The slow revolt of Western electorates

[TheKitttenGuard]

25 minutes ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

  I get that. I guess for me that doubt is assuaged by a point Hitchens makes in the You Tube I posted earlier. He points out that Islam has never truly experienced a reformation, at least not in the same way Christianity has. The very Mission Statement of the religion is "This is the final, unalterable word of God". You don't get to edit it. You don't get to cherry-pick it. You either accept it as a whole, or you are an apostate.

I find Hitchen's explanation overly simplistic in the extreme.  Islam had its first schism after Muhammad death. Also though I am seeing Sufi-Islam spoken of and do not know much, I know the Whabbahist were founded in 1776 and the works others cite are from the 20th century.  So we are not dealing wirh thoughts directly from the 7th century it is what later followers believe what the first Islamic community was.

The statement of "This is the final unalterable word of God" and accept or die is very fundamentalist mindset and more deriving from more modern times.

There can also be a discussion of Imperialism and it's affect.  Many of the most extreme Islamic views did not have immense power and influence. Several of them did get it by aligning themselves with the Imperial powers ( mainly Britian).  I know this is sounding of "leftist" bad West.  However, the West made influence on Islam and what type gained power.  I can not think of an example of such outside force having an influence on the course of Christianity.

[Manhole Eunuchsbane]

12 hours ago, TheKitttenGuard said:

I am not either.

I am fairly sure neither is Sam Harris.

 So this sent me on another You Tube dive, and I have to say that I disagree with the knock on Harris. I think his approach to this is very scientific and measured. It seems to me that he has done his homework here. I thought this clip is a fair example of that.

 

 

[The Marquis de Leech]

3 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

  I get that. I guess for me that doubt is assuaged by a point Hitchens makes in the You Tube I posted earlier. He points out that Islam has never truly experienced a reformation, at least not in the same way Christianity has. The very Mission Statement of the religion is "This is the final, unalterable word of God". You don't get to edit it. You don't get to cherry-pick it. You either accept it as a whole, or you are an apostate.

Except that The Reformation was about replacing the interpretative word of The Church with a much more literal emphasis on scripture. Prior to The Reformation, Church and State were rivals, whereas after it, Church and State overlapped and merged. The sort of crazy fundamentalist radicalism we see today was right up The Reformation's ally.

What ultimately de-fanged Christianity in the West was the World Wars.

[Altherion]

6 hours ago, Rippounet said:

Anyway, I'm uncomfortable discussing this here and there is a comparable discussion on the other thread (as you know).

This thread has inadvertently become an example of a phenomenon that is pretty widespread across Western countries. Even among people who understand neoliberalism, globalization and the other economic forces, economics is simply not as captivating a topic as Islamic terror. Even if rationally, we know that the latter is not quite as significant a factor in our lives as the former, first or second generation Muslim terrorists murdering our fellow citizens is more compelling. A competent demagogue may be able to parlay this into a significant power grab -- especially in European nations where the refugee crisis is most acute.

[Arakan]

1 hour ago, Altherion said:

This thread has inadvertently become an example of a phenomenon that is pretty widespread across Western countries. Even among people who understand neoliberalism, globalization and the other economic forces, economics is simply not as captivating a topic as Islamic terror. Even if rationally, we know that the latter is not quite as significant a factor in our lives as the former, first or second generation Muslim terrorists murdering our fellow citizens is more compelling. A competent demagogue may be able to parlay this into a significant power grab -- especially in European nations where the refugee crisis is most acute.

I think one reason is that our lives are more than just about money and material wealth. Islamic jihadism is at war with our way of life, ideas, values. Things we as people have been fighting very hard for for the last 300 years. Obviously this might vary between different western countries, e.g. the pursuit of individual happiness and material wealth is a stronger value in the US than in Germany. But nonetheless when your very way of life is attacked, people will respond. Nothing new. The fight about believes, ideology and ideals/values was ALWAYS the most intense one, throughout recorded human history. 

