students seen dressed as Arabs mocking them by carrying toy machine guns

Taiwan Living in Taiwan
41

Assuming they’re actual followers of Islam. I’ve met a lot of nice Arabs with basic manners too. If they’re being nice to you it’s probably because you’re not gay, a women or other type of person they hate. And some of the nicest people have the worst oppressive and evil ideaology. The mere fact that we have to point out possible repercussions of terrorist attacks and can Taiwan attract gays and Muslims at the same time is a testament to that fact.

And I’ve never said the West didn’t influence or did some messed up things to Arabic nations. I merely pointed out they would probably not be any more pleasant without it. Have you been to a Arabic nation? Go and see how fucked up they are with some nice people at face value. Until they separate you and not even let you speak to their women, or if your a gay person no less and they begin to stone you. I’m entirely ok with making a mockery of them and how their religion, social and government is.

I’m glade you met some nice arabic people. But here is a list of arabic countries. Algeria, Bahrain, Comoros, Djibouti, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, Oman, the Palestine Liberation Organization, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates, and Yemen.

Can anyone here honestly tell me they would like to live in any of those countries outside of tourist visits? Any of these countries seem like they would even be open to you living there? Talk to their women? respect simple human rights we are so accustomed to?

I might sympathize with people living there struggling, but left to their own hands, they would just have more failed democracies, totalitarianism, theocracies, fanatics of the caliphate, oppressive regimes. And it’s all because of one simple thing they all believe in with certain slightly different interpretations of that they are even willing to kill each other for.

42

And which religion are you not a genuine follower of, pray tell?

How nice any of these countries are to live in depends on what sort of job you can manage to get, as well as how much you like the local culture. Saudi Arabia potentially pays the most, but is also the most restrictive. Oman is relatively liberal, and even has Hindu and Buddhist temples. Egypt has lots of culture and a low cost of living. The Comoros are poor African islands which sell passports to rich people. Morocco and Tunisia get a fair number of European retirees. (I wonder which caliphate you imagine them all to be fanatics of?)

43

Yes, a country that segregates in mcdonalds, sure if financial gains is the only thing youre interested in maybe.

WTF ARE YOU TALKING ABOUT?!?! Oman is an absolute monarchy in which all legislative, executive, and judiciary power ultimately rests in the hands of the hereditary sultan.

Sure, great for visiting some of the cultural site, voice one opinion that the government doesn’t like. You’ll be tossed in a prison and never heard of again or just shot. I’m glad you think low cost of living and culture is enough to forfeit basic free speech.

Please go on and name more countries you want to live in, and i’ll continue to point out why most reasonable sane people in the modern world probably would not

44

I want to play this game! Ok, here goes:

U S of A

45

Islam is not the only religion that has been used as a pretext for violence and oppression. And other things than religion have also been used as pretexts for violence and oppression.

I don’t think all Arabs hate gays, women, and other types of people, and I don’t think Arabs are the only people who have among their number people who hate gays, women, and other types of people. As far as I could tell, the Arabs I knew were mostly busy doing other things than hating gays, women, and other types of people, and besides, I never got around to asking them questions about things like that.

I didn’t say you didn’t say that the West influenced the Arabs. I acknowledged that you said it. My point was that influence is a very nice word for what has been done to the Arabs by parties in the West.

Only for brief times. I was on a ship in the Persian Gulf for a few months in late 1983 and early 1984. The ship spent a lot of time at sea. The only places I went ashore at were Dubai and Bahrain.

That’s your right, and your business.

I don’t know how the Arabs (and some other predominantly Muslim societies) would have turned out if the West had left them alone.

Western peoples have also killed over religious issues.

46

If we’re discussing their democratic bona fides, then sure, Saudi Arabia is hopeless, Egypt is more or less a military dictatorship, and Oman is an absolute monarchy run by a liberal (and gay!) monarch. Most of the other Gulf states would fit this description. Morocco and Tunisia are struggling democracies. Syria is going through a bloody civil war, Palestine is under occupation.

