Western culture gone too far ? In light of clash...
 

Yep, you may be surprised but I am not without a fair share of heavy criticism regarding our own part of the world either. Yet, muslim terrorism bothers me most so that's why I tend to focus on that issue here as you may have noticed :stare: (also to have some fun to be honest)

In my view the backbone in western-European societies seems to be missing due to secularism and maximal individalism (of which I am a prime example !), in which money is basically more and more replacing God and determining our lifestyles. TV shows are getting crazier and extremer all the time, not in the least corrupting young children. Divorce numbers are staggering. Split families all over the place. Kids growing up too fast. Student girls prostituting on and off line and the list goes on. Youngsters using drugs and alcohol. Being a parent becomes more of a challenge all the time due to the 'unlimited' world outside.

It proves not to be ideal and I think many people are starting to become aware of the fundamental problems. Apart from the social and psychological problems many natives experience, it also has created a spiritual void the Islam is happy to fill more and more intensively. This is how I explain the succes of Islam among immigrants and the ever increasing number of mosqs built here. Konovalov, step in anytime when you feel like it and share your personal story of convertion with us ;)

Thesis:
To meet the challenge Islam poses on our societies, we should again somehow develop more of a spiritual/cultural backbone...

More money, more weapons and even generous basic rights/constitution clearly aren't 'superiority' enough to strike hard enough on growing islamic radicalism, here and the ME. I definitely think there's this social element as well in the global islamic challenge (and I am talking about the silent majority of moderate muslims ofcourse who disapprove of western extremism, not the minority of now influential nutters in their midst).

However, I dont want to entirely turn the clock back to the 1950ies era either. I need freedom.

But I also believe we should regain more common ground and dispose of chunks of our own cultural extremism to achieve moral superiority and a good future. This quest has to start within our OWN society, not in the ME.

Cleaning up our 'mess' should therefor also and primarily involve limiting the freedom of media and the entertainment industry. A broad common sense of good values and morals appears to be long gone in many ways, or at least western media-extremism has become far too dominating. In this respect (also immigrated) muslims deeply disrespect us and I understand.

I think we can learn from them (ME) about cultural tradition, a more spiritual attitude, and lowering our level of consumption, and they can learn from us......I wanted to say: equal rights for men and women in several ways and how to combine religion and culture as separate parts of life, but look where we have come.

Anyway, the questions to you are:

What's your take on our modern western culture and what exactly (superior cultural aspects) should muslims truely learn from us ?

My best attempt to be reasonable for a change :lol:

Cheers :hmm:

Is Paris burning?

I honestly dont know what you mean. I am not in a personal crisis if that's what you mean, however I could use a nice holiday :-j

Re: Western culture gone too far ? In light of clash...
 

They need to learn that stroking their egos and their peckers, by subjugating women, won't get them off this planet if Allah wills another asteroid onto the surface. They need to learn to control their sexuality. They need to have more respect for their daughters, and more discipline with their sons. And they need to wage jihad sessions with a calculator and chemistry book (physics and mathematics are also good choices, although the calculator becomes rather useless with the latter), before the mid-term exam, rather than with an AK-56 and some Koran quotes.

I think they'd learn all of this if we'd just stop paying them trillions of dollars, every year, for oil. You can fill Energon Cubes with any kind of energy that is available, and it's time to switch.

It's not called the city of lights for nothing!

@ Tycho, thanks. Would the US sell its oil cheap ? Our industry itself has been wasting valuable time on transformation of energy. It's high time in several ways. Interesting to imagine what would happen to the ME and the world's economy if the West's need for oil would drop.

@ Avon Lady: Ok, now feel free to elaborate.

It was just in the news that the rioters have shot at the police and firemen :stare: Hard measures are needed, its been a week now, and its only getting worse :doh: France will really have problems with these people. Again happy we havent taken everybody in here up north :smug:

This would be the politically correct version. Actually when offered to sit down and discuss the situation they werent interested.And the riot continues, what a riot :-?

This thread already derails as was to be expected.

For the record: Sixpack didnt become gay and I am all for tough and relentless action against (any) thugs but on the other hand I see room to improve our own standards (also in interaction with islam) and that's what the topic was about.

So who has a view to share OT beyond that of a Neanderthaler ? I know this is deep stuff and kind of creepy :lol:

Today it is a VERY demanding and VERY competive world (western), it's also extremely superficial where looks and money very often matter more than 'the usual normal' humane qualities. It's almost fashionable to be a rich arrogant pr*ck. So yes, there's definately some major negative things. I'd say it's the American Dream that's muted and gone overboard when landed here and mixed with european culture.

Sure im a conservative but everybody isnt. You cant control a free society. I would want harsher laws in some issues and all that but in a democracy majority decides and i will respect that. They say a woman must be covered. Do we say a woman must be uncovered? They say you must not drink alcohol. Do we say you must drink alcohol?

