Islam just can't stand images of Mohammed

[Angra Mainyu]

That said, going by the deeds of Muhammad you describe, he falls under category "terrorist" under any common usage I can think of - well, unless the "only recent behavior" rule or something like that is common, but I don't think it is.

By the way, what source are you going by? Some Hadith, or some other sources?

The story of the murder of the poetess is from Sira, traditional Islamic biographies of Muhammad. The Massacre of Banu Qurayza is famous -- it's in Hadith and Sira, and there's a one-line reference to it in the Quran.

Thanks.

I'll take a closer look when I have more free time - and I will keep pointing out that Muhammad was an evil murderer, rapist, etc.

 

[Sarpedon]

Since you insist, you said the concept of rape was ancient, and apparently you seem to believe that whether the concepts are ancient matter. So, how about the following?
I assert: Muhammad was an evil rapist. Hence, Islam is false. Do you have any objections?

Umm, yes I have an objection. The conclusion doesn't logically follow. It is an ad hominem argument. Do you really need me to explain that?

1. I made no dumb arguments here.

False. See above for illogical, dumb argument. This perfectly illustrates what I have been saying all along. Your prejudices and hostility have clouded your mind and led you to unreasonable conclusions.

For example, the concept of bipolarity is not ancient, nor was it present in the time of Muhammad. But that does not mean that there were no bipolar people then. The concept of gayness in the sense of sexual orientation probably didn't exist then, either. But that does not mean that no man or woman at the time of Muhammad, was gay. The concept of a brain tumor didn't exist, either. But some people had brain tumors. And so on. Whether the concept of terrorism existed has nothing to do with whether someone was a terrorist.

Except that a brain tumor is a thing, whereas terrorism is an idea. Ideas do not exist independently from the mind, while tumors and the planet Neptune do. It appalls me that you can't see the difference. You are mistaking ideas for reality, symbol for object. While you can retroactively apply a new idea to something that already exists, and sometimes achieve something useful, like for example game theory on criminal justice, or economic theory on history, you have to do it in a logical and meaningful way, which you have utterly failed to do. Your result is similarly barren and worthless. I didn't need you to tell me that Islam is false because muhammed was a rapist. I knew Islam was false for a variety of totally obvious reasons. All you are doing is yelling and screaming and lashing out because you are mad about something. There is no worthwhile content in anything you've posted.

 

[Angra Mainyu]

Since you insist, you said the concept of rape was ancient, and apparently you seem to believe that whether the concepts are ancient matter. So, how about the following?
I assert: Muhammad was an evil rapist. Hence, Islam is false. Do you have any objections?

Umm, yes I have an objection. The conclusion doesn't logically follow. It is an ad hominem argument. Do you really need me to explain that?

You're mistaken. Islam entails that it's not the case that Muhammad was an evil rapist.
Purely for example:

http://www.noblequran.com/translation/surah68.html

4. And verily, you (O Muhammad ) are on an exalted standard of character.

So, according to Islam, Muhammad was on an "exalted standard of character", implying he was not evil. But he was evil, as his heinous acts of rape show.

Another example: http://corpus.quran.com/translation.jsp?chapter=33&verse=21

If your objection is that I didn't explicitly write down the obvious premise "Islam entails that Muhammad wasn't evil", then I'll just point out that I wasn't trying to make a long or detailed argument, but just briefly explaining the usability of the fact that Muhammad is an evil rapist in a case against Islam - which should, of course, be obvious.

But since you insist:

P1: Muhammad was an evil rapist.
P2: If Muhammad was an evil rapist, then Muhammad was evil.
P3: If Muhammad was evil, then it's not the case that Muhammad was of an exalted standard of character.
P4: If Islam is true, then Muhammad was of an exalted standard of character.
C1: Muhammad was evil. [from P1 and P2]
C2: It's not the case that Muhammad was of an exalted standard of character. [from C1 and P3].
C3: It's not the case that Islam is true. [from C2 and P4].

False. See above for illogical, dumb argument. This perfectly illustrates what I have been saying all along. Your prejudices and hostility have clouded your mind and led you to unreasonable conclusions.

The argument is not dumb. But even if it were, you would be making an error by pointing to it, because you claimed my arguments were dumb before I made that argument.

