To ask what the problem is (The terrorists)

[lemisscared]

Because i just don't know. Have they got a genuine gripe? Why the hatred? What do they want to achieve? Honestly, shouldn't people be sitting round a table and making concessions on BOTH sides?

I am terrified which is probably daft but in Syria and other countries that im embarrased to say i don't know, people are being massacred daily and the West bats not an eye. They live with terror every day - how can we make it stop?? Not just here, but everywhere?

If there is a God, whoever's God you are, now would be a good time to intervene because i can't help but feel that the whole world is turning on itself.

Can somone please explain this to me, possibly from the point of view of the Islamists behind these attacks, because they must feel justified in their actions, i don't believe that the route of the problem is evil.

I'm just scared

I'm coming to the sad conclusion that there is something innate in the human race which causes it to self destruct.

We have always faced some threat or another - wars, terrorism, violence. This is just another manifestation of the human condition.

I think many humans are just evil fuck ups and it will never change unless the world is ruled by women

"Their own people" is pushing it a bit - Sunnis and Shias are as different as Catholics and Protestants aren't they?

lemisscared totally agree. There was a brief meme "Je Suis Ahmed" which I felt was actually more appropriate to the situation.

RIP - bearing in mind he was doing his job in protecting people who may or may not have agreed with his religion - maybe even opposed it.

Has anyone here read about the Muslims in India, who surrounded a church to protect the christians inside who were facing violent persecution from a Hindi faction ?

In my child like fantasy world - religious preference & beliefs should be no more a cause of contention than preferring say : East Enders to coronation street. "Hello I'm a Christian & I love East Enders" really /handshake/" I'm a Muslim & coronation at is my favourite". Polite smile & walks on -both leaving the other to live peacefully with their preference & beliefs. How do we get to that point I wonder?

muslim kills entire religion is guilty, black man kills: entire race is guilty. White man kills (aka brevik) : he's mentally ill.

Likewise, when Muslims or blacks kill there is always a "but" and a question of "understanding their motives" and seeing their actions as a response/reaction to provocation or in context. When white people kill there is no analysis, just "they must be a right wing bigot/insane".

Speak for yourself ghost: I'm very interested in the sociocultural phenomena behind right-wing extremism and other justifications for violence.

As a Muslim when I read this story I felt so so sorry for those poor people murdered! Then I instantly felt bloody fury at the idiotic extremist knobs who did that horrific act!
A) it's plain bloody wrong and just horrific
B) it's not condoned in Islam one Tiny eeny weeny bit!
C) members of family that do where the headscarf will now get even even more shit from the EDL in my town centre.
All these brain washed nut job fundamentalists do is make life harder for the rest of us Muslims and non Muslims. We all live in fear of a terror attack or a racist attack and quite frankly just makes Islam look like more of a hoaky pokey evil religion to the rest of the world. When in fact all it teaches is peace and kindness and tolerance.

Likewise, when Muslims or blacks kill there is always a "but" and a question of "understanding their motives" and seeing their actions as a response/reaction to provocation or in context. When white people kill there is no analysis, just "they must be a right wing bigot/insane".

This is not true. You left out the important bit: terrorism. These debates are about terrorism, and as it happens most terrorists these days are Muslim/Black. Terrorism is what makes people debate the 'but', given that one person's terrorist is another person's freedom fighter.

I don't think all terrorist acts are equally abhorrent. Blowing up Charlie Hebdo offices at night when nobody was there and destroying the computers was one thing. Going to the office on a shoot-out and killing the journalists at their desks was something else. I think you can see from people's reaction that destroying property is less shocking than murder. So people are not simply saying 'don't be a terrorist' they are saying 'don't shoot journalists just because you find their cartoons offensive'.

When in fact all it teaches is peace and kindness and tolerance.

Unfortunately they can find the justification for their actions because it is there. I'm glad that you interpret it to say something else, but they have the same right to see it their way and it's just as much their Islam as it is yours.

ghostland it is irrational to assume that two black people would have the same motives for an action, but it is perfectly rational to consider that two Muslims or two Baptists might share a motive.

Can you really not see the difference or do you just desperately not want to?

I've been reading and reading about this, trying to understand. I don't think I ever will.

What is clear to me is that Charlie Hebdo is part of a Middle East conflict brought to Europe. And here it will stay.

When children are being killed in Palestine, there are barrel bombs in Syria, landlines in Afghanistan, sectarian conflict, terrorist groups battling fur power,when the West is cosy with Saudi Arabia, we can't just expect these deep, raw conflicts to stay away from our borders.

The more I think about it, the more I feel that this isn't a binary Europe vs Islamism problem.

I don't know what the answer is. I don't know if there even is an answer.

Yes our alliances and foreign policy are not helping. Saudi have a terrible human rights record when it comes to free speech. They are armed by us and involved with the US in arming ISIS. It's all so confusing and complex.

The mixed messages are confusing. 17 journalists were killed by Israel in the last 12 months. 3 journalists have been imprisoned by egypt. Are only european journalist lives of value? Why are we arming saudi? What exactly is our involvement with Syria? Who is arming isis? It's all so entangled.

I have never understood why we are so close to Saudi. I get about the oil, but we seem to act as though they were close allies.

They are armed by us and involved with the US in arming ISIS. It's all so confusing and complex

Saudi and other Middle Eastern governments buy arms from Western companies of their own free violation in multi-billion deals that are facilitated or conveniently ignored by Western governments. No one is forcing them to buy them. No one is forcing them to use them. These Middle Eastern governments are not exactly passive players in this game. It's a two way street.

One could (and should) argue against the morality of Western companies and governments selling arms to regimes, knowing that they will be used against their own population or to annihilate their enemies in the most barbaric way. But surely its the the regimes who buy them and use them that are the ones who should be most held to account here.

To imply that it is the Wests fault that the Middle East is armed is highly disingenuous. We've moved on from colonialism and can no longer tell them what they can and can't spend their own money on.

BTW what evidence do you have that the US is arming IS ? I understood their main funding and supply sources to be donations from muslim individuals and consortiums from UAE and Saudi, revenue from oil wells they've captured and ransoms from kidnaps and other exhortations.

Yes they've also got some weapons originally provided by the West, but they weren't directly gifted to IS, but rather to the genuine anti-government rebels, who IS deceptively aligned with and pretended to be. Our governments were stupid not to see that that would happen, but again its very different to saying we deliberately armed IS.