welcome to repents world.

We should take a poll on how many of us here consider themselves to be "type A" personalities! Cajun spoke of her driving habits...I'm not sure if that's a clue. Are sports people/gamblers "type A" in totale or what?

i agree completely with this. i thank my lucky stars every day that i live here. i cannot even begin to imagine what life must be like in some of these other countries. it's frustrating at times dealing with chauvinism here, but here is NOTHING like other countries. covered head to toe, no freedom of movement, no voting, no working (that alone would drive me insane)...societies where women are still considered one more piece of property. or women are killed if they are raped, so as not to bring 'shame' on their family.

yeah, i've read about 'pressing' before. keep loading the poor bastard down til his body can't hold up all the weight anymore....

Well, at least you understood the ignore request was a joke... I think... that's progress. :)

Rupert, do some research on where fundamentalist Christians and fundamentalist Muslims stand on women, birth control, gays, and the role of religion in government and get back to me. I think you'll find they have remarkably similar positions on these topics, they just differ on how often you pray and who the big prophet was.

My point from that earlier post was, we need to be just as firm with our home-grown, Christian terrorists as we are with foreign, Muslim ones, else we look like hypocrites. Our "war" should not be against Islam, it should be against religious extremism, no matter what religion that extremism wraps itself in. And we should couch it in those terms, because then the moderates of all faiths will get behind us, knowing we're not attacking "their" religion; we're attacking those who would attempt to harm anyone's right to practice any faith freely and openly.

I think you're completely right about people doing what's easy. I hadn't thought to put it that way, but I think you're right on the nose with that. It's hard to look at other viewpoints, knowing you might change your mind, or, after all that, you might not (I've had both experiences).

We soooo need to take a car ride together-- I thought I was queen of chewing out other drivers, but clearly I am not. We could yell a duet! We'll put Kev in the back with earplugs.

Witch! She's a witch! Burn her!

Sorry. Props for the Macbeth reference. I love that play. Not the way I love "King Lear" but I love it.

lol i like macbeth....when my mother in law comes in sight...well, there's 'by the pricking of my thumbs...'lol

i like king lear, but i think othello is my favorite.

Oh yeah, I am an absolutely obnoxious driver... :o Either hit the gas or move out of my way! LOL

In response to Timm's post, I am about as type A as they get... :eek:

I don't think you can compare the two religions. One group tells people that they should repent from their sins. But it is your choice whether or not you choose to repent. If you don't want to repent, that is your choice. The other religion will tell you what to do and if you don't do it they will kill you. That is a huge difference.

I'll give you analogy. A father tells his son that he should not smoke marijuana. He tells his son that he thinks marijuana is harmful and that it's not a good idea to smoke it. But if his son chooses to smoke it any way, that is his decision.

Another father tells his son not to smoke marijuana and makes it clear that if his son does smoke it that he will literally murder him in cold blood. The father is serious and will murder his son with a butcher knife if he catches him smoking marijuana.

I don't think it would be fair to say that the two fathers are pretty much the same because they don't want their kids to smoke marijuana. The two fathers are not the same at all.

GR,
Interesting that you see "fear" as a reaction to threat.
Have a look at this link and see how it plays against "safety".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%...archy_of_needs

Perhaps, "hate" fits somewhere else in Maslow's pyramid as an oppositional motivation as well. Trigger-response "stuff". I have been looking for causal factors, but honestly, still have a problem with the motivation for it.

Interesting to study, as are Rupert's analogies.
Let's forget the Spanish Inquisition, Crusades, the slaughter of the Aztecs and the Incas. Muslims are BAD! doncha know?
I'm getting a clearer picture of the response to fear (you know, that nasty thing that causes that adrenelin response to the "safety threat"). It's called "justification"...another excuse for "hating" those that caused it, or allows actions that make it ok to take what they have that you want ("greed").
Ahh..human motivation...fascinating stuff!

Rupert, that's about as bad a mischaracterization of Islam as ever I've seen. The fact that you think honestly think Islam advocates killing nonbelievers any more or less than Christianity does is mind-boggling and a testament to the effectiveness of right-wing media. As DTS said, take a look at Christianity's history and you'll see several movements by some of its misguided followers to kill off non-believers, several of said movements being directed against Moslems. Fundamentalists are violent. Islam and Christianity are not.

