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In Germany, Syrians find mosques too conservative
- lolc 10y agoPretty harsh to flee from Salafists only to be greeted by them at the local mosque of your new place.
- raverbashing 10y agoAnd the west is full of "naives" (let's keep it at that) that think Salafism = All of Islam and that think we should tolerate foreign financing of mosques, segregationist preachers and other BS coming from any religion
- maehwasu 10y agoRight, the problem is that if Western countries cracked down on foreign financing and illegal/intolerant BS from ALL religions, mosques would represent 90-99% of total institutions/preachers affected. It would be absolutely the right move, it would help moderate Muslims...and the outcry about "Islamophobia" would be off the charts.
- jdavis703 10y agoLet's not forget that Western Christians still send out "missionaries" to other countries to spread their faith. I'm atheist so I have no dog in this fight, but it wouldn't surprise me if such a crackdown were met with a similar one on western powers exporting their religions.
- dogma1138 10y agoChristian missionaries get expelled, put in prison or even ransomed or killed out all the time... Muslim countries don't allow missionaries, China also has a very big problem with them especially Catholic missionaries because the Catholic Church and the Pope would "supersede" the universality of the central government.
- jdavis703 10y agoThey're killed and expelled with good reason. In the past missionaries were political operatives who assisted with the takeover and colonization of areas around the world including African countries and the Americas. Many of these missionaries in China (and other countries like DPRK) that are expelled are expelled because they failed to follow the proper laws around registering themselves (I'm going to veer into personal anecdote here, but I've heard missionaries bragging -- in I'm such a bad ass sense -- about operating underground churches).
- dogma1138 10y agoYou do understand that apolitical religion doesn't exists right? All missionaries are always political, including Muslim ones.
- pessimizer 10y agoWith good cause in many cases. Imported American/Scottish evangelical Christianity has had a terrible effect in many parts of Africa - see Uganda's harsh anti-gay laws (and actions), or the abuse and murder of children accused of being witches in Nigeria.
- tcbawo 10y agoHonest question: how could you prevent foreign financing of religious institutions? What would that look like? That seems like a difficult thing to prevent without affecting charities and 'good' institutions (eg. the Catholic church).
- zo1 10y agoI'm not the OP, but I think doing such a thing would be a bad move. Not all institutions and religious buildings are bad or hot-beds of hatred and intolerance. If you are going that route, you need to specifically target the bad ones, and extract them. However, even that's going to be a case of whack-a-mole, as they'll just go further underground and keep rebuilding. Most people seem to have a problem with radical islam these days. It's the hot debate topic, and seems to be causing quite a stir in both Europe and now America. You could argue that it wouldn't be a problem if you allowed a much smaller amount of immigration. A small enough amount such that hateful individuals from the incoming group don't get a chance to ferment and consolidate power with other like-minded individuals once they arrive. Whether there is an unusual amount of such hateful individuals within a specific incoming group is not at all relevant save for using it in order to determine how much further you have to limit the entry amount in order for their concentration to stay low-enough for the host nation to be safe. Unfortunately, this is a very unpopular opinion. You can't even have a reasonable discussion on the matter with opposing viewpoints without there being controversy and "racism" accusations flying.
- dogma1138 10y agoBecause in the west it did effectively became that, because of funding the majority of mosques, and all the largest ones are Salafist/Wahhabist/MB and funded by Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the rest. The Shia mosques tend also not to be considerably better since they are funded by Iran and Hezbollah but those communities in Europe at least are considerably smaller. For the most part only mosques that are still "OK" in Europe would be Turkish, Albanian and a few others, the problem is that funding and community outreach wise they are overshadowed by the billions that the Saudi's and their merry band provide to their communities. South America on the other hand will have a big problem soon.
- ZanyProgrammer 10y agoAlbanian mosques in Albania or outside Albania? Because they've been in Albania for a very long time :)
- dogma1138 10y agoOutside of Albania of course :)
- tormeh 10y agoHelpfully the low oil price is forcing Saudi Arabia to cut down on a little on the petro-islam.
