The Mustache of Understanding has a new term. He defines online jihad recruitment as ‘Virtual Afghanistan.’ Apparently, the bad guys are no longer recruiting people to go to Chechnya, Kashmir, Iraq, and Afghanistan in mosques because of the increased surveillance there. Instead, they are using Facebook and YouTube. So, Facebook and YouTube are part of Virtual Afghanistan in the same way that Kabul and Kandahar are part of the real Afghanistan. Clever, isn’t it?
What Little Tommy Friedman really wants, however, is a civil war in the Islamic world that parallels our own civil war back in 1861-1865. The good guys (The Virtual North) need to really take it to the bad guys (The Virtual South), so that everyone’s offspring can hate each other five generations down the line.
Only Arabs and Muslims can fight the war of ideas within Islam. We had a civil war in America in the mid-19th century because we had a lot of people who believed bad things — namely that you could enslave people because of the color of their skin. We defeated those ideas and the individuals, leaders and institutions that propagated them, and we did it with such ferocity that five generations later some of their offspring still have not forgiven the North.
Islam needs the same civil war. It has a violent minority that believes bad things: that it is O.K. to not only murder non-Muslims — “infidels,” who do not submit to Muslim authority — but to murder Muslims as well who will not accept the most rigid Muslim lifestyle and submit to rule by a Muslim caliphate.
The part I don’t quite understand is the exact point in this bloody process where they are all supposed to Suck.On.This.
Oh, I’m sure the Mustache will come up with some kind of virtual Gettysburg address that fits his fantastical tropes.
But if he does, I’m reading it as a virtual Antietam.
I DO think they need to have a 1618-1648 type of moment. Not the bloodshed, that sucks, but that kind of live-and-let live religious thing. It wasn’t perfect for the west either, but it was a huge step forward.
Oh, that Enlightenment.
Just a the West goes all “post-Enlightenment”.
Well if they went through a second enlightenment we’d probably get a lot of good tech. When Muslims get their science on they can do some pretty awesome things with math and chemistry.
I think MNPundit meant the Thirty Years War (1618-1648), not the Enlightenment, whcih came after it.
The Mustache of Understanding apparently overestimates the extent to which the internet is available to ordinary people outside of some of the more affluent Islamic states and muslims in the West.
And there already are several civil wars testing out his thesis. How are those going, Tommy?
Mustache [sic] can’t wait to get in on Reconstruction – the Carpetbagging aspect of it, that is, not the rights for the Emancipated
Fighting violence with violence, always a good idea.
Who is the audience for this tripe?
Certainly not Muslims. If I’m a Muslim, considering whether to wage war on my brethren, am I really going to seek out The Mustache for advice?
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“A corrosive mind-set has taken hold since 9/11. It says that Arabs and Muslims are only objects, never responsible for anything in their world, and we are the only subjects, responsible for everything that happens in their world. We infantilize them.”
Responsibility for actions starts at home …
The moment the U.S. Armed Forces invaded Iraq under the pretense of Al Qaeda and 9/11 attack, you lost all credibility throughout the world. This cannot be repaired; the destruction of a secular state Iraq and loss of more than 100,000 civilian lives. Moreover, the flight of Saudis when all air travel was banned will never be forgotten. The source of much evil resides in Yemen and Saudi Arabia, extremist Islam and Wahhabism. This is exported to the West by teachings in European and American mosques, built with funds from the oil rich Arab states in the Gulf region. The Ugly American was unleashed, the effect in fighting terror was naught. Stupidity everywhere. Angst and no backbone to do good.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."Is he writing fiction now? It doesn’t even make sense.
He is always calling for someone, other than himself, to spill blood.
What is wrong with him?
Mustache of misunderstanding. Fixed.
That this moron gets paid to write this crap, along with Brooks and Will, is further evidence of just how fucked we truly are.