Ali Eteraz replies to a party to the CIC complaint against Maclean’s in the comments section of this post;
“Please let us be heard?”
“Provide me a vehicle for debate?”
Is something wrong with you?
1 -Did you call Mark Steyn’s agent and try and set up a public debate? I bet he’d love a go; the right wing pundits do.
2 – Did you contact opposition publications to Macleans and publish stuff there? I bet they’d love a go to make Macleans look bad.
3 – Did you try and raise funds to start a new liberal magazine so you can respond to people like Mark Steyn?
4 – Did you contact the writer of Little Mosque on the Prairie, who is quite sympathetic to the CIC, and ask her to make a snide reference to the demographics issue that Steyn raises?
5 – Did you call Tarek Fateh, who and his associates seemingly have NO PROBLEM WHATSOEVER getting published works critical of Steyn?
6 – Did you even think about taking me up on my offer to get you guys published in the Guardian?
7 – Did you try and contact Anar Ali, the short story writer, to use her influence to write a rebuttal?
8 – Did you try to contact Irshad Manji — who last year wrote a piece damning all those who seek to stifle immigration — to help use her influence in challenging Steyn?
9 – Did you try to contact an agent for yourself or your other equally inept legal friends so that you might write an anti-Steyn?
I’m sorry if this sounds too much like a generalization, but I’ve dealt with individuals propounding the same kind of rhetoric you are — willful victimization, complete ignorance of how the world works, wallowing in self pity — and they often love to attach themselves to Western Muslim communities after 9/11 and drag them down. I’m sure you’ve got a few Muslim enablers as well. The individuals I am describing often tended to be highly educated, driven by some kind of parochial original sin which motivates them to teach utter and total despair to the community they attach themselves to, so that they may then save said community, and feel good about themselves.
I bet you and the other law students who have done nothing but toe the line the entire life (and have now turned into “humanitarians!” in what I figure is the last year of law school) had grandiose visions of having your name appear in Macleans as “defenders of the weak.” To be followed by a parade led by beautiful Muslim muhajjibas (oh, but how dare I suggest that YOU might be an orientalist).
Again, like I said, the statement of yours that I just quoted, is one of the saddest things I’ve read; quite helpless in fact. I never respond at this length in the comments, and felt compelled to do so, because you are just so far gone its tragic.
Anyhow this has been my last and final response to you.
Best of luck.
The usual response to something like this is to write a letter to the editor — not initiate a human rights complaint.
The problem with moderate Islam is that it provides the petri dish in which the more virulent and violent strains of Islam are cultivated.
Unlike Christianity, which stresses inward conversion and a voluntary response to the gospel, the message of Islam is much closer to an outward submission/political kind of dominance.
This is seen in the record of the conversion experience of Mohammed (whom I recall said he felt like a whipped dog), vs. the conversion of the apostle Peter or the apostle Paul.
And, of course, it is seen in the record of Islamic states.
Islam and Christianity simply have different characters. Canada may live to one day regret its rejection of moderate and moderating Christianity.
Someone explain the cover of Macleans where is says
“Mark Steyn has a right to be wrong”
Is Macleans implying that they thing Steyn’s assessment of Islam and the world demographic trends are wrong?
Are they capitulating to the pressure with this kind of thing? I am confused.
Steyn is absolutely correct in everything he states in his book. That man does his homework. I will believe him before I will believe his detractors.
Well said Ali.
The problem with moderate Islam is that it provides the petri dish in which the more virulent and violent strains of Islam are cultivated.
Unlike Christianity, which stresses inward conversion and a voluntary response to the gospel, the message of Islam is much closer to an outward submission/political kind of dominance.
Not so well said Richard.
Christian conversions have been as forced as any other religion until fairly recently in modern times. It was only after centuries of killing each other over relatively few doctrinal differences that Europe finally realized it was better to let individuals make their own religious decisions. I’d compare much of Middle Eastern Islamiscism to European Christianity maybe 300 years or so ago. And please don’t interpret that as making any equivalence between today’s Christianity and today’s Middle Eastern/Far Eastern Muslims. It is only to point out that moderate Christians spoke out and were slaughtered by our forefathers until enough of them spoke out and Bills of Rights and tolerance became widely accepted.
The moderate Muslims – which in my experience here in Ontario working side by side with many of them and is by far the majority in this province – are our allies.
