Friday, May 04, 2007

I have no words

Do we in the Western world consider ourselves civilized? We are certainly aware of the distant and the not-too-distant past history of the Christian religions. And there are some who see no moral difference between Christianity and Islam.

So what do you think?
The moment a teenage girl was stoned to death for loving the wrong boy

3rd May 2007

A 17-year-old girl has been stoned to death in Iraq because she loved a teenage boy of the wrong religion.

As a horrifying video of the stoning went out on the Internet, the British arm of Amnesty International condemned the death of Du’a Khalil Aswad as "an abhorrent murder" and demanded that her killers be brought to justice.

Reports from Iraq said a local security force witnessed the incident, but did nothing to try to stop it. Now her boyfriend is in hiding in fear for his life.

Miss Aswad, a member of a minority Kurdish religious group called Yezidi, was condemned to death as an "honour killing" by other men in her family and hardline religious leaders because of her relationship with the Sunni Muslim boy.

The link also contains video of the death of the young girl. You've been warned.

2 comments:

Caleb Bradshaw said...

So a non-Muslim girl was killed by her non-Muslim co-religionists for either dating a Muslim boy or converting to Islam.
What, in your opinion does it say about Islam?

Steve Erbach said...

Nikolay,

While I feel a bit of remorse for my loose reference to religion -- giving the impression that I favored Christianity over Islam -- I note that the linked article includes the news that the stoning of that recent convert to Islam by her non-Muslim relatives may have triggered a retaliatory attack: 23 Yezidi workmen were slaughtered by Sunni gunmen.

One can be repulsed by the actions of religious adherents of all stripes; but I will say this about Christianity vs. Islam: the leader of the Christian faith never advocated violence, whereas the leader of Islam did.

Yes, Christians on a daily basis demonstrate a virtual disdain for the tenets of the founder of their faith; but at least the founder was true to his non-violent teachings and urged his followers to do the same. On the other hand, Muslims have no tradition of non-violence since their leader outright encouraged it against the infidels, the unbelievers.

That's what I see as the primary difference between Christianity and Islam.

Personally, I lean towards Heinlein's preference for the cold loneliness of reason vs. the warming hearth of faith.

Steve Erbach
The Town Crank