Muslim boycott of Denmark/The cartoon controversy opinions please

Wolff

Oh and seeing as some people keep banging on about jews in Iran thought this might interest - seeing as the president of Iran doesnt even think the holocaust was a big deal.

I think he should stick to nuclear weapons doh sorry I mean trafficlights

It looks like a barrel of laughs for Jews allright.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/iranjews.html


Following the overthrow of the shah and the declaration of an Islamic state in 1979, Iran severed relations with Israel. The country has subsequently supported many of the Islamic terrorist organizations that target Jews and Israelis, particularly the Lebanon-based, Hezbollah. Nevertheless, Iran's Jewish community is the largest in the Middle East outside Israel.

On the eve of Passover in 1999, 13 Jews from Shiran and Isfahan in southern Iran were arrested and accused of spying for Israel and the United States. Those arrested include a rabbi, a ritual slaughterer and teachers. In September 2000, an Iranian appeals court upheld a decision to imprison ten of the thirteen Jews accused of spying for Israel. In the appeals court, ten of the accused were found guilty of cooperating with Israel and were given prison terms ranging from two to nine years. Three of the accused were found innocent in the first trial.5 In March 2001, one of the imprisoned Jews was released, a second was freed in January 2002, the remaining eight were set free in late October 2002. The last five apparently were released on furlough for an indefinite period, leaving them vulnerable to future arrest. Three others were reportedly pardoned by Iran's Supreme Leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei.6

At least 13 Jews have been executed in Iran since the Islamic revolution 19 years ago, most of them for either religious reasons or their connection to Israel. For example, in May 1998, Jewish businessman Ruhollah Kakhodah-Zadeh was hanged in prison without a public charge or legal proceeding, apparently for assisting Jews to emigrate.

SeanW

Oh dear, oh dear. Are we starting to see a pattern here?

It seems the real problems don't lie with "Racist" Danes and provocateur newspapers after all, and as stated, would you (reffering primarily to Hobbes) rather be a jew in Iran or a muslim in Denmark?

Saw in the news the other day some MEPs including one of ours, in a parlimentary debate, drawing a red line by freedom of the press and expression. About time.

fly_agaric

pete wrote:

yeah imagine how unfair having blasphemy laws that favoured just one specific religion would be.



http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3753408.stm

Thanks for the link and no thanks for the sarcasm.
When I said "specially for muslims" I meant that the pressure (of all types) for some return to strict blasphemy laws would be coming from them not that it would just cover their religion.

Wibbs

fly_agaric wrote:

So it seems freedom of expression is to be governed from now on by Islamic and Muslim norms even in countries which have not got a muslim majority.

For us in the "House of war"(or treaty if we're very lucky. see below), it could be argued that Islam considers these 'democratic societies' invalid as they are not under the authority of God's word.

Wolff wrote:

It looks like a barrel of laughs for Jews allright.

http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/iranjews.html

It's never been a barrel of laughs for Jews under Islamic governance. http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/anti-semitism/Jews_in_Arab_lands_(gen).html
Well worth a read. At best Jews and Christians are seen as lesser peoples, only offered protection in exchange for a non Muslim tax. At worst, anti semitism was and is as strong as it ever was in Europe's shameful dealings with Jews in the past. This idea that Islam can claim a higher moral ground on this is a very shaky one indeed.
A Muslim is not even supposed to have Jews or Christians as friends http://www.usc.edu/dept/MSA/quran/005.qmt.html#005.051

It's interesting that Qadri's post mentions a clash of civilisations. It is a them and us situation in the physical world inherent in this religion more than most. The Quran sees the world as divided into three parts. Dar al Islam(House of Islam), Dar al Sulh (house of treaty) and Dar al Harb(house of war). The latter is any peoples or land not under Islam or in a treaty with Islam. No other religion does this and it's notable that it's the house of war not unbelievers. http://atheism.about.com/od/islamicextremism/a/daralharb.htm http://mediaguidetoislam.sfsu.edu/religion/03e_concepts.htm Interesting choice of words.

Wolff

Hobbes wrote:

Catholics are also forbidden in Saudi in openly worshipping thier god. However both cases there is nothing wrong with worshipping in private.

QUOTE]

And you think this is acceptable - if Ireland were to ban every other religion except catholics from worshiping tomorrow would you find this equally acceptable - I think not


Saudi Arabia is a prime example of a country where religious intolerence is rife the religious police are a law unto themselves and have even stopped school girls leaving a burning school because they were not "dressed Appropriately".

