I am burning with rage!
who gives this tosser the right to burn the book so many people believe in???
Im not religious at all, but i would be pissed off if i saw some one burning or ripping a bible.
Ive got one that we were given in school many year ago and i can simply chuck it away, it feels wrong.
“who gives this tosser the right to burn the book so many people believe in???”
And just change two words to one…
“who gives this tosser the right to burn something so many people believe in???”
Not a big difference right? I have not completely changed your meaning or twisted your words. Have I?
Now it applies to the American flag. Something which when burnt deeply offends many Americans. Yet it is done routinely and it is often done with the purpose of causing offence.
Strangely, there is little outcry by the mainstream, some even defend burning the American flag as freedom of speech or expression.
Odd that there is such deafening silence about such freedom of expression now though.
Don’t get me wrong, I don’t agree with what the pastor is doing, it is offensive for no other purpose then to be offensive and what is the point in that, but I do not like the hypocritical nature of the way that this is being dealt with.
For the record, your thread title is also a little misleading. “in spite of 9/11” implies that 9/11 was done to stop this sort of thing…as in this sentence…
I drive my car to work in spite of the congestion charge.
Means that the congestion charge is designed to stop me driving my car to work, but I do it anyway.
Had 9/11 been done to stop this sort of thing, then I expect that this guys actions would have had much wider appeal, as “we can’t let the terrorists win” is a mantra oft repeated in the States.
Another nutty American religious fundamentalist, and a stupid one at that as this will only serve to encourage more people to become terrorists.
Did you know a major US company supplies gun sites with Christian psalm references stamped on them, including ones provided to the military for use in Afghanistan? Totally idiotic.
Two wrongs make a right? What proportion of people who hold the Koran holy burn an American flags? Is that number going to go up or down as a result of this?
Well that wasn’t really the point I was making was it Guiliano and had you not truncated my post you would clearly see that this was not the point I was making.
I don’t think the American Flag is a fair comparison. While I know there was/is religious violence I never really viewed the Americans as a religious organisation, the American Flag is a symbol of freedom and democracy for the USA …not a book about a religion.
The isn’t about the symbol of a country, rather it is about a religious book.
As a person generally opposed to organised religion of any description, not belief but the organised religion. I don’t place religion on a pedestal.
If people are offended by something, then calling it religion doesn’t make their offendedness any more important.
Some Americans are offended by the burning of the American flag, I don’t see why we should belittle that simply because it isn’t based on some organised religion.
Was I meant to remember verbatim what I wrote well over a week ago?
Other then shoe horning in different words, your post doesn’t really highlight anything, no inconsistencies in my stance or opinions, no errors in my logic, no mistakes I have made.
I don’t really see much of the point of why you have done this, other then to point out that I don’t remember exactly every single post I have made, out of the 1,100+ I have now made on this message board. Which to be honest, I would have readily agreed to anyway.
Nope, I would guess it tends to be the case that when someone does waffle so much rubbish and they claim to be right in every subject that they write about, it makes it extremely difficult to remember anything seconds later never mind weeks later!!
Really ?
I wish I never made mistakes too. :w00t:
I did it Kaos to highlight your points. I used an exact same point (that I disagreed with) that you used to answer one of your points to see if you would answer it.
You actually did what you usually do, didn’t say anything relevent to the post and waffled off in another direction.
As an atheist, I believe that Muslims have as much a right to be offended about someone burning a Qur’an as Americans do by the burning of their national flag in protest to their foreign policies. They are as entitled to follow their faith or nationalism, as I am not to. They are as entitled to be offended by such actions, as I am about the current fashion of hanging your jeans below your ar$e.
Do I have the right to stop others from expressing their opinions? Of course I don’t. Read your Bibles and Qur’ans and pray to your Gods and keep giving your religious leaders your money, it’s not my concern. I just don’t think that the religious amongst us have the right to a level of respect or misguided reverence which is not afforded to any other belief system (such as mine) - I can criticise robustly anyone’s taste in music, politics or bikes, but nobody expects me to treat those tastes with kid gloves or exaggerated respect. But why am I not allowed to openly criticise anyone’s religion, *particularly * Islam? I don’t appreciate the hypocrisy.
So what if we’re offended?
I am offended by some things, though. I am particularly offended where the actions, beliefs or faiths of an individual or group adversely impact on others.
For example, when children are denied the right to a proper education, when they are taught that if they leave their religion they will spend eternity in hell. When medical science e.g. stem cell research is compromised by the bigoted and well-financed opinions of ignoramuses. I am offended when voodoo of all kinds is given equal weight to science, by hymen reconstructive surgery, female circumcision (genital mutilation - common in the UK as well as in Africa). By stoning to death in the name of ‘honour’, because someone wants to marry someone else from a different faith.
Yes it was. Your post said it was legitimate to offend someone who had never offend you because you are offended. I am saying one wrong doesn’t automatically justify another, and that regardless of anything else one always needs to consider the consequences of your actions.
