Is Islam bad?

[Michaelm]

I don't know how much of this is due to the language barrier, but I have yet to see you make a single convincing argument to this end on here, though you seem to be basing most everything else you've said upon it.

ok let's try it differently by taking some story from the bible that I remembered.
There is this story of some father who was made to kill his own child to prove his faith to the monotheistic deity.
In the story the deity turns up at the last moment to prevent the actual killing.
Now if monotheists can be brought so easily to murdering their own children it must be even easier to get them to murder others.
Still I don't really get why you keep on arguing on this point.
When there are more gods ppl can turn to the non violent god and still keep their faith.
When there is only one god this is simply impossible.

Dude, I'm an agnostic, and have plenty of issues with organized religion, monotheistic ones very much included - that said, if I'm going to criticize something, I like to make sure that I'm not pulling stuff out of my backside to do it, and the whole "one god is worse than a whole bunch of them" angle doesn't make a lick of sense to me, and I have no reason to pretend it does because you and I may agree on other, larger points.

Ok, I didn't know you where agnostic. I kinda took it for granted you would see yourself as a member of some monotheistic faith. Maybe you told me before in the past but I forgot that, my mistake, sorry.
Let me also make clear that the word you wasn't directed only at you personally but at monotheists in general.
I'm not trying to bash you personally, I'm only bashing the monotheistic religions.
I'm pretty sure we have agreed on other points in the past.

Maybe I can't explain it very well but still I really feel it is so.
When I have to compare both monotheism and polytheism to say, political systems, then monotheism would be a dictatorship and polytheism more like a democracy.
I also believe real world democracy is nothing more than a dictatorship of the rich but that aside
According to mainstream views a dictatorship is considered worse than a democracy.
The same views believe it is far easier in a dictatorship to keep control over it's ppl than it is in a democracy.
But in religion it seems a dictatorship is preferred over a democracy. Where is the sense in that ?

I would be far happier if the most prevalent religion in our world would not have gods at all and be much more emphasized on nature.
It shouldn't even have any notion of non-believers or others.
It's organizational structure should be non-existing, there is no need for such a thing.
It's holy house should be the world and its nature, no need for any buildings whatsoever.
It shouldn't even necessarily need a written word or name to exist though it prolly must to get it started.

[BulletMagnet]

When there are more gods ppl can turn to the non violent god and still keep their faith.
When there is only one god this is simply impossible.

When you phrase it like this you make it sound like there are actual thundering voices from the sky giving commands to people (a la the Abraham and Isaac story you referenced), as opposed to human priests/rabbis/imams/etc. with a huge variety of viewpoints and interpretations addressing their congregations - heck, even if you stick only to "formalized" divides all three monotheistic faiths say they follow the same handful of books but are split into heaven knows how many sects and sub-sects, all of which see various things very differently even when they come from the same purported source. All of them thus have just as much room for variety as any pantheon - if you don't like what your particular church/temple/mosque says, find another, and if you don't like what your particular segment of the faith preaches, switch to a different one, or heck, write down your own interpretations and found your own.

Sure, some people will stay put and deal with parts of their faith they don't entirely agree with because they don't want to abandon the parts they do like, but do you honestly think that followers of polytheistic faiths haven't done the same on occasion over the millennia, especially when many of their gods were made out to be both more active in everyday affairs and less forgiving of infidels than their monotheistic counterparts?

When I have to compare both monotheism and polytheism to say, political systems, then monotheism would be a dictatorship and polytheism more like a democracy.

That strikes me as a rather flawed comparison, seeing as 1) We're supposedly dealing with supernatural beings here, not human leaders with a physical presence, and 2) No matter your personal preferences, you can't "vote out" a member of your culture's pantheon you don't like, no more than you can ignore the parts of the Bible/Koran you don't like - all you can do is choose to place the emphasis of your worship in one place or another, no matter which belief system you're talking about (or abandon the whole thing altogether). In that sense I guess it's sort of like joining a party (or, in some cases, registering as an independent), and it applies in both instances.

I would be far happier if the most prevalent religion in our world would not have gods at all and be much more emphasized on nature.

Nature is itself a singular entity, albeit an impersonal one, comprised of various disparate elements, and lends itself just as much to the monotheistic single deity which simultaneously embodies creation/destruction/power/wisdom/etc. as to the various sky/sea/fire/beauty/etc. gods of polytheism who reside under a single roof, depending on the viewpoint you wish to take. If you truly believe in the societal merits of some form of neo-paganism I think you'd be better-served seeking common ground with those who take a different tack than starting off the conversation with "your belief system is irredeemable".

