I am one of the (apparently) few Western atheists who grew up a Christianity but who is not bigoted against it. I would never say that Christianity is "worse" than Islam.
Or rather, I'm should say instead that I for one am going to refrain from comparing and ranking religions based on how "bad" or "good" they are.
But I will qualify that by saying... there's just something different about Islam when compared to the modern forms of other religions, and I don't know if it's merely the contemporary Islamic culture or if it's something inherent to the religion.
Yeah, I don't buy this argument for a number of reasons.
Let me address the argument as commonly stated: "Islam is in its 'medieval' phase, just as Christianity was some 500+ years ago."
First of all, the Middle Ages are undeservedly maligned, seeing as the true roots of Western civilization came out of the Middle Ages and not any earlier period of time, and the developments of the Renaissance were just a natural off-growth of Medieval thought and not sudden and disjointed return to Classical thought whatsoever as some people have tried to revise history to reflect.
Secondly, Islam is not a new religion. It is around 1300 years old, and unlike Christianity, it did not take nearly as long for Islam to mature and gain hegemony.
Finally, humanization has been a global force and liberty has spread throughout the globe. Its adoption has not been merely national or even regional. All nations and regions have tried to resist it to larger or lesser degrees, and its influence is felt to different degrees in different places, but I would argue that you can find the strongest holdouts in terms of resisting humanization and liberalism for any other reason aside from pure greed or tyranny in Islamic nations. Even in liberal nations, and even among many (though not all) of the more educated followers, Muslims vigorously resist adoption of more moderate forms of their religion, unlike followers of any other religion. Why is this? I can't help but believe that there is something different about Islam, and again I cannot tell if it is something to do with simply its contemporary culture or if it's something intrinsic to the religion.
I am not saying it is in its medieval stage, I am comparing it to what european christians were like many centuries ago. You put the argument as if I was suggesting some kind of natural cycle of things, I am not. Back then christians were very, very opposed to "moderate" forms of religion, often to the extent of murder, just like some muslims in the present day. The middle east is largly backwards, like Europe used to be. I don't think there is anything especially different about Islam, freedom of thought managed to battle it out and I suppose win in Europe, such things haven't happened to the same extent in the Middle East and I don't think Islam as it is causes this soley. I think if christianity was adopted in such regions and all else remained the same, it would still be a backwards place with insane crimes being commited in gods name.
America is so good at criticising and destroying a culture that is thousands of years older than she is.
Westerners like ourselves cannot judge a culture like this which has completely different values.
Sure we think it's wrong.
You really should study your history more...
Here's a starter.
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Have fun!
I'm not talking in numbers, I'm talking in barbaricity.
If Islam had the POWER to crusade the western world, do you honestly think that they would pass that chance by in favor of greater peace?
The crusades killed people for being of opposing relegious belief, fabricated offenses, and for minor offenses.
Islam is killing people of opposing relegious belief, for fabricated offenses and for miniscule offenses, on top of killing people for the way they dress.
Tomatoes and Oranges bro, but when it comes down to it, they're both acidic as fuck.
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