Political Posts

[Sweet]

2 hours ago, james22 said:

 

The Christian response to centuries of Muslim wars of expansion?

 

Those Crusades?

 

Funny example.

I mean yeh.  
 

The entire region was Jewish and Christian and it was conquered by a Muslim army.  But to fight back is somehow forbidden.

 

The Ottomans were laying siege to Vienna in the late 17th Century, their demand was surrender and convert to Islam or every inhabitant would be killed.

 

They were pushed back, and over time the Habsburg and Russians eventually pushed the Ottomans out of most of Europe.

 

I genuinely I think some of this narrative is a dislike of white people and European culture.

 

Edited May 10, 2025 by Sweet

[dealraker]

4 hours ago, Sweet said:

The IRA, nothing about their terror campaign was about religion, it was nationalism.

 

The KKK, racial superiority, not religion.

 

The British empire, imperialism, not even terrorism and not about religion.

 

The Crusades, on stronger footing because it was religious, but war is not terrorism.

Nobody claims that the Ottoman or the Muslim conquests was terrorism.  You are reinventing a definition to suit you.

 

Sweet, standard European descent white guy here...of course leaving out the small percent of that part we standard European "descenters" don't like to acknowledge.

 

100% disagree with all 5 of your above.  I'm a nobody I guess...on top of being a crybaby and all the other labels laid out on our male macho seeking political forum!  LOL.  

Edited May 10, 2025 by dealraker

[cubsfan]

2 hours ago, Sweet said:

I genuinely I think some of this narrative is a dislike of white people and European culture.

 

 

Unfortunately, you are correct. Radical Islam will never accept European or Western Culture. 

 

And to acknowledge or even say this - is somehow racist. Sad world we live in.

Edited May 10, 2025 by cubsfan

[John Hjorth]

Russian-Ukranian war :

 

Reuters - World, Russian-Ukrainian War [May 10^th 2025] : Europe leaders, in Kyiv, turn up pressure on Russia over ceasefire.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

So Putins cease fire bluff is being called now, effective Monday, or Russia will hit by new and further sanctions, at least from several European countries.

Edited May 10, 2025 by John Hjorth

[Sweet]

6 hours ago, dealraker said:

Sweet, standard European descent white guy here...of course leaving out the small percent of that part we standard European "descenters" don't like to acknowledge.

 

100% disagree with all 5 of your above.  I'm a nobody I guess...on top of being a crybaby and all the other labels laid out on our male macho seeking political forum!  LOL.  

Dealraker, I was born and I grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, although I don’t live there anymore.  
 

There were bombings and murders, many of them, by the IRA and by other organisations.  It is what some would call a ‘lived experience’ and I’m fairly certain you don’t have that experience.

 

I know what I’m talking for at least one of the five, and respectfully, you don’t.  I’ve never met anyone, friend or foe of the IRA (and I know many of both), who consider it a Christian inspired terrorist organisation.

 

There is nothing macho crybaby in what I just said, only facts.  But please consider that if you are confidently wrong on one, you might be confidently wrong on the others too.

 

Edited May 10, 2025 by Sweet

[Xerxes]

5 hours ago, james22 said:

 

The Christian response to centuries of Muslim wars of expansion?

 

Those Crusades?

 

Funny example.

 

 

Those are actually neither Muslim or Christian, … but Persian lands long before Jesus himself began contemplating the meaning of life 

 

Get your facts straight  

[Xerxes]

6 hours ago, Sweet said:

The IRA, nothing about their terror campaign was about religion, it was nationalism.

 

The KKK, racial superiority, not religion.

 

The British empire, imperialism, not even terrorism and not about religion.

 

The Crusades, on stronger footing because it was religious, but war is not terrorism.

Nobody claims that the Ottoman or the Muslim conquests was terrorism.  You are reinventing a definition to suit you.

 

Just for clarity:

 

are you pushing back because you think since the bible doesnt say anything about spreading Christianity by the sword, those cases shown by Sanjeev doesn’t demonstrate Christian doing nasty things 

I agree with you that British Empire had nothing to do with spreading Christianity by the sword in a systematic way, in the same way Spanish were doing, but nonetheless racism and complete subjugation was how they did business in Asia. 

