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Related to the earlier discussion about where ISIS gets its weapons, I wanted to share this great in-depth article from The Atlantic about the motivations of ISIS. Then In order to provide a more nuanced view of ISIS, here is criticism of that Atlantic article from thinkprogress.org.
From the Atlantic:
The Islamic State is no mere collection of psychopaths. It is a religious group with carefully considered beliefs, among them that it is a key agent of the coming apocalypse.
We can gather that their state rejects peace as a matter of principle; that it hungers for genocide; that its religious views make it constitutionally incapable of certain types of change, even if that change might ensure its survival; and that it considers itself a harbinger of—and headline player in—the imminent end of the world.
The thinkprogress.org criticism by one of the primary sources cited in the Atlantic article:
One of the oft-mentioned criticisms of The Atlantic piece is that it echoed the inaccurate belief that since ISIS’s theology draws upon Islamic texts to justify its horrendous practices, it is an inevitable product of Islam. Haykel didn’t say whether or not he thought Wood’s article says as much, but when ThinkProgress asked him directly whether Islamic texts and theology necessitate the creation of groups like ISIS, he was unequivocal.
“No,” he said. “I think that ISIS is a product of very contingent, contextual, historical factors. There is nothing predetermined in Islam that would lead to ISIS.”
He was similarly unambiguous when responding to the related critique that Muslims who disavow ISIS are somehow deluded or not “real” Muslims.
“I consider people … who have criticized ISIS to be fully within the Islamic tradition, and in no way ‘less Muslim’ than ISIS,” he said. “I mean, that’s absurd.”
(Score: 2) by shortscreen on Thursday April 30 2015, @07:09AM
Guy who is nominally part of the same religion as ISIS tries to distance himself from them? That's good, I guess.
Anyway, how many people really decided it would be cool to join ISIS and go on a rampage across the desert for philosophical reasons? Or was it because this group of roaming looters had more money and hype than the others?
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday April 30 2015, @07:51AM
Anyway, how many people really decided it would be cool to join ISIS and go on a rampage across the desert for philosophical reasons?
How many? Estimates vary from 15,000 to 200,000 [warontherocks.com].
Or were you seriously asking if it was just a joy ride by a bunch of looters?
Looters don't usually fill mass graves [nytimes.com].
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Thexalon on Thursday April 30 2015, @01:15PM
Ok, so 200,000 out of a Muslim population approximately 6000 times that size. That does not make the 200,000 even close to representative of all Muslims. Numerous Muslim leaders and scholars have denounced them as non-Muslim, and the vast majority of those fighting them are Muslim.
ISIS (or Daesh, which is what everyone in the Middle East calls it) is not really a religious group, it's a political group that uses religious trappings to justify its behavior. Its core leadership is the military officers and spies that used to be part of Saddam Hussein's old regime that fled when the US invaded, and they decided that appealing to religion would be a good way to regain power. These guys are not spending most of their time praying or reading the Koran or debating the finer points of shariah, what they care about is their military campaign. The reason they're beheading people is not because the Koran told them to, but because inducing terror and removing pre-existing leadership is one way to make a conquered population less likely to resist.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tathra on Thursday April 30 2015, @03:12PM
i point this out every time i see hatemongering bigots spreading this xenophobic bullshit. defining a group based on the actions of 0.0125% of the group is the height of sophistry, no matter how you slice it. its like defining all of christianity based on the Westboro Baptist Church.
hmm, maybe thats a better counter than using numbers, since people are morons who can't understand them - always counter "ISIS represents all muslims!" with "Westboro represents all christians!" and then literally every argument they use to explain how westboro aren't christians or don't represent all christians can be used word-for-word to explain that ISIS doesn't represent all muslims. and then when they refuse to hear it and still spread the same bullshit lies you have solid proof to call them out on being a xenophobic bigot instead of just ignorant.
(Score: 2) by Thexalon on Thursday April 30 2015, @03:29PM
The problem with that comparison is that Westboro Baptist Church is a much smaller and more powerless group. Westboro has maybe 40 members out of about 1.5 billion Christians, and has never come close to controlling territory.
There are a couple of more apt comparisons, though:
1. The IRA. The IRA at its height wasn't even close to a majority of Catholics in the world, engaged in all sorts of truly nasty terrorism, and was really about a political goal (unified Ireland) more than a religious goal (among other reasons, Anglicans are much more like the Catholics than most Protestants).