Good points, it surely is complex as hell...I mean: earth :know:

So the only general limits in a free society are in the criminal code (book), is that what this boils down to ? And the media can do whatever ?

Yes. Its starts with the constitution and the parlamentar system that draws up the laws. As the religion and state are separated this is the only way to control the society. A lot is offcourse left to the individuals choices but isnt that the idea?

I face a dilemma.

I have started to write a text, a very long one that will not be posted as a thread, but as a download, and it is a work in progress, open ending. It’s named „A critical history of Islam“. By focussing on historical developements and events, and interpreting them on a psychological and event-related political level I try to raise awareness for the many inner contradictions in Islam, and define it exclusively on the basis of the historical consequences it triggered, not from the perspective of it's self-understanding and dogma.

Somewhere a bomb blows off. Some sick bastard claims to have it done in the name of Allah, and he ripplefires quotes from the Quran to proove it. Immediately socalled Western moderates in Islam communities will raise and say that it is not Muslim at all, and they will start ripple-firing quotes – from the very same Quaran, prooving it’s peacefulness, and they will point out, that the fanatics have picked their quotes out of context. Next some people will come and question the context of the quotes of the moderates. Some smart heads will insist on all religions sharing the same basic beliefs, and that we all are about a God, and love, and tolerance. Not too mention those who come up with the Muslim neighbours they happen to know „who are really nice and kind people“, so Islam cannot be that bad at all. After a while the whole business is about defending Islam, and the victims of the event in the beginning have vanished into the voids of unimportance, as if it never happened.

I AM SICK AND TIRED OF THIS. I AM AT A POINT WHERE I DISLIKE BOTH, THE BOMBER AND THE MODERATE.

Yesterday evening a man send back my first draft of the first chapter, he holds the grade of a doctor of philosophy and teaches at university, in the field of intercultural comparisons (a friend of my parents). I asked him for his opnion. He strongly advised me not to release the text once it is finished, and that I maybe better should stop pursuing it. He said that the facts that I gave are from an unusual perspective but in principle correct, I nevertheless were unusual in my approach not to allow any freedom and space for diplomatic compromise in wording and interpretation and conclusions, necessarily giving me the aura of a dogmatist that way and making the text an aggressive "bomb" that only can raise maximum hostility from Muslims, and much hostilities from Western Multikulti-fans as well.

Hmpf. I know he is right. I also know that I am on a right path with my opinion, and that a growing part of pöublic starts to raise doubts about our tolerant policies towards Islam, and that the rlease of the work of mine will raise maximum controversy and even hostility, and that it easily can turn former neutrals or friends at this board into my bitter enemies, feeling heavily offended. For my opinion on the West’s limitless tolerance is very bad, and my opnion of Islam, Muhammad and the Quran is even worse. Now, what should I do? If I continue and release the first parts of this text in two or three weeks, it will raise just hate and anger and conflict, and will not acchieve anything to substantially change the silliness in Western societies – it just calls it by it’s name and brandmarks it as the folly that it is, but does not enforce changes. Plus: it is a complete affront against Islam. If I give up, I surrender to exactly the expected tolerance that I critizise, for reasons of not attacking Islam. And that is what I do: I intentionally attack it on the basis of it’s very own history. What else is Islam if not a massive rejection of it’s violant history, a set of contradictory rules and archaic rites from patriarchalic tribal communities and a mindset that got freezed in the status of conditions 1400 years ago and that in form of the Quran has a formidable tool to opportunistically excuse and defend anything: hate or tolerance, missionizing or acceptance, killing or letting live - making tiself untouchable that way, always avoiding critizism by saying: "But look here, the Quran says:...." ? Islam cannot be realised by reading the Quran or the Hadiths, this is one of my basic conclusions, this only helps to spread confusion over it’s nature and goals. What is Islam, then? Is it the result of the history that formed it (by patterns that were imprinted into it in the first twenty years of it’s existence?) Or is it the Quran? Is the moderate, tolerant man or the fundamentalist the true Muslim? Or should Muhammad’s life be the scale of judgement? Whatever approach you pick, it leads to different conclusions – how could Islam be taken as serious, then, if it displays so much of nothing? What would you think if I say not the tolerant Muslim is the true Muslim, but the intolerant fundamentalist, and that the only difference between this sort of true Muslims is only the ammount of violance they are willing to use or accept? Such a statement is considered to be politically uncorrect. But it is one of the most basic conclusions on Islam that I came to. Am I intolerant? A rightwing, then? A racist? Those that I just defined as untrue Muslims, the moderate ones, would be heavily offended to be told that. Konovalov will just shake his head, maybe beeing dissapointed by me. Could this be a scale to judge our relations towards Islam, is this the deciding issue: the answer if our Western culture’s position towards Islam is liked by Islam, or not? Should another culture be judge of our actings, becasue we let down our own culture that far? Wouldn't it be better to concentrate back on our own historical roots and traditions and values - that made our civilization the most superior historyx has ever seen, and gave it the most developed possebilities and potentials mankind ever has seen?