Whether the Bible gives a tacit consent or not. It doesn’t matter in my view. But clearly it seems to matter to most Westerners. 
 

With that said, I do wonder how Westerners (those that are whiter than me) view Belgian atrocities in Congo. 
 

I mean it is not sanctioned by the Holy Book, but it was Christians committing it. 
 

So Christians get a pass for it. 

[Xerxes]

Lastly

 

Ottoman Empire was a war machine bent on conquest. If it wasn’t Muslim it would have been using some other ideology as jet fuel. 
 

Or do folks here really think the Ottoman Turks, if they were Christian, they would be spreading peace and love at the gate of Vienna !! You got to be fuxking kidding me. 
 

If you want use an example, use one that makes sense. For instance use the Umayyed Caliphate that was systematically built on spread Islam by force. 
 

I always find it funny how posters here put all Muslim empire in one category. It speaks to complete lack of understanding of Asian history. 
 

I would include the Timurid empire in the same basket as the Ottomans. They are waged war for war sake. 

[Sweet]

26 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

Just for clarity:

 

are you pushing back because you think since the bible doesnt say anything about spreading Christianity by the sword, those cases shown by Sanjeev doesn’t demonstrate Christian doing nasty things 

I agree with you that British Empire had nothing to do with spreading Christianity by the sword in a systematic way, in the same way Spanish were doing, but nonetheless racism and complete subjugation was how they did business in Asia. 

Whether the Bible gives a tacit consent or not. It doesn’t matter in my view. But clearly it seems to matter to most Westerners. 
 

With that said, I do wonder how Westerners (those that are whiter than me) view Belgian atrocities in Congo. 
 

I mean it is not sanctioned by the Holy Book, but it was Christians committing it. 
 

So Christians get a pass for it. 

I think I’ve explain everything fairly well in my other posts, it’s all there.

 

In the specific post you quoted, I don’t believe they are examples of religious terrorism.

 

Terrorism committed by a Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist (whatever) for none religious reasons is not religious terrorism.

[Xerxes]

21 minutes ago, Sweet said:

I think I’ve explain everything fairly well in my other posts, it’s all there.

 

In the specific post you quoted, I don’t believe they are examples of religious terrorism.

 

Terrorism committed by a Christian, Muslim, Jew, Buddhist (whatever) for none religious reasons is not religious terrorism.

understood. 
 

so discussion was sandboxed really around what falls within or out of explicit religious extremism .. sanctioned by the Holy Book and levered by the aggressor as jet fuel.  
 

I would just submit that the actual victim does not care if it is sanctioned or not by the holy book. I could be from Congo have seen my entire family limps being chopped off by Christians for sports. It being in the Holy Book or not has little significance to me, …. 
 

But that was not what the discussion here is about. So I ll stop here and will derail no further 

[Sweet]

14 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

understood. 
 

so discussion was sandboxed really around what falls within or out of explicit religious extremism .. sanctioned by the Holy Book and levered by the aggressor as jet fuel.  
 

I would just submit that the actual victim does not care if it is sanctioned or not by the holy book. I could be from Congo have seen my entire family limps being chopped off by Christians for sports. It being in the Holy Book or not has little significance to me, …. 
 

But that was not what the discussion here is about. So I ll stop here and will derail no further 

Yes.

 

It really started about whether certain religions act more like ‘jet fuel’ (good analogy) compared to other religions.

[John Hjorth]

3 hours ago, dealraker said:

Sweet, standard European descent white guy here...of course leaving out the small percent of that part we standard European "descenters" don't like to acknowledge.

 

100% disagree with all 5 of your above.  I'm a nobody I guess...on top of being a crybaby and all the other labels laid out on our male macho seeking political forum!  LOL.  

 

I have been reading Charlies [ @dealrakers ] posts in this topic for a long time now, as perceiving Charlie [ @dealraker ] - I don't know how to phrase it, to avoid insulting anyone in this topic, but I'll try, anyways - , as a person based on and rooted in basic reason.

