Some random asswipe
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Mass shooting at Orlando gay nightclub [50 dead, 53 injured]
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Some random asswipe
The gun control battle has an ideological component as well. The battle being fought to get people to loosen grip on their guns is not strictly legal. The problem is, of course, that it is considered completely unacceptable to challenge religion. People have the freedom to call for the death of an entire class of citizens if they do it in a religious context.
That is also a problem yet people don't see it as one because of "religious freedom". The latter should be challenged as much as "the right to bear arms". Religions can be ideological weapons and when their tenets run contrary to the ideals of a pluralistic state, they are threats to the smooth functioning of that state.
I haven't seen the video but please don't assume that all religious people are hateful bigots.
Unfortunately as a Christian, it makes me sad that lunatics and hateful people use religion to spread their hate.
OuterLimits
Member
It definitely depends on which political side. Many are making everything black or white.
On right wing sites it's all about Islam, oh and how this dude was a registered Democrat. Of course not much talk about guns being a problem.
On left wing sites it's all about guns and not much talk about the likely radical Islamic aspect that isn't exactly compatible with secular progressive values.
A Link to the Past
Banned
I don't know that we should be posting that video, but I am excited to hopefully see backlash of biblical proportions (get it)
EdibleKnife
Member
None of this is a concrete solution. How do you want to challenge religion? What exactly do you want to do about it? Guns are at least tangible things which makes their regulation a more realistic endeavor. How do you want to battle something as tenuous as religion?
That's a much more slippery slope you're looking at than gun control. Sure, that would jail KKK members and the like as well as openly radical islamists but it would have done nothing to stop this guy. As I stated in my second post, he doesn't even know enough about his religion or ISIS to know that he'd be beheaded by them for being part of a different sect, so it's hardly like the guy was religious minded.
As for what you said on gun control, it's legal to increase backround checks. It's legal to make carrying guns in public require a license. It's infeasible to ban them in this country. And if you think it doesn't work, just look into how much the ban on automatics decreased crime rates.
His opinion is worthless to us but that's reality . He has followers http://www.faithfulwordbaptist.org
You think trump or Cruz will commit these crimes ? These issues are grass rooted. And need to be discussed. Just like gun laws
Spreading his message? Really ??
It's the mentality that needs to be openly discussed . Just like Islamic scriptures for calling killing of homosexual. When you are fighting ideology how else can you bring change but put it up front and mock it?
Kill Your Masters
Member
There are approximately 3299999 Muslims left in the US that can buy a gun while purchasing other groceries and go nuts if they want right now and nobody could stop them, yet for some "weird reason" they don't. Weird, right?
This can't be right, your government just probably secretly deported all Muslims.
It's also weird that 10 Islamic countries have death penalty for homosexuality . Isn't that weird.
Laughing Banana
Weeping Pickle
So what do you propose we do exactly?
Should we ban Islam from the US or something to that effect?
By actually discussing it or confronting him or making some vague effort to do something other than post a video for people to rubberneck at. If you feel like actually putting in some effort, I'd be happy to have you dissect and repudiate the video, but you couldn't be bothered to do that.
What you did instead was cooperative rubbernecking. You said, "Hey, come look at this trainwreck with me so we can shake our heads at it."
If you want to do something about it, do something about it. Complain to YouTube, create a video rebuttal and link both of them, write a reasoned piece about why the video is garbage. Do something besides dropping a link and saying "ugh."
Their hatefulness should not be protected under the guise of "religious freedom". I'm not sure what's so intangible about that. We already have laws that pertain to what citizens can legally say (defamation, perjury, hate speech etc.). Also, if they become officially politically involved or encourage violence against classes of citizens they should risk having their tax free status revoked. Religion and hate group/political lobbyist should not be allowed to intersect legally.
Of course, none of this will happen because we are afraid of religious people (even more than gun lovers) since many have proven themselves delusional and therefore dangerous. So we will continue to treat it like a sacred cow even when it is doing us more harm than good.
