Confused

[lucasstalin]

Hello.
I have been advised to introduce myself, so here we go.
I suppose, you wouldn't describe me as a traditional left wing thinker. However, I do share many of your ideals, freedom of speech, equality across the board, i.e. gender, colour and sexual orientation, I have strong opinions about organised religion, and feel that the working man (saying)deserves more than s/he receives etc etc.
I am from the UK, but emmigrated a few years ago, to a very isolated area of the world (don't want to give too much away, because I am unsure at present if Revleft is a proscribed movement/organisation).
Anyway, I am familiar with UK left wing organisations like the Green Party, LGF, UAF, SWP, Hate not Hope etc etc. but have become disillusioned recently for the following reason. Many of these groups seem to have allied themselves with the islamic community, and though I respect muslims right to practice their religion and to live free of the threat of violence etc, I am acutely aware of many of their beliefs which are contrary to the ideals of left wing thinkers, in relation to anti feminism, anti homosexual rights, anti animal rights, and anti jewish sentiments. Before, anyone insults me for being influenced by the anti islamic media. It is not, it is to do with my personal experiences and knowledge.
So I find myself at a crossroads, torn between my humanitarian beliefs, but not wanting to 'sell out' or become hypocritical by supporting an organisation, who I don't feel represents my beliefs.
Can anyone help me with my predicament?

[Dean]

and though I respect muslims right to practice their religion and to live free of the threat of violence etc,
Oh boy. This is always proceeded by prejudice. Let's watch:


I am acutely aware of many of their beliefs which are contrary to the ideals of left wing thinkers, in relation to anti feminism, anti homosexual rights, anti animal rights,
The cultural tendencies of Muslim areas do have these problems. But they represent something like 2 Trillian people worldwide. Don't you think that wide membership opens them up to criticism of provincial issues rather than "Islam is to blame"?


and anti jewish sentiments. Before, anyone insults me for being influenced by the anti islamic media. It is not, it is to do with my personal experiences and knowledge.
Well, in regards to this last one, I should expect you to more vehemently oppose Judaism since the so-called "Muslim-Jewish" conflict is a direct result of the Israeli apartheid state, and many Jews claim their allegiance to that regime.

But really this should be a good example as to how utterly nonsensical it is to judge people based on religion. There are material conditions which engender prejudice. *****ing about religion is just an obfuscation.


So I find myself at a crossroads, torn between my humanitarian beliefs, but not wanting to 'sell out' or become hypocritical by supporting an organisation, who I don't feel represents my beliefs.
Can anyone help me with my predicament?
Support the organization you think will have positive effects for the world. If you're looking for an organization which you can fully support, you'll either sell out or search forever. Its not exactly a fruitful endeavor.

[Manic Impressive]

Hi as far as I know Revleft is just a forum not a political organisation. It has people of all different ideologies from the far left from anarchists to tankies and a few restricted social democrats.

I don't know if your strong views on organised religion are for or against so it's a little hard to help with your predicament. If they're against then why single out only Islam? personally I think Christianity, Judaism and Islam all have very oppressive teachings and histories.

Here's a recent thread on the burka you may find interesting
http://www.revleft.com/vb/burka-burqa-arguments-t142528/index.html

and welcome:)

p.s. Stalin?

[lucasstalin]

