I had another of my strange thoughts. We have been discussing Brock Turner's punishment and the fact that millions of Americans are outraged at how "light" it was. Now as I have said multiple times, what Brock did was criminal and should be punished. However I think the variety of punishments he endured is adequate.
What I am curious about is are/were these 1 million people supportive of the US military and political involvement in Afghanistan. I mean the treatment of women under the Taliban is TERRIBLE. We are not talking some drunken tryst that went too far, we are talking near slavery, abuse, denial of education, murder, etc...
So I am curious if these outraged Americans stood up for the many millions of women there or if they just said... "You can't save everyone"...
Here is something I wrote long ago. G2A Protector of the Small
What I am curious about is are/were these 1 million people supportive of the US military and political involvement in Afghanistan. I mean the treatment of women under the Taliban is TERRIBLE. We are not talking some drunken tryst that went too far, we are talking near slavery, abuse, denial of education, murder, etc...
So I am curious if these outraged Americans stood up for the many millions of women there or if they just said... "You can't save everyone"...
Here is something I wrote long ago. G2A Protector of the Small
27 comments:
As far as Afghanistan is concerned, I think it is justifiably a case of "let George do it." The only question, of course, is how much to do and how to do it most efficiently. I'm not sure dropping MOABs on folks has a direct effect on their treatment of women.
Those women were here, not in Afghanistan. I suppose it's possible to make the argument that making war on people is for their own good, and will improve their behaviors, but the results so far have been less than optimal.
I always wonder about people so eager to declare war on Islam, or really any religion. When in history has that worked out well?
--Hiram
Do you think Islam is what the Taliban and ISIS are supporting when they commit atrocities against women?
Do you actually believe that the US actions in Afghanistan and Iraq were "religious crusades"?
Do you think Islam is what the Taliban and ISIS are supporting when they commit atrocities against women?
I am not really up on Taliban internal thinking.
Do you actually believe that the US actions in Afghanistan and Iraq were "religious crusades"?
That's a complicated question, many seem to wan to simplify. If someone believes we are at war with Islam, than characterizing our battles in the middle east as religious crusades doesn't seem totally unfair. Certainly, that's the way the people we are making war against believe. When Fox News says we are at war with Islam, I have no doubt ISIS and the Taliban would agree.
--Hiram
The war in Afghanistan wasn't about the treatment of women, it was to destroy the al Qaeda training camps that were a danger to the US, something the Taliban was not only allowing but helping. Their treatment of women wasn't the target, their use of terrorism was.
Now, once the country was "pacified" women were somewhat freed from the harsh Taliban ways, but still subject to Sharia strictures anathema to modern American sensibilities. You don't fight cultural problems with bombs and missiles. And the "rape culture" of the Turner case is a cultural problem.
I wonder something different. Are those outraged at Turner's "light" sentence wanting the harsher punishment as an example for others, so that the culture might be changed, or are they making him the sacrifice so they can continue the culture as it is?
Hiram,
Please provide a source of any person with significant influence in our government saying "we are at war with Islam".
Now I think you will find people saying we are at war with Islamic Radicals, Islamic Terrorists, Islamic Fundamentalists, etc. And you likely will find people saying that we should stop letting people from Islamic countries enter the USA because there is no sure fire way to ensure they are not Islamic Terrorists.
Jerry,
Destroying the Taliban and the Training camps was the reason for entering Afghanistan. (ie National Interest) Building a stable government that respects the rights of Men and Women is why we are still there. If not we would just leave and bomb the Taliban / Terrorists whenever they stepped across their country's borders again.
Please provide a source of any person with significant influence in our government saying "we are at war with Islam".
The complaint that many are making is that a statement like that is what we are avoiding saying. It's people outside the government or at least the administration who are urging the president to say we are at war with Islam.
Who is a religious radical? Someone who carries the tenets of their faith to an extreme? Mother Theresa perhaps?
--Hiram
Let's try again Radical Islamic Terrorist
Here is what a Radical Christian looks like.
If you want to learn more about Religious Radicals maybe this book is for you.
Radical Islamic Terrorist
What is it that we have the problem with? Radicalism? Islam? Or Terrorism? Was that kid who got off with a light sentence, a Christian rapist? And in terms of Christian rapism, was he a moderate or radical?
But let's be fair here. I would expect on the other side, our enemies do see this as a war between Christianity and Islam. And that is an image they are working very hard to present, both within the region in the world. In terms of presentation, this is an area where our enemies and the pundits of Fox news are in total agreement.
