Enough lessons from these reactionary bigots!

[ziggytrix]

Does sympathy with a motive imply radicalism?

In general, I can say I sympathize with destitute people taking desperate actions without actually condoning the actions, can't I?

[Pharaoh]

Originally Posted by ziggytrix

Does sympathy with a motive imply radicalism?

In general, I can say I sympathize with destitute people taking desperate actions without actually condoning the actions, can't I?

I'd say that believing 'western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to bring it to an end' implies radicalism. And 32% of respondents to the poll believe that.

[ziggytrix]

Ah, well that's not how you said it earlier.

I think anyone who openly says they seek to end western society should not be welcome in western society, but I bet you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who disagreed with that, no matter how big a lefty they were. It's kind of a no-brainer.

[Ant10708]

Be prepared for the real Holocaust

[ScruU2wice]

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

A substantial minority of muslims here are radical, about 25%, and as the Muslim population is nearly 2 million, that's half a million radical Muslims in the UK. If it was only a small minority causing trouble then there wouldn't be editors getting sacked and top politicians apologising about the cartoons.

A paper firing an employee that they find dentremental to their business, is infact there business. and it isn't out the realm of possibilty that politicians would apologize to make the normal muslims happy that also were offended.

And I don't expect Muslims not to be offended but I do expect our media and government to defend our freedom of speech. If Muslims riot, carry hate speech banners or make death threats then they should be arrested. We shouldn't let multiculturalism errode our freedom.

Death threats and riots are illegal, but sign making isn't. I don't condone what they sayl, but hate speech is in the same branch of freedom of speech as caricatures of "how evil muslims are"

Some 32% of respondents to the poll believed “western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to bring it to an end”. Of these, the equivalent of some 16,000 declared themselves willing to resort to violence if necessary to achieve this.'

If you know anything about polling people you would know that to obtain results anything like that the author would not have asked that question.

but lemme also pull out some quotes from the same article

Originally Posted by Times

According to a YouGov poll published yesterday, some 6% of British Muslims consider the attacks were justified.

6% is alot different than 25%

Originally Posted by Telegraph

Among those who hold this view, almost all go on to say that Muslims should only seek to bring about change by non-violent means but one per cent, about 16,000 individuals, declare themselves willing, possibly even eager, to embrace violence.

Thanks for leaving that part out for us..

Originally Posted by Times

Meanwhile, one in four British Muslims — while in no way condoning the bombers’ actions — express some understanding for the feelings and motivations that drove them to commit the crimes.

I see...

[Abcdxxxx]

Originally Posted by ScruU2wice

Death threats and riots are illegal, but sign making isn't. I don't condone what they sayl, but hate speech is in the same branch of freedom of speech as caricatures of "how evil muslims are".

The point is, you can't respond to insensitivity by being equally as insensitive and think it's anything but ...hypocrisy. If they want to enjoy free speech, they have to tolerate the free speech of others too.
There are parts of the world where they are protected from the sin of illustrating Mohammed through an artistic rendering....and it's not the Western world.

Democracy in a Cartoon
By Ibn Warraq

Best-selling author and Muslim dissident Ibn Warraq argues that freedom of expression is our western heritage and we must defend it against attacks from totalitarian societies. If the west does not stand in solidarity with the Danish, he argues, then the Islamization of Europe will have begun in earnest.
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/inte...398853,00.html

[imported_I, fuzzbot.]

Why is 'it's free speech' an appropriate response when no one has called for the government to shut someone up? Why should people 'relax,' unless they are calling for someone to be arrested, which no one did? Free speech has got to be one of the most misunderstood concepts ever. The 'it's free speech so shut up' argument is a particular pet peeve of mine. It means the government can't make laws forbidding people to say something. It does not mean that private citizens cannot be upset about what someone said, challenge what they said, etc. If the freedom only applies to who spoke first, it's pretty meaningless.

As a Muslim, I'm not offended when people attack the religion or burn Korans, because I understand exactly what they are attacking. Plus, it is usually other "Muslims" or former Muslims who are doing the attacking, at least where I'm from.

However, if someone were to come along and say that ALL Muslims are extremists and/or scum-of-the-earth, I would take issue with that. Unfortunately many people make this assumption.

[ScruU2wice]

Originally Posted by Abcdxxxx

The point is, you can't respond to insensitivity by being equally as insensitive and think it's anything but ...hypocrisy. If they want to enjoy free speech, they have to tolerate the free speech of others too.

That's the point I was trying to make but from the other end.

