Apostasy and Islam

.....When someone said ``Evil succeeds but for good men to remain silent`` What they should have actually said is ``Evil succeeds - period.``

Just a musing. Forget it.

#620 by aktaie

Thanks for the detailed lecture. Now kindly tell me what exactly is your moral argument? I mean, how must everyone behave? I am all for learning the `truth`. Forget Islam. Just tell me the perfect belief-system.

Thanks.

#600, masanamuthu {``I just pointed out why comparing Hitler and Mohammad is valid.. ``}

Masanamuthu,
Now that is a good one. LOL.
Not even the most rabid rabbi, such as the late Meier Kahane, ever attempted that one. :)
Let me continue the comparisons:

Abu Bakr was like Goering
Omar was like Goebbels
Usman was like Eichmann
Ali was like Rommel
:)

Re: #604
You present a lot of very typical ``realist`` arguments. For every question about the validity of beheading, flying planes into buildings, suicide bombings etc, you say ``But what about Guantanamo Bay/Hiroshima/Iraq``. From reading Dawn and other Pakistani newspapers it seems that arguments like yours have a lot of success in Pakistan. My personal favourite is this quote from a Sabaa J. Ali`s letter to Dawn about the conviction of David Irving ``Under Islamic law, even non-Muslims are protected in person and their beliefs cannot be ridiculed. There is dialogue and debate but within a civilized atmosphere, unlike what we see in Europe today.`` I`m sure that you, at least, will agree with me that Ms. Ali is ludicrously misguided in her fairytale version of the ``protected`` status of non-Muslims in the Ottoman Empire.

My point is, I don`t think any of you (or at least the more intelligent of you) really believe these arguments that you make. Did you really choose the side you are on because you pondered deeply about the moral weight of Guantanamo/Hiroshima vs. Zarqawi/OBL/Taliban`s actions and decided ``What the hell! The West is as bad, screw it, I`m supporting Islam!``. No, I don`t think so. You said yourself that you support Muhammad despite the fact that you are aware of his massacre of Banu Qurayzah. That`s just one incident. Just reading through a book of Hadith, or through, say, Ibn Ishaq`s biography of Muhammad leaves one with a bad taste in one`s mouth for all the other ``realist`` things your leader did. I contend that to support a leader like that, Muslims are trained, from the very beginning to be exactly the kind of ``realist`` you say you are. It becomes second nature to them to suppress their moral qualms and instead of that, take delight in displays of strength and power. In order to live with yourselves, you have to make yourself believe that everyone on the other side is just such a ``realist`` -- or maybe those are the only motivations you can see in anyone else, I don`t know. This is why Muslims have convinced themselves that the West is as rotted full of vice as their own lands. There is no other way they can live with themselves and their religion. This is the brilliance of Islam. It defeats morality. It is quite clear that in the Quran morality takes a second place to victory over the non-believers. This is why people like you can so easily claim to be ``realists``. It is quite clear that for you, morality is only something you bring up in a debate in order to show how hollow it is.

This is why people like Ramanujan can quote scripture after scripture, hadith after hadith and he will have convinced no one to re-examine their faith. The very nature of the religion makes its followers immune to moral arguments.

Ramanujan #601 {``I`ve never understood this Muhammad-Mahtma Gandhi connection. .. But just because you raised this topic - most educated Hindus don`t care much about him. I think pakistanis spend more time thinking about him than do Indians. I personally think he was more pragmatic than intellectual (Gujratis are usually pragmatic - that`s why they do so well in business). I don`t agree with him about his policy of non-violence -``}

Ram Bhai,
Thank you for honestly stating that you don`t agree with Gandhiji`s philosophy of non-violence. After all, he was murdered by Hindus who felt as you do. It is clear that you are representing the viewpoint of that hate-filled group of BJP/RSS/VHP/BD/SP/JS who are no better than the JI/LeT/Al-Kayda/JeM/SS nuts who go around blowing up themselves and others. The main difference between your kind and people like me is that we don`t don uniforms and then act mindlessly based on ``my side - right or wrong!``

You ask for facts, but I cannot feed you the nonsense that you are accustomed to consuming - such as the facts from the ``Sword of Truth`` website. Such right-wing Hindu sources of information have all the facts about Gandhiji, the Holy Prophet (PBUH), Nehru, Indira Gandhi, Feroze (Khan) Gandhi :) Sanjay Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi and others. Go ahead and live in your hate-filled world of Muslim-bashing. I have better ways to look at my fellow human beings.

#617 by mohar11

No Mohar. This is the story of the `Tipton three` who were mistakenly picked up in Afghanistan and released after 3 years from Gitmo.

Re: # 603 zee

Road_To_Guantanamo: before I spend time on this, what`s the big deal in this movie? a bunch of talibans going to jail - right?....

tahmed32

....I havent kept myself up to date on the Phillipines economy ....so would appreciate your specifying what you mean by distinguishing between Malaysia and the Phillippines.....

