[Osx-nutters] jesus camp

[David Cake]

At 10:43 PM +0100 21/9/06, Stefano Mori wrote:
>On 2006-Sep-21, at 03:50, David Cake wrote:
>
>>>They may do it for more selfish reasons if their theology 
>>>*guarantees* them instant accession to heaven as a result of their 
>>>actions.
>>
>>         Sure. But being a terrorist willing to commit murder is the 
>>problem. A slight increase in the willingness to commit suicide in 
>>pursuit of murder only mildly exacerbates the problem.
>
>Only mildly? I wonder if we're underestimating what it takes to 
>voluntarily die, when so many other options are available.

	Which brings me back to where we started, that suicide 
bombing as a tactic was invented and used rather a lot by the Tamil 
Tigers, a secular nationalist group.
	Any 'intuitive' explanation of why suicide bombing is going 
to be far more likely by Islamist zealots is first going to have to 
explain away the Tamil Tigers successful use of it (which is a matter 
of historical fact, and thus trumps all 'I think its like this' 
explanations, which is all I've seen so far and all I expect to ever 
see on the topic).
	Terrorism is bad. Murder is bad.
	But arguments that construct religious terrorism, and 
particularly Islamist terrorism, as being somehow worse than other 
forms of terrorism really consist of little more than an extra bit of 
demonisation of Islam, and largely hinder addressing the problem of 
terrorism generally, and helps distance Muslim moderates, and in 
various ways are part of the problem rather than the solution.
	Cheers
		David