More policitally incorrect facts from Ben-Peter Terpstra.
My. Did slave ships fly over the North, to land in the South? Pastor Rick Warren believes we need to say sorry to Islamokingdoms for the Christian Crusades – but are the facts on his side? And, how vegetarian is your local supermarket-shopping vegetarian?
Consider:
1. How common were Catholic Europe's infamous witch-hunts and witch-trials? Not very. Norman Davies, the British historian, estimates that 50,000 died. Or, 125 a year (on average) over a four-hundred-year period.
2. Historically, Protestants targeted more than witches. They were also classier victims.
3. The feminist image of the "innocent" female witch isn't entirely accurate. Iceland's male witches, for instance, were also targets.
4. Religious wars are terrible. Still, atheistic communist governments kill more civilians in "peacetime."
5. "Make love not war"? Forget Iraq and Afghanistan. Sexually transmitted diseases steal more lives.
6. Mark Twain: "A southerner talks music."
7. New York City was America's slave capital.
8. Europeans didn't have to introduce slavery to North America. The natives already owned slaves.
9. Afro-Americans served in the Confederate armies.
10. Is the South primitive? "The oldest women's college and the first public university were founded in the South," states the history writer, Clint Johnson.
11. Sorry Gore. "The claim that medieval scientists and theologians believed the earth is flat was concocted in the nineteenth century," says Tom Bethell.
12. Was Galileo's 1623 book, The Assayer, really controversial? In any case, Pope Urban VIII sanctioned its publication.
13. The Bible doesn't state that the world is flat.
14. Is the "extinct" ivory-billed woodpecker refusing to join the green movement's extinction list? Fact is, some researchers believe that the Elvis of the Bird Kingdom is alive and well. Keep your eyes open birdwatchers.
15. Patrick Moore is a famous "global burning" skeptic – and the co-founder of Greenpeace International.
16. Hippocrates, the righteous pagan pro-lifer? Uh-oh. The Hippocratic Oath affirms: "I will not give a fatal draught to anyone if I am asked, nor will I suggest such a thing. Neither will I give a woman a means to procure an abortion."
17. Unhygienic Christians? L. Thorndike writes in The History of Medieval Europe that "such occupations as butchers were under strict hygiene regulation."
18. Many "filthy" Medieval towns were known for their public baths, fine wines and open blue skies, in the warming period.
19. Don't touch your toes! "The gymnasia (literally, 'places to be nude in') were at the heart of Greek political and cultural life," says Anthony Esolen.
20. Note to Rick Warren: The Crusades were defensive in nature – not offensive. Europeans didn't feel right about Islamists invading their lands first.
21. Good news for Al Franken. Historian Thomas E. Woods writes: "LBJ was thought to have lost his Senate race until he discovered that he received an additional 202 votes from a small precinct. Interestingly, they voted in alphabetical order!"
22. In Reagan's so-called "decade of greed" charitable giving grew significantly.
23. Also, under Reagan pro-family spending programs increased by – take a deep liberal breath – 18 percent.
24. Liberals are right to point out that JFK sold thousands of books – but his ghostwriters deserve the credit for his awards.
25. Conservatives are right to point out that JFK's dad, Joseph, purchased between 30,000 and 40,000 copies of his son’s book, While England Slept.
26. Vegetarians need hunters. Why do they think their supermarket carrots have no bite marks?
27. Priceless. "The National Rifle Association has twice as many members as the Sierra Club and Greenpeace combined," states Frank Miniter.
28. Statistics suggest that bicycling is more dangerous than hunting (for children).
29. "Not all hunters are men. A 2006 survey by the National Sporting Goods Association (NGSA) found that 72 percent more women are hunting with firearms today than just five years ago," says Miniter. Expect this figure to rise. Thanks to Obama gun sales are booming.
30. Many of the early settlers, from women to children, used firearms – made in the North.
(Acknowledgments: The above quotes and facts were taken from Regnery Publishing's bestselling Politically Incorrect Guide series. Thanks to Tom Bethell, Clint Johnson, Robert J. Hutchinson, Anthony Esolen, Frank Miniter and Thomas E. Woods, the Great.)
31. A hundred years after the 13th amemdment of the USA, the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics was sending citizens to Siberia, not because they were to be punished for some crime, but simply because slaves were needed.
