Islamic slave traders in Pakistan

[Dâriûsh]

Actually, every response to this thread has avoided a generalization of Islam/Muslims. The title is the problem. Instead of "Slave traders in Pakistan", 'Islamic' is unnecessarily added. We learn about the 'Slave traders in the South', not the "Christian Slave traders in the South".

Actually, the last line was for econ21.

[stalin]

It just seems that every thread here becomes an excuse to draw those generalisations about 1.25 billion people who are all unique.
Just remember that the people that actually killed the 6 million jews and used nukes against other human beings were all christians and not all christians are responsible for that. I don't recall muslims invading our parts of the world in the last 100 or so years either. if they did we might be calling for a holy war too,

[spmetla]

Who's generalizing? No one here has said that all muslims are slave peddling homosexuals or even implied that. The outcry is against a group of people in tribal Pakistan who are actually guilty of it. Western influence and power is no excuse for these things to happen.

As for the Holocaust comment, remeber the Nazis didn't sanction Christianity or even approve of it. They considered organized reliegion as a threat because people might have loyalties to something besides the state. The atomic bombs in Japan actually saved human lives. There would have been far more dead Americans and Japanese if an invasion was carried out. This is an undeniable fact.

And as for muslims not having invaded our parts of the world recently yes it's true but seeing as history is a pattern of invasions and counterinvasions you can look back to the Arab conquest and the crusades and reconquista then the Ottoman empire's expansion and so collapse which only ended after WWI. It's just plain stupid to blame the current situation on the colonial experiment that the West tried out. And remeber the Islamic world as a whole isn't engaged in a holy war with the West, many muslims have embraced western culture and technology without problems and just about every Islamic country has peaceful relations with the west. Only a few fringe nations and a few fringe extremists are causing this trouble.

[Leet Eriksson]

I honestly didn't see any generalisations.

Its a common tactic to use religion as cover, also slavery is not exclusive to islamic countries by any means, its rampant in most of the world except Europe and North America

[solypsist]

how else is one supposed to fill every whorehouse and erotic club from israel to kuwait and then up to budapest? didn't you know that lapdances are better when they're crying?

[stalin]

The atomic bombs in Japan actually saved human lives. There would have been far more dead Americans and Japanese if an invasion was carried out. This is an undeniable fact.

And what else are they gonna teach in your schools? That the Japanese were desperatelly trying to surrender two months before the nukes dropped? But i guess they had to be tested somwhere.

[econ21]

And what else are they gonna teach in your schools? That the Japanese were desperatelly trying to surrender two months before the nukes dropped? But i guess they had to be tested somwhere.

We're going off topic here, but what the heck. I had this argument with redleg some time ago and I was taking your "side" of the argument.

But he actually presented some pretty compelling historical evidence - based on work by contemporary Japanese historians - that contradicts your claim. The point was that the Japanese were divided. Some wanted peace but others - the Japanese "war party" - would rather accept death than dishonour. Cabinet was paralyzed by a desire to achieve consensus -effectively giving the war party a veto. Only the Emperor could break the deadlock and even then there was a nearly successful coup by the hardliners, IIRC, after both bombs were dropped. To modern Western eyes, the WW2 Japanese war party is hard to understand but you only have to look at the casualty figures for Okinawa etc. to see that their stance was by no means atypical of their military.

[drone]

And what else are they gonna teach in your schools? That the Japanese were desperatelly trying to surrender two months before the nukes dropped? But i guess they had to be tested somwhere.

And the weapon was already tested:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trinity_test

[econ21]

But hey, they are Muslims, hence Islam=Barbarism.

Actually, the last line was for econ21.

Yes, my thread title was provocative. I wondered if it was unfair. But it is certainly fairer than saying I was equating Islam with barbarism. You'll find no claim in the text of my post of such a defammatry equation.

I took the thread title from that of the orignial piece, which was even more provocative:

Rescued - the Christian children seized by Islamist slave traders.

As I said, I did wonder whether the Sunday Times title was sensationalist, but then, as Ser Clegane pointed out, it is not simply that some Muslims have done some (very) bad thing. It's that some people connected to an Islamic Party (with links to AQ terrorists) have done this. I did not highlight the fact that the children were Christian, although that was also disturbing.

