And you're absolutely right. It's not fair to say that either are defined by violence by most of their adherents, I do think it's fair to say that the way that the Qur'an has been manipulated and misinterpreted is in direct conflict with our own interest as a country.

If we were to implement policy tomorrow which prevented Muslims from holding positions related to national security it would likely cause more harm than good, but because we are a nation that so embraces our own political correctness to a ridiculous degree, I think we often lose our own perspective because of it. We lose sight of the fact that the terrorist threat that is directed at us has it's root in a specific religious ideology. Whether or not that specific ideology is accurately representative of Islam as a whole tends to be irrelevant when dealing with matters of our own national security. It's a kind and inclusive gesture to invite a bear to dinner, but when the bear ends up eating you, it's not kindness or you own sense of what is just that got you killed, but your own lack of intelligence, foresight, and due vigilance.

The example that you provide about the disgruntled wackjob who shot up his former employer's office in Orlando would only be relevant if his ethnicity and religious beliefs had been the principle motivation for his attacks, if past attacks of a similar nature were evidenced by the same criteria, and if the magnitude and consistency of those attacks gave cause to be circumspect about his initial employment in the first place. If the answer to all those questions were "yes", then I do think that his ethnicity and creed would be relevant subjects for discussion.

This guy would be irrelevant if anyone was remotely paying attention or doing their job.

The way the American Military is run sometimes is not good business. The combat is grade A, but they need to get themselves an HR department.

I couldn't have written the stuff he did and kept my job, and this guys a ****ing Major.

This goes hand in hand with the current arguement going on about military advancement, and what advancement selections are based upon. Basically the current system is not allowing the most qualified and most stable persons to be put into leadership positions. Which should be rectified, people in leadership position need to be more closely monitored. The military puts so much time into watching every move of junior enlisted personnel, that a high ranking officer can go and do something like this without notice or suspicion until it is too late.

I recently read an article in Navy times about a Navy Chief in Bahrain who was a leader of a ring of corruption including 100's of accounts of severe hazing, rape, assault, and prostitution who received next to no punishment for his actions. His inferiors were put to blame 100%, leading one sailor to suicide. Point is, authority within the military is something that needs to be re-evaluated.

Also, the stress management training and suicide prevention training is a joke, talk about a ten minute click-through on a computer screen with a bunch of boring paragraphs you couldn't be more detached from. And suicide attempts are not taken seriously. I mean in my top secret space in which I work, a member recently attempted suicide, and is currently still working in a classified area. I mean who much more blatantly can you say "**** this place, I just don't care anymore". It just doesn't make any sense that someone that seemingly unstable can maintain access to top secret and above information without being at least evaluated my mental health officials. Within the military, the truth is often clouded by this **** storm of beaurocratic attitudes and bull**** policies that serious issues can fall through the cracks completely unrecognized.

I'm not saying that's what caused this incident, but re-evaluating the current system and appoaching it with a different point of view is not only sensible and practical, but it's also something that the military would never traditionally do.

There's also text that associates the Children of Abraham (or is it David? I've never been big on this whole Jewish based interlinking) which includes Jews and Christians, those that follow core texts of what we'd call the Old Testament, to be believers and not infidels and that they too will go to heaven. Not to mention the amount you could drudge out of the Bible that's as bad if not worse than that snippet of text.

And a psychiatrist. I heard mention from someone on another forum that all doctors in the Army start their ranks from Captain, though how true this is I don't know. Also consider that he'd been serving in the army for I think 12 years so if both of those are true he's not seen a massive amount of advancement. Not that I disagree that the army should be keeping better tabs on it's troops mental health but I don't think his rank has the same sort of relevance as if he were a commanding officer rather than a medically based individual. Saying that I've no real knowledge of the military ranking system and especially not the American one.

@ Crash.

That's what I was trying to say earlier. If this doesn't prompt the military into a major evaluation (pun not intended) then we're simply going to see more incidents like this.
The military absolutely NEVER takes any of the blame when stuff like this goes down, and as a result, nothing ever changes in response to incidents.

But I personally feel that because the men and women it employs are bound by contract, there should be a greater sense of responsibility over its personnel by the military organizations themselves. If there was, you'd see the military making more changes to itself and its policies, instead of trying to simply control its personnel.

No you're correct...
You see majors all the time in the medical field, but in a line unit the majors would basically be the middleman between the company commanders and the battalion commander. They don't make the important decisions, but they're still in leadership positions... moreso than in the medical field where the relevance is basically just their current rank as a doctor.

my point in saying he was a major was simply to point out that there should have been more scrutiny.

That somes up how I felt about Savanah's post. My boyfriend is Arabic and it really bothers me when people assume any criminal that's Arab/Muslium must be a terrorist. Or even being Arab in general. American's can be so damn ignorant, but I think we have Bush to thank for that.

When a leader (usually dictator) wants to rule a country, without risks of being rejected, he creates some kind of enemy that sinks the population into fear. When the majority of the population is fearful, nobody can suggest that the enemy does not exist, cause he'll be on the enemy's side.

It happened and still happening in Cuba, with the fear of Capitalism, it's happening in my dear country, with the fear of Syrian/Israeli/US/Iran occupation and it began in the US since 9/11, with the fear of the Muslim extremists, that now, in the minds of the majority, are all Arabs or just anyone with a beard and a dark tan.

I don't know when it'll end, but I guess it'll fade soon.

This thread has evolved from something tragic, to everyone blaming muslims/arabs/whatever.

I think the point of the thread shifted from the tragedy involved to the religeon of the guy caused it. I believe people become like this (to do something extremely sickening like murders) to based on their upbringing, environmental surroundings and external influences. No mention of religeon there, although there has been many cases of Muslims etc causing harm around the world, there probably has been as much harm caused by white people, black people, and every ethnicy inbetween. So if all muslims are terrorists, would it be correct for me to assume all American Black people are gangsters and carry guns, etc. No it would be wrong. So I find it wrong for people to look at muslims etc in an acussing way. Other races are just as bad, you probably dont hear about it as much as there is a massive hype around muslims at the moment, painting them black as if they can only do wrong.

Shit grammer ma bad. One day.. I will have awesome grammer.