Shooting at Wilders speech in Texas

[plarq]

Talk about constructive criticism.

Weapon of criticism cannot replace the criticism of weapon!

 

[Berzerker]

@Tim

before I personally took any sort of action I would eliminate any doubt about the intentions. I would go to the event. I would listen. I would ask. I would exchange opinions with anyone who was willing. I wouldn't walk in wearing body armor with guns blazing, having committed to violence against people without any first hand interaction with them.

Would you walk in armed just in case you need to blow them away for failing to meet your definition of free speech?

Having already said otherwise, I spit out the words you put in my mouth. Thanks for your attentiveness.

Already explained where? How could I falsely interpret your post when you didn't even make it?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

@Tim
Already explained where? How could I falsely interpret your post when you didn't even make it?

I gave you a quote of my previous post on the subject. I wandered back through the pages to find it for you. What more should I do for you? Why should I do anything for you?

 

[Berzerker]

So you accused me of falsely interpreting a quote you addressed to someone else pages ago before we started talking? How does that work? And you sarcastically thanked me for paying attention?

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Well, no, that isn't exactly how that exchange went. But since I guess there is a whole lot of fog surrounding the exchange it isn't worth hashing over. Your "summarizing" of my position wasn't accurate, but the error was understandable because I was generalizing without considering the context of the current event sufficiently, as Cheetah pointed out.

 

[Farm Boy]

There's a difference between celebrating our stern resolve to protect the speech of even dicks, and celebrating the speech of dicks. Because, you know, we like to lock step with people who share our own bigotries. There's an awful lot of the latter these days. And don't give me some mealy tripe about "oh but self censoring and taboos are bad just because! Boogey boogey boogey!" Bull. You don't have any right to tell a Muslim they are wrong to get personally offended by cariacatures any mroe than you have a right to tell a black man getting called the N word is no biggie.

 

[Narz]

and celebrating the speech of dicks.

Is anyone here doing that?

You don't have any right to tell a Muslim they are wrong to get personally offended by cariacatures any mroe than you have a right to tell a black man getting called the N word is no biggie.

Where do we draw the line? I find most advertising offensive. Our consumer culture risks the destruction of the very existence of human civilization. If you want to get offended over a drawing of your holydude boning his 9-year old wife, ok, go ahead & get offended but its a pretty ****ing lame, irrelevant thing to get offended about. So their holy book says "don't draw this dude", why should everyone have to play by their rules?

And seriously, how are a bunch of snotty art rednecks in Texas actually hurting anyone? They want to look at paintings offensive to Muslims & snicker. Who are they actually harming? Again, its not like their vandalizing the hold places of Muslims (something Muslims have certainly done thruout history, along with the usual genocide & cultural devastation in the name of God that most major religions are guility of).

What if I start a Pokemon religion where you can't draw Pickachu? And people start making fun of me & making hateful depictions of Pickachu laughing at me & raping my mom? Can I blow them away?

Its late & I'm being ridiculous but religion is ridiculous as is getting offended over idiots who want to goad you into violence. Its pathetic all around.

 

[Berzerker]

being black is not a religion

 

[Narz]

being black is not a religion

Well to be fair, most religious people don't consciously make a choice. When you're born into something & not believing is dangerous (as in some Muslim countries) your religion may as well be your skin color.

Even here in the west there is a fair amount of hostility towards non-believers (though that is slowly changing of course). Christians are certainly annoying & sometimes dangerous (murdering abortion doctors & whatnot) but at least they don't bug out & threaten to murder the guy who runs that clay bible website (forgot the link, anyone have it? its Bible stories with clay people, kind of neat & fun)

 

[classical_hero]

Strife and hysteria over the brown menace.

This guy is certainly a brown menace.

This guy is Jake Bilardi who went over to Syria to fight for Islamic State and thankfully killed no one but himself when the van he was driving blew up and only killed himself. This guy is whiter then most of here and yet here we are talking about the brown menace. This thread has become a parody of itself with the rush of so many to condemn those who created this event because they dared to mock those who did what Jake Bilardi did. The irony is that by condemning the group that set up this cartoon contest you are agreeing with the two people and their underlying view about the event.

 

[Berzerker]

Well to be fair, most religious people don't consciously make a choice. When you're born into something & not believing is dangerous (as in some Muslim countries) your religion may as well be your skin color.

