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Not sure how to respond here. Are you implying that people don't kill civilians for geopolitical goals? Like how Putin is doing now? Or that suicide bombers are

Not sure how to respond here. Are you implying that people don't kill civilians for geopolitical goals? Like how Putin is doing now? Or that suicide bombers are a religious thing? Kamikaze Fighters? The assassination of Alexander II? I'm not saying religion isn't a tool for executing these goals, but the orchestrators have always been acting under geopolitical goals.

javajosh 5y ago
Your comment is a combination of strawmanning and shifting the goal posts, and doesn't deserve a serious response. It does merit a question. What motivates you to resist the simple truth that Islamists hate and wish to kill Westerners for breaking their holy law (the same behaviors we call "freedom"), admire martyrs who suicide themselves into civilians for this purpose? Do you think an Islamist would disagree with any of that? If so, why?
- setr 5y ago
  I believe GP and you are talking about two different actors; the individual committing the final act, and the individual rallying others to the cause. The soldier does not have a larger strategy in mind; he kills for simple and extreme reasons. The government however is rarely so naive, and initiates their wars with much larger goals in mind. Even with a dictator, they represent the filtered understanding of many advisors, and balance the many goals of the group (so almost by definition, they cannot sustain a singular goal with singular purpose for long). The individual just needs one reason to do what he does, which might be as simple as “his boss told him to”.
- nemothekid 5y ago
  >What motivates you to resist the simple truth that Islamists hate and wish to kill Westerners for breaking their holy law Because it's a ridiculous premise that you would not apply to any other religion. It's not even a consistent view of Islam; you don't have Islamists in Malaysia (60% islamic) or Turkey (99% Islam) holding the same sort of contempt with to West. Consider it this way, if a Russian came to you and said "the Ukrainians hate Russians because they are full of Nazis and they hate how Stalin purged Germany of Nazis" you would quickly realize that is ridiculous notion - Ukrainians are currently being bombed by Russian soldiers which fuels their animosity. The West has largely done the same in the middle east, and not understanding this history leads you down to conclusion that they must hate the West because of Islam. I don't know how you could look at an entire group of people who have been practically waging a war for sovereignty against a incredibly more powerful adversary for almost _60 years_ and come away that their wish to kill westerners comes from breaking their holy law. Yeah, you can pretend Islam is a tiny part of it, but I think a larger part of that hate is having their government overthrown and then having their children blown up in an air strike.
  - javajosh 5y ago
    >Because it's a ridiculous premise that you would not apply to any other religion. I explicitly said in my initial comment that the slogan "They hate us for our freedom" applies to any fanatic of any religion. You are misrepresenting me, and are drifting further away from a specific point around what motivated the 9/11 attackers. Perhaps you are confused by the difference between Islam[0] and Islamism[1]? 0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamism
    - nemothekid 5y ago
      I’m not misrepresenting you. You are just continually ignoring the history in these regions. I don’t think any religion supports your point. “Religious fanatics” are a convenient boogeyman to justify war and aggression. These terrorists don’t exist because of some holy war, they exist because they were caught in the middle of a proxy war between two super powers and witnessed their schools blow up. People today are vehemently anti-China because of censorship in video games, but somehow it’s a leap of faith that people can be anti-West after their home is targeted in an air raid and we must turn to “religious fanatics”. If China dropped a bomb on your parents home over some mineral rights, don’t you think you would become a little anti-Chinese? What would you think if those Chinese turned around and called you fundamentalist Christian when you voiced those complaints? If you buy that fact that the Middle East sustained aggression for over 50 years because of “religious fanactism” then you must also believe Putin’s line of reasoning that Zelensky is a nazi because it’s the same kind of propaganda
      - markoman 5y ago
        The "They hate us for our freedom" line was merely a hamfisted attempt on G. W. Bush's part to pander to disciples of 'American exceptionalism' while his search for WMD had foundered & we faced the disgust of the world. I'm not sure that the phrase is even in opposition to God's Law since Bush surely believed that America was subject to God's Law (albeit a different one), yet surely didn't think that American Freedom would suffer for (being subject to His Law). Indeed, while the American Right now enjoys a resurgence nationally and works to roll back LGBTQ and abortion rights in favor of what they deem God would proscribe, they surely won't think that we are any less 'free'. And that is the largest point -- that freedom needs quotes, since its purely subjective.

