It's time already
(Sorry for the political/religious slant this post takes... I've been trying to stay focused on technology, but sometimes events are simply too large to ignore...)
The execution of John Foley is just the latest. But for me, its the straw that broke the camel's back.
I'm not a Muslim. I'm probably not even a Christian when you get down to it. I do believe in God, I suppose. And I do believe that God certainly didn't intend for one group of believes to exterminate another simply because they have different beliefs.
Parts of the Muslim world claim that ISIS and those of its ilk are a scourge, primarily, I think, because they are turning the rest of the world against Islam. If that's true, then the entire Muslim world who rejects ISIS and radical fundamentalist Islam (and it's not clear to me that rejecting one is the same as the other) needs to come together and eliminate ISIS, and those who follow its beliefs or even sympathize with it.
That hasn't happened. I don't see a huge military invasion of ISIS territory by forces from Arabia, Indonesia, and other Muslim nations. Why not?
I don't believe it is possible to be a peace loving person (Muslim or otherwise), and stand idly by (or advocate standing by) why the terrorist forces who want nothing more than to destroy the very fabric of human society work to achieve their evil ends.
Just as Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan were an Axis of Evil during our grandparents' generation, so now we have a new Axis of Evil that has taken root in the middle east.
It's time now to recognize that there is absolutely no chance for a peaceful coexistence with these people. They are, frankly, subhuman, and their very existence is at odds with that of everyone everywhere else in the world.
It's time for those of us in civilized nations to stop with our petty nonsense bickering. The actions taking place in Ukraine, unless you live there (an in many case even if you do live there), are a diversion. Putin and Obama need to stop their petty bickering, and cooperate to eliminate the real threat to civilization, which is radical Islam.
To be clear, I believe that the time has now come for the rest of the world to pick up and take action, where the Muslim world has failed. We need to clean house. We can no longer cite "freedom of expression" and "freedom of religion" as reasons to let imam's recruit young men into death cults. We must recognize that these acts of incitement to terrorism are indeed what they are, and the perpetrators have no more right to life and liberty than Charles Manson.
These are forces that seek to overthrow from within, by recruitment, by terrorism, or by any means they can. These are forces that place no value on human life. These are forces with which are inimical to the very concept of civilization.
There can be no tolerance for them. None, whatsoever.
To be clear, I'm advocating that when a member of one of these organizations willing self identifies as such, we should simply kill them. Wherever they are. These are the enemy, and there is no separate battlefield, and they do not recognize "civilians" or "innocents"; therefore, like a cancer, radical Islam must be purged from the very earth, by any means necessary.
The militaries of the world should unit, and work together, to eradicate entrenched forces of radical Islam wherever it exists in the world. This includes all those forms that practice Sharia law, where a man and woman can be stoned to death simply for marrying without parental consent, as well as those groups that seek to eliminate the state of Israel, that seek to kill those who don't believe exactly as they do, that would issue a fatwa demanding the death of a cartoonist simply for depicting their prophet, and those who seek to reduce women to the status of mere cattle.
To be clear, we have to do the hard work, all nations of the world, to eliminate this scourge, and eliminate it at its source. Mosques where radicalism are preached must no longer be sanctuaries. Schools where "teachers" train their students in the killing of Christians and Jews, and that their God demands the death of "unbelievers" and rewards suicide bombers with paradise, need to be recognized as the training camps they are. Even if the students are women and children.
Your right to free speech and to religion does not trump my right to live. Nor, by the way, does it trump my own rights to free speech and religion.
I suppose this means that we have to be willing to accept some losses of combat, in the fight against radicalism. We also have to accept that "collateral damage" is inevitable. As with rooting out a cancer, some healthy cells are going to be destroyed. But these losses have to be endured if the entire organism that is civilization is to survive.
If this sounds like I'm a hawk, perhaps that's true. I think, rather, I'm merely someone who wants to survive, and wants the world to be a place where my own children and grandchildren can live without having to endure a constant fear of nut jobs who want to kill them simply because they exist and think differently.
Btw, if Islam as a religion is to survive in the long run, it must see these forces purged. Because otherwise the only end result becomes an all out war of survival between Muslims and the rest of the world. And guess which side has the biggest armies and weapons? And who will be the biggest losers in a conflict between Muslims and everyone else?
So, it's time to choose a side. There is no middle ground. Radical Islam tolerates no neutrality. So, what's it going to be?
As for me, I choose civilization and survival. That means a world without radical Islam. Period.
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