 

So, I have a few questions, as being an European observer of what's going on in USA by now :

 

1. What's going on in the two chambers of Congress by now? [Personally, I see no information on daily basis available about that.] Are the congress members taking a break,  perhaps even a nap, looking at Netflix or Fox News, in stead of working, all while Mr. Trump is running the whole show?
2. The answer/reply to the above, what does that indicate towards the next US Federal budget [the 2026 budget]?, and when will that be available?, and
3. What about Trumps original plans for an US infrastructure reform [good initiative, I would say!], launched in his first period, where are we now with that?

[patience_and_focus]

4 hours ago, Xerxes said:

understood. 
 

so discussion was sandboxed really around what falls within or out of explicit religious extremism .. sanctioned by the Holy Book and levered by the aggressor as jet fuel.  
 

I would just submit that the actual victim does not care if it is sanctioned or not by the holy book. I could be from Congo have seen my entire family limps being chopped off by Christians for sports. It being in the Holy Book or not has little significance to me, …. 
 

But that was not what the discussion here is about. So I ll stop here and will derail no further 

 

Yes, there are many reason for atrocities committed by humans upon each other (go figure!). But for comparing religions (and I say this as an agnostic, leaning atheist), one has to be objective and precise. Otherwise it is very easy to conflate with other things to get one's bias confirmed.

 

22 hours ago, LC said:

 

Oh come on! And you claim you can't take me seriously!

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_terrorism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hindu_terrorism

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_terrorism

 

 

Since you excluded Islamic terrorism, I'll add it

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islamic_terrorism

 

If you actually read through any of them (Hindu terrorism for example) and compare it to Islamic terrorism, you can analyze in many ways including comparing number of terrorist attacks, number of deaths, number injured, etc etc. Turns out there is orders of magnitude difference between how many killed by Islamist terrorist vs others (see also - https://www.fondapol.org/en/study/islamist-terrorist-attacks-in-the-world-1979-2024/)

 

As I said before, you can also look at the statistics and proportion of countries with religion as it is practiced in the modern era that are closer to the ideals of enlightenment. Turns out Islamic countries are concentrated at the bottom of that list.

Edited May 10, 2025 by patience_and_focus

[james22]

“Voters, particularly in central and Atlantic Canada, need to recognize that a vote for the Carney Liberals is a vote for Western secession—a vote for the breakup of Canada as we know it.”

 

https://pjmedia.com/david-solway-2/2025/05/07/western-canada-puts-the-rest-of-canada-on-notice-n4939566

 

Maybe Trump dissed Trudeau specifically to cause the liberals to win, leading to a breakup. Then we get the oil, gas, and grain-producing provinces and the remnant-Canada gets angry Frenchmen.

 

https://instapundit.com/718474/

 

Should Alberta Become the 51st State?

 

https://www.rodmartin.org/p/should-alberta-become-the-51st-state

 

Canadians?

[LC]

34 minutes ago, patience_and_focus said:

Since you excluded Islamic terrorism, I'll add it

 

I only excluded it because I was asked to provide evidence of non-Islamic terrorism.

So to be clear, if you think I'm trying to downplay Islam, you couldn't be further from the truth. 

 

I agree: there's a good argument that Islam is currently the worst of the bunch.

500 years ago I would've said Christianity is the worst of the bunch.

Go back further and the Israelites were the worst.

 

My point is they're all garbage. Every one of them, including your personal favorite (the royal 'you').

 

Immigration policy should be based on some fact-based rationale.

Not how brown someone is or what sky god they prefer.

 

 

 

21 hours ago, Sweet said:

I don’t really know why people as clever as you can’t get it straight.  ’It’s all make believe anyway’ - yeh maybe it is.  ’It’s all the same make believe stuff’ - no it’s not.  Stop defaulting to your lefty ‘all cultures and religions are the same’ bs.  Unplug, use your eyes and engage your brain.

 

Your religion is special. Your book is the most righteous.

Who has more peace than your guys? Nobody!

 

If that is what you need to bring you comfort, so be it.

[patience_and_focus]

26 minutes ago, LC said:

 

 

My point is they're all garbage. Every one of them, including your personal favorite (the royal 'you').

