Islam - What's your view on it?

[TenEightyOne]

This presenter makes many good observations, in my opinion.

And some real turds. This is a personal question; do you actually know any Muslims or are you judging the accuracy of the presented comments on what you believe to be true from second-hand sources?

 

[W3H5]

I funny, I was just going to post that video to see what you more Islam-educated people thought of it.

I get a lot of that kind a thing flying through my YT feed but I watched that one thinking it would be reasonable but it does seem lots of anti-Islam propaganda, though I'm sure what he said can be explained one way or the other, knocking it down or supporting it, based on a person's stance towards Islam.

 

[FoRiZon]

Accidental post. Really sorry. Not in the mood discussing this honestly.

 

[ECGadget]

I myself watched one that I thought would be fairly reasonable and would be talking about why a person has issues with Islam, without all the taking things out of context etc. Unfortunately, whilst the first minute was promising it ultimately boiled down to "I hate Islam because it is violent to its very core." Um... Okay?

This chinese Imam who became a Muslim after being a Bhuddist and then a Christian actually made a fair point though. If Muslims remembered (and acted upon) what rights people have upon each other in Islam, what rights animals have and what rights even the Earth itself has over them, then far less people would be wary of Islam. For example:
The roads we walk on have the rights over us that in Islam you cannot urinate on the roads, or litter intentionally, or block the road without a proper reason, or vandalise the road. And if someone greets you on the road it is your duty to respond to them. But no videos will ever highlight any of that, which is a crucial part of Islam.

Actually another thought that comes to mind (@Touring Mars this one is related to your post ^^) is about how a small act could send a person to heaven, or even the wish of another person. Similarly not giving the due rights to others could lead you to hell. A few examples:
1) On the final day a man will be ready to go to hell. He will stand before God and will be told that heaven is ready for him. In confusion he will tell God that he did a lot of bad in the world, he didn't worship God or anything. God will respond that it was through the wish of his child that he is being admitted to heaven, because the child asked God to forgive him.
2) There will be a man who will be sent to heaven for one good deed only, and that deed was to fetch water from a well for a dog that was extremely thirsty.
3) There will be a Muslim man who has thousands of good spiritual deeds in his book, i.e Lots of worship. However, he frequently usurped the rights of other people in his community. God will ask people to queue up and tell God what was taken from them. Then a portion of that mans good deeds will be given to those people, until he has none left. Then God will say "Now you will take the bad deeds of the remainder"
As such, this man who worshipped God so much but did not value the rights of a human will have nothing but bad deeds and will be punished.

That last one highlights just how important rights are in Islam. As to the value of human life, a single act of murder is regarded as the second greatest sin in Islam (only behind the sin of Shirk) and is one of the 7 fatal sins. It is far higher up than even lying about God or the Prophets. That is how grave a sin murder is.

Now imagine that if one act of murder is that great a sin, how against Islam is a bombing?
"Whoever takes a life (unjustly), it is as though he has taken the life of all mankind. And whomever saves a life, it is as though he has saved all of humanity"
So these people killed 130 or so in Paris. That means they killed humanity over 130 times in the eyes of God. If we just take todays population that is 910 billion people they have murdered. I don't even want to think about the punishment they are set for.

 

[GBO Possum]

And some real turds. This is a personal question; do you actually know any Muslims or are you judging the accuracy of the presented comments on what you believe to be true from second-hand sources?

I have had both good and bad experiences with Muslms.

The "bad" experiences I refer to are not the the normal variety of interpersonal behaviors which we run into in our day to day living.

An example. I went to a beach resort on the island of Lombok with my family. This was a side trip across the strait from Bali, Indonesia. When we got to the hotel in Lombok, we were assigned a "guide", a very nice bloke about 6'5" and built like a tank. Later, we did the usual thing of visiting the village on foot to take a look and check out the local market. That was when I discovered that our guide was actually a body guard. It turned out that the market was staffed by men, by men who expected women to be covered up. When we got there, the feeling of unwelcomeness was palpable. The crowd (of men), gave us surly looks, with side glances at our huge body guard. I noticed that he used his size to get between us and them, and his facial expressions he gave them were, shall we say, "forceful".

