Are we At War with Islam? Check Your Premises!

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

I'm not going to go around and around and around once again about this starting from zero.

If anyone is interested in whether moderate Muslims exist or not, and their own two eyes are not enough to convince them that the 1.5+ billion Muslims throughout the world are not crazed lunatics hell bent on killing babies, I suggest starting with Daniel Pipes (who is far from Muslim-friendly, but objective enough to deal only with facts that he can source). It never fails to astound me when people ignore what 1.5 billion people actually means and they talk about "most Muslims."

Imagine 1,500,000,000 crazed lunatics running amok. The entire population of the USA is only about one-fifth that number.

Here's an article by Pipes. It is older, from 2004, but it is chock full of links. So there is a lot of good material to look at, that is if those who make their arguments by proclamation are truly interested in reading facts:

Identifying Moderate Muslims

by Daniel Pipes

New York Sun

November 23, 2004

From the article.

But there is also bad news, namely growing confusion over who really is a moderate Muslim. This means that the ideological side of the war on terror is making some, but only limited, progress.

"Ideological side" means the intellectual battle.

If people allow bigotry to reign in their words and souls, they have already lost the intellectual war by default. They simply walked off the battle-field and, frankly, turned into a version of the very enemy they claim they despise.

We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with terrorism. As pertains to Islam, we are at war with violent Islamist fanatics.

If there is any further interest, I just came across Pipes's think tank forum: Middle East Forum

I think it is wise to go through some reading in these places first before seeking out the growing number of anti-Islamist Muslim organizations that are devoted to freedom and living as good neighbors to other cultures.

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with terrorism. As pertains to Islam, we are at war with violent Islamist fanatics.

Terrorism is a military tactic; if "we" are at war with it the United States is a stupid, hypocritical fool. No country on the face of the earth uses more terrorism than the United States. Terrorism has its place and the good guys can use it too, if they be good guys. I loved it in Vietnam when air to ground delivered high explosive and napalm on top of the guys shooting at us. I hoped they were terrorized out of the contents of their large intestines--or just killed outright; I was trying to stay alive afterall. The atomic bombings of Japan were purely terrorist. They had nothing to do with reducing Japan's military capability. To the extent that could be done incendiary bombings by hundreds of B-29s flying at low altitude had already done that. The March 1945 bombing of Tokyo was even more terrorizing than the atomics and killed just as many or more than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. One high ranking Japanese officer--I think Navy--thought that we only had two of these bombs, but the Emperor had had enough of the bitch slapping. In the context of being at war with Japan those bombs should have been dropped. It was the context that was all wrong. The right in war is for the right to win it and get it over with ASAP. Now WTF are we doing in Afghanistan that makes sense? Coming on nine years folks.

--Brant

"violent Islamist fanatics" are basically state sponsored--wanna fight them? then fight the state

Edited July 28, 2010 by Brant Gaede

[BaalChatzaf]

We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with terrorism. As pertains to Islam, we are at war with violent Islamist fanatics.

Terrorism is a military tactic; if "we" are at war with it the United States is a stupid, hypocritical fool. No country on the face of the earth uses more terrorism than the United States. Terrorism has its place and the good guys can use it too, if they be good guys. I loved it in Vietnam when air to ground delivered high explosive and napalm on top of the guys shooting at us. I hoped they were terrorized out of the contents of their large intestines--or just killed outright; I was trying to stay alive afterall. The atomic bombings of Japan were purely terrorist. They had nothing to do with reducing Japan's military capability. To the extent that could be done incendiary bombings by hundreds of B-29s flying at low altitude had already done that. The March 1945 bombing of Tokyo was even more terrorizing than the atomics and killed just as many or more than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. One high ranking Japanese officer--I think Navy--thought that we only had two of these bombs, but the Emperor had had enough of the bitch slapping. In the context of being at war with Japan those bombs should have been dropped. It was the context that was all wrong. The right in war is for the right to win it and get it over with ASAP. Now WTF are we doing in Afghanistan that makes sense? Coming on nine years folks.

--Brant

"violent Islamist fanatics" are basically state sponsored--wanna fight them? then fight the state

The bastards sowed the wind and, in due course, reaped the whirlwind. This approach goes all the way back to Wm. T. Sherman. He burned Atlanta, he wrecked South Carolina, and he wrought terror and woe upon the ordinary citizens of the Confederacy.

Conan! What is good? To close with the enemy and to crush him and to hear the lamentations of his women!. Yes, Conan! That is good!

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

We are not at war with Islam. We are at war with terrorism. As pertains to Islam, we are at war with violent Islamist fanatics.

