The 'Jihad' Rant: Prove Me Wrong (warning: might be offenisve)
POSTED BY: HiroStone
UPDATED: Sunday, December 28, 2025 08:00
VIEWED: 22653
PAGE 8 of 11
Quote:
Originally posted by Nur:
As-salaamu alaikum,
People take offence to things, it happens. Let them be offended by what they will, in the end what does it matter anyway? Sadly many Muslims have become very reactionary post September 11th, sometimes its justified and sometimes its not. I've done it myself, but my point is that it happens and then others with opposing views react back just as strongly. All sides just need to DEAL WITH THAT.
The phrase 'I don't know much about Islam but...' can swing both ways on the pendulum if you take my meaning. To everyone who has said that they don't know much about Islam but would honestly like to, I encourage you to. You can be whatever religion you want to be (or none at all), it doesn't matter to me, but in the end this will only be solved when we all understand the REAL reasoning and ideals and beliefs and vocabulary that the other is using. The meaning of jihad as an inner struggle against something inside yourself wasn't even mentioned as far as I saw. And thats only one example.
On a random Firefly note since this is fireflyfans.net: Did everyone catch the woman in the burka in The Train Job? That ROCKED!
Canadian Muslims Love Firefly!
Those who restrain desire, do so because thiers is weak enough to be restrained.
-William Blake
O my Lord! bestow wisdom on me, and join me with the righteous.
-Qur'an 26:83
And maybe some day, when we all have enough understand about what all the religions are about and why we need them in the first place. We won't need any religions at all.
Like Fireflyfans.net?
Haken needs a new development system. Donate.
http://www.fireflyfans.net/thread.asp?b=5&t=3283
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Jasonzzz:
And maybe some day, when we all have enough understand about what all the religions are about and why we need them in the first place. We won't need any religions at all.
Maybe, maybe. But thats only if you believe that there is nothing beyond religion but the moral codes it teaches.
Those who restrain desire, do so because thiers is weak enough to be restrained.
-William Blake
O my Lord! bestow wisdom on me, and join me with the righteous.
-Qur'an 26:83
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
It's more than that, different people get different things from religion. For some, it's their entire lives, it's everything they do. For others, they need to have an explanation on why everything are, why things happen, and what's gonna happen tomorrow. The moral codes, I believe are a community effort to have a standard of conduct and believes, both on how we conduct ourselves and how we work with others. All of these things are needed between the selves and the neighbors (and we can debate it's whether a sense of control needed from the governing body or a need for each of us to "control" each other ).
If we understand why we need these things and accept them without having to resort to a set of supernatural believes...
If you look at the rules for Kosher, it's a codified means to hygiene and nutrition melded into all of those practices. Somehow over the years, all of these rules were just adopted by different sects from things that made good sense into being part of the religion.
Quote:
Originally posted by Nur:Quote:
Originally posted by Jasonzzz:
And maybe some day, when we all have enough understand about what all the religions are about and why we need them in the first place. We won't need any religions at all.
Maybe, maybe. But thats only if you believe that there is nothing beyond religion but the moral codes it teaches.
Those who restrain desire, do so because thiers is weak enough to be restrained.
-William Blake
O my Lord! bestow wisdom on me, and join me with the righteous.
-Qur'an 26:83
Like Fireflyfans.net?
Haken needs a new development system. Donate.
http://www.fireflyfans.net/thread.asp?b=5&t=3283
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Warning: obscenely long post
Quote:
Hirostone responded: A t-shirt can be personal. As I've said BEFORE and will say YET AGAIN, the t-shirt is immaterial as the man’s argument over the context it is used in. I said earlier that a Christian person can be offended by an “Austin 3:16” wrestling shirt, or that an African-American can be offended by a t-shirt with a Confederate flag on it. MY DEEPLY PERSONAL ISSUE THAT HAS BEEN SINCE THE BEGINNING OF THIS POST HAS BEEN ALL ABOUT THE US SOLDIERS OVER IN IRAQ AND HOW SOME PEOPLE’S POLITICAL CORRECTNESS ON A MATTER AS TRIVIAL AS A T-SHIRT SUPERCEDES MEN AND WOMEN DYING TO PROTECT NOT ONLY OUR COUNTRY, BUT HUMAN RIGHTS!!!! If you can’t see that, read my posts on this thread one by one! It’s never been about a t-shirt, just the issue behind it!
Second of all, the US interfere is necessary I think. That’s my opinion. What should the US be, an isolationist state, not caring about the issues of other countries, unless someone attacks us directly? Does the US have to close its boarders off to the world when we were founded by beliefs and ideals of openness and basic human rights? Things aren’t perfect in the US or in the world. But how can things get better if we ignore problems? If we don’t interfere, who will? If we don’t be prepared, what can happen next? Was a preemptive strike necessary? I don’t know. But if there’s a growth in the body, you get rid of the cancer right away, don’t you? Either by surgery or less evasive means, but you suppress it, right?
