Tommy Robinson

[davemclaren]

59 minutes ago, i8hibsh said:

 

 

Does that make her a racist?  I am a bit lost with it all.

No, but it does make her someone that looks to not understand the meaning and likely consequences of being in contempt of court. 

[shaun.lawson]

Applies to plenty on this forum IMO.

 

 

[JackLadd]

Not many niqabs and halal meat factories in Uruguay I'll wager. 

Edited June 1, 2018 by JackLadd

[Eldar Hadzimehmedovic]

Going after niqabs. 

[shaun.lawson]

7 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

Not many niqabs and halal meat factories in Uruguay I'll wager. 

 

Not many curtain-twitching weirdos terrified of their own shadow either tbf.

[Cade]

BAN MOOSLIM FACE COVERINGS

 

Edited June 1, 2018 by Cade

[Eldar Hadzimehmedovic]

What in the **** have niqabs and halal meat got to do with grooming gangs and paedophile rings? Exposed big style there Jack lad. 

[luckydug]

13 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

Not many niqabs and halal meat factories in Uruguay I'll wager. 

Not that many in Scotland either.

What's your point ?

[Bridge of Djoum]

18 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

Not many niqabs and halal meat factories in Uruguay I'll wager. 

Oh dear.

[MacDonald Jardine]

21 hours ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

You don't, not by Tommy Robinson anyway.

 

But the MSM have no difficulty in identifying Catholic priest paedos as Catholic priest paedos as it's absolutely relevant.

 

The same way that reporting the uncovering of ANOTHER highly organised Asian grooming gang is absolutely relevant.

 

The Metro only qualified that the highly organised grooming/paedo/beastie gang in their article was white as a reaction to the public outcry about the prevelance of highly organised Asian grooming gangs. You know, just to make sure everybody knows that whitey can be a horrible **** too. 

 

It's like on Kickback when folk want to express how much they utterly despise Celtic they feel compelled to add a footnote that they hate Rangers too for fear of being branded a bigot.

 

This distracts us from the fact that we may have a wee problem in this country with Asian (for Asian read born and bred Brits from a predominantly Pakistani background) grooming paedo gangs. 

 

If the MSM start banging on about Muslamic rape gangs the only thing they'll succeed in doing is increasing suspicion, increasing social polarisation, and increasing the number of white-on-Asian hate crimes and attacks (I say Asian here as your average angry brain donor isn't going to differentiate between Pakistanis, Indians, or anyone with a bit of a sun tan).

 

The country needs to have a grown-up discussion about this with all the blood and guts of the matter out in the open. Unfortunately the country isn't ready for a grown up discussion about this as the popularity and publicity given to an utter **** like Tommy Robinson so depressingly illustrates.

Do you think the Muslim community is ready for a grown up discussion?

[MacDonald Jardine]

19 minutes ago, Cade said:

BAN MOOSLIM FACE COVERINGS

 

?

[JackLadd]

2 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Not many curtain-twitching weirdos terrified of their own shadow either tbf.

 

^^

Lives in a country with 900 (nine hundred) Muslims in total (0.009%) but is an expert on Islamic texts,  culture, history,  global Jihad, motivations and inspiration,  UK security threat, and has deduced it is all one big misunderstanding (a minor foible) and Islam a benign and peaceful ideology. The rape, abuse, slavery, mutilation, terror, antisemitism, misogyny and nation building is all ... nothing to be worried about. What a shame that a great scholarly mind like this citizen chose to reside in Uruguay. Our loss is their (       )  Fill in your own blank. We are truly deprived. Maybe a trip to Bolivia to emulate his hero Che would be an idea.

[JackLadd]

32 minutes ago, Eldar Hadzimehmedovic said:

What in the **** have niqabs and halal meat got to do with grooming gangs and paedophile rings? Exposed big style there Jack lad. 

 

I don't approve of the forced veiling of woman or halal slaughter. Some governments in Europe feel likewise. Exposed huh. 

[shaun.lawson]

39 minutes ago, MacDonald Jardine said:

Do you think the Muslim community is ready for a grown up discussion?

