Are the radical Islamicists of ISIL (ISIS, IS, whatever) murderous thugs whose acts of barbarism deserve global condemnation at the very least? Absolutely.
But the folk who claim it's some particularly unique aspect to Islam that leads to these horrifying killings should consider the good Christian men and women of too many places in these United States who, within living memory, committed similar acts of barbarism. They didn't have video cameras, but the pictures were circulated around with similar purposes of instilling terror. And those American Christians didn't necessarily all wear goofy sheets and pointed hats, but were often locals in normalclothing gathered together with picnic baskets.
This is not to excuse ISIL, or to suggest that we ignore their brutality. This is to suggest that we might look at the beam in our own eyes as we condemn motes in others, and before we pretend that this is is something particular to Those People, but certainly not Us.
Originally shared by +laurie corzett:
"The actual process of lynching was morbid and incredibly violent. Lynching does not necessarily mean hanging. It often included humiliation, torture, burning, dismemberment and castration. Victims were beaten and whipped, many times in front of large crowds that sometimes numbered in the thousands. Coal tar was frequently used to douse the unfortunate victim prior to setting him afire.Onlookers sometimes fired rifles and handguns hundreds of times into the corpse while people cheered and children played during the festivities. Pieces of the corpse were taken by onlookers as souvenirs of the event [5]. Such was the case when James Irwin was lynched on January 31, 1930. Irwin was accused of the murder of a white girl in the town of Ocilla, Georgia. Taken into custody by a rampaging mob, his fingers and toes were cut off, his teeth pulled out by pliers and finally he was castrated. It still wasn’t enough. Irwin was then burned alive in front of hundreds of onlookers (Brundage, p. 42).
No one was ever punished for this barbaric killing. Black victims were hacked to death, dragged behind cars [6], burned, beaten, whipped, sometimes shot thousands of times, mutilated; the savagery was astonishing. How could ordinary people participate in such brutality?"
Yes, ISIS Burned a Man Alive: White Americans Did the Same Thing to Black People by the Thousands
This article was originally published on ChaunceyDevega.com and is republished here by permission of the author. ISIS burned Muadh al Kasasbeh, a captured Jordian fighter pilot, to death. They doused him with an accelerant. His captors set him on fire. Muadh al Kasasbeh desperately tried to put out the flames. ISIS recorded Muadh al Kasasbeh’s…
Those I've read and listened to seem to be making the connection between statements in the Hadith and Qur'an specifically on martyrdom and paradise. These two concepts are relatively foreign to other religions. Once you fully believe in these concepts it is not a stretch to then do things ISIS has done.
There are interesting stories of how Turkish armies in the North are fighting ISIS. They use women military members. Because getting killed by a woman is so shameful you will not get to paradise. ISIS members run away from the battle field. But even a stronger point is ISIS itself. Pick out anything they have done or are doing that is not connected to statements from Muhammad.
I grapple with this a lot. On the one hand I have Muslim friends that are kind, generous, and complete opposite of ISIS. On the other, there are many troubling parts of Islamic texts and their religion seems so closely bound to them.
There is no doubt that things like that and it has no meaning to ISIS. The lynchings were in respone to acts. not to what people are..You should know better. In addition, while the majority were black peopl. It was not souly so. In addition to attempt to excuse one horror by showing another is both childish and vile. Shame is your mantle in this matter
Dave, I see your point. But we must call these things what they are, whenever we see them, whoever is doing them. This has nothing to do with religion, even if the perpetrators say their religion wants them to treat others in this way. Religion has always been used an excuse for inhumanity, just as many other things have always been used as an excuse.
The "beam in our eyes" does not induce blindness. It means that we must not indulge in self-righteousness.
+Jon Weber I'm not necessarily saying that the motivations of the actions of ISIL and the actions around lynchings are precisely the same. The ISIL folk are more explicitly religious — but I'd suggest that religion was a tool in the cultural belt behind the systemic, brutal execution of any blacks seen to be a threat. Whether it was tying back to accreted myths about the races and different offshoots in the Old Testament, or the extension of excuses used from Scripture for the subjugation of the blacks in slavery pre-Civil War, or the Christian trappings put on by groups like the KKK, or that the reverends and preachers of the deep South seemed uninterested or unwilling to confront their small town congregations about what was happening — Christianity and its less savory texts were (and are) a part of the fabric of institutional racism that led to these horrors.