BTW, I am not against stricter gun control laws. I'm just not seduced by a single-minded focus on the how of these crimes and not the why.
I'm going to take this post as an example of the huge issue that's constantly being missed. Of course, please don't take this as a direct attack. Definitely not my intention.
Today I saw a parade of religious leaders on TV condemn the attacks. Those same religious leaders will go back to their places of worship, and continue denouncing lgbt as abomination, and spread the very same literature that is the foundation of the religion which contains inflammatory rhetoric towards LGBT.
Communities are led by these religious leaders. They grow thinking of LGBT as less than human, and why not; after all they are abominations that go against their God. These same religions fund and support activities to treat LGBT less than equal, depriving them of equal rights in the eyes of the law.
LGBT is simply dehumanized by these religious leaders. Why do you think there are so many suicides amongst LGBT youth?
To finish my rant, I think the big issue at hand is that as long as religions continue treating LGBT as abomination, continue keeping the inflammatory rhetoric in their religious texts, the divide between LGBT and the religious non-LGBT will continue.
Obviously not. But we can bring the issues upfront and support reformist over apologist. Instead of ignoring and say " Islam is peace " and try to kill the discussion.
I see your point. I am trying to add . We have to attack these ideologies. Understand the root cause of homophobic . Both in jeduo-Christian -Islamic scripture/tradition. Understand that these people believe as ultimate ruling of God , which for some is bigger than land law
BreezyLimbo
Banned
Real talk.
If you attack someone, about their ideology, the first thing they're going to do is withdraw further into their own communities. Attacking people doesn't work. You have to educate them. Whether it's educating them when they're older, or doing it when they're young, to effectively change people you have to educate them. 'The Root cause of homophobia' doesn't stem from religion(As some people corrected me when I originally responded earlier today), it stems from education and lack there of.
Teaching people is key. Yes, there will be people set in their ways, but attacking them isn't going to help anything. They're not going to change their ways. The best you can do is slowly strangle their community away by teaching their young. If this sounds like a cult it kinda is but you know that's how you get rid of bigoted communities. It's no surprise that parts of the world have gotten more progressive the better the education systems in those parts got better.
I was never a member of the Islamic faith, but I've never known of any verse in the Quran that outright says to punish or kill homosexuals. I can point to verses in the old testament, but none in the Quran (although some can argue that it is implied)
I see you've ditched the faith you were raised to believe in, which is something I can relate to.. but I've got to be honest, reading some of your posts on how you critique Islam is a bit disheartening. I see you criticizing your old religion, which is typical of someone who ditches their faith, but then I see you make these analysis on how Islam is worse than other common religions (note, I am not just referring to posts in this thread)
I don't think Islamic scripture is any worse than Christianity or Judaism, I think the political circumstance of the religions is different. For one there's a lack of separation of church and state in the Islamic countries, but more than this there is also political unrest and poorer living conditions in the middle east
I agree with you that there are homophobic scriptures that should be brought to light and condemned, but this isn't an issue that is unique to Islam
Hate speech is actually protected. That's why neo nazi's are still around in the U.S. as well as the KKK. We also have churchs that fuck up gay service members funerals.
But, here's the problem with the religious hatefulness ban: where do you draw lines? Do you base it off hatefulness in the scripture? If that's the case, then we'd be jailing christians as well as muslims. Do we base it off of something someone said? In which case, how far is too far idelogically? Do we start closing the doors on churchs that are anti-gay but don't call for them to be murdered? And on.
It'd be nice if you clarified a bit on what you're talking about. You're being pretty vague about what type of punishment you'd have in mind for a religion being anti-class. I'm not sure how such a punishment system would work.
You do it through education. Bombing the hell out of people tends to piss them off, and that's exactly what groups like ISIS want. You can't beat an ideology with force, it just creates a feedback loop.