2. The KKK. The KKK was originally led by former Confederate officers and politicians, and used terrorism and military action to take political control of the states that had been part of the Confederacy, effectively holding that territory for several decades. Their activities were mostly focused on political ends, but like ISIS they wrapped it up in the language of right-wing Protestant Christianity.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 30 2015, @05:31PM
Uh-huh - yeah. http://chersonandmolschky.com/2014/04/07/support-sharia-law-world/ [chersonandmolschky.com] http://chersonandmolschky.com/2013/12/26/myth-the-small-fringe/ [chersonandmolschky.com]
(Score: 2) by tathra on Thursday April 30 2015, @07:25PM
you wanna know what's really funny? bigoted islamophobes like you are doing more to help religious extremists [patheos.com] and ensure sharia law becomes entrenched in america [debbieschlussel.com] than anyone else. Indiana's RFRA explicitly enables Sharia to be enforced [thedailybeast.com] in Indiana, along with all kinds of other nonsense in other religions' dogmas.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 30 2015, @08:51PM
> http://chersonandmolschky.com/2013/12/26/myth-the-small-fringe/ [chersonandmolschky.com]
That site is nutjob land. Your citation starts out with the uncited claim that in December, 2007, Hamas celebrated its 20th anniversary. The main slogan of this celebration was “Jews, we have already dug up the graves for you.”
Funny though, googling that phrase [google.com] produces no hits other than references to that post. You'd think such a blatant display of malicious intent would have been reported somewhere on the internet. At least once, right?
If they have to make up bullshit for their lead-in who could possibly take anything else they have to say seriously? Oh, that's right, nutjob bigots, that's who.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Jiro on Thursday April 30 2015, @03:18PM
When the Atlantic article refers to them as Muslim, it means "They have beliefs that are based on literal interpretation of Islamic texts and which have precedents in Islamic history". When Muslim leaders say they are non-Muslim, they mean "Those particular literal interpretations and those precedents are one which we don't think Muslims are supposed to follow". Both of these can be true at the same time. And there are contexts in which the first meaning is important.
Consider creationists, for example. The Pope has supported evolution, so Catholics could claim that creationists are "not Christian" in one sense. But it would be foolish to deny that creationism is based on literal interpretation of the Christian Bible.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Thexalon on Thursday April 30 2015, @03:42PM
A lot of their practices are in fact not based on literal interpretation of Islamic texts. Neither the Koran nor the Hadiths promote genocide of the wrong kind of Muslim, attacking Christians and Jews, or kidnapping foreigners and demanding ransom. The people Mohammed actually advocated fighting and killing were the polytheistic pagans that lived in the Arabian Peninsula prior to the Muslims dominating the region.
The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 30 2015, @04:27PM
> A lot of their practices are in fact not based on literal interpretation of Islamic texts.
I ran across a study a few months ago that found that fundamentalists as a group are the people with the least knowledge of their professed religion. I forgot to bookmark it and I can't seem to find it again. But IIRC it wasn't limited to muslim fundamentalists, it was fundamentalists of all stripes.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 30 2015, @05:13PM
> Consider creationists, for example. The Pope has supported evolution, so Catholics could claim that creationists are "not Christian"
Surprisingly (or perhaps not) a large proportion of creationists think catholics are not christians. [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 01 2015, @07:33AM
But it would be foolish to deny that creationism is based on literal interpretation of the Christian Bible.
No, it would not. Creationism is based on a particular interpretation of the text, and one that is really devoid of, or as Click and Clack used to say, unencumbered by the thought process. So what is the "literal" interpretation of which you speak, Lilith? Oh, the temptress is always there to make us choose the fricking wrong tree of knowledge! Why did we have to pick the "Westborough" tree?
(Score: 1, Flamebait) by Runaway1956 on Thursday April 30 2015, @05:29PM
Someone dropped this link on me a few days ago. Why don't you check it out? http://chersonandmolschky.com/2013/12/26/myth-the-small-fringe/ [chersonandmolschky.com] This sister article has more on the same subject. http://chersonandmolschky.com/2014/04/07/support-sharia-law-world/ [chersonandmolschky.com]
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Friday May 01 2015, @07:45AM
Someone dropped this link on me a few days ago. Why don't you check it out?
Yes, indeed, why do not I check it out? Could it be, perhaps, that your references in the past were, um, somewhat lacking in credibility? Maybe because these links are poison anti-semitism (oh, did you not know that "Semite" refers to Arabs as much a Jews?) aimed at creating fear and loathing? If you want your fellow Soylentils to follow your links, you need to earn our trust, only provide links that are well sourced, verifiable, fact-checked, and do not come from jmorris. Otherwise, if you ask, "why don't you check it out?", we will all answer, "because you suggested it."
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Friday May 01 2015, @03:26PM
"Muslim" and "semite" are not synonymous.
How would you like to read a free Kindle book? Head over to Amazon, and look for 'The Caliphate' by Tom Kratman. It is a work of fiction, but it's not just a story.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday May 01 2015, @05:41PM
Tarchus asks for sources that are "well sourced, verifiable, fact-checked" and you respond with "a work of fiction."
I am absolutely not surprised. But it is always disappointing when people live down to a stereotype.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Saturday May 02 2015, @07:21AM
"Muslim" and "semite" are not synonymous.
