brianlux
Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,292
This story is about the edge of reason where fringe lunatic savage humans turn the world into a twisted bad dream. We need to get way beyond that. There are enough good people in the world- including people of all faiths and people of undecided faiths and people who just wonder at the mystery of it all- who are doing good things in so many places and so many ways to help turn down the heat of hatred and insanity. The first step, as gimme so aptly put it, is to reign in the fringe.
This incident will be used, of course, to paint a horrible picture of anyone who is Muslim or of Islamic faith or maybe even anyone with a different shade of skin color or country of origin or whatever but that is so wrong and so totally not what will end the madness. In fact, it will make it worse.
What really pisses me off is that the fringe draw all the energy into their pointless fucking black hole. I don't mean to suggest we should not be informed or just ignore these situations- I would never say that- but it seems to me that part of the solution is to turn some more of the focus and attention to what is working. For example, we hear about Ebola in Africa and think, "well that place is fucked" but I'm more interested in hearing about what's going on with dropinthebucket.org where people are working hard to help Africans or seashepherd.org to help save the oceans or the local food bank and so many other useful groups of people who are doing good things to help create a better scenario.
"Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!" -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
This is sick as fuck..there is no excuse...there is no reason..
people want to kill..and they just find a reason...in the name of whatever God they believe..
that exucation of the policeman says it all...
those idiots need to understand they cant win ,freedom,democracy and the world as is todsy..
they will kill some innocent on n their way to their own death...
and that the best case scenario to their iditioc ideas of what life is about
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
Less than third world people being allowed into and to live their own pathetic life style in a first world country. And this ladies and gentlemen is what happens. Same as in Britain where they spit on the soldiers. Stop putting up with the crap! I'm sure the sand dune that these people crawl out of to find their way to the free land of free money, education (not) and health care makes them smile even if they don't like the way their new country is run.
May sound a little far fetched for some people. Put a wire fence around their little enclave and let them sort it out for themselves. Solves a lot of government problems and saves innoncent lives.
The poison from the poison stream caught up to you ELEVEN years ago and you floated out of here. Sept. 14, 08
I had a talk with my mom about this. My moms 60 and said that these people (fanatics) are so brainwashed. She can't understand how even a 10 year old would even know that these kinds of shit are doing MORE harm then good. She doesn't understand how people who are Muslim would do this. I showed my mom the video and she cried for the policeman. Said you don't do that to anyone. That's not just against Islam, it's against humanity. It's not easy seeing your mom cry in front of you. I think my moms been thinking about it all day cuz her moods changed. It's a sad sad world and times we're living. Such a disgrace. Not a good day that's for sure.
These people aren't Muslims. Just like the Westboro Church aren't Christians.
I don't care if they read the book and know the secret handshake. They are lunatics
That is what the world needs to voice out. The Islamic community needs to understand that the ultra-conservative take on their religion is shear lunacy. Maybe then things will change.
Jason, I agree with your statement 1000%. I wish I was a somebody so I can speak up and maybe use some of my influence. I wish I had a podium to stand on and speak my mind. Unfortunately for me, these frauds of religion would no doubt take a shot at me. Even as a Muslim, they wouldn't care cuz just like Jason said, they're NOT Muslims.
Btw...the policeman says.. "Je suis mort chef" ..means "im dead chief"....like..kinda "leave me,im dead already chief
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
And i agree with jason..they are killers that is not cos they are muslisms..they are lunitics murderers and using islam as an excuse
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
Hey thirty, I'm confused with your post about "mercy please". Are u calling all Muslims scumbags or am I reading your post wrong? Dimi made a comment about them being murders who use Islam as an excuse and your response kind of threw me for a loop.
Hey thirty, I'm confused with your post about "mercy please". Are u calling all Muslims scumbags or am I reading your post wrong? Dimi made a comment about them being murders who use Islam as an excuse and your response kind of threw me for a loop.
I was simply echoing what the fallen officer was begging for (according to what Dimi had translated and heard).
This event is really brutal, man. Horrifying might be a better word. I feel awful about it.
BB - not that it needs to be said, but still...please don't feel like you are or need to be on the defensive with us here. Your good character has shown itself time and again.
