Thread: Somali justice in action!

Originally Posted by amac211

It IS wrong. Those people are so assbackwards about stuff like that. If anyone tried that shit here, theyd be locked up in an asylum.

You do realise that all us westerners are completely wrong according to Somalis right?

Originally Posted by sycld

Well, you're acting as though democracy and liberalism are only restricted to Western nations. The fact is that nowadays the movement towards democracy and liberalism is a global movement. Nearly every nation on Earth has been pressured to at least give lip service to these ideals, and nations as diverse and far-flung as India, Japan, South Africa, Argentina, and Mali have either achieved very democratic and liberal government or are truly striving to do so.

The Middle East is the only region of the world with such uniformly strong resistance to modern ideals and such strong and cohesive movements to retain the archaic institutions and values that oppose liberalism and democracy. All this is because of the embrace of fundamentalist Islam.

As a matter of comparison, let's look at India versus Pakistan. Until 1947, India was a unified colony under the British. Thanks to that bastard Jinnah and Gandhi's willingness to bend to his demands, Pakistan became a separate republic from India especially for all of the subcontinent's Muslims. Most of India's Muslims moved up to Pakistan, and most of Pakistan's non-Muslims moved to India. It involved the displacement of 17.9 million people, the largest and fastest transfer of people in human history.

Now let's see how each of these states evolved. India is strongly democratic and strongly secular, with a great deal of respect for human rights, though of course there are large human rights problems that still persist. Nonetheless, even villagers have a sense of empowerment and use the political leverage afforded to them by the government to benefit themselves and their community. In addition, liberal thought and tolerance is radiating out from the urban centers and finding its way into the more rural parts of India. And, as always, people of all religions, both Hindu and non-Hindu alike, more or less live next to each other in peace.

On the other hand, Pakistan's movement for democracy has never really gotten off the ground. The central government cannot really exercise control over the population, much of which is militant and fundamentalist, and the western part of the state has become a safe haven for the Taliban. The central courts routinely and unselfconsciously make audacious decisions that flagrantly violate human rights with little or no explanation given except that it is what is demanded of Islam (according to them, anyways.)

Why is Pakistan, which is ~97% Muslim, so different from India, which is ~80.5% Hindu?

Actually, good points.

Europe used to be like the middle east in regards to opposition to progress, but something changed and the power of the church lessened. What was it about Europe that allowed for this? Was christianity more accomodating for progressive change than Islam? That maybe. Was it something cultural in Europe that allowed for it? Maybe. I think there might be a bit of both, but I think we can both agree that Islam doesn't come out of this looking too good. What we were essentially debating was how crippling an influence Islam was, I wasn't too sure that it was Islam alone...but...

And Dr Baltar, we are not interfering, check the news, there is nothing about a bunch of internet geeks making attempts to change muslim culture, because all we are doing is criticising. Call it caulture all you want, but it is fair to prepend it with barbaric or backwards, because the way humans are treated in some of those countries, especially women, is just horrific. It doesn't matter if Islam justifies it, all this proves that Islam is wrong when it comes to treating human beings.

Originally Posted by sycld

Why do you keep referring to Europe? In the past, what made the rest of the word any better or worse than Europe, and why do you act like it's only Europe that has become democratized and liberal?

I don't think only Europe is democratized. I mention Europe mainly because once upon a time religion had a very serious hold there, but eventually the grips of religion weakened, and over the centuries great change occured, they expanded into other parts of the world, founded America etc. I am only mentioning it because I think it is the best example of a continent/area going from derranged by religion to an area that is ruled by liberal democracies.

Many Islamic states have become derranged by their religion, in the same way Europe once was. I hope that clears that up.

Originally Posted by sycld

I'm just going to be frank--

What a silly thing to say. Though I'm certainly no great scholar of history, you're just revealing your own lack of knowledge.

As I said, the Middle Ages are undeservedly maligned. The Renaissance and all history that followed was a natural development of the Middle Ages and not a return to Classical thought.

Also, it's silly to think that Medieval Europe was somehow so much worse than the rest of the world.

I will be frank, none of us have a clue what you are even on about now. I won't waste my time with you.

And a note on the crusades, be assured that the crusaders went under the guide of holy war, they might have used religion as a justification but in reality this was all about material self betterment. The crusaders killed people in Asia minor because the crusaders wanted their land. And in the latter crusaders, all pretence of religion were thrown out of the window.