Andrew Neil talking about jihadist losers

I've just listened to the item that thatbags posted and was disgusted at the aggressive way in which Brigitte Gabriel responded to the young woman's comments. And it's easy to be brave and outspoken when you have a baying, cheering audience to back you up. Whether someone agrees with the points she made or not, she could have made them without being very unpleasant to a young woman who appeared to be in a very isolated position within that particular audience.

I had not heard of this woman before but, having researched her a bit now, have discovered that even some whom she purports to speak for, such as Jewish people, are appalled by her views. Deborah Solomon of the New York Times Magazine described her as a "radical Islamophobe". Non-Muslims have described her talks as "hate speech" and have compared it to the sort of inflammatory talk found during Hitler's regime.

I think there is quite enough hate in the world already, and adding to it - and using crude and vicious stereotypes to characterise a whole group of people - is not, I feel, the answer. A person can call himself a Christian or a Muslim but that doesn't necessarily mean that they behave in accordance with their religion or would be accepted by other followers of that religion as representing it. Anders Breivick described himself as a "Christian" but I don't think many Christians would think his actions compatible with the Christian religion.

I take your point, wilmak. I don't agree. She seems to me like someone who knows how to debate and who is passionate about the subject she's talking about. I've heard others who have those qualities called aggressive too. I prefer assertive.

Here is an interesting essay by someone else I agree with. This person asserts, and I agree, that reform has to come from other muslims, which kind of goes back to something whitewave picked up: in a way, muslims do have to have more ideas, or to act on them anyway, than others, because it is their sacred texts that are being used by jihadis.

The original mediaeval Assassins from what is now Persia and Syria were believed by their Christian contemporaries to get high on hashish before going off to kill people. Seems as if we've been here before.......

My suggestion is unprintable on a public forum.

Sorry to back track, but thatbags I definitely don't hear the same tone of voice as you do when I listen to BG or SA in the video. I hear BG being aggressive and SA being measured. Here I am not talking about what was said, just the tones of their voices.

As for SA playing the victim, what is wrong with her asking why there did not appear to be any Muslims in the audience discussing the murder of Americans by extremists in a Muslim country?

As for BG, don't you think it would be wise to check if what she said is actually correct? I know what she said about Nazi Germany is wrong, so perhaps other examples are not as straight forward as she implied (9/11 being the obvious exception as I said before)?

I do think the whole thing was an attempt by both parties to make their points in front of a camera. Unfortunately for SA, it was BG's speech which went viral (I saw the video a while ago), no doubt because it taps into the American fear of Islam and it went on from there.

I don't think IS is promoting Islam, I think it is using Islam for its own purpose and that purpose is nothing to with religion.

Someone mentioned earlier the possibility of the Paris attackers being high on drugs. Some of the friends and relatives of the attackers have been talking about the attackers and describing their distinctly non-Islamic. Drinking, drug taking and never going to the mosque were mentioned. Apparently during suicide missions jihadists are known to use heroine and cocaine. One example is the Tunisian beach attacker. Reports are saying the hotel room booked Salah Abdeslam's name was filled with drug taking paraphernalia.

Love your post merlotgran!
I was just thinking this morning there's so much confusion about what to call the jihadi terrorists - are they IS? Isil? Isis? Daesh? Why don't we (all the non jihadi terrorists) agree on a single name for them, like Dimwits, or Dross?
If we could get all news reports to agree on some derisory name, might make them less attractive to the young who want to go off and join them

We could all use texts from religious books as an excuse for horrible deeds. They're just books though.

Simply? That word is rubbish, jings and you know it. It is more complicated than that. Promoting Islam has a lot to do with Daesh, as the Crusades had a lot to do with promoting Christianity, but there are/were other factors at play - male bonding against what they see as a common foe, self-delusion that they are "saving" their faith, political power maneouvering, sheer bloody excitement at killing and mayhem.

And Islam is a proselytising religion, just like Christianity. The difference is that, apart from a few missionaries, christians have largely given up on the proselytising (which is what the crusades were about).

It's about power.

I don't think they're interested in promoting Islam as a religion but they're using it as an excuse for their atrocities.

They claim to be following texts in the Koran and Hadidh and a friend of mine who knows those texts says that strictly speaking, their claims are correct. Where else do you think they get their Caliphate ideas from?

You think IS - or Daeish - are simply into promoting the Islam religion, as the Christians in the Crusades were into spreading Christianity?

Oh, come on!

As I've said before, pretending Daesh has nothing to do with Islam is the equivalent of pretending the Inquisition and the christian crusades had nothing to do with Christianity. This is not the same as saying all muslims are bad, just that there is an evident connection with some parts of islamic interpretations, the ones Daesh use themselves to 'justify' their barbarity.

I think we do unite in that way, ww.

And I think you, and some others (not necessarily on GN), are missing the point that it is isil Daesh members themselves who identify as islamic. If they didn't it would be a different story.

You are entirely missing Andrew Neil's point. What he described IS as was a bunch of murderous scum. Nothing to do with any recognisable organised religion. We should unite as one regardless of race, nationality or religion in condemning them.

Suppose there were a christian daesh equivalent, or a hindu one, or a buddhist one (etc, etc), do people really not think that the same would be said of those identity groups? That we know not all [insert group identifying word of choice] are bad.

Essentially, it's an irrelevance, as BG said quite forcefully, and in my view, correctly.

The muslim woman was playing the victim card when the real victims were the murdered Americans.

Who said anything about "any more", ww?

Why should the Muslims come up with ideas any more than the rest of us? And who says they arent?

I think what BG said can be paraphrased as: Yes, we know all muslims aren't bad. Stop playing the martyr and help us deal with this scourge by putting forward some useful ideas".

The muslim woman sounded whingey to me. It does get irritating. I don't think BG sounded aggressive. I think she sounded forthright, like someone who doesn't suffer fools gladly.

Bit like you, jings, really

No, with regard to the books, I didn't mean you, jings. I meant anyone, as I said.

While I would not disagree with what Neil said, I would question his tendency as a presenter of political programmes to use them as a platform for his own opinions rather than questioning the opinions of others.

While I would not disagree with what Neil said, I would question his tendency as a presenter of political programmes to use them as a platform for his own opinions rather than questioning the opinions of others.

While I would not disagree with what Neil said, I would question his tendency as a presenter of political programmes to use them as a platform for his own opinions rather than questioning the opinions of others.

Just looked at Act! for America. It looks like UKIP but with guns, active shooters training plans for in schools. It asks you to join or set up local chapters.
Doesn't sound very pleasant to me. One area, the securing our borders, has a guard standing at a very solid fence. I do not like that, either. Didn't we condemn the idea of Hungary doing that?