 

What is the 'Muslim community'? Sunnis and Shias have been killing each other for centuries. Are they part of the same 'community'? 

24 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

 

^^

Lives in a country with 900 (nine hundred) Muslims in total (0.009%) but is an expert on Islamic texts,  culture, history,  global Jihad, motivations and inspiration,  UK security threat, and has deduced it is all one big misunderstanding (a minor foible) and Islam a benign and peaceful ideology. 

 

Nope. Spent over 33 years - that's 85% of my life - living in the UK, alongside Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Muslims. I encountered horrible prejudice from time to time: towards Muslims, from people like you.

 

I'll take a wild guess that I've probably met, known and been/am friends with far, far more Muslims than you ever have or ever will. I'm a citizen of the world.  And citizens of the world like me don't like racist *******s like you very much.

 

22 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

 

I don't approve of the forced veiling of woman or halal slaughter. Some governments in Europe feel likewise. Exposed huh. 

 

Above, you complained about antisemitism. You do realise that methods of kosher and halal slaughter are very similar?

 

Yet I don't see you complaining about Jews. Why?

[luckydug]

This thread must be very close to crossing the line.

So much hate on display.

[Unknown user]

Just now, luckydug said:

This thread must be very close to crossing the line.

So much hate on display.

I think it's good to let these things run, it lets people see what's behind the mask

[Sir Vladimir of Romanov]

1 hour ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Not many curtain-twitching weirdos terrified of their own shadow either tbf.

 

Do you find it impossible to debate without childish name calling? 

[shaun.lawson]

2 minutes ago, Sir Vladimir of Romanov said:

 

Do you find it impossible to debate without childish name calling? 

 

Nope.

 

Do you?

[Sir Vladimir of Romanov]

2 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Nope.

 

Do you?

 

Several recent posts would suggest otherwise. 

 

No, I find it better to engage with people, makes for a better discussion. You should try it. 

[MacDonald Jardine]

50 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

What is the 'Muslim community'? Sunnis and Shias have been killing each other for centuries. Are they part of the same 'community'? 

 

Nope. Spent over 33 years - that's 85% of my life - living in the UK, alongside Jews, Christians, Hindus, Buddhists, Sikhs and Muslims. I encountered horrible prejudice from time to time: towards Muslims, from people like you.

 

I'll take a wild guess that I've probably met, known and been/am friends with far, far more Muslims than you ever have or ever will. I'm a citizen of the world.  And citizens of the world like me don't like racist *******s like you very much.

 

 

Above, you complained about antisemitism. You do realise that methods of kosher and halal slaughter are very similar?

 

Yet I don't see you complaining about Jews. Why?

I accept there are different sects of Muslim.

I don't consider myself prejudiced against any of  them.

However, there is something about the culture which at best tolerates and hides those who are quite happy abusing children. 

[XB52]

Dropped out of this for a day. Glad to see my view of at least one poster has been shown to be 100% on the money. I presume he will be an ex poster soon 

[Sir Vladimir of Romanov]

2 minutes ago, XB52 said:

Dropped out of this for a day. Glad to see my view of at least one poster has been shown to be 100% on the money. I presume he will be an ex poster soon 

 

Who? 

[shaun.lawson]

35 minutes ago, Sir Vladimir of Romanov said:

 

Several recent posts would suggest otherwise. 

 

No, I find it better to engage with people, makes for a better discussion. You should try it. 

 

Strange how you so often fail to practice what you preach.

 

18 minutes ago, MacDonald Jardine said:

I accept there are different sects of Muslim.

I don't consider myself prejudiced against any of  them.

However, there is something about the culture which at best tolerates and hides those who are quite happy abusing children. 

 

The exact same thing was said - and still is said - of the Catholic Church by many.

 

The exact same thing could also be said of the football world too. So shall we ban football then? Or at the very least, judge the whole sport by the disgusting actions of a few? 

 

I demand an urgent conversation with "the football community" - because it's all their fault. Everyone in football past or present, obviously.

Edited June 1, 2018 by shaun.lawson

[shaun.lawson]

 

[Sir Vladimir of Romanov]

16 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Strange how you so often fail to practice what you preach.

