To Noah:Believable and unbelievable polls

Submitted by Plato (India), Mar 4, 2007 at 11:07

"Plato, you still simply don't get it.

First, Muslims are indeed mandated by their religion to lie to infidels. Reference this:...."

I am not sure if the analogy exactly fits, but

"Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth."

Do the meek inherit it? This 'mandate' was disproved abundantly during the occupation of the Americas and other colonies.

"Think not that I am come to destroy the law, or the prophets: I am not come to destroy, but to fulfil. For verily I say unto you, Till heaven and earth pass, one jot or one tittle shall in no wise pass from the law, till all be fulfilled.

Jesus did not come to destroy the OT laws. The OT laws are no better than Islamic laws. How many Christians swear by them now?

it is a bit like assuming that a Christian will show his other cheek when he is struck on one.

Muslims are notorious, compulsive liars, and I have indeed verified that with my own eyes and ears. They prove it in international situations every day. So polling them is always with the understanding that they have a compulsion to lie and indeed are taught that it is proper to lie if it advances their cause

Your eyes and ears seem to have deceived you. Do you seriously believe that parents and imams (despicable though some of their teachings are) tell Muslim children to lie and cheat the infidels. The Muslims you have met are for certain a special breed. I am willing to concede that a goodly percentage are willing to defend their faith when it is questioned by twisting the truth. But to conclude that a whole mass of humanity believes their religion tells them to lie and cheat takes a bit of believing. Certainly their religion allows them to but that does not mean that they have made lying and cheating the infidels an article of faith of their daily lives. Quite the contrary I would think that they BELIEVE their religion does not allow them to lie to anyone.

"When Americans are asked that question ("is bombing and other attacks intentionally aimed at civilians justified"), they're generally thinking about a war situation. In other words, if we go to war with Iran, is is justified to bomb cities even if we're targetting civilians as we did in Dresden in WWII?"

I concede that could be an explanation for that surprising figure accepting collateral damage. But you have made an assumption about what people were thinking when the question was asked.

"When you ask Muslims the same question, they visualize it in their mind as an unprovoked attack on Islam. They're not thinking of it as "is it ok to bomb others" but rather as "is it ok for others to bomb us".

Again I concede that could explain the figure and again you have attempted to read the Muslim mind when they were polled. That is a lot faith in one's ability to read what is going on in other peoples' minds.

What I wrote: "Public opinion surveys in the United States and Europe show that nearly half of Westerners associate Islam with violence and Muslims with terrorists."

Your reply: No kidding. Why would they not? If anything, it simply shows that many people in America and Europe are in denial. Over 90% of all terrorism is committed by Muslim terror groups, and over 90% of all terrorist groups are Islamic. So the fact that only half of them associate Islam with terror means half of them are in denial.

Since you are a Vedantist let us bring in the concept of 'maya', illusion. 90% of terrorism world wide is Muslim inspired so jumping to the conclusion all Muslims are terrorists certainly has the hallmark of maya to me. The reality of Islamic terrorism gives you the illusion that all Muslims are terrorists.

"The article does a disservice by referring to the number of violent Muslims as a "tiny minority" and we know that is untrue."

Yes it is a disservice to your belief and what your eyes apparently see. You believe what the polls I have referred to are saying is maya, that the elephant of Muslim terrorism is chasing you and you have decided to bring out your heavy weaponry to frighten the elephant.

"The poll itself (and the entire article) is a propaganda piece aimed at making Islam more palatable....."

Islam is not palatable to me either. And you have done a nice hatchet job on that poll which debunks your belief.

"....Beyond that, we need to once again look at polls done in Jordan, Egypt, etc. We see 70% - 90% of them endorsing violence. When asked whether violence against civilians was justified when it comes to protecting Islam, the percentages were very high in the Muslim countries polled. Again, I believe it was 88% in Jordan. But once again...what are the Muslims thinking when asked that? To them, criticizing Islam is an attack on Islam. Giving aid to our allies (Israel) is an attack on Islam. Publishing a cartoon about Mohammed is an attack on Islam. These people are barbarians. Anything that is not subservient to and in praise of Islam is considered an attack on Islam. It's not as if when asked that question they were thinking of it in terms of being at war with another country."

Well, now I'll be damned. You have come round to believing in polls at least as long as it fits your belief. And you seem to be privy to Muslims' private thoughts when polled.

"See Plato, you simply don't understand either Muslims or Arabs, hence you cannot comment intelligently on the matter."Oh yes. The only intelligent people are those who are able to discriminate between polls. If the poll lines up with my view point it is just dandy, if not not deport that treasonous pollster

"....Even if all 300 (I suspect there will be far fewer) expected to attend were Muslims (which they obviously will not be), we're still talking about a fraction of a percent of the Muslims in the area attending. Going by past events, perhaps 10% of those in attendance will be Muslims, which means 30 out of 13,000 in Florida or 30 out of 40,000 in the three-state area. That's only 0.075% to 0.2% of Muslims (in the area) who are bothering to take the time to reform their religion. That would constitute only 0.0015% of all Muslims in America or a few ten-thousanths of one percent. If they can travel across the world on a pilgramage to Mecca, I think they can travel across the state to attend a summit."Again your futuristic vision may turn out to be correct but I am unwilling to play Nostradamus. And reformation does not require masses of people. Martin Luther was a lone individual who managed to influence a whole lot of people.

"The article was a misguided propaganda piece and was inaccurate and failed to dig beneath the mentality of those who participated in order to clarify why those numbers appeared. Their conclusions also fly in the face of reality and historical fact. It's meaningless."If an article does not fit your image of reality dump it in the dustbin as 'misguided propaganda'. And what makes you sure that those pollsters in Joradan and Egypt dug beneath the mentality of those polled to clarify their numbers?

"....See Plato, unlike you and Michel, I am not afraid to face the truth, to deal with reality (unpleasant though it may be). I do not cower from reality and search in vain for tidbits of propaganda in a misguided attempt to innoculate myself from reality or to help my indulge in a delusional belief. That's what you're doing. You're obsessing with finding clues, proofs, evidence of a belief that you choose to believe, even though that belief has no grounding in reality. You'd be better served trying to prove that Santa Clause exists. At least that would do nothing to undermine our safety, security, and freedom and would bring smiles to the faces of children instead of terror."Yes we are sceptical about the truth you peddle because it means accepting that human nature, yours and the Muslims, is so typical of our race that there is no alternative to the destruction of one or the other. And if that is truly our nature then we would have self-destructed a long time ago. We still might if each side retreats into their mental fortifications.

The mathematical calculations you present look suspiciously like the mathematical calculations by the 'science in the Koran' believers when they calculate the speed of light from some vague references in their Book. Take the polls that support your belief, reject any that don't support it, add or multiply by some arbitrary figure and hey presto out comes the speed of light, or any other figure you wish.

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