BB - not that it needs to be said, but still...please don't feel like you are or need to be on the defensive with us here. Your good character has shown itself time and again.
I do get your perspective though.
I agree
badbrains,u dont have to apologize gos u believe the same god as those murderers
you are fuckin great guy and u have nothing to do with those criminals
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
Btw...u can see at the video how well are trained,military style
the way carry the weapons and shoot one by one the bullets,shows proffecional military training
"...Dimitri...He talks to me...'.."The Ghost of Greece..".
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
0
brianlux
Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,292
Less than third world people being allowed into and to live their own pathetic life style in a first world country. And this ladies and gentlemen is what happens. Same as in Britain where they spit on the soldiers. Stop putting up with the crap! I'm sure the sand dune that these people crawl out of to find their way to the free land of free money, education (not) and health care makes them smile even if they don't like the way their new country is run.
May sound a little far fetched for some people. Put a wire fence around their little enclave and let them sort it out for themselves. Solves a lot of government problems and saves innoncent lives.
Are you not generalizing a whole group of people by calling them "less than third world people"? And how does the "sand dune that these people crawl out of" make them smile? A sand dune makes people smile? This doesn't even make sense. And seriously- what "enclave" are you suggesting we put a wire fence around? What, a whole country or just the parts where there are sand dunes? Is this kind of thinking really going to do anything to make a positive difference? Facepalm.
"Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!" -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
There are good and bad people of all and no religious affiliation. There's no doubt and after listening to Christian radio stations driving through central Texas can tell you there are some really mean wicked Christians in this country. So with that out of the way, more people/ organizations such as Charlie Hebdo need to straight out challenge all this god stuff. We need to move past all the superstitious beliefs that counter logic. I mean no disrespect, I really don't, but we need to move on.
This is horrifying and tragic and absolutely sad. In the recent events of news that I get from Germany, actions like that do not make the whole conflict easier to handle for everybody. In Germany, and probably in other countries in Europe too, a weird anti-islamic group has formed and is going on a rat hunt on a weekly basis hunting for supporters. They call themselves PEGIDA and reading about them reminds me of how the whole nazi movement started back then in Germany. This shit has to end. Why can't people live in peace with one another? Why is it necessary to kill others instead of starting a dialogue? Why can't there be religious and cultural diversity in a peaceful manner?
Please, Pearl Jam, consider a Benaroya Hall vinyl reissue!
BB - not that it needs to be said, but still...please don't feel like you are or need to be on the defensive with us here. Your good character has shown itself time and again.
I do get your perspective though.
Ya....Problem is, this is exactly what I read time and again, all over the internet - people calling on the 'good' muslims to denounce the bad ones....but for the people who require this, it's never enough.
Btw...u can see at the video how well are trained,military style
the way carry the weapons and shoot one by one the bullets,shows proffecional military training
Interesting that France has been a leader in funding, training, and directly (admittedly) arming extremist anti-government groups in Syria and Libya. It's possible these attacks were carried out using weapons and training supplied by the French government.
Also....the attacks come less than a week after France called for an end to sanctions against Russia, and a day or two after France reiterated support for Palestinian statehood and their ICC membership. Not exactly without precedent that terror attacks could be used to manipulate public opinion and political direction. Could be an attack contrived and implemented by special forces and (foreign?) intelligence agencies, against a UNSC member who keeps upsetting the international order.....or could be a contrived attack implemented by special forces and religious extremists who are pissed off about a cartoon....
Less than third world people being allowed into and to live their own pathetic life style in a first world country. And this ladies and gentlemen is what happens. Same as in Britain where they spit on the soldiers. Stop putting up with the crap! I'm sure the sand dune that these people crawl out of to find their way to the free land of free money, education (not) and health care makes them smile even if they don't like the way their new country is run.
May sound a little far fetched for some people. Put a wire fence around their little enclave and let them sort it out for themselves. Solves a lot of government problems and saves innoncent lives.
This post has no value....it adds absolutely nothing to the conversation.
0
brianlux
Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,292
There are good and bad people of all and no religious affiliation. There's no doubt and after listening to Christian radio stations driving through central Texas can tell you there are some really mean wicked Christians in this country. So with that out of the way, more people/ organizations such as Charlie Hebdo need to straight out challenge all this god stuff. We need to move past all the superstitious beliefs that counter logic. I mean no disrespect, I really don't, but we need to move on.
