There goes the neighborhood - Tunisia Edition

Religion can be great but there are many examples where it abused. This is one of them. Violence is never the answer.

human nature is not professional

This is clearly a problem with "religion" overall, not violent Islamic extremist factions. I was just watching the news reports of violent mobs of Christians, Jews, Buhdists, moderate Muslims, etc. storming the Egyptian and Libyan embassies here in the U.S. in retaliation.

Last I checked the U.S. was providing many countries in the ME with billions (aggregate) in aid to improve people's standard of living and attempt to promote human rights.....bad U.S., very bad!


:frusty:

Might want to broaden your frame of reference a bit. Once you do, I'm sure you'll find plenty of violent behavior attributable to the western religions you mentioned. (hmm... Crusades? Salem witch trials? Catholic persecution of scientists)

And regarding the US, let's cut the shit. Any dollar that makes its way into the ME is sent with the underlying purpose of subverting their chosen way of life in favor of the western style which we, in our infinite wisdom, have decided to force upon the rest of the world. If they want to live under an Islamist government, that's their right. We don't have the moral authority to get involved. If we had abstained from being so goddamned proactive in the affairs of other nations, there's a good chance that there would never have been a 9/11. Just because we send some funds their way does not mean we have the right to interfere.

With regards to the violence we're discussing, it can be boiled down to two simple factors:

1) religion provides the moral authority to do violence against those who have beliefs contrary to yours. (contrasted with agnostics and atheists who don't have any supernatural father figure to tell them it's alright to go mass murder each other)

2) the US has repeatedly ****ed with these people in such various and obscenely short sighted ways that we are now collectively reaping what we have sewn.

Those two pieces combined result in what we are experiencing now. Impossible to deny.

Cracks me up when people bring up the Crusades.
How long ago was that?

yes, christians never pointlessly murder other religions. not in the crusades, not in the holocaust, not during the black plague (the first thing that happened is they blamed the jews and started killing them).

granted, those examples are a bit dated, but i'd says christians have killed plenty in their time too.

and you don't need to aggregate. egypt is scheduled to get 2billion from us next year alone as one of our non-NATO member allies.

Cracks me up when people bring up the Crusades.
How long ago was that?

to those in the middle east, the stories are retold as if it happened yesterday. they can hold a grudge.

i always accept what i'm told as the truth

Might want to broaden your frame of reference a bit. Once you do, I'm sure you'll find plenty of violent behavior attributable to the western religions you mentioned. (hmm... Crusades? Salem witch trials? Catholic persecution of scientists)Of course you're right, Christians do nothing but perpetrate violence on others. Nice you needed to reach back hundreds of years for your references.

And regarding the US, let's cut the shit. Any dollar that makes its way into the ME is sent with the underlying purpose of subverting their chosen way of life in favor of the western style which we, in our infinite wisdom, have decided to force upon the rest of the world. If they want to live under an Islamist government, that's their right. We don't have the moral authority to get involved. If we had abstained from being so goddamned proactive in the affairs of other nations, there's a good chance that there would never have been a 9/11. Just because we send some funds their way does not mean we have the right to interfere. Any interference/funding in the ME has a lot more to do with secular U.S. interests (goodwill/positive outreach are generally better for business than violence) that promoting a religious agenda.

With regards to the violence we're discussing, it can be boiled down to two simple factors:

1) religion provides the moral authority to do violence against those who have beliefs contrary to yours. (contrasted with agnostics and atheists who don't have any supernatural father figure to tell them it's alright to go mass murder each other)

2) the US has repeatedly ****ed with these people in such various and obscenely short sighted ways that we are now collectively reaping what we have sewn.

Those two pieces combined result in what we are experiencing now. Impossible to deny.While we're cutting through shit, let's cut through your shit. You're quite anti-religious and paint with a very broad brush in your negative (and very condescending) statements against those who are religious. While you focus on the violence done by religious extremists, or those who manipulate people using religion, you never mention the vast good people who are religious do everyday in the name of their God/religion.

And while agnostics/atheists may not have a "supernatural father figure" that tells them to commit murder, those that want to commit violence for secular reasons (money/power/statism) don't have any moral compass to hold them back from mass murder. For example; tens of millions murdered by Communist regimes such as the USSR, China, Cuba, etc. Japan's persecution of Christians in the 1600-1800s, Mexico's persecution in the early 1900s.

Look at the violence in U.S. society today, most of it is over $$$, drugs, etc....purely secular. It's pretty old to hear athetists/agnostics bash religion every chance they get with weak arguments.

to those in the middle east, the stories are retold as if it happened yesterday. they can hold a grudge.

Suck to be that medieval.....
The can also hold a drone dropped JDAM up their wazoo then.

Don't you just love religion. Look at our omnipotent deity working in mysterious ways! Isn't it glorious? Praise jeebus. Also, way to go America for sticking your collective nose where it doesn't belong for decades. That policy is clearly working out for you. You should stick with that.

Purely a matter of opinion, and since we are invited their by their govts in most cases that argument never held any water with me. Especially in Bin Ladens case.
Islam and Islamic extremists are not a govt nor are they a uniformed army.