Reply #45: I didn't read your whole post (too long). But I take it the upshot is...

[Honeycombe8]

that Islam is not the problem, people are. True enough. Like guns. "Guns don't kill people....people kill people." Correct?

True enough.

But I'm not so sure that Islam isn't a big part of the problem.

As I said...look at the remnants of Egypt before Islam, and look at its accomplishments afterwards. A stark difference. Before the religion permeated the region, Egypt was a leader in the world as to science, art, and learning in general. Heiroglyphics. Even the world's oldest dog breeds, perhaps. Egypt had a female pharoah. (Yes, modern historians seem to think she was unpopular because she was female, but I would point out that there is no evidence of this. She was pretty much wiped out...her images and so forth...but I wonder if it had more to do with the fact that she seized power from her young charge, a male child, who wiped her image out when he grew up and regained power.)

Iraq was the home of the first city in the world. Can you imagine the Islamists in the region creating the first city in the world now? Where in Afghanistan they'd rather sacrifice the production of half the country (females) than create cities of learning and creativity. Where they had schools that taught only males, and then primarily religion was taught, peppered with statements of hatred for non-Islamists (and females). Where the males must die as martyrs to get the sex that they want.

No, I tend to think that the religion itself plays an integral part. Like any cult....it's the stupid people who should be held accountable for their actions. But that doesn't mean the cult had nothing to do with it.