Except that a brain tumor is a thing, whereas terrorism is an idea. Ideas do not exist independently from the mind, while tumors and the planet Neptune do. It appalls me that you can't see the difference. You are mistaking ideas for reality, symbol for object. While you can retroactively apply a new idea to something that already exists, and sometimes achieve something useful, like for example game theory on criminal justice, or economic theory on history, you have to do it in a logical and meaningful way, which you have utterly failed to do. Your result is similarly barren and worthless. I didn't need you to tell me that Islam is false because muhammed was a rapist. I knew Islam was false for a variety of totally obvious reasons. All you are doing is yelling and screaming and lashing out because you are mad about something. There is no worthwhile content in anything you've posted.

While your insults and accusations would justify being angry with you, I'm obviously not trying to persuade you that Islam is false, as anyone would know by rationally reading my posts.

That aside, you are mistaken. Whether it's "an idea" or not is irrelevant. The point is that whether the concept existed back then has nothing to do with whether the concept applies to some things (people, planets, or whatever) that existed back then.
Aside from that, terrorists are as real as brain tumors. And so are bipolar people, or gay people.
You simply ignored those examples, mistakenly believing that the brain tumor example would back your position. Still, I will proceed to make the point again, removing the part that you erroneously think gives you an advantage:

But that's not the point. Even if he believed his nonsense. He raped women, so he was a rapist. He stole other people's land, so he was a thief. He murdered plenty of people (including unarmed, defenseless prisoners, etc.), so he was a murderer. The labels "murderer", "rapist", "thief", "enslaver", etc., apply because his behavior matches the description given by those words.

The concept of rape is ancient. The concept of murder is ancient, though killing in war is not considered murder. The concept of thieving is ancient, though the idea that it was wrong to gain land by conquest is not. It was a fairly universal belief that God or the gods determined victory in war based on the merits of the combatants. Thus conquest of land was virtuous. The idea that prisoners shouldn't be killed or enslaved is likewise modern. This is why there is more to an idea than simply the definition of a word. You can't pretend that if you make up a word, assign a definition to it, and apply it to something, then you have necessarily produced a worthwhile idea. Especially when you are using loaded words with an obvious unstated motive. That is my point.

For example, the concept of bipolarity is not ancient, nor was it present in the time of Muhammad. But that does not mean that there were no bipolar people then. The concept of gayness in the sense of sexual orientation probably didn't exist then, either. But that does not mean that no man or woman at the time of Muhammad, was gay. Whether the concept of terrorism existed has nothing to do with whether someone was a terrorist.

 

[RavenSky]

Both dangerous and serving no purpose but to satisfy some childish whim to excite others.

Actually I don't think this is based on a childish whim. No, this was a well-planned and deliberate provocation. This result is - if not exactly what was desired - certainly advantageous to the agenda of Geller and her merry band of idiots. They wanted the stunt to cause trouble. Demonstrations, backlash, and anger at least. Violence perhaps. in any case, it worked out very well. There are two dead Muslims, and low-information folks around the country (and even here on this forum, apparently) get to point to this and say "see, all Muslims are like that."

This little cartoon contest served a purpose...to dupe stupid people (the two perps included) into even more stupidity. The two dead guys fell for the stunt (and fortunately didn't cause any more deaths) but they weren't the only ones who got sold a bill of goods.

^^^ that sums it up very well, imo

 

[Bomb#20]

Well first of all, calling Teddy Rooseveldt an imperialist is not anachronistic, as the concept was well established at the time.

Good god, you blatantly shift the goalposts like that and then you have the gall to accuse me of inconsistency? Let me remind you of what you wrote that prompted me to bring up Teddy Roosevelt.

Do we really want to discuss what war was like in the 7th century? Nothing he did was out of line of the standards of war in his time and place.

So why should we give a hoot whether the concept was well established? That's utterly beside the point. The relevant fact is that nothing Roosevelt did was out of line of the standards of war at his time and place -- he only did to the Philippines what all the other great powers were doing somewhere. If you'd told me your standard for anachronism was about to morph into "the concept was well established", I'd have picked different examples.

Calling Torquemada a totalitarian isn't quite accurate either, as he was the agent of the Church, and had no problem with the existence of the monarchy and the feudal system, which seems at odds with the usual definition of totalitarianism: the idea that power be concentrated in the hands of a single institution. So you are being both anachronistic and inaccurate.

By that standard O'Brien wasn't a totalitarian because as an agent of the Ministry of Love he had no problem with the existence and power of the Ministry of Peace. No doubt you have some technical definition in mind, maybe one that even matters for Poli Sci dissertations; but in common usage "totalitarianism" means the rulers policing any aspect of your life they please including even your private thoughts. (Oh, and it's not like Torquemada regarded the monarchy as a coequal branch of government. You think he'd still have been okay with the monarchy retaining its power if the Pope had excommunicated Ferdinand and Isabella?)