[DireWolfSpirit]

4 hours ago, TheKitttenGuard said:

I find Hitchen's explanation overly simplistic in the extreme.  Islam had its first schism after Muhammad death. Also though I am seeing Sufi-Islam spoken of and do not know much, I know the Whabbahist were founded in 1776 and the works others cite are from the 20th century.  So we are not dealing wirh thoughts directly from the 7th century it is what later followers believe what the first Islamic community was.

The statement of "This is the final unalterable word of God" and accept or die is very fundamentalist mindset and more deriving from more modern times.

There can also be a discussion of Imperialism and it's affect.  Many of the most extreme Islamic views did not have immense power and influence. Several of them did get it by aligning themselves with the Imperial powers ( mainly Britian).  I know this is sounding of "leftist" bad West.  However, the West made influence on Islam and what type gained power.  I can not think of an example of such outside force having an influence on the course of Christianity.

This is a nice review of a book that is interesting on Sufism, http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2008/08/20/paying-attention-to-the-other-islam and its influence on moderates in Islam.

Sufism has been called the mystical branch of Islam and compared to the Kabbalah tradition in Judaism (except were talking many times larger). The fundamentalists, the Wahabbists oppose Sufis as heretics and idol worshippers.

 

[Wouter]

11 hours ago, Rippounet said:

Have you read last eyar's The Atlantic's excellent article from last year (not that it supports my point in any way)?

http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2015/03/what-isis-really-wants/384980/

Very interesting, thanks for posting.

A note: in october this year, Dabiq was taken from Daesh by Turkish army and their FSA (groups which often have Islamic ties themselves) allies. The Daesh seem to have been fairly quiet about this, it probably does not count as "the crusader armies coming to Dabiq".

There is an uncomfortable truth in that article: in its origin, Islam is a militant religion of conquest and subjugation. Allthough many strands of Islam repress those tendencies to a greater or lesser degree, what it really needs is the kind of thing that happened to (major parts of) Christianity between the Enlightenement, The French Revolution and on until around the Second World War. I don't know what exactly sparked it, but at some point a significant part started to stop taking religious texts literally. It became permissible, even in a church, to say "that text is meant metaphorically". It seems that this is still problematic today, even for moderate islam, and the unpleasant implications of the holy texts have to be tiptoed around.

Something else that struck me is how the author has no problem finding religious nutjobs in London and Australia, and other places. Some of those people could easily create the next radical group, once the Daesh have fallen. Is leaving them be really the best way to handle this?

9 hours ago, Manhole Eunuchsbane said:

  I get that. I guess for me that doubt is assuaged by a point Hitchens makes in the You Tube I posted earlier. He points out that Islam has never truly experienced a reformation, at least not in the same way Christianity has. The very Mission Statement of the religion is "This is the final, unalterable word of God". You don't get to edit it. You don't get to cherry-pick it. You either accept it as a whole, or you are an apostate.

Exactly, allthough as Roose Bolton's pet leech pointed out, "reformation" is probably the wrong word here. The "reformed church" was more fundamentalist than the catholic church at that time.

 

[Wouter]

5 hours ago, Altherion said:

This thread has inadvertently become an example of a phenomenon that is pretty widespread across Western countries. Even among people who understand neoliberalism, globalization and the other economic forces, economics is simply not as captivating a topic as Islamic terror. Even if rationally, we know that the latter is not quite as significant a factor in our lives as the former, first or second generation Muslim terrorists murdering our fellow citizens is more compelling. A competent demagogue may be able to parlay this into a significant power grab -- especially in European nations where the refugee crisis is most acute.

The problem is not many politicians who are economically left-wing, or left-to-center, realise this. Remarkable about Wilders is that, in spite of being commonly considered extreme-rightwing, he is reported to have rather leftwing views on economy issues.