We made a couple of quick purchases, and, feeling uncomfortable, we asked to go back to the hotel. The guide looked relieved and so back we walked.

This unwelcomeness was so vastly different from our many vacations in neighboring Bali, that I pressed our guide to find out what was going on. Bali is largely non-Muslim, with a tolerant religious base of a meld of Hindu and a Bali-specific religious culture. It's very gentle, and remarkably welcoming to outsiders in a totally non-evangelical way. Lombok, like the rest of Indonesia is Muslim, often described as "moderate".

These men in the market were taking exception to outsiders, especially when those outsiders are women wearing beach dresses. That's why my wife and two daughters felt threatened. That's why we needed a huge body guard. That's probably why the occupancy rate of the resort was so low, and, based on the poor level of maintenance, had been low for a long time.

We went back to Bali a day or two later to resume our vacation in a delightful environment with delightful people. Remember the Bali bombing? That was not perpetrated by the gentle, lovely Balinese. It was perpetrated by a:censored:s from another part of Indonesia.

So yes, I have experienced Muslims, and in their own environment it has been less than pleasant.

However, for any single person to project their personal experience upon the whole planet makes no sense. The sample size is too small. So what you call "second hand sources" carry a lot more weight than the experiences of just one person.

I would not claim that Muslims behave in a certain way based just upon my experiences. To be statistically valid, I need "second hand hand sources". And the world has plenty of such sources.

EDIT

I just have to add this second hand source, an actual Muslim

 

[FoRiZon]

@GBO Possum Me here and also my friends are from you-so-called "another part of Indonesia" and Im one of them. So according to you, that means i will bomb some places for fun, yes. [/s]

Lets flip a coin. My father's friend were working voluntarily on Kansas (I dont remember much the exact place). He found some people disturbed him due to the same unwelcomeness making him cant go out very often. Turns out they are from Westboro Baptist Church or something. Then he goes to California and found out most of people there are friendly. Does that means Kansas are unholy mess while California is a total safe heaven?

Its funny that you mentioned Lombok. I can name some places that indeed has a rather "uncomfortable" environments overall here, especially Aceh. But Lombok isnt one of them. There are some minority, but its kinda expected, just like any other places ever. Does that mean i will judge entire Christian in America based on Westboros? Maybe i lived on a capital here so we dont have a problem accepting others and the absolute worst happened from Moslems is basically equivalent of Westboros called Islamic front, which most people even from Moslems here disliked it. Or maybe i dont really care much about religion overall.

(Im also get sick of local jokes called foreigners only knows Bali and nothing else.)

Sad really. We arent some whacky hijinks who favourite hobby is to bomb people, stealing rights from woman, preaching extreme teachings, and whatever that is in some people (here) in mind when hearing moslems. Its generalizations at best. Say what you want about what Islam be like to yours, each people has their own faiths and opinions (or not, but you got the point). But if it suddenly becomes stereotyping people, then I just said its just pretty depressing at this point.

Terrorists like ISIS wants this. The try best to marginalize moslems in places so they desperate in acceptance, gone confused, and join ISIS as their own "safe haven". You think only moslems has these unwelcomeness. How about we also flip the coin in Myanmar by Buddhists. And many other examples i might passed on.

Thing is, when narrowing down to broad groups as religion, political ideologies, nationalists, etc consists on many people with different people. Islam, Christian, Communists, Conservatives, Americans, Indians, Romanians, etc. Generalize one of them based on small groups or anecdote is generally quite close minded. Each individual or groups have their own good and bad traits. I know you may want to be fells safe. But there is definitely more strategic ways to sort it out than just rely on basic generalization.


This is probably my longest thoughts and rare from mine.

 

[TenEightyOne]

I have had both good and bad experiences with Muslms.

The "bad" experiences I refer to are not the the normal variety of interpersonal behaviors which we run into in our day to day living.

