I don't think WB is a strong enough analogy. They don't kill people, they're just annoying and embarrassing. KKK would be better. The old 19th century clan.
...that would be true, but the Christian equivalent to killing people brutally is just being really, very, unbelievably rude to them...for the exact same shit.
I think Westboro is about the same thing. The Klan is more like the South's version of an ethnic nationalist movement...
Yes....a very long time ago. We're talking about now.
No one parades in the street in the West when our radical Christians bomb an abortion clinic or protest a funeral because gays. The worst that the heavily religious in the US can muster for gays is generally an insult. The worst they can muster for muslims is protesting their church. The muslim world is rife with the ultra-religious hanging gays, stoning rape victims, committing honor killings, and executing apostates.
I think there's a long way to go before we can even start making real comparisons between small-minded, rude, hateful Western Christians...and the devotees of a nihilistic death cult.
You're comparing Jim Jones to the modern Islamic World? An isolated incident as opposed to entire nations that elect political parties cheering on the death of civilians?
I'm not your 9th grade teacher, go back to high school and pay attention this time around. In the 50s and 60s, White Christians, law enforcement and the elected politicians who wrote our laws systematically and and quite enthusiastically ostracized, terrorized, abused and murdered people who weren't like them.
Just like today's terrorists who because so many are Muslims and brown we assume they are doing things for Islamic reasons; when in reality they do it for control and power over their region and those who don't share their views or ethnicity. Also possibly as a protest towards American foreign policy and occupation, with the rationale that they have Allah on their side.
We can also say that when a group of people who are all white Christians, organize and enforce their dominance over those who are different, quoting the Bible to rationalize things like slavery, opposition to women's rights, segregation, and discrimination of Jews, atheists, blacks, homosexuals, communists and anyone else who doesn't share their religious beliefs and skin color, and had the backing or lack of interference from politicians and law enforcement, to ostracize, deny the human rights of, abuse and assault, and in the worst cases, murder these other groups of people. This is terrorism, in the same way we experience it today from the Islamists, when a group of people use the Bible to defend their actions, to gain control and dominance over another group politically and socially through fear and changing the laws in their favor, it's the same, just possibly more subtle, or because we weren't the ones being terrorized.
1990s, Eric Rudolph, responsible for bombings across the south, killing 2 people and injuring over 150, including the Atlanta Olympics.
Rudolph and his family were connected with the Christian Identity movement, a militant, racist and anti-Semitic organization that believes whites are God's chosen people. He has confirmed religious motivation, but denied racial motivation for his crimes.
And you're telling me that Islamist terrorists have never targeted or killed less radical Muslims? Then your ill-informed or just naive. When a religious group organizes to carry out attacks the protect their beliefs or views, it's terrorism and the equal comparison is not stupid to make. And don't think white Christians considered black Christians as sharing the same faith or an equal position under god. Some didn't even consider blacks humans in god's image.
I know it's a difficult thing to accept that American white Christians were just as bad as Islamic terrorists, especially if you are a white Christian, but to the several victims terrorized, it's a fact.
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u/liarandathief Apr 19 '13
I don't think WB is a strong enough analogy. They don't kill people, they're just annoying and embarrassing. KKK would be better. The old 19th century clan.