- imaginenore 10y agoThe west is not full of naives. You simply start asking questions to your regular muslims, and all kinds of crazy answers come out. 52% of British muslims want homosexuality made illegal. 16% of French Muslims support ISIS, 27% among aged 18-24. 31% of Belgian Muslims support ISIS. 47% of Quatar Muslims support ISIS. 37% of young British Muslims want Sharia law in Britain. 36% of young British Muslims think apostates should be killed. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/10/half-of-british-muslims-want-gay-sex-banned-says-poll/ http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/04/10/half-of-british-m... http://europe.newsweek.com/16-french-citizens-support-isis-poll-finds-266795 http://europe.newsweek.com/16-french-citizens-support-isis-p... http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1540895/Young-British-Muslims-getting-more-radical.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1540895/Young-British... These are just a few polls, there are tons more online, and they are all full of crazy crazy numbers. Islam is simply not compatible with the western values, and the left is refusing to acknowledge it.
- pmyjavec 10y agoWhat are western values exactly ? Do they exist anymore ? Westerners are the most naive people on the planet now days, look at the US election, the pretend democracy, the constant bombing of civilians in the Middle East, the pathetic attempts at resolving climate change. Most people just pretend it's not happening. How about corporate tax evasion, what kind of scam is that? Western governments have created these things by destroying the homes of Muslim people so they had to leave, and they believe they have a license to hate the west for the wars started in their homelands. Wars based on lies. Western values are just not what they need to be, gay marriage is far from acceptable in a lot of major western counties. If you know where I can find the book of western values and some good examples where they're being applied right now, I'd love to read it.
- raverbashing 10y agoNice troll. I wonder if it's feigned ignorance (insidiousness) or just plain incapacity of a greater comprehension. All I say it is not surprising
- nickik 10y ago
- wslh 10y agoSo, is there a latent real revolution in Islam?
- the-dude 10y agoI do not think so, but could be wrong. What I think is happening is that migrants who are already living abroad for a while feel a need to emphasize their born-in-to identity to counter the immigrated-into society. And salafists ( Saudi Arabia ) is sponsoring a lot of mosques and thus have a say in the one who preaches there.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- khnd 10y ago> migrants who are already living abroad for a while feel a need to emphasize their born-in-to identity to counter the immigrated-into society This is an important point. Going further, things like Trump brand politics of demonizing outsiders and newcomers fuels this need to emphasize born-in-identity.
- wazoox 10y agoOur dear Saudi friends....
- wfeui3 10y agoSyria was fairly liberal and diverse country before all this started.
- gaius 10y agoAlso check out these old photos of Afghan: http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/06/10/lost-in-time-groovy-afghanistan/ http://www.messynessychic.com/2013/06/10/lost-in-time-groovy...
- jonyt 10y agoReally? I think it's more accurate to say that Syria was a repressive, violent dictatorship before all this started[0]. Since the war started the government has slaughtered more of its citizens than the rebels have. 0 - http://www.refworld.org/docid/4a1fadbcc.html http://www.refworld.org/docid/4a1fadbcc.html
- didgeoridoo 10y agoCountry != Government. Through much of the latter half of the 20th century, Syria, Lebanon, and Jordan were relative beacons of liberalism and diversity. Makes the current catastrophe all the more gut-wrenching.
- jonyt 10y agoRelative to what? Do you have citations for this claim?
- didgeoridoo 10y agoRelative to the far more fundamentalist peoples of Saudi Arabia, Oman, Yemen, UAE, Qatar, Bahrain, and Kuwait. I'm not sure how I could provide a "citation" for a vague and judgment-based claim, other than to encourage you to read up on the history of the region in the 20th century and decide for yourself.
- wfeui3 10y ago
- tormeh 10y agoI have no idea what Saudi Arabia thinks it's doing with salafism, but between them and Russia I feel like governments increasingly are spending money on "soft power", and in increasingly dangerous ways.
- Luc 10y agoTurkey, too, finances mosks and the education of imams in Europe, to keep the flame of nationalist pride burning among Turks who've been here for three or four generations.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- raverbashing 10y agoThis is what bullies do
- GrumpyNl 10y agoPlease inform me about all the good things Islam has brought to us.