Both Pakistan and Philipines have open economies, no capital controls, ruling cliques both in politics and business, no capital goods imports substituted, joyful consumerism, black markets in foreign exchange, AND most importantly, BOTH rely chiefly on manpower export & workers remittances to support their balance of payments. In case of Pakistan it is only male workers (so far?). In case of Philipines it is female workers too.

Malaysia is exactly the opposite.

#613 by tahmed32

You know, you are a good boy after all ... a bit naive maybe, but shining stars in the eyes are basically good, though they do cloud the vision. (sigh).

Do you remember the article I wrote here a long time ago named ``Ikeesween sadi ka dastoor`` or something like that? Do look it up. Many of the measures I had proposed then have actually been taken, like splitting up of WAPDA, Saarc etc. Others too will eventually have to be taken.

The biggest challenge facing Pak right now is urbanization. Your cities are bursting apart at the seams, dying a slow death with the related social ills borne out of urbanization. Can you go and watch a movie with family now, which you could easily and enjoyably do just 30 years ago? That is because of urbanization.

There is nothing in the rural areas for educated people. 2/3rd of your populace is neglected. You can only educate people to disillusion them and add to your jobless rate. The only jobs are in the cities. Rural uplift is not even on the agenda.

All that needs to be done immediately is massive public spending on rural infrastructure, and relative prosperity can be achieved. If you just route a major road alongside a number of small towns/villages, all sorts of economic activity begins.

Why isn`t that on the agenda?

#611 by tahmed32

No. All I`m saying is that ``Shit Happens.``

Is that rocket science?

zeemax #584
you write Ishrat Husain had ambitions of becoming the next Finance Minister..``

I dont think either you or I have the power of reading people`s minds. Not everyone is interested in gaining political power - it is in fact the good for nothings, the landlords, the ``bearded politicians``, the ``uniformed politicians``, and such scum who are the ones angling for power (and wealth) in Pakistani society. Underneath these scum ``VVIPS`` who make headlines in Pakistan are the true elite of Pakistan - the vast middle class, the ``overachieving`` (to use words from the Easterly article) expatriate community. Ishrat belongs to the latter groupl

you write It (i.e. Pakistan) has no direction.

I think economic growth is a good basic direction towards which Pakistan is moving. No thanks to the above-mentioned ``VVIP`` scum of Pakistan, but thanks to international trends and to the vast reservoir of hard working and enterprising ordinary Pakistanis. I havent kept myself up to date on the Phillipines economy, so would appreciate your specifying what you mean by distinguishing between Malaysia and the Phillippines.

It ultimately takes a cultural revolution, gang-of-four style, to correct that with intellectuals and entrepreneurs thrown out of windows. You speak approvingly of the Cultural Revolution of Mao, which is seen as having caused incredible damage to the Chinese economy and in reaction to which the ecoomic realists took over and for all practical purposes changed the economy in the opposite direction, namely capitalism. Once again, you would be excused if you were living in some kind of a time warp in the 1960`s. You remind me of the Japanese guys who kept fighing World War II until someone finally told them that the war was over and took them out of the jungle in the 1960`s.

-- DIL (Developments in Literacy)? Huh? You think NGOs can do it? My friend, building brick & mortar schools is useless unless you can get teachers to teach there. Otherwise you`ll just be adding more ghost schools used as public toilets. Would you be willing to work in Chak # 289 District Sargodha for Rs. 4000?

You are obviously unfamiliar with the entire ngo education scene in Pakistan. Even the dullest civil servant in the world knows that building brick & mortar schools is useless unless you have teachers there. And the ngo`s are ten steps ahead of you in this in Pakistan - they are not just aware of this, they have devised all sorts of ways to address precisely this problem. Please go to some website (e.g. google DIL) and learn a bit more on this.

Cheers.

You too.

Re: # 603

thanks....

I will try them from my Office... where I have a un-interupted Lan connection.


at home i use dialup...

zeemax #608 What you are saying is that because woman abuse and horrible murders take place in Amercia, that means it is OK to accept the abuse of women in afghanistan and to make light of someone`s death. Does that make sense to you? I hope not!!

You dont need to be a black belt in morality to understand the above, and we are not talking rocket science either.

#607 Pres Bush clearly understands the ``moral ambiguities`` involved, especially for pakistanis. and that is why the famous you are with us or against. many have been merciful and benevolent AFTER full submission..history and mythology is full of such examples, and some such examples we glorify thru tales of moral wisdom..but in modern times we do it less e.g. hiroshima. no one goes around that, its accepted as a brutal technic.

In the movie `Lord of War`, Nicholas Cage says `` Do you know who shall inherit the earth? Its the gunrunners, because everyone else will be too busy killing each other``.

Just a musing. Please ignore.

#606 by tahmed32

Yaar c`mon. Who are you fooling with your idealistic moralizing. Don`t americans hack up their pregnant wives all the time and boil babies in microwaves? These `ugly` realities are exactly that. Ugly realities.