islamist extremists strike in france

[KareninsGirl]

My thoughts are with the victims of the latest barbaric act by Islamic extremists.

The world needs to wake up and defend itself.

RIP those who died and prayers for those critically injured.

at French magazine office www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30710883

Totally agree Idsavol. Yet all evening the apologists have been on TV excusing and 'understanding' this barbarity.

It's time we stood up and said Enough.

The OT evolved from Sumerian and Babylonian myths from the Bronze Age. Parts of the Koran are have a similar history.

But you are right. I was being illustrative. Basically, they were written by very primitive, ignorant (as in..lacked knowledge) people. So my overall point remains.

And if you think the NT is all sweetness and light, you have not read it. Probably just listened to the sweet little bits your vicar preaches on a Sunday, right?

Read it.

Oh,and Jesus Christ upheld and condoned every teaching in the OT. Why don't you?

Hey thanks IPity. And that's a really interesting thought, Troels, sounds very plausible.

Christianity is mainly about the New Testament, not the Old Testament with the fire and brimstone stuff.

But the Quran has this distinction too. There are the awful verses that everyone hears about but there are also verses that are the opposite and do not promote killing your enemies, there are hadith that show the Prophet being personally insulted but not taking revenge and just talking with people. Early Islamic warfare featured the same rules about not killing civilians that we have.

And that, Caffe and Back, is the basis for saying that extremists do not represent Islam that and the fact that important elements of jihadist ideology aren't even based in the Quran but in non-orthodox interpretations from centuries later. Religion/ideology is not static shouldn't its believers be allowed to say what is it and is not? If most Muslims say that jihadists are not representing Islam as it's understood today, is it really appropriate for non-Muslims in the West to say they're wrong?

Saying they don't represent modern Islam is not the same thing as saying there are no Islamic elements in their ideology, or that they don't themselves believe they are true Islam.

'claig you deny that Jesus is god and you deny the 10 commandments?'

Never thought about it too much. But what Jesus said makes sense to me and the 10 Commandments, as fae as I remember them, seem perfectly reasonable. "Love thy neighbour as thyself", "Forgive those who trespass against us" seems fine to me. Nothing about "murder and hatred" in the Ten Commandments.

Oh, and Claig....fire and brimstone is from the NT, not the OT. Guess who introduced the concept of suffering after death?

Dear old Jesus.

Have you actually bothered reading any of the Bible?

'Oh,and Jesus Christ upheld and condoned every teaching in the OT. Why don't you?'

There are verses about "smite" and stuff like that in the Old Testament. Jesus said "Let he who is without sin cast the first stone". It is totally different.

caffe

Try not to get drawn into debates around the "authenticity" of religion. If posters have managed to get this far into life still believing and respecting religious belief, most likely without having ever read the books themselves they are lost causes. This thread should be about freedom of expression and freedom to attack religion. That fundamental tenant of democracy is the only hope for the future of humanity.

'Jesus Christ upheld and condoned every teaching in the OT' eh? No. Utter rubbish.

Caffè, I think it's you who hasn't bothered to read any of the Bible.

Not even what I came on here to say, which is: Je suis Charlie.

Struggling to understand what point you think you are making, Dreaming.

The Koran says nice stuff too, so the people who do the bad stuff aren't representative of Islam?

How do you know the murderers today don't abide by the nice stuff too?

How strange.

Do you know anything about this prophet whose reputation they are willing to kill to defend? The "perfect example" of manhood?

He was a murdering paedophile.

If Mohammed doesn't represent Islam...who does?

I think the problem is that if you had young white men running around Europe beheading and shooting Muslims this frequently the same people who seem so keen to minimize these attacks would be in absolute paroxysms of outrage.

There would of course be the obligatory references to Nazism and they would be demanding that we as a society took the blame collectively and looked at where we went wrong.

But when it's Islamic terrorists it's almost as if we are expected to believe that they were produced in a complete vacuum. That there was no influence from mosque's, family, friends, madrassas, schools. Islam exists as a completely benign entity which has no influence on these murderers who suddenly spring from it.

It doesn't really wash with me. After the events surrounding the death of Stephen Lawrence British society was forced to face up to the fact that strong seams of racism permeated parts of it and drive it out.

By the same token I think Muslims in Europe also need to recognise that a hatred of their fellow Europeans permeates parts of their society and drive it out too.

Ok I will bite though.

The distinction between the OT and NT was added much later. There isn't a natural separation between the two. You know that page in the bible "new testament" it wasn't always there, it just served someone's particular purpose.

Without the old testament there is no original sin, no need for the ultimate divine sacrifice. No Christianity.

The New Testament is the teachings of Christ. That is the basis of Christianity, what Christ taught. Genesis and who begot whom and Adam And Eve is not Christ's message.

Aermingers - there was absolutely no cry for collective responsibility when Anders Brevik went on a rampage.

Or when Marwa El Shebini was stabbed to death in court

Or when Pavlo Lapshyn was convicted of murder and planting bombs.

But of course, they aren't viewed as terrorists, just deranged individuals, because they're white.