Given that many people are concerned both about the economics/globalisation and about islamic terror, this could be a very succesful approach. In countries where the first is only tackled by traditional leftwing parties (or communist leaning parties) and the second only by parties branded "extreme-right", a voter who has issues with both will have to choose what he wishes to emphasise in the voting box. Especially if the former in effect would want "more islam", and the latter would want "more neoliberalism".

[Arakan]

2 minutes ago, Wouter said:

The problem is not many politicians who are economically left-wing, or left-to-center, realise this. Remarkable about Wilders is that, in spite of being commonly considered extreme-rightwing, he is reported to have rather leftwing views on economy issues.

Given that many people are concerned both about the economics/globalisation and about islamic terror, this could be a very succesful approach. In countries where the first is only tackled by traditional leftwing parties (or communist leaning parties) and the second only by parties branded "extreme-right", a voter who has issues with both will have to choose what he wishes to emphasise in the voting box. Especially if the former in effect would want "more islam", and the latter would want "more neoliberalism".

Exactly the reason why Le Pen is so successful in France and why the AFD in Germany is gaining ground. Under the Professor they were quite neo-liberal in economic policies (except Anti-Euro). 

[Wouter]

2 minutes ago, Arakan said:

Exactly the reason why Le Pen is so successful in France and why the AFD in Germany is gaining ground. Under the Professor they were quite neo-liberal in economic policies (except Anti-Euro). 

Who is the Professor? An ex-leader of AFD?

Le Pen is economically considerably to the left of Fillon; if those two go to the final round I wonder what leftwing voters would do.

[Arakan]

Just now, Wouter said:

Who is the Professor? An ex-leader of AFD?

Le Pen is economically considerably to the left of Fillon; if those two go to the final round I wonder what leftwing voters would do.

Yeah, Professor Lucke the original founder of the AFD. Basically he was very pro free market, just anti Euro. He wasn't even a rightwing populist. Then "his" party was taken over by real rightwing populists and they have transformed the AFD into a party to be reckoned with. Before Berlin I expected them to get somewhere between 6-8% in the next federal election (enough to enter the Bundestag, we have a 5% minimum limit). But now after Berlin and other terror shenanigans conducted by refugees (Ansbach, Würzburg) 10-15% is not unlikely (absolute best case: 15-20% but unlikely). Protest vote incoming. 

[TheKitttenGuard]

3 hours ago, DireWolfSpirit said:

This is a nice review of a book that is interesting on Sufism, http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2008/08/20/paying-attention-to-the-other-islam and its influence on moderates in Islam.

Sufism has been called the mystical branch of Islam and compared to the Kabbalah tradition in Judaism (except were talking many times larger). The fundamentalists, the Wahabbists oppose Sufis as heretics and idol worshippers.

 

Thanks for the article.

The article you link states Sufi can be a moderating force.  I had some general familiarity that it is to be a more mysticism. 

Some pages back you have poster stating that Sufism is ISIS and the spread of it is the greatest danger.

I am somewhat familar with Whabbahism since that is stated that is what inspired Al-Qaeda and that is the greatest danger.

Many people think IS had some support from Saudis, at least in the beginning.  I was under impression that the Saudis are more Whabbahist which is stated to be enemy of Sufism. 

I also recall a few weeks in a YNET (an english Israeli site/paper) an opinion who stated we must allign with the Sunnis and take on the most dangerous Shiites i.e Iran.

 

Which is accurate and correct?  

I think to answer it will take study of Islam that I think is more beyond most in the West will want to do.  The primary is just of safety which is simple and straightforward. 

Spoiler

I am sure I made an accurate statement or two.  These are what I derived from various books and views over the past 15 years.

 

[Wouter]

From the POV of Israel, Hezbollah and Iran and their other Shia allies are dire threats, maybe existential ones. For Europe, the terrorists/radicals are almost always sunni (from various salafist backgrounds) so the view upon that will differ. 

[TheKitttenGuard]

21 minutes ago, Wouter said:

From the POV of Israel, Hezbollah and Iran and their other Shia allies are dire threats, maybe existential ones. For Europe, the terrorists/radicals are almost always sunni (from various salafist backgrounds) so the view upon that will differ. 

