Boycotting Denmark

[formerly known as hf]

I'm not too bothered if I offend flag-buring fanatics

[Crosshair]

Point.

Just worried that you make that connection with all residents of the Gazza strip.

[formerly known as hf]

Not by any means

[Ahoyhoy]

All I gotta say is this, on 9/11 I saw footage of Palestinians handing out candy and dancing in the streets. That offended me and I didn't see any Muslim country condone the Palestinians behavior. Apologize for your fellow Palestinians offending me and i'll apologize for the country of Denmark. And then this whole fiasco will all be over.

[Crosshair]

Killing thousands of innocent people is slightly worse than publishing cartoons about Mohammed in my book...

[Phalynx]

All I gotta say is this, on 9/11 I saw footage of Palestinians handing out candy and dancing in the streets. That offended me and I didn't see any Muslim country condone the Palestinians behavior. Apologize for your fellow Palestinians offending me and i'll apologize for the country of Denmark. And then this whole fiasco will all be over.

Dude nobody here should be apologising for a whole nations behaviour tisnt logical!

[Crosshair]

Correct. We're all Humans.

If one human acts, the rest are not automaticly evil, and must therefore apologise for what someone else did.

I'm sorry for Waterloo, Hastings, oh and i'm sure mankind should be blamed for The Inquisition...

[Nixit]

Killing thousands of innocent people is slightly worse than publishing cartoons about Mohammed in my book...

Though I personally agree with this.

Your book is much different than someone elses book (if you know what I'm getting at).

[west]

I don't want to read that other person's book, necessarily.

[Nixit]

I don't want to read that other person's book, necessarily.

I find mine quite a good enough read, as well.

[AoM]

The Amish people who live relatively close to where I am believe that having a photo taken of them is a sin and symbolic of putting themselves before God. They are also extreme pacifists, again due to their strong religious beliefs. So when some arrogant fool with a camera stops by and starts taking pictures of them, they must stop whatever they are doing and retreat in doors, because they do not believe in forcibly stopping the fool from taking pictures.

He may have well been within his rights to take pictures, it is after all a free country and to deny him his right to take pictures is censorship. But most decent folk would agree that what the guy with the camera was doing was wrong, as he was unduly and knowledgably antagonizing an entire people. And we would denounce that man and we might even want to destroy his camera so that he gets the idea.

Carry that over into the present discussion. The antagonization of Islam is the same, so why is our reaction so different? Unfortunately, it is because of the violence. Unlike the Amish, some Muslims have no reservations about striking back for what they believe in, and they sometimes go way too far in their backlashes, which is to the dismay of the more peaceful practitioners of Islam, who only wish for the cartoonist to draw something else, just as the photographer above should have taken a different picture.

But here's what the Muslims who burned the embassies are forgetting...

Let's say that the Amish have no reservations about violence and some of them angrily charge the photographer. But he gets away in his car. Still fuming, the Amish decide to get back at "the English." (Because anyone who's not Amish tends to be English to them.) So they put the nearby American town of Nowheresville to torch and shout as they do that "You've got no right to take our picture! It's a sin against Almighty God and it deeply hurts us to the core!"

Suddenly (in my little example), the Amish have gone too far, because in our view, the wrongs of the arsonry far outweigh the wrongs of taking the picture. In our view, even though the photographer was wrong in taking those pictures, he still had the 'right' to choose whether or not he took the photograph.

Now the Amish have given the the homeless people of Nowheresville no choice. The villagers didn't take the pictures. In fact, most of them respected the Amish for the way they lived and would have defended them. But now for the foolish choice of someone they don't even know, their livlihoods are affected, and it's the Amish zealots ( ) who are responsible just as much as the photographer, because two wrongs don't make a right. The villagers have lost their homes because of someone else's beliefs.

Now the whole nation has to back up Nowheresville. And the story gets out to the EU, and every one's saying "We're all Nowheresvillians now." No one is thinking about the photographer anymore, all they can see is Nowheresville burning, and the guys with torches and funny hats telling us what we can and cannot do with our cameras. Naturally we have to bristle, it's practically obligational at this point.

A decently intelligent American once said, "I may not agree with what you have to say, sir, but I will fight to the death for your right to say it." This sums up the American belief about free speech, and it takes courage and conviction to stand by those words. Do we have to protect and encourage the actions of the photographer? No. But we must protect the rights of the people of Nowheresville. Do we have to protect and encourage the cartoons showing a blasphemous depiction of the Prophet? No. But we must protect the rights of the Danes.

@Danish cartoonists: There are better ways to insult and make light of radical terrorists, and you can certainly do so without insulting the peaceful Muslims. If we don't get the peaceful Muslims on our side, what hope do we have of stopping the violence?

@Muslim boycotters: There are better ways to get back at the Danish cartoonists, and you can certainly do so without ostricizing the entire Danish nation. In your haste to get the right message out, you may have inadvertantly caused a greater problem.

@Muslim embassy arsonists (though I doubt that you play cantr): Take a lesson from our Amish friends. Passive resistance is not a sign of weakness, and it is not a lack of conviction or faith. Violence is too easy; the right path is often the hardest to follow.


One final note. This analogy is not meant to be a slight against any particular side of this debate, and is especially not meant to be a slight against the Amish (they're the real heroes here!). It is merely an effort to lighten the air and perhaps (miracles do happen) to give people another perspective with which to view the complex problems in the world today.

[west]

Well done, AoM!

10/10

[Oasis]

Wow! That was an incredible analogy, and an awesome message to all. Very well done!

[|william|]

I have come out of hiding to say well done, AoM.

[Phalynx]

A very thoughtfull piece of writing, if only the whole world was this sensible!