I already regret that I started to write this history-text, because it troubles my mind and makes me aware of how much importance I see in these issues for our Western culture, and it let me see my former travels in a different light: that of „know your enemy“.

Neal hit the nail on top, and very much so, when he said a couple of days ago: „Muslims, this is your house, who is going to clean it?“ I almost wanted to hug him for that. :) Cannot become much more precise in just one sentence.

Tolerance of ours needs limits on the basis of clear definitions of what we are as a culture, AND WHAT NOT. Unlimited tolerance only leads to anarchy in which the stronger one takes over. I started to wonder if this, besides the use of force and open violance, may be one of the tactics of Islam expansion. Sixpack is right when saying that the cultural erosion of the West attracts Islamic expansion into the vacuum that was created that way. I have written exactly that myself just days ago.

Can we afford to be that tolerant anymore? Do we really want true Islam – or only our flawed perception of it? Do we really know what Islam is? Can we trust it?

I think I let it rest for some days. I simply became too angry by thinking of it all.

Skybird, why the short post? :rotfl: :rotfl:

Anyway, some food for thought: The Suicide Bombers Among Us.

Europe, sit up and listen.

Western culture gone too far ? In light of clash...
 

I basically agree with Sixpack that Western society has lost touch with its values and has gone too materialistic. If you believe money is everything you'll find out some day that actually it is nothing.
On the other hand, Western values have not gone through the drain. They are still here and can be taken up again (and defended if necessairy) by a new generation. They have helped Europe through ages of devellopment and have themselves deepened during those ages.
I sometimes feel that the hars confrontation with fundamental Islam is a challenge for Christianity and Humanism. They are flexible enough - contrary to fundamental Islam - to adopt the those new challenges.
I'm not sure that's going to happen, but it certainly is a possibility. This thread is proof of that.

@skybird

i'll read your paper. everyone's entitled to their opinion, and i'd like to hear yours -- sounds like you put a lot of thought into it.

i'll even reserve judgement till i've seen it. if it's F.O.S, though, expect some resistance ;)

I feel for your dilema Skybird....

I try to understand and even ask for clear,precise examples or quotes from this book the Quaran and only one who seems to know em pretty good is Avon Lady....any way I go on my day and turn on the news at night and see a group of peoples in Iran ...burning American flags chanting Death to Isreal and America....I think to myself...Is there some group of Americans,Isrealis,Aussies,Chinese or whoever chanting Death to Muslims...death to Iraq...Death Arabs...and burning these countries flags?If there is and someone knows about it please post the link to it so I can see the justifiaction or at least the reason for an Eye for an Eye.

I already know the truth my Muslim friends though and being human it is hard to accept...being a "New" Teatament Christian.

You want my head?....You want to crucify me?..I will consider it an honor ..a great honor..to die like my Fathers Son did.

Was looking for some pics and came across this...maybe we all get a little to cought up in things myself included...
http://www.masada2000.org/Terror-Cat.html

One final note from another site...was an intresting thought...

Personally, I think it's the lack of real individualism and secularism (and yet the mistaken illusion of the presence thereof) is the real problem we're facing here. There is an illusion of freedom where there is none.

Dogmatism in any form is ultimately destructive. And it doesn't solve anything. I don't see how our problems with 'drugs and violence' can be solved by what's ultimately another violent drug.

I've had the 'wonderful' experience of, in my rather brief life, of experiencing the East and the West in a very direct and unrestricted fashion. In both, there were illusions of freedom; in both, and I hesitate to say in which more so, I felt/feel severely repressed as an individual.

No anti-individualist dogma will lead to anything good if people can't even so much as properly value themselves. People are cheap; real individuals are not. I don't know what it takes to beat it into others' heads that people are cheap in the eyes of society. You look around, and these "freedom-minded individualists" are being bought and sold by the pound, left and right, often voluntarily so. As long as you and everyone around you are just 'people', nothing is possible. Because you're a cheap commodity, to yourself as to everyone else.

Anyway, back to my basement of politics-avoidance :roll:

We have. And when we have trouble with them, it's usually because we've stupidly placed opposing refugee groups in the same asylums. There are of course those who have deep mental scars from having been in the middle of war zones, and may act erratically as a consequence. But this is understandable, and something one can observe in war veterans of any country.

Their main problem in Norway though, is distrust. Norwegians don't trust them, and so there's often a cold front between Norwegians and immigrants. It's not like the West welcomes them with open arms and offer them the best of everything. It's more like smashing a food tray down in front of them, and ordering, "here, eat! And shut the F up". How is anyone supposed to react to that kind of attitude? Circumstances considered, their behaviour has for the most part been exemplary.