Sorry to obsess on the subject but I just keep seeing these howlers by the professional journalists who we are told are so essential for democracy/social justice/world rotation/whatever. The latest giggler comes from Ed Pilkington writing in the Guardian:
There is also evidence that Hasan purchased a high-powered pistol three weeks ago as well as several high-capacity ammunition rounds that would allow him to continue firing without reloading.
Well… a 5.7mm pistol round is kind of low-powered really, at least in terms of ‘stopping power’ and I suspect the main reason that traitorous Muslim creep at Fort Hood killed so many people was they were defenceless and thus died from multiple point blank shots… therefore I can well believe he purchased several high-capacity magazines… you know, the sticky-down bits that hold the “ammunition rounds” (presumably as opposed to “newspaper rounds” or “doctor’s rounds”)… hehehe…. and I assume he got several so that he could reload quickly during his shooting spree.
It seems a crime reporter writing for a ‘quality newspaper’ does not need to know even the most rudimentary technical terms when describing a firearm used in a crime. The fact the editor of the Guardian lets a journalist make a ass of himself writing about something they obviously both know nothing about tells you a great deal about the state of the ‘indispensable’ news media.
One more time: ‘journalism’ is the craft of writing entertaining filler to go between the ads. What you’ve cited entertains and fills space, so it’s good journalism.
“Traitorous Muslim creep” is quite right, and the PC brigade whose diktat prevented the military from booting him about, or at least keeping him at arms length, have blood on their hands too.
Surely profiling likely assassins like this one could have been done. But of course that would have been discriminatory.
“Journalists” also have a bad habit of calling anything with armour a “tank”. AK-47s are called “machine guns”. I have seen a revolver described as “semi-automatic”.
I doubt anyone working at the Guardian has ever seen a weapon, let alone fired one.
What I found ironic was that he was a psychiatrist. Was he in charge of recruitment? (These soldiers are psychos, these are good people). How many recruits will need to be re-evaluated now?
I guess chuckling beats sighing in despair. (Reference Perry’s Ignorance is Bliss post).
I’m begining to think we all live in Hamlen.
I have actually attended gun ranges several times, fired various weapons on ranges and on my father’s farm, and took a 4-day defensive handgun course at Frontsight, Nevada, back in the early ‘Noughties. Any time I mention this to someone here in London, I either get a slightly furtive “Cool!” reaction or a look of mild distaste.
The ignorance of how to use firearms, of what they are and more importantly, what they are not, is part of the growing infantilisation of our society. It is an entirely deliberate process.
Shouldn’t that be ‘quality’ ‘newspaper’?
And this, I suppose, is performative writing at its best: “writing about something they obviously both no nothing about” 🙂
Ayrdale: I had similar thoughts at first, but the truth is that in order to do what he did he didn’t have to be recruited. Yes, he would have more likely killed a bunch of civilians rather than soldiers – is the difference so important? You may have had a point if a treacherous Muslim like him was in a position to access sensitive information and to pass it to AQ or something.
All that said, I wonder if they recruit self-professed communists (are there any left BTW?) or neo-nazis.
Back OT, I think it was Sunfish who said that the guy most likely purchased the weapon privately?
Obviously, if the Klinton era ban on high capacity rounds, sorry, magazines was still in place, this would never have taken place…
Clearly this mook was as mad as box of frogs, and should not have been in the militrary at all. However, the fact that he was a Muslim rendered him fireproof. Can you imagine the lawsuits if the army had tried to can him? Strike another 13 corpses down to political correctness and moral cowardice.
John, sorry, but I still fail to see how his being in the military has to do with any of this. What am I missing?
I could not agree more. And yet when I mention the fact that it’s a deliberate process to others I’m usually met with expressions normally reserved for a flat-earther.
He was not mad. He was just a run of the mill Jihadi. Good stuff on this from Daniel Pipes and Raymond Ibrahim.
Alisa:
He should not have been in the army because he was a fairly obvious crackpot jihadist, who took little care to hide his views. In these PC times, it seems that is not enough to get you advised to sek another career path.
John K: sure, but I didn’t ask why he shouldn’t have been in the army (I agree he shouldn’t have, he shouldn’t have been in the postal service either – not that he was, AFAIK. In fact he should have been locked away or expatriated to Saudi Arabia long ago). My question was how is this relevant to the shooting.
