Staff/Members discussion [report-free]

[psalms 91]

I don't know but it seems the whole world wants to acquiesce to pc anymore even Christians

I still believe in hell, am opposed to same sex marriage, against taking religion out of everything and am pro life so that makes me a neanderthal and I am fine with that but I dont want others shoving their views down my throat and I would think on a christaian site that most if not all these views would be the norm but as you say many christians are not agreeing with this as well, sad. As for the muslims no matter what view they espouse they are an enemy of the cross and if stronger would concert or kill every christian, this is not hate, simply what the koran teachs

 

[topcare]

I still believe in hell, am opposed to same sex marriage, against taking religion out of everything and am pro life so that makes me a neanderthal and I am fine with that but I dont want others shoving their views down my throat and I would think on a christaian site that most if not all these views would be the norm but as you say many christians are not agreeing with this as well, sad. As for the muslims no matter what view they espouse they are an enemy of the cross and if stronger would concert or kill every christian, this is not hate, simply what the koran teachs

Amen I will be a Neanderthal with you. The Cross is foolishness to the world but for us it is saving

 

[~Anastasia~]

Ok, thank you.

I see what you are saying - to a degree. And I agree that it is wrong to say things in such a way as to imply that all of a certain group believe something when they do not.

I think what a sentence implies might not be exactly the same from one person to another, because your answers were not what I expected.

I would have equated "Islam promotes xyz" (which you said could not be said in this way if it was not universally shared by all Muslims) with "The Koran teaches xyz" (which you said was ok).

I see you are making very fine distinctions then. Which there is nothing wrong with that, but it does become more difficult to reach a consensus.

For the sake of allowing me to consider it better, I can bring the example closer to home.

"Christianity promotes a literal interpretation on the Body and Blood in the Eucharist". (Which folks here for the most part will agree with, though it might not be universal among more modern groups of Christians. But according to the same logic, it cannot be said because it does not represent all.

But "The Bible teaches a literal interpretation of the Body and Blood in the Eucharist" would be allowed (and I agree it should be, since anyone who disagrees will say it is a matter of interpretation anyway.

But I have to wonder if the reactions/feelings about the "ruling" would be the same if I said

"Christians promote a symbolic understanding of the Eucharist" is NOT ok (following your statement that my first example would not be)

and

"The Bible promotes a symbolic understanding of the Eucharist" would be ok - and those who disagree would again reply that this is opinion and a matter of interpretation.

I don't know if I'm helping or making things worse. But I see a lot of confusion and/or disagreement over minor shifts in usage.

I'm not trying to be argumentative in the least - I was hoping to shed more light but it seems I failed because I'm not perfectly understanding the distinctions either.

Ask yourself a question, do all Muslims (generally speaking) believe that? How about the moderates?
If not, find a clearer definition.
For example, in Talmud some things are written that are violent towards little infants in sexual way. Can we say the Jews believe it? It's in the Talmud after all. You see what I mean?
(Talmud is not Torah[bible], but neither is Koran)
We should not say the Jews believe such things at all. They themselves hate such Extremists who believe such garbage.

Do you see what I mean?


Need a better example of what you mean.
If today you define Islam as what is going on in Middle East and see this as the representative of Islam (burning Churches) you should consider Moderate Muslims who openly object to it.
Why not call these barbarians as Fundamentalist Islamists?


Definite Yes. Correct statement.



Tell the truth, that is all I am asking.

We cannot say Liberals or Conservatives are idiots at CF. Because not every Liberal or conservative is an idiot. You wold be flaming some Liberals or Conservatives who are not idiots.
We MAY say that SOME Liberals or Conservatives are idiots.

Posting style is everything.

 

[Tallguy88]

I have noticed an influx of muslim views lately, is this a targeting of the site or just coincidence? Also I am not PC nor do I want to be so is this language allowed? Will muslims be shut down that promote or attack christians on this site. I would hope that this language will be allowed as they are an enemy of the cross.

