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Soldier beheaded in Woolwich, UK. Sickening.

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  1. #111

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    Judge people by who they are NOT what they are is my opinion.
    If you don't agree with that then that is your problem.


  2. #112

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    There are crazies in all religions that is forsure. However, most other religions at least pretend to be bothered by the extreme members of their group.

    Islam does a poor job of getting their peaceful message out there...that is if they have one.


  3. #113

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    Soldiers volunteer to kill people for money.

    Not that this makes the tragedy any less tragic.

  4. #114

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    Quote Originally Posted by Raccon:
    See also INXS' post (no. 95) where he admits to be an Islamaphobe because he 'can't tell the difference between a moderate and an extremist' so to him they are all 'nutjobs' and (from post no. 78) 'we need to be active atheists, ridicule and loathe religion...welcome and encourage its demise'; ironically this view is one of the reasons why even the moderate Muslims feel threatened, or are being attacked by radical non-Muslims
    I'm inclined to agree with him. We do need to promote, atheism, skepticism etc and encourage rational thought processes not superstitious ones. As long as it'd done in a peaceful and civilized manner.

    Anyway don't wan this to degenerate into another religion vs science debate.

    what's a radical non-muslim?

  5. #115

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    Quote Originally Posted by bibbju:
    The difference is that the xtian, buddhist, hindu and jewish nutters aren't running round the streets of London killing people with machetes.
    But they do run around the streets of the USA with guns (the christians, anyway)

  6. #116

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    Quote Originally Posted by cheepo:
    Soldiers volunteer to kill people for money.

    Not that this makes the tragedy any less tragic.
    Soldiers sign up to keep our countries safe from enemies, deal with natural disasters, keep the peace in various troubled regions and earn a living to support their families. I don't think many of them sign up because they want to kill people.

  7. #117

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    Quote Originally Posted by MovingIn07:
    Soldiers sign up to keep our countries safe from enemies, deal with natural disasters, keep the peace in various troubled regions and earn a living to support their families. I don't think many of them sign up because they want to kill people.
    How many times in history did British (or US, French, German, etc.) soldiers defend their countries, compared to the times they invaded other countries? "Safe from enemies"???? Sheesh

  8. #118

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    Terrorism is just a label, and its meaning is subject to much debate (haven't we had this discussion before--no, that was Howard, sorry), so applying it or not applying it to particular events is always going to be controversial. The definition I tend to prefer includes the intentional targetting of civilians to further religious or political aims, but I recognise that other people prefer different defintions.

    In the Woolwich killing, the target was not a civilian (and the alleged perpetrators apparently knew it), so I would not call this event "terrorist." (Me agreeing with Glenn Greenwald--what is the world coming to?)

    I think the fact that this victim was active duty military is significant (similarly, the Ft. Hood killings would not fit my definition of terrorism), because otherwise every act of resistance against an oppressive government's military would be classified as terrorism. (Likewise, wouldn't every act of oppression against a resistance movement's soldiers also be classed as terrorism?) Expanding the defintion to include just about everything tends to render it meaningless.

    Anyway, the proper definition of "terrorism" will not be resolved here.

  9. #119

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    Quote Originally Posted by MovingIn07:
    But they do run around the streets of the USA with guns (the christians, anyway)
    To be frank, I am a lot less concerned about what they do in the US until Americans start helping themselves by implementing some form of effective gun control.

  10. #120

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    Quote Originally Posted by closedcasket:
    There are crazies in all religions that is forsure. However, most other religions at least pretend to be bothered by the extreme members of their group.

    Islam does a poor job of getting their peaceful message out there...that is if they have one.
    Actually heaps of moderates spend a long time trying to do this, but nobody wants to listen and if nobody wants to listen it does not make the media. Perhaps we should fund their TV ads for them.

    To be clear, I think religion is silly (not evil or wrong, just plain silly - because grown adults should not be engaging in imaginary friends) but given that, all religions are such as silly as each other (at least Bhuddism seems to be more focussed on living a good life than having an imaginary friend, so it gets extra points there). We can't say Islam is more violent than Christianity because all you have to do is look at history and put the last 15 years in context, and they are just as bad as each other.

    Hitler was a Christian killing Jews (and a whole bunch of other folks) in the name of ethnic and religious cleaning. And he was within the lifetime of many people still living today. Northern Island is within my lifetime and MyMin's office was bombed by the IRA when we lived in London. THAT WAS Christians bombing the streets of London. Canary Wharf anyone? Stop being so blind and stupid.

    These guys are doing it because they are poor, disillusions with life, morality, the economy (or whatever), have been brainwashed or are just plain looking for an excuse to kill people. I don't really think religion actually has much to do with it. If the "Occupy Wallstreet" movement found similar types we might be seeing dead bankers. Any "movement" is going to attract the radicals and the nutcases.

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