37 killed in attack on Tunisian tourist beach resort

[Pickman's model]

Ok. Let me put it this way. The idea of secularism when applied to Islam (and the islamic world) completely breaks down because the authority of islam is not tied to anything resembling a state structure. Islam can be made statist, but it isn't inherently so.

none of which alters the fact that ba'athism was a secular ideology: see e.g. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2886733.stm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba'athism http://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/faq/baath-party-syria and http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu...s-part-ii-contemporary-problems-and-solutions

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Ok. Let me put it this way. The idea of secularism when applied to Islam (and the islamic world) completely breaks down because the authority of islam is not tied to anything resembling a state structure. Islam can be made statist, but it isn't inherently so.

That's not quite the same thing, though is it? So a state-based ideology in a majority-Muslim country can be Islamic or secular, still.

 

[ManchesterBeth]

none of which alters the fact that ba'athism was a secular ideology: see e.g. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/2886733.stm https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ba'athism http://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/faq/baath-party-syria and http://berkleycenter.georgetown.edu...s-part-ii-contemporary-problems-and-solutions

Here's what I said

Not only that, ba'athism isn't incompatible with fundamental islamism at its core.

Doesn't mean that it wasn't secular (whatever such an artificial categorisation is supposed to mean in the first place.) If you're going to be pedantic, do it properly m8.

 

[Pickman's model]

That's not quite the same thing, though is it? So a state-based ideology in a majority-Muslim country can be Islamic or secular, still.

not to mentio we all know islam not monolithick

 

[ManchesterBeth]

That's not quite the same thing, though is it? So a state-based ideology in a majority-Muslim country can be Islamic or secular, still.

No it can't. Even Kemalist Turkey (the daddy of all MENA secularisms) was fundamentally sunni islamic.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

No it can't. Even Kemalist Turkey (the daddy of all secularisms) was fundamentally sunni islamic.

In what way?

 

[Pickman's model]

Here's what I said



Doesn't mean that it wasn't secular (whatever such an artificial categorisation is supposed to mean in the first place.) If you're going to be pedantic, do it properly m8.

no, that's not what you said at 1049, in your first reply on the subject where you said secularism a useless abstraction when applied to the me.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

And the secularist ideas of Ataturk were far from abstractions. They had concrete application.

 

[ManchesterBeth]

In what way?

Ideologically, racially, culturally and ethnically. That enough for you?

 

[ManchesterBeth]

And the secularist ideas of Ataturk were far from abstractions. They had concrete application.

Ataturk was no secularist. Anyone who believes so is an absolute buffoon.

 

[ManchesterBeth]

no, that's not what you said at 1049, in your first reply on the subject where you said secularism a useless abstraction when applied to the me.

You can't separate religion and state when religion isn't inherently tied to those state structures.

 

[Pickman's model]

Here's what I said



Doesn't mean that it wasn't secular (whatever such an artificial categorisation is supposed to mean in the first place.) If you're going to be pedantic, do it properly m8.

i'd have thought times like these make for strange bedfellows rather than ba'athism, which many people agree is a secular ideology, having nothing incompatible with political islam. given the mosaoc of beliefs across the me secularism seems the most obvious policy for radical nationalists like ba'athists, while political or fundamentalist islam seems more likely to undermine than advance the ba'athist project.

 

[Pickman's model]

You can't separate religion and state when religion isn't inherently tied to those state structures.

what, not even in is?

 

[ManchesterBeth]

i'd have thought times like these make for strange bedfellows rather than ba'athism, which many people agree is a secular ideology, having nothing incompatible with political islam. given the mosaoc of beliefs across the me secularism seems the most obvious policy for radical nationalists like ba'athists, while political or fundamentalist islam seems more likely to undermine than advance the ba'athist project.

I don't really care what ba'athists refer to themselves as being or what others call them. The idea of secularism (or should we say Laïcité) is a contradiction in terms when applied to the ME simply because the differentiation between the individual and the collective is not applicable to islamic ideologies of all persuasions.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

You can't separate religion and state when religion isn't inherently tied to those state structures.

What religion is inherently tied to state structures? Christianity certainly isn't either.

Not sure what you are meaning by 'secularism' here. I can tell you what I mean by it: precisely the fact that state structures are not tied to any religion, and often, as in the case of Turkey, there are specific laws forbidding such a tying in. That is not to deny religious belief or its influence, it is simply to separate it off from forma structures.

Alternatively, state structures can be explicitly tied to a religion, and that is clearly not a secular state.