I only see two Muslims post regularly on CF. One is a male, a convert I believe. The other is female, no idea if convert or cradle. One of them can get carried away in debates. The other is always respectful in debate. Neither are proselytizers.

Muslims who join CF to convert Christians are perma-banned quickly.

 

[Edial]

Ok, thank you.

I see what you are saying - to a degree. And I agree that it is wrong to say things in such a way as to imply that all of a certain group believe something when they do not.

I think what a sentence implies might not be exactly the same from one person to another, because your answers were not what I expected.

I would have equated "Islam promotes xyz" (which you said could not be said in this way if it was not universally shared by all Muslims) with "The Koran teaches xyz" (which you said was ok).

I see you are making very fine distinctions then. Which there is nothing wrong with that, but it does become more difficult to reach a consensus.

For the sake of allowing me to consider it better, I can bring the example closer to home.

"Christianity promotes a literal interpretation on the Body and Blood in the Eucharist". (Which folks here for the most part will agree with, though it might not be universal among more modern groups of Christians. But according to the same logic, it cannot be said because it does not represent all.

But "The Bible teaches a literal interpretation of the Body and Blood in the Eucharist" would be allowed (and I agree it should be, since anyone who disagrees will say it is a matter of interpretation anyway.

But I have to wonder if the reactions/feelings about the "ruling" would be the same if I said

"Christians promote a symbolic understanding of the Eucharist" is NOT ok (following your statement that my first example would not be)

and

"The Bible promotes a symbolic understanding of the Eucharist" would be ok - and those who disagree would again reply that this is opinion and a matter of interpretation.

I don't know if I'm helping or making things worse. But I see a lot of confusion and/or disagreement over minor shifts in usage.

I'm not trying to be argumentative in the least - I was hoping to shed more light but it seems I failed because I'm not perfectly understanding the distinctions either.

No problem!
These are great questions!

When I said it is OK to say that Koran teaches sex-slavery I meant the Koran actually has verses stating that.
Quote the verse. Support what you say and you are OK.

If you say Islam teaches, not every Muslim accepts these verses from Koran and symbolize away the meaning.

Another point.
If someone says Christianity promotes symbolic Eucharist or real Eucharist it is not a correct statement.
And we all know that.
But it is not necessarily a CF violation.
Let's say I am a Protestant, I am not flaming you and you are not flaming me by saying this.

The objective is NOT to walk on eggshells trying not to make a mistake, but to walk on eggshells trying not to make a mistake in flaming someone.

If you and I disagree on Eucharist and both of us are claiming that Christianity promotes our views, we are both wrong yet are not in violation, because we do not flame each other.

If someone says the Bible teaches this or that - show verses.
If someone's interpretation is different from mine - no problem. One of us is wrong, but it us not a violation.
We are just debating, not flaming.

I can present Westboro Baptist Church (the one that is known for hating the troops and saying God hates you) and say that this is what Christianity teaches.

Hang on there for a second, we might say, this is what the Fringe Christianity, or Cultic Christianity teaches, but not Christianity.

When you want to say something negative about someone, make certain you are correct in what you are saying and you do not involve the innocent.

I can say with confidence that ISIS Islamists are a cancer of the Earth.
Strong statement, isn't it?
Let's say someone reports me.
Moderators would evaluate the report and hopefully would see that I called the ISIS Islamists the cancer, not Islamists.

If moderators miss that point and find it a violation, you may appeal in MSC and senior staff (myself included) would evaluate and probably overturn the violation.

Thanks,
Ed

 

[Edial]

I only see two Muslims post regularly on CF. One is a male, a convert I believe. The other is female, no idea if convert or cradle. One of them can get carried away in debates. The other is always respectful in debate. Neither are proselytizers.

Muslims who join CF to convert Christians are perma-banned quickly.

Yes, the Tallguy88 has a trigger finger concerning such posters.

It takes us weeks of rehabilitation on some of these banned posters in MSC. It works on some, but most stay banned.