I was cool with it up until that point, you could have been talking about pretty much any section of any society anywhere. It was disappointing to see you go on to extrapolate a tourist trap (and a pretty unpleasant one at that, from the sounds of things) to the whole of Islam, it seems, despite you pointing out that the reminder of your holiday was lovely.

Here's a question out of interest; were you paying the guide? If so, based on some experience of these things, I bet you weren't the only one...

 

[McLaren]

Westboro Baptist Church doesn't really like anybody, though. I'm sure all of Kansas would love to get rid of them.

 

[TenEightyOne]

Westboro Baptist Church doesn't really like anybody, though. I'm sure all of Kansas would love to get rid of them.

They're representative of Christian America as a whole though, right? Everything they say is backed up in their holy text, the ko-bible.

 

[novcze]

I understand how casual muslims feel about islam perception ... but what islam terrorists and islam state do is also islam and must not be ignored, because whenever peaceful majority stopped violent (or fundamental in this case) not so small minority.

 

[novcze]

They're representative of Christian America as a whole though, right? Everything they say is backed up in their holy text, the ko-bible.

Difference between christians and muslims is in organization, WBC has been denounced by The Baptist World Alliance and the Southern Baptist Convention (the two largest Baptist denominations) many times over the years. Everyone knows how good christian should be, but in the case of islam it's very 'not specific' ... is islam what your imam says? ... or everyone have their own version of islam? ... what is real islam?

 

[FoRiZon]

I understand how casual muslims feel about islam perception ... but what islam terrorists and islam state do is also islam and must not be ignored, because whenever peaceful majority stopped violent (or fundamental in this case) not so small minority.

.... The extreme Islam. If i may i can judge whole Christian in America as Westboro Baptist Church or Bhuddist as 969 Movement (Search it up).

Each large entities, not just Religious but nationalists, ideologies, etc has their own extreme individuals or group. Medias object Vocal Minorities instead of Silent Majority because obviously it contributes to their viewersip, making an info that majority will not reach or do for real. It is much very expected.

Difference between christians and muslims is in organization, WBC has been denounced by The Baptist World Alliance and the Southern Baptist Convention (the two largest Baptist denominations) many times over the years. Everyone knows how good christian should be, but in the case of islam it's very 'not specific' ... is islam what your imam says? ... or everyone have their own version of islam? ... what is real islam?

ISIS and some others has also denounced by majority of Islamic organizations everywhere and look how it still went.

I heard Christian standards in Deep South isnt the same as Metropolitan. Is Christian whatever the bishop says? Or everyone have their own version of Christian? What is real Christian?

Or hell, what is real [insert any religion, politics, nation, culture, etc]?

 

[ECGadget]

Difference between christians and muslims is in organization, WBC has been denounced by The Baptist World Alliance and the Southern Baptist Convention (the two largest Baptist denominations) many times over the years. Everyone knows how good christian should be, but in the case of islam it's very 'not specific' ... is islam what your imam says? ... or everyone have their own version of islam? ... what is real islam?

I wholly understand what you are saying here with regards to "What is real Islam". My posts in this thread have been doing my best to highlight 'real Islam', trying to break away from cultural references and ISIS agendas. I have one disagreement with @FrzGT but that is more in an actual rather a relative sense. In an actual sense there is no such thing as 'The Extreme Islam'. Reason being? Because what ISIS or the like do is against everything Islam actually stands for. In relative sense, if they are calling themselves Muslim then yes we could say 'The Extreme Islam'. But quoting what I said earlier today:

"There will be a Muslim man who has thousands of good spiritual deeds in his book, i.e Lots of worship. However, he frequently usurped the rights of other people in his community. God will ask people to queue up and tell God what was taken from them. Then a portion of that mans good deeds will be given to those people, until he has none left. Then God will say "Now you will take the bad deeds of the remainder"
As such, this man who worshipped God so much but did not value the rights of a human will have nothing but bad deeds and will be punished."