You cant hide skin color

 

[Funky]

Allow me to tune in to the discussion.

I don't want to reiterate what has been said so far, only that I am shocked by some people's willingness to blame innocent people for the violence that occured and for their own potential death, merely because they drew some cartoons. I don't even care if the cartoons were racist, or bigoted, or offensive to adherents of a certain religion. People almost got killed for drawing pictures. End of discussion. Whoever proposed that at least some fault lies with the cartoonists, or that they got what they asked for, should be thoroughly ashamed of himself.

But I'd like to go further.

As so often, I find that our words are getting in their own way. The labels we attach to certain groups or behaviours tend to obfuscate the discussion.
The label we apply to the ideology of Islam is "religion". No doubt, by every sensible definition of the word, Islam is a religion. However, by applying this label, we distinguish Islam from other ideologies. And not only that. Due to the importance that religion and worship of gods have played throughout pretty much our entire history, and the emotional attachment so many people have got and still get out of their religious beliefs, we place religions on pedestals, shield them from criticism and treat them with a degree of respect that no other ideology could hope to obtain.

Imagine for a moment that a new party appeared in the political sphere. On its agenda were things like:
1. There is only one true leader. This leader is infallible and everyone must follow and worship him.
2. Those who don't worship this leader shall not have any civil rights.
3. Women are worth less than men and may not act without the permission of their husbands.
4. Whoever mocks our leader shall be killed.
5. Whoever leaves our party shall be killed.
6. Jews are filth and must all be killed.
7. Homosexuals must be killed.

Such a party would constitute such an absurdity that most people would think it's a bad joke. If it did get some attention, it would be stamped to the ground and laughed out of the room by parties, media, and individuals from the entire political spectrum, even at the extreme fringe. In short, such an ideology would be completely unacceptable.

Yet this is precisely the ideology which we find at the core of Islam. But Islam isn't a party, it's a religion. Therefore it not only is accepted, but it demands respect. Not only from its followers, but from everyone. Does anyone else see a problem with that?

I happen to hold the opinion that bad ideas should be criticized, whether they spring from religion or not. The ideology of Islam clearly contains a huge amount of bad ideas. We must be able to criticize these ideas openly, vividly and mercilessly. We owe it to our fellow humans who suffer daily under the extreme cruelty and barbarism of the religious nonsense which is imposed upon them. We owe it most of all to Muslim women who live their lives in fear and subjection. If we can't criticize the ideology that holds them hostage and denies them basic rights in our secular Western societies, who else should do it?

For these reasons I believe that mocking and exposing this ideology is long overdue and an essential endeavour if our goal is to make the world a better place. Yet the fact that merely drawing Mohammed leads to such a backlash and a slandering of the people who dared to undertake this vile blasphemy, I can't say I'm hugely optimistic.

 

[Phrossack]

Allow me to tone in to the discussion.

I don't want to reiterate what has been said so far, only that I am shocked by some people's willingness to blame innocent people for the violence that occured and for their own potential death, merely because they drew some cartoons. I don't even care if the cartoons were racist, or bigoted, or offensive to adherents of a certain religion. People almost got killed for drawing pictures. End of discussion. Whoever proposed that at least some fault lies with the cartoonists, or that they got what they asked for, should be thoroughly ashamed of himself.

But I'd like to go further.

As so often, I find that our words are getting in their own way. The labels we attach to certain groups or behaviours tend to obfuscate the discussion.
The label we apply to the ideology of Islam is "religion". No doubt, by every sensible definition of the word, Islam is a religion. However, by applying this label, we distinguish Islam from other ideologies. And not only that. Due to the importance that religion and worship of gods have played throughout pretty much our entire history, and the emotional attachment so many people have got and still get out of their religious beliefs, we place religions on pedestals, shield them from criticism and treat them with a degree of respect that no other ideology could hope to obtain.

Imagine for a moment that a new party appeared in the political sphere. On its agenda were things like:
1. There is only one true leader. This leader is infallible and everyone must follow and worship him.
2. Those who don't worship this leader shall not have any civil rights.
3. Women are worth less than men and may not act without the permission of their husbands.
4. Whoever mocks our leader shall be killed.
5. Whoever leaves our party shall be killed.
6. Jews are filth and must all be killed.
7. Homosexuals must be killed.