For the love of Pete, go take a World Religions class or something. "The other religion will tell you what to do and if you don't do it they will kill you."????? That's what you think Islam is? Oh, God help us. I'd laugh if it didn't make me feel so very sad and hopeless for the world, because sadly, I don't think you're alone in this country in your insistance on villifying any religion besides your own.

And what about your heroine, Ann Coulter, saying, in the wake of 9/11, "We should invade their countries, kill their leaders and convert them all to Christianity." How does that tie in with your insistance that, "One group tells people that they should repent from their sins. But it is your choice whether or not you choose to repent."????

[quote=GenuineRisk]Rupert, that's about as bad a mischaracterization of Islam as ever I've seen. The fact that you think honestly think Islam advocates killing nonbelievers any more or less than Christianity does is mind-boggling and a testament to the effectiveness of right-wing media. As DTS said, take a look at Christianity's history and you'll see several movements by some of its misguided followers to kill off non-believers, several of said movements being directed against Moslems. Fundamentalists are violent. Islam and Christianity are not.

For the love of Pete, go take a World Religions class or something. "The other religion will tell you what to do and if you don't do it they will kill you."????? That's what you think Islam is? Oh, God help us. I'd laugh if it didn't make me feel so very sad and hopeless for the world, because sadly, I don't think you're alone in this country in your insistance on villifying any religion besides your own.
GR,
Sometimes it seems like you're shouting words against the wind. Sorry.
To me, it's a bit amusing that those that seek to justify due to their overwhelming knowledge ignor the fact that after Indonesia, India has the second highest Moslem population, 150 million (that's half of the total US population).
So what's next? Attack India?
Crazy stuff!
DTS

christanity and the muslim religion may have alot of viewpoints the same, but they differ where it matters, theology.

Muslim faith teaches that entrance into heaven is by following the 5 pillars of islam and basically working your way into heaven.

Christianity teaches thats its by grace not works.

Of course there are other similarities and diffrences but it matters not if the two do not agree on how to enter heaven. Either one is wrong and one is right or they are both wrong.

Also in the quoran it does say "Kill all the infidels" ( i have citation if anyone doubts) but you have to read it in context with the rest of the paragraph. Most muslim commentaries believe that it was meant kill the infidels(or pagans) that attack you first and kill in self defense. No where does it say go out and hack people that are not muslim. And this is coming from a person of christian faith,i am by no means a muslim. Just thought a clarification was neccessary.

Interesting that you showed up and weighed in on this, Skippy.
For those that don't know the story...it's in Genesis 16 and 21.
One born and rejected, one born to address a promise that was doubted.
For those that wonder how we got here, those two chapters won't take a lot of time.
Round and round we go....

Any Christians that would kill non-believers are just as bad as Muslims who would kill non-believers. I'm not denying that.

I don't know what Christians or Muslims did hundreds of years ago. All I know is what I see in the world right now. I don't see Christians killing non-believers.

I can't speak for Ann Coulter. I would have to think she was kidding but if she wasn't then she's crazy.

I feel sad for you if you think that the Christian Right(in this country today) wants to kill gays and non-believers. Sadly, I don't think you're alone in your belief. That is why there are plenty of liberals out there that think the Christian Right are some kind of terrible people. They actually think that a guy like Jerry Fallwell is comparable to Bin Laden.

Rupert, just because some muslim people misinterpret doesn't mean the whole religion wants to off everyone thats not muslim. Look at westboro baptist in the kansas. They would love to kill gays, that doesnt mean all christians do. You can't selectively slice out parts and apply them overall its not fair.

DTS: spot on with the genesis(small g) of the problem! This the result of Abraham not trusting God to make him the father of Isreals' generations to follow. It was the wifes' idea to sleep with servant! SECOND time woman put the Kibbosh on Gods' Plan(Garden of Eden ring a bell) But...WE love you ladies!

Faith is a tough thing we want things on our time not god's. Selfish creatures we are.

Skippy, I have never said that all Muslims are bad or anything like that. This thread is about what is going on in Somalia. I am simply saying that you can't compare the Religious Right to the wackos in Somalia, Afghanistan, or any of the other places where they will kill you if you don't do what they say.

sorry Richi,
I was not kidding.
I admire the Sheik.
sounds like a cool dude.


Repent

Ever hear of a little spot called Bosnia, Rupert? Christians killing Muslems. Oh, but that was such a long time ago, right? All the way back in the 1990's.

