Are the new TSA security procedures what we deserve for not listening to moderate Muslims?

The moral of this story is that we tend to believe what we’re inclined to believe and color everything with our own prejudices and misconceptions. I agree that civil liberties are in danger, and that the new TSA standards are wayyyy over the top. ( I was going to say more, but I’ll just leave it at that. )

I’ve listened to moderate Muslims and stand against rampant Islamophobia so I didn’t deserve these new ridiculous ‘safety’ measures. We’re flying to IL in January – we’ll see if I can make it through the procedures without going bat-shit on these people.

I don’t think that we “deserve” the current measures at all. The question is whether it is fair or right to play Russian roulette with airplanes.

The last three attempts were perpetrated by Muslims. (The shoe bomber; the underwear bomber; and the printer cartridges.)

As long as there is any danger of a plane going down, aren’t the extreme security measures justified?

Also, how does any of this have to do with not listening to the voices of moderate Muslims? (Not that I have not listened.)

As @Simone_De_Beauvoir said, I don’t think most people “deserve” any of this.

Sadly, I’d say that islamophobia will not go away for a while (the same way that, for instance, hate towards immigrants will not go away). It’s a generational thing, at best. The US has come a long way from segreation, but the path is still very long.

The terrorists are winning their War against us with their Death by a thousand cuts

The terrorists?

@iamthemob

An interesting use of statistics. I can only hope no one is fooled by this. Comparing groups like ELF to the 9/11 hijackers simply doesn’t fly (no pun intended). I dislike ELF and most animal rights groups as much as the next guy but let’s be honest about what they’re doing. They may burn an SUV in the middle of the night or free a few furry animals but that’s a far cry from trying to bring down a jumbo jet. And we’re certainly not going to catch them at the airport with a cavity search.

Nice distraction but hardly pertinent.

@Jaxk – agreed. Except for the fact that ELF constitutes a negligible amount of the acts, and when you focus on the violent acts the results are still the same.

Buys what, though? What is your info based on….

@iamthemob Read my link! “The magazine also revealed the attack was not meant to kill more than the plane’s pilot and co-pilot, and was meant to force the U.S. government to spend billions of dollars on preventive security screening measures.”

They sit back pull off a few cheap probes or attempts to mess with our air travel and look what happens in response….we buy expensive scanners. They will bleed us dry or so they think.

@Cruiser – I did read the link. It discusses an individual event attributed to Al Qaeda.

Point?

@iamthemob We are just feeding into their goals by all this “preventative” actions that are not preventing squat when we could be pumping that money and the money we spent on the war into their economy and they would on their own take down these extremists organizations and boot them out of their countries. I was agreeing with your premise in a very indirect way.

Ah, now it makes sense. It’s not always clear, because of the “information” that’s out there, what point one is making when they use the word “terrorist.” ;-) But yes, clear now.

When it comes to airplane security, I think it’s natural for us to separate the terrorists that are using planes from the ones that are doing other things. Yes, there are terrorists of all ages, races, and religious backgrounds, but we can divide them by the means of their violent actions and attacks (such as where they attack, what they use to attack, do they give warning, do they act alone or are they being instructed by someone else, etc). I don’t agree with profiling though because if we were to give certain groups a pass (meaning they didn’t have to go through security or had a more lax security check), it would open the doors for terrorists in that group to start using planes for their attacks.

Also, This.

I feel that it’s what we deserve for being complacent sheep that are all to willing to sacrifice the freedoms that our forefathers fought for just because some authority figures want to go on a power trip and convinces the sheeple that it’s for their own good.

I might feel differently if we were actually more secure, but we really aren’t. I don’t trust my security to minimum wage workers with less-than-zero common sense.

We seem to have a wave of McCarthyism in America every couple of decades. Each time, it’s a new scapegoat, and Muslims are the phobia du-jour. It’s sad. It’s terribly unfair on those singled out as the scapegoats. But it’s human nature, or so it would seem. Let’s think about why that would be.

