Are those nations stable? Yes. My point stands. Just because that nation doesn't work the way that you and I would both prefer doesn't mean that it's somehow an unstable nation.
Missed the point entirely. :roll:
You were comparing stability with lower homicide rates, ignoring the fact that most Muslim states are either dictatorships, monarchies, or theocracies. That those under sharia law can have their citizens killed or maimed for being gay, adulterers, or anytime some sharia law enforcer thinks the citizen is not adhering to some other point of sharia law. Also,
not much liberty in most such "stable" nations either, sharia law or not, meaning laws are enforced fairly brutally at the hands of government law enforcement.
The borders are rather porous as I'm sure you're aware...and if the Shi'a wanted to send terrorists into SA or if SA wanted to send terrorists into Iran, they could do that rather easily. What's more, there's tens of thousands of Shi'a in SA (who do face some persecution), and in the more cosmopolitan nations like Jordan, UAE, Bahrain, and Qatar, there are certainly both Shi'a and Sunni...and any number of members of the numerous other sects of Islam. My point stands.
No, it doesn't. In most monarchies, dictatorships, and theocracies, there is no real freedom of the press. Just because you don't hear of any Sunni or Shia acts of terror does not mean none have occurred. It is where the divisions have created instability that we hear of such things, typically from the one side when the other does something they'd like to bring to the world's attention. :shrug:
You're well-educated and very well aware of the world...which means that you DO know how significant it is that in a discussion over whether Islam is a peaceful religion, that Muslims in America are ten times more likely to become doctors than are 'normal' Americans. You're not confused at all. You might be trying to dismiss the point in order to win the debate...but you do get the point.
Well, I could point out that it was a Muslim U.S. Army physician who committed a mass shooting at Fort Hood TX back in 2014, but that is as irrelevant as your unsubstantiated claim that "Muslims in America are ten times more likely to become doctors than 'normal' American citizens..."
Normal citizens? WTH does
that mean?
Now try as I might I found no such AMA statistic. What I did find was this:
According to the American Medical Association (AMA), as of 2006, there were 921,904 U.S. physicians. The AMA does not report on the religion of its members.
FALSE: Muslim American Doctors and Shooters : snopes.com
But your point has no relevance even if it were true. It is a fallacy of equivalence; trying to associate a subset (Muslims more likely to be medical doctors) with the peacefulness of all members of said group.
Did I say that Islam wasn't spread by the sword? No, I did not. I DID say that ALL major religions have plenty of baggage...or do I need to point out the atrocities committed in the Name of God by mainstream "Christianity" over the centuries, including at least two centuries before Mohammed was born? What's more, as I said in the previous post, every single stable Muslim nation has a lower homicide rate than America - and that includes the third-world nations Malaysia and Indonesia. If Islam were an inherently violent religion, this would not, could not be the case. Again, my point stands.
Again, a false equivalency. If your sole basis for being more peaceful is the homicide rate, there are a number of nations Muslim or not, that are not as violent as the USA. Where are the national statistics for ALL violent crimes? Oh that's right; we don't know for sure because most Muslim nations don't seem willing to report these figures. You know, rapes, assaults, batteries, arsons, robberies, etc. Or report homicides honestly when they do report such figures. Got to keep up with appearances you know?
Democratic nations like ours are self-revealing because our citizens demand it. Trying to compare and contrast is a bit more involved than quoting available figures.