More of a danger than, say...

In reply to by stevewolock

More of a danger than, say, the white nationalist sentiments in the United States? I feel more threatened by that ideology here in America (and I'm white!), especially in the political situation right now.

I don't see Islam as a danger, but that may be because I know plenty of Muslims, and I can't begin to imagine blaming their doctrines for the actions of a few. (It's very, very, very few, by the way; 1.6 billion Muslims in the world, and maybe 30,000 of them are involved in terror organizations? That's 0.00001875%.)

I'm not sure why you dismiss the lessons of history so quickly. We certainly have plenty of evidence in history of religion being used as a political tool. It's also at work in the present day, in, for instance, the Buddhist persecution of Rohingya Muslims in Myanmar.

Religious doctrine in these situations is used by violent leaders as a tool for motivating their followers and justifying their actions. There is nothing to show it is an inspiration in and of itself.

I know you're not saying Islam is inherently bad. But even labeling it a "danger" is erroneous, considering 1.6 billion people (I think it's fair to round up here :) ) practice it without endangering anyone.

Join the conversation

Plain text

No HTML tags allowed.

Lines and paragraphs break automatically.

Web page addresses and email addresses turn into links automatically.