As for Davis, again, while the word 'racist' wasn't in much use in his time, the concept of a social order based on race, and that this was wrong, was.

First of all, nothing Davis thought of or did to black people was out of line of the standards for treatment of them in his time and place. For you to defend the term in his case on the grounds that some people at the time thought a race-based social order was wrong means you're shifting the goalposts again. And secondly, are you seriously proposing that having objections to punishing innocent children along with guilty parents is a post-7th-century concept?!?

For your information:

"The fathers shall not be put to death for the children, neither shall the children be put to death for the fathers: every man shall be put to death for his own sin." - Deuteronomy 24:16

Second, the problem of 'terrorist' as a label is how mutable it is. Once upon a time it meant one who used random violence against civilians to cause fear in order to intimidate people to achieve political goals. The first people who were generally called 'terrorists' were the early anarchists and communists who would do things like fling dynamite into Paris cafes. The randomness of the violence is what distinguishes the acts of someone like Muhammed, in that he killed the innocent, but did not kill randomly. That's the difference between what was originally called terrorism and what is called these days 'state sponsered terrorism' in that the first is largely random, while the second is not. I hate arguing semantics, but my main problem is this problem of inconsistency: you are not using words in a systematic way.

So, your argument is that other people have used "terrorism" in a lot of different ways, and therefore I'm using it unsystematically? Do you even listen to yourself?

I will allow a particular word to be defined in any well understood way for the sake of discussion.

Except mine, evidently.

You seem to be throwing around words as insults rather than showing any sort of understanding of them, or interest in having a meaningful conversation:

Says the guy who apparently feels "Only the Arab ones, I suppose." contributes to a meaningful conversation. Remember what I said about you being disqualified from accusing others of laziness? You are also not qualified to accuse others of insults.

Finally, Charlemagne was admired for killing people? Really?

You're the one who said he is considered by many to be admirable. What do you think he's admired for? Have you read his Wikipedia page? War after war after war. Take all that away and he'd barely be remembered.

You are the one making the positive claim that Muhammed's behavior was inconsistent with the time.

Why did you write that? Do you think putting words in your opponent's mouth is an honorable debating tactic? I assume you didn't do it on purpose -- no doubt you sincerely believe I made such a claim; after all, you could hardly have done it deliberately and expected me not to call you on it. But your sincerity doesn't get you any credit because you didn't have a reason to think what you wrote is true. You just made it up. And the only plausible reason you would make up such nonsense and impute it to me is that you can't be bothered to fact-check your statements about me because you fundamentally don't give a damn whether you're telling the truth about me or not. Have you considered the merits of arguing with what people say instead of with figments of your imagination? Even if on the subject of your opponents you have no moral qualms about reckless disregard for the truth, fact-checking your claims about us would at least spare you the embarrassment of getting caught at it.

If you disagree with any of the above tongue-lashing, quote me.

 

[RavenSky]

What? No one posted the winning cartoon?

View attachment 2908

I don't agree with what the organizers did because I think they were being purposely provoking, and putting people's lives at risk to push their own political agenda to no good purpose; but I do have to admit that the winning drawing is witty and makes an excellent point.

 

[RavenSky]

You want the right of fanatics to incite violence to trump the rights of people to live in peace.

I won't support twisting a society to merely satisfy the childish whims of a tiny group of fanatics.

We lock up people for inciting violence all the time.

Let me ask you a question. The local mafia wants their candidate to win a union election so they can siphon off a bunch of money from the various projects around town. In order to facilitate this, anytime that there's a campaign rally for a competing candidate, they send in a bunch of thugs to beat up the people who are attending it to send a message that supporting these other candidates is not acceptable to them. If someone plans a campaign rally for another candidate anyways because they do not want to give in to mafia intimidation, you are of the opinion that they are the bad guys because they are engaging in an activity which they know has a good chance of inciting violence as opposed to peacefully submitting to the intimidation?

As I'm reading your posts, it sounds like this is the argument that you're making. Is that correct or incorrect interpretation on my part of what you're saying? If it's incorrect, what is the difference between that scenario and the one in the OP which makes you draw a distinction between your attitudes towards them?

The difference in your analogy is that the group is not holding the rally for the purpose of provoking the mafia group. They are holding the rally for the purpose of promoting their candidate even in the face of violence from the mafia.

Someone contrasted this cartoon contest to the Charlie Hebdo murders, noting that Charlie Hebdo was an equal opportunity satirist magazine that only rarely targeted Isalm/Mohammed whereas the OP organizers had the sole purpose of traying to provoke a violent reaction.