And prevent firemen from putting out the fire lest they view the women.

Defend those actions

Hobbes

And you think this is acceptable - if Ireland were to ban every other religion except catholics from worshiping tomorrow would you find this equally acceptable - I think not

Here is 60 minutes documentry on the issue.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8kXbNbjmhI&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fonegoodmove%2Eorg%2F1gm%2F

It is a better breakdown of this whole mess (shows the muppets on both sides of the argument). What is intresting and what some of you are going on about is that Muslims do not have great rights in Denmark. For example there is no real Mosque in Denmark yet they make up the same percentage as Ireland (Denmark has 1 million more people too).

Wolff

Hobbes wrote:

. What is intresting and what some of you are going on about is that Muslims do not have great rights in Denmark.For example there is no real Mosque in Denmark yet they make up the same percentage as Ireland (Denmark has 1 million more people too).

So you are saying the Danish Government is discriminating against muslims by not building them mosques ?????

It may come as a surprise - but in secular countries the government doesnt build places of worship, unlike muslim countries where they do - as long as they are mosques of course

The reason for the nice mosques in Dublin is the good muslims themselves built, converted and paid for them - perhaps their Danish counterparts could take a leaf out of their books and help themselves by doing the same thing.

Please post links to the lack of rights muslims have in Denmark it will make for interesing reading -

Hobbes

Wolff wrote:

So you are saying the Danish Government is discriminating against muslims by not building them mosques ?????

It may come as a surprise - but in secular countries the government doesnt build places of worship, unlike muslim countries where they do - as long as they are mosques of course

Actually the Irish government didn't build the mosques here either. Pretty sure they don't build the churches either.

perhaps their Danish counterparts could take a leaf out of their books and help themselves by doing the same thing.

However from the documentry it appears that they are running thier churches from old factories. It certainly isn't a case of them being short of cash but seems to be more barriers put in place to allow them to build a Mosque.

Please post links to the lack of rights muslims have in Denmark it will make for interesing reading -

You didn't watch the documentry then I just linked to then I take it? :rolleyes:

Wolff

Hobbes wrote:

Actually the Irish government didn't build the mosques here either. Pretty sure they don't build the churches either.
However from the documentry it appears that they are running thier churches from old factories. It certainly isn't a case of them being short of cash but seems to be more barriers put in place to allow them to build a Mosque.
You didn't watch the documentry then I just linked to then I take it? :rolleyes:

Well your first point is well made seeing as its exactly what I said in my post

Froom my little trawl it seems that there are 40 or 50 mosques in Denmark none that are custom built but from one website that seems to be more from squabbles between rival groups of muslims ( nothing new there so ). As for barriers - i think you mean planning permission etc - its a bugger

I dont have the time unfortunately to watch the documnetary but would gladly read any links you have to all this discrimination.

BUT back to my orig point - Saudi Arabia - the holiest of holies - be all and end all of Muslim countries - you CANNOT build a church, temple or god forbid a Synagogue there FULL STOP.

You cannot bring items from a foreign religion into the kingdom - there is a list as long as my arm of forbidden items

You are not free to publicly practice your religion and there is a religious police force to make sure you do not.

No religious police in Denmark last time I looked

I think the scales are loaded - Muslim in Denamark or Christian in Saudi Arabia

Hobbes

Wolff wrote:

I dont have the time unfortunately to watch the documnetary but would gladly read any links you have to all this discrimination.

its worth watching as it shows the nutjobs on both sides. I had seen the Muslim priest they interviewed in it on the BBC documentry and imho the guys an asshole. He doesn't represent muslims.

It also shows that clearly the paper and the Denmark president clearly helped escalate the tensions.

i think you mean planning permission etc - its a bugger

Again I am not up on Denmark law but it is strange that they can't get a decent mosque built.

Sand

You didn't watch the documentry then I just linked to then I take it?

I did. It didnt mention any rights that Danish muslims lacked in comparison to other Danes. The worst thing they could finger Denmark with is that their muslim community hasnt any purpose built mosque but instead uses converted buildings. Its not exactly 1984 style repression tbh. You admit yourself that its up to the Danish muslims to build them, and they have had no problems with converting other buildings into mosques so its hard to see the secret hand of the oppressor in that either.

