At least one Canadian is willing to fight for free speech

[Shrunk]

No, that isn't the issue. We aren't talking here about a depiction of Muhammad in an artistic context, the way Jesus is depicted on artworks. We are talking about Muhammad being depicted as a suicide bomber and suggesting that all Muslims are inherently suicidal. It is a denigration and a misrepresentation of Islam for the purpose of putting down all Muslims. That is the issue and you can see it in the complaint, even if the media coverage of the case is rather shoddy. Depicting Muhammad as such isn't the issue.

I think the problem is that followers of religious ideology expect to be exempt from criticism in a way that no other ideologies are.  Similar cartoons criticizing a political party, or an ideology like socialism or capitalism would be understood as not being critical of every follower of that ideology.  I don't see why religion should be given a free ride.

Again, the same applies as above. The Muslim community is very fragmented. On the one hand that makes it the richly diverse culture that it is. On the other hand it means there is no official spokesperson and anyone can make claims on behalf of the entire Ummah. You can't therefore speak of the acts you mention as acts of the Muslim community as a whole. There is no pope here telling his flock how to behave. Lots of small actors take things into their hands to stir up controversy or violence that they think suits their personal causes. It has little to do with Islam itself. The religion is merely a tool for political ends.

I think it remains an open question whether Islam, in and of itself, promotes behaviours such as suicide bombing and terrorism.  That can be true even if most of its adherents don't engage in such behaviours.  I think this is a crucial issue at this moment in history, and not one that can be adequately dealt with if discussion is hamstrung by concerns over offending the sensibilities of Muslims.

Again, these guys weren't elected by anyone of significance. They do not speak for all Muslims. They unquestionably have their own agenda, just like Levant does. I am not sure what legal actions you think one could bring against them and on what grounds.

I'm not sure either.  I just wanted to point out the irony that Levant is having actions brought against him, while the individuals who have spread lies and misinformation, with the intent of causing unrest and resulting in a hundred deaths, are not.

[MishaK]

Nonsense. It's just more convenient to label people as "racist" because it's easier to rely on name calling rather then actually argue on a certain issue, particularly when that issue (multiculturalisms) happens to be the special darling of leftist partisan ideology.

Look, you just don't know the first thing about the issue. I have Muslim friends and friends who merely might be mistaken for Arabs and I know how they have been treated since 9-11. There is a ton of anti-Arab racism in the West and the events of 9-11 made it almost publically acceptable to express it openly. This has nothing to dow ith multiculturalism.

You don't think such behavior as this may garner a bit of animosity from the average Londoner, many of which did not ask to coexist alongside a culture as diametrically alien as that of Islam? And for what, because of a couple of satirical cartoons?:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_kyNIevsIs

Would you classify those as moderate Muslims? And if not, should we question why the British authorities are doing nothing about those obvious extremists? Remember, this isn't happening in some random middle eastern country, this is right smack into a major western city. And you are telling me that the threat of Islam is merely a fabrication of right-wing politicians to steal votes for their campaign when minor provocations result in such stupendous display of anger and violence?

I expect the intelligent Londoner to be able to differentiate between a rabble of hate mongerers looking for a rare moment in the spotlight and the other members of a diverse and varied culture without which the West wouldn't be where it is. You make the same sampling error as all right-wingers: you take the most extreme elements to be representative of a large and very diverse multitude. It simply isn't the case. Otherwise, Polynesians would be equally justified in thinking of all Europeans as Nazis, since that is the most extreme manifestation of Western culture.

Another flawed argument. Your implication that distrust towards Islam is motivated by prejudice rather then reason hasn't been argued properly, and your attempt to associate such distrust with Nazi ideology is a direct ad hominem. Besides, not all Germans were Nazi, and i find it quite amusing that you seem to have no trouble making sweeping statements about westerners (particularly about all the atrocities we committed while exempting Islam from a similar historical reproach) while trying to defend Muslims from similar generalizations.