 

[Antony in Tx]

Ed...not wanting to appear unnecessarily contrary, but comparing Westboro Baptist Church (with a whopping 39 members, almost all relatives from a single family) with the flood of church burnings, abductions of girls, beheadings, maimings, etc. and to try to make that look like (I'm saying this is what it sounds like on a very apparent level, not necessarily what you intend it to say) "Christianity is just as just as bad as Islam if we just twist words enough!" is patronizing and unfair from where I sit. To characterize the bad acts of what you are calling "extremist Islam" as representative of less than 1% of Muslims is a very big miss. It is probably syntonic with more like a third to a half or more of Muslims worldwide. That'd be like me saying that my joining the KKK is not a bad thing as long as I'm a "moderate Klansman". You're selling, but I'm not buying. If a Muslim poster is present and speaking in moderation, I would treat them with great hospitality, but if they ask what I think of their religion, I would tell them the truth.

 

[Edial]

Ed...not wanting to appear unnecessarily contrary, but comparing Westboro Baptist Church (with a whopping 39 members, almost all relatives from a single family) with the flood of church burnings, abductions of girls, beheadings, maimings, etc. and to try to make that look like (I'm saying this is what it sounds like on a very apparent level, not necessarily what you intend it to say) "Christianity is just as just as bad as Islam if we just twist words enough!" is patronizing and unfair from where I sit. To characterize the bad acts of what you are calling "extremist Islam" as representative of less than 1% of Muslims is a very big miss. It is probably syntonic with more like a third to a half or more of Muslims worldwide. That'd be like me saying that my joining the KKK is not a bad thing as long as I'm a "moderate Klansman". You're selling, but I'm not buying. If a Muslim poster is present and speaking in moderation, I would treat them with great hospitality, but if they ask what I think of their religion, I would tell them the truth.

Yes, you can tell him the truth.
You should always tell the truth.
But if there is a significant movement of moderate Muslims in the West who denounce suicide bombings, burning of churches and such it would not be truthful to say that Muslims approve suicide bombings.

You may however say Fundamentalist Muslims approve suicide bombings.

And BTW, I am not selling, I am just explaining how things are and how to avoid flaming violations.
We apply the same rules to cases of Liberals, Conservatives, Jews ...
If you generalize you could be flagged.

 

[rusmeister]

I do appreciate the courteous interchange.
But I am left feeling (and thinking - a vital difference) that my concerns have not been adequately addressed. And there is clear disagreement between the Orthodox consensus that the "moderate" voices in the West today (which I think are for Western public consumption to a great extent) are not in fact representative of Islam (and therefore do not negate generalizations that are true about a definite majority of Muslims in other places and all times) and the consensus of the moderation controlling CF, which insists that they ARE representative and therefore deny and forbid such generalizations.

So that is one of my two stated concerns, that disagreement over consensus. The other is the general philosophical problem of moderation of one worldview by another, to wit, of Orthodox by non-Orthodox and the misunderstandings which must arise because of the differences. (Though I think English-speaking converts to Orthodoxy tend to have a fairly good handle on Protestant views, having come from them themselves, very often as adults.)
Protestant
Any such attempt must inevitably be pluralist in its approach, and pluralism is the whole problem. It's good that we can find things to agree on. It is where we disagree that the problems begin. So I am left thinking what I thought when I posted the thread on inevitability.

 

[Tallguy88]

Rus, the Islam thing is a problem for a specif poster, not you. I've never seen you get in trouble for flaming a group the way the other poster did. They got a violation for something they said outside TAW. Here, you have a relatively free hand to say what you think of other faiths. Out there, it's a level playing field, everyone is treated equally. You stay in TAW, so it's not a problem for you.

Regarding moderation, we have one or two Orthodox moderators. To compare, there's only one Catholic (me). So despite OBOB being far more active than TAW, both the forum and the reports from the forum, TAW is comparatively over-represented on the mod team.