If we truly thought they were as irreemable as the bigots around here think, then what would really be the point of staying in Afghanistan or Iraq right now?
John West:
When Macleans writes “Mark Steyn has a right to be wrong”, they are advocating free speech.
They are saying, You may believe he is wrong, but he has a right to say it.
John:
“Is Macleans implying that they thing Steyn’s assessment of Islam and the world demographic trends are wrong?”
I think it means, from the point of view of the magazine’s relationship with Steyn, it doesn’t matter whether one of their columnists is right or wrong in anything they right, i.e. it is a freedom of speech issue for them and they stand by Steyn’s right to say whatever the hell he wants.
Reminds me of a light-bulb joke that is probably illegal in Canada (but I live in Texas, so I get to tell it):
Q. How many Islamofascists does it take to change a lightbulb?
A. That’s NOT funny. And for that insult to my religion I *KILL* you.
Ted
I don’t imagine you have ever cracked open a Qu’ran have you?
Ted … you completely miss the point of Christian reformation… it was Christians who fought and struggled within their own societies to find a balance of freedom and justice.
There is not now nor has there ever been anything but tribal and theocratic strife within Islam or in it’s dealing with the outer world. Islam is an Isolationist doctrine with only ONE solution for external influences. That being their ultimate destruction.
When and IF your precious examples of Moderation in Islam come to terms with their responsibility to mature and evolve the whole of their faith then and only then will civil societies be obliged to consider them in any way compatible. If you knew what you were talking about you’d realize that some of the most outspoken Islamic reformers have stated that the ONLY way to reform Islam is to be apostate of Islam.
With the exception of the fact that there is no comparable parallel in the Muslim world to the Church of Rome or the Church of England ….This is exactly the same thing as what happened in European sectarian wars that saw the abuses of religious doctrine in the efforts to hold on to power.
I am truly sick and tired of the half baked apologists offering revisionist theories of history to justify their weak arguments.
OMMAG said:
“I am truly sick and tired…”
I think this is why Jesus of Nazareth came…for the sick and tired.
Merry CHRISTmas….Amen and Alleluia!!
Hans-Christian Georg Rupprecht BGS, PDP, CFP
Commander in Chief
Frankenstein Battalion
2nd Squadron: Ulanen-(Lancers) Regiment Großherzog Friedrich von Baden(Rheinisches) Nr.7(Saarbrucken)
Knecht Rupprecht Division
Hans Corps
1st Saint Nicolaas Army
Army Group “True North”
This belongs here.
Canada’s HRC gets international fame.
Posted by: alan at December 20, 2007 2:19 PM
Confronting the Speech Police
The spectacle of Canada’s Human Rights Commission
A peculiarly Canadian institution, the Human Rights Commission attracted attention beyond Canada’s borders last week when the Canadian Islamic Congress filed several complaints against author and commentator Mark Steyn, and Maclean’s, the newsweekly that excerpted his bestselling America Alone last year….
http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NWU2MzgxZGY1MDA4MWFlODJkOWRlZWIxZGE3MzI5N2Y=
When and IF your precious examples of Moderation in Islam come to terms with their responsibility to mature and evolve the whole of their faith then and only then will civil societies be obliged to consider them in any way compatible.
OMMAG, while you are 100% wrong in your revisionist interpretation of how Christianity grew in Europe, you did make the statement above which is the point I was making, so I’ll forgive you for now.
Seems to me that Richard Evans’ point was that we should reject moderate Islam because it just creates the space for radical Islam to invade, sort of a slippery slope or trojan horse.
I see it the other way. The radicalization of Islam has not arisen out of opposition to western values, but to modernization’s own work in their own countries. The Muslim faith has undergone in many pockets a lot of modernization and moderation, just like Christianity started to 500 years ago. The civil wars and battles raging throughout Africa, the Middle East, Afghanistan, Pakistan, etc. reflect this struggle. And far more Muslims have died at the hands of other Muslims than non-Muslims. We are actually a small part in their war. If we don’t get that, we’ll never stop them.
And unfortunately the West has been a bigger enabler of fundamentalist Muslims than opponent. And no, not because of those on the left who don’t even accept that there is a problem or think that the possibility of discrimination against all Muslims is worse than doing something about radical terrorist Muslims. No we have enabled them with money and support for their governments, particularly the US backing of Wahabist Saudi Arabia. Without our money they’d be pretty much nothing.