 

 

The exact same thing was said - and still is said - of the Catholic Church by many.

 

The exact same thing could also be said of the football world too. So shall we ban football then? Or at the very least, judge the whole sport by the disgusting actions of a few? 

 

I demand an urgent conversation with "the football community" - because it's all their fault. Everyone in football past or present, obviously.

 

Funny how you seem to have an oracle like knowledge of what others post yet seem to fail to recall rather important details from your own life. 

 

I'll leave it at that as I'm sure nobody wants this to turn into another Lawsonfest. 

[shaun.lawson]

3 minutes ago, Sir Vladimir of Romanov said:

 

Funny how you seem to have an oracle like knowledge of what others post yet seem to fail to recall rather important details from your own life. 

 

I'll leave it at that as I'm sure nobody wants this to turn into another Lawsonfest. 

 

Do you find it impossible to debate without resorting to childish name calling? 

 

And by the way: it doesn't take an oracle-like history. It takes clicking on your username and looking at your recent posts. On page 1 of which, are two posts from you featuring... childish name calling.

Edited June 1, 2018 by shaun.lawson

[jack D and coke]

 

 

13 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Strange how you so often fail to practice what you preach.

 

 

The exact same thing was said - and still is said - of the Catholic Church by many.

 

The exact same thing could also be said of the football world too. So shall we ban football then? Or at the very least, judge the whole sport by the disgusting actions of a few? 

 

I demand an urgent conversation with "the football community" - because it's all their fault. Everyone in football past or present, obviously.

The Catholic Church is a scandalous organisation but it’s easy to critisice without fearing you might be brutally murdered in your place of work because of it.  The residents of Molenbeek took in and harboured the savages who went on the rampage in Paris and hid them from authorities, now I can’t remember a Catholic, or Jewish or Sikh or Hindu or any other area that is predominately one religion ever doing the same. British intelligence monitors around 2000 potential lunatics in the West Midlands alone and foils attacks regularly, I’m not seeing any other group causing similar anywhere. I read people say it’s never affected them here well I don’t remember large concrete bollards being placed all over streets and towns and cities in Europe now to stop people mowing pedestrians down at Christmas markets etc. I really don’t see what it is some people just point blank refuse to acknowledge here. The left are the new fascists, suggesting nothing is wrong anywhere and attempting to close down discussing it. Is this going to make it go away you think? 

Where you’re going with the stopping football comments I’ve no idea though. 

[Sir Vladimir of Romanov]

4 minutes ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

Do you find it impossible to debate without resorting to childish name calling? 

 

And by the way: it doesn't take an oracle-like history. It takes clicking on your username and looking at your recent posts. On page 1 of which, are two posts from you featuring... childish name calling.

 

You don't take constructive feedback well do you? You always seem very defensive. 

[shaun.lawson]

1 minute ago, jack D and coke said:

The left are the new fascists, suggesting nothing is wrong anywhere and attempting to close down discussing it. Is this going to make it go away you think? 

Where you’re going with the stopping football comments I’ve no idea though. 

 

I'm on the liberal left. I don't like, for example, face veils. At all. I have zero time whatever for theocratic regimes. With regard to which: I don't like our government's arming and supporting the despicable Saudi regime - state terrorists in all but name - which leaves us with much, much blood on our hands.

 

But strangely, I don't then blame the entire UK public for our government's behaviour. Because I know that most of said public doesn't agree with it either. Can you see the parallel yet? 

 

I'll tell you what lefties like me want. It's for people to stop doing the terrorists' work for them. Stop choosing to be terrorised by depraved murderers whose entire raison d'etre is to turn everyone against each other. Stop sensationalising, stop seeing some Fifth Column which doesn't exist.

 

Many people on here will be sold milk, or have their accounts done, or be brought home in a taxi, or you name it, by Muslims. What do you do? Do you think "I can't trust him - he wants to take over the world and impose Sharia law"?

