I think we should respect all religions (people might not know their friend is devoted to muslim or Chrisitanity etc)

[Eagle367]

JuliusHackebeil said:

Eagle367 said:

So let's go through these points. If you think islam is built to be the government,  you don't understand Islam. Ask any real scholar about Islam and they will tell you it's decentralized and doesn't mesh well with the modern state at all. Regarding sharia law, you do not seem to understand it. Then again many Muslims don't either. Sharia is supposed to be your own personal code as a Muslim, not a legal thing for society. Sharia is not one thing. It's many things to many people. The legal framework of Islam I'd called fiqh and people study it endlessly and there are variations of how they interpret law. These sorts of differences are why different sects exist. Asking Muslims about Sharia is a useless question. It's just one of these stupid things people chose to focus on much like jihad, which means to struggle and entails anything from struggling against your own personal demons to struggling against oppression. It is not holy war.

Your point about blaming Islam is a little bit confusing seeing as there are oppression and backwardness and all of that in underdeveloped and developing societies.  These societies have backwards views regardless of which religion they follow. Hell the evangelicals have such a sway in US politics and are not exactly separate from the governments in ways people pretend they are and the hindutva are bringing an extremist view of Hinduism to their government and in Myanmar, an extremist view of their religion is also being used to commit genocide against the rohingya. Point is religions are malleable and that might be a critique you can levy. Other factors determine how reactionary people are going to be. For example, Muslims in the US have more progressive values than Christians on average in the US and that is true for Canadians as well. Stability and development create progressive values. Instability and war and such stuff create reactionary ideology. Wahabism wasn't born from the golden age of Islam(because Muslims were way more progress back then) but was born when the colonial powers ravaged across the middle east. It's a new more reactionary interpretation of Islam that did not exist classically. 

Most of your other points also relate to this factor of the less developed countries having backwards values. It is the fault of a lot of societal factors but also the views of the Muslims there. And violence for mockery is wrong but the stats you show also show that a super majority of Muslims in more developed nations are against it. There have been polls that show Christians in the US are far more supportive of violence than the numbers you showed for Muslims in France and other places. With regards to women, Islam teaches about there being no superiority of men. Of course misogynists will ignore those parts.

The apostasy thing is again about interpretations. Christians used to kill people for not being part of their religion,  not just apostasy. But again, these views diminish through progress.  You showed how Afghanistan and Pakistan have such reactionary views. Have you seen the state of those countries? Afghanistan has gone through war after war since the 70s and pakistan has a huge economic problems and has been facing terrorism for decades.

As I have said before, there is nothing uniquely wrong about Islam. The problem of Islam and other religions is that they are too malleable. People can twist them to mean what they want. The things you pointed out are also not unique to Islam. None of them are. And your assertion that it's just Islam in the modern age is also not true. Most Muslims live in underdeveloped and developing countries and that leads to reactionary thinking. You can see it happen to Hinduism in India, Buddhism in Myanmar, Christianity in many African nations, east European nations and the US. What can be the key point to focus on should be the reactionary elements themselves. Islam is followed by billions and has a lot of interpretations but some are just wrong and anti human. The focus should be on those reactionary elements like wahabism, evangelicism, hindutva, etc. I have said this before but it bears repeating,  the problems you described are not unique to Islam, they are a product of instability and underdevelopment. 

I will have a more detailed answer later, but I am too curious not to ask right now:

You say that hundreds of millions of muslims wanting sharia law as the official law of their countries is not a problem, or not real?

And christians in the USA are more okay with and likely to commit violence against innocent civilians to defend Christianity? I am curious about these polls. Could you direct me to one please? Also: even if this was true - the numbers I provided about so many muslims who are okay with violence against civilians are a disturbing problem, no matter who else might also be that crazy.

And Islam does not provide a good framework for misogyony? How is it that it is such a big problem in islamic countries? Are there not countless different parts of the Qur'an that put women beneath men? Is there no connection?

And you say the apostasy thing is about interpretation. Sure. But is seems like hundreds of millions of people have a very bad interpretation of it. That is conviniently not part of Islam?

What would you think are actual problems of Islam then? Many religions have problems unique to them. What is Islams problem? Or are there none?

Way to not read what I said at all. First of all, just learn what sharia is seriously.  I wrote it out for you. It's misunderstood so damn much. It's not a damn legal framework, it's a personal moral code. The legal framework is fiqh and it's a whole damn thing all on its own. And I said Muslims in the US are less radical than Christians in the US. Read what I wrote. And yes data shows that Muslims in the US are more progressive than Christians in the US. A problem of interpretation means that there are some harmful interpretations. That's it. Did you not read the part about reactionary elements? I talked about wahabism? Did you not read what I wrote at all and just commented based on some buzz words you saw and plucked out and then some skimming around those buzz words? Seriously read what I wrote and then discuss it.

If you want specific problems related to Islam, talk to an expert in Islamic studies. There are schools of Islamic studies all across the world. You are far too ignorant of Islam to comment about problems specific to Islam. You misunderstand the basic terms as is like Sharia.