32. More slaves were sent to Brazil than the United states
Claiming "the Crusades were defensive in nature" is laughable. When the crusades massacred Jews was that "defensive?" When the Franks attacked Jerusalem, which was defended by both Jewish and Muslim fighters, and massacred Jews and Muslims, how was that defensive. And of course it just got worse from there in subsequent crusades.
I have never heaed anyone claim The Assayer was controversial with the Church. Its only controversy was scientific. It was his Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems that got him in trouble with the Church.
The Hippocratic Oath does not say "Neither will I give a woman a means to procure an abortion." It says "I will not give a woman a pessary to cause an abortion." Pessaries could cause severe infections and there were other ways to induce abortions.
Looks like Regnery needs a much better fact checker, what a surprise.
The Crusades took place after the Muslim conquest of not just Jerusalem, but Persia, Constantinople, modern day Pakistan, India, southern Italy, Spain, Portugal, north Africa, Georgia, the Caucasus. Believe it or not, all of those conquests were not exactly bloodless, and Christians, Jews, and secular people were all forced to live under various degrees of subjugation and legal oppression during Muslim rule. If the Crusades were not defensive, they were certainly a reaction to Muslim expansionism. But then Muslim massacres and attrocities just aren't as interesting, are they?
The Assayer, while not as controversial as Dialog, was indeed controversial, mostly because it was a counter-polemic in a running philosophical dispute between Galileo and the Jesuits at Collegio Romano, which resulted in Galileo alienating a number of Jesuits who were sympathetic to his ideas, and whom he later believed were responsible for his condemnation by the church. It is also worth nothing, however, that Dialog was published with formal authorization from the Inquisition as well as papal permission. The reason for Galileo's persecution after publication of the work was that he personally offended Urban VIII by failing to fulfill his request that opposing views on heliocentricity be presented, and by making Urban's views on geocentricity appear buffoonish in the work.
The Hippocratic Oath, as translated from the Greek by Ludwig Edelstein, reads:
I will apply dietetic measure for the benefit of the sick according to my ability and judgment; I will keep them from harm and injustice. I will neither give a deadly drug to anybody if asked for it, nor will I make a suggestion to this effect. Similarly I will not give a woman an abortive remedy. In purity and in holiness I will guard my life and my art."
http://www.medterms.com/script/main/art.asp?articlekey=20909
http://www.hsl.virginia.edu/historical/artifacts/antiqua/hippocrates.cfm
Pessaries in and of themselves do not seem to be the matter of contention in the original oath — providing a means for a woman to have an abortion does. You may be right though — infections caused by bacteria that wouldn't be discovered until 1636, a couple thousand years after the Hippocratic Oath was written, are probably why that passage was included.
If I was you, I wouldn't submit my resume for top fact checker.
todd:
Re: “Claiming ‘the Crusades were defensive in nature’ is laughable.”
Take a look at the list of events below. I fail to see the humor in them:
609-22 – Mohammed preaches in Mecca
622 – Meccans kick Mohammed out, he and his followers move to Medina, raid caravans
624 – Battle of Badr
625 – Battle of Uhud
629 – Muhammad conquest of Mecca
632 – Mohammed dies
633 – Mesopotamia falls to Muslim invasion, followed by the entire Persian Empire
635 – Damascus falls
638 – Jerusalem capitulates
643 – Alexandria falls, ending 1,000 years of Hellenic civilization
648-49 – Cyprus falls
653 – Rhodes falls
673 – Constantinople attacked
698 – All of North Africa lost
711 – Spain invaded
717 – Muslims attack Constantinople again; repelled by Emperor Leo the Isaurian
721 – Saragossa falls, Muslims sights on southern France
720 – Narbonne falls.
732 – Bordeaux was stormed and its churches burnt down
732 – Charles Martel and his Frankish army defeat Muslims, turning back the Muslim tide
732 – Attacks on France continued
734 – Avignon captured by an Muslim force
743 – Lyons sacked
759 – Arabs driven out of Narbonne.
838 – Marseilles plundered
800 – Muslims incursions into Italy begin, Islands of Ponza and Ischia plundered
813 – Civitavecchia, the port of Rome sacked
826 – Crete falls to Muslim forces
827 – Muslim forces begin to attack Sicily.
