5 ms·

I would normally also roll my eyes at "They hate us for our freedoms", but a couple passages of this letter reasonably could be paraphrased as "We hate you for

I would normally also roll my eyes at "They hate us for our freedoms", but a couple passages of this letter reasonably could be paraphrased as "We hate you for your freedoms". The paragraph beginning with "the worst civilization witnessed by the history of mankind" is a good example.

krapp 12d ago
Apart from the references to Allah, that paragraph and the ones that follow are practically indistinguishable from the beliefs of many evangelical and conservative Christians, that America is an evil and secular empire corrupted by sin and vice that has turned away from God and His holy book. It just disagrees about which holy book. And that aside, many of the criticisms of the US made there are valid. The United States is a deeply hypocritical culture, presenting itself to the world as a paragon of Christian virtue while being rife with racism, misogyny and failing to actually uphold Christian values (apart from some uniquely American strain of "Christianity" that considers capitalism a virtue but empathy a sin.) The US is a violent hegemonic empire that doesn't respect international law while claiming to be the world's moral leaders. The US has undermined democracies around the world while claiming to be "leaders of the free world." The US does do vast ecological damage to the world in the name of capitalism. Granted, Bin Laden was a millionaire Saudi who funded mass murder so he was talking out of his ass on a lot of things (I wonder if the Koran has an equivalent to "take the plank out of your own eye before you complain about the speck in another's eye",) but he wasn't entirely wrong about the US. I wouldn't say the US is "the worst civilization witnessed by the history of mankind" but it probably would be in the top ten.
- xorcist 11d ago
  Similarities between extremely conservative Christianism and extremely conservative Islamism? I am shocked! Seriously, has anyone ever argued that evangelicals and islamists would disagree about conservative ideas such as the role of sexuality or feminism in society? That sounds like a straw man among straw men.
  - krapp 11d ago
    Did you have a salient point to make or was this just some weird reflex on your part?

krapp 12d ago

Apart from the references to Allah, that paragraph and the ones that follow are practically indistinguishable from the beliefs of many evangelical and conservative Christians, that America is an evil and secular empire corrupted by sin and vice that has turned away from God and His holy book. It just disagrees about which holy book. And that aside, many of the criticisms of the US made there are valid. The United States is a deeply hypocritical culture, presenting itself to the world as a paragon of Christian virtue while being rife with racism, misogyny and failing to actually uphold Christian values (apart from some uniquely American strain of "Christianity" that considers capitalism a virtue but empathy a sin.) The US is a violent hegemonic empire that doesn't respect international law while claiming to be the world's moral leaders. The US has undermined democracies around the world while claiming to be "leaders of the free world." The US does do vast ecological damage to the world in the name of capitalism. Granted, Bin Laden was a millionaire Saudi who funded mass murder so he was talking out of his ass on a lot of things (I wonder if the Koran has an equivalent to "take the plank out of your own eye before you complain about the speck in another's eye",) but he wasn't entirely wrong about the US. I wouldn't say the US is "the worst civilization witnessed by the history of mankind" but it probably would be in the top ten.

xorcist 11d ago
Similarities between extremely conservative Christianism and extremely conservative Islamism? I am shocked! Seriously, has anyone ever argued that evangelicals and islamists would disagree about conservative ideas such as the role of sexuality or feminism in society? That sounds like a straw man among straw men.
- krapp 11d ago
  Did you have a salient point to make or was this just some weird reflex on your part?