If we’re discussing which countries would potentially allow you to live in them, and which ones you might be happy to live in, then that is a different matter. Suffice it to say that Western foreigners have settled in many of these countries.

47

Well you can look at them historically to get an idea. Been fucked up since Muhammad, especially after he died. I have no reason to think they would have pulled themselves together and made a better place.

the kids aren’t making fun of some ethnic minority that are oppressed. The stereotype isn’t that far off from the truth. A huge number of Arabs in Arabic nations are sympathetic to many terrorist groups.

I don’t understand why everyone’s trying to dress up the ugly truth.

48

One issue is that the British Empire, with the help of T.E. Lawrence, supported relatively conservative, nomadic desert chieftains (later monarchs) over relatively modernized coastal populations with their democratic aspirations. The USA has followed a similar policy of propping up friendly dictators.

To put this in perspective, let’s have a look at majority-Buddhist countries. Sri Lanka just emerged from a bloody civil war in which the most belligerent voices were coming from Sinhalese Buddhist monks. Thailand is a military dictatorship which negotiates power with royals who cannot legally be criticized; its Buddhist leaders show little solicitude for Muslim Malays living in the southern provinces (given to Thailand by the British). Burma has the Rohingya situation. Bhutan ethnically cleansed its Hindus during the 1990s. From this record, is it right to conclude that Buddhism is evil?

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49

wowww
it seems that some of the fellow forumosans are a bit or a lot… humm

well here is what i think- and this is ONLY my point of view.
Iam mixed - eastern european from the daddy and north african from the mummy -
grew up in north africa being a christian and going to the church every sunday.
my fellow jews friends went to the cynagog and the muslim friends to the mosk

I have never seen a gun in Morocco.
I grew up in Marrakech ( considered as the gay capital of morocco)

i left the country at 18 and build my life in 6 other countries.

What i think is:
do you really think that these guys wake up in the morning thinking about blasting people, killing woman or gay or whatsover terrorist group do?
Do you really think that these guys building their life on the kuran?

what i think is that muslim ( in general) like any other humans, wake up in the morning and think about how they will make $, their work, their holidays, family and every one struggles depending on how wealthy he is or not.

If they are rich, well they think about partying and spending $, or investing and getting richer or whatsever,
middle class will focus on making $ and spending it,
lower class will focus on how they will pay their rents etc…

I don’t believe they are more different than us.
After a long day at work, people tend to relax afterwards, a beer, a tea, watching sport on tv or just staying with families.

You will always have weak people who can be easily brain washed and manipulated.

But any person with a bit of common sense will never blow himself because of a holy book.

PS: some of the best parties in europe are in Morocco :rofl:

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50

thats a lot of falling lead…

51

So bad that Morocco isn’t Europe!

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i see that you didnt get it
:rofl:

why so bad— it is great like it is-
different cultures, different country continent - same people

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I’ve been to Morocco like 8 or 9 times. I get the differences thing :wink:

Maybe I should have read your entire post before commenting.

54

Thats so patronizing. Lookup the history of Islam. How would other societies have turned out if Islam had left them alone.

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55

Not the same

There is nothing you can take from the Sutras or what the Buddha taught that could be used to support violence or expansionism. That there is inter-religion violence is true, but the nature of it isnt the same. Buddhism doesnt imagine itself as the final religion on the planet, when as the prophecy is told the followers of other religions succumb to Islam. There is nothing uniquely Buddhist in what is happening in Burma

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Christianity is the same.

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57

They wouldn’t have learned much algebra…

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No its not

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Yeah, so justifying colonization there. Great. India wouldnt have trains or a fair legal system if it wasnt for the glorious British Empire.

Islam was done with the algebra/science stuff by the 1300’s BTW, expansionism continued after that. The Islamic world refuted logic and reason at that time.

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Not to say everywhere else is Happy Land or something, but I’ll pass.

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