Yes, and it is some of the point.  

"The West" view of Islam is how it affects us and our interest.  Our knowledge and concern is really no further than that overall.

At the risk of extreme simplication.

 Islam is attacking the West with small numbers amateurs and semi-professionals terrorist with various levels of technology that make governments to strip rights of its citizens, and harsh crackdown on the Muslim communities.

The West attacks with Professional and High Tech army that can bring great damage to their societies.   They can can replace governments in whole and grant power to a certain part of the religion based on what the West thinks is best for them.

You are sure of the truth with Sufism.  I can with Whabbahism, and Israel can with the Shia.  None of it is of Islam itself it what we are viewing as the greatest danger only to us.  

On this speaking within as a America we sure can make an influence.

[A wilding]

3 hours ago, Wouter said:

There is an uncomfortable truth in that article: in its origin, Islam is a militant religion of conquest and subjugation. Allthough many strands of Islam repress those tendencies to a greater or lesser degree, what it really needs is the kind of thing that happened to (major parts of) Christianity between the Enlightenement, The French Revolution and on until around the Second World War. I don't know what exactly sparked it, but at some point a significant part started to stop taking religious texts literally. It became permissible, even in a church, to say "that text is meant metaphorically". It seems that this is still problematic today, even for moderate islam, and the unpleasant implications of the holy texts have to be tiptoed around.

 

The Thirty Years War was possibly the biggest single factor in that demilitarisation of Christianity. Simplifying, it was a war between Catholics and Protestants that lasted a generation and caused so much horror and destruction as to seriously discredit the idea of spreading a religion by force. Which analogy does not bode well for the Middle East.

 

[Arakan]

1 hour ago, A wilding said:

 

The Thirty Years War was possibly the biggest single factor in that demilitarisation of Christianity. Simplifying, it was a war between Catholics and Protestants that lasted a generation and caused so much horror and destruction as to seriously discredit the idea of spreading a religion by force. Which analogy does not bode well for the Middle East.

 

But it's a good analogy, many differences not withstanding. In 20 years, the history books will see the Iraq War since 2003, the war in Syria, side shows like Yemen, Libya under one narrative. Thank god, Egypt stayed "relatively" calm so far...

EDIT: sorry forget, one overwhelming 

[Larry of the Lawn]

42 minutes ago, Arakan said:

But it's a good analogy, many differences not withstanding. In 20 years, the history books will see the Iraq War since 2003, the war in Syria, side shows like Yemen, Libya under one narrative. Thank god, Egypt stayed "relatively" calm so far...

I find it difficult to believe that the history books will have one narrative.  There will likely be many competing narratives, with biases and blame shifted around the various factions.  

[Wouter]

1 hour ago, A wilding said:

 

The Thirty Years War was possibly the biggest single factor in that demilitarisation of Christianity. Simplifying, it was a war between Catholics and Protestants that lasted a generation and caused so much horror and destruction as to seriously discredit the idea of spreading a religion by force. Which analogy does not bode well for the Middle East.

 

That might indeed be the initial spark. The catholic church nevertheless remained a significant force in my region until roughly the 1960s, but I guess in already a very diluted form compared to the early 17th century. The catholic church has often been "flexible" in its learnings, anyway.

52 minutes ago, Arakan said:

But it's a good analogy, many differences not withstanding. In 20 years, the history books will see the Iraq War since 2003, the war in Syria, side shows like Yemen, Libya under one narrative. Thank god, Egypt stayed "relatively" calm so far...

In an interesting shift, Egypt has had some kind of disagreement with Saudi-Arabia and is now getting closer to Russia and Assad. Trump may also renew US ties, as Obama wasn't a fan of the present regime there.

[Arakan]

19 minutes ago, larrytheimp said:

I find it difficult to believe that the history books will have one narrative.  There will likely be many competing narratives, with biases and blame shifted around the various factions.  