I get what you're saying and respect where you're going with this Callen, but is it not perhaps more important for people to not let their personal beliefs become a reason to hate others who have different beliefs rather than try to convince them there is no god? I know too many people of faith who are good people and who do good things to say that just letting go of their faith is going to make the world better. Besides, that will not happen. Humans as a whole will never ever stop believing in God. People of faith like Wendell Berry and Jim Wallace have done more good things for this planet than 99.9% of us will ever come close to so why would we spend our time trying to convince them to give up their belief in God?
"Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!" -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
Police officer killed in the video, MUSLIM. List of victims
Elsa Cayat was a psychoanalyst and columnist at Charlie Hebdo. She ran a bi-weekly column "Le Divan" (The Couch).
Mustapha Ourrad was a proof-reader at the magazine.
Michel Renaud had reportedly been invited to Charlie Hebdo as a guest editor. He was the founder of Rendez-vous de Carnet de Voyage - an art festival.
Frederic Boisseau, was a caretaker, who was in the reception when the gunmen stormed the building. He was 42.
*****Ahmed Merabet, was a Muslim police officer who was the first to arrive at the scene of the attack. Shocking footage showed one of the gunmen shooting dead the injured 42-year-old policeman as he lay on the ground injured.
Franck Brinsolaro was Charbonnier's personal bodyguard. He was 49.
There are good and bad people of all and no religious affiliation. There's no doubt and after listening to Christian radio stations driving through central Texas can tell you there are some really mean wicked Christians in this country. So with that out of the way, more people/ organizations such as Charlie Hebdo need to straight out challenge all this god stuff. We need to move past all the superstitious beliefs that counter logic. I mean no disrespect, I really don't, but we need to move on.
I get what you're saying and respect where you're going with this Callen, but is it not perhaps more important for people to not let their personal beliefs become a reason to hate others who have different beliefs rather than try to convince them there is no god? I know too many people of faith who are good people and who do good things to say that just letting go of their faith is going to make the world better. Besides, that will not happen. Humans as a whole will never ever stop believing in God. People of faith like Wendell Berry and Jim Wallace have done more good things for this planet than 99.9% of us will ever come close to so why would we spend our time trying to convince them to give up their belief in God?
Do people need to believe in God to continue to do good things?
"My brain's a good brain!"
0
brianlux
Moving through All Kinds of Terrain. Posts: 42,292
There are good and bad people of all and no religious affiliation. There's no doubt and after listening to Christian radio stations driving through central Texas can tell you there are some really mean wicked Christians in this country. So with that out of the way, more people/ organizations such as Charlie Hebdo need to straight out challenge all this god stuff. We need to move past all the superstitious beliefs that counter logic. I mean no disrespect, I really don't, but we need to move on.
I get what you're saying and respect where you're going with this Callen, but is it not perhaps more important for people to not let their personal beliefs become a reason to hate others who have different beliefs rather than try to convince them there is no god? I know too many people of faith who are good people and who do good things to say that just letting go of their faith is going to make the world better. Besides, that will not happen. Humans as a whole will never ever stop believing in God. People of faith like Wendell Berry and Jim Wallace have done more good things for this planet than 99.9% of us will ever come close to so why would we spend our time trying to convince them to give up their belief in God?
Do people need to believe in God to continue to do good things?
No, of course not.
