Tuesday, July 26, 2005

Islam is a terror organization

"If the Boy Scouts of America had 1,000 Scout troops, and 10 of them practiced suicide bombings, then the BSA would be considered a terrorist organization. If the BSA refused to kick out those 10 troops, that would make the case even stronger. If people defending terror repeatedly turned to the Boy Scout handbook and found language that justified and defended murder --and the scoutmasters responded by
saying 'Could be' -- the Boy Scouts would have been driven out of America long ago.
Today, Islam has whole sects and huge mosques that preach terror. Its theology is openly used to give the murderers their motives. Millions of its members give these killers comfort. The question isn't how dare
I call Islam a terrorist organization, but rather why more people do not." - Michael Graham 630 WMAL ( I don't know... some radio station that carries Bill O'Reilly, Mr. Graham, and Rush Limbaugh.)


[To Michael Graham at michaelgraham@630wmal.com]

This is absolutely ridiculous. Read it back to yourself and ask yourself if you actually believe the words that come out of your mouth. If 10/1000 boyscouts practiced suicide bombings they would not be considered a terrorist organization, they would be called terrorists who happen to be boyscouts. Your logic is impeccable. "If the boyscouts refused to kick them out, that would make the case stronger... handbook, justified, blah blah blah driven out of
america". Ok maybe. To call the BSA terrorists because of 1% of their scouts is stupid and irresponsible. It is an entirely different story if their handbook justified murder in some way, but it wouldn't matter as boyscouts and Islam are completely different. Apples and oranges, your middle school english teacher should have given you an F.

Why not compare Islam to something comparable. How about Christianity? So you're saying that if 10/1000 Christians practiced suicide bombings they would be considered terrorists? Are you saying that? What aboutthe abortion clinic bombers we hear about every now and then that pop up in the news? How about the good Christian boys that murder people because of their sexual orientation? Are they murderers and their entire religious community as well? Of course not. But that's what you're saying. So Perhaps it would make the argument stronger if the
Bible had language that defended murder, etc., and priests responded by saying 'Could be', would they have been driven out of America a long time ago?

[from google search, you can check the Book references references, sure they are out of context, a different place, a different time, but isn't that the case with Islam? Extremists?]

1) In Leviticus 25:44-46, the Lord tells the Israelites it's OK to own slaves, provided they are strangers or heathens.

2) In Samuel 15:2-3, the Lord orders Saul to kill all the Amalekite men, women and infants.

3) In Exodus 15:3, the Bible tells us the Lord is a man of war.

4) In Numbers 31, the Lord tells Moses to kill all the Midianites, sparing only the virgins.

****5) In Deuteronomy 13:6-16, the Lord instructs Israel to kill
anyone who worships a different god or who worships the Lord differently.****

6) In Mark 7:9, Jesus is critical of the Jews for not killing their
disobedient children as prescribed by Old Testament law.

7) In Luke 19:22-27, Jesus orders killed anyone who refuses to be ruled by him.

It's a shame that people actually listen to people like you and take what you say to heart. Your arguments do nothing to form an American cohesion or stabilize touchy social relations, if you wanted to say that Islamic Organizations haven't done enough to condemn terrorism, just say it. If you want to say every Islamic organization should issue a fatwa against Osama Bin Laden and followers, just say that.

Don't call Islam a terrorist organization. Like I said, I hope you don't take yourself seriously; I hope you're just doing it to pick up your dwindling ratings. Nobody could be that stupid.

Stephen Wang
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Stephen,

Thanks for the thoughtful email and for giving my stuff a read. I appreciate it.

So, since you've dismissed out of hand the idea that Islam is in any way linked to terrorism, how do YOU explain why every single suicide bomber from 9/11 to today is Muslim?

Coincidence?

Thanks for listening!

Michael Graham
630 WMAL
9am-Noon Weekdays
(link)

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Michael,

Thank you for replying. I'm starting to wonder if that response you gave me was a cookie cutter one that was sent back to anyone with a tinge of disagreement in their email.

Let's take a step back. Before I get to your question, how did you come to the conclusion that I have dismissed the idea that Islam is in any way linked to terrorsim?