Ted — Of course everyone knows what you said about Christianity 300-400 years ago is substantially true but they also know that it is irrelevant to the situation Canada faces in the year 2007.
The fact that members of the Christian faith today don’t force conversions and kill people who disagree with them and members of the Islamic faith do, is relevant.
If radical Muslims wanted to recruit in Canada, where do you think they would go? To a synagogue? To a church, perhaps?
What does the actual record indicate?
Ted,
Stop blaming the West for enabling the murderous mullahs.
(Though the anti-freedom and anti-American lefties and elites sure haven’t helped)
Islam was radicalized from the start. You either became a Muslim, a slave (dhimmi), or you died.
They slaughter infidels (Jews and Christians) first and foremost. When they run out of infidels they slaughter the ‘moderate’ muslims in order to ensure they are pure and true and part of the jihad.
Stats from Germany have indicated that they have approximately 180,000 radicalized Muslims (a small percentage). Ah, the tolerance.
The Koran calls for the killing or submission of all non-Muslims. Enjoy your Dhimmitude – I’ll die free.
“No we have enabled them with money and support for their governments, particularly the US backing of Wahabist Saudi Arabia. Without our money they’d be pretty much nothing.”
And that is why we must continue developing the oil sands and start drilling off the West coast of BC, drill in Alaska and also build many Nuclear power plants ASAP. We need to stop buying ME oil and provide for ourselves.
I know the Global Swarming gang will go nuts at this suggestion, but unless at least four billion people are prepared to commit suicide tomorrow morning, we need energy and lots of it. I am sure they would be okay with that idea, they’ve already started with their unborn babies and now want to tax the ones who actually to be born.
Maybe if we tax all the Muslim babies we can get most of our oil money back and balance the books that way.
“It’s the economy stupid!” – former US president Bill Clinton
The comparison, Richard, is that moderation and killing of “pagans” ended in our foreparents culture a few hundred years ago because of the spread of knowledge, science, technology and further modernization. There are islands of modernization throughout the Muslim world. Granted, some of them are led by dictators, like Egypt, Jordan and until a couple of years ago Iraq even Afghanistan has been led and may soon again be led by a woman, not to mention the large groups within other countries. But the point is that there are allies.
Like with the Cold War, sometimes we have to accept the warts of some allies in the greater fight against a greater evil. That means not turning our back on them but providing arms and aid. It is usually conservatives who like to call this struggle World War IV; but they seem never to want to really act like it is.
If you folks think Islamic extremism and the HRC is a real problem, just watch out! There is another Trudeau in the wings who is set to give his “vision” for Canada soon. No doubt it will be attractive to central Canada and he will eventually become PM. This is the calm before the next Liberal storm. Gee, I wonder where the statue of Castro will go? Probably next to the closed Christian churches….
I love Steyn.
But I continue to be perplexed why people are running to defend Maclean’s magazine.
This is a magazine that for *years* rode the politically correct bandwagon, and in its own small way contributed to the lethargic, left-wing, small-minded attitude that exists in Canada today. And it is that very attitude that has now come back to bite them.
Quite honestly I hope they rot.
There are others who have been much more reliable and honest defenders of the truth (Steyn being a great example). Personally I couldn’t care less if Macleans, a weak and capricious defender of the truth, gets its full comeuppance.
I wouldn’t trust the rag for a minute. You wait and see. This affair will soon enough make them return to their old ways.
Dear Naseem Mithoowani, Khurrum Awan , Muneeza Sheikh and Daniel Simard.
I’m really not that stupid to swallow your …
— But I wish you a Merry Christmas
MacLeans has a new chief editor, Kenneth Whyte, who was previously chief editor at the National Post when it was founded. Mark Steyn, also at the original NP, is now at MacLeans, and Andrew Coyne recently moved from the NP to MacLeans. Just so you know, this isn’t your father’s MacLeans.
More importantly, the issue here isn’t the content of what was published, it’s the freedom to say it without state intervention.
Here is an excerpt from MacLeans chief editor Ken Whyte’s 2007-12-05 response to the CIC allegations:
“The student lawyers in question came to us five months after the story ran. They asked for an opportunity to respond. We said that we had already run many responses to the article in our letters section, but that we would consider a reasonable request. They wanted a five-page article, written by an author of their choice, to run without any editing by us, except for spelling and grammar. They also wanted to place their response on the cover and to art direct it themselves.
