8/24/2005

 

Suicidal attitude

I am sorry that I talk so often about Orkut. It will probably get annoying for people who don't know it. But Orkut is really the world in small, there are very interesting phenomena there to investigate in relation to xenofobia.

I am in a fight right now with the person I have been arguing with for a long time already, it started right after Theo van Gogh got killed with a discussion about the "Arabization of the Netherlands".


By the way, I really like a lively debate, but I am not really sad that some Islam haters, like the person below, have left my community. There are many friendly people in my community now and the discussions are still very interesting in my opinion. And there are enough other places in Orkut where Islam haters can post their dirt. I must say that I am a little proud of myself that I founded the Discourse Analysis and Racism community, when I go through the discussions. My moderation isn't strong, I banned one person who kept insulting people and I removed the posts of a fascist who literally said that he thought that the white race is the best and strongest in the world. Critical posts regarding the Islam will not be deleted by me, people are free to say what they think.

So this person said to me:
"It is time for a new title for your "Discourse Analysis and Racism" community. It no longer deals with any of the issues it was desingned or pretends to deal with. It is now merely an Islam fan club which doesn't predend to question it as it would any other philosophy, making it unequally devoted to one religion. Congratulations, you are your own version of "Fair". You don't matter anymore in your own community, except for in a fan sort of way. I shouldn't be sad about this, but I am. All of you wonderful Dutch tolerance went towards intolerance. This is what happens when you tolerate intolerance, intolerance wins.
Does your community pretend to deal with hinduism? Shintoism? Buddhism? Catholocism? Asatru? Jianism? Sikhism? Bahai'ism? No!I've looked. Islam is the only religion your community reconginzes. This is a sign of sickness, either of focusing on only one topic, or of having only one topic to speak of."

I replied to him:
"My community deals with racism / xenofobia. In my opinion the Islam is discriminated a lot so that's why I talk about the Islam often. Just come back there then and start to analyse a certain discourse about racism, you are welcome. If everybody who has different views than I will leave, then there will only remain views of lunatic liberals and peaceful Muslims there, indeed.
If you want to describe experiences or views of how hindus are discriminated, or other groups, you are more than welcome. By the way I once said in a discussion that Hindus are believers too (also if they don't have prophets or a divine book). We agreed then that it doesn't matter which faith you have as long as you try to be a good person who does good deeds.
You make the impression that you left because you feel you lost the argument, that you find too much resistance now if you continue to post your prejudices and hateful simplistic generalisations about the Islam. I wouldn't expect that of you because you are a strong debater.
I really like it more to have lively debates with people with other views then to have long lists of people saying that they agree with each other."

He said:
"How can I ever expect any fair moderation out of someone who thinks that I'm a racist because I corrected that stupid Urdu speaking girl about the meaning of a word in Arabic. Not to be rude, but you don't know what you are talking about. Not at all. You really know nothing about Islam, Muslims or the Middle East. Yet, you would bend over backwards to try and prove how tolerant you are of what you don't understand, or worse, refuse to see for what it is.
Your rampant tolerance has lost you control of your community, and all membership of any opposing voices. Your community is the sound of one hand clapping, patting it's owner on the back. It takes two hands opposing one another for there to be applause."

I said:
This is unbelievable. You contradict yourself a lot. First of all I didn't say that you're a racist. And with regard to what you say:
- I don't know what I'm talking about with the Islam and I refuse to look at it
- I tolerate extremism
- My community is biased to one side, I need opposing hands to make an applause.
- My community doesn't discuss discourses or racism.

I told you and tell you again that I do want to have debates with opponents with other views, also in DAR. If you think that I make mistakes in my reasoning then show me which mistakes. I don't support extremism, I support peace. If you have the opposite hand to make an applause in DAR, why don't you go there, why do you block me? I still think that it should be possible that our conversations can be productive. E.g. the e-mail discussions were not bad and there we could explain how we look at the world with respect for other views. When I say that you post hateful simplistic generalisations I mean that of course but I think you are capable of nuancing it. But it's your choice."

In a scrapbook from another Islam hater he wrote:
"I've blocked Esther. I've never done this on Orkut before, but I think that we have nothing to ever say to one another again. Her suicidal attitude makes me sad."

I replied there:
"Wow a suicidal attitude, I never heard that before, he is really creative with what he invents for me."

And the last thing I said to the first person (in my own scrapbook because his is blocked) was:
"You can see the Islam in two ways:
- A dogmatic religion which is lacking 500 years behind compared to christianity and which produces Muslim terrorists like the ones from the London attacks.
- A peaceful religion which serves as a personal guide / code of life for more than one billion people to encourage them to be morally good people.

Both views are partly true but not completely and both show only one side of a coin. I know that the coin has two sides. I don't deny that terrorists who claim to be Muslims exist and I certainly don't approve of what they do, that will be clear by now I suppose. So you say that I see only one side of the Islam but I can see the other side too. However I never noticed that you understood anything of the positive and humanist side of the Islam that I am interested in. So you find that in my community we speak too much about the Islam, and not enough about other religions. But in other scraps it clearly seems as if you are yourself interested in discussions about the Islam. But then you will say again that it's too much from one perspective only in my community. And then I invite you to present a different perspective, but then you refuse to do so. And you say each time that I don't know what I am talking about, but that is the reason why I try to read and hear more about the Islam, so that I know what I talk about as much as possible. So I don't see what the problem is, then."
Comments:
DAR is not a fan club at all. Its a community where people discuss real issues. And why Islam discussed there alot its because its the religion on hit list these days just like communism in coldwar era.
 
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