Human Rights are not universal. The only reason why the West and Islam share some common morals is because both are derived from Christianity.
No, it's not. Other religions - every religion except perhaps Satanism - shares some common morals; atheists share some common morals with Muslims and Christians.
It doesn't even make a lot of sense to talk about 'universal' with human rights, not because they're not but because it's confused.
Is there any such thing as any universal human right? Say, the right not to be tortured to death for no reason? If not, then how do we justify any war for any moral reason - and how would that make any sense to even talk about? And yet basically everyone agrees morals are important. So I'd say put aside the 'universal' debate.
Basically there's no universal agreement on morals - one person things one thing, another another - but that doesn't mean that the person who thinks something is moral can't decide he things someone else is doing something immoral and intervene. So where does that leave us?
If you see a man abducting a 6 year old child you know he plans to rape torture and murder, are you required to say "I have my morals, he has his" and let him proceed? On the other hand, is a person who sees someone eating pork allowed to say 'that's immoral and I must ban you from doing it', if not kill them for the bad behavior?
Who's to say "but one is really bad and the other isn't"?
Bottom line there is no easy answer to take either extreme; it does come down to people deciding their views when to intervene.
Where was this human morality when Titus massacred Jerusalem's population? After all, the Romans were the most advanced society of the time. What about the Nazis? Stalin? Morals were different for them. For Hitler, there was nothing wrong in killing a Jew. It was the right thing to do... Look at the big picture: right and wrong have never been universal. And what's good for a human and what's not is also subjective. Jailing people, or executing them is bad for an individual but arguably good for society as a whole. So who decides? For you it's your constitution. For me, it's the Quran.
The fact that someone did something we view as immoral in the past does not require us to allow any behavior by everyone now.
Yes, the plantation owner in 1840 Alabama might have thought keeping slaves was not immoral. Now, we think it is. And? It means that we do not allow it now. If our society sinks back to thinking it's not immoral, sadly, then we'll have no reason not to allow it again. But we do now, and we outlaw it now. That doesn't mean it wasn't immoral then (nor does it mean we're right now. Maybe we're just overly sensitive).
But TODAY, I think that the bigotry against gays is wrong, that our understanding of the history of the bigotry and its flawed basis show it's wrong. Today, you are the guy still defending Hitler, still defending slavery, when it comes to you defending bigotry against gays. And I'm ok with opposing you harming Jews or slaves or gays - just as I'm ok with opposing anti-Mulsim bigots here from harming you for their bigotry.
You really don't have a point. You are not going to be able to defend your bigotry with anything other than some nihilism about "there's no such thing as morality".
Or the similar claim, "there's no such thing as morality in terms of telling others right and wrong". And you can see above my example on the child murderer about that.
The main problem here is that most people evaluate Islam in what they have in front of them today--which is a on the whole a corrupted and backward society that doesn't even follow Islamic principles except in name. The average jihadi doesn't know any other aspect of Islam, its philosophy, history, jurisprudence but is brainwashed to believe that blowing others up will take him straight to heaven. It's pretty much how the West is fed with the "freedom" rhetoric. It's noble to kill innocents in the name of freedom as long as you call in collateral damage.
This has nothing to do with Islam, frankly. You may say and think you are basing your hatred of gays on the Quran. It doesn't matter - I'm discussing the bigotry, not why.
Whether you hate gays because you think the Quran tells you to or because you resemble the ignorant terrorists above and 'were raised to hate them' doesn't matter.
But IMO you resemble the people you condemn above on the gay issue more than you realize.
Society in 200 years will see today's society as barbaric, corrupt and backwards. That is how it works. People will always see "others" as inferior. If Hitler had won WW2, anybody that was not a fascist would have been "backward." "Human Rights" would have been different then. Something similar would have happened if the Soviets had won the Cold War. In the same way, in an Islamic society Western values are regarded as backward and corrupt.
Not exactly. For example, take the golden rule. It goes a long way to addressing the issues you list - 'don't dehumanize other people'. It covers a lot of ground, and doesn't change a lot over 200 years. Slaves were dehumanized. Hitler dehumanized Jews. Terrorists might dehumanize the west and many in the west might dehumanize terrorists.