It is hard if not impossible to dimiss the link between Islam and the terrorists we have been at war with. I have not dismissed the link, what I do not believe is that Islam is a terror organization as you so brazenly stated. The suicide bombers are extremists of the Islamic faith, I think we can agree on that. There are approximately 1.3 billion muslims in the world, that is about 20% of the world's population, for you to say that an extremist sect of Islam defines an entire religion, mind you the second largest religion in the world, is
not only wrong but irresponsible.

The link as I said, is difficult to dimiss. I implore you to say what you mean and not add some firestarter at the end of it. Had you said that the Koran or the teachings of Islam give room for extremist interpretation would have been debatable. Had you said international Muslim leadership isn't doing enough to denounce Islamic radicalism, that would be debatable.

What you have spread to the american public is known as a syllogistic fallacy.

To answer your question, every single suicide bomber from 9/11 to today is muslim because we are at war with radical Islamic militants. Whether our presence in Iraq is supressing it or fueling its growth among the non-extremist Islamic community is something that YOU should be focusing on, not making irresponsible comments like Islam is a terror organization. Is this fact a coincidence? No, it's a moot point. It is not a coincidence because we are at war with terrorism, more specifically with Islamic radicals. Were you trying to get at a deeper meaning, because that was a stupid question. That's just like asking why all of the gorillas fighting in the Vietnam War were Viatnamese. There are no other suicide bombers because nobody else is
in conflict or you just don't hear about it on the news.

So what is your deeper point? The IRA isn't bombing the UK because of successful police action in the past and they aren't quite as active as they were in the past. Is there violence elsewhere in the world? Of course. Is there violence in Darfur and the Sudan? Sure. Is their violence and bombings in Haiti? Sure. The more I think about it, the
more I realize you have no idea what you're arguing about.

How do you explain why every single abortion clinic bomber is right wing Christian? Is Christianity a terror organization, a religion that promotes that folowers eliminate sinners? Come now, nobody is that irresponsible, the people who bomb abortion clinics are extremists. People who take their own interpretation of their religion and mold it to fit their own socio-political agenda are extremists, just like the suicide bombers.

Do some math. Abortion clinic bombers, say there are about 100. 100 out of a couple of billion is a tiny tiny percent. Islamic terrorists, say there are about 10000 that's still about a thousandth or a percent of the whole.

So what are you trying to say when you say Islam is a terror
organization? What do you want to do? Deport all muslims? Should we interrogate US citizens who are muslims? Should be infringe people's civil liberties because they are Muslim? Do you want to put all Muslims in jail? Because that is what you are saying. You are saying, Islam is a terror organization, all muslims are terrorists. Think before you spout something else out that is blatantly ridiculous. It's sad that people believe you. You are priveleged to be in a position
where you can spark discussion, but you turn it into some kind of post 9/11 witch hunt. great job.
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Thursday, July 14, 2005

color relations

"They gonna drive out the black element to make the galaxy quote/unquote safe for white folks. And Jedi's the most insulting installment. Because Vader's beautiful black visage is sullied when he pulls off his mask to reveal a feeble, crusty, old white man. They trying to tell us that deep inside, we all wants to be white!" - hooper x

And so it goes, that's all I heard for years in Florida while I was growing up, people trying to be something they are not. Asians wanting to be black, blacks wanting to be white. Where the truth is there isn't such thing as 'being white' or 'being black', well at least in my opinion (they are social constructs, yeah). So you have people psycho-analyzing Michael Jackson, Kanye rapping about people saying he's too white, examples are all out there.

I was walking through Union Square last weekend with Matt when we stumbled upon basically a public demonstration comdemning Israel's actions in the West Bank against Palestine. We walked into the massive crowd that was growing around the orators, one man in his organizations blue t-shirt was arguing with a young couple, one guy with long really knotty hair that could have turned into dreads if he fumbled with it a bit more and his girlfriend. They both could have been your average hipster punk nyc amalgamation that you always see in Union Square, the conversation turned to race and history. The Phoenecians, Hamurabi, Jesus, etc. all black the blue t-shirt man said, "you sir, Israeli, not a caucasion". I got the finger though, pointed right at my face, "he's a caucasion".

