The dialog becomes impossible because of many other important reasons, too, including,
a. the opposition by liberals/leftists/Islamists to bring forward any critical review of some extremely troubling vicious aspects of Islam and Islamic scriptures (Quran and Hadiths) under the phony reasons of islamophobia
b. the reluctance of Islamists to accept the notion of freedom of expression even if it means some of the expression offends the Muslims (e.g. discussion regarding pedophilia of Muhammad or someone drawing cartoons of Muhammad)
These views by Bill Maher and Sam Harris may help understand this point in a better way. [1], [2], [3]
In fact, the freedom of opinion is under attack because of Islam, even in the free western world to a large extent.
The freedom lovers, liberals and humanists must understand this threat posed by the vicious ideology of mainstream Islam. The USA and the west now must also invest similar (if not more) efforts and resources to fight this vicious ideology as those that they invested to fight another vicious ideology called communism.
It should however be noted that there are many people who have been Muslims just by birth and they do not necessarily follow the vicious ideology to its core.
So the fight must be against Islam and not against all Muslims, per se.
No, comments and thinking like yours are the reason there is no progress.
In conflict between group X and group Y, if you ask X it's because Y does (insert list of offenses here). The same from the opposing side. Nobody wants to acknowledge that both sides have issues, and if they work towards fixing said issues the world will be a better place.
Your whole diatribe about "liberals/leftist/Islamist" is the exact same crap that extremist on the other side preach, just projected through your (the way I view it) conservative lense.
The biggest problem is that nobody is willing to step outside of their comfort zone, to see how the other half lives, in order to move forward. That goes for both the "liberals/leftist/Islamist" left and the "conservative/anti-pc/nobody-deserves-to-be-comfortable-except-me" right
> So the fight must be against Islam and not against all Muslims, per se.
If you understand what Islam is, and what a muslim is, this statement makes no sense.
>>If you understand what Islam is, and what a muslim is, this statement makes no sense.
If you mean to say that "Islam and Muslims are the same" I beg to differ. Islam is a religion not person and Muslims are persons.
Let me clarify, Islam is a religion/ideology whereas Muslim is a person who is either practicing Islam (religion/ideology) or who is labeled as Muslim because he/she is born within a family who practices Islam.
By "the fight must be against Islam and not against all Muslims, per se", I mean the fight must against the ideology/religion and must not necessarily against all Muslim population.
So it was a big mistake by USA to attack Iraq as a reaction to the 9/11 attacks on USA, instead the military attack (only small surgical level) should have been restricted to Taliban/Osama in Afghanistan and then along with that small military surgical attack, the USA should have actually opened a war against the vicious ideology of Islam.
The Iraq was not a big threat to USA. Millions of innocent lives could have been saved in Iraq and elsewhere, if the USA had realized that this is an ideological war and must be fought on the ideological war-front. This can and must be done by supporting liberal minded humanists (like, Bill Maher, Sam Harris, Richard Dawkins) who are exposing the viciousness of the ideology of Islam and upholding the modern humanist values like freedom of expression and separation of 'mosque and state'.
Muslims are people who practice the religion of Islam.
Religions (for those who practice them) are ideals that are intrinsically woven into peoples lives.
So by saying you should attack Islam (with no qualifiers to that statement), you are indeed saying you should attack Muslims.
I'm not going to address the second part of your statement, other than to say that the war in Iraq was illegal, wrong, and counter-productive. It, 9/11, and US sponsored creation of the terrorist boogieman are largely the root that modern islamophobia, and on the flip side modern terrorist cells, have sprung from.
Just admit that you don't like muslims and go on about your day.
>>So by saying you should attack Islam (with no qualifiers to that statement), you are indeed saying you should attack Muslims.
That is your way of interpreting it.
I never said we should physically attack the Muslim people. I am not against Muslim people, per se. All I am saying is we should attack the vicious ideology of Islam.
If the sentiments of some (potentially radical or not-so-radical) Muslims get hurt due to the thought attacks on the ideology of Islam, so be it. These Muslims should learn to get offended and learn to respect the freedom of expression and learn to respond to such offending expressions in more civilized manners and not by killing people.
You should be telling and encourage these Muslims to learn the fundamentals of free and open society.
If some Muslims are getting offended because some people draw cartoon of their prophet, so be it, these Muslims must learn to live peacefully in a free society even if they get offended by other people.
If some Muslims are getting offended because some people raise the issue of the pedophilia practiced by their prophet Muhammad, so be it, these Muslims must learn to live peacefully in a free society even if they get offended by other people.
The liberals/critical thinkers should not be suppressed just because expression of their thoughts in a peaceful manner hurts the sentiments of some Muslims.
The liberals/critical thinkers have attacked earlier and do attack now also the Christianity/Judaism/Hinduism and our free society never suppresses their thoughts. Islam should not be an exception and hence Islam should not be given special treatment.
Once again let me make it clear that I am not against Muslim people, in fact, I do have many Muslim friends and they are open to such thoughts.