You are mistaken. I am not associating "distrust" of Islam with Nazi ideology. I am showing a parallel flawed reasoning. You allege that Muslims (a very diverse group) had it coming for them because of "their" alleged past behavior. That is exactly the same reasoning applied by anti-Semites throughout European history, except the group in question is different. Their argument was Jews (a very diverse group) had it coming for them because of their sins of the past (killing Jesus, extorting money, organizing international conspiracies). You are punishing members of a collective based solely on an accident of birth, because of the misunderstood acts of a few . I might add another note. I am not making sweeping statements about Westerners and unilaterally defending Muslims. I am arguing that the human potential for violence is inherent in all cultures. Your accidental membership in Western culture does not make you a better or potentially less violent person than someone born in Damascus. Throughout history, given the circumstances of the time, both the West and Islam have engaged in unspeakable violence. Much of this history is very recent. So your claim of Western superiority based on its alleged peacefulness is just total nonsense.

My blanket judgments pertains current cultures as they are today so my argument is very well tenable to the issue at hand. After all, we are not discussing the merits of western civilization vs. Islam and their comparative history, but whether this compulsive lenience towards Muslim immigrants based on political ideology is wise and whether western enmity towards them is justified or not. Mind you that it's not the Muslims that i'm attacking here. They have their own reasons to act the way they do and it's their prerogative to protect their own interests (in the end, what do they care about our culture?), my quarrel is against those "other" westerners who would have us capitulate rather then risk laying a finger on some "minority" to protect our interests on the chance it might lead to another Third Reich.

Sorry, but that just doesn't even qualify as a coherent argument. You cannot be selectively amnesiac and look at a snapshot of culture as you perceive it today. America as we know it today wouldn't exist without slavery or the extermination of native Americans or without the violence of the Civil War. Central Europe as we know it wouldn't exist without the upheavals of Nazism and Communism, without the extermination of European Jews and colonialism. Indeed, European science and technology as we know it today wouldn't exist without Arab numerals and European literature and art wouldn't exist without the Baghdad library's preservation of ancient Greek texts that had been mostly destroyed in Europe. What you see today is highly contingent on all that came before. You cannot look at it in historical isolation. Your claims of superiority are therefore bogus.

As to the second part of your rant below. I have nowhere argued for lenience towards anyone based on membership in a particular religious or cultural group. On the contrary. All my argumentation above was about equal treatment. Anyone who violates the social contract should be sanctioned exactly the same way, irrespective of cultural background. Because of your fear of an unknown culture, you mistakenly see all Muslims as a single, homgeneous block of people who think exactly alike, and you are therefore incapable of separating individual offenders from the cultural group as a whole. I am all for prosecuting the right individuals. But I am very much against singling out innocent individuals based solely on their membership in a cultural group. If you had ever experienced life as a member of a minority (as I have) you would know what that means and how deeply undignifying it is to be mistreated for no other reason than an accident of birth.

While your example of "prejudice" was not absurd? Do i smell a double standard here?

Pedophiles are not a "culture". And, unlike a diverse group such as Muslims, by definition each and every one of them is someone who has injured the bodily and psychological integrity of a member of a specially protected group (minors). That is not a parallel at all. Whereas my example of anti-Semitism is very much a parallel since it likewise involves prejudice based on an accident of birth: involuntary membership in a very diverse and heterogeneous cultural group.

To the contrary. Muslims have more freedoms then Westerners in that they are free to engage in illicit activities (like for instance their extremely sexist marital customs) which would land anybody else in jail.

That allegation has no basis in truth. Muslim women in the West enjoy the same legal protections as Western women. It is unfortunately true that due to cultural norms it is very difficult to get in contact with Muslim victims of marital abuse and to help them get out of their abusive relationships. (But to tell you the truth, that is not an easy task with Western women either.) But the claim that Muslims receive more lenient treatment is nonsense. In Germany, for example, prosecutors are cracking down on honor killings and illegal underage marriages among Muslims. As I keep saying: all sanctions and protections of the law should apply to all, irrespective of cultural background. That includes being punished for marrying off your 15-year old daughter, but it also includes protection from hate speech. No acts of individuals justify hate speech against a whole cultural community and all of its members.

1) How is the fact that Christians are less prone to collective violence "demonstrably false"? Just compare Christian leaders with Muslim ones and see if you notice a difference in aptitude and belief. Even assuming that individual assessment is impossible to determine for every observant member of either religion the divergent teachings between their respective leadership is defacto proof there is a difference in terms of general bigotry between them.

