Gosh TW, I didn't know you were so good at sarcasm. It's a talent you rarely display :thumb:

Let's keep this baby rolling.

I was just listening to a very interesting piece on NPR's Talk of the Nation. They were contrasting the furor over the Mohammed cartoons with the recent conviction and sentencing of David Irving for the crime of denying the holocaust. (The trial was in Austria; he got 3 years.)
This is a very awkward situation. I realize that Germany and Austria must have a very special relationship to their own history and their responsibility for the millions of WWII atrocities, and this form of censorship may be appropriate -- for them. America is really an outlier when it comes to our militant free-speech stance.
On the other hand, the Mohammed cartoons have killed protesters, and those the protesters target. Self-inflicted, all of it.

1. You can express your ideas.
2. You can't cause a riot.

What happens when your ideas cause a riot?

The police uphold the bloody law and if the protesters are breaking it, arrest them and since they're riot cops and therefore incapable of restraint, propbably kick their heads in. And you keep on expressing your ideas.

Eventually, when enough people (preferably, those with lots of money and power already) start agreeing with your ideas, you overthrow the government and start your own, and then go around kicking in the heads of the people who are spouting *their* ideas.

Government isn't hard. All it takes is money, and the power follows.

Irving's sentence was largely self-inflicted. He brought himself to fame (or infamy) by bringing a lawsuit in the UK against his detractors. He claimed that he was the victim of a world-wide Jewish conspiracy out to get him. He lost the case. Had he just laid low and contented himself with sniping in academic journals, I doubt if he would ever have come to the notice of the Austrian government.

The governments of Austrian and Germany can hardly be blamed for their stance on this subject. The two nations have the blood of 6 million people on their hands - especially Germany.

Let's face it, if someone had written that Mohammed inspires Muslims to become terrorists (this gets written all the time), it would not have had the impact of the cartoon. I'm not saying that the people causing riots or killing other folks in the process were in the right, but the cartoon was sacrireligous and, thus, doublely inflamatory to the Muslim world.

The Muslim people honestly believe that the West is to them what Hitler was to the Jews. The cartoonist and the newspaper which published his work were expressing their right of free speech the same way someone shouting "fire!" in a crowded theater does.

Again, I do NOT condone the more outrageous actions of the protesters. I'm just sayinng.

It’s not very awkward once we apply details. For example, Irving claimed he had changed his mind in the 1990s after learning more about those concentration camps. Problem: he was suing the Emory University professor in Britain in 2000. Irving claimed that he said he no longer agreed with his book years previous to 2000 when he was suing that Emory University professor to (essentiall) defend his book.

Irving apparently is a perverse liar. His sentence apparently goes beyond the holocaust. He lied to the court when he said he had changed his opinion in 1990s - to try to get his sentence eliminated. That trial is more about the credibility and honesty of Irving - who has a problem with both human requirements.

Yup, Irving really pulled a boner on that "I rethought my position in the 90's" defense. At the time of the civil suit that Irving filed in 2000, he also said "I'm going after Lipstadt because she's peddling her book in England; in the U.S. she is protected by NY vs. Sullivan, by the First Amendment..."

Hmmmm... A man who claims First Amendment rights bring suit in a country where he thinks they didn't care about the right to free speech. Interesting. He was also photographed front stage at skinhead rallies in Austria and Germany.

Tisk, tisk. Poor baby. Let's all jump on the bandwagon for free speech for Mr. Irving - the man who did his best to circumnavigate that right. Uh huh. :eyebrow:

Why doubley inflamatory? Twice as inflamitory as what?
Nonsense, there's no comparison. They are scumbags with nothing to do and nothing to lose so they have a riot for fun and prophet. :mad:

Twice as inflammatory as the written statement. The Muslims have some big prohibition against graven images which, I believe, extends to Mohammed, as well. Please correct me if I'm wrong. I never said the protestors were right in their extreme actions, merely that the cartoon was like a match to the kerosene.

If you saw Kitsune's link from post #22, you would know that's not true. :eyebrow:

So why would they be any different than Christians who fought and killed over the same nonsense. See previous history over Iconoclasts. That secular nonsense literally created another fissure in Christian faith.

Only problem with twelve cartoons is that they provide no intelligent thought, no humor, no useful sarcasm to cause intelligent people to see through religious extremist rhetoric, and only insulted. Reason to justify riots and create political hum-dung demonstrates how many leaders and their followers are inspired by lies and religious myths rather than the advancement of mankind.

I have no respect for the cartoon's author and have same disrespect for religious types who took such offense as to respond physically. No wonder god does not yet want man in space - which is why he keeps blowing up manned spacecraft and destroying probes to Mars. We remain tolerant of the absurd among us who cannot be bothered to first learn reality before proclaiming their rights and the power of their pagan gods. Yes it is a comment about both incited Muslims and another idiot: George Jr.

Thank you, Bruce. No, I hadn't seen Kitsune's link, but I do notice it makes mention of the "Islamic ban on depicting the Prophet." I also notice that none of the Muslim artists who broke that ban went so far as to depict the prohet as a smoking bomb. Again, I am not saying the protesters were right in going to the extremes that some of them did, I'm just saying.

My mom turned me on to this. We laughed till we cried. It would take me over three thousand years to explain why we found the ashtray joke hysterical. :lol:

dov, Thats not funny. I don't know why you are here, why don't you goto www.aquafans.com, they would love you over there.