I don't think it should be illegal or restricted. But I do think it is disingenuous to pretend they were innocent people practicing their free speech in the same way people at a political rally for candidate A are. And I do think I have the right to exercise my own free speech to say that the OP organizers are giant assholes.

 

[Arctish]

I don't agree with what the organizers did because I think they were being purposely provoking, and putting people's lives at risk to push their own political agenda to no good purpose; but I do have to admit that the winning drawing is witty and makes an excellent point.

It's pretty good, but I like last year's Everybody Draw Mohammed Day winner better:

 

[RavenSky]

You're really struggling.

I don't like Pamela Geller because she is a bigoted cunt who spends far too much time and money fomenting hatred against Muslims. The world would be better off if people like her didn't speak. Just like it would be better off if vicious anti-semites, racists and homophobes did not speak. This is not some unique view of mine - probably most of the sane people in the world agree with me. So why you thought this was some "gotcha" moment for you to pounce on is puzzling.

I attempted to extrapolate the principles you appeared to be espousing to "Warpoet is a hater of Geller so Warpoet should shut up about Geller".

I know. And it was fucking stupid the first time you "attempted" to extrapolate that, and your subsequent attempts at explaining or defending your insinuation haven't made it sound any less fucking stupid. My contempt for Pamela Geller stems from her actual beliefs, whereas her contempt for Arabs and Muslims is based simply on the fact that they're Arabs and Muslims. Thus, she is a bigot, and I am not, which means she should shut up, and I shouldn't.

It's really quite simple, and you appear to be the only person who can't grasp the distinction, assuming you are even being serious and not just dicking around because you think it's clever (it isn't).

His argument sounds very much like that "don't be intolerant of my intolerance" attempts at so-called logic.

- - - Updated - - -

I don't agree with what the organizers did because I think they were being purposely provoking, and putting people's lives at risk to push their own political agenda to no good purpose; but I do have to admit that the winning drawing is witty and makes an excellent point.

It's pretty good, but I like last year's Everybody Draw Mohammed Day winner better:

Apparently I have given out too much rep this morning, so was unable to rep you for that one.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Let me ask you a question. The local mafia wants their candidate to win a union election so they can siphon off a bunch of money from the various projects around town. In order to facilitate this, anytime that there's a campaign rally for a competing candidate, they send in a bunch of thugs to beat up the people who are attending it to send a message that supporting these other candidates is not acceptable to them. If someone plans a campaign rally for another candidate anyways because they do not want to give in to mafia intimidation, you are of the opinion that they are the bad guys because they are engaging in an activity which they know has a good chance of inciting violence as opposed to peacefully submitting to the intimidation?

As I'm reading your posts, it sounds like this is the argument that you're making. Is that correct or incorrect interpretation on my part of what you're saying? If it's incorrect, what is the difference between that scenario and the one in the OP which makes you draw a distinction between your attitudes towards them?

The difference in your analogy is that the group is not holding the rally for the purpose of provoking the mafia group. They are holding the rally for the purpose of promoting their candidate even in the face of violence from the mafia.

Someone contrasted this cartoon contest to the Charlie Hebdo murders, noting that Charlie Hebdo was an equal opportunity satirist magazine that only rarely targeted Isalm/Mohammed whereas the OP organizers had the sole purpose of traying to provoke a violent reaction.

I don't think it should be illegal or restricted. But I do think it is disingenuous to pretend they were innocent people practicing their free speech in the same way people at a political rally for candidate A are. And I do think I have the right to exercise my own free speech to say that the OP organizers are giant assholes.

And that's the entire point. It's not really a difference to make a counter argument to my post which makes the exact same point as my post. The point of the analogy was talking against people who'd have violent reactions to your speech, not to compare the content of the speech being made.

It doesn't matter if they're assholes or not assholes. They shouldn't be restricted. That's the totality of the point.

 

[Sarpedon]

You are the one making the positive claim that Muhammed's behavior was inconsistent with the time.

I wrote it because it is true.

Back then did everyone rule by the fear that he'd murder your children?