Well, I just listed for you several examples of violence inflicted by Christian or Western cultures that compares to, or outdoes, the violence you allege is exclusive to Islam. I am not sure how you compare levels of violence anyway. If the issue is sheer numbers, then all the variously religious or non-religious leaders of Russia win the contest, and they aren't Muslim. Or maybe Mao or Genghis Khan, and In any case, just looking around the world today, you will find that, for example, Indonesia, the most populous Islamic country, is quite peaceful, as are Jordan, Yemen, Turkey or the Arab Emirates. Conversely, no Islamic leaders were involved in starting the Iraq war. That was started by a devoutly Christian leader without provocation against a disarmed and cowed country ruled by a non-religious pseudo-socialist who is regarded as an apostate by devout Muslims. Your blanket statements are just way too broad to fit the multifaceted realities of the world. They are and remain nonsense.

2) Nobody is arguing about the superiority of either. Since i'm not religious, i couldn't possibly care less. I reckon though that you seem to enjoy the word "superior" just as much as you enjoy calling people "racist"

Technically, you are arguing that Islam is inherently violent and the West isn't. It is correct that you don't use the word "superiority", but if that isn't a claim of superiority, I don't know what is.

Of course, the idea we cannot criticize Islam on account of the fact that "it is as varied in practice and belief as Christianity" is simply not tenable. For one, Christianity is far from being beyond reproach in itself and your argument doesn't amount to much of a justification. We had to fight tooth and nails to rid our society from religious rule and all of a sudden you are justifying religion against religion.

You must have serious reading comprehension problems if you read that out of my previous posts. I am not in any way "justifying religion against religion". I am arguing for equal treatment and equal protection. You are arguing that Islam is inherently more violent than other religions and should therefore not be accorded the same protections as other religions, as it supposedly threatens peace and the integrity of Western culture. You argue that members of Islamic culture deserve the enmity they get and should be treated with suspicion, if not outright excluded from Western society. None of your arguments are tenable for the reasons explained above, the main reason of which being that you fail to distinguish offensive individual perpetrators from the peaceful and productive majority of the members of a culture. You are judging people based on a spurious connection, an accident of birth.

Second of all, merely because we aren't exactly beyond reproach doesn't mean criticism cannot be raised. Even assuming that Islam isn't the violent monster the "media" would like us to believe (not that we haven't been directly attacked or anything, but hey, we were asking for it!), it's a simple fact that their moral compass is different from ours and from their point of view we are the immoral ones. Obviously, you are not going to resolve such differences unless you point out they have no other choice but to submit to western law and western morality if they want to live with us.

Nobody claimed otherwise. As explained above, I expect all members of society to abide by the same social contract, irrespective of their cultural background. It is you who wants to exempt Muslims from certain elements of this social contract (protection from hate speech), based not on any individual liability for any acts actually committed, but solely on membership in a collective.

But my argument is not towards Islam (i actually must confess a bit of admiration towards them. Unlike most emasculated westerners, they at least can put up a fight when they feel their culture is under attack, perceived or not, and lo, nobody among their own ranks making a fuss about it!), but towards those who think they can impose their ideological experiments upon everybody else then rely on slander when the people don't like it.

This is beyond bizarre. You admire the perceived lack of dissent of a culture, most of the members of which live under repressive regimes that do not tolerate dissent (and most of which, BTW, are either feudal, socialist or military dictatorships that have nothing to do with Islam per se)? That's like admiring Hitler for the trains being on time. BTW, there is plenty of dissent. You just don't hear it because you don't know any Muslims.

Besides, as i already said, the fact many westerners aren't beyond reproach doesn't mean Muslims aren't worst. Mob psychology may be the same regardless of culture or religion, but there is no reason to believe nurture does not have an effect and there is no reason to assume one culture or religion isn't more violent then another. In the end, modern Europe is a lot nicer then it was under papal rule, and it's only because Islam is on a position of inferiority towards other nations that we have never experienced the full extended of their arsonist tendencies.

