easily be 'problems with Christianity' or 'problems with Judaism' were, say, Islam the dominant religion of the prosperous, technologically advanced First World, and some other religion predominant in tribal, honor-based, backwards, underdeveloped, intolerant areas.

Radical Islam could as easily be a symptom as a cause.

[Nuclear1]

Thing is Christianity was designed to be a part of the government just like Islam.  After the Middle Ages and centuries of religious wars in Europe, countries started realizing that church and state need to be separate.  Higher standards of living and reasonable economic stability have only helped.

Maybe after Middle Eastern Islam goes through a similar transformation...

Radical Islam could as easily be a symptom as a cause.

Exactly. 

Unequal distribution of wealth in Saudi Arabia-->general hatred of the West-->breeding ground for radical Islam.

[Thaeris]

Thing is Christianity was designed to be a part of the government just like Islam.  After the Middle Ages and centuries of religious wars in Europe, countries started realizing that church and state need to be separate.  Higher standards of living and reasonable economic stability have only helped.

Maybe after Middle Eastern Islam goes through a similar transformation...

 

Be careful with statements like that. The early Church was pursecuted to a terrible extent by the governments in power. If necessary, go and find some early Church history. Same for Islam. If you want to make a reasonable argument, know your facts.

[Rian]

Consider the example of Uganda. They’re on the verge of passing severe anti-gay legislation, including penalties of death or life imprisonment, and are predominantly Christian. What’s more, they’ve appropriated a fair portion of their anti-gay rhetoric from American evangelical Christians.

Or Jamaica, where sex between two men is punishable by lengthy prison sentences. Also predominantly Christian.

I’m sure there are more examples.

Considering this, is anyone here going to say that modern Christianity is fundamentally intolerant and incompatible with modern society? I kind of doubt it. No religion with such a long history is going to be entirely free of hold-overs from less rational and tolerant times, but the vast majority of its followers can still be rational, tolerant, benevolent members of society.

[Mars]

Extremist assholes of any sort are terrible human beings.

Don't be one.

[Nuclear1]

Be careful with statements like that. The early Church was pursecuted to a terrible extent by the governments in power. If necessary, go and find some early Church history. Same for Islam. If you want to make a reasonable argument, know your facts.

I'm well aware of the early persecution by the Romans.  

I'm talking about specific excerpts from the New Testament that essentially told its readers to submit to the government and do what they tell you to do.   When the Word of God itself tells you to do what the guy on the throne wants you to do, you better do it.

[karajorma]

The early Church was pursecuted to a terrible extent by the governments in power.

The early Church bears little similarity to Christianity these days.

How many people do you see wearing fishes for instance?

[Thaeris]

Be careful with statements like that. The early Church was pursecuted to a terrible extent by the governments in power. If necessary, go and find some early Church history. Same for Islam. If you want to make a reasonable argument, know your facts.

I'm well aware of the early persecution by the Romans. 

I'm talking about specific excerpts from the New Testament that essentially told its readers to submit to the government and do what they tell you to do.   When the Word of God itself tells you to do what the guy on the throne wants you to do, you better do it.

I think you're taking that WAY out of context. The issue there is moreso to not make a problem of yourself due to your beliefs.

[NGTM-1R]

You are making the assumption that Islam = intolerance.

I think you could make a pretty good argument for that via extension from Sharia Law = Intolerance.

Since Islam defines itself as obeyance of God's Law, and Sharia Law defines itself as God's Law...yeah.

[Nuclear1]

How many people do you see wearing fishes for instance?

Bumper stickers.

Nuff said.

I think you're taking that WAY out of context. The issue there is moreso to not make a problem of yourself due to your beliefs.

No.

Powerplay by the Church to keep Europe in line.  Believe it or not, the Church was fairly corrupt.  Corrupt to the point that they even went in and selected which individual books warranted inclusion into the Bible.  

[Blue Lion]

Isn't Islam expanding rapidly still? I don't see them going away anytime soon.

[High Max]

How many people do you see wearing fishes for instance?

Crosses would be a better example, and the answer is 'more than you think' and you see the symbol of the fish on cars too. I don't know about London though. Of course if people are going to call themselves a certain faith and wear crosses, they best live like it or they shouldn't call themselves part of the religion. I hate when people call themselves a member of a religion and don't act like it because it is hypocrisy.

[Thaeris]

How many people do you see wearing fishes for instance?

Bumper stickers.

Nuff said.

I think you're taking that WAY out of context. The issue there is moreso to not make a problem of yourself due to your beliefs.

No.

Powerplay by the Church to keep Europe in line.  Believe it or not, the Church was fairly corrupt.  Corrupt to the point that they even went in and selected which individual books warranted inclusion into the Bible.  

Yeah. Tell us something new. Doctrine. The problem you're citing is man's doctrine. You'll notice such things as the Reformation (also imperfect due to doctrine) did a lot to combat that said corruption...