“We told them we didn’t consider that a reasonable request for response. When they insisted, I told them I would rather go bankrupt than let somebody from outside of our operations dictate the content of the magazine. I still feel that way.”
“In fact, Maclean’s published a total of 27 letters over two issues in response to Steyn’s piece—more published responses than any other cover story has received over the past year.”
The CIC made a tactical error by performing an op-ed in the National Post. Here’s a question MacLeans lawyers may want to ask the CIC: “Why were you willing to accept a reasonable offer to comment in the National Post, but were unwilling to accept a reasonable offer to comment in MacLeans?”
Ted,are you suggesting that we should all accept islam’s murderous ways for now because the christians were doing it 3 hundred years ago? That all we have to do is keep our fingers crossed and hope like hell that our society survives until the barbarians evolve into modern people? What is your point about the comparison?
Ted
The other day on Celestial Junk featured an article written by an apostate Muslim. He said that he grew up in an Islamic household in south Asia. He said that the family was very observant in its Islamic practices but that it insisted that its children not think or study Islam. The reason was simple either the student would become a fanatic or an apostate.
My question is what does 300 years ago have to do with me today……not a heck of a lot. I think 300 years ago my ancestors were farmers in scotland on one side and farmers in norway on the other.
Explain how I am responsible for any of that. Actually, I am pro choice but here is an interesting conundrum….if I as a human didnt have any rights till I was outside my mother how can I have any responsibilities before then either? Just asking?
Ted, I echo wallyj’s questions to you.
If we, the modern “progressive” West are sufficiently evolved beyond the behaviours of the past, good for us…but what should we do when faced with barbarism? Cower and accept the loss of life as the hordes attack, hoping that they’ll eventually tire of killing and enslaving us and eventually evolve?
We should instead, as an “evolved” and “progressive” culture, stand up and clearly announce to all barbarians that their barbarism is unacceptable and that they MUST STOP their barbarism. We must enunciate exactly what is expected of citizens of our culture…a Charter of Responsibilities to balance the Charter of Rights…and we must take action to ensure that they comply. If they cannot or will not comply, then they must be removed from our society (incarceration or deportation).
But we have lost before we’ve begun, because we haven’t enunciated our cultural norms and mores…we haven’t clearly stated what our “Canadian Values” are…we haven’t adequately identified what a citizens responsibilities are to society. Herouxville made a start at this, but it was only a beginning.
As an example, women are equal members (with men) of society and MUST be treated equally (not “specially” but equally). If there are people coming to Canada that cannot or will not abide by this right, they should not be welcomed in our society and should be turned away.
Can we agree on this?
The titular subject of this thread is freedom of speech. Most of the comments have been on the speech, not the freedom of speech. Maybe that’s why we have so much trouble fighting those who do not support freedom of speech per se.
I think some folks here have either had too much rum in their egg nog or are being deliberately obtuse.
Why is what happened 300-500 years ago in our own past relevant? In most ways it isn’t. But there are lessons to be learned nonetheless. Then we were pre-industrial, tribal-like, fanatically religious, felt ourselves divinely justified in slaughtering apostates, forced conversion on non-believers and slaughtered or jailed them if they didn’t come along. Then we only allowed the priests to read our most sacred texts, even preserved an old dead language so the people would get educated on it. Then
And how did we come to realize that we were better off not being so dogmatically and theocratically pure and that forcing citizens to be theocratically pure was not necessarily in our best interest?
Education was critical. So was the spread of science and technology. I would argue that the industrial revolution and free markets played an even bigger role because it meant a Catholic might, in their own self-interest, decide that they needed the local Jew or Protestant because of what they were selling – wasn’t going to socialize with him at first, but might trade with him… and then realize he’s maybe not so evil afterall.
So no, Wallyj, Eeyore, etc, when I said we need to educate, provide aid, provide support, treat the moderate countries and moderate Muslims the way we treated the non-Soviet countries… when I said that I actually did not mean we should just sit back and “keep our fingers crossed and hope like hell that our society survives until the barbarians evolve into modern people”.
Nor should we just sit back an espouse empty plattitudes of anger and feel content in our self-righteousness and “stand up and clearly announce to all barbarians that their barbarism is unacceptable and that they MUST STOP their barbarism…and we must take action to ensure that they comply”. That sounds a whole heck of a lot like a rightwing version of John Lennon’s naive idealism.
