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Any free thought, speech or expression.
Yes, I agree with you at the end of the day, I just wonder what is really achieved by this specific battle over depicting Mohammad. I'm not aware of Western literature or art going out of its way to present figurative depictions of Mohammad in the past - just seems odd that it's become a bit of an obession with some self-proclaimed defenders of press freedom. I just wonder if there aren't more important and productive battles to be fought, such as over the right of girls to have an education and not have their genitals mutilated, all in the name of 'Islam'. I'm just not sure how the deliberate provocation of the cartoons fits into the wider struggle against extremist Islamic lunacy, and whether it hasn't been overall rather counter-productive.
The other irony of course is that there are lots of actual restrictions on press freedom in France and the UK - France's privacy laws; the UK's laws against incitement to racial hatred etc. It's not as if the absolute right to freedom to say whatever you want is enshrined in either French or UK law. The US is different, although there may be some excpetions that I'm not aware of. They do have their own odd prohibitions, like not burning the flag.
Sadistic killing without a big propaganda hype behind it just isn't in fashion anymore, there needs to be some ‘higher purpose’- imagined or otherwise. But in the end you’re still just a homicidal brute.
It just so happens that 'religious extremism', or whatever excuse for a 'cause' you want to call it, is very appealing to the mentally feeble or violently psychotic. People who are mentally stable and not feeble minded (thus less - or not - inclined to indoctrination) with no violent tendencies simply do not go around shooting/beheading people they dislike, or even hate.
Raging war against these groups is all well and good, but communal ownership & individual follow up is needed - communities, families, societies and the like need to take responsibility, in as far as they can, for the psychotics amongst them. The lack of damnation from within the communities where these psychotics come for the acts we’ve been seeing is disturbing.
If we don't understand and deal with the causes, attacks will only continue again and again, and become worse. Over the past 15 years, the instances of these kinds of attacks have increased, and the consequences have become more severe. We are on the cusp of a tipping point imo.
The only way to solve this in the long run is to ensure that it is extinguished from within......i.e. from within the Muslim community. That requires understanding, addressing and healing any legitimate (and only the legitimate ones) grievances which might be manifesting themselves without validating the attackers or the attacks. It also means not inciting further hatred needlessly.
You cannot eradicate this any other way without blowing the budget deficit, wasting innocent lives unecessarily on both sides & eventually losing the freedoms which we cherish. If that happens then the attackers have indeed won.
The causes for people to sympathize or relate to the attackers have to be understood at the root level and fixed. This will then annihilate and expunge the problem from within eventually because there will be nowhere for would be attackers to hide and no support for their actions. It will take years. Now's as good a time to start as any.
I don't think burning the flag is a federal crime in the USA. If it is illegal someone accused of doing it could plea freedom of expression and get acquitted.
Regarding the battles against Islamism, it is the same for women rights, gay rights or the right to blasphemy. We are confronting the same absolutism. i.
You're right in principle. I guess I just personally see the 'right to blasphemy' one as less important, and one that needlessly offends when we need to be building bridges and strategic alliances with sensible, moderate Muslims. It makes it easier for the nutters to portray 'the West' as anti-Islamic. But at the end of the day, I would defend someone's right to cause offence over someone's right not to be offended, so I agree with you. I just think you have to pick your battles and this was not the best one to pick for a range of reasons.
The synical thing is they even broke their own law, as the policeman they killed was a Muslim. Under sharia law they ought to be beheaded because of this.
but that's not the point. The point is they took to violence because they couldn't stand the words or drawings.
There is no need for provocation, true - if I lived next door to a Muslim family I would not be sending them Christmas cards with caricatures of their prophet on them.
But then again I do believe that when it comes to nonviolent acts offense is always taken, never given. The punishment should fit the crime, so if you are offended by cartoons or such then react accordingly, ie. protest or boycott. Gunning the cartoonist down hardly seems like balanced retribution.
They'd probably say he was an apostate and deserved death because he was 'fighting' for the kafirs!
Any one seen 'Four Lions'? Quite funny in parts.
I am not sure what the truth is or if anybody would know the truth if it slapped him/her in the face, the truth is often subjective if anything especially when it comes to systems of faith.
And while we criticize our Muslim fellow believers, lets not forget the bloody history we had with our Christian church and the bloodbaths due to the various schisms within our church. And to be honest the average devoted christian is not very entertained when his her religion gets mocked.
As for free thought, speech & expression they are an ideal which we aim to achieve, but somehow even in the west it causes problems as we are not always that open and honest.
For me the attack was a sign of stupidity, stupid in the sense that anybody believes that through violence you can kill any ideas you do not agree with. Thoughts that differ to your believes system always pop up again and as history has shown NO amount of violence can stop them, only delay them for a while. But they are an inescapable force of human nature.
Time to start a MohammadCapCon on this site?
I think we can all agree on that. And I repeat that I'm not in any way justifying the killers or on a fundamental level saying that people shouldn't have the right to blaspheme Mohammad. I completely defend their right to do so. All I'm questioning is the wisdom of doing it and pondering what it actually achieved.
As was said in one of my favourite movies (Angels and Demons): "Be careful......these are men of God"
No, no - I understood your argument, and I agree...