However, if you can show people that you're not what they say you are, it'll go a lot further to prevent people from joining groups like ISIS.
However, the US and it's allies have fucked up the Middle East so bad it's probably to late for that.
I was never singling out Muslims. I notice that people tend to assume I am.
Anyway, you're finding all the problems in the world just as the people who don't want their guns taken away do. I'm afraid we all have our "sacred cows".
Humans are shitty, we've been killing each other in the name of something or other in various ways for thousands of years. No amount of gun control, immigration control or any control will change that, we are just shitty end of the day we are just animals with flawed brains and there's just too many of us
I'm not asking for guns to be taken away, though. And most of the people who are afraid of their guns getting taken away are normally also the type to complain about anything effecting religious liberty.
Education. That's vague. ISIS is something that absolutely needs to be bombed out. They're genocidal against other muslims and completely xenophobic. None of the countries in the area can stand them either.
But yes, the middle east has been fucked since it was divvied up amongst the winners of WW 1 in arbitrary lines.
A Link to the Past
Banned
There are 50 countries with a majority of Muslims. While those 10 have reprehensible laws, you cannot simply apply this information without appropriate context. It's kind of like when people talk about head scarves and such, they cite countries that require it, while ignoring all of the Muslim countries that do not. It is just as easy for the law to be implemented through corrupt religious officials.
There have been no gun mass killings in Australia since 1996 after gun control was instituted nationwide there.
A lone person can kill people more efficiently and easily with a gun than a lone person can with just a blade.
This isn't that hard to understand. No one's talking about changing human nature. We're talking about limiting access to the WEAPONS that enable destruction, and limit the capacity for madmen to cause harm.
This isn't that difficult to understand!
It's plain obvious again the problem with Islamic scripture.
"If two men among you are guilty of lewdness, punish them both. If they repent and amend, Leave them alone; for Allah is Oft-returning, Most Merciful."
Quran 4:16
"And (remember) Lut: behold, he said to his people: "Ye do commit lewdness, such as no people in Creation (ever) committed before you. "Do ye indeed approach men, and cut off the highway?- and practise wickedness (even) in your councils?" But his people gave no answer but this: they said: "Bring us the Wrath of Allah if thou tellest the truth." He said: "O my Lord! help Thou me against people who do mischief!" When Our Messengers came to Abraham with the good news, they said: "We are indeed going to destroy the people of this township: for truly they are (addicted to) crime."
Qur'an 29:28"
Hadith
"Narated By Abdullah ibn Abbas : The Prophet (peace be upon him) said: If you find anyone doing as Lot's people did, kill the one who does it, and the one to whom it is done.
Abu Dawud 38:4447"
To be clear , as I have said before the discussion isn't one broad stroke of all Muslim . This is about scripture and the difference in how now Christians see the Old Testament and how in Islam vast majority believe as Quran exact word of God and exactly how to govern society and live, while Hadith are perfect example of life of prophet.
If you can understand that difference you will understand the mentality of these attackers
Here is a great video to understand my point
https://youtu.be/pSPvnFDDQHk
Ok
Pretty much vast majority if not all have homosexuality banned. I was trying to make a case that was equivalent as killing. Many have punishment etc
https://76crimes.com/76-countries-where-homosexuality-is-illegal/
Fantastical
Death Prophet
1/5 having a death penalty for homosexual acts is not a good record.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Anti-LGBT elements in this context are more a problem with religion itself (particularly Judaeo-Christian, though I do not know if it goes beyond that). One can see a variance in how members of Islam react to LGBT people; the more educated and exposed a Muslim is to it, the more they come to not have those views. I would sooner believe that the nature of the Middle East is more of a factor as to why LGBT people there are victimized than the implement used to victimize.
Israel had homosexuality banned till 1988. Good ol' Judaism.
And if you look far enough into the past in any european nation you won't find any better treatment of LGBT.