Youve also dodged fly agarics question about whether youd prefer to be a Christian in Saudia Arabia or a Muslim in Denmark. Maybe you just missed it, but either way your answer - if youre being honest - is predictable. Anyone sane would prefer to be a Muslim in Denmark. European tolerance of Muslims in Europe is on another level compared to that in the ME. They have nothing to teach us about free exspression, tolerance or respect. Quite simply, a muslim in Europe has the same rights and access to protection under the law as anyone else. This is not the case in many ME states, specifically SA. Quite simply Hobbes, you might do the West the honour of accepting that all credit to cultural understanding, but were so far ahead of the muslim world on this issue, that were out of sight.

Do you still campaign for the banning of Life of Brian on the grounds that it is offensive to Christians to parody the life of the person they view as the Son of God? That *was* banned in many countries for the same reasons people are trying to ban these cartoons, but weve managed to ever so slowly force the hands of the religious thought police from around our throats. We cant go back in time for Muslim opinion, so theyre going to have to catch up.

In my mind, the Danish government *should* fund the construction of mosques because otherwise funding will come from Saudi Arabia, and that will mean Saudi immans, spreading Saudi fundamentalism which does not mix well with Western values. Strategically speaking, the Saudi influence in European mosques needs to be completely severed. European governments need to help build a European Islam. The Saudi sponsored Islam is not the only version, historically or otherwise. I see commentators constantly repeating the error that Islam forbids images of the Prophet. It does not, there are many muslim images of Mohammed, the Sunni branch of Islam does. There are other possibilities for Islam, forms of Islam that are far from fundamentalist or incompatible with European standards and our governments need to try and guide European muslims to them.

The constraint is that funding mosques would breach the church-state split, and theres no guarantee the mosques will respect the states "veto" on certain immans or their teachings. But we cant abandon the responsibility for forming European Islam to the Saudis, whove managed to radicalise and exterminate competing strands of Islam across the muslim world.

Wibbs

Hobbes wrote:

Here is 60 minutes documentry on the issue.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U8kXbNbjmhI&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Fonegoodmove%2Eorg%2F1gm%2F

It is a better breakdown of this whole mess (shows the muppets on both sides of the argument).

Good doc. Fairly balanced too.

What is intresting and what some of you are going on about is that Muslims do not have great rights in Denmark.

Really? they have rights of citizenship like any other Dane. Access to benefits like health, social security etc. They can even be members of the government (gasp :eek:). BTW I agreed with that Muslim chap interviewed in the clip. We should be aiming for the middle path in all this. Perhaps with time the muppets on either end of the spectrum will be frozen out. Hopefully.

For example there is no real Mosque in Denmark yet they make up the same percentage as Ireland (Denmark has 1 million more people too).

I have to agree with Wolff on this one.

Wolff wrote:

BUT back to my orig point - Saudi Arabia - the holiest of holies - be all and end all of Muslim countries - you CANNOT build a church, temple or god forbid a Synagogue there FULL STOP.

True, but we have to be careful that we don't even start the same kind of stupidity from a secular point of view in Europe either. Two wrongs and all that. Muslims(or any other group) have the right to be upset, have the right to peacefully demonstrate(like they did here and elsewhere) and have the right of the law behind them if any laws are broken(civil action as well). They do not have the right to impose their value sytem on the majority, or other minorities in a secular democracy, which is what some are suggesting. They do not have the right to threaten anyone with violence in defence of such slights(regardless of the prescence or not of religious backing in doctrine).

Hobbes wrote:

It also shows that clearly the paper and the Denmark president clearly helped escalate the tensions.

I agree with you re the paper. I'm not so sure about the president. I don't think he realised the sh1tstorm that was looming. I know that's little comfort or excuse now, but I think he was more ill informed rather than culpable.

Again I am not up on Denmark law but it is strange that they can't get a decent mosque built.

It could be down to the demographics of the Muslim population in Denmark. Maybe the money isn't there, due to quite a small population and the lack of an emergent middle class like we've had here. Just a thought. I agree it's strange though as many richer Islamic nations give money for the building of mosques in other countries(SA for one).

EDIT Just saw Sands post. Very good points all. Especially the point about fostering the growth of a less radicalmore "European" Islam. I'm sure many in the Muslim world would quietly welcome same. In Europe and beyond.