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Old 11-19-2004, 05:57 AM   #64 (permalink)
zen_tom
Guest
 
Quote:
"First, I don't appreciate your insinuation that I'm prejudiced against Muslims or Arabs."
Ok, that's very noble of you, however, you then go on to say:
Quote:
"Once again, the leaders are fanatics who believe that the US is the "Great Satan" and that it is the will of God that we should all be killed."
and:
Quote:
Religious fanaticism and the belief that taking the other guy out wtih you will get you 72 virgins in the afterlife can lead people to do some pretty bad stuff.
Both of which are blatantly prejudiced (and largely false) things to say.
The issues over there are not due to religious fanaticism (though religion is a very convenient flag that both sides hold up to identify themselves) but to do with people having their homes bulldozed by a foreign population that arrived against their will 50 years ago, and in return to do with having your friends and families blown up while they sit at a cafe enjoying a sunday afternoon.

Quote:
I'm not saying that Israel should not be held accountable for their wrongdoings, but right now I'm concerned with a nation that is run by radicals who hate us and have nukes.
They only hate us because we fail to understand their predicament. We so easily fall into the trap of calling them religious fundamentalists and using those terms to explain their actions, but, having met a number of 'religious fanatics', or 'fundamentalist extremists' I know that while some of the things they say do sound a little odd sometimes, they are motivated by exactly the same things that motivate us. They don't hate us, but what they do hate is how events on the world stage are spun in the West's favour - it is a conflict, don't imagine that there is any moral high-ground.

There are of course those who's families have been killed by actions of 'Pre-Emptive Defense' or 'Counter Terrorism', or just driven from their homes by people of European origin, and perhaps it's understandable for them to hate us. If you take away their jobs and their future too, then it doesn't take much of a leap before suggesting they perform an act of grotesque revenge. All that virgin crap is the same sort of thing as the American Army's claim that all the dead soldiers are Great and Noble Heros. The truth of the matter is that soldiers are two a penny, and you have to fill them full of high-falluting psychological bullshit otherwise they wouldn't risk their lives for the crappy pay-packets they get. So Virgins, or Great Heros - Both run into the line of their own death - who's the fanatic?

Finally, imagine for a moment that you grew up in Iran instead of wherever it was that you actually grew up. Now try to imagine how you would see the situation.
 
 

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