Terrorism is a military tactic; if "we" are at war with it the United States is a stupid, hypocritical fool. No country on the face of the earth uses more terrorism than the United States. Terrorism has its place and the good guys can use it too, if they be good guys. I loved it in Vietnam when air to ground delivered high explosive and napalm on top of the guys shooting at us. I hoped they were terrorized out of the contents of their large intestines--or just killed outright; I was trying to stay alive afterall. The atomic bombings of Japan were purely terrorist. They had nothing to do with reducing Japan's military capability. To the extent that could be done incendiary bombings by hundreds of B-29s flying at low altitude had already done that. The March 1945 bombing of Tokyo was even more terrorizing than the atomics and killed just as many or more than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. One high ranking Japanese officer--I think Navy--thought that we only had two of these bombs, but the Emperor had had enough of the bitch slapping. In the context of being at war with Japan those bombs should have been dropped. It was the context that was all wrong. The right in war is for the right to win it and get it over with ASAP. Now WTF are we doing in Afghanistan that makes sense? Coming on nine years folks.

--Brant

"violent Islamist fanatics" are basically state sponsored--wanna fight them? then fight the state

The bastards sowed the wind and, in due course, reaped the whirlwind. This approach goes all the way back to Wm. T. Sherman. He burned Atlanta, he wrecked South Carolina, and he wrought terror and woe upon the ordinary citizens of the Confederacy.

Conan! What is good? To close with the enemy and to crush him and to hear the lamentations of his women!. Yes, Conan! That is good!

Ba'al Chatzaf

Sherman waged war against terrorists?

--Brant

beat your drums, Bob; it keeps you busy and your hands off the guns

[BaalChatzaf]

Sherman waged war against terrorists?

--Brant

beat your drums, Bob; it keeps busy and your hands off the guns

I was talking about the Jap and German civilians we slaughtered during WW2.

Sherman and Grant were the first important generals to target civilians and their property, since it is the civilians that make war possible in the first place. They are still talking about Sherman's march through Georgia and his wrecking of South Carolina which was the originating state of the secession.

Ba'al Chatzaf

When you bite the throat bite deep --- Old Klingon Saying

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

You guys make it sound like being a bigot is a good thing.

And if you can't be a bigot, at least be a terrorist. That's a good thing too, huh?

Sometimes I wonder what the hell I'm doing here...

Michael

PS: You know what you do? You give legitimacy to schmucks like Oliver Stone, who claimed that Hitler needs to be understood in context, since he was only a product of evil capitalism (he was the Frankenstein monster and evil capitalism was Dr. Frankensten, his creator). Stone is filming the "real" history of the USA. to be aired on Showtime. It should be a barrel of laughs. How about his film glorifying Huge Chaves? You want bigots and terrorists? Just look. Oliver Stone's not hiding anything. You want to be that--or more precisely, the "other" side of the same thing that is that?

I want nothing to do with it. I am the enemy of both sides.

[Brant Gaede]

War is terrorism incarnate. The United States may have been morally justified to have fought the war against the Barbary pirates. Everything else was basically a wagonload of horse manure. The other wars "we" had to fight were all out of stupid self-context generating, war-mongering and nationalist hubris. The United states has continually assaulted American Indians in various venues since the country was founded, in some cases it was near genocidal. Today they are blessed by socialistic paternalism. The two big wars to begin with were The Mexican-American and then the mis-named "Civil War." Then a big break until The Spanish-American led to our involvement in WWI led to WWII led to The Cold War and its proxy wars and now we have oil wars, only there is no oil in Afghanistan, mostly stupidity, graft and even more manufacturing of terrorists--as happened in Iraq too--to counter or in response to United States' stupid responses to 9-11. Out of the disaster that the U.S. is fast becoming, 9-11 will go down in history as a strategic-tactical masterstroke.

--Brant

praying for intelligence but has no illusions

reality rears its ugly head

[Brant Gaede]

You guys make it sound like being a bigot is a good thing.

And if you can't be a bigot, at least be a terrorist. That's a good thing too, huh?

Sometimes I wonder what the hell I'm doing here...

You are calling me a bigot. Just what did I say to deserve that?

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

I don't think you are a bigot.

I said, "You guys make it sound like being a bigot is a good thing."

Well, is it?

I mean if a bigot is one of the "good guys" and also a terrorist?

Is that a good thing?

After all, it is true that someone like that can terrorize an enemy, which, if I understand your remarks, trumps all moral matters, such as killing innocents, etc.

Is that a good moral standard in your view?

It isn't in mine.

Michael

EDIT: I get real weary every time I read that blowing up babies is a moral good--but only if it is "their" babies, not "our" babies. It isn't. Sometimes during wars it has to be done, but that doesn't make it moral or good. When you get to that level of choice, there is no more morality or good. That's gone. You just try to get through the damn thing alive and see what's left so that, afterward, morality can be coded into a set of values again. So that the clean-up crew can come around and you can start all over.