[Abcdxxxx]

Of course the free speech argument would seem inapropriate to you, Fuzzbot They haven't called for the Government to shut someone up, they've just called for the entire Muslim world to persecute the entire Danish population. They're burning embassys, kidnapping people, and making other opportunistic threats. Yeah, we both agree it's ridiculous....so I'm unclear why you're defending their rationality. I could care less what minority of the population these extremists represent, as long as the majority of Muslims making it their priority to EXPLAIN why extremists feel the way they do. You overshadow your own stance, and give the impression you are sympathetic to their cause. You're not all extremists just like we're not all incapable of diffferentiating between criminal Muslims, without persecuting peacefull Muslims.

[Pharaoh]

Originally Posted by ScruU2wice

That's the point I was trying to make but from the other end.

And my point, that you don't seem to understand ScruU2wice, is that how ever much Muslims riot and make death threats we shouldn't give up our freedom of speech. They can riot as much as they like for all I care, I'm not concerned about their protests, I'm concerned about our freedom of speech. If they don't like it they should stay in their Islamic countries, and if they break the law here they should be arrested.

[Chojin]

Enough lessons from these reactionary bigots!

[Abcdxxxx]

Reactionary bigots is a great way to describe the people burning down embassys, kidnapping Europeans....or better yet, killing Dutch filmmakers....all for just offending a Muslim's sensibilities. None of those are merely examples of "freedom of speech", they're crimes.....so let's put it into context. Those actions are not the moral equivalent of an artistic statement deemed to be in poor taste. Danish cartoons which slight one religion do not justify death threats.

Wake the fuck up. In your desperation to scream "not all Muslims are bad people" again and again (we agree, we agree enough already) you're arguing on the side of fascists, and violence. You're defending the argument for persecution of the Salman Rushdie's of the world....and if you're not....then stop arguing. Not all Muslims are bad....stop undermining that message by defending Islamic fascism....ESPECIALLY if it represents a fucking minority within the Islamic population.

[Slinky Ferret]

Originally Posted by Abcdxxxx

Danish cartoons which slight one religion do not justify death threats.

Exactly. It is a cartoon, a cartoon is a joke. A joke is meant to be funny. One could argue that a hell of alot of people obviously can't take a joke. But then on the other hand... you could say, well maybe they like any excuse for doing this type of thing. For example, look at the Miss World incident in Nigeria, one comment that was in fact meant to be a compliment to her beauty, became an excuse for muslims to run around butchering christians.

I just don't understand why they can't just do something funny back, why must they always resort to violence? I don't want to offend certain people by writing this, I just find it so hard to understand why they must retaliate in such extreme ways. It was a joke! There are cartoons in the papers every day depicting our politicians in one form or another and yet they never react by burning or kidnapping. Surely to better yourselves above those that have caused you injury is to respond in a dignified and intelligent manner?

[imported_I, fuzzbot.]

Originally Posted by Abcdxxxx

Reactionary bigots is a great way to describe the people burning down embassys, kidnapping Europeans....or better yet, killing Dutch filmmakers....all for just offending a Muslim's sensibilities. None of those are merely examples of "freedom of speech", they're crimes.....so let's put it into context. Those actions are not the moral equivalent of an artistic statement deemed to be in poor taste. Danish cartoons which slight one religion do not justify death threats.

Wake the fuck up. In your desperation to scream "not all Muslims are bad people" again and again (we agree, we agree enough already) you're arguing on the side of fascists, and violence. You're defending the argument for persecution of the Salman Rushdie's of the world....and if you're not....then stop arguing. Not all Muslims are bad....stop undermining that message by defending Islamic fascism....ESPECIALLY if it represents a fucking minority within the Islamic population.

I like how you keep going on and on about what Muslims are doing and you haven't said a thing about the book burning yet.

You can protest or question or critique a religion without going to the extent of burning their sacred book. That action lends itself to another facet of the "freedom of speech" clause that people like to pull out so often, which is that you have freedom to speak your mind but what you don't have is the right to incite a riot or create an environment that can lead to harm or endanger the lives of others.

To that end, I see flag burning in a somewhat similar light. If someone burns the flag of a nation, it's quite a general statement. If someone burns an effigy of a leader of that nation, it sends a more direct message which can be understood.

Islam, like Christianity, has its more extreme factions. You need only review the shootings at abortion clinics in the US to know this. Look at Pat Robertson. He praises the death of people as punishment from God. He has praised the murder the abotion clinic doctors. Is that not extreme? Is that terribly far away from being related to a faction of Islam that calls for the death of those who debase their beliefs?

Islam has millions of followers all over the world. Millions and millions. Is it safe to say that if muslims were truly a blood-thirsty crazed bunch of lunatics that we'd see a whole hell of a lot more violence?

Burning a book makes a very final statement about the people as a whole. And at the end of the day, just because you have the "right" to do something, that doesn't mean you should do it.