Fear is not a rational thing. It is inherently gut-level and irrational as things get. That said, a healthy heaping of it has helped mankind through all the ages survive as a frail, slow, thin-skinned animal living among saber-toothed tigers and great cave bears—and of course, the most dangerous animal on Earth, other human beings.

Rationally, far more American people die every year in automobile accidents than from all acts of terrorism combined. Even in 2001, terrorism claimed 2,752 while traffic fatalities totaled 37,862. Unless you count in various nutcase Americans as terrorists, there have been 0 people killed by terrorist attacks in the US in the nine years since 2001..So realistically, even if we had a 9/11 every year, we should all still be far more terrified of climbing into an automobile, truck or bus than of being snuffed out by a terrorist.

But again, fear isn’t rational, and for a very good reason. We all know the saber-toothed cat has been extinct for something like 10,000 years. But if what looked for the world like one suddenly came after you, would your rational mind or your gut decide what to do?

Commercial airline crashes are rare. Commercial air travel is far safer per mile than most other forms of transportation. But when a crash does occur, it’s so spectacular and so many people die in horrific fashion all at once. This inflates our fear of terrorism bring our flight down. Look at how Americans reacted after 9/11. Air travel dropped dramatically. Rationally, it may have been a safer time to fly than today, but we didn’t react rationally—we reacted emotionally.

Knowing what the stakes are, I would not want to be the President or head of DHS or TSA. If there is no attack, every effort you put into preventing it annoys an impatient and unforgiving public. Let an attack happen and see how long till the same people whining about “Don’t touch my junk.” and the “grave danger of X-rays in body scanners” are on the TV bellowing their anger that government didn’t keep them safe. It’s a no win proposition. The best any official in charge of it can do is go to bed every night confident that have done all that is prudent to foil another attack. I don’t presume to know whether they sleep well at night—just that if it was my job, I probably couldn’t.

No, that’s a non sequitur.

No one deserves the TSA.
and
Americans improving their listening to moderate Muslims would also be a good thing.

“No one expects the TSA!” : D

@CaptainHarley Yes, but they lack the element of surprise :P

Oh, I’d say they’re pretty damned surprising! LOL!

I think there will be a fundamental change when the first majority Muslim country is run by moderate Muslims who are free to establish

1) freedom of religion
2) free speech

which means that any Muslim in such a future country can openly declare that he has become an atheist or a Christian or a Buddhist without having to fear for his or her life.

In the West we all know that moderate Muslims are the majority, that they are tolerant and that they interpret Islam as a religion of peace. But the issue is: Are they in charge? They were in Turkey, the only secular country, but this is no longer the case. And even when Kemalists ran the country, there wasn’t free speech. Criticizing Turkey or Islam wasn’t possible. And Christians in Turkey have had and still have great problems.

Unfortunately, the security measures are still necessary in my opinion. Germany these days is on high alert. Our interior minister informed us that there are concrete indications that militants are planning attacks in November.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/nov/17/germany-security-alert-terror-plot

I do indeed think that we haven’t done enough when it comes to engaging moderate Muslims in a dialog. There are virtually no Muslims in our Fluther community. And some who tried are often shocked by the overall anti-religious polemics which erupts from time to time and are driven away. Hating all religions doesn’t build bridges.

For the past 8 months I’ve become part of two Muslim Internet forums and found this to be very valuable and enlightening. And it confirms that almost all users in these forums see jihad as a personal struggle to become a better person. Helping people in need. Working toward peace. Not being greedy. The majority of users (not all) are very respectful toward Christians and it has also shown me that some of the most educated Muslims there, know more about the Bible than we know about the Quran.

Bangladesh, although not a “city on the hill,” is a secular, parliamentary democracy with a 90% Muslim minority that recently voted a non-Muslim party into power over a traditionalist, theocratic opposition.

Indonesia is also a democracy (the world’s third largest after India and the USA. Its constitution guarantees religious freedom, but the government officially recognizes 6 religions, Islam, Protestantism, Roman Catholicism, Hinduism, Buddhism, and Confucianism. 86.1% of its population of just over 200 million are declared Muslims.