[Brant Gaede]

Michael, I don't revel in war. That seems to be Bob's thing. If I had been born 20 years earlier I would have fought in WWII and likely been killed. After Pearl Harbor I'd have tried to get Japan by the throat and rip it out. I could have been a crew member on the Enola Gay. It is not that blowing up babies is a good thing; the good thing was getting the war over with, period. My uncle didn't participate in the bombings of Japan because he got shot up by a Japanese Zero, but he could have. After the war he left a Japanese girl crying on the dock as he sailed home a la that smarmy musical. Times were different then in some respects and times are the same now in others.

In Vietnam I ran medical patrols for the Vietnamese civilians. In Special Forces we differentiated as best we could between combatants and non-combatants and did a good job. One evening on the Cambodian border a mother brought us her baby dying of tetanus wondering if we could do anything. We couldn't. The baby died a few hours later. Elsewhere later--actually all the time there--I was an armed combatant. In the 1960s SF Aidmen were the only medics in the world recognized as combatants under the Geneva Convention. I would not have volunteered for the training if it had meant giving up my rifle. I made sure I got through the training or I would have been sent to a conventional unit as an unarmed medic.

--Brant

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

Brant,

One of the reasons I value soldiers--moral soldiers--is because they have to make so many decisions while being shot at when there is no morality other than a sense of inner decency to guide them. And they do that so that I don't have to. That's the reason I cannot blame any of them if they snap and cause an excess in their killing, nor can I blame any of them for making mistakes when they tried their best.

But the type of men and women I'm talking about would NEVER consider it to be a good thing to bomb babies or kill innocents. At best, they would call ending a war by bombing a city an upside to doing a terrible, terrible, terrible thing.

The type of soldier who thinks bombing babies ("their" babies--enemy babies) and killing innocents ("their" innocents--enemy innocents) is a good thing, well... I just don't want someone like that on my side. I don't want him/her near me. I don't even respect the fundy Objectivist position that cavalierly dismisses the issue by claiming all the moral blame for such deaths lies with the enemy. There is no good and there is no passing the buck in bombing babies. Claiming the first is psychotic and claiming the second is moral cowardice.

The fact is there is no morality in these kinds of things. What standards can you use to determine the good? The baby or innocent person doesn't care who kills him, he's just as dead either way. That is never good and is never a point of indifference in people I respect.

This thing gets me weary because it seems like Ayn Rand kicked off a fad. In discussions like the one we are having, you always get people here in O-Land who try to find things to turn on their head so they can find moral good in what society calls bad. They are way too often pseudo-philosophical ferrets qua ferrets. They are certainly not Ayn Rands, not even mini-Ayn Rands. I believe those who play this game are seeking some kind of profundity, or seeking to see some kind of essence that is not evident to others. But some of these find-the-good-in-the-gross games get really wacko-sounding.

It makes me wonder....

And it makes me tired...

Michael

[Brant Gaede]

It also gets me tired Michael because they really don't know what they are talking about. My own situation is kind of queer, however, for while I saw hundreds of dead bodies in Vietnam they were all soldiers. I have never seen one dead civilian killed by an act of war except on TV. The devastation of cities caused by bombings is beyond my experience, but I can imagine that much better than a Leonard Peikoff can. I've seen fighter-bombers swoop in and drop their ordinance. I've watched Gatling guns at night pour ketchup to the ground from a C-47. On TV it's a gross attenuation. Bullets crack and whistle when they blow by your head breaking the sound barrier. If you heard them they missed you. The contempt I have for war-mongers who've never known war is profound. I do grant Bob some grace because he's not all wrapped up in an Ayn Rand flag and has some kind of supposed mental deficiency (that doesn't involve inability to think, however).

--Brant

[BaalChatzaf]

I do grant Bob some grace because he's not all wrapped up in an Ayn Rand flag and has some kind of supposed mental deficiency (that doesn't involve inability to think, however).

--Brant

I attempted to enlist three times but was turned down because of bronchial asthma. So I settled for being a weapon smith. Some of the guidance systems I have help to build (all pre-GPS) have guided cruise missiles and have killed thousands, so indirectly I have blood on my hands. I am proud of every drop since my "babies" have killed our enemies. I have a very simple approach. Cherish and protect your friends, destroy or evade your enemies. I have also worked on nuclear weapon systems but they have not (yet) been used in anger.

As Conan says: What is good? To close with the enemy and crush him and to hear the lamentations of his women.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Brant Gaede]

I do grant Bob some grace because he's not all wrapped up in an Ayn Rand flag and has some kind of supposed mental deficiency (that doesn't involve inability to think, however).