"Pretty cookies, heart squares all around, yeah!" -Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
Sharpening Contradictions: Why al-Qaeda attacked Satirists in Paris
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment)
The horrific murder of the editor, cartoonists and other staff of the irreverent satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, along with two policemen, by terrorists in Paris was in my view a strategic strike, aiming at polarizing the French and European public. The problem for a terrorist group like al-Qaeda is that its recruitment pool is Muslims, but most Muslims are not interested in terrorism. Most Muslims are not even interested in politics, much less political Islam. France is a country of 66 million, of which about 5 million is of Muslim heritage. But in polling, only a third, less than 2 million, say that they are interested in religion. French Muslims may be the most secular Muslim-heritage population in the world (ex-Soviet ethnic Muslims often also have low rates of belief and observance). Many Muslim immigrants in the post-war period to France came as laborers and were not literate people, and their grandchildren are rather distant from Middle Eastern fundamentalism, pursuing urban cosmopolitan culture such as rap and rai. In Paris, where Muslims tend to be better educated and more religious, the vast majority reject violence and say they are loyal to France. Al-Qaeda wants to mentally colonize French Muslims, but faces a wall of disinterest. But if it can get non-Muslim French to be beastly to ethnic Muslims on the grounds that they are Muslims, it can start creating a common political identity around grievance against discrimination. This tactic is similar to the one used by Stalinists in the early 20th century. Decades ago I read an account by the philosopher Karl Popper of how he flirted with Marxism for about 6 months in 1919 when he was auditing classes at the University of Vienna. He left the group in disgust when he discovered that they were attempting to use false flag operations to provoke militant confrontations. In one of them police killed 8 socialist youth at Hörlgasse on 15 June 1919. For the unscrupulous among Bolsheviks–who would later be Stalinists– the fact that most students and workers don’t want to overthrow the business class is inconvenient, and so it seemed desirable to some of them to “sharpen the contradictions” between labor and capital. The operatives who carried out this attack exhibit signs of professional training. They spoke unaccented French, and so certainly know that they are playing into the hands of Marine LePen and the Islamophobic French Right wing. They may have been French, but they appear to have been battle hardened. This horrific murder was not a pious protest against the defamation of a religious icon. It was an attempt to provoke European society into pogroms against French Muslims, at which point al-Qaeda recruitment would suddenly exhibit some successes instead of faltering in the face of lively Beur youth culture (French Arabs playfully call themselves by this anagram). Ironically, there are reports that one of the two policemen they killed was a Muslim. Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, then led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, deployed this sort of polarization strategy successfully in Iraq, constantly attacking Shiites and their holy symbols, and provoking the ethnic cleansing of a million Sunnis from Baghdad. The polarization proceeded, with the help of various incarnations of Daesh (Arabic for ISIL or ISIS, which descends from al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia). And in the end, the brutal and genocidal strategy worked, such that Daesh was able to encompass all of Sunni Arab Iraq, which had suffered so many Shiite reprisals that they sought the umbrella of the very group that had deliberately and systematically provoked the Shiites. “Sharpening the contradictions” is the strategy of sociopaths and totalitarians, aimed at unmooring people from their ordinary insouciance and preying on them, mobilizing their energies and wealth for the perverted purposes of a self-styled great leader. The only effective response to this manipulative strategy (as Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani tried to tell the Iraqi Shiites a decade ago) is to resist the impulse to blame an entire group for the actions of a few and to refuse to carry out identity-politics reprisals. For those who require unrelated people to take responsibility for those who claim to be their co-religionists (not a demand ever made of Christians), the al-Azhar Seminary, seat of Sunni Muslim learning and fatwas, condemned the attack, as did the Arab League that comprises 22 Muslim-majority states. We have a model for response to terrorist provocation and attempts at sharpening the contradictions. It is Norway after Anders Behring Breivik committed mass murder of Norwegian leftists for being soft on Islam. The Norwegian government launched no war on terror. They tried Breivik in court as a common criminal. They remained committed to their admirable modern Norwegian values. Most of France will also remain committed to French values of the Rights of Man, which they invented. But an insular and hateful minority will take advantage of this deliberately polarizing atrocity to push their own agenda. Europe’s future depends on whether the Marine LePens are allowed to become mainstream. Extremism thrives on other people’s extremism, and is inexorably defeated by tolerance. Let me conclude by offering my profound condolences to the families, friends and fans of our murdered colleagues at Charlie Hebdo, including Stephane Charbonnier, Bernard Maris, and cartoonists Georges Wolinski Jean Cabut, aka Cabu, and Berbard Verlhac (Tignous)– and all the others. As Charbonnier, known as Charb, said, “I prefer to die standing than to live on my knees.”.
is the most serious attempt (and the most misunderstood) to describe the challenges that both (let's call it) the western civilization and the islamic world have to deal with. In the west: what's the real illuminism what's the reason and how it's not in contrast with the faith... For the islamic people: what are the grounds (into) the islamic religion and culture to condemn (finally and definitely) the violence that seems to be justified by the Koran and/or its interpretation...