Ok, it really ticks me off whenever people say that we attacked Iraq to free the Iraqi people from Hussein’s brutal regime. Yes, I know he was a bad person, he gassed the Kurds, he tortured hundreds of people, massacred thousands more, etc. But America does not invade a nation to free its people. Vietnam and Korea were to fight Communism, and keep the people from being oppressed. The only time we actually tried freeing people was the Spanish-American War, and I’m kinda fuzzy on that part of history. Maybe it would be good if we invaded every nation that grossly violated Human Rights, but saying we do is simply not true. Yesterday, there was a small article in the center of my newspaper (The Washington Post). Apparently in Uganda there’s a resistance group called The Lord’s Resistance Army (on Bushes “has ties to terrorists list”) which fights the government. Recently they killed 192 people and burned down a refugee camp. They get new members by kidnapping children to be “soldiers, porters, or concubines.” This kind of thing is not isolated in the least. In Nigeria (or was it Niger) there are death camps, where approximately 3 million people have died. There was this other African country where gang-rape by guerillas was such a big problem that the UN needed to send it surgeons to provide relief. There are also child soldiers in Myanmar and Thailand, I think. The latest Parade Magazine (usually a worthless magazine) was titled “10 worst dictators of the world”. 2 of the “dishonorable mentions” are just as bad as they were last year, when they ranked, but have been overtaken in evilness. And of course Columbia has been fighting a civil war for 40 years. Are any of these nations going to be invaded or helped out anytime soon? Does anybody in America even care? Obviously not enough to warrant even pretend help by America, like Liberia got.
Yeah, of course Iraq was a threat to us and definitely should have been stopped. After all, they had 950,000 well fed troops, and had been bragging about their “nuclear deterrent” for quite a long time. Oh wait, that’s North Korea I’m thinking of.
Though I guess Iraq could have given weapons to terrorists. Which brings me to the realm of Tradneister. You may be thinking “that’s not a real country,” and it really isn’t. While they declare their independence, no government in the world recognizes them. They’ve broken off of Moldova, Europe’s poorest nation, and are about as big as Rhode Island. What makes t
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Jasonzzz:
Unfortunately, as good as the US's intentions are, I don't think the rest of the world has the same view. The rest of the world not only thinks, but believes very strongly that the US is acting as a big bully, a big expansionist Empire.
Sigh, a lot of this is pure fear and panic at what we *could* do, if so motivated. Part of this is psychological projection, essentially telling us how they would act if they had our military might. And there is really no way to convince them otherwise of even your best intentions, except just go throw life and do what you have to do, and ignoring the nattering nabobs of nihilism.
And you have to admit, some of them don't want us going after Saddam because of what we will learn as to who was breaking sanctions, who was being bribed, etc.
You can tell them till you are blue in the face, and they won't believe it. So they get to sit along in fear and panic, flinching every time America makes a move, and if this nation notices at all, just shrugs it off and keeps going.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Hotpoint:
I got the numbers from the CIA World Factbook which if anything overstates the size of the US Economy
The US has a $10 Trillion economy which was between 20% and 25% of the world total in 2002 depending on which exchange rates you use
The Dollar has crashed over 40% in value against the Euro since then so the USA makes up a smaller proportion of planetary product than it did then
Thanks.
I don't see this as a bad thing. Actually this is probably a good thing for more people.
The dollar crashing also is not totally a bad thing. It makes our exports cheaper, and their imports more expensive, shifting balance of trade more in our favor than it has been.
Besides, we ain't doing worse off. Economics is not a zero sum game. If our share of the global market has shrunk from 40 to 20 percent, it ain't because our piece of the pie is smaller, its more pie for everyone.
So someone else overseas gets richer, and has more products, goods and services available that they can pay for. That sounds like a good thing to me. Not at all sure where the down side is.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by liposuction:Quote:Not entirely acurate. The only role the USA really played was to arm the current Afghan leaders and resistance. The U.S.S.R. crossed international borders in a hostile manor. The first time they had done so in over 20 years. We were not equipped to deploy the armed forces to the field in any way shape or form, else we probably would have. The US had the intelligence and research to prove that communism was enough of a threat to do so. I, for one, am glad that we did. At the high point of the Soviet Empire, it was harder to get any meat for consumption, than it was under the czar in 1930.
Power vacuum - USSR pulled out of Afghanistan, we stepped in and set-up our guys. Problem is, our guys weren't much of an improvement over the Ruskies. But eh, c'est la vie.
Actually we did not set up the previous government in Afghanistan. And this is the reason why we can't simply hand Iraq any kind of government they want, as some have demanded.
It was the Pakistani government, specifically their security agency the ISI that set up, funded and promoted the Taliban as a solution. We let them have whatever government they wanted, bowed to the wisdoms of the actors in the region, and that did not work out too well.