--Brant

I attempted to enlist three times but was turned down because of bronchial asthma. So I settled for being a weapon smith. Some of the guidance systems I have help to build (all pre-GPS) have guided cruise missiles and have killed thousands, so indirectly I have blood on my hands. I am proud of every drop since my "babies" have killed our enemies. I have a very simple approach. Cherish and protect your friends, destroy or evade your enemies. I have also worked on nuclear weapon systems but they have not (yet) been used in anger.

As Conan says: What is good? To close with the enemy and crush him and to hear the lamentations of his women.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I think you have made this post about 40-50 times. You rank right up there with Rosie the Riveter.

--Brant

[jriggenbach]

I do grant Bob some grace because he's not all wrapped up in an Ayn Rand flag and has some kind of supposed mental deficiency (that doesn't involve inability to think, however).

--Brant

I attempted to enlist three times but was turned down because of bronchial asthma. So I settled for being a weapon smith. Some of the guidance systems I have help to build (all pre-GPS) have guided cruise missiles and have killed thousands, so indirectly I have blood on my hands. I am proud of every drop since my "babies" have killed our enemies. I have a very simple approach. Cherish and protect your friends, destroy or evade your enemies. I have also worked on nuclear weapon systems but they have not (yet) been used in anger.

As Conan says: What is good? To close with the enemy and crush him and to hear the lamentations of his women.

Ba'al Chatzaf

I think you have made this post about 40-50 times. You rank right up there with Rosie the Riveter.

--Brant

Except, of course, that Rosie, unlike Ba'al, does not inspire revulsion and spasms of uncontrollable gagging and heaving.

JR

[mikelee999]

(Note from MSK: Content deleted for hate speech and bigotry.)

[mikelee999]

(Note from MSK: Content deleted for hate speech and bigotry.)

[mikelee999]

(Note from MSK: Content deleted for hate speech and bigotry.)

[mikelee999]

(Note from MSK: Content deleted for hate speech and bigotry.)

[9thdoctor]

Everyone here who has moderate Muslim friends, please post.

I’ve already posted on this, I’m not going to repeat myself for the likes of you.

Anyhow, most *American* Muslims got a cheap thrill out of 9-11. They were happy. That was a World Cup win to them.

With your history of petulance, why should anyone bother to engage you? Crybaby. Bigot.

[Michael Stuart Kelly]

mikelee999,

Enough bigotry.

I'm not going to spend time trying to debate with your long bigoted rants.

You sound like the KKK, except against Muslims.

You're into hate. So this is not the place for you. There are other forums that welcome hate speech. I suggest you make use of them.

You are not on moderation or anything yet, but I will start deleting your posts if they are the same kind of crap as these last four.

Michael

EDIT: In fact, I started going through those posts with more attention and after thinking about it, I can't condone statements like what you wrote (apparently to "keep your daughter safe"): "I'd kill every one of those girls and their moms to protect my daughter. I'd kill their innocent children born and unborn who will grow up poisoned and deadly."

So I have deleted your content. I don't want that shit on OL.

[9thdoctor]

So I have deleted your content. I don't want that shit on OL.

I just knew you were going to delete his stuff. Now I’m afraid I didn’t quote enough to justify my reply…too bad for you, posterity.

May I suggest a “Beyond the Pale” thread in the Garbage Pile forum, a locked archive of the worst of Leonid, Mikelee999 and the rest. In a sense, by deleting these posts, you’re letting them get away with having written such vile shit. OTOH, they can (and do, in Leonid’s case) post it elsewhere.

[Brant Gaede]

So I have deleted your content. I don't want that shit on OL.

I just knew you were going to delete his stuff. Now I'm afraid I didn't quote enough to justify my reply…too bad for you, posterity.

May I suggest a "Beyond the Pale" thread in the Garbage Pile forum, a locked archive of the worst of Leonid, Mikelee999 and the rest. In a sense, by deleting these posts, you're letting them get away with having written such vile shit. OTOH, they can (and do, in Leonid's case) post it elsewhere.

A toilet for OL? Please, no.

--Brant

[Philip Coates]

> I just knew you were going to delete his stuff. Now I’m afraid I didn’t quote enough to justify my reply

I have the same problem. It's good for extreme examples of such poor thinking, emotionalism, collective demonizing to stay up there. Now I can't write a post with examples of his where I can point to his mistakes and what is wrong with them. Many people think in the manner of his collectivist rant about "all muslims" so it's important that it be refuted.

[9thdoctor]

It's good for extreme examples of such poor thinking, emotionalism, collective demonizing to stay up there.

I agree with MSK’s policy, there’s plenty of places on the internet for hate speech, and examples to link to and quote. I was able to go back into my cache and copy the posts, if you want them send me a private message. He says he worked with a Somali immigrant who was happy on 9/11. One. I suspect this has overly colored his view of Muslims. My experience has been the opposite, the one’s I’ve worked with have been so secularized that you wouldn’t know what their religious background was, but for the names (Ali-Khan and such).