You seem to apologize for Muslim atrocities, while holding in greater contempt any casualties/atrocities by Christians.
War is war, and atrocities occur on both sides in any war.
I still hold to the argument that Islam at its core is violent, and that it spread violently from its beginning, in the 7th century.
There are those who now (and throughout its history) have practiced Islam peacefully. But there can be no denying that Islam was spread from its inception by the sword, and has a long history of putting any dissenters to the sword.
Whereas, Christianity, despite some abberrant atrocities perpetrated in the name of Christianity, is clearly peaceful at its core, and initially spread across the Middle East and Europe peacefully.
"Free Will" is at the core of Christian faith. The freedom to accept or reject it.
And again, the period of the Crusades (1099 A.D.to 1300 A.D., roughly) was NOT a period of Muslim peace toward the West, but a period where Muslims had invaded deep into Europe. A quick look at a map of Moorish or Ottoman empires from 1000 A.D. to almost 1600 A.D. makes my point unmistakeably clear.
And I still hold to the argument of the 700 Club article you just quoted:
That whatever atrocities were perpetrated on the Christian side during the Crusades ( clearly not something endorsed in Christian teachings) that
there was provocation from the Muslim side over the previous several hundred years that finally brought about Christian retribution, that invoked the Crusades in 1099.
It wasn't just Christians, out of the blue, deciding to expand their territory into the heart of Islam. There was Islamic provocation. Islam had invaded deep into Europe.
And, I might add, Muslims had slaughtered the pre-existing Christian populations in the Middle East and North Africa, when "converting" those areas to Islam.
And I might also add, Islam still spreads the same way across the Islamic world.
Sudan has murdered between 2 and 3 million Christians and other non-Muslims since 1981 and ongoing.
And Islam has contributed to, if not solely instigated, many other regional conflicts across the globe, from Liberia to Chechnya, to Palestine, to Iraq and Iran, to Pakistan, Afghanistan, Indonesia, East Timor and the Phillipines. And that is not even a complete list.
Historically, and presently, Islam is a lightning-rod for fanatical violence, in the sacred cause of spreading its influence, and of maintaining its existing territory.
Finally, I question the impartiality of your so-called superior "academic source". It is difficult to say with certainty what the motivations of the person or persons are who wrote the anonymously authored piece on the
http://www.wikipedia.org/ website. It may be objective, or it may not.
I don't like the way you assume that your sources are entirely objective and right, and simultaneously assume that my sources are not, simply because this one I quoted is from a clearly attributed Christian news source. Your
http://www.wikepedia.org/ source may have ideological biases that are not as freely admitted.
Everyone, academic or not, has opinions and biases.
We're back to the same problem with your objective/subjective argument that we've had across several topics now.
