Doubling Down

On 3^rd of March 2018, Sam Harris appeared in front of a packed house at the Majestic Theatre, Dallas, Texas for a long-form public conversation with former neo-Nazi skinhead Christian Picciolini.

Picciolini was, up until 1996, a proud white supremacist of the sort that would cover his “superior” white skin with black swastika tattoos and attempt to demonstrate the “superiority” of his race by beating seven bells of shit out of innocent people on the basis that they didn’t look like him.

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Out For the Count – The Protest For Dankula and Free Expression

The list of things that could persuade me to take a fine springtime Monday off of work, is about the size of the yellow pages and crammed full of trivialities. The list of things that could persuade me to willingly spend that same work-free and temperate Monday navigating Southern Rail’s incompetent shitshow to travel into the bustling, crowded heart of our country’s capital, is virtually non-existent. It’d need to be something I view as essential or otherwise impossibly tempting. Something like a protest against the governmental erosion of our most important fundamental principle, maybe. Or beer. Beer will do it too.

 

Islamic Terrorism is Motivated by Religion, Not Retribution

Imagine the following scenario: During the morning rush hour commute, a young man enters a busy New York subway station armed with an improvised explosive device. The device is detonated, and owing to a technical malfunction, a lack of competence, sheer blind luck, or a combination of all three, only a handful of people are injured. This is viewed essentially as a “failed” attack by some, and by others; a relatively minor contribution to a series of far more prolific terrorist atrocities which have killed tens of thousands around the globe in the last sixteen years.

 

Playing Dumb – The Masochism of Misrepresentation

Thanks to incremental advances in scientific knowledge, gaps in our collective understanding reduce over time. We may someday discover the boundaries of the universe. We might work out how to view dark matter. It’s possible that we’ll uncover incontrovertible proof of the existence of parallel universes. We may even gain a true understanding of the popularity of televised cooking competitions.

There are, however, some mysteries that seem destined to remain inexplicable. For an example of such phenomena, look no further than in the apparently boundless ability of ostensibly unimpaired people to grossly misunderstand virtually every statement ever uttered or written by American author and neuroscientist Sam Harris.

 

Las Vegas and the White Privilege Myth

Once again, a crowd of innocent people enjoying a night out at a music concert have had their lives taken in a senseless and vicious act of brutality and callousness. On Sunday 1^st October, 62 year old Stephen Paddock killed 59 people and injured over 500 more in a mass shooting in Las Vegas. From his 32^nd floor room at the Mandalay Bay Hotel, he opened fire with an arsenal of modified semi-automatic assault rifles, upon concert goers attending a country music festival.

 

Hiding In Plain Sight – The Bigotry of Peter Sweden

One of the most common, tiresome, and potentially dangerous side effects of speaking out against Islam and its adverse influence over society, are the ceaseless accusations of bigotry and racism hurled around by all and sundry. Explaining repeatedly as to why objection to a set of deeply illiberal ideas and their increasing prevalence, does not constitute a blanket hatred of individual people, seems to make little difference. For someone like myself, a major aspect of my objection to Islam is the suffering it causes Muslims. I object to the subjugation and persecution of Muslim women, apostates, and other minorities, frequently enforced by countries that base their societies on the precepts of Islam and Sharia.

 

NO, YOU’RE NOT MORE LIKELY TO BE KILLED BY A RIGHT-WING EXTREMIST THAN AN ISLAMIC TERRORIST

On 22^nd May, 2017, a 22 year old jihadist named Salman Ramadan Abedi wandered into the Manchester Arena during a concert populated primarily by young teens and their parents, and detonated a suicide bomb, killing 22 people including an 8 year old girl, and injuring approximately 120 others. This was the deadliest terror attack on U.K. soil since a group of jihadists murdered 52 commuters in the London transport attacks of 2005.

We are often told that in the wake of a large scale atrocity of this kind, we should defy the terrorists by simply carrying on as normal. Well, it just so happens that what I would normally be doing is writing about Islamic terrorism and berating the apologists who shamefully obfuscate the issue. Which is exactly what I intend to do now.