And so for the next 45 minutes until we got too hungry Matt and I listened to this man talk about not about how the black man wants to be white, but how the white man is jealous of the black man and how culture is entirely derivative of the blacks, how the moors civilized spain, how the Phoenecians civilized everyone with law and culture.

The crowd got some choice lines.

"I hate liberals more than anyone else. A republican will come up to my face and say fuck you nigger. A liberal he will try to identify with me, try to tell me that my color doesn't matter. I would much rather be a nigger than for you to take marginalize my color. Liberals like that Israeli girl who was just here will try to identify, 'Oh I like rap and hip hop music too, bitch I don't give a fuck what you like'. White people always want to be black, look at your cultural history. Baggy pants? the black man. Rock and roll? Jazz and the black man. Many countries even advocated being fairer skin, but not America, not the white man, getting a tan, being blacker is the aesthetic. everyone wants to be black, they are all jealous".

I don't think anybody is denying the impact that anyone has had in America, surely all minority groups contiributed in some part.

Enter, two older guys, must have been late 30s.

"Man you don't know what you're talking about, I don't want to be black, I'm fine just the way I am"

"Do you know what Melanin is? Do you know what Melatonin is? I'll give you 5 bucks, goto the bookstore and educate yourself so I don't waste my time talking to you"

After a while it comes out that those 2 guys are doctors. I'm skeptical because it didn't seem like they knew shit.

"Of course I know what Melanin is, it comes from your skin cells"

"But mother fucker, melanin is produced by melatonin which is created by the pyneal gland. white people don't have any melanin, they sell this shit in bottles now, where do you think they harvested it from? the black man!"

"But sir, you're talking about two different things, I think you're getting confused"

"mother fucker, go ask for a refund, you didn't learn shit in med school. do you know who epycurious is?"

"why? does it matter? who is lskjdflksjdf? i don't give a fuck"

"these guys are doctors and don't know who epicurious is, didn't you guys take the hypocratic oath? do you know who hypocrates is"

"sure, do no harm"

"you took the oath but you don't know who epycurious is"

"you don't have to take the oath anymore"

"you don't take the oath? these fuckers don't know who hypocrates is"

"wait but i do..."

"tell me what the first 5 lines of the hypocratic oath are, I bet you can't do it"

"I don't know what they are, it doesn't matter, can you recite to me the first 5 lines of the US constitution? how many more trivia questions are you going to give me"

"First 5 lines of the Constitution? I don't' give a fuck. It's all bullshit anyways. You white people have no accomplishments save two things, colonialization and disease. They say AIDS/HIV came from Africa, NO! where did it come from? 1967 it was created in a lab, the human retrovirus. Black people reproduce too quickly, gay people don't reproduce at all, the white man just wanted to even the playing field because he couldn't keep on pace with the black man".

Ok it was at this point that I got too hungry and we left.
If you go on the internet there are quite a number of articles detailing congress asking for a virus that shuts down the human immune system in a defense appropriations bill. all the population control sounds like way left-field conspiracy, but it is entirely possible, in my opinion that AIDS was created by accident. There are numerous accounts of people trying to study similar diseases in sheep and monkeys in an attempt to protect against something similar and in many cases they thought they discovered something new only to find out their experiment was contaminated by samples from the blood they did with the monkeys. Laboratory testing was not anybody's strong suit at that time. They were trying to cure Hepatitis B at the time, could some HIV contaminated stuff gone into the vaccine for hepatitis, i don't think anyone would have thought to check for it or known what to look for, but it's entirely possible that when they gave immuninazation shots to the gay populace of nyc that they inadvertantly passed them AIDS. all conspiracy theory, but... the more you read, the more a few main ideas seem entirely plausible.

Other notes. the guy is a whack job. Melanin and Melatonin are completely not related, at least in the way he was talking about. Melanin is produced by skin cells, melatonin isn't even for skin coloration, it's for sleep regulation and wake/sleep rhythm. Even if they got melatonin from somebody and put it in a pill, the more melatonin you have the less melanin your body produces. Just goes to show, you can tell a crowd anything if you have a loud enough voice and you tell your opposition to shut the fuck up a couple of times.

Welcome to Union Square. Where everyone has something to say, but hardly half know what they are talking about.