From: joedees@bellsouth.net
Date: Sun Jan 27 2002 - 23:43:15 MST
On 28 Jan 2002 at 0:04, L' Ermit wrote:
> Dear Joe,
>
> To my thinking you appear very well "programmed" with a very US-centric
> perspective. I would suggest that other people from different cultures see
> things very differently. I know I do. Let me try to illustrate why.
>
> <snip>
>
> [Joe Dees] Poverty is a poor explanation, considering that significant
> percentages of much poorer people in Africa, Central America and Southeast
> Asia are not generally exhibiting these savage proclivities (with the
> exception of the areas in SE Asia where Islam has spread).
>
> [Hermit] Warfare is so endemic in Africa that it is hardly newsworthy. In
> addition, in most of Africa, the environment is so unhealthy that CNN
> reporters don't much like to visit there. So the US does not see
> minute-by-minute reports on the horrors of Africa. That does not mean that
> they do not happen and are not "real." I suggest that you will shortly see a
> great deal of media attention placed on Zimbabwe - if any TV crews dare to
> risk their lives visiting... But the Congo, Nigeria, Ethiopia, Rwanda and
> Burundi all have their place on the mass murder lists - and most of the
> deaths were caused by "Christians"... Refer
> [url=http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/warstat2.htm][/url]. And the killing
> continues.
>
These are mainly tribal conflicts among peoples on whom Christianity adheres
as a veneer, if at all. When large numbers of people are killed, it is because of
warfare between two tribes 9such as between the Hutu and the Tutsies). Large,
inter-tribal coalitions engagin in common-cause warfare are not found there to
anywhere near the degree that they were found in medieval Christian Europe or
in the contemporary Islamic world.
>
> [Joe Dees] In the case of Pol Pot, he was under the sway of another utopic
> meme, agrarian communism, and was killing all opposition in his own country
> to reify his dream, not attacking unbelievers across sovereign borders.
>
> [Hermit] An horrific meme and result. Agreed.
> [url=http://www.freedomsnest.com/rummel_vietnam.html][/url]Yet it has been
> suggested that the US played more than a small role in committing murders in
> that part of the world - with her own political agendas.
>
Several world powers had their fingers in that bloody pie, not excluding the
USSR and China.
>
> [Joe Dees] Similar communist memes have infested the Stalinist USSR and
> Maoist China, and a different, more acquisitive, racially based totalitarian
> meme (Nazism) infected the Third Reich (a milder little brother, fascism,
> infected Italy).
>
> [Hermit] And the US did not suffer similar problems (but far fewer victims
> of democide)?
>
Individuals in this country have been both communist and fascist.
>
> [Joe Dees] Japan was infected by the belief in the deity of their temporal
> leader, and a sense of their racial superiority on the basis of their
> association with him (since he was also Japanese) combined with a sense of
> manifest destiny encompassing the Pacific theatre.
>
> [Hermit] While this appears to be a faithful regurgitation of American
> wartime propaganda, we should question how accurate a "history" one can
> build from the propaganda of only one side in a conflict...
>
The japanese propaganda is not believeable; they still have great difficulties
admitting to their schoolchildren about 'comfort women' and the rape of Nanking.
>
> [Joe Dees] Most of the people who were killed by Christians in the name of
> their religion were killed during the Middle Ages (Inquisition and Crusades
> and Hundred Years' War and missionary colonialism, etc.), after which
> Christianity has been gradually and progressively defanged by the
> moderating and domesticating influence of the Enlightenment and
> scientific/technological advance.
>
> [Hermit] While I agree that these are some of the reasons why Christianity
> is no longer powerful, another very important factor is the Industrial Age
> and consequent increase of both the value and political significance of
> labor. As it is, one of the greatest "colonial massacres" perpetuated by
> "Christians" upon "heathens" was the execution between 1886 and 1908 of some
> 3 million Congolese. Not so terribly long ago...
>
Long ago so that if we are vigilant, we will not regress that century or more. A
lot of that had to also do with racism.
>
> [Joe Dees] However, Islam has never completely come to terms with modernity;
> a significant chunk of its adherents still embrace a medievalistic mindset
> concerning their purported divine license to kill or convert all infidel
> unbelievers.
>
> [Hermit] Is this not true of Christians too? Your error, to my mind, is to
> persist in assigning to [b]all[/b] Muslims the characteristics of
> [b]some[/b] small but visible minority of Muslims. Imagine if we did this
> for "Christians" - or Americans - or Israelis? Does this mean that we should
> take the most primitive and economically non-viable trailer-park dwellers
> from some deep-southern Baptipentafundicostamentalist (tm) community and
> assert that they represent Americans in general?
>
We do not have presently have marauding bands of fundies killing neopagans
or Wiccans, despite the biblical injunction that 'thou shalt not suffer a witch to
live', but backsliding Muslims are automatically subject to the death fatwa still.
>
> [Hermit] Refer also [url=http://www.msnbc.com/news/694382.asp]Arab economies
> stir unrest accessed 2002-01-26[/url] which strongly supports athenonrex's
> assertion. [quote]The lack of democracy, he warned, means that disaffected
> Egyptians have no outlet other than religion for their grievances. And as
> businesses recognize the implications for the country’s long-term stability,
> that in turn will weaken their willingness to invest. “I’m against the
> fundamentalists myself, and my brother’s ideology,” Saber said. “But it’s
> the government that is creating the conditions for the mosques to attract
> these individuals.”[/quote]
>
The existence of a secular democratic system would be contrary to the Koran,
which makes no distinction between church and state, and places the will of the
people forever subservient to the will of Allah, as communicated by the mullahs
and imams.
>
> <snap>
>
> Regards
>
> Hermit
>
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