@iamthemob and @ETpro – Turkey is a secular, parliamentary democracy too, but like in Bangladesh a freedom of religion and free speech mindset is not so widespread. Even today it’s illegal to criticize Turkish culture (one of the reasons why Turkey can’t join the EU yet). Take a look at this

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostasy_in_Islam#Apostasy_in_the_recent_past

“The violence or threats of violence against apostates in the Muslim world usually derives not from government authorities but from individuals or groups operating with impunity from the government. An example is the stabbing of a Bangladeshi Murtad Fitri Christian evangelist while returning home from a film version of the Gospel of Luke. Bangladesh does not have a law against apostasy, but some Imams encourage the killing of converts from Islam. Many ex-Muslims in Great Britain have faced abuse, violence, and even murder at the hands of Muslims. There are similar reports of violent intimidation of those electing to reject Islam in other Western countries.

Hashem Aghajari, was found guilty of apostasy for a speech urging Iranians to ‘not blindly follow’ Islamic clerics; Hassan Youssefi Eshkevari was charged with apostasy for attending the ‘Iran After the Elections’ Conference in Berlin Germany which was disrupted by anti-regime demonstrators.

More recently, on 21 January 2007, the Central Council of Ex-Muslims was founded in Germany, an association led by Iranian exile Mina Ahadi and Turkish-German immigrant Arzu Toker. The association stands up for former Muslims who chose to abandon Islam. Shortly after going public on February 28, 2007, the group received death threats by radical islamists.

On 18 April 2007, two Turkish converts to Christianity, Necati Aydin and Uğur Yüksel, were killed in the Malatya bible publishing firm murders. Having tortured them for several hours, the attackers then slit their throats.”

http://richarddawkins.net/articles/3550-atheism-2-0-indonesia-39-s-nonbelievers-find-refuge-online

“Indonesia’s nonbelievers find refuge online: two young women are defiant unbelievers in the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, but they let few people in the real world know it. Instead, the women have joined scores of young Indonesian atheists who have found refuge on the Internet, using web tools such as social networking sites, mailing lists, blogs and wikis to communicate with like-minded people in a country where declaring there is no God can turn someone into an outcast.

It’s easier to say that you’re gay than an atheist. Quote: It’s also more likely that I could be physically attacked or killed because I’m a kafir (unbeliever) and my blood is halal (allowed to be spilled) according to Islam.”

How many Christians who converted to Islam or who became atheists are being murdered in the name of Christianity?

Islam is a religion of peace, as long as no one disagrees. When non-Muslims and moderate Muslims express criticism openly, the outrage is huge. And this is not because of a tiny minority of islamist terrorists, but because of the more than 100 million non-militant zealots of political Islam who reject the mindset of freedom and the Age of the Enlightenment.

This is the reason why so many people in the West are scared. Not because they overlook the fact there are more non-Muslim terrorists in our own countries (such as ETA in Spain or the militant communists in Greece, Corsica etc.). It’s because those 100 million non-militant Islamists are very vocal, apply peer pressure and show great disdain for Western values. Like the Turkish fathers in Germany who don’t even look at a female teacher at a parent-teacher conference, let alone talk to her or answer any questions. Or the Turkish fathers who think German women are unclean and our girls are sluts.

It’s a fact that non-militant political Islam endorsing the sharia is the breeding ground for militant Islamism.

Liberals in the West criticize the Christian Right and ultra-conservative politicians all the time. For example Sarah Palin. And rightly so.

Both non-militant and militant Islamists are far worse than the Tea Party movement, but liberals are being extra careful. Oh dear, they are just expressing their culture. Well, and when it turns out that this culture is about dismantling freedom of religion and free speech, oh no, it won’t come to that. That’s just happening in Saudi Arabia. Islamists as a minority won’t gain much control elsewhere.

We should remember from history that minorities who seize power, can in fact control a majority once democracy and freedom gets abolished.

@mattbrowne Unfortunately, what you say is true, as the references clearly show. Only a small handful of Muslims are terrorists, but it is most definitely the least tolerant major religion bu a long stretch.

