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PaperclipPerfector  19d ago (text post)   35134 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of February 3, 2025

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In his own words, Bin laden repeatedly states his theological concerns as his sole justification for both wanting to kill Iraqis and Americans (esp in his 96 and 98 fatwas). He quotes scripture. His modern followers do likewise. They think Non Muslims should not be in "Muslim lands" unless they pay the tax. That's what they're upset about. Not geopolitics - but pissing-off the creator of the universe. They have stated this stated explicitly, many times, pointing to scripture, quoting specific passages, getting ascent from Imams and ulama. Bin Laden viewed the Baathists as apostates. That was is issue with them.

If you take the view that all these movements are sincere religious movements and really believe what they say, everything starts makes sense. The same goes for Hamas.

I posted bin ladens fatwas and writings recently, as well as this, which seems apt:

Dabiq Magazine 'Why We Hate You and Why We Fight You - 2016:

"One would think that the average Westerner, by now, would have abandoned the tired claim that the actions of the mujahideen—who have repeatedly stated their goals, intentions, and motivations—don’t make sense... There are exceptions among the disbelievers, no doubt, people who will unabashedly declare that jihad and the laws of the shari’a—as well as everything else deemed taboo by the Islam-is-a-peaceful-religion crowd—are in fact completely Islamic, but they tend to be people with far less credibility who are painted as a social fringe, so their voices are dismissed and a large segment of the ignorant masses continues believing the false narrative... We hate you, first and foremost, because you are disbelievers... we have been commanded to fight the disbelievers until they submit to the authority of Islam, either by becoming Muslims, or by paying jizya... We hate you because your secular, liberal societies permit the very things that Allah has prohibited... What’s important to understand here is that although some might argue that your foreign policies are the extent of what drives our hatred, this particular reason for hating you is secondary... we will never stop hating you until you embrace Islam."

Why would you trust the words of a mass murderer? Or at least do you think he might possibly be disingenuous or not exactly forthright?

I don't think he necessarily deserves this level of credulity.

This is a common critique, but it is absolutely crazymaking. I don't intend to jump down your throat, so bare with me.

When a Christian says "I think gay sex is sin" and points the Bible, we don't sit around and questions if that's really why they don't condone homosexuality. We know why the Westboro Baptists say "God hates fags". Its not mysterious. We know why the Mennonites build barns, drive buggies, and live in their communities. They will tell us. We know why Mao opposed the bourgeoisie, and did his thing. We know why Hitler did his thing. We know why Spanish Inquisitors did their thing. Nobody questions it.

But religiously motivated Islamic terrorism seems to beget an isolated demand for rigor no matter how much it makes sense of otherwise bizarre behavior.

Incredulity doesn't necessarily follow from the actions of even a mass murderer. That has never been the case. Moreover, Bin Laden was not a lone, isolated actor. He was part of a wider movement, an ideology, with a long history of beliefs, documented in ancient texts, interpreted in the writings of modern Imams and ulama. His stated beliefs totally explains his actions, not only in war, but also in life. His actions and explanations were held consistent for decades. They make sense of the actions of millions upon millions of people (ie the Taliban, ISIS, the Muslim brotherhood).

Bin laden was first and foremost a deeply religious person. It totally explains every facet of his entire adult life. The Taliban is likewise deeply motivated by religion. So is ISIS. They tell us. They can trace their reasoning through modern scholarship of ancient texts in the exact same way as modern priests can legitimately claim that homosexuality is a sin under Christianity.

My argument is that if you take the perspective that the beliefs are sincere and literal, everything starts to make sense. I mean to seriously convince you of this. Charlie Hebdo, ISIS, the Taliban, and 9/11 - to name a few examples - become no less mysterious than an Amish person using a horse-drawn plough in 2025. Thousands of people will spell out in excruciating detail why they do what they do. As Dabiq printed, these actions are completely Islamic (to some minority of 1.8B Muslims), and people saying otherwise are peddling a false narrative.

No, that's well and good. No offense or anything. And I think to the same extent that I'm crazy making, you're sanewashing.