 

[ManchesterBeth]

What religion is inherently tied to state structures? Christianity certainly isn't either.

No, although Western christianity was replaced by Liberalism for all intents and purposes, which is a religion in its own right.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

No, although Western christianity was replaced by Liberalism for all intents and purposes, which is a religion in its own right.

You're playing fast and loose both with history and definitions.

 

[Pickman's model]

I don't really care what ba'athists refer to themselves as being or what others call them. The idea of secularism (or should we say Laïcité) is a contradiction in terms when applied to the ME simply because the differentiation between the individual and the collective is not applicable to islamic ideologies of all persuasions.

yeh cos obviously everyone in the me is a muslim

 

[ManchesterBeth]

You're playing fast and loose both with history and definitions.

Hardly.

 

[ManchesterBeth]

yeh cos obviously everyone in the me is a muslim

Fuck's sake.

Where did I say that, you absolute moron?

 

[Pickman's model]

what, not even in is?

dialectician

 

[Pickman's model]

Fuck's sake.

Where did I say that, you absolute moron?

and there was me thinking you were a master debater.

"the differentation between the individual and the collective is not applicable to islamic ideologies of all persuasions"

 

[ManchesterBeth]

and there was me thinking you were a master debater.

"the differentation between the individual and the collective is not applicable to islamic ideologies of all persuasions"

Doesn't invalidate my point. nice to see you trying to struggle to be contrarian, mate.

 

[Pickman's model]

Doesn't invalidate my point. nice to see you trying to struggle to be contrarian, mate.

thank you for conceding there.

now, returning unwillingly to is (third time of asking)

 

[Idris2002]

No it can't. Even Kemalist Turkey (the daddy of all MENA secularisms) was fundamentally sunni islamic.

Sudden mental image of a deranged Ataturk belting some poor imam over the head with a hammer, while screaming "I'm the daddy now".

 

[ManchesterBeth]

now, returning unwillingly to is (third time of asking)

Religion exists as a social relationship, not a materially quantifiable thing you can separate from the state or eradicate from the minds of state officials.

I'm for the withering away of such a social relationship. Not being replaced with another contractual social relationship which is just as much the same (metaphysically speaking that is) a la secularism.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Ataturk was no secularist. Anyone who believes so is an absolute buffoon.

Ok, donning my buffoon's helmet, I'll dispute this, partly because I think I mean something different from you with the term, something less ambitious.

From what I know of Ataturk, he made rather contradictory statements wrt religion, with some statements of his atheism, others the opposite, of the essential nature of religion.

But he was consistent in wanting the new state structures to exist apart from religious structures in their formation. That, to this buffoon, is an act of secularist nature. Compare and contrast, say, with Iran post-revolution, where state structures and religious structures form part of the same formation.

That's not a 'useless abstraction'.

 

[Pickman's model]

Religion exists as a social relationship, not a materially quantifiable thing you can separate from the state or eradicate from the minds of state officials

endogenous growth theory all over again

 

[ManchesterBeth]

From what I know of Ataturk, he made rather contradictory statements wrt religion, with some statements of his atheism, others the opposite, of the essential nature of religion.

He was an atheist in the present, but not in the future. For him religion in Turkey was useless not because it was untrue, but because it failed to adapt to the capitalisation of agriculture and the bourgeois revolutions, like it did in Europe.

But he was consistent in wanting the new state structures to exist apart from religious structures in their formation. That, to this buffoon, is an act of secularist nature. Compare and contrast, say, with Iran post-revolution, where state structures and religious structures form part of the same formation.

This is simply untrue. After the dissolving of the caliphate he set up the department of religious affairs, forced all mosques statewide to recite the adhan in Turkish, and even tried to institute a Turkish style of praying. Alevis and other dissident Turks/Kurds were seen as muslim and it was a criminal offence to contend otherwise. One could, of course, be a Christian or a Jew.

 

[butchersapron]

Ok, donning my buffoon's helmet, I'll dispute this, partly because I think I mean something different from you with the term, something less ambitious.

From what I know of Ataturk, he made rather contradictory statements wrt religion, with some statements of his atheism, others the opposite, of the essential nature of religion.

But he was consistent in wanting the new state structures to exist apart from religious structures in their formation. That, to this buffoon, is an act of secularist nature. Compare and contrast, say, with Iran post-revolution, where state structures and religious structures form part of the same formation.

That's not a 'useless abstraction'.

You may find this article from the time of the hebdo attacks of interest:

Olivier Roy on Laicite as Ideology