Shows just how much Islam places the value of the rights of others (the primary one the right to life for everyone), that even a person who prayed so much will have his deeds worth nothing to him, simply because he did not respect the rights of humanity. That there is a the 'real Islam'. When you see a Muslim being an upstanding citizen, that is the 'real Islam'. A Muslim who also does a bunch of spiritual things, e.g. prayers, reading the Qur'an, that is the 'real Islam'. One who goes out of his way to help an elderly person, that is 'real Islam'. Biting your tongue to prevent oneself from saying something bad in anger; loving a partner with all your heart; cleaning litter off the street; protecting an innocent person; all 'real Islam'. And quite oddly, almost all of that is exactly the same as being a top class human being. And that is what Islam is actually about, just as much as your five prayers, fasting for a month and believing in one God. Those things are just the foundations, the pillars.

I hope that provides a reasonable explanation? ^^

 

[TenEightyOne]

Difference between christians and muslims is in organization, WBC has been denounced by The Baptist World Alliance and the Southern Baptist Convention (the two largest Baptist denominations) many times over the years. Everyone knows how good christian should be, but in the case of islam it's very 'not specific' ... is islam what your imam says? ... or everyone have their own version of islam? ... what is real islam?

Just as radical Islamics are condemned by Imams across the world every day. Take a country like the USA as an example of diverse (and sometimes extremist) interpretations of christism. Churches can even have their own version of the bible to ensure that their doctrine is "the true word".

I understand all the points you're making but, once again, it's easy to point out that Islam can have extremes and ignore that it's a human trait whatever the core belief.

 

[GBO Possum]

@GBO Possum Me here and also my friends are from you-so-called "another part of Indonesia" and Im one of them. So according to you, that means i will bomb some places for fun, yes. [/s]

Lets flip a coin. My father's friend were working voluntarily on Kansas (I dont remember much the exact place). He found some people disturbed him due to the same unwelcomeness making him cant go out very often. Turns out they are from Westboro Baptist Church or something. Then he goes to California and found out most of people there are friendly. Does that means Kansas are unholy mess while California is a total safe heaven?

Its funny that you mentioned Lombok. I can name some places that indeed has a rather "uncomfortable" environments overall here, especially Aceh. But Lombok isnt one of them. There are some minority, but its kinda expected, just like any other places ever. Does that mean i will judge entire Christian in America based on Westboros? Maybe i lived on a capital here so we dont have a problem accepting others and the absolute worst happened from Moslems is basically equivalent of Westboros called Islamic front, which most people even from Moslems here disliked it. Or maybe i dont really care much about religion overall.

(Im also get sick of local jokes called foreigners only knows Bali and nothing else.)

Sad really. We arent some whacky hijinks who favourite hobby is to bomb people, stealing rights from woman, preaching extreme teachings, and whatever that is in some people (here) in mind when hearing moslems. Its generalizations at best. Say what you want about what Islam be like to yours, each people has their own faiths and opinions (or not, but you got the point). But if it suddenly becomes stereotyping people, then I just said its just pretty depressing at this point.

Terrorists like ISIS wants this. The try best to marginalize moslems in places so they desperate in acceptance, gone confused, and join ISIS as their own "safe haven". You think only moslems has these unwelcomeness. How about we also flip the coin in Myanmar by Buddhists. And many other examples i might passed on.

Thing is, when narrowing down to broad groups as religion, political ideologies, nationalists, etc consists on many people with different people. Islam, Christian, Communists, Conservatives, Americans, Indians, Romanians, etc. Generalize one of them based on small groups or anecdote is generally quite close minded. Each individual or groups have their own good and bad traits. I know you may want to be fells safe. But there is definitely more strategic ways to sort it out than just rely on basic generalization.


This is probably my longest thoughts and rare from mine.

I was cool with it up until that point, you could have been talking about pretty much any section of any society anywhere. It was disappointing to see you go on to extrapolate a tourist trap (and a pretty unpleasant one at that, from the sounds of things) to the whole of Islam, it seems, despite you pointing out that the reminder of your holiday was lovely.

Here's a question out of interest; were you paying the guide? If so, based on some experience of these things, I bet you weren't the only one...