Alisa:
I guess it’s relevant because if he hadn’t been in the army, he wouldn’t have been able to get onto the base. It’s also relevant in a wider sense: how many jihadists are there in the US military, secure in the knowledge that being a Muslim means no-one dares to challenge them for fear of some sort of lawsuit?
Well yes, like I said, if they have access to sensitive info or other things like that. Seriously, I do agree that people like him shouldn’t be in the army, but it has nothing to do with the shooting. Regarding him getting into the base, again, if he were a civilian he would have done it in a post office and killed just as many people. The only difference would have been that the victims would have been civilian as well – is this difference really material?
I agree he could have killed as many people in a post office, but it is nonetheless disturbing that jihadis should be more or less untouchable in the US forces.
Of course, if he had tried this in the nearby town of Killeen, he’d have been shot pretty quick; unlike on the army base, the local Texans are not disarmed.
Good point and very disturbing.
You dont get to be a Major in the US Army by being an obvious crackpot jihadist. At least, I sure hope not. It is tempting to grumble about the foolishness of keeping this guy in uniform, but, I suspect the army needs a few arabic speakers about, so, maybe there is much more to this than what we have heard so far?
A few thoughts on Darryl’s post:
1) I guess that depends upon how “obvious” a jihadist crackpot he was. Word is getting out now about his extremist statements, but how public were they? Would the Army necessarily have had any knowledge of them?
2) On that same point, perhaps the Army did have some inkling that he was unstable. After all, this is a man who, after 20 years in the Army, is only an O-4. Why was he not at least a Lt. Colonel by that time? What blocked his promotion?
3) The Army does indeed need Arabic speakers, but I don’t find it at all obvious that it needs them in the ranks of its physicians. If its Arabic speakers are not on the ground in Iraq, shouldn’t they at least be in Intelligence, translating documents and transcribing intercepted messages, or training other interpreters? What’s the value of having an Arabic-speaking psychologist unless he’s helping to interrogate detainees at Guantanamo?
Speaking for all Muslims, it is seriously and unnecessarily offensive to read phrases such as “traitorous Muslim creep” and “treacherous Muslim” as are scattered about in this discussion.
Far from being “treacherous”, this man will – in all probability – have been a person of high integrity, intensely loyal, of sound mind (a necessary quality for a military psychiatrist) and acting according to his beliefs and principles. Calling him names and slandering his religion will not alter those things and abrogates the responsibility of the military for what happened.
Nidal Hassan should never have been allowed to join the military in the first place because, as a good Muslim, it would have placed him in a cruelly untenable situation that I would suggest could only have eventuated in one sort of outcome (i.e., what eventually happened) – jihad. It is certainly not Nidal’s fault that the military decided to accept him into the military. Maybe it was a deliberate and sinister experiment – we will probably never be told.
A very good explanation for his behaviors and the Muslim religious POV is given by Anwar Alawlaki:
(website: anwar-alawlaki.c-o-m)
Ranting and railing against Muslims or Islam and the Muslim religious POV in general is unlikely to alter the simple truth underlying Anwar’s explanation – that all Muslims are brothers.
Well, please tell me if I am becoming an annoyance, but I still don’t see how his being in the military is relevant to any of this. As far as I can see, his being part of the military has inflicted no more damage than his presence in a Wal-Mart would have if he did the shooting there. Should jihadis be banned from entering Wal-Marts? Well, like I said, if they can be identified early on (a big if, as Laird rightly points out), then they should be banned from normal society all together. There is nothing special about the military in that regard, unless he was in a position to compromise sensitive information or to do blow up some strategic facility to which civilians have no access, which I don’t think was the case here. This is a man who went out, bought a weapon and shot people around him, which is in no way different from that university student a year or so ago – only that one wasn’t a Muslim, just a regular nut-job.
May I remind you that in the US joining the military is voluntary (if you are familiar with this concept), so your hero actually put himself in that untenable situation?
I most certainly hope so, although I wouldn’t describe it as ‘unnecessary’.
Alia: Please focus on the subject. I wonder if, in your eagerness to compound the offensiveness, you don’t seem to miss the point – two points actually. One is the point about the relevance of the military (read my comment above) and the other point is about the simple truth of all Muslims being brothers (in the quote from Anwar’s blog). A Muslim could not stand by and watch his brothers being murdered by the kafir and still be able to call himself a Muslim.