A Link to the Past
Banned
Actually, if I recall Israel allows homosexuality and recognizes same-sex marriage (though marriages are not done in the country, IIRC). I think that is more a product of Israel's political history than an inherent acceptance of homosexuality, but it should be noted that (again IIRC) Jewish people are among the most accepting of it among all religions in the US.
Anyway, the point is that if the kind of people who are in charge of Middle-Eastern countries that have homosexuality banned were Christian, odds are homosexuality would still be banned.
Used to kill each other by the thousands back in the day, sticks stones / bows arrows / swords spears / guns , we just progressed to the nuclear bomb
Regardless of numbers we still kill each other over the most trivial things
jellies_two
Member
exactly and as has been pointed out by Jim Jeffries, if this guy was in Australia and had wandered about town asking criminals (some of whom do have guns, as the NRA love to say) for a gun, someone would have quickly reported that a mentally unstable guy was after an assault weapon and a sting would be arranged. He would have stood out like dogs balls. Like the guy in Shanghai airport today, without a group, without means, he would have been a loser with a knife and a local story at best.
Oh right, I forgot about that detail. Still, they only legalized homosexuality at all in 1988.
Of course it isn't good enough. More should be done in the Islamic world. Whatever that exactly means.
We bombed the hell out of AL Quada in Afghanistan and Iraq to the point where you hardly hear about them anymore.
ISIS stepped in to fill that gap and they're worse then AL Quada.
What happens when you bomb ISIS into irrevellencely and the next group that replaces them takes it to the next level, going even further then ISIS has?
You can't fight an ideology with force. It doesn't work. It's exactly what they want, as it's a perfect recruiting tool.
You need to figure out why they're attracting people to join them (bombing the hell out of someone's country is a great place to start, as it tends to piss people off).
Dat edit
A Link to the Past
Banned
My point wasn't "hey, it's something"; it was that there is clearly variance between Muslim leaders. Despite the passages that pretty clearly state that homosexuals are to be put to death, only a minority of Muslim nations follow that. It does suggest that there are a lot of factors to talk about as to why some nations are more extremist than others, with one of the factors being the nature of the Middle East.
I mean, it's not a stealth edit because the user was clearly corrected. :v
My mistake is preserved forever in link's quote and the edit reason.
Cow Mengde
Banned
I'm an American living in another country, so I only heard of this news after I woke up. I saw the headline and shrugged thinking this is just another shooting. I thought it was about the singer. I only noticed it was another incident after seeing it talked about else where that what a huge tragedy this is. Not that the singer getting killed wasn't sad, but it just felt like another homicide case or something.
I agree that any ideology that believes gay people are inhuman or deserving of death is wrong. And I think most of us know those people exist, and who they are, generally speaking. That's why I don't find it necessary to highlight one particular dumbass regurgitating arguments he got from Westboro Baptist and others. I'm not interested in raising the profile of another church the way Westboro was able to raise theirs. And it's not needed, because the problem isn't that we don't know people think terrible, horrible things and often act on those thoughts, the problem is there is very little we can do about it.
What do you do about someone who believes that gay people should be put to death? How do you change their mind? The very act of arguing against them convinces them that you have been corrupted, because what they're following isn't a reasonable argument that can be repudiated with logic, it's an unfalsifiable statement of faith.
Beyond that, these philosophies of hatred, whether they're parts of Isam, Christianity, Hinduism, Sikhism, or whatever aren't the only factor involved. We like to believe that things happen for a reason, but it's rare that things happen for a single reason. Things happen because a confluence of reasons and timing occur. Mentally ill people rarely engage in violence. Religious people rarely engage in violence, Violent people, worldwide, rarely have access to guns. Here, we create the conditions for perfect storms all the time, because we mix mental health issues, easy availability of guns, and pathological philosophies. Getting rid of one of the problems isn't going to solve the issue. Elliot Rodgers didn't need religion to go on a murder spree. Nor does one have to be crazy. Any two of the three are generally enough.
