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I think critiques of American bumbkins is an American tradition. Hawthorne to Twain to Mencken to etc. It is the American organism hashing itself. It is heal
by iiii_iivii_iiii 10y ago
I think critiques of American bumbkins is an American tradition. Hawthorne to Twain to Mencken to etc. It is the American organism hashing itself. It is healthy and has helped to make this country what it is. However there is a dangerous trend today to severely ignore the lack of this in other nations whose own bumbkins self-immolate while those who could be Twains or Asimovs are immolated. But hey, say what you want about about everyone if it makes you feel good.
- madengr 10y agoI think it's more that the Left in America won't criticize Islam.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Cyph0n 10y agoWas it Islam that got the current president into office?
- sabertoothed 10y agoIslam is not the predominant problem in the US. Really not. Nearly half of US Americans don't believe in evolution. Christian fundamentalism causes much more harm at the moment than islamists.
- iiii_iivii_iiii 10y agoChristian "fundamentalism" is quite benign in this country. Aside from the issue of abortion and perhaps stem cell research can you list some travesties caused by Christianity in America? The fastest growing religion is non religion.
- danhak 10y agoSending gay youth to psychologically damaging "conversion therapy" camps. Actively campaigning against the rights of gay individuals to marry or raise children. Physically abusing, disowning or abandoning gay children. There's a reason LGBT youth are 4x as likely to be homeless as their straight peers.
- dgellow 10y agoWait. Actively participating in a democratic process to support you opinions is a bad thing? edit: I will clarify. I was reacting to "Actively campaigning against the rights of gay individuals to marry or raise children". I'm for gay marriage. I'm also for allowing other people to campaign against my opinions.
- kevingadd 10y agoIt's weird how people can't agree on whether torturing teens or banning people from using bathrooms is an 'opinion', especially since doing those things has literally no upside for anyone, and it's 'solving' problems that don't exist.
- dgellow 10y agoSeems to be the definition of what an opinion is. A personal view on a given topic.
- mtberatwork 10y agoWhen the consequences of an opinion directly infringes on a person's civil rights, then yes.
- bmelton 10y agoThe consequences of such opinions almost always directly infringe on a person's civil rights in today's America. Increasing access to health care by raising taxes infringes upon economic freedom. Implementing gun control infringes the 2nd amendment. Keeping us safe from terrorists infringes on our fourth amendment rights. We have, for at least the past few decades, opted to largely ignore certain types of civil liberties, and just about every American is willing to infringe someone else's liberties to get something out of the democratic process that they care more about. I agree that gay marriage is good, and doesn't hurt anyone, and that so long as marriage is an institution, every American who wants to partake in it should be allowed to, whether gay, straight, trans or whatever -- but let's not pretend that the infringement of civil liberties at the ballot box is a trait unique or peculiar to those voting against gay marriage.
- dgellow 10y agoThat's not what said the parent comment. Both religions have their (different set of) problems. But see how it goes when you criticize Islam. Criticize any other religion and you're fine, criticize Islam and you get a fatwa against you and become a racist xenophobic islamophobe.
- kevingadd 10y agoThis simply isn't accurate unless you live in an oppressive middle-east country with extremist Sharia law. Incidentally, some of those governments are in power because of coups and/or unrest triggered by western nations for our own purposes. Obviously there's no western equivalent to ISIS at present, but arguably that's because of the unique instability that exists in the middle east, partly as a result of western intervention. ISIS wouldn't exist unless we helped create it. If you look hard enough you can certainly find christian evangelical leaders who will call for the destruction of people who attack their faith. It's simply not normal and doesn't represent the vast majority of believers.
- dgellow 10y ago> This simply isn't accurate unless you live in an oppressive middle-east country with extremist Sharia law You don't have to live in a country under Sharia laws to get a fatwa against you. I mean, check this short list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatwas#Fatwas_promoting_violence_against_a_particular_individual https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fatwas#Fatwas_promotin... For the rest of your post, I'm not sure to see how it's a response to my comment.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- jsmith0295 10y agoEven if that were the case, that doesn't make it a good idea to align yourselves with Islamists as many on the left have.
- kevingadd 10y agoWhy not?