[Spectre X]

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

The Daily Telegraph? Along with The Financial Times, The Times , The Guardian and The Independent it's one of the five quality British newspapers. It's about as far away from a tabloid as you can get.

Besides which, the poll was by YouGov, they're well respected, reliable and used by all the quality British papers.

You can read The Times article on the same poll, here.

'Some 32% of respondents to the poll believed “western society is decadent and immoral and that Muslims should seek to bring it to an end”. Of these, the equivalent of some 16,000 declared themselves willing to resort to violence if necessary to achieve this.'

Try again, knucklehead.

This Telegraph, is this the Telegraph that is distributed world-wide?

Because that one really is only an alien baby story away from an ordinary tabloid.

[Spectre X]

Originally Posted by Slinky Ferret

Exactly. It is a cartoon, a cartoon is a joke. A joke is meant to be funny. One could argue that a hell of alot of people obviously can't take a joke. But then on the other hand... you could say, well maybe they like any excuse for doing this type of thing. For example, look at the Miss World incident in Nigeria, one comment that was in fact meant to be a compliment to her beauty, became an excuse for muslims to run around butchering christians.

I just don't understand why they can't just do something funny back, why must they always resort to violence? I don't want to offend certain people by writing this, I just find it so hard to understand why they must retaliate in such extreme ways. It was a joke! There are cartoons in the papers every day depicting our politicians in one form or another and yet they never react by burning or kidnapping. Surely to better yourselves above those that have caused you injury is to respond in a dignified and intelligent manner?

They were pretty crappy cartoons, though.

If anyone wanted to mock my religion I'd appreciate it if they'd actually put some effort into it, rather than use a bunch of childish pictures meant to cause controversy.

[ScruU2wice]

Originally Posted by Pharaoh

And my point, that you don't seem to understand ScruU2wice, is that how ever much Muslims riot and make death threats we shouldn't give up our freedom of speech. They can riot as much as they like for all I care, I'm not concerned about their protests, I'm concerned about our freedom of speech. If they don't like it they should stay in their Islamic countries, and if they break the law here they should be arrested.

I told you that I agreed with you that they should stay.twice.

But the muslims who aren't on the same page as me see it as not exercising freedom of speech, but delibaratly insulting their faith. They don't see the journalists going "Hey you know what we don't agree with this cartoonist point of view, or we do, but the overall message we are trying to send is that as a newspaper we can print whatever we want", the people that are rioting and causing the chaos are hearing "Hey dude what should we do to piss of Muslim people and belittle their religion? print Cartoons with the prophet mohammad? sounds cool. Woah these cartoons fucking suck, but as long as some muslims get mad we can say that we won a battle agains the deviant religion of Islam. Serious braw this is the best idea we had since flushing a koran down the toilet in gitmo."

[ScruU2wice]

Originally Posted by Spectre X

They were pretty crappy cartoons, though.

If anyone wanted to mock my religion I'd appreciate it if they'd actually put some effort into it, rather than use a bunch of childish pictures meant to cause controversy.

That's my beef with it, I've lost respect for the danish just because the only one that was funny was the virgins one, and that like out of 12

[sadie]

lol. you've lost your respect for all danish people because of some cartoons?

[Sethomas]

That's right, all nine of them.

[ziggytrix]

Originally Posted by Slinky Ferret

Exactly. It is a cartoon, a cartoon is a joke. A joke is meant to be funny.

Then why was only one of them even remotely funny? That's my biggest beef with the Dutch cartoonists. Their sense of humor sucks balls!

Isn't FS Danish? I bet if they'd let him do the cartoons the Muslims would be LOLing in the streets.

edit: I need to read all the replies before replying

[Sethomas]

No, he's Dutch. Their languages look the same but are totally different when you actually study them. Culturally, The Netherlands are the punk dykes of Europe, whereas Denmark wishes it were still part of Sweden.

[ziggytrix]

My grandad once told me the Dutch soldiers would get all defensive if you called them 'Dutch' during WW2. They'd say "No, is Hollanders!" I guess cuz 'Dutch' sounded too much like 'Deutsch'.

How do you get 'Dutch' from 'Netherlands' anyway? They never talked about that in Geography.

[Sethomas]

I've wondered that myself. It's probably derived from the same word as "Teutonic", which I bet if you go back far enough is the root for "deutsch". That's why the Pennsylvania Dutch all spoke German.

[pjalne]

Dutch and Deutsch come from the same word, which meant something like "common" or "domestic" (as opposed to "alien" or "foreign"). A lot of names for cultures, languages or nationalities out there really translate to "the people".

EDIT: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theodisca