Yes, of course Nidal elected independently and voluntarily (one presumes) to join the military, but, if he had not been blockquote>allowed into the military in the first place, then this jihad could have been avoided. Maybe the military accept all applicants, regardless? I wouldn’t know what their selection process involves.
Either way, the military would certainly have already had a
good understanding of this – a “Muslim dilemma” – and that is why I wondered if it had been some kind of cruel experiment – a “live test” – to enlist Nidal. If an experiment, then , the killed and injured personnel were merely “collateral damage” and expendable – as were the US military personnel who were forced to view the atom bomb tests.
Firstly you don’t “speak for all Muslims”, you just speak for the ones who agree with you.
Unnecessarily offensive to whom? The man was not conscripted, he volunteered to join the US military (ergo he is a traitor) and he committed his murders shouting “Allah Akhbar”, so his treachery was motivated by his religion (and from my previous comments to you on this blog, you know what I think of religion in general and yours in particular)… so “traitorous Muslim” is an accurate description. And as I am on the other side, I regard him as a creep.
Now as it happens, there are thousands of self-described muslims in the US military (i.e. people who rather value their country over their religion), so there is no reason not to allow US muslims into the military unless they show signs of being fundamentalist wackjobs, which most are not.
On subject and ignoring what you refer to except those “self-described Muslims” in the military: as I said,
A true muslim will have – cannot avoid having – the Muslim dilemma, if he enlists in the military in these days. It is that dilemma that probably broke Nidal and made him take jihad. He probably could not live with himself in that state any longer, and thus Jihad was the only thing to do. He was a true Muslim at that point – even though he might not have been before. It would have been a deliberate act, carried out by someone sound in mind and body. You may believe him to be insane if your generous liberal tendencies prefer that term, but that grossly underestimates the agonies he would have gone through – fighting against temptation before before finally following the word of Allah.
No doubt there are many “self-described Muslims” in the military who are not – in all truth – true Muslims. This proves nothing except that some Muslims are not always true to their faith. Allah has already told us what will happen to them if they stay in that condition.
Then again, though these latter might not experience the Muslim dilemma initially, who is to say but that – like Nidal – the word of Allah might not give them that experience at some later stage? Wise are the ways of Allah.
So, in other words, he acted not from being bat-shit crazy but instead he chose to commit a conscious act of evil?
I agree.
Slander?
I suspect that I missed the part where you pointed out any statements in either of the Ft Hood threads that were factually untrue. Could you be so good as to remind me?
The 5.7mm cartridge is essentially a .22 bullet fired at great velocity, so technically-speaking it IS a “high-powered” cartridge.
It’s just not very effective on humans unless it lands in a mortal spot — which makes the issue moot, because a mortal spot makes the bullet choice irrelevant.
Where Hasan got kills, they were because of major damage done to vital organs. But he wounded far more than he killed — his captor, the hero lady cop, was shot FOUR TIMES in her legs and still survived (ATOW) despite massive blood loss.
Four shots to the legs with a .45 ACP would have resulted in a quick death from blood loss because the .45 bullet leaves a hole more than twice the size of a .22 (because of wound ballistics and tissue destruction).
The 5.7mm cartridge may indeed be “high-powered”: but in America you’re not allowed to hunt anything more than varmints with them — which tells the story right there.
“Nidal Hassan should never have been allowed to join the military in the first place because, as a good Muslim, it would have placed him in a cruelly untenable situation that I would suggest could only have eventuated in one sort of outcome (i.e., what eventually happened) – jihad.”
Aside from the fact that Hassan’s joining the Army was totally voluntary (which has already been discussed), if this is a true statement (i.e., if serving in the U.S. military would necessarily create an irreconcilable moral conflict for any “good Muslim”), then the obvious and inescapable conclusion is that no Muslim should ever be permitted to enlist (unless he were to provide some sort of oath renouncing Islam). Is that the result NJ Dawood is seeking? (It works for me.)
“acting according to his beliefs and principles”
I’m not sure what is the best word to describe murdering strangers who are peacefully going about their business in Texas (not in Iraq or Afghanistan), but “principles” isn’t one that springs to mind. If Hassan’s actions are truly reflective of Muslim “principles” then all Muslims should be deported today.
NJDawood, why didn’t he just resign from the military? It’s not as though you have to sign up for life. Why didn’t he take the equally-honourable road of quitting from a job he didn’t like? That would have resolved his dilemma, and he could then have emigrated to Afghan, and joined the jihadis openly and honestly, instead of betraying the trust of his fellow soldiers. Or are Muslims only good muslims if they kill others by treachery?