There are over a billion Muslims out there. They aren’t chopping heads off in Jordan. Women aren’t forced to cover themselves up in Egypt. A former female Prime Minister is running for Prime Minister again in Afghanistan. In addition to fighting terrorists, we need to support these Muslims with aid, education, trade, even arms.
Sure Ted,lets give them arms so they can take our heads. Wow,in Eygpt women do not have to cover themselves up. Woo Hoo,the end is in sight,except that last weekend in Eygpt,a man stabbed his bride to death because he did not believe that she was a virgin. Last weekend in Eygpt,muslims went on a rampage,burning and looting christian shops because a couple of christian A-holes pulled down the veil of a woman.even though she wasn’t forced to wear it. These shop-owners now face the decision of rebuilding or leaving. I would be hiking my skinny ass out of there,pronto.Would the previous gov’t of Afghanistan allow a woman to run for president.Hell,they weren’t even allowed to be educated. And the islamification of the world continues.
Sorry,I was straying way off-topic.
From the article in the National Post..
“If Maclean’s wants to publish articles alleging that many Muslims are “hot for jihad,” it has to provide an opportunity to respond.”
NO IT DOES NOT! No obligation what so ever.
Nonetheless, Maclean’s sucks for a lot of other reasons.
I agree, Lev, that MacLeans should have no obligation to provide an opportunity to respond (regardless of whether or not you think they suck). Nevertheless, they did offer a reasonable opportunity. They are in favour of supporting freedom of speech and the marketplace of ideas, as they have now done by publishing Tarek Fatah and Farzana Hassan’s rebuttal of Mr. Steyn’s thesis here: tinyurl.com/2fd2sh
In other words, in the matter of the complaint against MacLeans, the CIC is lying about MacLeans. Islam doesn’t enter into it. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom to lie, otherwise libel and slander would be legal.
Vitruvius, I always appreciate your comments.
I would argue however that because Macleans survives on money from advertising its ability to engage in free speech *even if it wanted to* (big if) is rather limited.
The best free speech I have seen in the last decade has been in the form of books by courageous authors (and publishers willing to publish them) and blogs such as this one.
Maclean’s may have changed its colours, but it is still old-media (apologies for using a tired cliché), and hence I have reason to doubt that it would stick to its guns for very long when under fire by the anti-free speech crowd.
In the end the people have to *want* free speech for it to happen, and I’m pretty sure most readers of Maclean’s want the watered down version of free speech that doesn’t go too far in offending their politically correct sensibilities.
Said readers are perhaps prepared to undertake a little foray into territory that is uncharted for most of them, providing a small thrill, but when the action gets too hot they will run for the hills back to the comfort of their state-dictated beliefs and Maclean’s will lead the way.
Perhaps, Ted, people might be more inclined to listen to your history lessons if you knew the difference between Afghanistan and Pakistan. At any rate, the idea that religions go through some sort of predictable phases of development, i.e. that Christianity became moderate in response to the spread of education and technology, and therefore Islam will do likewise, is tired nonsense. Your characterisation of pre-industrial Europeans as ‘tribal-like, fanatically religious, …slaughtering apostates’ is a strained attempt to suggest parallels between the Christians of 3-400 years ago and the Muslims of today, but it’s unlikely to withstand serious scrutiny. There will always be some similarities owing to the universal nature of human beings, but the underlying dissimilarities between Christianity and Islam can’t just be glossed over by assuming that all religions are basically the same.
From its inception, Christianity recognized the legitimacy of the secular state (“render unto Caesar, etc.”). Christianity spread by voluntary conversion under an empire that went thorough periodic fits of tolerance and persecution for several hundred years before the empire became in any sense ‘Christian.’ Not so with Islam. Islam has spread primarily by conquest, from the time of Mohammed on. Christianity too, has been spread partly as a result of military conquest, but there are solid theological grounds from within Christianity by which this can be critiqued. For Islam to reject conversion by the sword, they’d have to reject the example of Mohammed. How much would you wager on that happening?
Actually, lying is not necessarily contrary to the free of speech. It is unethical and low life behavior, though so far as free speech it is not contrary to. If a lie causes harm to an individual or an enterprise, there are courts to seek remedy.
We have evidence, every day in arguably every country on every continent, politicians tell lies, it is somewhat of a syllogism if one says something and another says it is not true, someone is lying.