First off, the Amish don't really every engage in suicidal mass-murder. At baseline, I think we should take sane people who contribute to modern society in positive ways more seriously and people like bin Laden less seriously.

Bin laden was first and foremost a deeply religious person. It totally explains every facet of his entire adult life. The Taliban is likewise deeply motivated by religion. So is ISIS. They tell us.

Oh I fully agree. What I think though is that they have found justification within their religion for a set of beliefs that emerged in other ways.

As Dabiq printed, these actions are completely Islamic (to some minority of 1.8B Muslims), and people saying otherwise are peddling a false narrative.

Absolutely, Islam has this seed within it for those that want to find it. But the fact that a couple million found it and the remaining ~1.8B should make us realize that it it not sufficient. Something else has to cause bin Laden to radicalize and find, within Islam, the justification for his radical drive that did not happen to the modal Indonesian.

Cool. It's crazymaking to me, I don't think anyone intends it. I disagree about motivations. I find the evidence so overwhelming that in any other scenario nobody would ever disagree (of course I could be wrong, so I make my argument).

People readily see the connection between Christianity and homophobia without any prompting. Or between the Amish and the comparatively extreme lives they lead. People believe that antivaxxers don't vaccinate their kids because they believe vaccines would cause autism. We believe what those group say about the motivations for their actions. We even believe that psychotic people really believed their delusions when their actions and retelling make sense of their behavior.

What I'm am talking about is not isolated to Bin-Laden by a long shot (nor does it apply to all Muslims). I'm saying such people get specific beliefs from specific lines of text, they actually believe them, and that modern scholars have said that these are plausible beliefs given the text. That does all the heavy lifting of my argument. It explains the over-representation of homophobia in Christians, and Charlie Hebdo. It doesn't preclude ambient homophobia or psychopathy. Those reasons will always be there.

I do think Bin Laden was a psychologically normal person who merely had some unhelpful beliefs about the creator of the universe. And there are many thousands like him. This does not preclude sociopathy etc. as an exacerbating factor. Sincere beliefs like martyrdom, jihad, haram (all as understood by many) are the best explanation. We know this because of a disproportionate amount of specific, observed behaviors. That's what is analogous to the Amish - who just happen to beliefs and actions are far more benign, but are equally explained by their beliefs. It likewise explains why there are Islamic countries with sharia judicial and banking systems. Why else would they do these things? (The economic consequences of usuary prohibition in Islam is actually its own fascinating modern history. They get around it in complicated ways to this day, much like orthodox jews have a special light switch for use on Saturdays). The kosher light switch only makes sense because of Judaism. State sanctioned public beheadings for apostacy only make sense because of Islam. Christian gay-conversion therapy only makes sense because of Christianity. Secular factors play a roll (well, not so much for the light switch).

Complex form violence unique to Islam has popped up in Indonesia. The claimed reason of the perpetrator? Islam. This violence doesn't look anything like the Inquisition for a reason.

People readily see the connection between Christianity and homophobia without any prompting.

I dunno, live in a blue state long enough and the number of either LGBT accepting or outright queer churches sort of suggests that some folks a homophobic and those that are also Christian tend to draw from christianity their justification for it.

I could be wrong.

Complex form violence unique to Islam has popped up in Indonesia. The claimed reason of the perpetrator? Islam. This violence doesn't look anything like the Inquisition for a reason.

I agree, I think maybe we could agree there is a particularly etiology here in which sociopathic people, given the contents of Islam, gravitate towards it and specifically forms and types of violence.

IOW, I guess what you call an aggravating factor seems to be indispensable. And what you think is indispensable here, I see as providing an outlet and ultimately enabling rather than causal.

My argument is that if you take the perspective that the beliefs are sincere and literal, everything starts to make sense.

Sure... but nobody's that self-centered that they'd destroy most of the compromises set up to channel disputes among maximally self-centered individuals, right? Besides, when I do self-centered stuff, I'm lucky enough that it usually has some productive end, and the woo woo shit I might otherwise be partial to/where I work towards what makes observable, repeatable sense is generally... not, so naturally they'd have a sense of that and know when to moderate it.

This is the model that "reasonable citizens" have; that's why they can be defeated.

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