QueenZone discussion #1326112

Zebonka12 wrote: Ha, good point. I can't imagine what a task it'd be to get it reliably excised from the internet at this point, though.

That is just wrong, and it shows a great flaw in the American system: the entrepreneur *always* gets the better of his employees, even if he cheats them.

Blaming the video is convenient for the Obama administration. Blaming the video obviates questions about inadequate security at the Benghazi consulate. Even better, from the administration's point of view, the more we talk about the video, the less we talk about whether the administration made the right choices in its Libyan and Egyptian policies. But blaming the video also imposes some ugly costs. Self-selected Muslim leaders exploit incidents like this to pose demands that threaten human freedom in the Middle East and around the world. Even under the prior secular regime of Hosni Mubarak, Egypt regularly used blasphemy laws to persecute religious minorities and independent thinkers. That country's new Muslim Brotherhood government has already shown itself even more aggressively intolerant of dissenting speech, suppressing newspapers that print criticism of President Mohamed Morsy. Pakistan's record is even worse, with courts pronouncing death sentences on supposed blasphemers, most recently a mentally impaired Christian girl accused of burning pages of the Quran. (She was released on bail Friday after it was established that her accuser, a local imam, had faked his evidence.) Western countries, too, are targeted by demands for the regulation of speech deemed objectionable by certain Muslims. From "The Satanic Verses" uproar of 1989, through the Danish cartoon incident of 2006, to this latest video, European and American governments and media institutions have compromised their most cherished values to appease angry mobs. Clear-eyed observers will notice that these periodic uproars are rarely, if ever, spontaneous. They are almost always contrived by political actors for political purposes. Ayatollah Khomeini's issuance of a fatwa against Salman Rushdie helped distract attention from the bitter decision to end the war with Iraq with a compromise peace he could have had six years earlier, sparing hundreds of thousands of Iranian lives. The Danish cartoon incident was the work of freelance European imams, hoping -- like Al Sharpton in the Tawana Brawley case -- to promote themselves through a manufactured controversy. (The most provocative of the Danish cartoons were apparently fakes.) And this latest video uproar has been used by the Muslim Brotherhood government of Egypt to rally support against the last of the old leaders of the Egyptian army and security services. Opportunistic leaders use these incidents in this way for one reason: They work. They gain results at low to nonexistent cost. And unfortunately international institutions have lent legitimacy to these outrages. President Barack Obama delivers his annual address to the United Nations on September 25. Let him take time in that speech to refute and repudiate blasphemy laws. Let him say that he upholds and vindicates free speech as an American right and that he respects and endorses free speech as a universal human right. Let him say that Americans will be protected in their speech rights against threats of violence from anyone, anywhere. Let him say that if freedom of speech means anything, it means first and foremost the right to criticize orthodoxy, political or religious. Let him say that freedom of speech includes the right to mock, to be rude, to be stupid and to be wrong -- because we know that speech that is stupid and wrong will be rebutted, refuted and mocked in its turn. Not everyone shares the American regard for free speech. That's their lookout. But the leaders of the United States will not be bullied into compromising their most cherished values -- and their most solemn constitutional obligations -- by inciters of mobs, by would-be dictators and by overweening street preachers. Let him say that, too.

Micrówave wrote: This movie probably would have gone away quite quickly, unseen by millions, until radical fundamentalists turned it into an attack campaign.They're not mad it shows Mohammed... they're cranked at the way he's depicted.  I'm sure if the "Mohammed" in the movie went around saving babies and getting kitties out of trees, Carl's Jr. Tripoli would still be standing.

YourValentine wrote: and to stand up for our values which are not only different but better than those of Middle East theocracies which we sadly keep helping to build.

No system or culture is superior to any other.

Micrówave wrote:

No system or culture is superior to any other.

What a fricking moron!!!Uh, yes, TQ, some are.INDIAMost Indians own a mobile phone, but don't have access to private toilets. The government and activists hope to help.Out of 7935 towns, only 162 have sewage treatment plants.I would have to say the United States Sewage system is SUPERIOR to India's.  Proove me wrong, dimwit.link

Now having an opinion already makes me a fascist.

I am not a friend of organized religion in any form, but I will say this: I have never met a muslim anywhere near as offensive as some of the christians who try to run the show where I live.

YourValentine wrote: The freedom of speech is mainly the freedom of a minority to voice their opinion or else it is worth nothing. I do not need freedom of speech to say that the sun is shining, I need it when I want to say something extremely unpopular. There is no human right to be not offended by what other people say and we cannot let a rioting mob dictate what is possible to say or show or display in our countries.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote:
You talk of our 'values' being superior, but what are 'our values'? When you look at an Islamic country, you see bearded mullahs opressing women. You don't see the massive amounts of charity in Islamic culture. It is *exactly* the same thing as muslims looking at America, and only seeing greedy corporations/banks robbing the people and pursuing profit regardless of morality, but not seeing individual freedom, except when it is abused to insult muslims.
So true -- and media distorts things, that's how we get our perceptions of the world, and their media distorts things just as much as our media does. Not meaning 'their' and 'our' in any offensive way, just meaning different countries and cultures slant things in different ways.