And Rupert, if you want to sound like you understand anything about this situation, you should take time to learn what happened hundreds of years ago, because I promise you, Moslems in the Middle East know and in some cases, are still mad about it. Remember Bush referring to the initial attacks as a "crusade?" Remember how upset the Moslem world got?

But thanks for agreeing one religious fanatic who would kill in the name of the religion is as bad as another, regardless of the religion. I knew there was common ground somewhere in this discussion. :)

OYE VEY!!! Timm,
Think of the problems that could've been avoided if Abraham had taken a cold shower or watched the football game instead.

In Yugoslavia(Bosnia, Croatia, etc.),that was a totally different situation. You had a situation there with three different groups that had been historic rivals and bitter enemies for years. You had the Serbs(Orthodox Christians), the Croats(Catholics), and the ethnic Albanians(Muslims).

In World War II, Serbs had been massacred by the tens of thousands in concentration camps. Then in 1991, the new Croat government was reviving fascism and enacting discriminatory laws targeting Orthodox Serbs. There was a civil war and the minority Serbs ended up fighting back and outgunning the Croats and the Albanians. There ended up being mass executions of Croats and Albanians at the hands of the Serbs.

I'm not excusing what happened there. You had a civil war there with a history of each side massacaring the other side. If there was no outside intereference, I think that whichever side had the most firepower would have massacred the other side. That is often times the case in wars. You have atrocities committed by both sides. In Vietnam, there were plenty of atrocities committed by our troops. There's no excuse for it, but it continuously seems to happen in wars.

Anyway, I don't think part of the theology of the Christians there was that all non-Christians in the world should be killed. It was just a case of bitter enemies who had a history of killing each other that wanted to continue to kill each other.

I want to make sure you understand that I'm not condoning what happened in Bosnia. It was murder. Murder is murder. I'm simply saying that I don't think theology was the reason for the murders. It was just a case of enemies killing each other. I think that is different from someone saying that you will be beheaded if you don't follow their religion.

And Rupert, a lot of the angry feuds waged by Moslems today also go back generations-- Osama turned anti-American as a result of how we handled the Soviets and Afghanistan. We trained him, for heaven's sake.

I agree with you that the tensions in Bosnia were ethnically based, but you still had Christians killing, which implies that they feel they have a right to kill "other." Which of course, is not very Christian as we understand Christianity. :) My point was, I felt you were grossly generalizing Islam as a "We kill nonbelievers" faith, when in fact members of all faiths do terrible things, many of those things allegedly in the name of the faith (though I tend to think, at its essence, most war is about who has the stuff. I'm with George Carlin on that). This law in Somalia is barbaric, to those of us looking from the outside. But barbarism happens in many faiths and to say basically, "What do you expect from Islam?" is not helpful nor fair.

But here's the thing-- your posts really started me mulling over the "They're attacking us because their faith is crazy and they hate our freedom" mentality that is not all that uncommon here in the US (i'm not saying you have that mentality, though you may; I don't know). And I thought, it's obvious to anyone with a modicum of common sense that that's a ridiculous position. Most nations with a majority population of Moslems live pretty peacefully, and what in the world is, "hate our freedom?" And here's the thing I started mulling, and I thought of it in part thanks to Cajun's smart observation about people wanting to do what's easy-- if one can convince oneself that we were attacked on 9/11, and before (the USS Cole, etc) because a religion is "crazy" then we can absolve ourselves of any responsibility and be the innocent victim (as a nation-- the people killed on 9/11 were certainly innocent victims themselves). We can retaliate in any we want because hey, they're crazy out there and we didn't do anything wrong. BUT-- if we take away the "crazy" position, we have to ask ourselves why in that case we were attacked, and that starts to open up an uncomfortable can of worms about US foreign policy over the last 50 years in regards to the Middle East and oil. Where maybe we aren't always the stellar perfect good guy we imagine the US to be. Because most of us don't pay much attention to the rest of the world. We have our cheap food, our cheap oil, our prosperity and what the costs of that are to the rest of the world, we don't really know or care. Until we get attacked, and then we stand, amazed. How could anyone want to attack us? We're nice! We're the good guys!