@mattbrowne I believe you are correct when you say terrorism from Muslim extremists would start to fade if more Muslim countries weren’t religious theocracies but alot of these terrorist attacks came from Muslim terrorists who were from nations that tolerated other religions.

@iamthemob Islam is the least tolerant of all other religions. Comparing other “terrorists” to Muslim terrorists is pushing it.

@Paradox – No it’s not. When you state “Islam is the least tolerant of all other religions” you seem to be discounting the fact that it’s people who are intolerant. All of the intolerance that I’ve suffered has been at the hands of Christians in the west. It also doesn’t comment on the lack of attention to the moderate Muslim voice. Also, when you say that a lot of these terrorist attacks come from nations where other religions other than Islam were “tolerated,” I would like to see the statistics on that, as well as the level which the other religions were tolerated, and the level to which the individuals were raised by parents who were native to that country and fully participatory in the country, rather than Muslim isolationists.

A terrorist is a terrorist. All of them have adopted the worst and least tolerant of whatever ideology they pursue. And in every case, “one man’s terrorist is another man’s freedom fighter.”

@iamthemob – I agree that it’s the people, because it’s people who interpret holy texts. Paul Watzlawick argues that the belief that one’s own view of reality be the only reality is the most dangerous of all. So all we can do in this case is count the numbers of people who think the punishment for apostacy is death or not. Here’s an interesting overview of the matter:

http://www.answering-islam.org/Authors/Arlandson/apostasy.htm

“It must be conceded that automatic death for apostasy is not as prominent a theme in the Quran as one would expect. For instance, these verses condemn it, but its punishment is reserved for divine judgment in the Last Day, or its punishment is not clear down here on earth.

The hadith are the records or traditions about Muhammad’s words and actions outside of the Quran. This body of literature and the Quran form the foundation of later classical law. Bukhari (d. AD 870) is considered one of the most reliable hadith collectors and editors, if not the most reliable. Four examples from Bukhari and two hadiths cited by Maududi suffice to give us an idea of how harshly early Islam treats apostates.

The blood of a Muslim who confesses that none has the right to be worshiped but Allah and that I am His Apostle, cannot be shed except in three cases: For murder, for adultery (a married person who commits illegal sexual intercourse) and the one who reverts from Islam (apostate) and leaves the Muslims.”

We do not find this in other religions. On the contrary, the Catholic church practices the opposite: excommunication.

In another thread, someone stated that homosexuality was linked to pedophilia. I thought this was done away with. However, the Catholic church created a new surge in fear against homosexuality by blaming it for the molestation crisis in the church.

The Uganda death penalty for gays is based on the Christian evangelical agenda in Africa.

Western Christianity is responsible for greater threats to me here than “political Islamism” and is spreading death and hate as part of it’s message too.

A terrorist is a terrorist…is a terrorist. Stop blaming the people that aren’t you.

Within the Catholic Church you will find the whole range from liberal to ultra-conservative positions. The Vatican itself is mostly conservative and ultra conservative. In general the Catholic Church in Germany is somewhat more liberal. Dr. Robert Zollitsch, the Archbishop of Freiburg im Breisgau and Chairman of the Conference of German Bishops said in an article with the German magazine Der Spiegel, that he accepts civil unions by states but he is against same-sex marriage. And there are other more outspoken dissenters

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_and_Roman_Catholicism#Dissent_from_official_Church_position

Lutheran viewpoints concerning homosexuality are diverse because Lutherans are not centrally organized worldwide. In 2008, 37% of ELCA pastors were found to support same-sex marriage.

In many European Lutheran churches, LGBT people can work as Lutheran pastors. In the year 2000, the Evangelical Church in Germany (EKD) passed the resolution Verantwortung und Verlässlichkeit stärken, in which same-gender partnerships are supported. The Church of Sweden has permitted the blessing of same-sex unions and the ordination of partnered gays and lesbians since 2006.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homosexuality_and_Lutheranism

Western Christianity is responsible for greater threats to you than political Islamism?

You must be kidding.