And why do you think of the Taliban as the good guys? What is wrong with a democratic Afgani government?
Which makes them perfect to enlist in order to present people who want to be self-described Muslims with an alternative to your view of what it means to be a Muslim.
If it was a jihad by Nidal, as would seem reasonable to suppose, then it was categorically and by definition not an act of evil – it would be a holy jihad. So the statement above would be incorrect in that regard.
“(The utterance or spreading of) a false or malicious statement about a person, intended to injure or defame; a false and defamatory oral statement; the act or offence of making such a statement.)”
The use of and acceptance of such slander (“Islamophobia” is another name for it) is an indication as to why Muslims in the US will need protection from hate speech and hostile actions, following this incident. People who tolerate this sort of thing would be quite happy to see Islam made into a forbidden religion, regardless of US statutory freedoms. The Koran warns us of such cynicism of the kafir.
To state the obvious, because he is a fundamentalist muslim, i.e. he is on the other side. No mystery there really.
“A true muslim will have – cannot avoid having – the Muslim dilemma, if he enlists in the military in these days. It is that dilemma that probably broke Nidal and made him take jihad. He probably could not live with himself in that state any longer, and thus Jihad was the only thing to do.”
Accepting as true the first two sentences and the first half of the third, I do not accept the conclusion. Going on a killing rampage was not “the only thing to do.” Hassan could simply have resigned his commission. Failing that (and it’s possible that the Army doesn’t permit officers to resign their commissions immediately prior to deployment), he could have refused to obey the orders and accepted the consequences (probably a brief period of incarceration followed by a bad-conduct discharge). Either course of action would have resolved the alleged moral dilemma, and is what a man of actual principle would have done.
“People who tolerate this sort of thing would be quite happy to see Islam made into a forbidden religion, regardless of US statutory freedoms.”
And Muslims who approve of the slaughter of non-Muslims in the name of their foul religion are the reason otherwise tolerant Americans will be driven to see “Islam made into a forbidden religion.” You’re bringing it on yourself, buddy. Don’t be surprised when you reap the whirlwind.
Life, no.
However, part of getting DoD to pay for his medical school was a commitment to seven years of active duty followed by another nine of active guard or reserve. That’s assuming that he had a bachelor’s already on entry. Leaving early would involve prosecution for desertion and/or dishonorable discharge.[1]
NJ Dawood:
So, the unprovoked murder of thirteen unarmed people is not an act of evil in your delusional little world?
In the eight years since the unprovoked mass murder of 3000 people by your co-religionists, how many acts of retaliation against innocent Muslims have been reported in the United States?
(Hint: That’s a real question with a real answer.)
BTW, still waiting for any response as to what false statements of fact were made (other than by you) in either of the two SI Ft. Hood threads.
[1] In the US, either would have the same effect upon his post-service employment prospects as a felony conviction from a civilian court. He could apply for conscientious-objector status, but applications made within a few months of one’s first overseas deployment tend to be viewed skeptically.
Some interesting questions and points there, but all pretty loaded, or maybe people simply preferring to remain in ignorance.
In answer/response to some:
* Nidal was apparently trying to resign, but was not being permitted to. In any event, he probably would have felt compelled – as a true Muslim at that point – not to run from the dilemma once he experienced it. He certainly confronted it. His Islamic principles for action might not have been the same as yours, but they would have been principles nevertheless.
* I never said that “the Taliban are the good guys”. I never mentioned the Taliban or that I was “on the side of the Taliban”. However, since they have been mentioned by yourselves: Allah is on the side of all those who submit to Islam. Therefore, if they have submitted to Islam, then it is Allah who would have chosen the Taliban to do jihad. I do not understand why they in particular would have been chosen. The ways of Allah are mysterious and cannot be understood by us.
* “…an alternative to your view of what it means to be a Muslim.”. Wrong. It is not “my view”. My view is worthless. It is Allah’s stated view in the Koran. Nidal would have understood the truth of this also.
* Islam will never be made into a fobiddden religion because, even though the kafirs are corrupt, immoral and godless, they need Islam – it is Islam’s duty – to save their souls if possible. For that reason, Allah tells us that Islam must be dominant. However, not all the kafirs can be or want to be saved.
Well of course you think that, I would expect nothing less.