We need to address all of them, and quit pretending there are easy answers, like getting rid of a religion or all religions. Not only is that a fantasy reaction, a thing you couldn't do with all the firepower in the world, but it's collective punishment of those who have lived their lives according to the law. It's allowing bad actors to taint life for everyone.
And I'm fine with tackling violent philosophies embedded in religion, and I think that's possible without attempting to jettison the entire religion, a thing which causes reflexive horror and panic from the religion's adherents. But when we get people saying "get rid of religion" or "don't let Muslims in the country" these are people who aren't interested in serious answers. They're people who are angry, but too dumb to actually come up with anything resembling an idea to make things better, so they grasp for a simple answer and shout it twice as loud.
And it's the same thing causing terrorism, this need for easy answers. If your country has been a war zone for twenty years, the easy answer is to hate and to make bombs. It's the first thing we think of doing, because we're angry, violent animals, and it's in our nature to return violence with violence. Blaming a caricature of your enemy is always easier than trying to understand what's really happening. But taking the easy way is killing us. All of us.
A lot of you people are ignoring the violence that happens outside of the Middle East or outside of Western countries as well.
Trying to say this isn't an Islam problem is ridiculous. Whether it is South Asian muslims in India, Chinese muslims in China, Indonesian muslims in Indonesia, Kenyan muslims in Kenya, Nigerian muslims in Nigeria, Tunisian muslims in Tunisia, Dagestani and Chechen muslims in Russia. There is always one constant. They are followers of a militant religion that often excuses human rights violations as part of their faith. Apostasy is punishable by death. Homosexuality is punishable by death and actually applied. India has ethnic tensions but they have a country with Hindus and Sikhs and Buddhists while Muslims needed their own country of Pakistan. The us against them mentality is prevalent worldwide and the religious solidarity transcends race, borders, ethnicity and culture.
Additionally, muslim men make up 0.5% most likely of the American population. Now compare and contrast the number of people killed or the # of terror incidents with any other ethnic group in the US. They will be vastly overrepresented. Why? Think about all the terror attacks that are prevented each year as well.
Trying to say this isn't an Islam problem is ridiculous. Whether it is South Asian muslims in India, Chinese muslims in China, Indonesian muslims in Indonesia, Kenyan muslims in Kenya, Nigerian muslims in Nigeria, Tunisian muslims in Tunisia, Dagestani and Chechen muslims in Russia. There is always one constant. They are followers of a militant religion that often excuses human rights violations as part of their faith. Apostasy is punishable by death. Homosexuality is punishable by death and actually applied. India has ethnic tensions but they have a country with Hindus and Sikhs and Buddhists while Muslims needed their own country of Pakistan. The us against them mentality is prevalent worldwide and the religious solidarity transcends race, borders, ethnicity and culture.
Additionally, muslim men make up 0.5% most likely of the American population. Now compare and contrast the number of people killed or the # of terror incidents with any other ethnic group in the US. They will be vastly overrepresented. Why? Think about all the terror attacks that are prevented each year as well.
Only the Jewish orthodox believe Torah is word to word of God . Which is about 10%.
Compare to vast majority of Muslim believe that Quran is direct word of God .
The way both look at the scripture is very different
Same from here in the UK. The public will move on and won't want to return to free-for-all-gun laws.
Do you honestly know a lot then about Islam and homosexuality laws around the world?
A Link to the Past
Banned
I don't know that citing African countries es examples really works to your advantage. Further, a lot of your countries mentioned have serious issues with poverty. Did you ever wonder why Muslims in the US are more supportive of same-sex marriage than white Evangelical Christians?
It should also be mentioned that you probably didn't phrase your post correctly, because it appears to claim that the only constant for these Muslims is that they follow a militant religion, which either sounds like you're claiming that all of these Muslims are extremists or that all Muslims are Muslims
Poltergust
Member
Quick question: is it confirmed whether or not this guy had a bomb?
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