 

The fantasy world so many prefer to live in is not reality. The desire to be so much more terrorised by terrorism than it warrants is just extraordinary. There were many more terrorist attacks around the world in the 1970s and 1980s than there are now. 

 

Two other quick things:

 

1. The Manchester bomber was reported to the authorities five times - and the authorities did nothing. That's on us, not the local community. It's also on us that we - the UK - ourselves radicalised the Manchester bomber by encouraging him to go to Libya and fight alongside the rebels.

 

2. Are you unfamiliar with the near epidemic of reports of historic child abuse in football? So where's our disgust for the football community? There's none. Because we know there were just some horrific individuals doing disgusting things. 

 

The only reason we don't take the same approach with Islam and Muslims is the same old irrational fear of the 'other' which is at the root of most of the world's problems.

[William H. Bonney]

1 hour ago, shaun.lawson said:

 

 

Who is that dj? 

 

Edit. Found him. 

Edited June 1, 2018 by Dino Velvet
I'm lazy

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

1 hour ago, jack D and coke said:

 

 

The Catholic Church is a scandalous organisation but it’s easy to critisice without fearing you might be brutally murdered in your place of work because of it.  The residents of Molenbeek took in and harboured the savages who went on the rampage in Paris and hid them from authorities, now I can’t remember a Catholic, or Jewish or Sikh or Hindu or any other area that is predominately one religion ever doing the same. British intelligence monitors around 2000 potential lunatics in the West Midlands alone and foils attacks regularly, I’m not seeing any other group causing similar anywhere. I read people say it’s never affected them here well I don’t remember large concrete bollards being placed all over streets and towns and cities in Europe now to stop people mowing pedestrians down at Christmas markets etc. I really don’t see what it is some people just point blank refuse to acknowledge here. The left are the new fascists, suggesting nothing is wrong anywhere and attempting to close down discussing it. Is this going to make it go away you think? 

Where you’re going with the stopping football comments I’ve no idea though. 

You are unaware of how terrorists swanned around the "hard" areas in Northern Ireland then?

[Governor Tarkin]

3 hours ago, MacDonald Jardine said:

Do you think the Muslim community is ready for a grown up discussion?

 

I'd imagine some of it is and some of it isn't.Same as any community.

 

There are grown up discussions going on all the time (you can trawl through the google yourself if you want any specifics because I cant be arsed), but the mainstream public domain is dominated by tabloid diplomacy with debate led by cartoon character populists like Robinson and his Muslim opposite numbers.

You probably know this so I'm struggling to see what your question was really driving at.

[Governor Tarkin]

3 hours ago, JackLadd said:

The rape, abuse, slavery, mutilation, terror, antisemitism, misogyny and nation building is all ... nothing to be worried about. 

 

Sounds a lot like the British Empire tbh.

 

[Governor Tarkin]

2 hours ago, XB52 said:

Dropped out of this for a day. Glad to see my view of at least one poster has been shown to be 100% on the money. I presume he will be an ex poster soon 

 

I hope not. It takes all sorts. The poster in question is perfectly entitled to hold the views that he does and to express them freely. I haven't seen any forum rules broken. If you find them so abhorent you can always pop him on ignore.

[jack D and coke]

53 minutes ago, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

You are unaware of how terrorists swanned around the "hard" areas in Northern Ireland then?

I knew yeah but I don’t think that’s all that similar tbh. That was a massacre unknown in the west and they hid these people in their community. This is also worldwide and no amount of peace processes or “good Friday agreements” can reason with this ideology for me. 

[JackLadd]

1 hour ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Sounds a lot like the British Empire tbh.

 

 

 

An empire largely consigned to history. Although the most bloody episode was the partition of British India and creation of Pakistan in 1947. Not that it was the first bloodbath there, Muslims had been persecuting and slaughtering Hindus for centuries during the Islamic invasion and under various Sultanates. Prior to that you had the biggest slave trade in the world run by the Moors and Arabs. Recently restarted in Libya and rife across the Islamic State. Sharia permits slavery of non Muslims for any purpose including sex. No bible bashing abolitionists there.  To do so would be blasphemy and punishable by death. 