Brian: Yes agree we should let people know not to hate others but for any reason including race, ethnicity, religion, SEXUAL ORIENTATION, Rights to one’s Body, etc. Also agree many do good because of religion but is the motivation well placed….to ensure they “GET IN”?! Sure hope they picked the right God or all for waste. “The right choice is Mormon”.
Many, including myself, are discriminated against due to believing in Science versus a made up book. Having a Christian boss that fishes for my agreement that we are blessed with our jobs/positions or when someone sneezes in our open cube farm and all the good Christians trying to shout over each other “God Bless You” and the first and loudest is the best Christian. Oh yeah they add the God part every time. Christians hate when people push their fragile belief system and will make one pay. Pretty tired of it hence my posts of late.
I believe that humans will eventually stop believing in the Bible, Koran and other holy texts. Many experts agree and religious people are becoming less and less in many places in the world. So to speed up the inevitable, I feel it is the right and prudent thing to say, “No there is no way that we all descended from “Adam and Eve and No Noah didn’t put all animals on a Boat and no the earth is not 6000 years old”. This should be screamed from the top of our lungs. To not do so is to go against humanity, and I believe sanity. Don’t “Pull Punches” tell the truth, it’s the right thing to do.
I know my position on this board will be received with disdain but as with Charlie Hebdo I’m okay with that. “I’d rather die standing than live on my Knees”.
Comments
This incident will be used, of course, to paint a horrible picture of anyone who is Muslim or of Islamic faith or maybe even anyone with a different shade of skin color or country of origin or whatever but that is so wrong and so totally not what will end the madness. In fact, it will make it worse.
What really pisses me off is that the fringe draw all the energy into their pointless fucking black hole. I don't mean to suggest we should not be informed or just ignore these situations- I would never say that- but it seems to me that part of the solution is to turn some more of the focus and attention to what is working. For example, we hear about Ebola in Africa and think, "well that place is fucked" but I'm more interested in hearing about what's going on with dropinthebucket.org where people are working hard to help Africans or seashepherd.org to help save the oceans or the local food bank and so many other useful groups of people who are doing good things to help create a better scenario.
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
people want to kill..and they just find a reason...in the name of whatever God they believe..
that exucation of the policeman says it all...
those idiots need to understand they cant win ,freedom,democracy and the world as is todsy..
they will kill some innocent on n their way to their own death...
and that the best case scenario to their iditioc ideas of what life is about
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
May sound a little far fetched for some people. Put a wire fence around their little enclave and let them sort it out for themselves. Solves a lot of government problems and saves innoncent lives.
The poison from the poison stream caught up to you ELEVEN years ago and you floated out of here. Sept. 14, 08
Godfather.
These people aren't Muslims. Just like the Westboro Church aren't Christians.
I don't care if they read the book and know the secret handshake. They are lunatics
That is what the world needs to voice out. The Islamic community needs to understand that the ultra-conservative take on their religion is shear lunacy. Maybe then things will change.
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
Mercy. Please.
Scumbags. Their puppet masters (the fanatics who motivated them) are scumbags too.
I was simply echoing what the fallen officer was begging for (according to what Dimi had translated and heard).
This event is really brutal, man. Horrifying might be a better word. I feel awful about it.
BB - not that it needs to be said, but still...please don't feel like you are or need to be on the defensive with us here. Your good character has shown itself time and again.
I do get your perspective though.
And thanks for clarifying Thirty.
I agree
badbrains,u dont have to apologize gos u believe the same god as those murderers
you are fuckin great guy and u have nothing to do with those criminals
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
the way carry the weapons and shoot one by one the bullets,shows proffecional military training
"..That's One Happy Fuckin Ghost.."
“..That came up on the Pillow Case...This is for the Greek, With Our Apologies.....”
Are you not generalizing a whole group of people by calling them "less than third world people"? And how does the "sand dune that these people crawl out of" make them smile? A sand dune makes people smile? This doesn't even make sense. And seriously- what "enclave" are you suggesting we put a wire fence around? What, a whole country or just the parts where there are sand dunes? Is this kind of thinking really going to do anything to make a positive difference? Facepalm.
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
Not pointless at all. I value your posts Bad Brains.