The good guys, that is, who are less than 5 percent of the world's population, yet consume 25 percent of the world's energy. The good guys who pushed for NAFTA, touting it as a chance to open up free trade, then continued to subsidize our own farmers, condemnng farmers from other countries bound by the agreement to poverty. The good guys who turn a blind eye to Saudi Arabia's human rights violations, as long as we get a supply of oil. In fact, Bush elder once ranted to Queen Noor about Hussein that he thought it completely unfair that "that madman" controlled a quarter of the "civilized world's" supply of oil. Huh? Madman or not, that's not "the civilized world's" oil, it's Iraq's oil. You want it, pay for it. But we don't want to. We want it cheap or free and we're big and rich and powerful and we can bully our way into lots of things. And you and I, the average citizen, happily ignore the rest of the world until the results of our policies hit our shores, killing people who also had nothing to do with the hatred aimed at our government.

Al Franken said something about differences between conservatives and liberals-- amusing (to a liberal), but there's a nugget there, though maybe not in the way he put it. He said conservatives tend to love their country the way a four-year-old loves his mommy-- mommy is perfect and anyone who would say anything against mommy is bad. Liberals love their country the way an adult loves his mom-- the love is just as strong, but tempered by an awareness that his mom is not infallible. Now, I think he's not right-- I know plenty of conservatives with a very clear-eyed view of the US, but I think there is something to how you love your country-- it's not fun to think we do some sh*tty things to the rest of the world, because we want to think we're always the good, nice guy. But to really grasp what starts things like these attacks, we have to be willing to look at our own actions, as well as the other nation(s)' and decide was our government, in any way, culpable? And we have to be willing to look back 50 years or more to things that happened then and see what the outcome has been. Because it's only then we can really start to find solutions that will, in the end, keep the innocent men and women just trying to go to work safe. It's funny-- dissenters get branded as terrorist-lovers and traitors, yet, by trying to really understand WHY a human being would take up arms and bombs against other nation, by being willing to step into a jihadist's shoes for a moment, and try to see things from his perspective, they maybe are the only ones who will find the root causes and so help find solutions.

As Danzig said, I'm grateful to live here, with at least more chances as a female than I'd have in Islamic nations. But that freedom is not due to the Christianity; it's due to secularism. A secularism that says that I'm my own person, not a creation from a man's rib, that I'm an equal partner in a marriage, not the junior one, and that the male of the species is perfectly capable of controlling his sexual urges without my having to cover my ankles (one of the reasons I'm against the Islamic head-scarf-- whatever else women insist it symbolizes, it also symbolizes an attitude that women have to cover themselves because men can't be held responsible for their actions otherwise and that's insulting to men and demeaning to women. In my opinion, anyway). And that means freedom for me and my fellow women. But again, that's due to people being willing to say religion should be off the table when it comes to governing. Any religion.

Apologies, Rupert-- I'm sure I've bored you to tears by now. :( If you're even still reading at this point.

It's amazing you can type that much about the Middle East and never mention Israel......

You're absolutely right, especially since I think Palestine/Israel should remain on the top of every US President's foreign policy agenda until something gets sorted out or the world comes to an end. I think if it's possible to resolve that conflict, a lot of the drive goes out of the radical Islam movement.

Mea culpa; thanks for calling me on it.

Clinton, in an interview post-presidency, had a brilliantly simple, absolutely impossible solution-- Israel goes back to the original boundaries, Palestinians give up right of return, and the UN takes over control of the holy cities. He said it was what needs to happen, and what will never happen.

I took a class called the Modern Middle East, who would have known it's probably the most pertinent thing I walked away with from my college career considering a graduated with considering now I'm an IT guy at a law firm.

I really wish more people would have their eyes opened like I did.

What are your thoughts on the Middle East?

I partially agree with you and I partially disagree with you. Ther are times that a country or people may have an issue with us over policy. But other times, I think it has very little to do with policy.

For example, let's take the shoe-bomber. I think his name is Richard Reid. This guy was a simple criminal. He wasn't a Muslim. He wasn't even religious. He was just a criminal who kept getting arresting. He had no grievance against the US.

Anyway, while he was in jail just a few years ago, he converted to Islam. When he got out of jail, he was still bent on being a criminal and breaking the law. He joined a mosque and he ended up leaving because they weren't radical enough. They didn't encorage him to do anything bad. He didn't like that. He wanted a mosque that would encourage him to contiue his criminal behavior. Then he found a mosque that was radical where they encouraged him to be violent and go on jihad. They encouraged him to try to blow up an American plane. So the religion was just an excuse for him to continue his anti-social behavior. He had no grievance against the US. His attempt to try to blow up the plane had nothing to do with US policy. It was just a continuation of his criminal behavior.

