Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
Shapiro's view that Sharia advocacy is radical does not imply that he believes that fundamentalism is absent from Christianity or Judaism.
Of course not, his frequent ragging on Islam and not ragging on Christianity or Judaism ever implies he is much more in favor Christian and Jewish fundamentalism or at least ok with it. You think he is going to stand up for gay couples if the Religious Right make gay marriage unrecognized again?
Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
You claimed that Shapiro "just wants his own religion's theocracy". You have provided no evidence to support this assertion.
I know the difference. I'm still waiting for your evidence that Shapiro supports Talmudic theocracy.
Oh man, you sure got me. I can't prove that Shapiro wants to literally install a theocratic government in the US, he just wants religious inspired laws to apply to non-religious people. Damn man, I sure feel silly.
Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
Radical is an adjective: the only "authoritative source" you need to define it is a dictionary. From a Western perspective (ie. Shapiro's perspective) people who want to replace secular governance with theocratic dictatorship (ie. Sharia) are radicals. He isn't saying that supporting Sharia is radical within the the Islamic world, he saying its radical within the Western world.
It's almost like the "authoritative source" is important because they have context to recognize where the definition of radical: "relating to or affecting the fundamental nature of something; far-reaching or thorough", would be appropriate to apply instead of just being the opinions of some guy (Shapiro) who wants to maximize the "radical Muslim" number. And Sharia law isn't a form of government, it is a judicial system.
And Shapiro is not saying it is "radical within the Western World", he is just straight saying they are radical. Did I miss that caveat?
Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
He isn't defining radicalism on the basis of the poll numbers; he is using the poll numbers to show the percentage of Muslims internationally who hold views which are radically different from the prevailing views in the the United States.
He is defining "radical" in his own opinion based on his knowledge of the Muslim faith, which I am guessing is not much given as he treats "Sharia law" as a singular thing instead of different regions with different hadiths. And many of the views he put forth in defining radical Muslims are not strange at all to the US. Targeting civilians is sometimes justified? Sign us up for that! "Blame the US, Israel, or someone else for 9/11"? Plenty of Americans do that too.
Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
A person who is willing to commit murder in the name of their faith is radical by any standard.
I think I agree with that. If only that was one of the poll answers given.
Originally Posted by
ep1c_fail
Murdering someone for "dishonouring" the faith can never be justified.
Cool, I agree, that isn't what is being discussed.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
Any decent person, I would hope.
Haha, sure buddy, the belief that a baby is a life and must thus be preserved is just as radical as wanting to kill your sister for being raped. If preserving life is radical in your opinion but murder isn't then I really don't know what to say anymore.
Oh c'mon, you can surely see what you are doing right here. You are literally describing the pro-life position in the most generous way possible and the honor killing position in the most negative way possible. People who think honor killings are sometimes justified would explain it in a much more pleasant, euphemistic way, maybe something like: "preserving the purity of my sister's soul so that she may go to heaven and have everlasting bliss". Much like how you use the phrase "preserving life" is a euphemism for forcing a woman to carry a fertilized embryo to term and birthing a child. And yes, in my opinion, I think that treating a fertilized embryo as a living baby (person) whose life needs to be preserved is pretty damn radical.
You are also still trying to conflate and weasel terms used in the polling responses, which is like, half the danger of using poll responses in the first place. Shapiro is not citing people who think their sister's should be killed for being raped; he is citing people who think honor killings are "sometimes justified". The fact that you think the two statements are synonymous is the problem we are having.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
The thing is, I can think of cases when killing is justified. There can be and is no situation that justifies honour killing. Would you also be defending them if they had the position "rape can sometimes be justified"?
I am not defending people who want to commit honor killings, where have I ever even implied that? The original point was demonstrating how dishonest Ben Shapiro with his use of poll data; which you have shown you ate up hook, line and sinker ("and having a positive opinion on Ben Laden").
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
So again you continue to accuse a large swath of people with no evidence.
I am not even accusing; I wasn't the one to call out "Radical Christians" on my huge political platform. But you eat up Shaprio's uninformed opinion on ing poll data points but deny the issues fundamentalist Christians have caused us? I listed examples!
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
The point you are not conceding is that thinking that there exists a scenario in which honour killing is justified is radical. You quite clearly are saying otherwise.
I know, I stated as much in the quote you are responding to. You (or Shapiro) has yet to justify why that or any other poll response Shapiro cherry picked in particular is your standard of "radical" with anything other than "it's obvious". There are literally an infinite number of other standards you could have on what defines somebody as a "radical".
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
And now you are comparing murder to something that is mostly harmless (albeit dumb). Being stupid doesn't make one a radical, thinking that killing someone for bringing you dishonour is radical.