Wait, so you claim Muslims are "worst" but you really think you aren't making a claim of Western superiority and you take offense when I use that term? I suggest you look up "superiority" in a dictionary. BTW, modern Europe ca. 70 years ago was a lot less nice than under papal rule. But again, your selective amnesia sets in...

By conceding that Muslims haven't had the time to "evolve" you have pretty much confirmed that they are in need of evolving in the first place, which means their presence in Europe has to be handled as a special case, prone to particular concessions, the most visible of which is the compulsory shielding of their religious believes by deeming criticism towards those believes an act of intolerance, confusing the blasphemous indignation of the Muslim community as a cry for ethnic injury and intolerance waged towards them.

I made no such concession. I said that all cultures are in a state of flux and the West's ascendance is a very recent and potentially emphemeral phenomenon. Just like the heyday of the Caliphate in Baghdad was ephemeral. At that point in time you would hardly have been making the argument that Islam is inferior to the Europe of the Dark Ages. Never mind also that the West of today wouldn't exist without the abominations of the genocide of native Americans and colonialism (which, BTW, also included the violent expropriation of natural resources and the deliberate undermining of the political cohesion of Islamic countries, in case you forgot that little detail). So again, your claims of superiority are highly contingent on temporary historical circumstance and not at all pre-programmed into the social codex of any particular culture. Again, the issue is not blasphemy, but hate speech.

Yes but in the case of Muslims blasphemy is considered a hate crime.

No, it isn't. I have given the definition of hate crime above. It involves the denigration of members of a certain list of protected categories. Mere blasphemy doesn't rise to that level. You are welcome to provide evidence to the contrary, but you won't find any.

Of course, you fail to mention that what "worked" and what "didn't" in the past differs according to political affiliation. 

Either way, care to mention historical cases where multiculturalism worked for the benefit and prosperity of a particular nation, kingdom or civilization?

Oh, let's see, how about the US of A, which was built by a multicultural hodgepodge of immigrants, as were Canada and Australia. They seem to be quite well off in all respect these days, don't you think. How about the Ottoman empire in its heyday, when it was open to all other culturs, provided they paid taxes to the Sultan, when it even provided a safe haven to Jews expelled from Catholic Europe. They all contributed greatly to the glory of the empire. Are you that blind and deaf that you are unaware of these?

[MishaK]

I think the problem is that followers of religious ideology expect to be exempt from criticism in a way that no other ideologies are.  Similar cartoons criticizing a political party, or an ideology like socialism or capitalism would be understood as not being critical of every follower of that ideology.  I don't see why religion should be given a free ride.

I think that is a deeper, two-fold problem. On the one hand you are correct that religious ideologies are problematic. They represent an unhealthy merger of religion and an aspiration to political power that violates separation of church and state, were it to come into power. All ideologies that fail to distinguish that the path towards personal salvation cannot involve a forcible infliction of those spiritual tenets on political societies as a whole are generally doomed to violent conflict, be they of Islamic or Catholic extraction. But the openly political Wahhabist extremism isn't representative of all of Islam. It certainly shouldn't get a free ride, but in reality, in the West, it doesn't. It is just that right-wingers like Levant fail to distinguish political radical Islam from apolitical spiritual Islam. The latter should enjoy the same protections as all other religions.

Secondly, I do find it problematic that a certain level of explicitly hateful speech has become acceptable in the West in the political arena. It did not use to be the case that certain sufferers of rabies could publish books that denigrate half the population of a democratic country as "traitors" solely based on their political affiliation. In substance this is not very different from hate speech and it is sad that we tolerate it in today's political discourse.

I think it remains an open question whether Islam, in and of itself, promotes behaviours such as suicide bombing and terrorism.  That can be true even if most of its adherents don't engage in such behaviours.  I think this is a crucial issue at this moment in history, and not one that can be adequately dealt with if discussion is hamstrung by concerns over offending the sensibilities of Muslims.

If you are going to make that argument, then you can't stop me from firing back that there is nothing in Christianity that wouldn't promote suicide bombing among Christians. You will recall that the religious justifications for individual martyrdom and violence used by the Crusaders are not much different from those used by radical Muslim suicide bombers today. The arsenal available today is more lethal. But that's about the only difference. All religions are vessels. They can be used for personal spiritual enrichment or they can be abused for political ends, abusing individuals to sacrifice their lives in a mistaken belief in salvation in the afterlife. But Islam is not particularly unique as compared to the others.