[Governor Tarkin]

2 minutes ago, JackLadd said:

 

 

An empire largely consigned to history. Although the most bloody episode was the partition of British India and creation of Pakistan in 1947. Not that it was the first bloodbath there, Muslims had been persecuting and slaughtering Hindus for centuries during the Islamic invasion and under various Sultanates. Prior to that you had the biggest slave trade in the world run by the Moors and Arabs. Recently restarted in Libya and rife across the Islamic State. Sharia permits slavery of non Muslims for any purpose including sex. No bible bashing abolitionists there.  To do so would be blasphemy and punishable by death. 

 

Hindus did a fair bit of slaughtering themselves mind, not to mention the Sikhs. The Romans and before them the Greeks were partial to a bit of slavery too (have a wee scan at Plato's views on the subject in his 'Republic'). In the not so distant past Christian militias were slaughtering Muslims in the former Yugoslavia, and a short time before that in the Lebanon. Chuck a right good bit of raping into that mix too across all of those theatres. Jew and Muslim continue to commit attrocities against each other on a daily basis in the Eastern Mediterranean.

 

No room for whattaboutery when trying to work out who the most horrible ***** are.

 

Go and have a look in the mirror. You are around a weeks worth of food, forced political and economic upheval, the loss of a loved one to violence - or some other such like - from becoming everything you hate and fear. 

 

Them's the facts.

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

1 hour ago, jack D and coke said:

I knew yeah but I don’t think that’s all that similar tbh. That was a massacre unknown in the west and they hid these people in their community. This is also worldwide and no amount of peace processes or “good Friday agreements” can reason with this ideology for me. 

Their ideology, as in the nutjobs who carried out the Bataclan attacks, cannot be reasoned with because it is nihilistic. The point I was making in a roundabout fashion is that people like this can terrorise and scare the bejaysus out of those they live beside for fear of retribution. Applying nutjob behaviour to all of Islam is as daft as applying Timothy McVeigh's behaviour to all Christians.

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

4 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Hindus did a fair bit of slaughtering themselves mind, not to mention the Sikhs. The Romans and before them the Greeks were partial to a bit of slavery too (have a wee scan at Plato's views on the subject in his 'Republic'). In the not so distant past Christian militias were slaughtering Muslims in the former Yugoslavia, and a short time before that in the Lebanon. Chuck a right good bit of raping into that mix too across all of those theatres. Jew and Muslim continue to commit attrocities against each other on a daily basis in the Eastern Mediterranean.

 

No room for whattaboutery when trying to work out who the most horrible ***** are.

 

Go and have a look in the mirror. You are around a weeks worth of food, forced political and economic upheval, the loss of a loved one to violence - or some other such like - from becoming everything you hate and fear. 

 

Them's the facts.

Boom!

[Governor Tarkin]

1 minute ago, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

Applying nutjob behaviour to all of Islam is as daft as applying Timothy McVeigh's behaviour to all Christians.

 

It really is that simple.

[JackLadd]

30 minutes ago, Governor Tarkin said:

 

Hindus did a fair bit of slaughtering themselves mind, not to mention the Sikhs. The Romans and before them the Greeks were partial to a bit of slavery too (have a wee scan at Plato's views on the subject in his 'Republic'). In the not so distant past Christian militias were slaughtering Muslims in the former Yugoslavia, and a short time before that in the Lebanon. Chuck a right good bit of raping into that mix too across all of those theatres. Jew and Muslim continue to commit attrocities against each other on a daily basis in the Eastern Mediterranean.

 

No room for whattaboutery when trying to work out who the most horrible ***** are.

 

Go and have a look in the mirror. You are around a weeks worth of food, forced political and economic upheval, the loss of a loved one to violence - or some other such like - from becoming everything you hate and fear. 

 

Them's the facts.