But as you already know, I regard the whole ‘god’ thing as a psychological artifice, a delusion, and all I care about is weakening people who have totalitarian world views (such as yourself) and encouraging self-described muslims (who you do not regard as “real” muslims of course) to occupy the popular “mind space” that you hope your views (sorry, “Allah’s views”) to occupy. I want to see gradually shifted from being a totalitarian ideology into being a less harmful cultural nicknack (i.e. rather like the way Christianity has gone).
You just mentioned submitting to the will of God, whom you call Allah.
Do you submit to the will of Allah? If God is powerful enough to decide battles, then all wars between muslims and nonmuslims are His to decide- so when Israel wins, this must mean that Allah wants them to.
Do you submit to this?
Similarly, Allah must want Israel to have Jerusalem, or they couldn’t have taken the city. Do you submit to Allah’s will in this?
Also, can you resolve this paradox? The Koran claims that Allah’s will cannot be chained, even by Allah, AND claims that the Koran is the last word on Allah’s will, and Mohammed is the seal of the Prophets. Only one of these can be true. If Allah’s will is random, then the Koran cannot be the last word, since Allah will have a different command tomorrow. If the Koran is the final word, then Allah is binding Himself to never alter his revealed will.
Which of these is true, or is there a way out that we haven’t seen?
Sunfish: Ignoring your jibes, I do not know the answer to your question, but you apparently think you do, so could you please stop messing about and do us all the privilege of your answer?
However, as a student of statistics, I would say that statistics are often unreliable. There are two aspects here that I can comment on:
1. Reported incidents: reported cases of a crime do not provide any indication of the relative size size of the iceberg. What I do know from fist-hand accounts is that the vast majority of Muslims are concerned not to be see complaining (i.e., gagged by fear of further retaliation) and so most of the retaliatory acts will have gone unreported.
2. Classification of reported incidents: the deliberate mis-classification of crimes so as to provide the misleading picture of a less significant crime-rate is a common practice by politically correct, liberal officials in in Western societies.
Perry de Havilland: fine; want whatever you want. The Koran tells us “Therefore, deal calmly with the kafirs and leave them alone for a while.” I shall not be drawn into arguments about the “rightness” of the Koran. It is ALL true and could not be otherwise, as it is the undoubted word of Allah, given to us by the Prophet (pbuh), to save our souls.
Nuke Gray: ditto.
Nidal, as a good Muslim, would have understood all of this.
None. As in, ‘zero.’
Forgive me for being direct: bullshit.
Absence of evidence is not evidence of absence. A legitimate student of statistics would know this.
The same politically-correct scrotes who want to be seen to take ‘hate crimes’ seriously?
Sunfish: Thank you for confirming your ignorance of the limitations of reported statistics in societal crimes and your ignorance of the acknowledged practice of (usually) deliberate mis-classification of statistics that are non-PC.
I suspect that you might have been flunked by my statistics professor for your naive credulity alone.
Let’s not let the facts get in the way of a good story, eh? Pretend it never happens.
Mind you though, that would not be such a popular approach to the estimated hundreds/thousands of rapes that go unreported each year in the US due to fear variously of:
* the police investigatory process;
* family and societal repercussions;
* retaliation from the offender(s).
You are using circular reasoning, therefore you cannot answer the questions I posed. How right Jesus was that there would be false prophets after him!If you Mohammedans can’t stand criticism, you shouldn’t dish it out.
I see no value in leaving you guys alone however. Islam (at least your version) needs to be attacked culturally, politically and when needed, militarily.
Very sensible. There can be no possible meeting of the minds vis a vis what I regard as superstitious gibberish scribled by a dark ages barbarian, but which you regard as the literal word of a god that I see as a preposterous mental construct… not much room for useful discourse there really, hahaha.
Yep. I have absolutely no useful knowledge about any aspect of criminal justice or public safety in the United States.
Still waiting for the false statements of fact that led you to use the word ‘slander’ a few hours ago.
Sunfish: My reply above provided a definition of slander for you. Some of what has been said in these and other discussions in this discussion forum could certainly be considered “false or malicious” about Islam. It even seems anti-racial and hate-filled in some cases – e.g., the suggestion to deport all true Muslims.
You can go look-see for examples yourself. I’m not going to do it for you. You will find whatever you want to find. Your evidence of anything might be as ephemeral as your supposed knowledge of statistics.
i have to ask…is this NJ real? is it some sort of elaborate flame or a real life brain washed drone of some hysterical cleric?