My point has always been that historical figures need to be judged with consideration of the conditions of their time, instead of anachronistically applying modern sensibilities to them. While your definition of terrorism seems to be 'using fear of violence as a political tool' is a valid definition, which you have indeed used with fair consistency, and I admitted I was wrong to say 'inconsistency', what is the fruit of it? What have we learned from calling Muhammed a terrorist? I gave the example of applying game theory to criminal behavior as producing worthwhile results. What are your results? You haven't made a convincing argument against islam, you haven't increased our knowledge of history by providing a fresh viewpoint, you haven't increased our understanding of current problems by shining a light on history. Your definition, while consistent, is imprecise; it is a vague definition, at odds with the way that other people use it. I am willing to accept your definition for the purpose of discussion, but I can't help but suspect that because you are using a vague definition that could be stretched to embrace lots of things, you are applying it to a term already so loaded with the intent to tacitly associate those other definitions with the thing you are defining more benignly. I've been in this business for a long time, and I have seen this trick before. Serious scholars tend to avoid loaded terminology for precisely this reason. So yes: Muhammed was a terrorist, according to your definition of the word. Now that I have said that, you can take that quote out of context,

Muhammed was a terrorist,

and post it under my name elsewhere, and say 'look Sarpedon says muhammed was a terrorist' to people who have a different idea of what terrorist means. I don't think that is your actual motive here, but for people like the President, it is a very real concern. This is why we can't blindly accept the motives of people who are revising the meanings of words and revising history.

Remember what I said about you being disqualified from accusing others of laziness? You are also not qualified to accuse others of insults.

I let this pass unremarked last time because I still had hope of something interesting coming from this conversation. But I won't let pass now. You have no power to command me. The fact that you think you can make up rules for other people and obviously expect them to follow them demonstrates another one of my premises: That you are arguing not from fact, and not for any scholarly purpose, but purely to support your prejudiced and egotistical view of the world. You make up definitions of words and expect everyone to accept them without question. You make up rules for other people which you expect them to follow. You impose your own standards on foreign cultures and distant times in history of which you are clearly ignorant and expect others to go along with it. You judge and you declare guilt. You accept stories that support your conclusions and dismiss what doesn't. And you produce nothing worthwhile, nothing but propaganda to be used against your fellow human beings, the muslims, my neighbors. Lots of people on this board and other places have been trying to turn me against my neighbors for their own political goals. I am offended that other people think they can command me, manipulate me, cause me to hate and fear and harm my neighbors, for goals that are not my own. Is islam false? Yes. Are there dangerous muslim extremists? Yes. Was Muhammed an evil man who started a religion for power and sex? I think so. Do most people who talk negatively about Muhammed do so for the purpose of harming and defaming muslims? I think so. Do most people associate the term 'terrorist' with people of a certain race and religion? Yes. Does calling Muhammed a terrorist serve any purpose other than incitement against muslims? I do not think so. Have you managed to demonstrate otherwise in all your posts defending calling him a terrorist? No. Has anything you've said here made me think your motives are any different? No.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You can admire Muhammed's piety and fortitude while ignoring his pederasty and violence.

Pederasty ? Interesting, that's something I have never heard leveled at "the prophet" before.

He married a girl of 9. Most of us have a problem with that.

 

[Tom Sawyer]

Pederasty ? Interesting, that's something I have never heard leveled at "the prophet" before.

He married a girl of 9. Most of us have a problem with that.

But that's not what pederasty means. That was his pont.

 

[Malintent]

Just to put it out there, the yelling fire example is often cited but has never actually been tested in court.

The expression came from the case Schenck v. United States in 1919. The case related to free speech of organizers of "draft dodgers", who were charged with obstruction by handing out pamphlets that encouraged avoiding the draft. In this case, Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr.'s opinion in the United States Supreme Court decision on this case used the words, "falsely shouting fire in a crowded movie theater" to express the difference between true but dangerous information, versus false and dangerous information.

So, no, no one actually ended up in court FOR shouting fire in a movie theater.. but the analogy is apt and often sited... and sourced from a supreme court decision.

 

[Nexus]

He married a girl of 9. Most of us have a problem with that.

A minor correction here, he married her at 6 and had sex with her at 9.

 

[untermensche]

A minor correction here, he married her at 6 and had sex with her at 9.

Therefore........?

 

[angelo]

A minor correction here, he married her at 6 and had sex with her at 9.

Therefore........?

He was a a f............g paedophile, and set an example for his followers that are still followed today in the 21st century!

 

[Juma]

Therefore........?

He was a a f............g paedophile, and set an example for his followers that are still followed today in the 21st century!

Sigh. No. He was probably not a pedophile... Yes he banged a 9 year old which is awful but that doesnt make him a peadophile.

 

[Jayjay]

I would say that actually banging a 9-year old is worse than being a pedophile.

 

[Juma]

I would say that actually banging a 9-year old is worse than being a pedophile.

Yep. Definitely worse than an non-outliving pedophile..