- Fifer82 10y agoNothing for many centuries like all other religions. If I had my way, anyone of faith would not be able to use any product of science. Let the lord cure their cancer and reduce waiting lists for those who have a backbone, self-respect and some freewill.
- DanWaterworth 10y agoModern science came out of religion. To believe that they are in direct opposition is unbelievably narrow.
- notgood 10y agoAny proof of that? and not that e.g. part of it grew on religious nations/people despite of religion?
- dorfsmay 10y agoLook into the history of the first universities. And note that I'm a naturalist, I don't care for religions, but you can't pretend they didn't shape our societies.
- rayiner 10y agoScience as we know it is the structured pursuit of knowledge, mostly through organized institutions. In the western tradition, those institutions grew out of the Catholic Church. It was a logical outgrowth--the Church provided a ready-made organizational framework and a profession (the priesthood) whose job it was to sit around and think about things. If you had to point at a profession that comes closest to being what "scientist" grew out of--it'd be the clergy. Galileo studied at the University of Pisa, which was created by Papal edict. He wanted to enter the priesthood when he was young.
- TazeTSchnitzel 10y agoIs this due to the effect where immigrants from a country, and their descendents, end up more conservative than people in the country they came from? You see this in other places too. (American Irish Catholics are more conservative than modern Irish Catholics, for instance.)
- rhizome31 10y agoThis may be one of the factors but not the single factor since, according to the article, Turkish-speaking mosques aren't more conservative.
- woodpanel 10y agoGermany has a weird way of integrating its religious institutions: The state collects taxes for the churches. With muslim guestworkers arriving in the 50's it was clear that theses guests weren't staying for long and subsequently a) muslim religious institutions weren't (for a long time) included in this "state-collects-the-moneys"-Scheme and b) thus it was welcomed that they'd be financed and run by foreign institutions. In the result you typically have mosques that are either exclusive on grounds of ethnicity (eg the mosques run by the turkish state)* or inclusive on grounds of the interpretation of islam (sadly the Saudi funded radicalist ones are very inclusive). * since interpretation often is a cause of dispute within regions you can have more inclusive interpretations like the Alavites that are usually ethnically homogenic.
- gerbal 10y agoAn Official Germany Islam like there is an Official German Lutheranism would be a great help in Germans feel safer with Muslims. I'm surprised the German Government has allowed German Islam to be effectively controlled by the Turkish Government for as long as it has. (Though I guess Turkey wasn't all that concerning until the Erogan era)
- woodpanel 10y agoAbsolutely. But that includes the German National Concept incorporating Islam as on par with Christianity and Non-Religiousness. And since discussing "German National Concept" has been a taboo since 1945 (more or less) the developments in this regard are premature to say the least. That a foreign nation runs Churches in a sovereign state is really laughable. It's of course always a means of political influence and thus what Saudi Arabia and Turkey does is directly comparable to what the Catholic Church did until the "Papal States" were dissolved.
- throw2016 10y agoIsn't it strange that the West's so called best friend in the middle east is by far the most regressive and primitive regime in the region that is allowed to willy nilly spread terrorist idealogy for 30 years. Western governments, media and institutions then rant and rave against human rights but tip toe around the Saudis and instead dismantle other regimes in the region inimical to the Saudis throwing millions of lives in the middle east into chaos and leaving gaping power vacuums for extremists to fill. And then simultenously spend billions of dollars building surveillance states at home making a mockery of our own commitment to democracy to deal with the fallout of the Saudi financed spread of wahhabism. There is something extremely rotten at work here unless one supposes our foreign policy apparatus is naive.
- jacquesm 10y agoIt's not so strange. Hint: Oil.
- nickik 10y agoWe really need that Syrian Oil ... Oil is a terrible explaition for most of whats going on. Oil serves as a backdrop why the US originally got in the region. However, you can explain nothing that happens short term by pointing to oil.
- pmyjavec 10y agoSadly, it's because we're all fed nonsense and propaganda, constantly by our governments, corporations and media outlets. People are way to entertained and comfortable that it's just all too convenient to ignore. Even people's social media feeds can be tweaked to change people's views enmasse,not saying they are, but it's a real possibility. I stopped reading "The Guardian", Facebook and most main stream media sites and my mental health is much better for it. There is a serious war going on in which innocent civillians are dying and we don't actually, fully understand why, but it's being funded with our tax money. We need to wake up. I honestly believe the current implementation / configuration of western democracy in the west has been failing us for far too long, the system needs a major overhaul.