--Hiram
" Building a stable government that respects the rights of Men and Women is why we are still there." To some extent that is correct. To the extent it is "nation building"-- trying to get a far older Eastern culture to embrace our Western values, it probably isn't going very well. To the extent that we can't keep the Taliban influence down WITHOUT a stable, effective central government, it is a necessary follow-on to the "war." Had we been fighting a nation-state we would have installed a military governor and ordered the rest of the established order to keep the peace. Not the case here. It was essentially a civil war and we have to rebuild one side while the other keeps fighting an unbalanced war.
Hold the phone. Terry Jones is a "radical Christian"? OK, occasionally he burns somebody's holy book. That prompts those somebodies to burn down a couple churches and behead a few dozen Christians. Is this the moral equivalency you are trying to draw?
"...our enemies do see this as a war between Christianity and Islam."
That is correct, but there is no reason why we must accept their portrayal of it and in fact should make every effort to make the distinction between fighting Islam and fighting radical terrorists using Islam as a justification for their barbarity. The problem is the fundamental philosophical difference among the religions.
The Jews quote Jehovah to say, "Thou shalt have no other gods before me."
The Christians quote Jesus to say, "The way to the Father is through me."
The Moslems quote the Koran to say, in essence, "convert or die."
The difference is clear, and the only way to deal with radical Islam is to hasten its adherents to their 72 raisins.
Jerry,
Your silliness is making Hiram's point...
"The Moslems quote the Koran to say, in essence, "convert or die." "
The reality is that a small sliver of Muslims believe that. If the 1.6 Billion Muslim's all believed that we would have quite the war going on.
Remember that the Koran is a lot like the Bible. The old testament is full of violence and brimstone, and then it evolves.
So some folks are "eye for an eye" and some are "turn the other cheek"...
Sorry, it is only RADICAL Islamists who insist on "convert or die," and then make good on it. And that "small sliver" is too many. Is there a "new Testament" in the Koran?
Read my link and learn...
""The Moslems quote the Koran to say, in essence, "convert or die." "
OK, I read the selective whitewash from PBS. Knowing a few Muslims, I might even believe it, and assume they are representative of the larger group. But there are still hundreds, even thousands, of extremists who quote the Koran to justify their barbarity. They are finding it /someplace/ in there, even if out of context. And you have a lot of supposedly Muslim countries in which women are treated very poorly-- worse than those selected passages would indicate. Now are those whole countries mis-interpreting the Koran, or are they in fact following it? It's one thing to argue interpretation and quite another to argue clear commandments from the Holy Book.
So back to the original question: It doesn't matter where you stood on the Afghan war or the war on Islamic terror, because the treatment of women was not and is not the purpose of those ongoing battles. So how about my follow-on question? Do those complaining about the light sentence want to condemn the culture that led to it, or just that one individual so we can pretend the cultural issue doesn't exist?
I created a whole new post around those questions.
Yes if one out of 1,000 is an intolerant extremist woman beater... That means there are 1.2 Million of them. Now are you going to turn your back on the 999 good humans because you are scared of the 1... How does the story of the Good Samaritan apply?
Just a reminder... The women in the old testament had few freedoms and almost no rights.
Another similarity with those Muslims. Maybe someday they will mellow like most Christians did.
Here are some interesting links regarding
Christian Terrorists
Global Research Terrorist Stats
Jewish Terrorists
NG Jewish Extremism
Apparently the KKK was a Protestant based org.
"Moral threats
The second Klan grew primarily in response to issues of declining morality as typified by divorce, adultery, defiance of prohibition, and criminal gangs in the news every day.[97] Secondly, it was a response to the growing power of Catholics and American Jews with non-Protestant cultural values. By the mid-1920s the second Klan had a nationwide reach, with its densest per capita membership in Indiana. The Klan became most prominent in cities with high growth rates between 1910 and 1930, as rural Protestants flocked to jobs in Detroit, and Dayton in the Midwest; and Atlanta, Dallas, Memphis, and Houston in the South. In Michigan, close to half of the state's 80,000 Klansmen lived in Detroit.[98]"
Anti-abortion Violence
Then of course we have those who are seriously against LGBT Rights
My point of all these links is that maybe there are 1 in 1,000 fundamentalists in every faith. Those who believe that tolerance is unacceptable weakness and that it is their holy mission to stand up to it violently.
What LGBT rights are we talking about? The right not to be murdered? Are these special rights? Could the shooter have claimed a religious practice exemption to the laws against murder?
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