How to defeat ISIL

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tomclarke
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by tomclarke »

Biology can only go so far. Maybe it can program a fear of snakes - but if you think about how DNA influences brain development it is very difficult to build in specifics based on vision. Maybe fear of snakes is learnt.
Weak evidence for its being in primates innate:

http://whyevolutionistrue.wordpress.com ... of-snakes/

Whereas innate dislike of certain tastes (bitterness) is easy. It can go directly from the relevant receptors. Note that with learning we manage to reverse even that one.

The point about prejudice is that it can be anything. And can be right or wrong. It is not a safe basis for decisions.
Diogenes wrote:
tomclarke wrote:Indeed. Your morality is not mine, and would correspond to what I've called prejudice.


Prejudice is a survival trait. It's just nowadays regarded as bad because of past abuses.


If you are walking along and you see you are about to step across a snake, what do you do?


Do you assume it's venomous or not?



Being Non-Prejudiced will get you killed a sufficient percentage of the time to make the survivors naturally prejudiced through the consequences of evolution.

GIThruster
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by GIThruster »

"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis

tomclarke
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by tomclarke »

This raised some fuss when it was first proposed, some time ago. Personally I am strongly against what it seems to be saying.

What was said at the time is that there is no way there would be any change in the law - so inheritance rights etc under british law could not change. The "advice" is about being sensitive when all parties want to implement Sharia Law as often happens. And indeed it is entirely fair to let people dispose of their property as they wish as long as it does not conflict with the Law here - that provides protections enough.

Diogenes
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Diogenes »

tomclarke wrote:
This raised some fuss when it was first proposed, some time ago. Personally I am strongly against what it seems to be saying.

What was said at the time is that there is no way there would be any change in the law - so inheritance rights etc under british law could not change. The "advice" is about being sensitive when all parties want to implement Sharia Law as often happens. And indeed it is entirely fair to let people dispose of their property as they wish as long as it does not conflict with the Law here - that provides protections enough.


So when a Woman "consents" to being abused under Sharia law, British Law is going to allow it because she "Consented"?


I'm not sure you grasp the "voluntary" nature of this business.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Stubby
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Stubby »

Everything is bullshit unless proven otherwise. -A.C. Beddoe

tomclarke
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by tomclarke »

Diogenes wrote:
tomclarke wrote:
This raised some fuss when it was first proposed, some time ago. Personally I am strongly against what it seems to be saying.

What was said at the time is that there is no way there would be any change in the law - so inheritance rights etc under british law could not change. The "advice" is about being sensitive when all parties want to implement Sharia Law as often happens. And indeed it is entirely fair to let people dispose of their property as they wish as long as it does not conflict with the Law here - that provides protections enough.


So when a Woman "consents" to being abused under Sharia law, British Law is going to allow it because she "Consented"?


I'm not sure you grasp the "voluntary" nature of this business.
That is more or less true. Except that abuse is tightly defined, and against the law. If a woman consents to not getting an inheritance then probably the law will not force her to contest it.

I have friends who are devout Muslims, and have heard the arguments, for example, from enlightened women who choose to wear a veil. Personally I find even that symbolically unfortunate: the idea that women feel safer covered up comes with a whole patriarchal mindset that I strongly don't like. It goes with a male defence to rape of "she was dressed provocatively so I know she really wanted it even though she said no". But the one thing that we cannot helpfully do is tell others that their fears (at whatever level) are groundless. Who am I to tell Muslim women it is wrong to wear a veil? Might as well tell a nun she should dress in a mini-skirt.

When it comes to other aspects of a nomadic patriarchal set of social values I am even more strongly and implacable against them. As are many Muslim women in this country. The real problem is where we have ghettos from a specific country with no integration, effectively taking their culture and keeping it here. FGM (not Muslim), childhood exorcism (not Muslim), arranged marriage at a young age, or any age without full consent (many cultures and religions), institutionalised male violence and control (almost any culture). I'm not denying that Sharia Law embodies these things as practiced in cultures that have them. Christianity backed women being treated as slaves for many centuries in this country and still does in some. In all of its forms Sharia Law, like Christianity, asserts the essential spiritual difference between men and women - which I think is wrong. Typical differences are obvious, institutionalising that as an essential difference is over-generalisation and harmful.