I'm not sure either.  I just wanted to point out the irony that Levant is having actions brought against him, while the individuals who have spread lies and misinformation, with the intent of causing unrest and resulting in a hundred deaths, are not.

But where have these deaths occurred? They didn't occur in the West. They occurred in countries with inadequate and corrupt legal and law enforcement systems. You can't say that the West doesn't prosecute Islamic killers when given the opportunity.

[Shrunk]

I think that is a deeper, two-fold problem. On the one hand you are correct that religious ideologies are problematic. They represent an unhealthy merger of religion and an aspiration to political power that violates separation of church and state, were it to come into power. All ideologies that fail to distinguish that the path towards personal salvation cannot involve a forcible infliction of those spiritual tenets on political societies as a whole are generally doomed to violent conflict, be they of Islamic or Catholic extraction. But the openly political Wahhabist extremism isn't representative of all of Islam. It certainly shouldn't get a free ride, but in reality, in the West, it doesn't. It is just that right-wingers like Levant fail to distinguish political radical Islam from apolitical spiritual Islam. The latter should enjoy the same protections as all other religions.

Secondly, I do find it problematic that a certain level of explicitly hateful speech has become acceptable in the West in the political arena. It did not use to be the case that certain sufferers of rabies could publish books that denigrate half the population of a democratic country as "traitors" solely based on their political affiliation. In substance this is not very different from hate speech and it is sad that we tolerate it in today's political discourse.

I think there is a difference between disapproving of a form of discourse, and actually using legal means to prevent people from using it.

If you are going to make that argument, then you can't stop me from firing back that there is nothing in Christianity that wouldn't promote suicide bombing among Christians. You will recall that the religious justifications for individual martyrdom and violence used by the Crusaders are not much different from those used by radical Muslim suicide bombers today. The arsenal available today is more lethal. But that's about the only difference. All religions are vessels. They can be used for personal spiritual enrichment or they can be abused for political ends, abusing individuals to sacrifice their lives in a mistaken belief in salvation in the afterlife. But Islam is not particularly unique as compared to the others.

I would actually agree with you there.  I should perhaps mention that my cultural background is Muslim, though in practice I am an atheist.  My personal view is that religion of any stripe fosters this kind of violence by emphasizing allegiance to an unseen deity over concern for the welfare of one's fellow man.  However, my opinion notwithstanding, there remains grounds to debate whether the current disproportionate rate of religiously-inspired violence coming from the Islamic world is due to something inherent in the Islamic faith.  And sometimes that debate is going to occur in the medium of something as crude as those Danish cartoons.

By far the best thing I have read on this controversy is Art Spiegelman's article in the June 2006 issue of Harper's.  Read it if you can.

[bwv 1080]

Look, you just don't know the first thing about the issue. I have Muslim friends and friends who merely might be mistaken for Arabs and I know how they have been treated since 9-11. There is a ton of anti-Arab racism in the West and the events of 9-11 made it almost publically acceptable to express it openly. This has nothing to dow ith multiculturalism.

I expect the intelligent Londoner to be able to differentiate between a rabble of hate mongerers looking for a rare moment in the spotlight and the other members of a diverse and varied culture without which the West wouldn't be where it is. You make the same sampling error as all right-wingers: you take the most extreme elements to be representative of a large and very diverse multitude. It simply isn't the case. Otherwise, Polynesians would be equally justified in thinking of all Europeans as Nazis, since that is the most extreme manifestation of Western culture.

You are mistaken. I am not associating "distrust" of Islam with Nazi ideology. I am showing a parallel flawed reasoning. You allege that Muslims (a very diverse group) had it coming for them because of "their" alleged past behavior. That is exactly the same reasoning applied by anti-Semites throughout European history, except the group in question is different. Their argument was Jews (a very diverse group) had it coming for them because of their sins of the past (killing Jesus, extorting money, organizing international conspiracies). You are punishing members of a collective based solely on an accident of birth, because of the misunderstood acts of a few . I might add another note. I am not making sweeping statements about Westerners and unilaterally defending Muslims. I am arguing that the human potential for violence is inherent in all cultures. Your accidental membership in Western culture does not make you a better or potentially less violent person than someone born in Damascus. Throughout history, given the circumstances of the time, both the West and Islam have engaged in unspeakable violence. Much of this history is very recent. So your claim of Western superiority based on its alleged peacefulness is just total nonsense.