In some ways, Bin Laden is a similar story. He may have had a legitimate grievance at one time, but that was against the Soviets. We helped him and the Afghans in their fight against the Soviets. They were victorious. The Soviets ended up leaving Afghanistan.

Do you think Bin Laden was going to retire after that? Of course not. He's a terrorist. He's going to find someone else to go after. So he decided he would go after us. He was mad at us(infidels) for being in Saudi Arabia. He thinks that foreign infidels should not be on the sacred ground of Saudi Arabia. But why should it be up to him? The Saudi government wants us there.

If you are a terrorist, you can always find a justification for attacking people. Just because a terrorist has a justification, it doesn't make it legitimate. Let's say that I don't like Korean people because I don't like them being on the sacred ground of the United States. So I go to South Korean and bomb some building. My justification is that I am mad at their country because I don't like Koreans being in my country(the US). If that happened, would you say that South Korea needs to look at their policy and that they are partly at fault for me bombing them? That is ridiculous.

Rupert, interesting stuff and I'll get back to it- but I have to go to work (bleah) and then to "Evil Dead, the Musical" (yay!). I'll check in tomorrow. Hey, go watch my short film, would you, please, if you have the time? (Link on the esoteric board)

Just didn't want you to think I was blowing off your post. :)

Let's just pretend that tomorrow we gave in to Bin Laden. We said, "Osama, we don't want to fight with you any more. We don't want any more terrorist attacks, so just tell us what you want us to do and we will do it."

He'd probably tell us to get out of Saudi Arabia and probably tell us to get out of the Middle East entirely. He'd tell us to stop supporting Israel. So let's just say that we did everything that he wanted. Do you think that he would retire from being a terrorist? I don't think so. He'd probably leave us alone for now and he would find another target. He'd probably try to overthrow the Saudi government. He'd be blowing things up all over the place in Saudi Arabia. He'd probably try to do the same thing in Egypt. Let's say that he was successful and he overthrew those governments. Do you think he would stop there? I don't think there is any chance that he would stop there. Even if he conqured the entire Middle East, I don't think he would stop there. He'd find someone else to wage jihad on. The West would probably be his next target.

Anyway, none of that is going to happen. But the point is that a terrorist like Bin Laden is going to keep being a terrorist. He will always have a new target to go after. And if you are his target, you need to do what he says or else he will terrorize you.

Bin Laden is an individual citizen with a group of followers. He is not a country. His group carries out bombings in all different countries. He has no right to try to impose his will through violence on all different countries. If I got a group of a few thousand followers, I would have no right to start bombing targets here or any other country.

I think it is a mistake to want to blame the victims in any way. I am not saying that it is not important to figure out why the terrorists are mad at us. It is important to know why they are attacking us. But just because they have what they believe is a reason to attack us, it doesn't mean that the attack is justified in any way.

I will watch your film when I get a chance. I probably won't have time today.

The israeli palestinian conflict will never end. They have been fighting for thousands of years and will continue fighting until one is gone. No amount of presidental visits or talks are ever going to get them to stop hating one another.

has nothing to do with getting them to quit hating each other, has everything to do with them not killing each other and keeping the whole region on 'simmer' constantly.

also, it's only been since israel got their own homeland in the 20th century that things really got out of control. but that's what happens when one group give another group a third groups land. not really going to go over well.

the holy city is claimed as the homeland by islam, christianity and judaism. maybe if it was separated from israel, and controlled by a neutral party, that would help the situation.

interesting tho that a thread about a zealot turns into talk about israel.

No zig it has everything to do with them to quit hating each other. In case you forgot palestine is run by a terrorist group whose soul mission is to destory israel . That is going to spawn massive conflict. Hard to eradicate someone without killing. Israel is the power in the middle east and everyone knows that.

i just don't think you have to like each other to live next to each other. yep, israel has a lot of military power. they have to, or risk being destroyed.
no easy fixes there i'm afraid.
and it isn't just palestine that wants them destroyed. hell, sometimes i think much of the world does.

Or read a scroll!