“It even seems anti-racial and hate-filled in some cases – e.g., the suggestion to deport all true Muslims.”
how can it be hate filled…you just said all true muslims can not be reconciled to non-believers. in a particularly tough spot, you said its understandable for a muslim of conflicted conscience to deceive and massacre. yet, it is hate filled to suggest deportation of true muslims? my word, you have conflicted and nutty messages to bestow upon us. that is why i can’t figure out if you are real or some elaborate hoax.
NJDawood, What do you mean, ‘undoubted’ word of Allah? I doubt it, very much! Your blind assertion that it is true is insufficient.
Yes, i suspect NJ is a real person. Just as Superman has to battle Luthor, so evil tries to attack goodness and openness. We should probably expect at least one such person, if not more. As a preacher once said, “If I haven’t riled someone, my sermons must be too mild!”
Let’s just take it as a compliment that we’re riling people enough for them to respond.
My comment has been misunderstood, I think. I said ‘obvious crackpot jihadi’ because someone else used that phrase in the thread, early on. I dont think we have enough information yet to say he was any of those things, though it is looking bad for him from the ‘religion of peace’ motivational standpoint.
NJ’s wacky theory of possible army experimentation and expendable personnel is indeed a laugh riot which also demonstrates exactly what is wrong with the ilk who take his viewpoint.
All of which is off the topic…
They’ve got records of him contacting al qaeda over the internet and one of his imams had previously worked with two of the 9/11 hijackers (was investigated and released on that), who is now hiding in Yemen. Apparently a lot of his fellow soldiers had filed complaints about his overt anti-American, pro-jihadi statements in the past. I suspect it will come out that he received specific instructions over this as a means of destroying unit effectiveness in Afghanistan pre-deployment.
Alisa:
I find it disturbing that a man with seemingly overt jihadist views should, it seems, be untouchable in the US military for fear of “islamophobia” or some such career damaging accusation. This particular lunatic was a psychiatrist with a pistol, but what if the next one has access to a tank or an F16? That’s why I don’t want these nuts in the military.
By the way, this Dawood fellow must be a stooge surely? Can anyone really be so stupid?
When it comes to what constitutes a ‘good’ Muslim: if it involves murdering people in the name of your religion because you think your holy book tells you to, then the only ‘good’ Muslim is a dead Muslim. Most Muslims apparently do not believe that to be the case (or at least do not overtly act as if they do) so they get to live. But go the Jihadi route and the quicker you get perforated with an automatic rifle or converted into a smear of bone-flecked jam by a JDAM the better.
Speaking for all true Muslims, I believe it is munkar to blow up innocent women and children – and those who support such things are not true Muslims …
Speaking for all true Muslims, I believe it is munkar to pick and choose which explicit Words of Allah , by such transparent manipulations as “these words were written down later” – how convenient for the murderous who pretend to true belief – and those who support such things are not true Muslims …
NJ.Dawood would have us believe that *he* can interpret the Words of Allah, like a prophet – even as he professes to belief in Islam, which holds that Mohammed (pbuh) is the final true Prophet …
NJ.Dawood holds that dhimmi are kaffir – even though that contradicts the Words of the Compassionate and the Merciful … he sounds more like a follower of Iblees …
ap: yes, NJ is very much real, just like the shooter and the 19 murderous bastards on 9/11, and the rest of their ilk. These people actually believe this crap, and we better believe they do.
Laird: you are very much mistaken. NJ is not an unprincipled individual, in fact, he adheres to some very clear principles. The same goes for the murderer. They are completely foreign to you and me (for example, his definition of ‘evil’ is quite the opposite of yours or mine), but they are his principles.
NJ: I understand very well everything you say about your and that murderous treacherous Muslim’s in TX version of Islam, and I take it very seriously indeed. I also tend to agree with you that the guy most likely is not insane. This is exactly the reason why this version of Islam is very offensive to me, and why I see it as my moral duty to use every opportunity to offend it and its adherents.
John K, I already agreed with you on this: regardless of this particular incident, people like this shouldn’t be in the military. Problem is, how do you make that happen? Are you going to ban all Muslims? I don’t think it’s a good idea, but I could be wrong. It may be that in this case, if in fact it is true that the guy was communicating with AQ, it was indeed political correctness that made the military close its eyes and recruit him anyway, or maybe they aren’t even checking for such activity – I have no idea. But absent any suspicious activity, how do you make sure that jihadis or adherents of other totalitarian ideologies do not get into the military, or indeed into normal society in general? I mean, really: we have a Marxist in the White House, and people worry about Muslims in the military? Wake up.