And you dehumanize gays. And that's wrong. The US has dehumanized gays our whole history. We were wrong. We're improving. You should too.
At the same time the US had legalized slavery, we had abolitionists who said it was wrong. They were right. At the same time you hate gays, we have people saying you're wrong.
Now this was about your demand that you be left alone to hate gays. You lumped in your treatment of gays with your choices of food, dress, etc. They aren't the same.
When Hitler was doing the genocide against a number of groups, did the world have a right to say 'we're going to intervene'? I'd say yes. Now the sad fact is we didn't. The world was more concerned about going to war with him for his attacking others, and I question whether the world would have intervened without Hitler's attacks. But that's not the point. I'm not saying war is justified for you being a bigot - or for war to be started against the US because we are. But I do think it's the world's business to protect human rights.
That can mean speaking out, sanctions, alliances, and in theory even violence.
I'm not saying to invade you now for your bigotry, but I am saying that I disagree with your defense that it's no one's business if you harm gays.
You have the right as sovereign nation to ban gay marriage, to execute gays, to bring back slavery, to create concentration camps and kill all Jews in your borders, to legalize child rape and murder - you can do those things. You can refuse to explain yourself to the world. But they're still moral issues and the world still has the right to respond and oppose you harming people.
It's not a neat answer, there's no simple process for saying 'your morals are approved and yours are not', for saying what the sanctions will be.
Sadly, the most common behavior seems to be to misuse these issues as war propaganda - sort of like us ignoring Saddam's behavior when an ally, but bringing it up 20 years later when we're trying to get support for war against him. But nonetheless, I'd say that human rights ARE universal issues, in that everyone has an interest in protecting everyone.
And at the moment, I'm interested in protecting the gays in your society from your bigotry.
But I'm not calling for war, I'm just telling you, as I would tell that slave owner, you're wrong, and try to encourage you to improve your problem in this area.
I'm assuming your views are based in part - regardless of the Quran - on ignorance and an existing bigotry, that can be fixed, the same way I do with anti-gay bigots here.
I was just watching a show last night - it was only 14 years ago a TV station refused to carry a show because it had a character announce they're gay. How backwards ignorant, wrong is that? It shows us having people who simply did not understand homosexuality to the point they thought that someone saying they're gay is some evil thing, that they can just 'oppose gay' the way they opposed robbery. If that was here in the US 14 years ago, how much worse would it be in another entire culture?
Sorry, abolitionists spoke out against slavery, and I'm telling you your bigotry is wrong.
I'm encouraging you to discuss the issue - you might find you agree it's wrong eventually.
One nice thing, now that many 'civil rights' issues have been won - no more slaves, women can vote, etc. - it makes the next ones easier, people have a better idea about equality.
I'm not going to say ignore your Quran, but just as with Christians who thought the bible approved slavery, or killing gays, there's room for realizing you misunderstand it.
There are all kinds of things in the bible today that can be viewed differently than they have been - things like the Leviticus rules. You don't need to be killed for touching a football. Wearing clothing made of more than one material may be an 'abomination' just as 'man laying with man' is, but there are different interpretations of the rule. I sure hear a lot more from fundamentalists against gays than the two-material fabric.
Use a little common sense - what if you were gay? What do you think people who are born gay did wrong that they deserve to be 'dehumanized' or treated as second class?
Jesus saying 'love your enemy' speaks a lot more loudly than Leviticus to many people.
It may have seemed outrageous to end slavery as immoral at one point. Later, it didn't.
I'd like to use the argument, Green Bean, you are familiar with bigotry against Muslims, so you should better understand why bigotry against gays is wrong. But I know that doesn't work - the same applies to blacks in the US, who better understand bigotry because of our history, and yet are much more likely to be anti-gay bigots anyway, and when confronted about it, don't get the point, instead they get pissed off at being compared to gays. 'Fighting anti-black bigotry is nothing like fighting anti-gay bigotry!' What can I say.
But to repeat, no, I don't buy your attempting to say human rights issues are 'your business' the way what you choose to eat is, like some 'cultural trait' to be respected.