 

The hate and fear of Islam is what I am discoursing here. I have taken a dispassionate view of Islam and it's history and arrived at a considered view. I am holding up the mirror to Islam. If anything I have said is ugly it's just the reflection coming from its book of words and deeds. Spare me your whattaboutery regards ancient pagan civilisations and their history of taking slaves. Do you think this covers Islam for the Armenian genocide? Jizya tax? Modern day honour killings that go on in UK?  And the Balkans suffered under the yoke of the Ottomans and have historical enmities going back centuries. What happened there was deep rooted and hard to untangle. One clear example I'd give you is the Barbary pirate states that the U.S went to war with over slave taking in the 19th century. They Barbary pirates petitioned the U.S with Sharia law. Slaving is allowed, see verses here. We can take your people from their ships in the Mediterranean and enslave them. There is no whattabboutery for this. The U.S went to war and got their people back. And as for your last quip that I would turn into a genocidal rapist minus food and money. Don't judge everyone by your own standards. 

[Geoff Kilpatrick]

1 hour ago, JackLadd said:

 

The hate and fear of Islam is what I am discoursing here. I have taken a dispassionate view of Islam and it's history and arrived at a considered view. I am holding up the mirror to Islam. If anything I have said is ugly it's just the reflection coming from its book of words and deeds. Spare me your whattaboutery regards ancient pagan civilisations and their history of taking slaves. Do you think this covers Islam for the Armenian genocide? Jizya tax? Modern day honour killings that go on in UK?  And the Balkans suffered under the yoke of the Ottomans and have historical enmities going back centuries. What happened there was deep rooted and hard to untangle. One clear example I'd give you is the Barbary pirate states that the U.S went to war with over slave taking in the 19th century. They Barbary pirates petitioned the U.S with Sharia law. Slaving is allowed, see verses here. We can take your people from their ships in the Mediterranean and enslave them. There is no whattabboutery for this. The U.S went to war and got their people back. And as for your last quip that I would turn into a genocidal rapist minus food and money. Don't judge everyone by your own standards. 

If your next door neighbour was a Muslim, how would you feel about it?

[shaun.lawson]

3 hours ago, Governor Tarkin said:

Go and have a look in the mirror. You are around a weeks worth of food, forced political and economic upheval, the loss of a loved one to violence - or some other such like - from becoming everything you hate and fear. 

 

Amen. 

[ri Alban]

10 hours ago, Cade said:

BAN MOOSLIM FACE COVERINGS

 

Adolf's little helpers.

[boredwaitin]

Being based and living here in the middle east , i have learnt a lot. My best friend is a muslim and you couldn't find a better person than him. Unfortunately not everyone is like that . Same as UK Saturday night arse holes rule the country and we all pay the the price. Yes there are certain Muslims that have a vendetta but so do uk citizens.  Most people i have met want a trouble free life but get associated with the arseholes because of there colour or religion.  I dont care about either and will always be friends with them.

[Eldar Hadzimehmedovic]

45 minutes ago, boredwaitin said:

Being based and living here in the middle east , i have learnt a lot. My best friend is a muslim and you couldn't find a better person than him. Unfortunately not everyone is like that . Same as UK Saturday night arse holes rule the country and we all pay the the price. Yes there are certain Muslims that have a vendetta but so do uk citizens.  Most people i have met want a trouble free life but get associated with the arseholes because of there colour or religion.  I dont care about either and will always be friends with them.

 

Good post. My son's aide is a hijab-wearing Muslim woman. She's brilliant. Talented, smart, compassionate. She's changed his life. She began wearing the hijab after her divorce. She didn't wear it married and nobody told her to. To her it's just a different standard of modesty - about the same as western women wearing bikinis at the beach (her words, that's how she sees it). Every so often when she's here, an alarm will sound on her phone and she'll disappear off upstairs to pray. Means nothing to me but fair enough. Live and let live. It makes me actually raging to see her lumped in and associated with diatribes about the Koran and terrorist attacks. She's so far from that world it's almost ridiculous.

[i8hibsh]

10 hours ago, XB52 said:

Dropped out of this for a day. Glad to see my view of at least one poster has been shown to be 100% on the money. I presume he will be an ex poster soon 

 

One less person to oppose your view I guess.    