That's why I said:-

I would not claim that Muslims behave in a certain way based just upon my experiences. To be statistically valid, I need "second hand hand sources".

I specifically did NOT extrapolate my experiences to the whole of Islam. Because my experiences are very limited as are the experiences of any individual.

Come on guys, actually read my post before you reply!

 

[Imari]

Everyone knows how good christian should be...

No, they really don't, and that's the problem. People are making it sound like Islam is unique in having extremist splinter groups, whereas the truth is that any group of humans of appreciable size has divisions. Humans are just fairly awful at agreeing with each other en masse.

If the group is large enough, it become statistically highly likely that at least one of those splinter groups is going to be very violent. There are and have been violent extremists from pretty much every major religion that I can think of.

I understand how casual muslims feel about islam perception ... but what islam terrorists and islam state do is also islam and must not be ignored, because whenever peaceful majority stopped violent (or fundamental in this case) not so small minority.

What US terrorists and the US state do is also American, and must not be ignored. I say we get rid of the US, because while it's only a few who are actually dangerous clearly the whole country is backing them.

This is a country that has a huge number of "terrorists", killing indiscriminately. See their stats on school shootings alone. And their government agents have been known to use torture, and the state maintains a huge arsenal of weapons of mass destruction, which they have been known to use.


This is the problem when you let your emotions get ahead of your reason. You want justification for the way you feel about Islam, and so you reach for whatever you can. Unfortunately, when you substitute other groups into the arguments you use, it becomes obvious how silly they are.

You're not alone in this, but you may want to think about the real reasons why Islam disturbs you. It's not because they're a threat to you.

 

[prisonermonkeys]

http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-11-...ll-help-us-conquer-it/6974758?pfm=ms#comments

 

[McLaren]

They're representative of Christian America as a whole though, right? Everything they say is backed up in their holy text, the ko-bible.

= joking.

 

[novcze]

No, they really don't, and that's the problem. People are making it sound like Islam is unique in having extremist splinter groups, whereas the truth is that any group of humans of appreciable size has divisions. Humans are just fairly awful at agreeing with each other en masse.

It seems like nobody really get my point ... christians and especially the largest catholic church have clear organization and structure and it looks like some 1.25 billion can agree on its principles. Pope is their leader and authority ... question is if there is equivalent of this in islam. Is there any unyfying authority in islam?

And I know quite good why I'm "disturbed" by islam or by any other religious group which can somehow justify their immoral actions with their holy book.

 

[TenEightyOne]

It seems like nobody really get my point ... christians and especially the largest catholic church have clear organization and structure and it looks like some 1.25 billion can agree on its principles. Pope is their leader and authority ... question is if there is equivalent of this in islam. Is there any unyfying authority in islam?

And I know quite good why I'm "disturbed" by islam or by any other religious group which can somehow justify their immoral actions with their holy book.

To continue your parallel; you already seem aware that there are deep divisions in Christianity itself and very different "flavours", generally with the most senior flavour-priest at the head of each division. Islam is the same, there are disagreements about the correct holy texts and the fundamental interpretations thereof. There are people who support differing seniorities-of-lineage, people who think it's literal, people who take it as humanist advice and people who seek to take advantage of the vulnerable to further their own wants and ends.

And I know quite good why I'm "disturbed" by islam or by any other religious group which can somehow justify their immoral actions with their holy book.

And you're perfectly entitled to be, of course. It should however go without saying that you should also be disturbed by any group perpetrating immoral actions in the name of any idea, belief or cause. As it is your posts leave me with the impression that you somehow think Islam is peculiarly bad in all regards.

 

[Imari]

It seems like nobody really get my point ... christians and especially the largest catholic church have clear organization and structure and it looks like some 1.25 billion can agree on its principles. Pope is their leader and authority ... question is if there is equivalent of this in islam. Is there any unyfying authority in islam?

It's because your point is wrong. Christians do not agree on the principles of Christianity.

If you want to narrow it down to the 1.25 billion Roman Catholics, then they agree with the other Roman Catholics on what Christianity should be. But they don't agree with Protestants, or the Orthodox Catholics, or any of the other numerous denominations within Christianity.