Sorry, but that just doesn't even qualify as a coherent argument. You cannot be selectively amnesiac and look at a snapshot of culture as you perceive it today. America as we know it today wouldn't exist without slavery or the extermination of native Americans or without the violence of the Civil War. Central Europe as we know it wouldn't exist without the upheavals of Nazism and Communism, without the extermination of European Jews and colonialism. Indeed, European science and technology as we know it today wouldn't exist without Arab numerals and European literature and art wouldn't exist without the Baghdad library's preservation of ancient Greek texts that had been mostly destroyed in Europe. What you see today is highly contingent on all that came before. You cannot look at it in historical isolation. Your claims of superiority are therefore bogus.

As to the second part of your rant below. I have nowhere argued for lenience towards anyone based on membership in a particular religious or cultural group. On the contrary. All my argumentation above was about equal treatment. Anyone who violates the social contract should be sanctioned exactly the same way, irrespective of cultural background. Because of your fear of an unknown culture, you mistakenly see all Muslims as a single, homgeneous block of people who think exactly alike, and you are therefore incapable of separating individual offenders from the cultural group as a whole. I am all for prosecuting the right individuals. But I am very much against singling out innocent individuals based solely on their membership in a cultural group. If you had ever experienced life as a member of a minority (as I have) you would know what that means and how deeply undignifying it is to be mistreated for no other reason than an accident of birth.

Pedophiles are not a "culture". And, unlike a diverse group such as Muslims, by definition each and every one of them is someone who has injured the bodily and psychological integrity of a member of a specially protected group (minors). That is not a parallel at all. Whereas my example of anti-Semitism is very much a parallel since it likewise involves prejudice based on an accident of birth: involuntary membership in a very diverse and heterogeneous cultural group.

That allegation has no basis in truth. Muslim women in the West enjoy the same legal protections as Western women. It is unfortunately true that due to cultural norms it is very difficult to get in contact with Muslim victims of marital abuse and to help them get out of their abusive relationships. (But to tell you the truth, that is not an easy task with Western women either.) But the claim that Muslims receive more lenient treatment is nonsense. In Germany, for example, prosecutors are cracking down on honor killings and illegal underage marriages among Muslims. As I keep saying: all sanctions and protections of the law should apply to all, irrespective of cultural background. That includes being punished for marrying off your 15-year old daughter, but it also includes protection from hate speech. No acts of individuals justify hate speech against a whole cultural community and all of its members.

Well, I just listed for you several examples of violence inflicted by Christian or Western cultures that compares to, or outdoes, the violence you allege is exclusive to Islam. I am not sure how you compare levels of violence anyway. If the issue is sheer numbers, then all the variously religious or non-religious leaders of Russia win the contest, and they aren't Muslim. Or maybe Mao or Genghis Khan, and In any case, just looking around the world today, you will find that, for example, Indonesia, the most populous Islamic country, is quite peaceful, as are Jordan, Yemen, Turkey or the Arab Emirates. Conversely, no Islamic leaders were involved in starting the Iraq war. That was started by a devoutly Christian leader without provocation against a disarmed and cowed country ruled by a non-religious pseudo-socialist who is regarded as an apostate by devout Muslims. Your blanket statements are just way too broad to fit the multifaceted realities of the world. They are and remain nonsense.

Technically, you are arguing that Islam is inherently violent and the West isn't. It is correct that you don't use the word "superiority", but if that isn't a claim of superiority, I don't know what is.

You must have serious reading comprehension problems if you read that out of my previous posts. I am not in any way "justifying religion against religion". I am arguing for equal treatment and equal protection. You are arguing that Islam is inherently more violent than other religions and should therefore not be accorded the same protections as other religions, as it supposedly threatens peace and the integrity of Western culture. You argue that members of Islamic culture deserve the enmity they get and should be treated with suspicion, if not outright excluded from Western society. None of your arguments are tenable for the reasons explained above, the main reason of which being that you fail to distinguish offensive individual perpetrators from the peaceful and productive majority of the members of a culture. You are judging people based on a spurious connection, an accident of birth.