Such a party would constitute such an absurdity that most people would think it's a bad joke. If it did get some attention, it would be stamped to the ground and laughed out of the room by parties, media, and individuals from the entire political spectrum, even at the extreme fringe. In short, such an ideology would be completely unacceptable.

Yet this is precisely the ideology which we find at the core of Islam. But Islam isn't a party, it's a religion. Therefore it not only is accepted, but it demands respect. Not only from its followers, but from everyone. Does anyone else see a problem with that?

I happen to hold the opinion that bad ideas should be criticized, whether they spring from religion or not. The ideology of Islam clearly contains a huge amount of bad ideas. We must be able to criticize these ideas openly, vividly and mercilessly. We owe it to our fellow humans who suffer daily under the extreme cruelty and barbarism of the religious nonsense which is imposed upon them. We owe it most of all to Muslim women who live their lives in fear and subjection. If we can't criticize the ideology that holds them hostage and denies them basic rights in our secular Western societies, who else should do it?

For these reasons I believe that mocking and exposing this ideology is long overdue and an essential endeavour if our goal is to make the world a better place. Yet the fact that merely drawing Mohammed leads to such a backlash and a slandering of the people who dared to undertake this vile blasphemy, I can't say I'm hugely optimistic.

Where does Islam demand that Jews must be killed?

And I'll reiterate that this event did not seek to make any valid criticisms of Islam. If the cartoons had been, as I've said, making fun of how Islam is called "a religion of peace" despite all the Koranic passages advocating war, slavery, etc., that's perfectly valid. Want to draw a cartoon making fun of how Islamic extremists physically attack cartoonists? That's fair! An illustration pointing out how intolerant many Muslim countries are to other faiths? Valid! These are all perfectly reasonable complaints to have.

But the prophet sodomizing a goat? There's no point, no message, beyond "Hey, let's try to piss off those barbaric Muslims! It'll be fun!" That's not criticizing an ideology at all, that's bullying. And then we're expected either to praise these bullies and bigots as heroes, or else be "thoroughly ashamed" of ourselves.

 

[Farm Boy]

And views like that which cast a blindingly broad blanket over good and mean souls alike, attempting to cast firmly the battle lines of the good and enlightened vs the backwards and barbaric. I owe no insults to the Muslims I know in person or on this board. I owe no respect to the Texas bigots. I probably owe some respect to the cop who protected the Texas bigots. I may owe somewhat more respect to the unarmed security guard who was hurt. I hope the Texas bigots were paying him a decent wage to be their firing line. I haven't really seen much news about Mr. Bruce Joiner. One would almost think everybody's forgotten about his 2 hours being treated an released, and he's definitely the most sympathetic individual here.

The irony is that by condemning the group that set up this cartoon contest you are agreeing with the two people and their underlying view about the event.

And no, CH. By calling bigots bigots, by refusing to state my admiration for how awesome bigoted people are, by failing this little ad hoc patriotism check, nowhere does that endorse shooting up bigot rallies, this one or the Klan, with automatic weapons fire. I understand it's a nuance. But it's really not that complicated. Or, lets get frisky, are you only saying that their underlying view about the event is that it was stupid? Are you limiting the statement that much? Then sure. I can agree with two dead attempted murderers that far.

 

[Funky]

And then we're expected either to praise these bullies and bigots as heroes, or else be "thoroughly ashamed" of ourselves.

You must have misread this bit. Feel free to go back and try again. Apart from that, showing that we will not give in to having Islamic blasphemy rights imposed on us and that we will defend our right of free speech seems to serve a good enough purpose for me.

And views like that which cast a blindingly broad blanket over good and mean souls alike...

No, sorry... It probably escaped your attention that I didn't mention Muslims, let alone all Muslims in my post. It is the ideology I am criticizing.

 

[Traitorfish]

Where does Islam demand that Jews must be killed?

I was under the impression that Islamic explicitly dictates that Jews, like Christians and Zoroastrians, shouldn't be killed, because they're monotheists.

 

[Farm Boy]

Ah right. I'm just insulting your cultural and social heritage, reducing it to the outlook of a group of violent extremists, it's not like watermelon generalizations are about people much less all people of a background.

I'm sure they'll get your nuance that's too slippery for Farm Boy to nail down.

 

[Ajidica]

I was under the impression that Islamic explicitly dictates that Jews, like Christians and Zoroastrians, shouldn't be killed, because they're monotheists.