Beyond the sheer inhumanity, what is striking about the case is that it is not just simple criminality (people trafficking Russian mafia style) or psychological perversion (paedophilia etc). It's (1) the link between the slave trade and the "politics/religion"; and (2) the impotence/indifference of the authorities.

I also wondered about the argument that it happens everywhere, including Europe. But again dismissed it. What happens elsewhere is typically much more like the criminal and psychologically perverse. For example, in the UK - do sex traders here target specific religious groups - say, young Muslim boys? Are the British police indifferent? Are journalists taken hostage by armed gangs of slave traders? Do slave traders walk into the offices of political parties after doing their "business"? To say this report could be true of 99% of places in the world is ludicrous. Here I agree with Dâriûsh, the report points to something much more culturally specific.

How many Christians speak out against the Lord's Resistance Army? Haven't seen a thread yet in the backroom that does this.

We did have a thread on this a few months ago - I recall posting in it. No Christian who has read the bible will have any time for the superstitious mumbo-jumbo of Alice Lakwena (faith stopping bullets - come on, how many Christian soldiers believe that?), still the less her venal successors in the LRA leadership. The (largely Christian) government of Uganda is - rather ineptly - fighting these thugs, who take refuge in Islamic Sudan.

[PS: in case of any further misunderstanding, I should say I am a godless atheist, so I have zero interest in promoting Christianity against Islam.]

[Reenk Roink]

We did have a thread on this a few months ago - I recall posting in it. No Christian who has read the bible will have any time for the superstitious mumbo-jumbo of Alice Lakwena (faith stopping bullets - come on, how many Christian soldiers believe that?), still the less her venal successors in the LRA leadership. The (largely Christian) government of Uganda is - rather ineptly - fighting these thugs, who take refuge in Islamic Sudan.

Very well. One thread, probably before I came to the Org, and definitely before I frequented the Tavern regularly. My point still stands, abuses by radical fringes are rarely and if so, inconspicuously called out by the mainstream group.

This lack of a voice is hardly surprising, and anyone who thinks such silence represents a tacit support or acceptance is mistaken. After all, I did say concerning Christians and the Lord's Resistance Army:

"Of course, most Christians would never condone such action, but are either unaware or apathetic to such acts."

[Duke Malcolm]

This lack of a voice is hardly surprising, and anyone who thinks such silence represents a tacit support or acceptance is mistaken. After all, I did say concerning Christians and the Lord's Resistance Army:

"Of course, most Christians would never condone such action, but are either unaware or apathetic to such acts."

Yes, the Lord's Resistance Army is dreadfully under-reported on. There is only the occasional program on BBC Radio 4 and the World Service about the goings on in Uganda...
Which probably also be the case with the slave traders. But overall, the various Christian churches are quicker and more ready to dissociate themselves from and condemn any notable bad things carried out by Christians than the various Islamic organisations are to do the same about things carries out in the name of Islam. While the Islamic folk no doubt do condemn it, they do not speak up quick enough or loud enough -- The Ministers and such of the Church of Scotland and Bishops of the Anglican Church often appear in the newspapers and on the Heaven & Earth show to explain their stance.

[Scurvy]

While the Islamic folk no doubt do condemn it, they do not speak up quick enough or loud enough -- The Ministers and such of the Church of Scotland and Bishops of the Anglican Church often appear in the newspapers and on the Heaven & Earth show to explain their stance.

I think the muslim community speaks up just as quickly and loudly as the christian community.....muslim clerics/community leaders often appear on bbc news and in newspapers etc..

sidenote: soes anyone actually watch the heaven and earth show?

[Leet Eriksson]

I think the muslim community speaks up just as quickly and loudly as the christian community.....muslim clerics/community leaders often appear on bbc news and in newspapers etc..

sidenote: soes anyone actually watch the heaven and earth show?

yeah they do show up on TV occassionally. I might sound a bit biased, but western media usually gives fanatics more air time than moderates.

But to be honest the same is done here with our own media, which just pisses me off more