Good Muslims?

Tonight I watched a story on 60 Minutes about this guy ^, a Muslim cleric in London.  He is a radical who refuses to condemn the actions of Muslim extremists, even the sicko who beheaded a British soldier on a public street in London.  He says a double standard is acceptable when viewing the actions of the oppressed vs the oppressor.  He is active in the effort to recruit disaffected Muslim youths to travel to Syria and fight for ISIS, among other likely treasonable actions.

Here's what I don't understand:  With billions (?) of Muslims in the world, I realize they can't ALL be bad, but why don't the supposedly huge numbers of peaceful, moderate Muslims speak up against their renegades?

Anybody....?

It reminds me of a post I saw on Facebook recently.  It said, "Radical Muslims behead infidels.  Moderate Muslims want radical Muslims to behead infidels."

Yet for those Muslims here in the west we have to respect and protect THEIR rights? Yes, of course we must (to the extent the law prescribes), but how much slack do we have to give them?  Is it OK to be just a little suspicious?

That's a dilemma with a Capital D. 

S

At my offensive best....

After reading the "world news" section of the paper this morning (every morning, actually) I once again have to ask myself, what good thing does Islam bring to the world table?  "Militant Islamists attack a mall in Kenya, blow up a church in Pakistan....Iraq, Afghanistan (all the little 'stans' actually), Syria, Libya, Somalia, Mali, kill, kill, kill..."  If they have a dominant Muslim population (with a few possible exceptions such as secular Turkey), they're up to no good.  No?  Show me otherwise.

"Oh, but those are just the militants.  Most aren't like that at all."  Really?  Polls I've seen taken in virtually all Muslim countries show the general population, while not actually taking up arms against the Infidels, expresses overwhelming sympathy for the militants.  Face it.  They simply don't like us.  Round peg, square hole.  Not gonna work.

As I remember from my studies as a child there was a time centuries ago when Muslim countries were leaders in math, science, philosophy, culture, etc.  So what happened?  They don't seem to be leaders in much of anything these days except Jihad.  Why do we have to have relations with them?  For oil?  Sure, I get that.  But we can do business with them without having to otherwise interact with them, can't we?

Seems to me they need our (the civilized world's) cash as much as we need their oil.  "Fill up the tanker, here's your money....see 'ya."  "We want to send our students to your country."  No.  "We want some of your foreign aid to build..."  No.  Any American travels there of his own free will and finds himself threatened with headlessness....too bad.

We constantly hear that isolation is bad.  How so?  If we want to live peacefully and prosperously by ourselves here (in the West), and they choose to live in ignorant squalor there, how is that bad?  Wouldn't we both be getting what we want?

I can see the desirability of globalisation when it comes to interacting with others of similar values.  But it doesn't seem to me we share many values with the Muslim world.  Lets all sacrifice some, put our heads together and find an alternative to their oil stranglehold, and then split the sheets and move forward.  And they can move backwards.  And if a phone rings here from their area code, don't answer it.  

Live and let live, I say.

OK, skewer me.

S

What's wrong with those crazy people?

What is it about Islam that makes their believer's minds short circuit?  Whether North African, Somali, Arab, Persian, Pakistani or even a Muslim American military doctor at Ft. Hood, TX, their minds often just seem to reject logical thought processes.  I've looked at it from every angle I can think of and the only common denominator seems to be their Islamic faith.

They just don't seem happy unless they're fighting each other or their neighbor.  "You covet my camel, you see my wife's big toe....I KILL YOU!"  A daughter somehow learns to read and write....heads roll, literally.  Want a job?  "I have a job.  I make bombs."

Now I'm wondering if being around them for all these years during this Age of Oil hasn't infected / affected our Western thought processes, too?  We somehow think they want American-style freedom and democracy.  We've set them up time and again, and they've squandered it every time.  Why can't we take a hint?

It seems to me our "problem" is we're a compassionate people.  We see pain and suffering and we want to help.  That's a good thing and I'm glad we're that way.  But to help someone they have to WANT to be helped.  I'm sure many Muslims do, but far too many others, perhaps even a majority, seem to want nothing more than to return to the 16th Century.  

Now the civil war in Syria has turned even nastier and we want to go and kick some bad-guy ass.  Look around, Washington....we're up to our eyeballs in Muslim dung now!  Lobbing a few cruise missiles into Syria might make us feel better, make us feel like we're doing something to help, but that's delusional.  

Why don't we just build a bonfire on the Washington Mall and shovel in a few billion dollars worth of greenbacks?  We could close the ceremony with a rousing chorus of Kum Ba Yah, too.  Yeah, that'll show 'em!

We need to face facts:  Nothing we can do is going to civilize them.  We need to treat them like our old, weird uncle we see at the family reunion once a year....say "hi", send them a Christmas card (they'll love that!), and then stay as far from them as possible.  We want to buy their oil, they need the money; that's business.  Otherwise, leave them alone to re-arrange their own rocks.

S

Here's what I don't get

The "religion of peace" has struck again, this time by knife-wielding zealots in London.  I know, I know....you can't condemn an entire religion because of the actions of a few malcontents.*  Very true.  All religions have their nut cases.  Christians have theirs, too....just look at the Westboro Baptist Church.  