Having radical thoughts makes one radical, but you aren't going to find people who always agree on what thoughts are radical. That's the point. These poll responses you are claiming are radical are only so in your unlearned opinion. The most learned opinion you seem to have is Shapiro's, which isn't much, and the only justification you have provided is "it's obvious". I can't believe I am even letting you get away with focusing on honor killings as if that was the only response used by Shapiro to label "radicals". "Targeting civilians is sometimes justified". Oh man, so radical.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
What does his stance on reformed Jews have anything to do with this?
No, it isn't based on religion, it is based on the belief that the baby is a life and that aborting it is thus murder of another life. You don't think that murder is forbidden only because of religion, do you?
Shapiro doesn't think Reform Jews are "real Jews" because they don't keep as close to Jewish tradition as him. Literally, their views of how to live in the world are not traditional enough, in his opinion, to be truly Jewish. You see how his world view might be, idk, informed by his religion?
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
I admit I didn't watch much of the video, he kind of lost me at "I would blame the US for 9/11" and when he began saying that it's obvious that Muslims want Sharia law (which is extremely backwards and radical).
Right, you don't care about the abuse of data part, just want more confirmation that the majority of Muslims are bad crazy people. You literally don't see a problem with labeling huge swaths of people as "radical" based on polling response data points. You don't even need to know anything else about any particular person, just the response to a poll in 2009.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
It's almost like that is the subject of the video or something. Tell me, when you criticise adherents of one religion (like, say, Christianity in this thread), do you then start to criticise every other religion as well just to be fair?
I'm not talking about criticizing radical Christians in the video about radical Muslims; I am talking about criticizing radical Christians anywhere in his body of work. Do you think he just hasn't gotten to that video yet? Are you really speaking honestly, here?
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
Why aren't you criticising Buddhist radicals?
We can if you want? They have their issues with violence, to be sure.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
You consider all of those things to be radical, yet don't think that supporting literally all of those and so much worse under Sharia law isn't radical? You're very inconsistent.
Wait, wait, wait. I didn't call them radical, I called them extremists. More importantly, I am not posting videos on my huge platform about how huge swaths of Christians are radicals because the believe "X". I am not treating myself as an authority to tell anyone who truly is or isn't a radical. My opinions on who is actually a religious radical or not are incredibly limited; don't try to compare my responses to Shapiro's video.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
Oh my god, you're actually defending suicide bombings. I can't believe it.
Can we keep in good faith here, please? Can you really not think of any possible situations in which someone could morally justify a suicide bombing? Do you not have an imagination or something, or are you just pretending? A Jewish resistance fighter in the Warsaw ghetto suicide bombing a Nazi Officer's car seems like it could be morally justified to me. He was probably going to die anyways.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
Sorry for forgetting the exact wording, don't see what that proves.
It proves the whole point! You can't possibly think that people who have "positive" feelings about Bin Laden is actually the same thing as having "mixed" feelings about him, but Shapiro tricked you into conflating the two as if they are the same. You would have parroted that line to other people who are already disposed to negative opinions about Muslims: "Did you know 70% of Muslims have positive feelings towards Bin Laden?!" Even though that isn't what the poll actually said! You just accept his conflations.
Originally Posted by
nhytgbvfeco2
My scepticism is entirely secular, are you calling me a religious fundamentalist?
It doesn't matter if it is because of Islam, that's not really the point. The point was to address the claim that only a tiny minority of Muslims are radicalised.
No, I mean you are willing to read poll numbers and feel confident that their given responses are motivated by their religion but when Shapiro, an admittedly rather religious person, has an opinion about abortion or gay marriage it is suddenly: "How do you know his reasons for those positions are actually secular?!"
Originally Posted by
Mithradates
I think this is apples and oranges because certain self defence scenarios would be justified moraly and legaly in every single country, there is a clean difference between "its okay to kill people" (no, its not) and "its okay sometimes" (yes, it is) you cant conflate this two groups.
That is exactly my point. Thank you for supporting me.
Originally Posted by
Mithradates
There is no justified scenario for honor killing which would be universally accepted by all peoples. For me it is simply unjustifiable no matter what therefore I dont see or make a difference between the "it would be justified to kill my daughter if she would do that" and the "No, not in that case, but in that case it would be justified to kill my daughter" group so for me its okay if Shapiro treats them together.
Killing in self defense is not universally accepted by all peoples. Heard of Quakers? Or devout monks? Don't pretend we have universal morality or some nonsense. Killing somebody in self defense is not some "objective" morality principle we all believe in. You do, and I do, but that doesn't make it universal.