NJ:
If you wish to claim that a truthful or factually correct statement can be consider slander, then I reject your definition without further discussion. Slander isn’t slander unless the statement is factually false.
Still waiting for examples of what false statements of facts anybody may have made that you wish to offer up as evidence of slander. And still waiting for examples of acts of violence against Muslims in the US in retaliation for 9-11-01. If they exist in anything other than the febrile imagination of a CAIR press flack, then surely you should be able to find some.
I don’t know where race comes into the discussion. “Muslim” isn’t a race, and neither is “Arab.”
Unless you’re lying. Surely, you wouldn’t do that, would you?
BTW, out of curiosity, since you guys claim to not be polytheists, why do you worship Muhammad when he’s not God?
Sunfish: they are not worshiping Muhammad, they see him as both a prophet and a person of exemplary virtue – after all he did “marry” a 9-year old child, while killing and pillaging lots of folks he didn’t like. This whole thing really does have an internal logic, like it or not.
From the pedant’s corner, technically any defamatory post here is “libel” (slander is oral defamation, but shouting at one’s computer screen doesn’t count). And since Mr. Dawood chose my “deport all ‘true’ Muslims” remark as his sole exemplar, I would like to point out that for the remark to meet the legal definition of “libel” it must, in addition to being untrue, also cause damage to the reputation of the person so defamed. I submit that my remark fails each of those tests (it being clearly impossible to damage the reputation of any “true” Muslim!).
Still, it does cause me some pleasure to think that he finds my humble remarks defamatory. Happy to oblige.
(As an aside, I really enjoy those little “pbuh” parentheticals these guys sprinkle into their posts. Everyone does know that the first word there is “piss”, right?)
I used to think it is ‘pox’?
Alisa:
The Community Organiser in the White House is indeed a problem. He managed an entire speech at Fort Hood without mentioning the “M” word. With someone like that at the top, it is doubtful that military personnel will wish to endanger their careers by reporting doubts about jihadist colleagues.
Yes John, and as Paul pointed out on another thread, he managed an entire speech in Berlin without mentioning the S or the C words, or indeed the other M word. Still, the Organizer is not the problem and neither is Islam. Although they certainly are problems currently (and the big O is a much bigger problem than some jihadis here and there), they are just some of the many manifestations of the moral decline of the West, which is the problem.
Laird:
The definition provided by NJ included “(The utterance or spreading of) a false or malicious statement about a person, intended to injure or defame…”.
I guess he would have felt that could arguably be applied to cover things on this forum.
I don’t think it is very useful or constructive to use the word “piss” or “pox” about Mohammed. In the first place it is infantile, and secondly it’s probably not hugely insulting anyway, and even if it was, then what useful outcome would it achieve?
Islam doesn’t allow icons, because that could be a move to idolatry, so, rather than call Islam names, an offensive thing to do would be to draw cartoons representing the likeness of Mohammed – as the Dutch cartoonists did and which led to protests and death threats from Muslims worldwide. That was a Very Bad Thing to do, in the Muslim view – it was highly offensive.
An Extremely Bad Thing – one of the worst things to do – would be to walk on the Koran having (say) smeared it with bacon dripping.
So what? I am not encouraging you to do either of these things, though I applaud the Dutch cartoonists for making the statement they did about freedom of expression. I am providing them as a basis for comparison with the past gross mistreatment of religious icons/artefacts. A couple of relatively recent examples were created in the name of “art”. They are the Piss Christ (depicting a small plastic crucifix submerged in a glass of the artist’s urine), and the Madonna in a Condom (self explanatory).
Both of these “artworks” were felt to be highly offensive to Christians, yet – as far as I know – Christians did not riot or threaten jihad on anyone as a result. In fact, some Christians – myself included – whilst finding them distasteful in the extreme, had to agree that there just might be a valid statement in there somewhere, whether the “artist” in each case realized it or not.
In the crucifix example, you could say that it illustrated the way contemporary society seems to have come to regard Christianity and Christian ethics. In the condom example, well, it could have been making a statement about the prohibition on contraception by the RC church, though it seems to have been a thoughtless prank by an artist who was probably only intent on self-promotion.