Not so sure about Zoroastrians due to their non-Abrahamic background, but traditionally Jews and Christians were to be considered protected, effectively second class citizens. They pay a religious tax and then they would be protected so long as they stayed out of politics or the military.
That didn't last long and soon quite a few Christians were becoming involved in politics (viziers) and the army (ghulam slave-soldiers). IIRC one of Saladin's viziers was a Christian.
Add into that for a long time in the Middle East Christianity was the dominant religion and how the early Arab invaders benefited from the split between eastern Christians and their brethren in Constantinople over the nature of Jesus/God/what have you. There was a fair amount of the "better the Sultan's turban than the Pope's red hat" effect going on.

 

[Funky]

Ah right. I'm just insulting your cultural and social heritage, reducing it to the outlook of a group of violent extremists, it's not like watermelon generalizations are about people much less all people of a background.

I'm sure they'll get your nuance that's too slippery for Farm Boy to nail down.

First of all, I didn't insult anything, I gave facts about the content of the Koran and the Hadith. Second, by criticizing an ideology I'm not saying anything about the people. Obviously there are varying degrees to which the ideology is followed. I really don't know why this is so difficult for you.

 

[Kaitzilla]

Where does Islam demand that Jews must be killed?

Here you go
http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Muhammad

Allah's Apostle said: "I have been ordered (by Allah) to fight against the people until they testify that none has the right to be worshipped but Allah and that Muhammad is Allah's Apostle, and offer the prayers perfectly and give the obligatory charity, so if they perform a that, then they save their lives an property from me except for Islamic laws and then their reckoning (accounts) will be done by Allah." Narrated by Ibn Umar, in Bukhari, Volume 1, Book 2, Number 24

Allah's Apostle said, "The Hour will not be established until you fight with the Jews, and the stone behind which a Jew will be hiding will say. "O Muslim! There is a Jew hiding behind me, so kill him." Narrated by Abu Huraira, in Bukhari, Volume 4, Book 52, Number 177

I've seen the 2nd part show up from time to time.

Spoiler :

Link to video.


Link to video.

To be fair, a lot of this seems to be centered in the middle east.
Islam works fine in Indonesia.


I find it sad how Apostasy is punished so heavily.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apostasy_in_Islam

Apostasy in Islam (Arabic: ردة riddah or ارتداد irtidād') is commonly defined as the conscious abandonment of Islam by a Muslim in word or through deed.[1][2] It includes the act of converting to another religion (such as Christianity) by a person who was born in a Muslim family or who had previously accepted Islam.[3][4]

Apostasy in Islam includes in its scope not only former Muslims who have renounced Islam to join another religion or become non-religious, but Muslims who have questioned or denied any "fundamental tenet or creed" of Islam such as Sharia law, or who have mocked Allah, worshipped one or more idols, or knowingly believed in an interpretation of Sharia that is contrary to the consensus of ummah (Islamic community).[5][6] The term has also been used for people of religions that trace their origins to Islam, such as Bahá'ís in Iran, and Ahmadiyya Muslims in Pakistan and Indonesia.[7][8]

The definition of apostasy from Islam and its appropriate punishment are controversial, and they vary among Islamic scholars.[9] In Islam’s history, the vast majority of scholars have held that apostasy in Islam is a crime punishable with the death penalty, typically after a waiting period to allow the apostate time to repent and return to Islam.[10][11][12] Some contemporary Muslim scholars also hold the traditional view that the death penalty for apostasy is required by the two primary sources of Sharia - the Quran and the Hadiths - while others argue that the death penalty is an inappropriate punishment.[13][14] A majority considers apostasy in Islam to be some form of religious crime, although a small liberal minority does not[9][15][16] and some reject the use of the death penalty.[17][18][19]

Under current laws in Islamic countries, the actual punishment for the apostate (or murtadd مرت&#1583 ranges from execution to prison term to no punishment.[20][21] Islamic nations with sharia courts use civil code to void the Muslim apostate’s marriage and deny child custody rights, as well as his or her inheritance rights for apostasy.[17][18][19] Twenty-three Muslim-majority countries, as of 2013, additionally covered apostasy in Islam through their criminal laws.[22]

According to critics, punishment for apostasy in Islam is a violation of universal human rights, and an issue of freedom of faith and conscience.[13][23]

I would assume the people who keep killing the cartoonists believe in the death penalty interpretation for mocking Allah.