Another point. I am not sure the bin Ladan was born in Saudi Arabia. But his family, and especially his father is Yeman. A very rich Yeman that made it big in construction under the Saud family, he has built a lot of mosques for the government of SA. But as a Yeman, he was never consider a Saud. Which has created problems.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Kurukami:
On the whole, when referring to the generally apathetic American citizenry, I'd agree. In specific, when talking about the Bush administration and the Project for the New American Century ( http://www.newamericancentury.org/), I heartily disagree. The invasion of Iraq was in its planning stages long before September 11, 2001, and Bush and his cronies did everything they could to pin both 9/11 and the following anthrax attacks on Hussein. They failed in both regards, for lack of evidence, and then pointed the finger of WMDs at Hussein and succeeded (despite their lack of evidence).
This is a lie. A false statement that is so knowingly and obviously false, it is very difficult to dimiss this fallacy as accidental. No one in the administration has ever made any public comments to the effect that Saddam was tied to 9-11. In fact they have come out publically disclaiming evidence that Mohammed Atta met with Iraqi intelligence officers, (one in particular who is now in US custody) in Prague. Czech Intelligence agencies are still saying they met, yet our government and our CIA have said they did not.
If anything, the administration has been saying that Saddam was NOT involved, with the possibility of providing some training in Salam Park
As for anthrax, I have heard no administration offical ever make a statement about the anthrax coming from Saddam. Some of the documents Saddam turned over did show he has a large quantity of antrax that could be, and was intended for, use as a weapon. But there has been no public statement or comment linking Saddam to the anthrax attack here, by this administration.
I don't know how many times it has to be said, but if Bush lied about WMDs so did Bill Clinton. So did every member of the UN Security Council. Before the war everyone was certain Saddam had WMDs. Even Hans Blix. Now that they can't be found, only Bush is the one to lie about that subject, despite the fact he said exactly what everyone else was saying.
Besides which, if Bush lied about the WMDs, not finding any does not prove your case. In fact, it proves just the opposite.
When you say he lied, it involves not only making a false statement, but knowing that the statement you are making is false. Simply making a false statement is not lying, its making a mistake.
If Bush lied, that means he knew it was false, that Saddam had none. And he knew that after the war, (was the outcome ever in doubt?) this lie would be exposed. A prudent thing to do would be to ensure that it was not exposed, to plant WMDs in Iraq, and avoid exactly the heat he is taken now for not finding them.
But Bush did not do that. Neither did Cheney, Rumsfield, or the rest of the administration. Nobody planted anything, we know because no WMDs were found. If none were found then not only does that means that Saddam did not have them, but Bush didn't plant any. This is not the actions of a liar.
Constantly repeating a false claim over and over and over again after it has been dealt with, after it has been pointed out just how wrong it is, those are the actions of a liar. One that would make Goebbles proud.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
You know, my boss tells me never to assume anything, because it makes an "ass out of u and me." Well, I was assuming again! 'Cause I'm really good at it. I forget that nobody here knows me, or the huge tendency towards assumptions I have! When I speak of setting-up Afghanistan, etc., we supplied arms, materiel that sort-of thing. And I forget that nobody here knows that to me, it's all the same thing. Is it? Technically, probably not. And there's the making for all kinds of trouble right there! Those pesky little technical slip-ups I/we make, forgetting that when typing away on some pretty complicated issue, what I'm going to assume and what someone else is going to are completely different things! Not to mention the little bits of knowledge/information we all just -and here's that word again - assume that everyone knows.
The Guardian says bin Laden was born in Saudi Arabia, and I'm trusting them to be true in this. All I know of his connections to Yemen is that Yemen has an arrest warrant out on him.
Nur - yeah, I caught the burka! It really irks me that the show was yanked so fast - I'd have loved to see how Joss worked the development of different religions. Like shepherds, and some being married - so did the catholics and the protestants mend their fences and blend traditions? And what's the deal with buddhism and companionism? Well, maybe some day!
****
Now Kurukami - you KNOW griswalds cost more 
!!
NOTIFY: N | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME
Quote:
Originally posted by Drakon:
Besides, we ain't doing worse off. Economics is not a zero sum game. If our share of the global market has shrunk from 40 to 20 percent, it ain't because our piece of the pie is smaller, its more pie for everyone.
Not at all sure where the down side is.
The down side is trying to afford 50% percent of the worlds defence spending on perhaps 25% its wealth
It's called "Imperial Overstretch" and bought down every major power for the last 500 years. The USSR was the last victim of this
A recent product of US Imperial Overstretch is the cancellation of the Comanche Stealth Helicopter program. Prior spending commitments mean that the USA just can't afford it any more despite a huge defence budget
If you want some recommended reading try "The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers" by Paul Kennedy
...................................
Hurrah, hurrah, when things are at their worst
With cries of “Death or Glory” comes the mighty Twenty-First
NOTIFY: Y | REPLY | REPLY WITH QUOTE | PERMALINK | TOP | HOME