- cagataygurturk 10y agoTurkish government does not finance mosques in Germany, even they do not finance them in Turkey. Mosques are built by donation money.
- woodpanel 10y agoMeh... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish-Islamic_Union_for_Religious_Affairs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkish-Islamic_Union_for_Reli... Ditib runs almost all trukish-speaking mosques in Germany. (But those are probably not the mosques the Syrians were complaining about)
- dibstern 10y agoIn other words, he's 100% wrong.
- tanto 10y agoThats not correct. Some are but the turkish government is paying a lot of the imams teaching there. See here: http://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2016-04/moschee-deutschland-tuerkei-imame http://www.zeit.de/politik/deutschland/2016-04/moschee-deuts... Although its a germany article. As I also have some of religious friends which are working for donation financed mosques I know for sure that some mosques are financed by the turkish government.
- eveningcoffee 10y ago“Weakness and ignorance are not barriers to survival, but arrogance is.” ― Liu Cixin, Death's End
- dibstern 10y agoDisagree. Counterexample: looking down the barrel of a gun "I wonder what this trigger thing does..." That quote is far too easy to find counterexamples for, because ignorance does indeed harm. There's a reason we have Darwin awards.
- eveningcoffee 10y agoLiu Cixin was talking about the survival of the humankind in the galactic context, but it possibly could be limited to a single localized culture on earth. From this perspective the example you gave does only good for the survival of the whole.
- Kenji 10y agoIt is ironic how Germany represses fascism that comes in the form of Nazism, but not fascism that comes from Islamic fundamentalism. A clear double standard.
- vikiomega9 10y agoWould I be wrong in saying the US government sponsors in a similar fashion Christian missionaries albeit tacitly?
- mzw_mzw 10y agoYes, you would be wrong in saying that. Really, where would that idea even come from?
- vikiomega9 10y agoFrom an article like this[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith-based_foreign_aid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith-based_foreign_aid
- mzw_mzw 10y ago"The neutrality of this article is disputed." Man, no kidding. And there's an enormous difference between supporting an aid organization that is religiously based, and opening actual mosques and employing imams.
- gaius 10y agoYes, because there are no Western-financed Christian missionaries operating in Saudi Arabia.
- vikiomega9 10y agoRight, but what about some part of the third-world?[1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith-based_foreign_aid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Faith-based_foreign_aid
- mcguire 10y agoThen, there was the weird day when I learned that a local Baptist church was sponsoring a missionary expedition to darkest Rio de Janeiro, in order to introduce Christianity to the heathen Catholics. No, literally. I am not joking. This is not a metaphor.
- dominotw 10y agoThis is true in America too. Most of mosques here were setup here by people who immigrated here in the 70's and their ideologies never went through the reforms that happened elsewhere even in countries like Pakistan. Middle-class Pakistani parents here are more fundamentalist and repressive than say Pakistani middle-class parents .
- selimthegrim 10y agoIf I could upvote this a million times I would.
- dep_b 10y agoYou see the same with immigrants in Europe. (descendants of) Turkish and Moroccan immigrants are more fundamentalist and repressive than in those countries. This is because a lot of people are explicitly trying to not fit in with Western values that are frowned upon, while in their native countries nobody feels that pressure. "We" always assumed they would eventually adapt to our lifestyle within a few generations but the opposite is actually happening. There is no clear reason why this is specifically happening with them and not to earlier waves of immigrants like Spanish, Italians or Greeks. But also the Islamic world as a whole was much more modern 40 years ago. Photos of pretty girls in mini skirts in Kabul or Teheran really look alien now.
- dominotw 10y ago> Photos of pretty girls in mini skirts in Kabul or Teheran really look alien now. I would argue that it was alien even back then. The pictures often see are Shah's elites not common people of Iran by any means, they were still mostly conservative Muslim. Forced westernization and humiliation of muslims was one of the reasons Shah was kicked out.