Who spoke about only one narrative? I mentioned one overwhelming narrative. Same as the Thirty Years War, one of the most complex wars in European history. But nowadays simple version: Protestants vs Catholics. 

edit: sorry mate, you were right. Meant to say one overwhelming narrative but forgot the word :/

, 

[Rippounet]

13 hours ago, Altherion said:

This thread has inadvertently become an example of a phenomenon that is pretty widespread across Western countries. Even among people who understand neoliberalism, globalization and the other economic forces, economics is simply not as captivating a topic as Islamic terror. Even if rationally, we know that the latter is not quite as significant a factor in our lives as the former, first or second generation Muslim terrorists murdering our fellow citizens is more compelling. A competent demagogue may be able to parlay this into a significant power grab -- especially in European nations where the refugee crisis is most acute.

I've been thinking about that, especially since I should know better than to get bogged down in discussions about Islam.

I think xenophobia and islamophobia are naturally appealing because of their simplicity. It's easy to create an enemy image of the "other" (whoever the other or the others may be) and relentlessy attack that image, without having to take into account the subtleties of reality. In a way, subtleties cease to matter when you position yourself as defending something abstract. The other must be evil, not just because he is or may become an actual threat, but also because he is different and doesn't share your values.
Which is the second advantage of xenophobia: it helps define what you stand for. Throughout history, whole nations have been built around the opposition to a common enemy. The phenomenon is the same today. In fact, since national identities are being diluted in globalization, it falls to xenophobes to actually redefine such identities and defend borders. Or rather, we abandon the task to them.
Lastly, there's the fact that there is an actual threat in the first place. No one can deny that the West has a serious problem with jihadists and terrorism. It's even difficult to downplay the threat because of the fear of disrespecting the victims.
And yet, of course, in the grand scheme of things, such blind terrorism is utterly irrelevant. Terrorism can only succeed in achieving anything in very specific conditions, which have no chances of being even vaguely met in this century. The only thing ISIS can hope to achieve is to disrupt our societies and our daily life, which in the long run pretty much means nothing. How such disruptions evolve however, will be considerably more important, while the terrorists and their despicable acts themselves will go down in the asheap of history, to keep company with all the pathetic violent morons who preceded them:

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/jan/02/in-the-end-we-forget-the-anarchists-bombers-and-lone-wolves-but-the-hysteria-they-provoke-stays-with-us

Discussing neoliberalism, by contrast, is very difficult. First, one must actually convince others that neoliberalism is an actual problem. This is not evident at all to most people. Quite the contrary, free markets, open borders, small governments, deregulation, less taxes... These are generally viewed as being positive. For any discussion on neoliberalism, one must begin by agreeing on what the problems are, which already requires a significant amount of research.
Then, one must learn how to articulate a criticism of neoliberalism, which is bloody difficult, because it requires so much self-learning and critical thought. I'll daresay I'm highly educated, but knowing how to criticize the current dominant ideology was not part of my education. This is something one has to do on their own, reading "heterodox" economists and complex analyses that rarely make it to the mainstream media.
And of course, it's even worse if anyone asks you what you propose. Articulating the alternatives in a convincing way is hell.
All the while, you have to face a considerable amount of propaganda and slogans that are empty but commonplace. Once you start reading about economics, you realize just how enormous the lies you are being fed on a daily basis are, that -as Warren Buffet said- there is a "class war" being waged by the wealthy, and that the media is very busy making sure the masses don't realize it. That issues like terrorism and immigration are perfect opportunities to both legitimize the establishment and distract your attention from what really matters. Rational discussion on public affairs becomes almost impossible because everyone is focusing on what are really minor issues, while believing stuff like the "trickle-down theory."
And once you've reached the end of the road and understand what's going on, you sound like a godamn conspirationist lunatic. Worst-case scenario, you might be labeled as a terrorist threat by some. Because after all, given the current definition, what are guys like Tyler Durden and Elliot Elderson, if not terrorists?