Italian charged with defaming Islam

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Oerdin
This is crap! All religions need to be equal and there should be no special privilages for Islam

I am still not convinced that Islam gets a priviledged treatment in Italy. It's very possible that the Italian judiciary punishes other kinds of slander.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Oerdin
The obvious lesson for Jews and Christians is you just need to kill a few thousand people and then you get special privilages.

What are you trying to do? Get us atheists killed?!?!

[Velociryx]

I'm shocked!

How dare she say the least bad thing about those poor, misunderstood muslims!

Here's a thought...perhaps if they, as a group would loudly condemn the bad seeds among them who do things like blow up airplanes and cafe's filled with innocent civilians, just MAYBE global opinion would not have reached such a low that they'd be in NEED of this kind of third party protection.

I mean, how many times did I hear the Catholic Church rant and rave and openly condemn the IRA for the same nonsense in Eire?

But nooooo.....aside from a few low to mid ranking clerics (maybe equal to a bishop, in Christiandom?), I haven't seen much of a ripple, if it even qualifies at THAT.

If they don't want people to talk bad about them, how 'bout working to improve their reputation (a thing the USA could stand to do too, come to think of it )

-=Vel=-

[chequita guevara]

Vel.

[Velociryx]

Che.

-=Vel=-
(and Ted Striker!)

[laurentius]

Originally posted by paiktis22
You are my prime example of a Finn. I tell them look at Pekka and understand finnish people

please dont

[Spiffor]

Here's a thought...perhaps if they, as a group would loudly condemn the bad seeds among them who do things like blow up airplanes and cafe's filled with innocent civilians, just MAYBE global opinion would not have reached such a low that they'd be in NEED of this kind of third party protection.

I mean, how many times did I hear the Catholic Church rant and rave and openly condemn the IRA for the same nonsense in Eire?

The catholic Church is a religion with a clear hierarchy, and a worldwide spiritual leader that can speak for the whole religion. Sunni Islam is no more centralized than US protestants.

In France, the government strived to have a body that can be seen as the local "leader" of the Muslim faith. AFAIK, it always condemns the terrorists and other forms of religious hatred (we have a problem with Muslim antisemitism).

When protestant cults massacre people on the other side of the world (more precisely, in Uganda), do you hear the outrage from "the protestants". Closer to home, when Phelps desacralizes a funeral, you probably hear outrage from individual protestant churches, but where is the outrage of "the protestants" to be seen?

If there was such a thing as a Muslim pope, you can bet you'll often hear the guy condemning the terrorists. But there is no more Muslim pope than there is a protestant pope, and the nutjobs are free from condemnation by a spiritual authority.

[chequita guevara]

You don't hear aything from most protestants because secretly they agree with Phelps. They just aren't so uncouth.

[Pekka]

laurentius, I represent us better than you left wing alliance commies. You're not the future. I am.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by chegitz guevara
You don't hear aything from most protestants because secretly they agree with Phelps.

I thought the majority of your religionists were still sane, despite the quick progresses of the whackjobs?

[Pekka]

Spiff, It's not one leader people need to hear the condemning. It's at least some credible organisation, there have been years of time to do it, maybe one small org has actually said 'well if we REALLY think about it, it was wrong'.

That's like if it was Christians, it would mean the village of Yipayee in the close Canadian border plus the rural area of Fletzschumberg in Germany has said 'it was wrong'.

They don't need 'a pope' to give a feeling they didn't appreciate the act. They even didn't need one to make it known it wasn't condemned.

[JohnT]

See above quote about respecting religions, Spiff.

[Pekka]

edited

I'm saying, if you take religion of any kind that limits your freedom of speech, it doesn't belong in the west. Period. West has fundies of them own already.

[chequita guevara]

Originally posted by Spiffor
I thought the majority of your religionists were still sane, despite the quick progresses of the whackjobs?

The majority of Americans disapprove of homosexuality, believe it is a sin, and that it should not be condoned. A majority, however, also believes that we should not oppress homosexuals just because they engage in sinful and "disgusting" behavior, in addition to those of us who think there's nothing wrong with it whatsoever. That is why most people are opposed to discriminating against gays in jobs, education, and housing but also opposed to gay marriage.

[Spiffor]

Originally posted by Pekka
Spiff, It's not one leader people need to hear the condemning. It's at least some credible organisation

Agreed. However, it's not that simple.

Sunni Islam is a religion where anybody and his dog can become a priest, just like protestantism. As a result, there is a great variety of doctrines, that are more or less liberal/reactionary. Islam is "organized" in these different churches, that act as organizations representatives of themselves.

The French experience shows that it is difficult to unite them into a cohesive organization. It has been years since the "Council of the Muslim Belief" has been created at the French government's initiative, and the internal politicking are still crippling. On the divisive issue of the headscarf ban, the Council pretty much splitted up. The only reason why it still exists today is because of the life support provided by the government.

Now, not many countries will try to actually create a central authority for Islam where none exists. Imagine what happens when a non-state-sponsored organization of this kind meets a divisive question: it splits up, just like Muslim denominations have done since Muhammed.

As such, Sunni Islam is pretty much doomed to have a great many small-scale leaders that represent only themselves and a small following. This is the reason why, even when one sees a liberal Imam on TV who condemns everything you want, one can't really think "the Muslims think so". Simply because the liberal Imam doesn't represent anybody but himself.

I don't want to depict a rosy picture. Radical Islam feeds off hatred, the hatred exists, and has causes that are religious as well as national/historical. In particular, the hatred will be especially strong among the most reactionary Muslim populations: the ones in the middle East (the ones in North Africa and in Southeastern Asia seem to be much less uptight).

But it's absurd to say that there is no outrage. Sunni Islam is varied enough that there is outrage, and not an unsignificant one. But maybe the reason why I know it is because, over here, Muslim outrage does get air time.


I'd like to add for Che that, no matter how tempting it is to paint the Muslims with a broad brush, it's still wrong. If you look at the reasons and the manifestations of the hatred, you'll see that religion plays a rather secondary role. The promotion of radical Islam is strongly related with politics (most notably, with Saudi funding of wahabite hatemongers) and with frustrated nationalism. The most fertile ground for these beliefs are the backward areas of socially backward countries (most of the Middle East). It's no surprise that the loathable radical Islam, whose agenda is to restore the dark ages, comes from countries where pre-enlightenment ideas are still very prevalent.