And even regardless of that, that ostensibly good, God-fearing, church-going Christians could participate in such acts, and within living memory, tells me that the brutalities of ISIL are nothing unique to Islam.
+Mr Bill SC Many lynchings were not in response to any "act" that would provoke even a normal law enforcement response. A black thought to be looking at a white girl inappropriately, or one who spoke out of turn, was easily and quickly made an example of. It was intimidation, and terror, and it was participated in and condoned by entire communities.
That folks like the KKK didn't focus solely on African-Americans, but were anti-Catholic nativists to boot, is meaningless. The vast majority of mob actions of this sort were directed to toward blacks.
Lastly, I explicitly said I was not looking to excuse one horror with another. My point was to say that while we can and should do what we can (and what that is remains another conversation) to oppose ISIL's murderous destruction, we should do so not out of any innate sense of moral superiority, or with the idea that burning people to death is, these days, "just" an Islamic thing.
+Paula Moore _'The "beam in our eyes" does not induce blindness. It means that we must not indulge in self-righteousness.'_ Precisely. That is all I meant to say. We can (and must) condemn such actions, but without the arrogance of asserting that they are some unique case of Those Other People that could never happen here.
+Dave Hill I would agree that folks in the old South certainly used and looked to the Bible for justification. We all want to know we are vindicated right. Especially when the acts carried out are morally questionable.
The difference being that ISIS is following Muhammad directly. And the are carrying out the Caliphate as stated in their texts. Point to an act they carried out and you'll find something either Muhammad stated should be done to an infidel or justification in their text.
I guess I'm trying to say ISIS is directly following their religion. I do not see them primarily as turds in the punch bowl.
+Jon Weber I'm not enough of an Islamic scholar to be able to judge their actions by the Quran. I do know that plenty of Christians over the centuries have derived, if not as direct commands than as interpolated from the Old Testament (and even parts of the new), and have doe so in all apparent sincerity. That there are Muslims (as well as Christians) who seem to find following their faith and Scripture without conquering their neighbors, burning heretics, or declaring a theocracy, tells me that it's not a slam-dunk. (That there are folk in both faiths, as well as Jews, Buddhists, and even non-faith-based ideologues, who are willing to be tribal enough or putting-ideology-above-humanity enough to do the conquering / burning / tyrannizing thing tells me more about humanity than about any particular ideology.)
A question. At what point should the comparisons be secondary and actually do something to stop them as needed…..a personal action rather than one can say ivory tower conversations.? In other words placing own ass in jeopardy.
+Mr Bill SC I don't think the one should take place to the exclusion of the other.
That said, just as important is what stopping them means, and what it costs (in all dimensions) to do so. We could stop them by nuking the entire claimed region to a glass parking lot. Probably not best from a cost-benefit equation. We could send 50,000 troops and occupy the whole place and impose a Pax Americana for as long as we feel is necessary. How long will that be, how much will it cost (in money, and lives). We could send fewer troops, but, again, to do precisely what, and what will be the knock-on effects (what happens in the area when we come in, what happens when we leave, how do we ensure that what we're doing won't make things arguably worse)?
Or we adopt a softer option, provide support (guardedly, so it doesn't backfire on us) to folk who are willing to fight against ISIL, firmly encourage others (esp. the regional powers) to do the same, and see what can be done to ameliorate the worse of the current barbarity going on — but realize there will be no ideal solution of puppies and unicorns, and that the resulting regime(s) may not be our bestest friends that faithfully follow along all of our policy suggestions.
(If getting rid of ISIL meant Iran has more influence in the area, is that an acceptable cost? If it meant leaving Assad in place, would that be okay? If it meant we end up with a somewhat-less-radical Islamic state, what would we be willing to pay, in lives and money and the opportunity costs thereof and future problems, that cost?)
Of course not to the exclusion. And at what point as I stated "placing own ass in jeopardy."