Yes! And my god why would anyone think that is a question? Islam, like Christianity and Buddhism, is a global religion. Heck, even white people or people with hairy feet can be Muslim. Not that hard to understand. But Semite, well, yes this has something to do with it, since the language of the Koran is Arabic. And the Jews are also of the same race. This always confuses me when people say that Arabs are anti-semites, since Arabs are semites. And why are not Jews anti-semetic for hating Palestineans? OK, the whole thing is too confusing, but you totally missed the point. If you want to hate Jews, you really got to hate Arabs, but if you just want to hate Jews and Arabs, you don't have to hate all Muslims, especially Cat Stevens. Are we clear now, you fricking wanna be neo-nazi?
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Saturday May 02 2015, @01:43PM
It seemed to me that you were trying to imply that hating Islam is anti-semitic because most Muslims are Arabs, or that most Arabs are Muslims. I wasn't sure which point you were trying to make.
I'll just point out that I never said anything about Arabs, Persians, Africans, Semites, or any other racial or ethnic group.
My problem is with Islam. Islam promises to rule the world according to Islamic law. Islam is both more than, and less than, a religion. It is a POLITICAL MOVEMENT as much as it is a religion. Rule the world - that's political. Theistic government is a political government. Islam is anathema to democracy, and in direct opposition to any definition of freedom that I have ever heard. Submit. Submission to Islam, submission to Allah, call it what ever - some imam wants to run my life for me.
I don't allow Christian preachers to run my life, damned if any imam is going to do it.
But, yes, I am perfectly aware that Jews and Arabs are both Semitic.
And, one more thing. If you try to make sense of the "logic" of either love or hate, you'll soon have bats in the belfry - IF you don't already. There is no logic involved. No rhyme, nor reason. Why does your mother love you? Why does a brother hate a brother? Why does your mate hate/love you? No logic - don't expect anything like logic.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday April 30 2015, @05:32PM
You fail to explain the massive influx of money to ISIS. Just because your Muslim friends haven't run off to reestablish the caliphate doesn't mean they aren't sending money.
There isn't enough marketable things in northern Iraq and Syria to explain the sheer amount of cash these guys have. Its not all captured Humvees you know.
Also, while you seem quick to write off 200,000 combat volunteers, which is a number that even the US and supporting countries [turner.com] were never able to put on the ground in Iraq, even during the height of the invasion. Far less than half of the Iraqi invasion forces consisted of combat troops.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 30 2015, @05:50PM
> You fail to explain the massive influx of money to ISIS
You fail to prove the existence of a massive influx of money to ISIS. They are a wholly self-sufficient criminal syndicate. [businessinsider.com]
> Also, while you seem quick to write off 200,000 combat volunteers
They are not volunteers. They are paid 2x-4x what local armies pay their troops. [buzzfeed.com]
The only question of interest now is will frojack learn from his mistakes or stubbornly cling to the false narratives that tell him his hate is justified?
(Score: 2) by marcello_dl on Thursday April 30 2015, @12:57PM
In fact when us Italians went to Afghanistan against the famed irreducible Bin Laden, we reportedly tried to mellow them with money. Then the French took over some zones, and had some more backlash, and were rightfully angry at us for doing deals with the enemy.
But, and it went underreported, we showed the world there's an amount of self interest behind the facade of islamic terrorism. Ideologically, the terrorists lost.
You probably can find sources for this.
(Score: 2) by tathra on Thursday April 30 2015, @03:28PM
ideology is nothing more than a convenient excuse to use to get support in the form of money and followers. take the taliban for example, while they were in power they completely banned opium production [afghanistannewscenter.com] saying that drugs and drug cultivation goes against the Quran, but now that they're out of power they're directly involved in drug trafficking [bbc.com] that began almost immediately after they were ousted.
taliban, al queda, ISIS, westboro baptist church, the KKK, the crusaders, the spanish inquisition, etc, they're all the same - none of them are religious groups at all, religion is just the excuse they use to take power and control people, cherrypicking the religion to use whatever they can to support their personal ideals and beliefs, which have nothing to do with the religion, to sate their lust for power, while ignoring everything in that religion that doesn't support them or directly contradicts their position, and then ditching it whenever it becomes inconvenient (until they can once again use it to seize power and control people).
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday April 30 2015, @04:42PM
cherrypicking the religion to use whatever they can to support their personal ideals and beliefs, which have nothing to do with the religion, to sate their lust for power, while ignoring everything in that religion that doesn't support them or directly contradicts their position
The really amazing thing is that is exactly what the extremists on the other side do too. Both anti-western islamic extremists and the nuke-em-from-orbit islamaphobes cherry-pick the same parts of islam in order to justify themselves. They are practically two sides of the same coin and in many ways they need each other in order to survive. Its like the islamaphobes actually want the global caliphate bullshit to be true so that they can feel good about wanting to destroy muslims.
Every once in a while one of those loons becomes so frustrated that people won't believe his bullshit that he decides to prove it by doing exactly what he claims to oppose. [splcenter.org]