javajosh 5y ago

Your comment is a combination of strawmanning and shifting the goal posts, and doesn't deserve a serious response. It does merit a question. What motivates you to resist the simple truth that Islamists hate and wish to kill Westerners for breaking their holy law (the same behaviors we call "freedom"), admire martyrs who suicide themselves into civilians for this purpose? Do you think an Islamist would disagree with any of that? If so, why?

setr 5y ago
I believe GP and you are talking about two different actors; the individual committing the final act, and the individual rallying others to the cause. The soldier does not have a larger strategy in mind; he kills for simple and extreme reasons. The government however is rarely so naive, and initiates their wars with much larger goals in mind. Even with a dictator, they represent the filtered understanding of many advisors, and balance the many goals of the group (so almost by definition, they cannot sustain a singular goal with singular purpose for long). The individual just needs one reason to do what he does, which might be as simple as “his boss told him to”.
nemothekid 5y ago
>What motivates you to resist the simple truth that Islamists hate and wish to kill Westerners for breaking their holy law Because it's a ridiculous premise that you would not apply to any other religion. It's not even a consistent view of Islam; you don't have Islamists in Malaysia (60% islamic) or Turkey (99% Islam) holding the same sort of contempt with to West. Consider it this way, if a Russian came to you and said "the Ukrainians hate Russians because they are full of Nazis and they hate how Stalin purged Germany of Nazis" you would quickly realize that is ridiculous notion - Ukrainians are currently being bombed by Russian soldiers which fuels their animosity. The West has largely done the same in the middle east, and not understanding this history leads you down to conclusion that they must hate the West because of Islam. I don't know how you could look at an entire group of people who have been practically waging a war for sovereignty against a incredibly more powerful adversary for almost _60 years_ and come away that their wish to kill westerners comes from breaking their holy law. Yeah, you can pretend Islam is a tiny part of it, but I think a larger part of that hate is having their government overthrown and then having their children blown up in an air strike.
- javajosh 5y ago
  >Because it's a ridiculous premise that you would not apply to any other religion. I explicitly said in my initial comment that the slogan "They hate us for our freedom" applies to any fanatic of any religion. You are misrepresenting me, and are drifting further away from a specific point around what motivated the 9/11 attackers. Perhaps you are confused by the difference between Islam[0] and Islamism[1]? 0 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam 1 - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamism https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamism
  - nemothekid 5y ago
    I’m not misrepresenting you. You are just continually ignoring the history in these regions. I don’t think any religion supports your point. “Religious fanatics” are a convenient boogeyman to justify war and aggression. These terrorists don’t exist because of some holy war, they exist because they were caught in the middle of a proxy war between two super powers and witnessed their schools blow up. People today are vehemently anti-China because of censorship in video games, but somehow it’s a leap of faith that people can be anti-West after their home is targeted in an air raid and we must turn to “religious fanatics”. If China dropped a bomb on your parents home over some mineral rights, don’t you think you would become a little anti-Chinese? What would you think if those Chinese turned around and called you fundamentalist Christian when you voiced those complaints? If you buy that fact that the Middle East sustained aggression for over 50 years because of “religious fanactism” then you must also believe Putin’s line of reasoning that Zelensky is a nazi because it’s the same kind of propaganda
    - markoman 5y ago
      The "They hate us for our freedom" line was merely a hamfisted attempt on G. W. Bush's part to pander to disciples of 'American exceptionalism' while his search for WMD had foundered & we faced the disgust of the world. I'm not sure that the phrase is even in opposition to God's Law since Bush surely believed that America was subject to God's Law (albeit a different one), yet surely didn't think that American Freedom would suffer for (being subject to His Law). Indeed, while the American Right now enjoys a resurgence nationally and works to roll back LGBTQ and abortion rights in favor of what they deem God would proscribe, they surely won't think that we are any less 'free'. And that is the largest point -- that freedom needs quotes, since its purely subjective.