[Michaelm]

Sure, some people will stay put and deal with parts of their faith they don't entirely agree with because they don't want to abandon the parts they do like, but do you honestly think that followers of polytheistic faiths haven't done the same on occasion over the millennia, especially when many of their gods were made out to be both more active in everyday affairs and less forgiving of infidels than their monotheistic counterparts?

Well I think in polytheism there would also be ppl doing the same yes.
But I do think it would be far less in comparison to monotheism cause believers still have a choice.

That strikes me as a rather flawed comparison, seeing as 1) We're supposedly dealing with supernatural beings here, not human leaders with a physical presence, and 2) No matter your personal preferences, you can't "vote out" a member of your culture's pantheon you don't like, no more than you can ignore the parts of the Bible/Koran you don't like - all you can do is choose to place the emphasis of your worship in one place or another, no matter which belief system you're talking about (or abandon the whole thing altogether). In that sense I guess it's sort of like joining a party (or, in some cases, registering as an independent), and it applies in both instances.

Well if you put it like that is sure seems flawed but that's not the comparison I was aiming at.
In a dictatorship it's usually the will of one person, or maybe even one party, that will happen, comparable to the single god.
In a democracy it's usually a compromise of several persons and/or parties that will happen, comparable to the multiple gods or atleast to the choices of the believers.
In that respect the comparison stands strong I think.

Nature is itself a singular entity, albeit an impersonal one, comprised of various disparate elements, and lends itself just as much to the monotheistic single deity which simultaneously embodies creation/destruction/power/wisdom/etc. as to the various sky/sea/fire/beauty/etc. gods of polytheism who reside under a single roof, depending on the viewpoint you wish to take.

Though I think I get what you're trying to say I don't see the danger in there as I do see it in monotheism and less in polytheism.
Nature is not a thing you have to believe in, it is just there all around us and we can see, smell and touch it, unlike the deities in most other religions.
I find it very hard to believe you can get ppl violent to others about such a thing unless, maybe, they are kept deliberately unknowing about the most simple laws of nature most of the ppl living today know about.

II think you'd be better-served seeking common ground with those who take a different tack than starting off the conversation with "your belief system is irredeemable".

Sure you're right on this one but in my defense I was only giving my opinion.

[Ed Oscuro]

Whoa, I didn't know Michaelm was still about. We have some seriously dedicated long-term...contributors here.

It's an interesting point about the "religions change over time" vs. "thundering voices from the sky," though. Implicit through our whole discussion is the condescension that the directives accepted by radicals, like those in the Isaac and Abraham story, are just wrong. But we can split this up: We can say that a religious person can sit in one of four camps - Disruptive and committed (meaning they hold radical views which we view to be bad, and they are also committed to religion);
disruptive and opportunistic or disinterested (they do radical things, but they might not really be interested in the religion, or their religious experience isn't identified as such by others);
conventional and committed (meaning they are religious but not interested in things we view as bad - though they may still be "radical," it just means that that radicalism takes a form that's accepted by many people, i.e. the current Pope's repopularization of the Catholic view of social responsibility about wealth);
dispassionate or wholly opportunistic (they're not really religious, and they're not involved with any "bad" campaigns that religious types have taken up. Of course, there's degrees to these categories as well.

What's important to note is that a lot of people are in the last category - their main focus, and indeed the focus that has triumphed in many places throughout history, is probably on family and having a stable life. Promises of things that come the day after they've died don't attract them much.

Indeed, many people who say they are religious still implicitly disagree with much of what their religion says. BulletMagnet gives a nice version of this above, and the recent splits within Catholicism (especially in America) with people arguing for the vestment of female priests, disagreement over contraception and abortion policy, and the implicit disagreement of many with the Pope's discussion (same as many popes before him) of the Catholic view that income inequality is bad and a problem - all these things show that people are capable of considering themselves to have a religious life while at the same time being very selective about what they believe.

The push comes from multiple sources - it can come from private concerns for the family and individual life, and it can be entrenched in political and social institutions as it has been in the US (and infamously, or perhaps famously, in revolutionary France). At the same time it's not clear what wiping out religions, or any particular religion is going to solve any problems. Islam is, after all, the religion that coexisted with societies that contributed greatly to the advance of science and mathematics in the period between the fall of Rome and the subsequent take-up of those problems in medieval Christian Europe.