Maclean’s does print what ever pleases those that make decisions, no one, no agency of government or enforcers of correctness have any say in the matter.
Nonetheless, being a generous person, Maclean’s sucks. Though, have to admit, have not read it in many moons. If at the doctors office, usually the last page.
Sorry about the syntax. Should read ‘free speech.
Thank you for understanding.
I agree, TJ, that the commercial enterprise known as MacLeans has limited ability to pursue the boundary conditions and edge cases of free speech. Perhaps that’s partly why I feel driven to stand for them in this case, because Ken Whyte et al are standing up, even at the risk of, as Ken put it, “going bankrupt”. This is one of those make or break cases. If MacLeans gets punished by the state for the CIC’s fradulent claims, that’s a big loss for all of us.
You, TJ, are predicting that MacLeans, Whyte, Steyn, Coyne, &c will fold under the CIC’s inquisition. Colour me skeptical. There’s some pretty heavy hitters lined up here on the front line and behind the benches. But what do I know? Time will tell.
Lev’s point on radical freedom v. the ethics of honesty is well taken. Still, in this case, I think the unethical dishonesty of the CIC is relevant to their credibility in bringing this action. Oh and, Lev, you might want to try to avoid saying “I haven’t read” and “I judge” in the same sentance 😉
I don’t judge, merely have an opinion.
Just in
Seyed Soharwardy was on talk radio 8:10/8:20 p.m. Thurs.
He and Mathew Johnston from the WS Blog have come to an understanding.
The result is that S.S. has canceled the protest that was slated to go tomorrow (Friday) in downtown Calgary.
Further he had started a filing process with the federal human rights commission (the AB HRC had no jurisdiction) and he is in the process of canceling this complaint.
Kudos to both of these people for working this issue out.
The message is loud and clear – the comments at issue were, in my opinion, over the top and they were challenged. It escalated into a major issue but as it should be – the two of them settled the issue between themselves in a manner acceptable to both.
Lets hope that the CIC/MacLeans issue and the Western Standard Magazine issue gets settled between the principals as well before it comes in front of any Human Rights Tribunal. Get the egos out of the way and just get it done.
I wonder how many tv sets Elvis would’ve gone through by now.
The issues between Maclean’s; Western Standard and the ‘victims’, should be settled only one way, HRC should disqualify itself and dismiss the complaints.
Well something that might help is to toss out the charter. PET gave us this charter, but other than judicial activism it hasn’t provided us with anything we didn’t have before. If anything, the Charter of Rights has diminshed your freedom, my freedom.
The real reason for this charter wasn’t a need, wasn’t a lack of freedom for anyone, but something that made PET important.
Not one Canadian gained anything they did not already have thanks to Common Law.
That’s very good news, Calgary Clipper, thanks for alerting us. The comments in question (I still read the Shotgun comments every day) were over the top, obc is a sociopath that had to be bounced, and it’s being done. Freedom of speech does not mean freedom to be an arshole on somebody else’s property.
Kevin Steel et al are currently undertaking a re-engineering of the Shotgun, and I’ve communicated with him on that matter. Rather than take up space here, you can read my comments at: tinyurl.com/2rqhmf – where I pine for the great discussions in the early weeks and months of the Shotgun almost four years ago when Kate and I and ET and EBD and other SDA regulars used to comment there before things got out of hand.
That is wrong. May as well bounce me next,and then winston and then well, whoever offends islamic sensibilities. Then once the shotgun is no longer viable,target SDA,you see where I am going with this.Writing hate is wrong and should not be tolerated,but remember this sohawardy fellow also started a lawsuit over the cartoons.
WS may find that it is difficult to ban a determined commenter. He can change his IP address and sign in as someone else. At least the comment will be less acidic if the new person knows he can be banned again and again.
This will serve to moderate comments, but not stop people from making their point. That is not actually censorship, it is refereeing and that’s not a bad idea.
Kate does it very well here.
I want to add to Richard Ball’s comment
“Islam and Christianity simply have different characters. Canada may live to one day regret its rejection of moderate and moderating Christianity.”
Vitruvius provided a link in an earlier post to the Pope Benedict’s lecture at Regensburg.
I was a very interesting read.
The Pope is describing an essential difference between the two faiths.
