CT Phipps
Carbon Dated and Proud
Please answer me in a straight forward way. How is ISIS antithetical to Islam?
At the risk of pointing out the obvious, they're kind of massacring large numbers of Muslims. The Koran frowns on that even when it favors going to war with non-monotheistic faiths.
Note they are also massacring Christians who are protected under the book.
So are Jews notably.
So are NON-COMBATANTS notably.
"And fight in the cause of God those who fight against you, and do not commit aggression. Indeed God does not love those who are aggressors," (The Quran, 2:190).
The Caliphate is something that split Islam from the beginning on who to be in charge of it but ISIS has no claim to it other than the fact they said so.
You could make an argument about the brutal treatment of women being allowed by interpretations of the Koran but the fact is that you can make that argument for Jews to massacre all non-Jews. Islam has moved on past the dark days of society and ISIS wishes to recreate the worst evils of the past. But even if they did, they'd be executed for the fact they war on other Muslims and slaughter of noncombatants.
Not the least, again, many of their brutal mistreatment of women are illegal to do against Muslim women.
Which they do.
Note: TAMERLANE thought waging war on his fellow Muslims and the atrocities (based on his love of Genghis Khan) was wrong and it was actually something that imperiled his soul.
Note this is all dark age fundamentalist militant interpretations of the scripture they're fucking up. Actual pacifist and progressive Muslims (and I mean progressive by not the fucking Dark Ages like most Muslim nations ARE) they're just sickening monsters.
It's the irony really Saudi Arabia is the place most Americans think of for Muslim culture and that's kind of awful by any standard but ISIS makes SA look positively benevolent.
People are stuck using flawed heuristics to explain human behavior. I really dislike the myth that poverty is the cause of terrorism.
On this we agree.
Terrorism is a tactic and has been used by the rich, poor, and middle-class throughout history. No one has a monopoly on killing people for ideology or intimidation through atrocity. Rich people tend not to be the people blowing up marketplaces, mind you, but plenty of terrorist organizations have rich patrons.
Certainly, the United States had many many affluent (or middle-class) backers of the IRA to the point it kept it going for decades longer than it might have otherwise. Both the United States and Soviet Union (by definition rich) also supported terrorist groups against their enemies.
Mind you, there's certainly a point that terrorism tends to flourish when people are desperate and miserable but even that's not necessary. Timothy McVeigh and Theodore Kaczynski are American examples of the trope as well the stereotype of "American rich kids joining extremist organizations" which dates back to the Sixties.
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