[shaun.lawson]

1 hour ago, Eldar Hadzimehmedovic said:

 

Good post. My son's aide is a hijab-wearing Muslim woman. She's brilliant. Talented, smart, compassionate. She's changed his life. She began wearing the hijab after her divorce. She didn't wear it married and nobody told her to. To her it's just a different standard of modesty - about the same as western women wearing bikinis at the beach (her words, that's how she sees it). Every so often when she's here, an alarm will sound on her phone and she'll disappear off upstairs to pray. Means nothing to me but fair enough. Live and let live. It makes me actually raging to see her lumped in and associated with diatribes about the Koran and terrorist attacks. She's so far from that world it's almost ridiculous.

 

Yup.

 

My favourite editing client is from Kuwait. Her work on its very odd political system - part democratic, part absolutist - is brilliant. She didn't wear a hijab while studying for her PhD in the UK; she does back there. And while sure, she sees the hypocrisy and nonsense in hardline interpretations of Islam (which some employ in Kuwait, but most don't), her faith is incredibly important to her, and guides her in everything she does. Lumping her in with extremists is equally disgusting.

 

Then there's Indonesia. Or Malaysia. Or Tunisia. Or Morocco. Or Jordan: in Amman, women might wear tight minidresses or be covered up; alcohol is on sale on stores, except during Ramadan; food is available for non-Muslims during Ramadan; women drive, vote and hold political office (as they do in Kuwait too); there are plenty of bars and nightclubs; laws are based on civil law, not Sharia law (same again in Kuwait, whose constitution guarantees the rights of all). Or Lebanon - with Beirut described to me by a friend who works for the UN as "Vegas and the Taliban all rolled into one": Hizbollah, religious and ethnic tensions on the one hand; an incredible nightclub and party scene and one of the world's most continually precarious democracies on the other.

 

Heck, even under monsters like Saddam Hussein or Bashar al-Assad, Iraq and Syria were secular: with thriving, educated middle classes and respect for women. So why on Earth are all Muslims and all Muslim countries lumped into one amorphous mass? Most countries in the Americas and Europe are, in theory at least, Christian: so do we think everyone in the US or UK has the same values as in Hungary or Poland? There's more than enough divisions and differences in our own country to begin with.

 

Frankly, anyone's religion is a private matter for them. It's not to be ridiculed, judged or stigmatised by anyone else. The only thing that counts is the content of anyone's character. There's good and bad in all people; good apples and bad apples everywhere. We seem obsessed with "bad Muslims" in a way which is never applied to any other group. It's extremely weird and very insidious.

Edited June 2, 2018 by shaun.lawson

[jack D and coke]

7 hours ago, Geoff Kilpatrick said:

 Applying nutjob behaviour to all of Islam is as daft as applying Timothy McVeigh's behaviour to all Christians.

I don’t think that the vast majority of people are doing that tbh. NI or the Israel Palestine problem is the same either that’s two groups right next to each other in a struggle and tit for tat. Britain, France, Belgium etc has growing problems with militant Islam. Nobody is suggesting all Muslims are violent that is hideous but there are reckoned to be a couple of hundred million around the world who see violence of this kind acceptable for mocking Islam etc. All this other whataboutery isn’t comparable in any way. 

Machine gun attacks, guys running along streets with machetes, in vehicles mowing people down, suicide bombers is random and not comparable to anything else. 

 

[Governor Tarkin]

7 hours ago, JackLadd said:

Don't judge everyone by your own standards. 

 

I get it, Islam has been and can be a bit of an arsehole. I haven't seen anybody disputing that so you can probably move on.

 

Do you think ranting on about the crimes of Islam goes anywhere towards helping remedy the situation that the world now finds itself in? What do you see as the most constructive way forward, bearing in mind that most intelligent people with the power to actually change anything already have a reasonable grasp of the historical process and it's consequences to date.

 

And on the question of standards, I'm not judging anybody by my own standards as I don't have any. Why limit oneself with a rigid framework of rights and wrongs that one has little prospect of adhering to. Life is fluid, and within the shifting boundaries that hold civilization together we have the relative freedom to improvise and adapt at our leisure as we see fit. Islam isn't going to take that away from us any time soon, depite what you may think.