Nobody claimed otherwise. As explained above, I expect all members of society to abide by the same social contract, irrespective of their cultural background. It is you who wants to exempt Muslims from certain elements of this social contract (protection from hate speech), based not on any individual liability for any acts actually committed, but solely on membership in a collective.

This is beyond bizarre. You admire the perceived lack of dissent of a culture, most of the members of which live under repressive regimes that do not tolerate dissent (and most of which, BTW, are either feudal, socialist or military dictatorships that have nothing to do with Islam per se)? That's like admiring Hitler for the trains being on time. BTW, there is plenty of dissent. You just don't hear it because you don't know any Muslims.

Wait, so you claim Muslims are "worst" but you really think you aren't making a claim of Western superiority and you take offense when I use that term? I suggest you look up "superiority" in a dictionary. BTW, modern Europe ca. 70 years ago was a lot less nice than under papal rule. But again, your selective amnesia sets in...

I made no such concession. I said that all cultures are in a state of flux and the West's ascendance is a very recent and potentially emphemeral phenomenon. Just like the heyday of the Caliphate in Baghdad was ephemeral. At that point in time you would hardly have been making the argument that Islam is inferior to the Europe of the Dark Ages. Never mind also that the West of today wouldn't exist without the abominations of the genocide of native Americans and colonialism (which, BTW, also included the violent expropriation of natural resources and the deliberate undermining of the political cohesion of Islamic countries, in case you forgot that little detail). So again, your claims of superiority are highly contingent on temporary historical circumstance and not at all pre-programmed into the social codex of any particular culture. Again, the issue is not blasphemy, but hate speech.

No, it isn't. I have given the definition of hate crime above. It involves the denigration of members of a certain list of protected categories. Mere blasphemy doesn't rise to that level. You are welcome to provide evidence to the contrary, but you won't find any.

Oh, let's see, how about the US of A, which was built by a multicultural hodgepodge of immigrants, as were Canada and Australia. They seem to be quite well off in all respect these days, don't you think. How about the Ottoman empire in its heyday, when it was open to all other culturs, provided they paid taxes to the Sultan, when it even provided a safe haven to Jews expelled from Catholic Europe. They all contributed greatly to the glory of the empire. Are you that blind and deaf that you are unaware of these?

I cannot speak for Josquin, but all this historical analysis is meaningless because what I am referring to Western Culture is a current set of ideas (like free speech, Women's rights, capitalism, democracy etc) which has nothing to do with ethnicity or geography.  It does not matter what people of European descent have done in the past, it is entirely moot to the point at hand which is the protection of free speech. 

[MishaK]

I cannot speak for Josquin, but all this historical analysis is meaningless because what I am referring to Western Culture is a current set of ideas (like free speech, Women's rights, capitalism, democracy etc) which has nothing to do with ethnicity or geography.  It does not matter what people of European descent have done in the past, it is entirely moot to the point at hand which is the protection of free speech. 

It does matter very much, because that stuff didn't come out of nowhere and the West's adherence to its own ideals is inconsistent at best. You cannot ask us to ignore the shortcomings of the West to aid you in condemning Islam by focussing exclusively on the shortcomings of the most radical version of Islam. Your argument is a combination of a syllogistic fallacy, where you confuse rule and exception, and an inductive fallacy involving unrepresentative samples and hasty generalizations. You are essentially cherry-picking the facts you like and ignoring the ones you don't like.

[bwv 1080]

It does matter very much, because that stuff didn't come out of nowhere and the West's adherence to its own ideals is inconsistent at best. You cannot ask us to ignore the shortcomings of the West to aid you in condemning Islam by focussing exclusively on the shortcomings of the most radical version of Islam. Your argument is a combination of a syllogistic fallacy, where you confuse rule and exception, and an inductive fallacy involving unrepresentative samples and hasty generalizations. You are essentially cherry-picking the facts you like and ignoring the ones you don't like.