Say you live in a remote community, and your fellow farmer is of religion 'x' - what, exactly, are you achieving by running around shouting that his religion is silly, or mocking his religious symbols? Yes, you have exercised your right to free speech, but meanwhile also alienated yourself from the very people you need co-operate with and exist peacefully.
It goes without saying that the farmer is not within his right to harm you for saying that, but I think the point is clear enough...
There are no problems with freedom of speech in the west, there are problems with the impairment of this freedom because people might get offended, or what have you. The essence is that we can disagree, and that's our right, however elequently we put it.
Then shouldnt we be looking at the root cause and trying to eradicate this cancer rather than indulge it? No one seems interested in the slightest in my offence that religion is even in this day some sacred cow that we all have to treat with reverence.
Through science and enlightenment we no longer think the earth is flat or that we are the centre of the universe yet we are still all ordered by our governments that we must respect people who believe in religion. Why - its utter bollocks?
Take the story of God: Here's a bloke who creates, if you will, a version of The Sims for his own entertainment. After a while he gets annoyed at the AI (which he programmed and could change if he wanted to) of the people for not behaving as he wants so he puts his own son into the game who is then executed for their sins, which somehow means that they are all saved and if they follow his rules they will get to go and live with him when they die.
All I can think of to say is why? If you are God what is the point of it all? Why create us and then get the hump when we dont do what you want? You created us you cretin so you know how we are going to behave. Why do you make these beings and give them desire for sex, money, smoking & drinking and then do your nut when they indulge all these vices rather than go to church and help the poor? Here's an idea if you want to help stop the suffering of the poor and disadvantaged, how about tonight you leave a suitcase of £1 million outside their front doors?
If you conclude that God exists then how can you not think he is just a cruel, self indulgent arsehole?
Yet half the planet is in thrall to these bullshit stories and the rest of us have to put up with the consequences.
Here's an idea - how about we divide the earth in half? One half for the religious and one half for the secular. We all just get on with our own business and never have any contact with each other because I'm really sick at having to listen to the bleatings of the intellectually challenged who think all this crap is true.
Totally agree and I am conscious that what I'm saying could come across that way, which it's not supposed to.
Is we can express ourselves and have different opinions. :) The very
Thing these terrorists hate.
I'm in complete agreement with you. I have religious friends with PhDs in biology and sciences who, when discussing religion, completely confound me with their lapse in basic reasoning. In fact, I am actually amazed at how otherwise completely logical people can become completely illogical when discussing the origins of the universe or religion.
So my point is, it's best to tread lightly. At some point they'll come around, when science proves more (which it inevitably will). We've got a ways to go yet, which is why religion still has quite a hold. People need something to hold on to when science has failed to provide an answer.
Regarding governments asking that we respect religious beliefs: I think it's because they realize this is a way to control the masses. Without religion, I think governments fear that they may not be able to retain moral authority, and anarchy may result. So they co-opt religion if you will, in order to retain some credibility with the masses who respect it above all else.
I recently saw an interview with Richard Dawkins, evolutionary biologist. I think he and I are on the same page on this.
A the end of the day, we're in agreement. I just think those lives were wasted needlessly.
As I mentioned: it was said best in Angels and Demons: "Be careful....these are men of God"
I am not aware of any western country "ordering respect" for those who believe in whatever.
I am aware though that in western countries we do have constitutional provisions for freedom of expression which naturally includes freedom of religious expression.
But then there is also that camp, that believes in the inalienable right to "freedom of expression that only agrees with me"
Puts some of the 'disagreements' on here into stark perspective.
The burden of proof is on those of faith. Something a lot of them seem to either ignore or not realise. While the Wizard may be using provocative language, the sentiment is completely valid and in no way ignorant. I'm happy for people of faith to indulge themselves. If it makes their lives better then all power to them, but don't expect the truly enlightened to be a slave to such nonsense.
Freedom of expression is intrinsic to our democracies.
The terrorist attacks aren't even truly an attack on freedom of expression.
The law actually does protect the cartoonists.
The terrorist attacks are an act of lawlessness, an act of war even, as we are actually at war with the IS (Islamic State) or whatever they call themselves.
We are not at war with what they believe so much (Allah is supreme etc) but rather their lawless, war-like actions.
The appropriate response is to fight back and defend our democracies, just as we did against the Nazis.
I think the lesson of fanatical religion is that we should avoid phrases like this and any claims to special knowledge or enlightenment, triumphalism or dogma. Modern Western scientific knowledge is not some revealed truth that explains everything - particularly not in relation to the nature human existence. I'm an atheist, but am repelled by the stupid dogma of people like Dorkins (deliberate mis-spelling) almost as much as I am by fundementalist religion.
Also if I don't want to believe in Santa Claus, I can !
The terrorists want me to live in a country were they'll TELL me what
I think and what my opinion should be.
I use the word enlightened ironically, as it is the default response of most faiths. Perhaps it didn't come across that way; I didn't for a minute think anyone would believe I was claiming enlightenment, whatever that is defined as. I also agree on Dawkins. I don't think religion should be expunged from society, but I do think the privileges it demands are unreasonable in this day and age.
Indeed. The problem is not the offence: anyone has the right to be offended by the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. But nobody has the right to force others to be offended, or to be protected from being offended. Hence, no religion, no religious people, can claim special protection from mockery, ridicule and criticism. And since they make a claim regarding a revealed and absolute truth, they can be challenged on it. And ridiculed.