My point is that I'll fight the evil social aspects of how Sharia Law is practiced anywhere. I'll argue philosophically that Sharia Law however interpreted is in principle wrong, as I will the power issues in Christianity between men and women (less codified than Sharia, but no less powerful). Men treating women appallingly happens throughout the world and is not specifically Muslim - making out that it is my be comfortable, but is untrue and also, practically, deeply unhelpful for Muslim women. I'd say as a religion Islam is a few hundred years behind Christianity in its "average" social enlightenment. Both religions vary enormously and today have enlightened forms, and abusive forms. For Christians not to see the historic and current kinship is hypocrisy. For Christians to say "the abuses are not true Christianity" is true but unhelpful. The same can be said of all religions and the abuses still happen.

MSimon
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by MSimon »

Diogenes wrote:So when a Woman "consents" to being abused under Sharia law, British Law is going to allow it because she "Consented"?

I'm not sure you grasp the "voluntary" nature of this business.
Where government is concerned the idea of "voluntary" is always a question. So are you at liberty to do things that others consider against your interest? That in fact was the Jeffersonian ideal. Not in all respects. But generally.

And when the minority you once wished to abuse - with quite a bit of success I might add - becomes instead a favored group? Dangerous times until the machinery you built to go after that minority is dismantled.

You can see it at the end of Alcohol Prohibition. Harry Anslinger - a former prohibition agent - was looking for a new job. Some one else to target since those he formerly targeted were now legal. And he found them. Mexicans. Well not Mexicans directly. Just one of their bad habits. He was going to stamp it out. And the plants too.

U.S. government to grow 30 times more marijuana this year

Can government enforce culture? A very old question. Only when enforcement requires minimal effort. i.e. 99.9% are supporters or acquiesce. Once strong dissent numbers 1% It becomes difficult. At 5% impossible.

When Orthodox Judaism became such a minority Beth Din (Jewish Courts) were instituted in America so that Jewish law could be enforced among agreeable parties in circumscribed areas. I expect Sharia law will be given similar respect - eventually.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beth_din
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.

GIThruster
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by GIThruster »

tomclarke wrote:For Christians to say "the abuses are not true Christianity" is true but unhelpful. The same can be said of all religions and the abuses still happen.
This is not true, Tom. This is just more of your childish atheistic rhetoric. Anyone who studies the women's suffrage movement can plainly see it is a uniquely Christian movement, that has its roots in the Bible and historic Christian teaching, and arose spontaneously in Christian cultures ONLY. Furthermore, there has NEVER been any other religion that resulted in women's rights like what we see today. Not a single one of the hundreds of different types of goddess worship found around the world ever accorded women the egalitarian status suffrage--from the BIBLE--has resulted in. So saying the same can be said of all religions is a complete falsehood that could not be farther from the truth, and saying Christianity is responsible for sexism when in fact it puts an end to sexism is just more cheezy atheist bullshit.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis

Teahive
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Teahive »

If Christianity "puts an end to sexism" why didn't it do so for the better part of two millennia?

choff
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by choff »

There are those who believe the women's suffrage movement had a very dark side to it, and modern feminism has successfully engaged in revisionist history.

https://www.youtube.com/user/girlwriteswhat
CHoff

MSimon
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by MSimon »

GIThruster wrote:Anyone who studies the women's suffrage movement can plainly see it is a uniquely Christian movement, that has its roots in the Bible and historic Christian teaching, and arose spontaneously in Christian cultures ONLY.
Well actually it was the rise of power, energy, and electricity that gave the suffragettes what they wanted. And now that women have the vote socialism has a built in constituency. Women no longer have to rely on an unreliable man for sustaining her and her offspring. The government is quite glad to replace him. For the votes.

You will note that the Democrats are the woman's party and the Republican's are the man's. Generally.

I'm glad you think it is a good thing.
Engineering is the art of making what you want from what you can get at a profit.

GIThruster
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by GIThruster »

Teahive wrote:If Christianity "puts an end to sexism" why didn't it do so for the better part of two millennia?
Yes, it's astonishing we've come so far in so short a period of time. I would never have guessed such change were possible in less than 5,000 years, given our past.
"Courage is not just a virtue, but the form of every virtue at the testing point." C. S. Lewis

Diogenes
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Diogenes »

tomclarke wrote:
Diogenes wrote:

So when a Woman "consents" to being abused under Sharia law, British Law is going to allow it because she "Consented"?


