Originally Posted by Skybird

Serpent,

read a bit about Islam's ideology and history. And do not trust pro-Islamic sources for doing so. We had this kind of debate so often that even me gets a bit tired of repeating the same old things time and again. your assumptions about what Islam is and wants are good-willed, but simply wrong. You mental comparions to western history necessarily must fail, for Islam has no parallels to the Western tradition. It simply is totalitarian, intolerant towards other cultures, and highly expansive/aggressive. In these things it is totally different than the later churches, the teaching of Jesus, and Buddhism.

I am totally anti Bush, as by now you may have noticed. But I am even more anti-Islam, and I have reasons for that. These reasons lie in
- it's self-definition,
- it's lack of consideration, it's slyness and selfishness,
- it's circular pseudo-reasoning and absence of any logic,
- it's explicit codifying of using force and violance and justifying it if it is in the name of Islam's interest (to be found in the Quran),
- it's claim to be the eternal victim where it turns others into victims indeed,
- it's education of people to become dumb and blindly believe the self-justification of a warmongering bandit who was one of the worst criminals ion human hiostory,
- it's violant history that kills every cultural diversity and tolerant coexistence that in the long run always, always tries to become the last man standing, at the cost of all others;
- and the absence of any future-orientation, replacing evolution with stagnation, knowledge with superstition, spirituality with helplessness and unreflected copying of one single figure: Muhammad, creativity and creational power with apathy and phlegmatism.

Islam is nobody's friend, and everyone's enemy. In principole it has declared war on everything and everyone that is not itself. It's demand to be the ruler of all mankind and owner of all land and countries is more absolute and total than the demands of the Nazi's ideology, the Chinese emperors or the European empires ever has been. Hitler admired it for it's ruthlessness!

Try to see that islamic society is still there, where Muhammad has left it in the 7th century. And then ask yourself why this is so, and what this tells you about the worth of Islam, and muhammad himself. Next compare that to the teachings of Jesus, and Siddharta, their teachings of not acting violantly, but peacefully which is so muczh the opposite of wjhat Muhammad taught and did thorughout his life, wading in blood. Islam is no solution to problems. It is the source of many problem that we have. It does not tame violance, it calls for violance and declares it a holy obligation. It attacks other cultures, and calls their self-defense an attack and an offense. It prohibits any resistance to Islam, it prohibits leaving Islam (by death-penalty) and calls subjugation and discrimination of other faiths "Islam's protection". Many self-declared Muslims will tell you that I am lying, or misunderstand Islam. I tell you that many Muslims are brainwashed victims of a man-hating ideology that puts the search for knowledge under penalty and made it a law that the search for answers must be limited to the Quran, for that is the central revelation of their God. Moderate Islam is untrue Islam, the only Islam there is is the fighting Islam, I base that statement on the Quran and the biography of Muhammad, the example he has set himself, as well.

In other words: we ask: is it really like this or that, like the findings suggest or like the bible says? They ask: why is it that the Quran is always right? - Now, think about that intellectual precondition, and then consider how far it could lead you when reflecting existential questions, questioning youirself, or doing scientific work - not very far, you' ll find. And the developement status of Islamic societies that very much are still basing on the mental and moral living conditions of the early and mid-medieval reflect that.