 

 

The argument against it is that just because some religion, as practiced, was garbage long time ago cannot be perpetually used as an argument for making everything equal in today's context. Some religions evolve (dilute / accept progress and evidence / change - call it what you want) better than others. As an aside, I don't think Christianity was worse than Islam 500 or 1000 years ago. You can ask remaining  Zoroastrians of Persia, or Buddhists of Gandhara (today's north east Afganistan) who were completely butchered  (this infact has continued even in modern times with trying to erase any Buddhist history like the destruction of Buddha of Bamiyan in 2001) just as two examples. And after all, Christianity was willing to give room to renaissance and enlightenment and not react like Islam does internally even today.

 

This inability to evolve raises suspicion of something fundamental at flaw.

 

Edited May 10, 2025 by patience_and_focus

[LC]

21 minutes ago, patience_and_focus said:

As an aside, I don't think Christianity was worse than Islam 500 or 1000 years ago

 

As to worse or better - it's subjective and at least IMO not worth arguing. We have incomplete data on events 1000 years ago and so interpretations can differ. What we cannot reasonably deny is that Christians waging holy war across a continent is a pretty shitty thing to do.

 

 

11 minutes ago, patience_and_focus said:

just because some religion, as practiced, was garbage long time ago cannot be perpetually used as an argument for making everything equal in today's context

 

I disagree and I think I have good reasons:

-It's all faith based which IMO means it's inherently a less-effective system of interacting with reality (compared to lets say some scientific/logic based approach). I mean, the medical community has to essentially bullshit these idiots into vaccinations, lest we have a humanitarian crisis: https://vaccineconfident.pharmacist.com/Learn/Build-Vaccine-Confidence-in-Others/Tailor-Your-Outreach/How-to-talk-about-vaccines-with-someone-who-is-Christian-when-you-arent-Christian

 

-It refuses, as best it can and as long as it can, to accept modern realities. Homosexuals are still evil. Condoms are still evil. Two simple examples.

 

-In practice: When will Catholics priests answer for their crimes? When will rural Christians elect a humanist leader? You want to claim progress - there has been minimal progress and shitheads (across all religions  incl. Christians) are still justifying their shitty behavior with their shitty religion.

 

As long as you believe your sky god allows it, what won't you do?

[Spekulatius]

Read the Koran (yes , I have done it - at least the 100 first pages) and it become immediately clear that it has expansionism by any means as a core feature. No other religion is build like it.

 

Islam is also very narrowly defined rule based with little flexibility which means that 1500 years after it was founded, it is hopeless outdated in term of its rules and modus operas do, a bit like the Christianity would be if the New Testament would never have been written. i think this is societies   Following  the Koran by the book literally have very poor outcomes.

 

Fundamentalist Islamism  is a poor operating system but the issue is that the Koran isn’t written in way to make it flexible, so one is stuck in the past following it.

[dealraker]

7 hours ago, Sweet said:

Dealraker, I was born and I grew up in Northern Ireland during the Troubles, although I don’t live there anymore.  
 

There were bombings and murders, many of them, by the IRA and by other organisations.  It is what some would call a ‘lived experience’ and I’m fairly certain you don’t have that experience.

 

I know what I’m talking for at least one of the five, and respectfully, you don’t.  I’ve never met anyone, friend or foe of the IRA (and I know many of both), who consider it a Christian inspired terrorist organisation.

 

There is nothing macho crybaby in what I just said, only facts.  But please consider that if you are confidently wrong on one, you might be confidently wrong on the others too.

 

Disagree, there were religious factors involved in the Ireland conflicts and respectfully you are dead wrong, and I mean DEAD wrong, on all the others.  The crybaby wasn't associated with you Sweet, not at all...of course you knew that but chose to be offended anyway.

[dealraker]

5 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

 

I have been reading Charlies [ @dealrakers ] posts in this topic for a long time now, as perceiving Charlie [ @dealraker ] - I don't know how to phrase it, to avoid insulting anyone in this topic, but I'll try, anyways - , as a person based on and rooted in basic reason.

