Islam - How Awful Is It?

[pErvinalia]

The percentage? Are you serious?

Of course he's serious. You made a ridiculously hyperbolic claim...

Śiva wrote "...often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion." That's not hyperbolic. Not if you define 300 out of 3 million, or 0.0001% as 'often'.

[Jason]

Incidentally, your characterization of American Muslims as non-violent followers of a new Islam doesn't bear the ring of truth as often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion.

Just saying.

What percentage of them do that?

What percentage do you require?


Also, since when did you become a muzzie lover?

[Jason]

The percentage? Are you serious?

Of course he's serious. You made a ridiculously hyperbolic claim...

Śiva wrote "...often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion." That's not hyperbolic. Not if you define 300 out of 3 million, or 0.0001% as 'often'.

Oh yeah. NPR - that's a reliable source.

[pErvinalia]

Incidentally, your characterization of American Muslims as non-violent followers of a new Islam doesn't bear the ring of truth as often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion.

Just saying.

What percentage of them do that?

What percentage do you require?


Also, since when did you become a muzzie lover?

I'm a rationalist. I find irrational nonsense like that you are peddling currently to be in need of addressing.

[pErvinalia]

The percentage? Are you serious?

Of course he's serious. You made a ridiculously hyperbolic claim...

Śiva wrote "...often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion." That's not hyperbolic. Not if you define 300 out of 3 million, or 0.0001% as 'often'.

Oh yeah. NPR - that's a reliable source.

It's your claim, dude, so YOU tell us how often "often" is. I doubt it's significantly different than Hermit's figures. You fucked up. Just own your stupid words.

[Jason]

Irrational? OK then, have you actually read the paper in question or are you just agreeing with something that confirms your bias?

From the paper:

The estimated number of foreign volunteers from Europe ranges from 5,000 to 6,000, most of them from France, Belgium, Germany and the United Kingdom, while U.S. officials speak of several hundred

Now consider this:

Authors interviewed law enforcement officials, prosecutors, and defense attorneys, and attended relevant court proceedings. Additionally, they reviewed thousands of pages of legal documents, filing information requests and federal court motions to unseal records where necessary. Finally, the authors conducted several interviews with American travelers who returned from the territories held by the Islamic State (IS).

Now consider this:

Networked travelers use personal contacts with like-minded supporters of jihadist groups in the U.S. to facilitate their travel. In some of these cases, a group of individuals, usually connected by kinship, friendship, or community ties, travel together to Syria or Iraq. Others, while traveling by themselves, had contact with individuals in the U.S. who support - ed their journey by providing financial or logistical support, or with individuals who were involved in supporting jihadist groups in other ways (e.g. through committing or planning attacks). These groups can be as small as two, and in one case, at least a dozen individuals, all from the same community and/or social network. Eighty seven percent of
the travelers for whom information is available had some form of personal connection to other travelers or jihadist supporters.

Now consider this:

returnees can augment jihadist networks in the U.S., provide others with knowledge about how to travel and conduct attacks, and serve as nodes in future jihadist recruitment.

And this:

in some cases, prosecution is infeasible. At times, it is difficult to garner evidence about a traveler’s activities in Syria and Iraq that is admissible in a court of law. As a result, prosecutors are often forced to charge returned travelers with lesser offenses. While the average prison sentence for individuals who attempted (but failed) to travel to Syria and Iraq is approximately 14 years, the seven successful travelers that have been convicted from 2011–2017 received an average sentence of ten years in prison.

And this:

There are no deradicalization or rehabilitation programs for jihadist inmates in the U.S. federal prison system. Without these programs, incarcerated travelers have few incentives to renege on their beliefs, and may attempt to build networks in prison or radicalize other prisoners.

And this:

the current mobilization of foreign fighters and jihadist travelers to Syria and Iraq outnumbers all other mobilizations to jihadist conflicts during the past 40 years.

And then this:

Estimates of the total number of foreigners who have traveled to Syria and Iraq broadly range between 27,000 and 31,000

And more:

Some
were not attracted to a specific jihadist group prior to traveling, but later made networked connections that dictated their choice of organization. A number of these individuals likely went abroad rather than staying home to plot attacks largely because of the opportunity and
“social desirability” of waging jihad.

