I’m glad i don’t live in planet Fitch…I suppose I’ve not done enough legal, or otherwise, substances, to have made it to that level yet…in time…They set a prison with walls you can’t even perceive…you buy their lies….and walk…zombie like…to their arguments…I wish I was a revolutionary…with power in the air…standing shoulder to shoulder…human beings everywhere….take the march into their face…take it to the square…let them know we’re revolutionary…let them know where there…

Stop these petty arguments children…there’s a war being waged on your brain…

FIAR,

I think we’re closer to agreeing than not. I’ve favored the Iraq strategy for the very reason that it attempts to introduce a viral meme into Islam that has at least some chance of destroying the radical impulses of the religion.

Frankly, I don’t see any other way to combat radicalism at this point, as I don’t think that Americans believe that radical Islam is an existential threat to the U.S. That belief would be necessary to enact the fever dreams of the “kill all Muslims” crowd.

Myself, I do think radical Islam could be an existential threat– not this year or next or even in 10 years, but I worry about what can change in the span of two generations. It’s why I support fully your “not mutually exclusive” option of killing those “what need to be killed,” and applying the “nuance” that we conservatives supposedly don’t have to the others, through democratization and the introduction of Liberty.

But since we’re idly speculating here, what still worries me is the possibility that an idea can be in and of itself objectively dangerous, incapable of reform. As in my previous example– what is the “moderate Nazi”? The “moderate Stalinist”? We don’t even bother trying to concieve of these things– we merely wish to destroy the ideology.

I think if anything can qualify as having a history of virulence, it’s Islam. While I do wish to see it transform, and I want to believe it is possible, I still worry that it might be a fool’s errand.

Unfortunately, it’s a question largely unanswerable in the here and now, where we so desperately need that answer. So I’ll hold my breath and dive headfirst into reform, hoping that there’s no sandbar hidden in the murky green water.

Isn’t the subtext of this entire discussion that we need to use extra care with moderate Muslims, because if we don’t, we think there’s a damn good chance they’ll radicalise, and blow themselves up?

Nope. Not at all. It’s to use them. I never made any claim of radicalizing them, just causing them to go home, be quiet and stop trying. They will just give up, and even if they don’t we will thoroughly discredit them ourselves. Our own determined effort to advance the fundamentalist view of Islam will brand the reformers as heretics, and not “real Muslims” by using the bin Laden Islamic view to deconstruct them.

The ultimate result will be to negate, on our own, a potentially powerful “enemy within.” Big bonus points for the terrorists, they don’t have to worry about the threat of apostasy because we’ll relegate the reformers to insignificant status for them. Never mind the squandered opportunity to cause fundamentalist Islam to crumble from within.

But heaven knows we have to be careful with Muslims! Because one wrong ‘Die Muzzies!’ and Ahmed– devout, peace- loving Ahmed, who knows jihad is an inner struggle– might just dust off the detonator and push the red button.

Hahaha! Me, of all people, worrying about offending people? You have read my blog before, right? See also the above response. Jihad is an “inner struggle?” Not hardly. It means “kill the infidel.”

“religion of peace”

Buzz! Wrong answer. Got a bridge to sell me? Maybe some prime farmland on the Gaza Strip?

“Hijacked religion”

More like religion of hijacking. We do have the opportunity to hijack the religion ourselves though. Think of what the media does when it wants to present a minority voice as one that is overwhelmingly popular in order to sway public opinion. They selectively cherry-pick who to talk to, and how they present it to create the illusion tat it’s the overwhelming majority view.

There are some areas in life where perception really is reality. That is, if people are convinced that it is so, they will respond based on that belief. Take the Tet Offensive, for instance. It was portrayed as an abysmal failure, even though it wasn’t. Enough people believed that it was though, and it became a turning point in the Vietnam War. They’re trying to do the same thing with Iraq too.

All through time, information war, propaganda, psy-ops, whatever you wish to call it has played an important role in achieving victory. The information war is important, yet we so stubbornly refuse to engage in it. Why are we so adamantly opposed to engaging in subterfuge?