 

So, I have a few questions, as being an European observer of what's going on in USA by now :

 

1. What's going on in the two chambers of Congress by now? [Personally, I see no information on daily basis available about that.] Are the congress members taking a break,  perhaps even a nap, looking at Netflix or Fox News, in stead of working, all while Mr. Trump is running the whole show?
2. The answer/reply to the above, what does that indicate towards the next US Federal budget [the 2026 budget]?, and when will that be available?, and
3. What about Trumps original plans for an US infrastructure reform [good initiative, I would say!], launched in his first period, where are we now with that?

Fear is involved with number 1, the who and what feared is obvious.

You can find trending figures on the budget deficit for number 2 above and they are not good.  Quote: "Halfway through fiscal year 2025, the U.S. Budget deficit increased by $1.3 trillion. So we are up to a $2.6 trillion annual rate. That rounds up to 9% of GDP."  Keep in mind budget deficit obsession is only available during democratic administrations, it is never an issue with a republican one.  

For 3 is it plan or impulse that we see from the administration as to all things?  Seems there is interest in crypto infrastructure and fast billions for one family.  That's all I know on that issue.  

 

 

[John Hjorth]

15 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Read the Koran (yes , I have done it - at least the 100 first pages) and it become immediately clear that it has expansionism by any means as a core feature. No other religion is build like it.

 

Islam is also very narrowly defined rule based with little flexibility which means that 1500 years after it was founded, it is hopeless outdated in term of its rules and modus operas do, a bit like the Christianity would be if the New Testament would never have been written. i think this is societies   Following  the Koran by the book literally have very poor outcomes. ...

 

I have personally the exactly same perception, as a Dane. Lack of tolerance towards persons with a different mindset than your own, if you stricly adhere the Koran,  creates a lot of derivative societal problems.

[Sweet]

20 minutes ago, dealraker said:

Disagree, there were religious factors involved in the Ireland conflicts and respectfully you are dead wrong, and I mean DEAD wrong, on all the others.  The crybaby wasn't associated with you Sweet, not at all...of course you knew that but chose to be offended anyway.

The IRA were not motivated by religion, they were motivated by nationalism.  The IRA were not bombing and killing because of some passage in the bible.  Their goal was to get Northern Ireland out of the United Kingdom, which they saw as a war of ‘liberation’.

 

Catholics tended to be Irish Nationalists, Protestants tended to be Irish Unionists (British), but not always.  Religion had nothing to do with the IRA, and the IRA had Protestants in it too.

 

Don’t take my word for it, take the IRA at their own word.  Pasted below is the IRAs own handbook which they issued to IRA members upon joining:

 

https://cain.ulster.ac.uk/othelem/organ/ira/ira_green_book.htm

 

I lived there for over 25 years from birth.  Anyone claiming the IRA were a terrorist group motivated by religion demonstrates only that they know nothing about the IRA.

 

Edited May 10, 2025 by Sweet

[Sweet]

40 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

Read the Koran (yes , I have done it - at least the 100 first pages) and it become immediately clear that it has expansionism by any means as a core feature. No other religion is build like it.

 

Islam is also very narrowly defined rule based with little flexibility which means that 1500 years after it was founded, it is hopeless outdated in term of its rules and modus operas do, a bit like the Christianity would be if the New Testament would never have been written. i think this is societies   Following  the Koran by the book literally have very poor outcomes.

 

Fundamentalist Islamism  is a poor operating system but the issue is that the Koran isn’t written in way to make it flexible, so one is stuck in the past following it.

Exactly.  Islam is not just a religion, it’s a defacto political document based on founding their own religious state.  It has intertwines religion and politics in a way that Christianity does not.

 

And the people who get this the most, and are most critical of Islam, are former Muslims who renounced their faith.

 

Edited May 10, 2025 by Sweet

[james22]

1 hour ago, LC said:

Immigration policy should be based on some fact-based rationale.

 

So you agree we should discriminate, great.

 

What are some of the criteria we should use?

[LC]

2 minutes ago, Sweet said:

It has intertwines religion and politics in a way that Christianity does not

 

Christianity was definitely a political and imperialist force (and happy to be so) in its heydey.

 

Christian missionaries across the world are evidence enough.