- jsmith0295 10y agoIt's a totalitarian ideology which is fundamentally opposed to liberal democracy. It shouldn't be tolerated for the same reasons Nazism shouldn't be tolerated.
- jcranmer 10y ago200 years ago, people said the exact same thing about Catholicism.
- pjc50 10y agoYou absolutely have to distinguish between Islam and Islamism, just like people need to distinguish between Zionism and simply being Jewish. Or for that matter between the various forms of Christianity and their levels of political involvement. People have a right to religious beliefs. They do not - must not - have the right to turn that into a legal enforcement of those beliefs on people who do not share them.
- jsmith0295 10y agoYeah, I should've been more clear, but that is what I was talking about.
- madengr 10y agoI agree, but the parent thread was about "other nations". Islam is the fastest growing religion in the world. The fact that any religion is growing is worrisome, but Islam is probably the worst.
- autokad 10y ago300 million people believing in creationism is far less harmful than 1 person dropping bombs at a marathon. i believe in evolution, but you need to get over the idea there is some kind of innate golden age waiting to happen if only those annoying chiristains would believe in evolution. unless you are a biologist, believing in creationism has no impact on your life or how you do your job. i dont care if my brain surgeon believes in creationism. you know what i care about? how well they do brain surgery.
- adrianN 10y agoI'd argue that creationism is more dangerous, because it instills a general distrust in science. This leads to leaders who can openly claim that global warming is a Chinese hoax. Global warming will most likely kill several orders of magnitude more people than all Islamic terrorists taken together.
- swah 10y agoOne can trust science, but not scientists as if they're some special beings above corruption and what else.
- tobltobs 10y agobut then why this fixation on Islam and not on the heroin epidemic or mass shootings?
- supergreg 10y agoEasier to deal with a "them vs us" than an "us vs some of us"
- sabertoothed 10y agoEvolution was just an example to illustrate how far religious superstition reaches. Disbelief in science in general has a massive impact - causing deaths. Even disbelief in evolution causes deaths, e.g. if we don't do enough to deal with antibiotic resistance.
- ZeroGravitas 10y agoThey won't even use the phrase "radical Islamic terrorism" just because experts, including Trump's National Security Advisor, think it's damaging to American interests to do so.
- CalRobert 10y agoSome organizations prefer to avoid even the word "terrorist" because it can be interpreted in wildly different ways, is massively emotionally loaded, and does little if anything to add understanding to the conversation. It's also a lot harder to try to understand your opponent's motivations (which is critical to reaching a solution) when you say "radical Islamist terrorist" instead of "person or group who did X because they want Y". http://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/guidance/terrorism-language/guidance-full http://www.bbc.co.uk/editorialguidelines/guidance/terrorism-... Just saying "horrible jerks who do really rotten things for a variety of motivations" might be more effective in helping people ascertain risk. After all, Volkswagen put a dangerous agent in the atmosphere that will kill thousands of people - are they "terrorists"? Exxon-Mobil knew their business was likely to result in the displacement and deaths of anywhere from thousands to millions of people, are they terrorists? Millions of voters have installed a leader in the US who advocates bombing innocent families, many of them guided by their religious beliefs. Are those voters "terrorists"?
- chronicx0 10y agoThe only "terrorist" is Bernie Sanders.
- gmac 10y agoJust saying "horrible jerks who do really rotten things for a variety of motivations" might be more effective in helping people ascertain risk. YES. (OT, this was one of the things I most appreciated about Star Trek: Into Darkness — Cumberbatch's character sets off a large and destructive bomb in a government building, with much loss of life, and is then pointedly referred to throughout simply as a criminal. A heinous criminal, certainly, who must be dealt with — but a simple criminal nonetheless).
- CalRobert 10y agoMaybe because it makes more sense to criticize actions than belief systems, many of which have profoundly varying styles and degrees of observation. Plenty of folks on the left (and right) criticize oppression, superstition, and the like. Plenty of folks in all camps are guilty of same. Like Christianity, or any other major religion, adherents of Islam vary massively in how they choose to practice (if at all).
- jsmith0295 10y agoThe two are not mutually exclusive. Belief systems influence actions. Obviously it makes sense to call out the Neo Nazis within the Trump movement, so why wouldnt it make sense to criticize ideas which are effectively fascist held by a much larger number of Muslims, even those who have immigrated to western democracies.