We need moderate muslims views heard.
Interesting that France has been a leader in funding, training, and directly (admittedly) arming extremist anti-government groups in Syria and Libya. It's possible these attacks were carried out using weapons and training supplied by the French government.
Also....the attacks come less than a week after France called for an end to sanctions against Russia, and a day or two after France reiterated support for Palestinian statehood and their ICC membership. Not exactly without precedent that terror attacks could be used to manipulate public opinion and political direction. Could be an attack contrived and implemented by special forces and (foreign?) intelligence agencies, against a UNSC member who keeps upsetting the international order.....or could be a contrived attack implemented by special forces and religious extremists who are pissed off about a cartoon....
This post has no value....it adds absolutely nothing to the conversation.
I get what you're saying and respect where you're going with this Callen, but is it not perhaps more important for people to not let their personal beliefs become a reason to hate others who have different beliefs rather than try to convince them there is no god? I know too many people of faith who are good people and who do good things to say that just letting go of their faith is going to make the world better. Besides, that will not happen. Humans as a whole will never ever stop believing in God. People of faith like Wendell Berry and Jim Wallace have done more good things for this planet than 99.9% of us will ever come close to so why would we spend our time trying to convince them to give up their belief in God?
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
Elsa Cayat was a psychoanalyst and columnist at Charlie Hebdo. She ran a bi-weekly column "Le Divan" (The Couch).
Mustapha Ourrad was a proof-reader at the magazine.
Michel Renaud had reportedly been invited to Charlie Hebdo as a guest editor. He was the founder of Rendez-vous de Carnet de Voyage - an art festival.
Frederic Boisseau, was a caretaker, who was in the reception when the gunmen stormed the building. He was 42.
*****Ahmed Merabet, was a Muslim police officer who was the first to arrive at the scene of the attack. Shocking footage showed one of the gunmen shooting dead the injured 42-year-old policeman as he lay on the ground injured.
Franck Brinsolaro was Charbonnier's personal bodyguard. He was 49.
Do people need to believe in God to continue to do good things?
-Eddie Vedder, "Smile"
http://www.juancole.com/2015/01/sharpening-contradictions-satirists.html
Sharpening Contradictions: Why al-Qaeda attacked Satirists in Paris
By Juan Cole | (Informed Comment)
The horrific murder of the editor, cartoonists and other staff of the irreverent satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo, along with two policemen, by terrorists in Paris was in my view a strategic strike, aiming at polarizing the French and European public.
The problem for a terrorist group like al-Qaeda is that its recruitment pool is Muslims, but most Muslims are not interested in terrorism. Most Muslims are not even interested in politics, much less political Islam. France is a country of 66 million, of which about 5 million is of Muslim heritage. But in polling, only a third, less than 2 million, say that they are interested in religion. French Muslims may be the most secular Muslim-heritage population in the world (ex-Soviet ethnic Muslims often also have low rates of belief and observance). Many Muslim immigrants in the post-war period to France came as laborers and were not literate people, and their grandchildren are rather distant from Middle Eastern fundamentalism, pursuing urban cosmopolitan culture such as rap and rai. In Paris, where Muslims tend to be better educated and more religious, the vast majority reject violence and say they are loyal to France.
Al-Qaeda wants to mentally colonize French Muslims, but faces a wall of disinterest. But if it can get non-Muslim French to be beastly to ethnic Muslims on the grounds that they are Muslims, it can start creating a common political identity around grievance against discrimination.
This tactic is similar to the one used by Stalinists in the early 20th century. Decades ago I read an account by the philosopher Karl Popper of how he flirted with Marxism for about 6 months in 1919 when he was auditing classes at the University of Vienna. He left the group in disgust when he discovered that they were attempting to use false flag operations to provoke militant confrontations. In one of them police killed 8 socialist youth at Hörlgasse on 15 June 1919. For the unscrupulous among Bolsheviks–who would later be Stalinists– the fact that most students and workers don’t want to overthrow the business class is inconvenient, and so it seemed desirable to some of them to “sharpen the contradictions” between labor and capital.