Here is a bit of it
“The decisive statement in this argument against violent conversion is this: not to act in accordance with reason is contrary to God’s nature. The editor, Theodore Khoury, observes: “For the emperor, as a Byzantine shaped by Greek philosophy, this statement is self-evident. But for Muslim teaching, God is absolutely transcendent. His will is not bound up with any of our categories, even that of rationality.” Here Khoury quotes a work of the noted French Islamist R. Arnaldez, who points out that Ibn Hazn went so far as to state that God is not bound even by his own word, and that nothing would oblige him to reveal the truth to us. Were it God’s will, we would even have to practice idolatry.”
If the Pope is right in making this distinction then this is a pretty significant dividing point.
How could Descartes get out of the whole he dug for himself if the universe is run by a God as described by Ibn Hazn? If the universe is not open to rational investigation how does mankind progress?
Although the Pope’s point makes sense to me I don’t have the knowledge to decide if he is correct about Islam or not.
I particularly wonder that there could have been no effect on Islamic thinking when they were at least the keepers of western classical knowledge during the so called dark ages in Europe.
There is more to the lecture but I thought this part of it amplified on Richard’s comment.
I’d take out a subscription with MacLeans if they published a rebuttal to the Pope’s lecture.
I do not have a problem with someone regulating thier own website,but it seems that the WS site will be monitored by others,who if they find something offensive will respond with a HRC lawsuit,and then someone else will be banned. Maclean’s may as well apologize to the outraged kids now and bend over.
You read me too broadly, Wally, or perhaps you did not read my tinyurl.com/2rqhmf comments at all. You are not a sociopath, obc is. Once again, it’s not about Islam, it’s about how one behaves in a private property social context.
That obc posted more than half the comments in many threads month after month is all you need to know. That he deliberately mangled the name of everyone he disagreed with is the kiss of death. Freedom of speech doesn’t mean that the owner of a property has to put up with people who defile it.
Indeed, it means the opposite, for if anarchy prevails, one has no property.
Top most comment by Richard Ball solves the matter.
The CIC is welcome to the same free speech everyone enjoys at Maclean*s.
If the CIC is able to present ideas opposite in a clear and well written manner, it will likely be published.
If not, then chances are it will not be published. Fair is fair. = TG
Ted
I gather you have never looked into Islam from the way you talk about it. You are applying your western mindset to something quite different from anything you have known before. You are certainly not alone. The Qu’ran is a short book. It does not have to be studied ,analyzed and discussed to get a grasp on it. It is crystal clear in it’s meaning. That is the great irony of Islam is that it condemns itself to the non Muslim reader in almost no time. Just scan the books and remember that you are the unbeliever that is constantly spoken of. You are what Islam must subdue, enslave or destroy. This is why Muslims are eager to close down discussion on Islam and dub it racism to discuss it. There are multitudes of sites offering copies of the Qu’ran all over the net.
As far as translations, there are a handfull of widely accepted translations. They really only vary in tone and expression rather than meaning.
Of course when you engage a Muslim in debate and they realise you know what your talking about, they go into obfuscation mode. They will tell you the usual “out of context” blather and go on about the inability of English to capture the pure poetry of Arabic. Well, kill, enslave and destroy mean the same thing in any language in the end. I heard one Muslim say that only 40% of Arabic is translatable and the rest was too sacred to understand for unbelievers.
I invite you to spend sometime talking to real Muslims. Ummah.com is based in Britain I believe and is run by Muslims largely for Muslims but none Muslims may join. You have to join to visit the juicier forums where every day Muslims won’t hesitate to tell you what is going to happen when they overturn us. Now you have to be respectful or you get banned faster than they could behead you, so be innocuous and “dhimmified” for awhile so you get a true feeling for our muslim friends as they are in their natural surroundings. Sure they have “moderates” as well as “radicals” and it’s an opprotunity to see how moderates wither before the “radical”. If you stay long enough you realize there are no moderates or radicals, there is only Islam and it’s slaves.
Another good site is FaithFreedom. It is run by apostate muslims as a clearing house for ex muslims to spread the truth of Islam and turn fellow muslims away from Islam. They don’t pretend there is a reform capability to Islam except that Islam be cast off completely.
There are many sites with information on Muslim history and habit. I can’t encourage people to know Islam enough. You will be inoculated against Islam and know how to defend yourself against it. That is the other odd thing, no opponent need lie or fabricate anything horrible about Islam you just have to state the facts. It condemns itself with it’s own words and actions every day.