- CalRobert 10y agoBecause they're Neo Nazis. Not Neo Christians. I criticize the fascist beliefs of many of my countrymen but it has nothing to do with their religion. Please, hang out with some Muslims. They're just regular folks like anyone else. If more people in the US understood this it would help a lot. It might also show the problems with targeting "Radical Islamic Terrorism" when it could also be "Radical Crime Committed by People With Various Motivations and Worldviews Many of Whom Hail From a Region With a Troubled Past, the Causes of Which are Myriad and Require Some Study of Post WWI Imperial Policy Among Other Things"
- kevingadd 10y agoA significant portion of terror attacks in the united states are committed by non-muslims, mostly white and christian. Why won't the Right in America criticize Radical Evangelical Terror? (This is a rhetorical question. It's not fair to blame clearly unhinged extremists on a religion at-large when billions of devotees do no harm.)
- rimliu 10y agoSometimes silent support acts as enabler to those doing the harm. Alas, views of the majority of muslims are not encouraging (i.e. views on issues whether sharia should be the law of the country, should apostasy be punished by death, etc.)
- huxley 10y agoAsk very religious Americans if they think the laws of America should be more driven by Biblical principles, it isn't any different. Besides, religious courts already exist in the US. For example, Halakha are religious courts run for Orthodox Jews, they exist in America and make many decisions on family law and civil disputes. But even among bigger groups, lots of disputes are dealt with within the religious community, Catholics have 200 diocesan tribunals, if you want to end your marriage and stay in communion, you pretty much have to ask for an annulment at a diocesan tribunal. Lots more examples: http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/08/applying-gods-law-religious-courts-and-mediation-in-the-us/ http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/08/applying-gods-law-religio...
- rimliu 10y agoInteresting, I did not know about other religious courts. What I had in mind however was the opinion that Sharia should replace the country's court system.
- jbmorgado 10y ago> "Why won't the Right in America criticize Radical Evangelical Terror" Because that doesn't actually exist and it's just a faux and very poor argument. If you are intellectually honest you would understand there is a big diference between someone from a certain group (may it be christian, muslim, etc) just committing a crime as an individual and someone from a certain group committing a crime invoking principles that derive from belonging to that group (like their religious supremacy for instance). In that regard, yes, there are a lot more islamic attacks than there are christian attacks. We had one single attack in Europe that could (emphasis on could since the guy was by foremost an extreme right winger and not some christian fanatic) be connected to christian ideologies in the past decades (by Anders Behring Breivik, which did in fact kill a lot of innocent people)... but now go and check how many terrorist attacks you have connected to islamic ideologies.
- dang 10y agoReligious flamewar is not welcome on Hacker News, and we regularly ban accounts that conduct it here. Political flamewar isn't welcome either, and you managed to combine the two in a toxic cocktail. All: please keep this poison away from here. If this is the kind of argument you need to have, this is not the website you're looking for.
- pdimitar 10y agoI am in full agreement with you, but I still feel surprised by the amounts of replies that person got. Seems like people love to argue pointless negativity even if the "argument" it makes has zero roots in reality. That's extremely sad. :(
- dang 10y agoIt's human nature, so we can't change these effects, just maybe interpret them as damage and route around them a bit.
- pdimitar 10y agoMy observation as well. It seems that the idea of "don't make stupid people famous" will never work. Shame.
- iiii_iivii_iiii 10y agoI don't know what that person posted but if you're referring to my post above as pointless negativity I just don't know what to think.
- pdimitar 10y agoNo, wasn't directed at you, but at a heavily downvoted (and subsequently flagged) comment which was a very obvious troll and flame bait.
- iiii_iivii_iiii 10y agoPeople aren't allowed to comment on religion at all? Unless it's a positive comment that entices no debate? A discussion of religion is relevant to the article. I'm getting an icky feeling that if my post was directed at any other religion than Islam there wouldn't be an issue.
- dang 10y agoThe reflection on American intellectual history in this comment is welcome. Its trollish and uncivil aspects are not. Please edit those out if you're going to keep commenting here.
- iiii_iivii_iiii 10y agoWait, what part was trollish? Last sentence?