Friday, 14 May 2010

In Passing

Maybe he’s lying.


Paul Berman:  [Swiss-born islamist Tariq Ramadan] is fated by his family heritage to stand for certain things.  But he is fated by his own personal temper and the time in which he lives to stand for other things.  He upholds every possible position and its opposite, which did seem to me kind of interesting.

...I read works by [him], by his family, and sometimes by people around him.  I read works written about him.  And I marveled at the contrasts and confusions.

If you listen to Ramadan for fifteen minutes, you will learn that he says all the right things, whatever a liberal-minded person would want such a man to say.

Michael J. Totten He does.

Paul Berman:  He’s against bigotry, he’s against anti-Semitism, he’s against terrorism, he’s for the rights of women, he’s in favor of democratic liberties, he’s for a tolerant and multi-religious society...  There isn’t a single objectionable point in the first fifteen minutes of his presentation.

MJT:  Yes.

Paul Berman:  Unfortunately, the sixteenth minute arrives, and, if you are still paying attention, you learn that he wants us to revere the most vicious and and reactionary of Islamist sheikhs -- the people who promote violence, bigotry, totalitarianism, and terror.  The sixteenth minute is not good.  The liberal quality of his thinking falls apart entirely.
...
Tariq Ramadan tells his audiences: you must tread in the path of Hassan al-Banna.  This means treading in the path of all kinds of terrible people.  But Ramadan also says: the path of Hassan al-Banna is the path of democracy, tolerance, and rationalism.  And so, Ramadan introduces a remarkable ambiguity into the debate, which ends up producing a sea of intellectual confusion.
"Ambiguity” maybe, but the "intellectual confusion” probably lies only in the minds of his audience.  Because Ramadan is likely engaged in taqiyya - systematic lying to the infidel for religious purposes.
It has full Quranic authority (3:28 and 16:106) and allows the Muslim to conform outwardly to the requirements of unislamic or non-Islamic government, while inwardly "remaining faithful” to whatever he conceives to be proper Islam, while waiting for the tide to turn. - Mervyn Hiskett, Some to Mecca Turn to Pray: Islamic Values and the Modern World
Meaning we must firmly keep in mind that what’s actually going on is: We’re being conned.

Elsewhere:

Via:  IP

Posted by: Old Grouch in In Passing at 01:15:08 GMT | No Comments | Add Comment
Post contains 389 words, total size 4 kb.

Comments are disabled. Post is locked.
70kb generated in CPU 0.0264, elapsed 0.3395 seconds.
51 queries taking 0.325 seconds, 200 records returned.
Powered by Minx 1.1.6c-pink.