Dennis Campbell - 26 January 2009 11:35 PM
There is another problem, IMO, when proposing to act against a whole class of people called “Muslim,” based on the acts of a few. Seem to me by proposing that we’re behaving exactly as do religious fundamentalists of any religion, condemning masses of people based on some system of belief, or lack of it, we attach to that mass. How is that different from the Mullah who screams that all infidels should be destroyed?
When people get aroused by fear and anger, they tend to become more generalized in their perceptions, and tend to not make discriminations. That’s one implication of the expression that as you get angrier, or more frightened, you get stupider.
I know of no war or cultural conflict in which both sides did not caste the other in simplistic, non-discriminatory terms that justify some retaliatory actions against the opposing group. You kill Japs, Kikes, Sloops, rag-heads; honkies, and the list goes on, but not people. People may need to be killed, especially if and as they attack us in an effort to cause harm. But you cannot put a bullet into an ideology.
One of the conficting cultural differences between much of the western secular cultures and Islamic collectivistic cultures is that we have a tendency to judge individuals on the basis of individual behavior, not only the ideology they may espouse. Fundamentalist Islamic, or for that matter Christian, cultures tend to be collectivistic, not individualistic, and they do not tend to respect individual rights.
This thread’s original post reflects that tendency, and in so doing denies being considered “intellectual,” or “rational,” or “reasonable,” but bigoted.
Dennis
Exactly.