Zebonka12 wrote: I think one could make a (very carefully worded) argument for our way of life being better than that in Syria or the Sudan. But it's way too simplistic (and frankly, wrong) to blame it on race or even religion. These people don't act like bashy bazooks because they're a lower race - they do it because they're in a shite situation, and people in that situation *will* act up. And even though religion happens to be frequently woven into whatever caused that shite situation in the first place, the actual truth of it is that if we didn't have religion, it'd be some other flag being waved to get people to do what we want them to. Factionalism has many faces!

Manufactured outrage such as that seen in recent protests in Egypt, Libya and elsewhere is “much more prevalent and much more widespread” than it was when The Satanic Verses was published, the book’s author, Salman Rushdie, has told CNN's Fareed Zakaria. Rushdie's new book, Joseph Anton: A Memoir, is an account of the firestorm surrounding The Satanic Verses. But Rushdie suggests that as with the protests over The Satanic Verses, the recent unrest surrounding a controversial video that was posted on YouTube has been managed. “At the time of the attack on The Satanic Verses, what we saw was not so much a spontaneous outpouring of rage as a very carefully manufactured outpouring,” Rushdie told Zakaria. “There was no doubt that it was highly controlled. You know, there were missives sent out from mosques to all sorts of people and they were all identical to make sure everybody was singing from the same song sheet...making the same attacks on the book in the same words.” “Looking back at it, you can see that that was one of the early moments at which this project of manufacturing outrage began,” he said. “And that’s, of course, become much more prevalent and much more widespread.” “And I think certainly, if we look at what’s happening now, this is very much a product of the outrage machine," Rushdie said. “Yes, there’s this stupid film...and the correct response to a stupid film on YouTube is to say it’s a stupid film on YouTube, and you get on with the rest of your life. “So to take that and to deliberately use it to inflame your troops, you know, is a political act,” Rushdie added. “That’s not about religion, that’s about power.”

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: What disgusts me utterly is that you people are defending a man who, in peddling his own extremist views, has WITTINGLY and WILLINGLY endangered scores of people's lives. Nakoula tried to be as offensive as he possibly could, to provoke the most hostile reaction he possibly could. He is just as much a terrorist as the people who attacked American embassies are.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: Just last year, two mosques in Holland were drenched in pig-blood, and another was torched, leading to the death of the imam. The violence is not a one-way thing, even if the there is an imbalance.

Mr.Jingles wrote: Words don't hurt, at least not physically.

"Likewise, we condemn any type of extremism. Of course, what took place was ugly. Offending the Holy Prophet is quite ugly. This has very little or nothing to do with freedom and freedom of speech. This is the weakness of and the abuse of freedom, and in many places it is a crime. It shouldn't take place, and I do hope the day will come in which politicians will not seek to offend those whom others hold holy," When asked by Piers Morgan whether he thought protesters should stop threatening U.S. staff abroad, Ahmadinejad said he cannot say what other people or nations should do, but that he believes "extremism gives birth to following and subsequent extremists." "Perhaps if the politicians take a better position in the West vis-a-vis offensive words or thoughts or pictures towards what we hold holy, I think conditions will improve,"

The Real Wizard wrote: But he must be wrong, since Iran is evil and everything... Never thought I'd see the day when I'd fully agree with the president of Iran.

"I'm sorry. Let me ask you this. Do you believe that anyone is giving birth through homosexuality? Homosexuality ceases procreation. Who has said that if you like or believe in doing something ugly, and others do not accept your behavior, that they're denying your freedom?" he asked Morgan. "Proper education must be given ... the education system must be revamped. The political system must be revamped. And these must be also reformed, revamped along the way. But if you, if a group recognizes an ugly behavior or ugly deed as legitimate, you must not expect other countries or other groups to give it the same recognition."