837 – Naples repels a Muslim attack
838 – Marseilles taken
840 – Bari falls
842 – Messina captured and Strait of Messina controlled
846 – Muslims squadrons arrived at Ostia, at the Tiber's mouth, sack Rome and St. Peter’s Basilica
846 – Taranto in Apulia conquered by Muslim forces
849 – Papal forces repel Muslim fleet at the mouth of the Tiber
853 – 871 – Italian coast from Bari down to Reggio Calabria controlled, Muslims terrorize Southern Italy.
859 – Muslims take control of all Messina
870 – Malta captured by the Muslims.
870 – Bari recaptured from the Muslims by Emperor Louis II
872 – Emperor Louis II defeats a Saracen fleet off Capua
872 – Muslim forces devastate Calabria
878 – Syracuse falls after a nine-month siege
879 – Pope John VIII forced to pay tribute of 25,000 mancuses (AUD$625,000) annually to the Muslims
880 – Byzantine Commanders gain victory over Saracen forces at Naples
881 – Muslims capture fortress near Anzio, plunder surrounding countryside with impunity for forty [40] years.
887 – Muslim armies take Hysela and Amasia, in Asia Minor.
889 – Toulon captured
921 – English pilgrims to Rome crushed to death under rocks rolled down on them by Saracens in the passes of the Alps
902 – Muslim fleets sacked and destroyed Demetrias in Thessaly, Central Greece,
904 – Thessalonica falls to Muslim forces
915 – After three months of blockade, Christian forces victorious against Saracens holed-up in their fortresses north of Naples
934 – Genoa attacked by Muslim forces
935 – Genoa taken
972 – Saracens finally driven from Faxineto
976 – Caliphs of Egypt send fresh Muslim expeditions into southern Italy. Initially the German Emperor Otho II , who had set up his headquarters in Rome, successfully defeated these Saracen forces
977 – Sergius, Archbishop of Damascus, expelled from his See by Muslims
982 – Emperor Otho’s forces ambushed and his army defeated
1003 – Muslims from Spain sack Antibes
1003-09 – Marauding bands of Saracens plunder Italian coast from Pisa to Rome from bases on Sardinia
1005 – Muslims from Spain sack Pisa
1009 – Caliph of Egypt orders destruction of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, the Tomb of Jesus
1010 – Saracens seize Cosenza in southern Italy.
1015 – All Sardinia falls
1016 – Muslims from Spain again sack Pisa
1017 – Fleets of Pisa and Genoa sail for Sardinia, find Saracens crucifying Christians, drive Saracen leader out. Saracens try to re-take Sardinia until 1050
1020 – Muslims from Spain sack Narbonne
1095 – The First Crusade.
There were 463 years between Mohammed’s death in 632 and the calling of a Crusade to free lands that had been Christian for a thousand years before the Muslim invaders arrived.
“The Crusades In Context”
By Dr Paul Stenhouse
http://answering-islam.org/green/crusades-stenhouse.htm
Of course, Islamic-driven warfare didn’t stop with the end of the Crusades.
We Christians could say that Muslims, Islamic apologists, self-loathing Christians, and anti-Christians have taken the Crusades “out of context,” as Muslims are wont to say about Christians interpreting the Koran. Not only that, but in all fairness, maybe Muslims did have to fight a “defensive” war all the way to Vienna to stop the Viennese Christians [and all the Christians in between Mecca and Vienna] from persecuting Muslims living there. They also had to take over all of North Africa and most of Spain to prevent same.
However, there is another possible explanation for the Muslim claim that the Crusades were offensive wars fought by Christians against Islam, and the Prophet [pbuh] and Allah know that Islam certainly needs defending: the mere existence of an unbeliever/kafir is an offense against Islam, and how dare anyone defy the will of Allah?
Under Books Y'all aren't supposed to read in The Politically Incorrect Guide to the South:
http://books.google.com/books?id=1samovCrW9wC&pg=PA155&dq=the+politically+incorrect+guide+to+the+south+richard+williams&ei=kX97SeTcK5fUzATtnailBg
Stonewall:
Does it explain how the South got to be known as "Dixie"?
Patrick,
Considering what a fine job the factcheckers did this election, I'm sure todd would be taken in a heartbeat.
I'm not sure what the point of all these are, collectively they leave me with a picture of a nudist Dixie-whistling southern pope with medieval cleanliness shooting carrot- eating rabbits and dodging small children on bicycles.
However, the poster is entirely correct about the Hippocratic oath. The point was "to do no harm". Abortion was considered taking a life. Euthanasia was also forbidden.