At the end of the day, Christianity's effects in homes seems to have moved towards a stable, non-world-disrupting order (aside from the occasional crusade - I haven't forgotten the recent history of hawkish activity within our borders with Christian overtones, though a lot of that clearly fits under category 2, the savvy operator who cares more about opportunity than religion) while supposedly secular society also falls into terrible problems now and then (it's no accident that the first puppet of our adventure in Vietnam was Catholic, but our reasons for being interested in that country and for staying there preceded and survived him).

I think that all that needs to be done is to have a safeguard against fanatics. Since fanaticism isn't exclusively religious in nature (and probably not even reliably religious in nature) it seems that when we protect against fanaticism we allow people important freedom to have their own lives, while not blindly believing that we have identified a problem and dealt with it. The idea of censoring and repressing an entire religion - be it Jewish, Catholic, Buddhist, Christian, whatever - seems every bit the wasteful fool's errand that burning books was in Ray Bradbury's fiction.

[Michaelm]

Religion can be considered an addiction.
Compare it with smoking and see why eradicating it does have positive outcomes.

Current smokers will not stop smoking cause of the changed societal views but new smokers are far less then before.
Eventually in some decades no-one will smoke anymore. The threat that smoking is will be eliminated.

The same goes for monotheism but unfortunately it is kept intact cause ppl just don't see the danger it beholds and they go on finding excuses to keep it intact.
Cause after all, it is what gives ppl hope they say.
The failure to see this is not clever at all.

[djvinc]

Hi there,
I've yet to read the entire thread, but something strikes me : is there any muslim here talking ?
This tends to turn to philosophical conversations (which can be good) when religion is often about beliefs and "guts" and implication above one's own being.
I'm wondering what is the part of hearsay here, and if the original question is even always relevant or has the same meaning for everyone (ismal bad for the society, bad for the muslims, bad for health, bad for the environment, bad for girls or bad for shmups players).
If it's "bad" as in "counter-philantropic", this seems like a dumbed-down question to me
(if it matters, I'm a muslim)

[Lord Satori]

moh posted a brief comment on the previous page (to which I took out of context and sigged)

[Khan]

I'm also a Muslim but I have no real interest in replying about the subject matter convincing some random strangers on the merits and disadvantages of my religion would wear thin for me personally...besides there is 1000's of web pages with the information if the tc was that interested.

[copy-paster]

So the conclusion is, is all Muslims are ISIS and terrorist? Or it's because a bunch of US media reported the terrorism news and they are connecting with Islam and ended up like this?

[Lord Satori]

Posting almost a year later. Why? There's nothing new to be said.

[Strikers1945guy]

So the conclusion is, is all Muslims are ISIS and terrorist? Or it's because a bunch of US media reported the terrorism news and they are connecting with Islam and ended up like this?

Of course all Muslims aren't terrorists. Are all christians those bat shit crazy Jehovah Witnesses? Hell no. You can be crazy and wrong or wrong. Same outcome.

[evil_ash_xero]

Of course all Muslims aren't terrorists. Are all christians those bat shit crazy Jehovah Witnesses? Hell no.

That's the most extreme example of "crazy" Christianity, you can think of? I mean, they're pacifists.

[Strikers1945guy]

Of course all Muslims aren't terrorists. Are all christians those bat shit crazy Jehovah Witnesses? Hell no.

That's the most extreme example of "crazy" Christianity, you can think of? I mean, they're pacifists.

We are all aware of the Westboro Baptist church and their hijinks but I don't personally know anybody who claim to be one so I went with the next best thing. A guy I work with in construction is a jehovahs witness. Years ago he fell off of some scaffolding and broke his arm in like 10 places. Required surgery to correct the bone. He could have had surgery the next day but he would have required some donor blood during the operation from what he told me. He made the hospital wait like 3 weeks while they got enough of his blood collected to use during the surgery so he didn't have any heathen unclean blood flowing through his veins. Guy is a nut.

[Bananamatic]

i thought westboro were just trolls

[emphatic]

The ones behind this are bad: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cairo_Dec ... s_in_Islam

[Lord Satori]

Posting almost a year later. Why? There's nothing new to be said.