GratefulFan wrote: I have talked before about what I view as the sometimes dogmatic nature of free speech in America. Not picking on America, it's just the purest example of free speech values I know. (Hey, Canada banned "Money for Nothing" from the radio for a while in 1985. Oh sorry. In 2011.) But statements like Mr. Jingles' in the form of "X is ignorant and despicable, but I will defend their to right speak their mind" pop up as reliably as dandelions at these times and illustrate a particular uncritical absolutism that both mirrors elements of Middle Eastern cultural expression and partly explains Islamic rejection of Western values. Social and cultural costs born of the deification of the First Amendment are almost never examined and when they are it seems to simply be accepted that steeping in all manner of garbage is not a cost of freedom, but freedom itself. Crush fetish vidoes (eventually specifically outlawed in subsequent legislation under animal cruelty), Super PACs, and the Westboro gang are an off-the-top-of-my-head sampling of things a Supreme Court majority has decided America really needs to keep tyranny at bay. Maybe so. But somewhere in the ideas dismissed as the rantings of an intolerant society mired in the dark ages is an opportunity to look more completely at Western values. Not to change, but to see what we sometimes pay for failing to adequately discern and to acknowledge that there is a rational basis for the rejection by other cultures of some of our outcomes. I brought up the NY Mosque issue earlier because beyond arguments both explicit and implied that Americans are above descent into dogma, there is also a sense that the system of values is not only superior, but fosters a level headed and sometimes self sacrificing fealty to higher principles. In fact elements of the statement of Ahmadinejad and other opinion makers in the Arab that would be almost univerally rejected by most of us are virtually identical in structure to the "it has little or nothing to do with freedom of religion" canard from the Ground Zero mosque days. In the current climate we offer a comparison of how western culture would (or wouldn't) react if Jesus Christ or a church was blasphemed, a self evident observation that is only deceptively illuminating because special protection for religious thoughts is not a cultural value in America. Nothing is being tested here, where Middle Eastern patience and understanding is being pushed to its limit, just as it was for those Americans who processed the NY mosque proposal with hurt, anger and humilation. We don't have to surrender principles to acknowledge that there is nothing new under the sun and to regret not our values but the way that they can be denigrating and trying to our own citizens and those in other countries alike. To understand that a better kind of imperfection is still imperfection.

YourValentine wrote: I think there is basically no disagreement here with your thoughts at all. Of course there are excesses and each time we have to re-evalutae which legally protected rights we have to make a priority and of courseother cultures have every right to make other priorities.

YourValentine wrote: You say that ".... and the Westboro gang are an off-the-top-of-my-head sampling of things a Supreme Court majority has decided America really needs to keep tyranny at bay." Of course that is not what the judges decided and you know it. No judge said that anybody "needs" the Westboro fanatics to keep tyranny at bay - they decided that the actions of the fanatics were protected by the 1st amendmend and therefore the court could not sanction these actions...

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: When both the *intent* and the *predictable result* of any publication, be it a film, a cartoon, a book or whatnot, are to incite riots and violence, it should not be considered freedom of speech, but hate-speech and an attempt to disturb the public order.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: When both the *intent* and the *predictable result* of any publication, be it a film, a cartoon, a book or whatnot, are to incite riots and violence, it should not be considered freedom of speech, but hate-speech and an attempt to disturb the public order.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: So, you are of the opinion that Al Qaeda-propaganda films are free speech then? Incidentally, you creeps, the only parties in the middle east fighting Islamism are the COMMUNISTS.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: When both the *intent* and the *predictable result* of any publication, be it a film, a cartoon, a book or whatnot, are to incite riots and violence, it should not be considered freedom of speech, but hate-speech and an attempt to disturb the public order.

Mr.Jingles wrote: Seriously for how long does the world have to walk on egg shells when it comes to Islam?

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: Who tell poor people in Africa that they'll get AIDS if they *do* use a condom? The pope and his bishops.

thomasquinn 32989 wrote: Muslims are no better and no worse than Christians, Jews, Hindus, etc. Might I remind you of a couple of things? Who bombs abortion clinics in America? Christians. The biggest terrorist organization in the world is the Lord's Resistance Army - it's a Christian group. Who are the ones throwing rocks at Israeli schoolgirls that are 'improperly dressed'? Jewish extremists. Who massacre supposed 'witches' in Africa? Christians. Who tell poor people in Africa that they'll get AIDS if they *do* use a condom? The pope and his bishops. Who committed acts of mass murder in former Yugoslavia? Orthodox Christians. Who massacres demonstrators in northern China? An atheïst government. And, by contrast, who are the only ones in the middle east that oppose Islamism? The COMMUNISTS.

The Real Wizard wrote:

Mr.Jingles wrote: Seriously for how long does the world have to walk on egg shells when it comes to Islam?

Until the majority of its adherents no longer live in the dark ages. Until then, they will react like savages when their worldview is challenged by people thousands of miles away. The middle east does not have many evolved people capable of critical and rational thought, and this isn't going to change any time soon. Therefore is up to the west to stay out of their business and not provoke them. We should know better. If they want to live in the dark ages, then let them. Even if we are offering them 72 tangible virgins per male over 18, and a million dollars to every person who can spell their name. If they don't want it, then we should get the hell out.

Mr.Jingles wrote:

The Real Wizard wrote:

Mr.Jingles wrote: Seriously for how long does the world have to walk on egg shells when it comes to Islam?

Until the majority of its adherents no longer live in the dark ages. Until then, they will react like savages when their worldview is challenged by people thousands of miles away. The middle east does not have many evolved people capable of critical and rational thought, and this isn't going to change any time soon. Therefore is up to the west to stay out of their business and not provoke them. We should know better. If they want to live in the dark ages, then let them. Even if we are offering them 72 tangible virgins per male over 18, and a million dollars to every person who can spell their name. If they don't want it, then we should get the hell out.

Well, we have some major fuckin' problem here then, because ANYONE, and I mean ANYONE has the potential to open a can of worms by posting something online that will offend Muslims.