The operatives who carried out this attack exhibit signs of professional training. They spoke unaccented French, and so certainly know that they are playing into the hands of Marine LePen and the Islamophobic French Right wing. They may have been French, but they appear to have been battle hardened. This horrific murder was not a pious protest against the defamation of a religious icon. It was an attempt to provoke European society into pogroms against French Muslims, at which point al-Qaeda recruitment would suddenly exhibit some successes instead of faltering in the face of lively Beur youth culture (French Arabs playfully call themselves by this anagram). Ironically, there are reports that one of the two policemen they killed was a Muslim.
Al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia, then led by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, deployed this sort of polarization strategy successfully in Iraq, constantly attacking Shiites and their holy symbols, and provoking the ethnic cleansing of a million Sunnis from Baghdad. The polarization proceeded, with the help of various incarnations of Daesh (Arabic for ISIL or ISIS, which descends from al-Qaeda in Mesopotamia). And in the end, the brutal and genocidal strategy worked, such that Daesh was able to encompass all of Sunni Arab Iraq, which had suffered so many Shiite reprisals that they sought the umbrella of the very group that had deliberately and systematically provoked the Shiites.
“Sharpening the contradictions” is the strategy of sociopaths and totalitarians, aimed at unmooring people from their ordinary insouciance and preying on them, mobilizing their energies and wealth for the perverted purposes of a self-styled great leader.
The only effective response to this manipulative strategy (as Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani tried to tell the Iraqi Shiites a decade ago) is to resist the impulse to blame an entire group for the actions of a few and to refuse to carry out identity-politics reprisals.
For those who require unrelated people to take responsibility for those who claim to be their co-religionists (not a demand ever made of Christians), the al-Azhar Seminary, seat of Sunni Muslim learning and fatwas, condemned the attack, as did the Arab League that comprises 22 Muslim-majority states.
We have a model for response to terrorist provocation and attempts at sharpening the contradictions. It is Norway after Anders Behring Breivik committed mass murder of Norwegian leftists for being soft on Islam. The Norwegian government launched no war on terror. They tried Breivik in court as a common criminal. They remained committed to their admirable modern Norwegian values.
Most of France will also remain committed to French values of the Rights of Man, which they invented. But an insular and hateful minority will take advantage of this deliberately polarizing atrocity to push their own agenda. Europe’s future depends on whether the Marine LePens are allowed to become mainstream. Extremism thrives on other people’s extremism, and is inexorably defeated by tolerance.
Let me conclude by offering my profound condolences to the families, friends and fans of our murdered colleagues at Charlie Hebdo, including Stephane Charbonnier, Bernard Maris, and cartoonists Georges Wolinski Jean Cabut, aka Cabu, and Berbard Verlhac (Tignous)– and all the others. As Charbonnier, known as Charb, said, “I prefer to die standing than to live on my knees.”.
The last line quote is actually a Zapata quote.
http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2006/september/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20060912_university-regensburg_en.html
is the most serious attempt (and the most misunderstood) to describe the challenges that both (let's call it) the western civilization and the islamic world have to deal with. In the west: what's the real illuminism what's the reason and how it's not in contrast with the faith... For the islamic people: what are the grounds (into) the islamic religion and culture to condemn (finally and definitely) the violence that seems to be justified by the Koran and/or its interpretation...
LK
Many, including myself, are discriminated against due to believing in Science versus a made up book. Having a Christian boss that fishes for my agreement that we are blessed with our jobs/positions or when someone sneezes in our open cube farm and all the good Christians trying to shout over each other “God Bless You” and the first and loudest is the best Christian. Oh yeah they add the God part every time. Christians hate when people push their fragile belief system and will make one pay. Pretty tired of it hence my posts of late.
I believe that humans will eventually stop believing in the Bible, Koran and other holy texts. Many experts agree and religious people are becoming less and less in many places in the world. So to speed up the inevitable, I feel it is the right and prudent thing to say, “No there is no way that we all descended from “Adam and Eve and No Noah didn’t put all animals on a Boat and no the earth is not 6000 years old”. This should be screamed from the top of our lungs. To not do so is to go against humanity, and I believe sanity. Don’t “Pull Punches” tell the truth, it’s the right thing to do.
I know my position on this board will be received with disdain but as with Charlie Hebdo I’m okay with that. “I’d rather die standing than live on my Knees”.