Owen, What you are perhaps missing is the complexity of politics and the emergence of extremism everywhere in response to anger and frustration with the conditions in which people are forced to live. This, alas, includes the US and the rise of the extreme right which seems to have somewhat taken control of the Republican Party. One might ask why people in the US don't apologize for all the wrongs that the US has committed in the rest of the world and maybe still be doing so.
Chaos results in emergence and self-organization some of which is pretty nasty. One tends to forget all the massacres committed by the church, e.g. the inquisition, forced conversion of colonized peoples and the rise of Hitler and its consequences. Ah humanity.... cheers, Paul -----Original Message----- From: Owen Densmore <[email protected]> To: Complexity Coffee Group <[email protected]> Sent: Thu, Sep 13, 2012 11:01 am Subject: [FRIAM] Fwd: America and the Middle East: Murder in Libya | The Economist The Economist sent out their weekly email, which included a story on the Libya fiasco: http://goo.gl/0mfCW This reminded me of one of my possibly Politically Incorrect notions: Why don't the civilized muslim world attempt to counter this insanity on the part of their fundamentalists? At least some attempt to apologize for My Religion, The Bad Parts? God knows I do! We had an imam visit the cathedral in Santa Fe to discuss the simplicity and beauty of his religion. Some questions were asked about The Bad Parts, in a very civilized manor. The conversation was sane, polite, and certainly informative. What if the Vatican sent out a hit squad for all the similar anti-Christian movies or other inflammatory media? Or the Buddhists sent ninjas after non-believers? Or the Jews killed Dutch cartoonists? What I'm getting at is this: why *isn't* there a strong community of sane and vocal muslims at least trying to communicate to the rest of us? Please do understand that this is not a rant against religion, but more of a puzzled look at an insane situation. And Yes, I really wish we'd keep our nose out of other's affairs. I'm not trying to be a bigot. But I truly would like to grok this phenomenon. What am I missing? Good complexity question, I bet. -- Owen ============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
============================================================ FRIAM Applied Complexity Group listserv Meets Fridays 9a-11:30 at cafe at St. John's College lectures, archives, unsubscribe, maps at http://www.friam.org
