Well let's just hope the dude is not yet in prison or dead.

I for one, welcome the age of arab enlightenment.

Smart guy. Roll on the reformation.

Mmmm I don't know, I think his praisal of western culture comes from being frustrated with his own culture. In fact, what's so different about western world and the spread of Christianity vs the spread of Muslim teachings and its expansion to east and west? It's basically the same thing when you think about it. Both the west and middle east wanted to spread their teaching (by means of conquest most of the time). It's not like west did things any different than the Arabs.

And his examples are misleading. Japan isn't a great model for liberty and democracy. Japanese still very much live in a very closed society with limited exposure to foreign ideas. You don't hear of certain things on the news, females are still expected to behave certain ways, etc etc. The Yakuza still acts as the 'Samurai class' of the old days where they can get away with bullying its citizens. So much for individual liberty and freedom of ideas. However, its economy, technological innovation and civil infrastructure did benefit largely from western teachings tremendously, which it could not have gotten from within its closed society model.

Australia and South Africa was born out of colonization and by enslaving the indigenous population and this too makes for a terrible example. But in today's world these guys enjoy stability and happiness where its citizens are happy and isn't looking to revolt at any second because they too adopt western technologies and other foreign ideas and methods to cope with their own environment.

One thing I do agree with him is when he says closed society lag behind other nations. Japan certainly was a closed society before the Americans forced open its gates, and the Japanese ended up with an empire of their own in the East. America opened its gates towards all immigrants and saw an incredible rate of growth for the past 3 centuries. 15th century Europe got a huge boost in culture and technology when they started accepting knowledge from outside their own worlds like the Arab culture and the Far East Chinese.

Openness to other cultures, philosophies and technology gives benefits to your own. This is what this man was trying to say, despite all the bad examples

Someone talking about proactivity and making a positive contribution to humankind's future instead of just grievance-based politics... strange.

Ibrahim Al-Buleihi might have just as much to teach to many of us in the West

Wow, someone in the Arab world who actually sees how it really is... and got on TV?

I have a strange feeling though he was put on to be made to look like a crazy fool to the rest of the Arab world. The presenter seems rather condescending and uninterested in the guy's actual points.

First, the western world has so many foundational ideas beyond Christianity that we take for granted. For instance, rights language. We talk about our right to this and that, but that is only after hundreds of years of getting it wrong and consciously working towards better models. The "east" only has one rival school, Confucianism, which the middle east does not hold. The middle east has no real rights language at all, spare religious orders.

One again, Japan isn't a "great" model for liberty, but compared to the dictatorships of the middle east, it is a pillar. I mean, just 50 years ago they had a emperors, and not just ceremonial ones. I don't want to breeze by all the very important points you bring up, they have a long way to go...and they still are very exclusionary in many ways. But comparable that to women being stoned for being in a room with a man that is not their husband.

I don't think any of his examples where bad, in fact, they showed the small case compared to the large cases. Japan has had partial implementation of western ideas and values, and has had partial success with social change for the better. He has to be careful what examples he uses. He can't use the USA as an example without being completely ostracized. And even then the United States has a similar story to tell about colonization and displacement of natives.

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Mmmm I don't know, I think his praisal of western culture comes from being frustrated with his own culture. In fact, what's so different about western world and the spread of Christianity vs the spread of Muslim teachings and its expansion to east and west? It's basically the same thing when you think about it. Both the west and middle east wanted to spread their teaching (by means of conquest most of the time). It's not like west did things any different than the Arabs.
And his examples are misleading. Japan isn't a great model for liberty and democracy. Japanese still very much live in a very closed society with limited exposure to foreign ideas. You don't hear of certain things on the news, females are still expected to behave certain ways, etc etc. The Yakuza still acts as the 'Samurai class' of the old days where they can get away with bullying its citizens. So much for individual liberty and freedom of ideas. However, its economy, technological innovation and civil infrastructure did benefit largely from western teachings tremendously, which it could not have gotten from within its closed society model.
Australia and South Africa was born out of colonization and by enslaving the indigenous population and this too makes for a terrible example. But in today's world these guys enjoy stability and happiness where its citizens are happy and isn't looking to revolt at any second because they too adopt western technologies and other foreign ideas and methods to cope with their own environment.
One thing I do agree with him is when he says closed society lag behind other nations. Japan certainly was a closed society before the Americans forced open its gates, and the Japanese ended up with an empire of their own in the East. America opened its gates towards all immigrants and saw an incredible rate of growth for the past 3 centuries. 15th century Europe got a huge boost in culture and technology when they started accepting knowledge from outside their own worlds like the Arab culture and the Far East Chinese.
Openness to other cultures, philosophies and technology gives benefits to your own. This is what this man was trying to say, despite all the bad examples

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Invocations (dead) cannot be called by hpqp because hpqp is not privileged - sorry.

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