I'm not sure you grasp the "voluntary" nature of this business.
That is more or less true. Except that abuse is tightly defined, and against the law. If a woman consents to not getting an inheritance then probably the law will not force her to contest it.

I have friends who are devout Muslims, and have heard the arguments, for example, from enlightened women who choose to wear a veil. Personally I find even that symbolically unfortunate: the idea that women feel safer covered up comes with a whole patriarchal mindset that I strongly don't like. It goes with a male defence to rape of "she was dressed provocatively so I know she really wanted it even though she said no". But the one thing that we cannot helpfully do is tell others that their fears (at whatever level) are groundless. Who am I to tell Muslim women it is wrong to wear a veil? Might as well tell a nun she should dress in a mini-skirt.


I am starting to view Muslim accoutrements in much the manner I would view Nazi Armbands. Saying that we should have no objections to people wearing such stuff is to miss the point entirely. That they CHOSE to wear such stuff marks them as a dangerous entity in our midst.


I am being persuaded that Islam can no more be tolerated than Nazism; That it is incompatible with my comprehension of civilization. Yes, I suppose this would make for an awkward position for someone with Muslim friends, but i'm not sure how you can square that circle. If we have learned anything from Rotterham it ought to be that some people are willing to polite themselves to death.




tomclarke wrote:
My point is that I'll fight the evil social aspects of how Sharia Law is practiced anywhere. I'll argue philosophically that Sharia Law however interpreted is in principle wrong, as I will the power issues in Christianity between men and women (less codified than Sharia, but no less powerful). Men treating women appallingly happens throughout the world and is not specifically Muslim - making out that it is my be comfortable, but is untrue and also, practically, deeply unhelpful for Muslim women. I'd say as a religion Islam is a few hundred years behind Christianity in its "average" social enlightenment. Both religions vary enormously and today have enlightened forms, and abusive forms. For Christians not to see the historic and current kinship is hypocrisy. For Christians to say "the abuses are not true Christianity" is true but unhelpful. The same can be said of all religions and the abuses still happen.

You argue that Islam will "evolve." I do not believe this. I believe that much of it's strength comes from the fact that it will NOT evolve, because Allah is eternal. He doesn't change his mind, and if he says it's your duty to kill infidels, then it is you duty to kill infidels.


What you postulate is a form of Islam that ignores what is in the Koran, but that would not really be Islam, now would it? It would be some form of faux Islam, and it would eventually be attacked mercilessly by adherents of the real thing.


Indeed, what ISIS is doing now, is in compliance with Islam. The Prophet Mohammad did the very same himself.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Diogenes
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Diogenes »

MSimon wrote:Alcohol Prohibition.


You start talking about this stuff, and my eyes glaze over and my mind just goes to sleep. Like I said, Sermons have that effect on me.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

Diogenes
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Re: How to defeat ISIL

Post by Diogenes »

GIThruster wrote:
tomclarke wrote:For Christians to say "the abuses are not true Christianity" is true but unhelpful. The same can be said of all religions and the abuses still happen.
This is not true, Tom. This is just more of your childish atheistic rhetoric. Anyone who studies the women's suffrage movement can plainly see it is a uniquely Christian movement, that has its roots in the Bible and historic Christian teaching, and arose spontaneously in Christian cultures ONLY. Furthermore, there has NEVER been any other religion that resulted in women's rights like what we see today. Not a single one of the hundreds of different types of goddess worship found around the world ever accorded women the egalitarian status suffrage--from the BIBLE--has resulted in. So saying the same can be said of all religions is a complete falsehood that could not be farther from the truth, and saying Christianity is responsible for sexism when in fact it puts an end to sexism is just more cheezy atheist bullshit.


I was going to mention this myself in my previous post, but I am trying to keep my messages shorter.


That equality for women stuff? That is pretty much an outgrowth of that Christian "We are all equal as Children of God" doctrine which also abolished slavery, and for the same reason. Other religions don't teach equality. (especial Male/Female equality) They teach the exact opposite; that there is an unbroken chain of Male Authority all the way up to God, who is also Male.


This is another example of what I mean when I say that modern Atheists are contaminated with Christian Doctrine, and they don't even realize it.
‘What all the wise men promised has not happened, and what all the damned fools said would happen has come to pass.’
— Lord Melbourne —

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