Where did I do any of that?  I just said we should respect freedom of speech

[MishaK]

Where did I do any of that?  I just said we should respect freedom of speech

You claimed that what matters is the "current set of ideas (like free speech, Women's rights, capitalism, democracy etc)" and that "t does not matter what people of European descent have done in the past". That's cherry picking in order to assert a Western superiority that doesn't exist. BTW, nobody is denying anyone any freedom of speech that wouldn't be denied if the culture maligned hadn't been Muslim. As I have explained earlier, replace the Muslims with sterotypical depictions of Jews and ask yourself if that would be considered anti-Semitic hate speech. Freedom of speech is not limitless.

[bwv 1080]

You claimed that what matters is the "current set of ideas (like free speech, Women's rights, capitalism, democracy etc)" and that "t does not matter what people of European descent have done in the past". That's cherry picking in order to assert a Western superiority that doesn't exist. BTW, nobody is denying anyone any freedom of speech that wouldn't be denied if the culture maligned hadn't been Muslim. As I have explained earlier, replace the Muslims with sterotypical depictions of Jews and ask yourself if that would be considered anti-Semitic hate speech. Freedom of speech is not limitless.

First, antisemitic hate speech is protected by the first amendment, as reprehensible as it is.  Look at the publicity morons like David Irving get over being prosecuted for their speech in European courts (and then being able to sue for libel in UK ones).  The only "Western superiority" I am asserting is the superiority of a set of ideas to premodern modes of culture.

[drogulus]

     There's no principle that says freedom of speech applies only to certified good or true speech. And the "fire in the crowded theater" exception only applies to that circumstance, where there is immediate danger of panic. Incitements to violence are also a legitimate restraint on speech. There are also the laws against libel. So freedom of speech isn't limitless.

     But after those exceptions it would be a good idea to consider the right to say and publish what you want as so important that other rights must give way. That's the principle that allows Mein Kampf to be published and read. The free speech right should be understood not just as your right to say and publish what you want, but my right to hear and read it if I choose.

     Once again the left cowers before the terrorists and bullies, willing to give up freedom to people who don't believe in it. This isn't just intimidation by violence, which is bad enough, this is fear of being mislabeled racist, or Islamophobic, which is downright pathetic. The left invented charges like these to squelch debate on college campuses (remember "speech codes"?), and now the tactic is being used to neutralize them, with their own cooperation. There is no crime imaginable that you could complain about now without falling under the same ban you support for the "racists" you oppose. You've been checkmated, and don't realize it.

[BorisG]

Fight to physically defend yourself. That is all. 0:)

[val]

I can only accept limitations on free speech, when it offenses individual dignity or other fundamental rights.

I cannot say that Mr A is stupid or inferior because he is a muslim, a christian, an atheist, a jew, a black ...
The same way I cannot publish an article inviting people to kill muslims, christians, atheists ...

This, because there is a conflict between rights, and some rights are even more important than the free speech: life, individual dignity, are examples.

But, this said, I must be free to say what I want about religion, ideology, I have the right to be racist, or to be against racism, and express my ideas in public. The limits are in individual rights that I must not violate. I can say, for example, that black people are bad actors. It may seem a stupid statement, and I think it is, but I have the right to say it.
But I have not the right to say that Mr. Denzel Washington is a bad actor because he is black or that Hollywood should refuse black actors. My freedom of speech ends when it puts other people rights in danger.

[Florestan]

I can say, for example, that black people are bad actors. It may seem a stupid statement, and I think it is, but I have the right to say it. But I have not the right to say that Mr. Denzel Washington is a bad actor because he is black.

But the latter assertion follows logically from the former.

[val]

Florestan
But the latter assertion follows logically from the former.

Yes, it does. But the point is that individual rights are reported to persons. It is what is called as "subjective rights". A general idea does not violate subjective rights. One thing is to say that Nazi Germans killed millions of jews. Another thing, very different, is to say that Herr Schmitt, member of the Nazi party, killed a jew.

[Florestan]

A general idea does not violate subjective rights.

I'm afraid I don't understand. If you say "black people are bad actors" then Denzel Washington's rights, subjective or not, have been already violated, even if you don't name him specifically.

Anyway, I am of the opinion that free speech should be limited not so much by law as by individual reason and responsibility.