They're the homophobes who somehow tie every evil / tragic thing that happens back to homosexuality.  Flood hits NYC, tornadoes hit OK, earthquake hits the west coast....it's God's way of getting back at us.

But when the Westboro Baptist Church announces they are going to protest the funeral of a soldier, for example, thousands of people (Christians?) turn out to protest the WBC protesters.  We denounce people of our own faith (?) who preach hate and violence.  We don't celebrate them.

Here Texas A&M students form a shoulder-to-shoulder human shield to keep Westboro Baptist Church protesters from disrupting the funeral of a soldier KIA.

But when Islamic extremists commit a heinous attack such as the one yesterday in London when several Muslims hacked to death a British soldier outside his barracks, I don't see rank-and-file Muslims lining up to disavow the actions of their fellow Muslims.  Why is that?

"Gaza Arabs celebrate Boston Marathon attack with dance, candies"

You'll see a few individuals holding up little hand-lettered signs that say, "This isn't Islam", but they are totally overshadowed by the throngs jumping up and down in jubilation.  The majority just sit on their hands.

Why don't they cleanse their ranks of those who scheme and plot to do harm to innocents?  Instead, they seem to applaud them.  If you knew someone was building a bomb or building a war arsenal, for example, wouldn't you call the police?  Why do they allow their places of faith to be polluted by haters?  Why don't they police themselves?  Is this just a matter of the press reporting one side but not the other?

Yet after every atrocity committed by Muslim extremists in the name of Allah, the rest of us are cautioned (rightly) to not rush to judgement and take out revenge against all Muslims.  We preach peace and fairness....we "talk the talk" and we "walk the walk".

Mainstream Muslims say they ARE a religion of peace.  OK, fine.  Then I'd like to see them do a little walking, too.

(Move over Salman Rushdie.  I'm probably now on someone's hit list.)

S

*And please don't start your comment with, "Yeah, well, back in the dark ages Christians....".  I'm interested in the here and now.

BREAKING NEWS!

For once there's actually news worthy of the title.  These are crazy (read: insane) times we live in.  As I write this the news is showing live pics of the cops surrounding the suspected hiding place of Dzhakhar (I'm just gonna henceforth call him "Dizzy") Tsarnaev.  He's giving the usual "you'll never take me alive, copper" speech, and I imagine the cops are thinking, "OK, as you wish, ass hole."

What do we know?  Just bits and pieces.  He and his bro were Muslim, but we don't know if they were radical Muslims.  Is this politically motivated?  Did they get terrorist training somewhere?  Do they have accomplices?  Have they set booby-traps elsewhere?  All unknown.

But to tie this in with another current hot topic....this is exactly one reason why people should be allowed to own and possess firearms.  People in the Boston area have been told to stay home, don't go out for any reason, and if possible to retreat to their basements.

I personally would feel a helluva lot safer if I had my gun with me as a last line of defense in case some nut on the run like Dizzy were to invade my home and threaten my family.  I don't need an assault rifle with a hundred-round magazine.  My .40 cal H&K is plenty.  

If you ever thought that scenario was an absolutely far-fetched possibility, turn on your TV right now.  This whole thing is insane.  Killing innocent bystanders, knocking off a 7/11 (to draw out the cops and bring things to a head?), tossing more homemade bombs, shootouts....just insane.

S

I'm beginning to see a pattern here...with EDIT

I've said for a long time, particularly after watching news clips showing rioting mobs in Muslim countries, "Those people just don't think right." A like comment yesterday on my blog from PT Dilloway, referring to the violence in Libya, said, "In what freaking universe does that make any freaking sense?"

This brought to mind an article I once read that pointed out that in the Muslim world marriage between cousins (known as "consanguinity"), and even brothers and sisters, is common.  A little online research found many credible sources confirming this and offering these statistics:  

Thirty-three percent of all marriages in Egypt are consanguine, as are 48 percent in Libya, 60 percent in Iraq, 70 percent in Pakistan, 67 percent in Saudi Arabia, 40 percent in Syria, 34 percent in Algeria, 63 percent in Sudan, 46 percent in Bahrain, 64 percent in Jordan, 42 percent in Lebanon, 54 percent in Qatar, 45 percent in Yemen, and 54 percent in the UAE.

This has been going on for 1,400 years in the Mideast, and is done in order to keep wealth (?) and power "within the family".   This is why it's so hard for sovereign countries to command the loyalty of their citizens.  People's loyalty goes to their "clan", not their arbitrarily cobbled together "country".

Not surprisingly, research has shown that children of consanguineous marriages have 10-16% lower IQ's.  Can you imagine the consequences of this generation after generation after generation?  Well, they might be able to keep all the camels in the family, but they also have a mighty polluted gene pool!

We (the West) keep trying to lead the Mideast towards our version of how things should be....democratic, governed by rule of law, peaceful, respectful to all, including women, etc.  I'm wondering if their average citizen can even comprehend those concepts?  

Thousands of years of tradition and ignorance and inbreeding are hard to overcome.  IMO we're beating our heads against a brick (or in their case mud) wall.  

S

EDIT:  Oh, the insanity....now they're burning the KFC in Cairo!  Is nothing sacred?