And a real-life example of an extremist hiding among moderates fomenting further extremism from the same paper:

One example is Christopher Paul, a Muslim convert from the Columbus, Ohio, area who participated in al-Qaeda training camps in Afghanistan during the late 1980s and early 1990s, and later joined the foreign fighter brigades active on the Bosnian Muslim side of the civil war.

At the conclusion of the conflict in Bosnia, Paul traveled through Europe and made a number of connections with al-Qaeda cells. He subsequently returned to the U.S. and attempted to recruit his own network of jihadist supporters in Columbus.

Following up on that:

These are the individuals who, upon conclusion or dispersal of a conflict, move onwards to the next battlefield and form connections between “Some estimates place the number of U.S. persons involved in overseas jihadist movements from 1980 to 2011 at more than a thousand.” their old networks and new networks. Ideologues like AQAP cleric Anwar al-Awlaki, whose work on “lone actor jihad” survived his death, have their works re-purposed to recruit individuals during later mobilizations. Operatives like Christopher Paul use skills that they learn in their previous experience with jihad to facilitate plots worldwide.

Also this:

There are documented instances of American jihadist travelers to several other countries, including Yemen, Libya, Somalia, and Nigeria. However, these cases are not included in the sample

And finally (because this is getting silly):

In order to be included in the sample, a traveler must have either: associated with a U.S. designated FTO that ascribes to Salafi-jihadist ideology while in Syria and Iraq or, associated with a non-designated militant group that ascribes to Salafi jihadist ideology.

To sum up: The study only covered Americans travelling to Iraq and Syria since 2014 (that have been caught and those they exposed) it does not cover many other destination hot spots like those mentioned above, and yet more like Pakistan. These guys are known to return from participating in conflicts in the name of Jihad and Islam to foment further extremism and plot terrorist acts. And finally, a whole swath of extremists travelling to these conflict zones are excluded because they do not do so in the name of a Salafi jihadist ideology.


So... please... tell me more about irrational nonsense. Next time read the fucking paper.

[Jason]

Of course he's serious. You made a ridiculously hyperbolic claim...

Śiva wrote "...often young American (and Canadian) Muslims are radicalized and travel to conflict zones to slay infidels in the name of their religion." That's not hyperbolic. Not if you define 300 out of 3 million, or 0.0001% as 'often'.

Oh yeah. NPR - that's a reliable source.

It's your claim, dude, so YOU tell us how often "often" is. I doubt it's significantly different than Hermit's figures. You fucked up. Just own your stupid words.

[pErvinalia]

Again, it's your claim, so it's up to you to provide numbers. That's how rational debate works. And YOUR own quote above says several hundred from the US. So not that different from the NPR number that you inexplicably rubbished.

[Jason]

You're a complete nincompoop aren't you?

Also all those quotes are from the fucking paper that the NPR (really unbiased source btw) referenced in their article. Again... read the paper. Don't just agree with what you see because it confirms your bias. I thought you were a thinking rationalist.

[pErvinalia]

Dude, it's YOUR claim. YOU have to provide numbers to back up your claim. If you can't get the basic of rational debate right, then what's the fucking point even responding to you??

[Jason]

I fucking well did. First off it's like 6000 from Europe, second off that number of 300 is garnered from the investigation of a small number of captured returning jihadists who gave up their fellows - it is not indicative of the total number of American Muslims who have gone overseas to fight in jihadist conflicts, third off that number is restricted to Salafi jihadists only, fourth off it only includes those who went to Syria and Iraq from 2014 onwards.

[pErvinalia]

You were talking about the US. Stop moving the goalposts. That's a logical fallacy, by the way. According to that article it's about a thousand over 30 years. Out of 3 million! Do the sums, if you can. Although, remembering why you spat the dummy and fled from ratskep I wouldn't be surprised to find that simple fractions are too hard for you.

Now fuck off. There's clearly some mental problem going on at your end. I feel like I'm picking on a retard.

[Jason]

Funny I feel the same way about you. How about addressing the points I just made. If you have a problem with reading comprehension perhaps you can speak to your doctor about adjusting your medication?

[Jason]

Also what I said was this:

The fact is, it is regularly reported that it occurs and is a major problem being confronted by law enforcement in Canada (and the USA too I'm sure).

Referring to people travelling to foreign conflicts to fight in a jihad.

[pErvinalia]

Fark, dude. YOU made a claim that jihadists leave the US "often"! That's complete hyperbolic bullshit in aid of you trying to paint the bulk of Islam in the west as an extremist threat to us. About 50 a year out of 3 million. That's not "often".