Like I said, every large group has divisions. The larger, the more divisions. Christianity is no exception.

Islam has large sects, which are roughly the Islamic equivalent of the large Christian sects. Like the large Christian sects, they share some views and disagree on others.

You're probably either Christian yourself, or from a Christian society. Study how divided Christianity is, and then you'll understand a lot about Islam as well. And why the answer to your question is "No, there is no grand government of Islam, just like there is no grand government of any other major religion".

And I know quite good why I'm "disturbed" by islam or by any other religious group which can somehow justify their immoral actions with their holy book.

So again, that's pretty much every religious group ever. I struggle to think of a religion that hasn't committed atrocities that they've justified by reference to their own holy texts.

Hell, people don't even need to bother to justify themselves, they can just go out and kill. I'm probably fairly safe in saying the worst atrocities are committed in the name of nationalism. Every large country and most of the small ones have committed horrendous atrocities in conflict with other groups.

Let me ask this: Do you think that the sort of people who would join an army like ISIS are the sort that would not kill just because they didn't have appropriate justification? Or would they just kill anyway?

Me, I think that people who want to do this stuff will do it one way or the other. The holy book thing is just a convenience. It makes them feel better if they can say "my book told me to", but that's ignoring the fact that they're the sort of person that actually feels OK about killing people.

 

[LeMansAid]

Let me ask this: Do you think that the sort of people who would join an army like ISIS are the sort that would not kill just because they didn't have appropriate justification? Or would they just kill anyway?

Me, I think that people who want to do this stuff will do it one way or the other. The holy book thing is just a convenience. It makes them feel better if they can say "my book told me to", but that's ignoring the fact that they're the sort of person that actually feels OK about killing people.

I'm sure there are plenty of soldiers that would not want to kill, but feel that they need to for the ultimate goal. Why shouldn't that be a possibility in a religious person?

I also note that you are separating the willingness to kill from the reason presented for killing. That's again getting very close to being able to separate someone's capacity for conviction and the application of that conviction (Kim Davis again).

For the record on that...... https://www.gtplanet.net/forum/threads/the-war-on-isis.311220/page-60

You were the one who brought up commitment.

Yes.

I think you're fishing for things that I haven't said.

Oh yeah, I was trying to set you up - and it kinda worked. I asked if you were impressed by their commitment, and you ran with commitment as a term, but adjusted "impressed" to "hard to fault".

I know I'm being a smarmy pain in the arse here, and using entrapment to an extent - but I personally accept that 1) some people are innately willing to kill, and 2) some people are willing to kill only for a cause / 3) some people have an innate ability to show conviction, and 4) some people will show conviction only for a cause.

It seems odd to me that you would emphasise number 1 over number 2, while completely refusing to accept that number 3 can exist at all.

 

[Imari]

Oh yeah, I was trying to set you up - and it kinda worked. I asked if you were impressed by their commitment, and you ran with commitment as a term, but adjusted "impressed" to "hard to fault".

Yeah, I said "commitment" because that was the question you asked. Changing the word wouldn't have answered your question, which would seem like a dick move.

I said I couldn't say I was impressed, because I'm not impressed. But that it's was hard to say that they don't have a lot of commitment, and so I tried to make that clear as well. I'm not impressed, but they are very committed.

You persist in trying to twist my words to mean something that I don't feel.

I know I'm being a smarmy pain in the arse here, and using entrapment to an extent...

Yeah, you are, and it's not pleasant. A shame, because you've been interesting to talk to on occasion, but you're going on the ignore list if all I've got to look forward to is you trying to trip me over my own words so that you can yell "Gotcha!".

 

[LeMansAid]

I intended it to be a serious conversation, with a bit of light-hearted antagonism thrown in.

The 1-4 in my post is the strictly serious bit, and stands outside of semantics.


* Note to self - remember.... po-face.

 

[novcze]

It should however go without saying that you should also be disturbed by any group perpetrating immoral actions in the name of any idea, belief or cause.