Very good point Aermingers and if they took that advice there may be a chance of reform, at least domestically within the UK

Primitive beliefs that apparently sane people are prepared to kill for Yet our Ian press doesn't have the courage to say so. The Guardian is shocking in their equivalent if scrape victim wearing a mini skirt ideology.

Claig, Le Pen does not represent "the French model"; she panders to the small-minded views held by one part of French society and if you examine FN voting figures you'll see that many who support the FN are recent immigrants or second generation French citizens.

Those who were gunned down today represented another, radically different French model, and a far older one, going back to Voltaire and Rabelais: a tradition of acerbic, intelligent opposition to intolerance, of galvanising people, through ironic, caustic texts and caricature, into opening their eyes and minds rather than blindly following irrational doctrines that claim to represent one absolute truth.

Cabu, Charb, Bernard Maris, Wolinski and those who were murdered because of the sketches they drew were part of that older model and were all viscerally opposed to the form of intolerance and simplistic thinking that, paradoxically, Le Pen and her kind share with the extremists.

Well Caffe I don't know how to say it any more plainly.

Most Muslims today reject the jihadist interpretation of Islam as a perversion of their religion and not true Islam. I think we should agree with them and not with the jihadists who think theirs is the true path. But ultimately, I don't think it's for non-Muslims to decide what true Islam is today.

But ultimately, I don't think it's for non-Muslims to decide what true Islam is today.

Not much chance of that when even the muslims can't seem to agree on what it is.

Le Pen defends the French "integrationist" model as opposed to the British "multicultural" model which BBC Newsnight was on about tonight, implying that the French should change their "intrgationist" approach and adopt "multiculturlalism", which Cameron and Trevor Phillips have said in the past has failed.

"Ms Le Pen, a 42-year-old criminal lawyer, argues that multiculturalist policies were created by Anglo-Saxon politicians to help them define - and capture - ethnic communities in voting blocs. She says this approach, which she described in French as "communautarisme", has benefited only the political class and its adoption in France is partly to blame for its economic and social woes.

"This model of multiculturalism is one which other countries, including the Anglo-Saxon nations, are now moving away from. Look at what [British Prime Minister] David Cameron has said recently, see what Mrs Merkel in Germany says."

www.smh.com.au/world/multiculturalism-is-a-myth-le-pen-20110311-1brbs.html

Most Muslims today reject the jihadist interpretation of Islam

I'm not disagreeing but i'd like to know what evidence you have used to from this opinion.

Most surveys I have seen how around a 60/40 split between lack of support to terrorism and support.

So yes, most muslims reject jihadi but it's not a massive split.

Or just condemn those jihadis that interpret it in such a barbaric way. But they don't condemn and their silence means they tacitly condone.

Big security op still ongoing in Reims. US TV reporting 2 gunmen in custody and one gunman has been shot dead but that seems unlikely.

This whole discussion strikes me as akin to that old one about how many angels can dance on the head of a pin - it is all imaginary and a human construct. How rational people with any understanding of science can believe in the supernatural is beyond me. How do people just not get that religion was invented to explain what - at the time - was inexplicable? Nowadays we have scientific explanations, and have no need for gods - apart from our fear of death as a final ending, which many people seem unable to accept. All the rules dictated by the various religions of the world are human constructs - how is it for a moment logical to think that you won't go to some 'heaven' because you've eaten a forbidden food, like (random example) prawns?

As science explains more about the universe, so god, or gods, diminish - they become the gods of the gaps - if you don't understand something, then 'god did it' is the answer - until it's explained by science, and then the rational religious person will accept that, but still assert that 'god did it' is the answer to the mysteries we haven't yet discovered an answer to. The Pope now accepts evolution, but still Catholics are told that birth control is a sin, ffs.

All religion is a delusion, and the sooner we can all have the emotional maturity to accept our mortality and stop this ridiculous and irrational reliance on an imaginary security blanket called 'faith', the better. 'Faith' is just another word for gullibility and denial of reality in the face of evidence to the contrary.

I may be an atheist, but I am also an atheist who has experienced the death of loved ones. If it makes people feel better to imagine that we're all going to be reunited in some blissful place (I like the Rainbow Bridge, myself), then go for it, but it's still illusionary. Harsh, but true - and that's the nature of an impartial and uncaring universe. Truth doesn't do hugs.

Exactly, Pixel

Some argue what we see in the Middle East today (especially in Syria/Iraq) is basically Islam's Thirty Years War.

Wet, there have been multiple posts on this thread alone showing how Muslim leaders are condemning the attacks.

'All religion is a delusion, and the sooner we can all have the emotional maturity to accept our mortality and stop this ridiculous and irrational reliance on an imaginary security blanket called 'faith', the better. 'Faith' is just another word for gullibility and denial of reality in the face of evidence to the contrary.'

The newspaper headlines today say

"War on freedom"

Freedom is what our civilization has achieved abd has granted to us. It means we can choose to believe in religion. There is no one way for everyone. We have the right to disagree and believe in different things, and Katie Hopkins has the right to say and believe what she believes in also and any attempt to stop our freedom of expression is a war on all our freedoms.