Rather than resort to infantile name-calling then, the most useful and objective comment you could make about Islam might be similar to, for example, the facts as presented in Geert Wilder’s video clip “Fitna”. The Muslims desire to absolutely ban that video because it reveals the simple and horrible truth about the incredibly hate-filled and violent Koran, with its numerous exhortations to kill just about anyone who is non-Muslim (kafir) and who will not convert or pay a jizya (a tax/fee for being allowed to live and practice one’s own religion – within limits), and especially all Jews anyway (who are described as pigs and dogs) and not forgetting the Christians, of course. That’s an awful lotta people you might be obliged to kill, enough to awe even Hitler by the enormity of the task. An estimated max of 1.2 billion Christians and 13 million Jews, by today’s reckoning.
The good in America has always been under threat. America eventually won out over the external threat of the sick fascist ideology of Hitler, and over the external threat of the sick fascist ideology of communism – and even where it had infiltrated American society. It might not be able to win out against the internal/external threat from the sick fascist ideology of Islamism – it may have infiltrated American society too well. The sickness flows directly from the dictates of the Koran. It demands belief and submission and thus makes the minds of its believers sick, through indoctrination in those dictates. If it were newly invented, the hate speech in the Koran alone would probably make Islamism banned as a dangerous cult – similar to the way that some countries ban the Moonies or the Scientologists, except that Islam is potentially much, much worse. It is potentially deadly, and it has always been sick that way. It is almost as though it (especially the combination of the Koran and Sharia law) were anti-life in the way that Islam must be the supreme religion and would constrain its Muslim members and all other peoples (non-Muslims), crippling and deforming their spirits, preventing them from being able to ever properly experience the joy of life, of being human and happy and free. (“Freedom go to Hell” is a familiar Muslim protest sign.)
So, the suggestion I make is: always try to reveal and publish the truth about Islam, rather than simply decry it or make fun of it.
“Magna est veritas et praevalebit” – Truth is powerful and will ultimately prevail.
Despite the “howlers” from incompetent journalists, if we want to get past them and into some accurate facts and realism, this vid clip could be what the Fort Hood shooting jihad might have looked like from Hasan’s first-hand perspective. Calm and deliberate death-dealing to the enemy.
WARNING – graphic and violent content.
COD4 2 Gameplay 2(Link)
Oops, yes, I know, my bad. They are “Danish” not “Dutch” cartoonists.
There can’t seriously only be 13 million jews in the world..?
But that’s about all there are.
Yes, only about 13 million Jews alive today. Of course, it would have been quite a lot more if about 6 million of them had not unfortunately been murdered (it was genocide) during WW2, but even then they did not go to waste. No, quite the reverse.
Nowadays we are familiar with the trend of trying to make everything produced “sustainable” and “recyclable”, except people of course – but that earliest of great recyclers, Adolf Hitler, apparently effectively demonstrated his anticipation of the trend such that even people did not need to be wasted and were recyclable – by having his henchmen render the body fats from several millions of innocent Jews (men, women and children) to produce a kind of soap and used the ashes of their burned bodies to make road asphalt to build into roads. Some people have remarked that there is no limit to the fertile imagination of the mind of Man. I remember my mother telling me about this Hitler and what he had his German people do, as I listened to her in wonder as a child, and I recall years later the truth hitting home when I studied the history of that “great” Nazi regime.
Is this relevant to this discussion? Well yes, actually, because Hitler was ably abetted and encouraged by the Muslims’ Mufti, Haj Amin al-Husseinim during WW2. The Mufti was the leading Palestinian Islamic cleric, who was merely intent on speeding up the genocide of the Jews in line with the clear instructions from Allah in the Koran – which was, of course the Fort Hood gunman Hasan’s “bible”. The bible of Islam – “The Religion of Peace”™.
Incidentally, I did not intend this comment to detract from the literary quality of the Koran, which many Arab academics have called “the oldest and most beautiful example of Arabic prose” – I guess this prose is yet another example of the gifts to humankind from the great Islamic civilization (if that is the correct term), up there in lights with “algebra”.
You are all getting trolled so hard in this thread
Just surprised is all… if Hitler managed to murder half the number of jews alive today half a century ago he must have really gone some… and i would have expected the population to have recovered more than that in the intervening years given the rise in world population as a whole in that time. Sorry I know I’ve gone totally OT here!