Originally Posted by dy156

More deep thoughts by DY156:

I know there are several threads about the Chechnya tragedy, but I have a real question here. After 9/11, many said that us policies making the Islamic world were to blame for driving them to desperation and causing them to do things like that. There has been much talk about the chechen struggle for freedom from Russia, and how that could have caused the tragedy in the Breslan school. I think another question needs to be asked. Why are Islamic terrorists so evil, and cruel?
There have been plenty of revolutionary struggles for freedom, from the American Revolution to the IRA that used terrorist-like tactics. Yet until now, to my knowledge, no one has ever specifically targeted schoolchildren!
I know some might point out that Timothy McVeigh killed many children in his attack in Oklahoma City. Though I hate to even write the words, in his defense, he was targeting the federal building that was one of the best symbols for what he was trying to attack, and likely did not know there was a daycare there as well. The Chechens likely lost all support they may have (and even should have) had with this incident.

But I wouldn't ask such a broad question based on this event alone. Holding innocent hostages is one thing for a group protesting the "occupation" of their country to do. Broadcasting those hostages' beheadings is another. They kill them in the most gruesome, terrible way they can think of, and there are no better words to describe such acts than "evil" and "cruel."

I certainly don't even need to go into suicide bombers and planes into buildings too in order to justify this question, but those incidents also are acts of unimaginable cruelty to me.

I've said elsewhere that if I stereotype arabs or muslims, it is that they are doctors, based on the fact that many of the islamic people I know are rural doctors. Please don't think I'm being a racist or a biggot. Nor am I saying that Islamic people are the only bad guys out there now or in history, just that the way they protest, fight, and attempt to help their cause is so totally inhuman and foriegn to me that I don't understand it.
Is it a cultural thing? Is it hidden in or a misinterpretation of the Koran?
Just wondering.