JMak
DP Veteran
- Joined
- Sep 18, 2008
- Messages
- 1,942
- Reaction score
- 568
- Gender
- Undisclosed
- Political Leaning
- Conservative
It's not a fetish. It's very real and it can be countered. I'm sorry you don't feel that way.
It is a fetish. And I don't deny that the concern with root causes is "real." Of course it's real. My problem is that the root causes fetish is dangerous as it leads us to avoid dealing with the real root cause...Islamic violence. Instead, this root causes business has caused us to blame the victims rather than the perps. In other words, this root causes analysis typically leads to some vague notion of American or western culpability. I call it a fetish because it seems to be driven by some anti-American, anti-western attitude.
Really? Okay, please cite what the terrorists say, maybe give examples of reasons that have disappeared and ones that have taken their place.
Colonialism, poverty, US troops in Saudi Arabia, etc.
No, not "typically." It's certainly a factor, but not the factor. Do you know how many Muslims there are on this planet? Do you know how many perpetrate the crimes you are speaking of?
You're quibbling on the margins. The core reason politicians and scholars have settled on to explain Islamic terrorism is the Israel/Palestinian problem. That problem, they argue, is the reason why Muslims commit acts of terrorism against the US, Europe, and elsewhere...a form of protest against the West's support for Israel.
But didn't you understand my point? I was arguing the falsity of that conclusion made by politicians and scholars by noting that Islamic terrorism occurs all over the world and in places where the Israeli/Palestinian problem is a not of any concern at all.
Moderate Islam in no way reflects much of what you are talking about.
Moderate Islam is a minority, outside the mainstream.
What you are describing is fundamental Islam, not moderate Islam. Islam, like Christianity, has evolved albeit at a slower pace. It's still evolving. There is a war within the culture with the fundamentalists struggling to keep control versus the moderates who are changing with the times. Your narrow description and broad application of the worst of Islam is very disingenuous.
Not at all. It's the realization that Islam promotes violence. It's from this core of Islam that Islamic extremism flows. Islam teaches that violence is an appropriate method to redress grievances.
Not even clever.
I don't care if you don't find it clever.
The fact is that terrorism is a manifestation of a disease, a symptom, not the disease itself.
And the west's problem is it's unwillingness or inability to confront even the possibility that islaimic terrorism is, you know, at all connected to...~gasp~...Islam. The focus on so-called "root causes" leads to finding socioeconomic or political excuses for Islamist terrorism such as poverty, colonialism, discrimination or the existence of Israel.
What incentive is there for Muslims to demand reform when Western "progressives" pave the way for Islamist barbarity? If the problem is not connected to Islamic beliefs, it leaves one to wonder why Christians who live among Muslims under identical circumstances refrain from contributing to wide-scale, systematic campaigns of terror.
Well?