Yes I'm, however I can comprehend actions of those who are trying to achieve some real goals with their immoral actions. Going into heaven by blowing up yourself and everyone around you isn't real goal and it isn't just immoral it's totally preposterous.

As it is your posts leave me with the impression that you somehow think Islam is peculiarly bad in all regards.

All religions are equally bad, but most religions mellowed into peaceful form, which makes them no problem for me.
Even when you look at current christian extremists, which is by popular vote on this site Westbro Baptist Church, how many people they killed? ... wiki gives me one pipe bomb and damaged SUV, nobody died.

Then you have islamic crazies bombing planes, killing people everywhere around the World in the name of their god and for the glory of islam. Maybe there is something inherently wrong in islam or they are well behind the times. Do these terrorist identify themselves with any major branch of islam?

 

[TenEightyOne]

Yes I'm, however I can comprehend actions of those who are trying to achieve some real goals with their immoral actions. Going into heaven by blowing up yourself and everyone around you isn't real goal and it isn't just immoral it's totally preposterous.

Yes.

All religions are equally bad, but most religions mellowed into peaceful form, which makes them no problem for me.
Even when you look at current christian extremists, which is by popular vote on this site Westbro Baptist Church, how many people they killed? ... wiki gives me one pipe bomb and damaged SUV, nobody died.

There are Christian killers more extreme than Westboro as there are in other religions. The point of them as an example here is that they don't represent all of their religion, a comparison for ISIS that works well in some ways.

 

[Imari]

Do these terrorist identify themselves with any major branch of islam?

Yes and no. Yes, they identify. No, you probably wouldn't consider it major. They tend to be Salafi, which is a relatively small fundamentalist movement within the major Sunni denomination.

Al Qaeda, ISIS, and Boko Haram are Wahhabi, which depending on who you ask can be considered as a sub-group of Salafi, or synonymous with it.

This fundamentalist group is fairly fast growing at the moment, which is hardly a surprise. However even within the Salafi, it's not universally agreed that violence is a valid method of implementing the social reforms that they see as necessary, such as Sharia law. Some believe in only non-violent political activism, and others find any political activity to be detrimental to their true purpose of pursuing Islam.

You start to see how the true violent jihadists are a minority of a minority of a minority. Wiki says ~50-60 million Salafi, and ~5 million Wahhabi. For comparison, the Church of Latter Day Saints (the Mormons) are about ~15 million.

 

[LeMansAid]

All religions are equally bad, but most religions mellowed into peaceful form, which makes them no problem for me.

I do find that I have to catch myself sometimes when I find that I get too carried away with the "us and them". "We" (the west, the secular, the modern religious, the first world) haven't been getting it right for all that long yet really. It feels like a long time because for a lot of us it's been for most or all of ours lives that homosexuals have had some kind of equality, that women have been something other than play things for men, that a black man has been able to sit next to a white man on the bus, etc. But it's not been long at all. Edit - That's not strong enough. "We" did absolutely despicable things until recent times, and some would still want to, but are thankfully outnumbered. "We" were killing people that had done zero harm to anyone else, all based on "values".

Given a decent period of political stability and non-abusive influence from the outside, if the religious archaics can't get it right, I'll start to really point the finger (if I'm still alive). For now I'll try to hone in on more specific situations where people are afforded every opportunity to act with dignity and fairness, but don't - and condemn.

I'm suspicious of what's in and around Islam, but if I view them/that as a whole and not separate individual situations/people I can't expect myself to be viewed as an individual, free from what "my" people have done in very, very recent history.

Sometimes I'm a hypocrite, but I try not to be.

 

[novcze]

Given a decent period of political stability and non-abusive influence from the outside, if the religious archaics can't get it right, I'll start to really point the finger (if I'm still alive). For now I'll try to hone in on more specific situations where people are afforded every opportunity to act with dignity and fairness, but don't - and condemn.

I can agree with you on philosophical level but in reality I have far less faith in human nature.

 

[novcze]

Some politicians should also look more into the structure of islam, because it looks like they don't know what islam branch they support with their actions.