Homosexual relations are a crime and face punishment in some Islamic countries such as Saudi Arabia, or Islamic Republics such as Iran. The death penalty is currently in place in Saudi Arabia, Iran, Mauritania, northern Nigeria, Sudan, and Yemen. In many Muslim nations, such as Bahrain, Qatar, Algeria and the Maldives, homosexuality is punished with jail time, fines, or corporal punishment.

Take a look at this map:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/LGBT_rights_by_country_or_territory

Can you give me one example of a gay person that was flogged in the US or Europe?

I agree that we must fight the Christian Right with all their hate mongering. Their words and intentions are despicable. But I am shocked about your comparison with the alleged harmless Islamism.

@mattbrowne – I’m very sorry, but are you telling me that, in my daily life, which is why I argued a personal threat, that what happens to people across an entire ocean is a greater threat to my rights than what happens in my own government?

You must be kidding, and you’re demonstrating an arrogance that is untenable.

What is closest to us is generally most important to our lives. When there is a law that prevents me from getting married, it affects me every day. When it remains possible for me to be arrested in some states for certain acts in my bedroom, even though there has been a constitutional prohibition for only seven years (seven years? I could be arrested for making love with impunity until just seven years ago?), it affects me every day. When we can be discharged for admitting who we are, it affects me every day.

These are things that affect me personally because they are laws enacted – laws – by my government that say “You are not as good as other citizens.” And they are based on a Judeo-Christian ethic or morality.

You are determined to show that there’s no comparison in the harms – but the way that one harms me…me personally…is different than an overall harm. And the way that you single out one religion as the one we should focus on is unnecessary and prejudicial when the harm is what matters, and the source is in comparison much less important.

Stop trying to push blame off Christianity. When you claim to be against human rights abuses, be against them all. Otherwise, it is you yourself who is practicing moral relativism.

@iamthemob – I disagree with the laws around you that affect your personal life in such a dramatic way. These laws should be changed. I can understand that you are very angry, but this doesn’t give you the right to offend me.

Stop insinuating that I’m trying to push blame off Christianity. Stop insinuating that I am not against all human rights abuses. This is not acceptable. None of my earlier comments indicate any of this. I won’t continue this kind of conversation.

@mattbrowne – When you claim that you have a better understanding of what affects me personally, and that it is not Christianity, but it is Islam, that is in fact what you are doing. You are, expressly or by implications, defending the harm it has caused to me because it is not as great overall as what is being done in countries ruled by more radical religious theocracies.

You consistently argue that Islam does harm now, greater than, Christianity. You consistently defend Christianity in comparison to Islam. That is damaging the cause of attacking human rights violations because it privileges people that are committing certain harms instead of illuminating all the abuses that are occurring.

When you literally and sarcastically ask me if I’m “kidding” about me being more oppressed by Christian fundamentalist tactics, rather than Islam ones, you are ignoring the consistent oppression that is brought about by the Judeo-Christian ethic. When you defend the Catholic church despite the fact that it is spreading these vicious lies and hasn’t done anything to publicly apologize for it, I am in disbelief (e.g., when you say ” In general the Catholic Church in Germany is somewhat more liberal. Dr. Robert Zollitsch, the Archbishop of Freiburg im Breisgau and Chairman of the Conference of German Bishops said in an article with the German magazine Der Spiegel, that he accepts civil unions by states but he is against same-sex marriage. And there are other more outspoken dissenters”).

Now, I believe that you are against all human rights abuses – you have demonstrated this repeatedly. Again, I lament your tactic of focusing on one group of abusers and defending another. The abuse is the issue, and the victims are as varied as the abusers are.

@mattbrowne

“Can you give me one example of a gay person that was flogged in the US or Europe?”

Maybe not. But I could give you plenty of examples of gay people who were murdered, or committed suicide, because of persecution.

@crisw

The people in our countries who harass or flog or murder homosexuals are breaking the law.

The people in countries run by political Islam who harass or flog or murder homosexuals are enforcing the law.

Heinous crimes in both cases. And we all should do everything we can and put a stop to this. We should discuss what everyone of us can do to help shape a better future. Tolerance is the appreciation of diversity and the ability to live and let others live.