If Fundamental Islam is the problem, I see there being two ways to solve the problem. One is kill the people practicing it, and the other is to end the practice of it. I think it’s easier to undermine and reform it than to say, “sorry Abu. You convert to another religion, or I’ll have to kill you.” If we rule out reform, then there’s no third option of saying, “Or you could just practice your religion peacefully.” How could they, we ourselves made such a concerted effort to inform the world that would be apostasy. (or we will if we stay on the same path)

The plus side is that “Kill the people practicing it” and “end the practice of it” are not mutually exclusive. They can work in concert with each other. Maybe some of you Christians think that “end the practice of it” has to mean convert to Christianity, but as an atheist, I don’t see that as reasonable.

I’m not suggesting that we be naive as to the nature of the threat. I’m suggesting an internal threat to their way of life. We can thrust enlightenment and reform upon them with the pen, rather than thrust death upon them with the sword.

Wow. Just. Wow.

Umm, I think you took my comments more seriously than I intended them FIAR. Since you’ve asked the question, I answer with my stock answer: “What a4g said.”

Seriously though, I do have a few Muslim friends, and I don’t think they want to blow themselves up. They are really good guys, and I sincerely hope that no harm will ever come to them. Furthermore, if a Muslim came to my site and left a comment I agreed with, I would not wish death upon him. Similarly, if a Muslim came to my site and left a comment I disagreed with, short of overtly supporting terrorism, or being particularly trollesque, I wouldn’t wish death on him either.

On the other hand, I do believe Islam is a religion founded on violence, death, and conquest and is part of the problem. C’mon, the Prophet (piss be upon him) was a warlord. Well, I guess that’s not really a strong argument coming from a warmonger, but you get my point.

I intentionally came at your original point at a 90 degree angle, FIAR, because, as jt noted above, you had done a pretty thorough job.

I think we can agree that wishing death via the internet is probably not terribly constructive or effective, even for those holding to the “glass parking lot” theory of warfare.

But it occurred to me that we might be engaging in a bit of soft bigotry. Isn’t the subtext of this entire discussion that we need to use extra care with moderate Muslims, because if we don’t, we think there’s a damn good chance they’ll radicalise, and blow themselves up?

I’ll have to double check my history books, but it seems to me that a foundational element of Western thought is that when put to the lash, you cleave more closely to the Lord.

Our side has martyrs, too. And when ridiculed and spit upon and burned and torn apart, they opened more fully to love. I don’t recall any St. Bartholomew of the Suicide Belt.

In fact, I don’t recall any bile- spewing troll that made me do anything but laugh, or perhaps lose interest. I’ve never had that compulsion to wish death on every last Muslim because somebody without a Shift key and the inability to spell ‘you’ pushed Submit on the comments button.

But heaven knows we have to be careful with Muslims! Because one wrong ‘Die Muzzies!’ and Ahmed– devout, peace- loving Ahmed, who knows jihad is an inner struggle– might just dust off the detonator and push the red button.

If Hitler had put a unitary NaziGod at the head of his political movement, would we be trying to intellectually separate the peace- loving religion of the Wehrmacht from its more psychotic adherents?

It is our own intimate association with a truly great religion that give us a soft spot for this desert plague which has shown itself consistantly throughout history to be a destructive, evil blight upon the world.

I find it hard to write this, because I do not want to believe it, but it is hard to deny when the evidence keeps slugging me in the face.

Just as surely as they hijacked the tools created by the infrastructure of our own great society to attack us on 9/11, so they use found objects in our intellectual infrastructure– our faith in the ultimately positive nature of religion– to use against us and weaken our effectiveness.

Their “religion of peace” mantra is a crude boxcutter brought into the belly of the magnificent, delicate craft of Western thought.

Perhaps the problem we don’t wish to face, is that like us, when faced with adversity and torment, they too will cleave more closely to the Lord.

Only theirs is curiously surrounded by a swarm of flies.

get the…Muslims in positions of power…

I see what you are trying to hide here! You are trying to make it look like because I’m from Mississippi that I must be stupid, and won’t see through your facade! Well, not today, Mr! I know how to use Dictionary.com!

I’m not in denial. I believe I was the one that said

fight mercilessly, fight with “disproportionate force,” and win rapidly and decisively.

Perhaps you use a different dictionary than I do where “Mercilessly” means appeasement, but in my dictionary it doesn’t. Maybe in Missisipian “win rapidly and decisively” means something else too.

I dunno. I’m just a dumb Yankee.

Funmonger, eh? At least I’m not the one in denial about all muslims wanting to kill me.

Funmonger

You’re no fun, commentmonger!