Initially, thankyou for your time replying to my muddled intro.
To challenge a few of the points made, Dean, the reason there are 'cultural tendencies to have problems in these areas' is because Allah, instructed the prophet Mohammed to spread these beliefs, they are recorded in the islamic holy scriptures. I can prove it if you like? This would suggest it is not a 'provincial issue' but a Fundamental issue.
Dean, I must not have made it clear, I am opposed to organised religion i.e Judaism, but to answer Manic at this point also, as I mentioned, many left wing organisations ally themselves alongside islamic groups, but do not ally themselves with Christian religions, i.e. the recent outrage by said organisations at the popes visit to the UK. The left wing groups are generally pro-palestine, which would indicate an anti-israel and dare I say Jewish stance also.
So this is the point I tried, very badly, to make. I can justifiably bring up islam, because this is the only religion that the left are supporting and promoting and this is where my confusion exists.
Justifiably so, the left has shown displeasure at Catholicism recently and maybe less justifiably supports Palestine (though that is a seperate discussion altogether). I just don't know why, left wing groups whos aims are honourable are allowing themselves to be rode roughshod by a group, who do not represent what they stand for.
PS, thankyou for your info about this FORUM and its members, I see there are a number of different perspectives, I wonder if my own beliefs will be tolerated. I don't mean to offend anyone, I am just speaking from the heart and hoping to get answers to the problems I am unable to fathom.

[Volcanicity]

It's not a case of left-wing groups supporting Islam,it's more supporting their right to worship their religion,against far-right groups and certain Countries government's.The reason the Popes visit to the UK wasn't supported was because of the Roman-Catholics stance on a lot of issues not least paedophile Priests,abortion,contraception,LGBT issues etc. Welcome to Revleft.

[ContrarianLemming]

To be frank, we'll take whatever allies we can get to acheive our goals.

[scarletghoul]

The cultural tendencies of Muslim areas do have these problems. But they represent something like 2 Trillian people worldwide.
lol really ?

[Bright Banana Beard]

lol really ?
How many zeros is that? :confused:

[Le Corsaire Rouge]

"2 Trillian" is no zeroes because "trillian" is not a number, it's the name of Zaphod Beeblebrox's girlfriend. 2 trillion has 12 zeroes in America (2,000,000,000,000) and 24 zeroes in Britain (2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000), and even 2,000,000,000,000 is more than 300 times the entire population of Earth (around 6 billion, or 6,000,000,000).

[Q]

How many zeros is that? :confused:
It's a nice IM chat app (http://www.trillian.im/). Trillion is 10^12 (1 with 12 zero's) in the English counting system (in Dutch triljoen happens to be 10^18).

To the OP: Welcome :)

I agree that the far left shouldn't uncritically align with imams. The SWP did that a few years back with Respect, which consequently turned out to be a complete disaster (and rightly so).

[Q]

2 trillion has ... 24 zeroes in Britain (2,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000)
No. The British abandoned the -iard extension and adopted the simplified American system a while back. And even so, it's not 10^24 (which would be quadrillion).

[Sam_b]

The SWP did that a few years back with Respect

No, we did not 'uncritically align with Imams'.

[Dean]

Yeah I think that figure was like 1500 times as large as the real figure:

1.57 Billion or about 23% of the population.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam#Community

That's what I get for posting so early

[Le Corsaire Rouge]

No. The British abandoned the -iard extension and adopted the simplified American system a while back. And even so, it's not 10^24 (which would be quadrillion).
We never used the "-iard" extension in Britain anyway: 10^9 was a thousand million, not a milliard. And though Harold Wilson's government may have "abandoned" the British billion, lots of the population haven't - even where the American billion is used, it's interchangeable with "thousand million". But you're right that the "long scale" trillion would classically be 10^18, not 10^24. However, when I was growing up we (bizarrely, apparently) used it as powers, so a billion was a million million, and a trillion was a billion billion, and a quadrillion was a trillion trillion, and so on. Even now that seems intuitively to be the best system to me! :)

[Q]

We never used the "-iard" extension in Britain anyway: 10^9 was a thousand million, not a milliard. And though Harold Wilson's government may have "abandoned" the British billion, lots of the population haven't - even where the American billion is used, it's interchangeable with "thousand million". But you're right that the "long scale" trillion would classically be 10^18, not 10^24. However, when I was growing up we (bizarrely, apparently) used it as powers, so a billion was a million million, and a trillion was a billion billion, and a quadrillion was a trillion trillion, and so on. Even now that seems intuitively to be the best system to me! :)

But that makes no sense :huh: