Refudiating the Islamophobes

Hmmmm…. interesting thought just hit me…

Does not Freedom of Relgion, also entail the RIGHT to be AGAINST a Religion you find objectionable?

rumcrook: hi, I find that your link was very informative, and I realy loved the nice letter on
the right side, thank you.

@Romeo13:

Funny how there have been many posts calling anyone who does not think this mosque should be there as Islamaphobes…

Not accurate. I argue that those like Geller and commenters here who think America is in danger of falling under Sharia law, and who have never met a “moderate” they didn’t suspect of being a deceptive radical, and who think Islam itself is the enemy, are “Islamophobic”. Juan Williams is not. Mark “Monkey God religion” Williams is. This open letter in the WSJ is not. It’s in the same spirit as Sarah Palin’s plea- respectful. Don’t agree with some of what’s in the article but it’s at least not inflammatory.

@Minuteman26:

To borrow a quote from another blog (Basti Says), allowing that mosque to be built any where near ground zero is akin to the framers of the Constitution allowing a statue of King George to be errected at the site of the Boston Massacre.

Yet another variation of the Pearl Harbor-Shinto Shrine analogy. If bin Laden and Zawahiri and KSM and the al Qaeda network and affiliates were behind the GZ”M”, then that analogy would apply.

@Romeo13:

(also note the folks who got arrested a couple weeks back for going to an Islamic event… and doing nothing…)….

And check out this story on Geller’s NY rally, where two Egyptians who were there from out of state to lend their support were assailed as Muslims:

At one point, a portion of the crowd menacingly surrounded two Egyptian men who were speaking Arabic and were thought to be Muslims.

“Go home,” several shouted from the crowd.

“Get out,” others shouted.

In fact, the two men – Joseph Nassralla and Karam El Masry — were not Muslims at all. They turned out to be Egyptian Coptic Christians who work for a California-based Christian satellite TV station called “The Way.” Both said they had come to protest the mosque.

“I’m a Christian,” Nassralla shouted to the crowd, his eyes bulging and beads of sweat rolling down his face.

But it was no use. The protesters had become so angry at what they thought were Muslims that New York City police officers had to rush in and pull Nassralla and El Masry to safety.

“I flew nine hours in an airplane to come here,” a frustrated Nassralla said afterward.

The incident underscores how contentious — and, perhaps, how irrational — the debate over the mosque has become.

@recklessprocess:

It is the right of everyone in the city to decide if they want a memorial to the hijackers next to the burial ground of those killed in the event.

Is it a memorial/mosque/community center dedicated to honor the hijackers?

@suek:

You and Word have stated that it is _not_ a mosque – it’s a “community center”. As such, how does the “freedom of religion” apply?

Simply characterizing it as “a mosque” is misleading. There will be a mosque involved there, but it is envisioned to be much more than just that. Not just a community center to service Lower Manhattan and everyone of all faiths being made welcome, but also to include a memorial to the victims of 9/11.

A mosque isn’t just a place of worship, but also a place of learning and education; so even though there won’t be minarets and it is not just about Islamic worship, maybe the term really isn’t that important. I’ve been calling it an Islamic community center. But I think when most people think “mosque”, they equate it with “church”.

Ilovebeeswarzone – what are you trying to say? You can’t stack feces thirteen stories high without consequences?

I’m sure that having a mosque a few blocks away from Ground Zero is perfectly legal. But of all the issues we debate – legality plays only a part. There is also ethics and common sense. Surely it is also legal that people can protest about the building of a mosque near Ground Zero because it is insensitive and only going to cause more trouble that it’s worth.

In the same vein I guess it would be legal for a Militia to open a club house near the site of the Oklahoma bombing, or Sein Fenn to open a branch on bridge st in Warrington, UK, or the KKK to open a lodge near 16th St Baptist church in Birmingham or the AFT to open an office at Mount Carmel Center in Waco. Maybe the Germans could open gasworks at Auschwitz. Or the US open a celebration of nuclear technology at Hiroshima? Maybe swap the Kaaba in Mecca for a McDonalds store – if in the highly unlikely event the Saudi authorities would allow it. But if it could happen and was legal – does that make it right – and silence those who would want to protest?

Manhattan is a big enough place without a mosque called the ‘Ground Zero’ mosque being built so close. It won’t heal as many wounds compared to the salt it put in others.

Well, since this thread is still going, something to compliment Mike’s Newt videos:

Is fear of Islam the new McCarthyism?
By Susan Brooks Thistlethwaite

Religious freedom and the right of free expression are the strongest source of power Americans have for combating radicals who use Islam as the excuse for their violent extremism. The struggle with such extremists will not, indeed cannot, be won with military force, but through the power of our values. If there is a “narrative” abroad in the world that justifies violence against the West because the West “hates Islam,” the way to correct that narrative is with the practice of our cherished ideals of religious freedom and tolerance for diversity of opinion.

Instead, however, conservatives such as Newt Gingrich want us to reject not only violent extremists, but also Islamic ideas, especially ideas on religious law, that is, Sharia law. Gingrich believes that Americans are “at risk” as a nation, not only from the violence of a “militant Islam,” but also from the cultural integration of Muslims in the West. The latter he calls “stealth jihadists.” A close historical parallel, Gingrich argued in a lengthy address to the American Enterprise Institute entitled America at Risk: Camus, National Security and Afghanistan, where he is now a senior fellow, is the struggle with aommunism.

Almost, but not quite. The total approach Gingrich is proposing has a better historical parallel in McCarthyism. McCarthyism has come to mean making charges of disloyalty or even subversion without regard for adequate evidence. In his address, Gingrich offered a lot of anger and fear, but very little actual evidence to support his claims about Islam and the West, or even his claims about the ineffectiveness of President Obama’s approach to National Security. Joseph McCarthy, as is well known, was a Senator from Wisconsin, who used his position as chairman of the Committee on Government Operations and its Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations to launch investigations designed to document charges of Communists in government. His often unsubstantiated charges, and the so-called “blacklists” that were created, suppressed American traditions of political dissent, and cultural creativity for many years. McCarthy was censured by the Senate on December 2, 1954, for behavior that was “contrary to senatorial traditions.”

But it is not the career of McCarthy himself that provides the best historical example of the political power of anti-Communism. Historian Rick Perlstein, in his book Nixonland: The Rise of a President and the Fracturing of America, describes the way in which the “the politics of anger,” including anti-Communist fervor, were employed by Richard Nixon. Nixon, junior Congressman on the House Un-American Activities Committee, recognized how popular anti-Communism could be as a political platform
and employed it to eventually be elected president. It is, of course, more than likely that the tactics used by the HUAC were sometimes replicated by the Nixon White House and resulted in the Watergate Scandal that led to Nixon’s resignation.

Gingrich, perhaps best remembered for his ethics troubles, his resignation from his House Seat and as Speaker of the House, and his confession of an extra-marital affair, is now moving to the religious right, as well as further to the political right. Gingrich says he will “consider” a 2012 run for the Presidency, and clearly this national security address that focuses on an “Islamic threat” is an opening gambit in that effort.

Conservatives are very divided over national security, argues Brian Katulis of the Center for American Progress. In light of that, an all-pervasive “Islamic threat,” it seems to me, can look like a very attractive, politically unifying strategy. This is a cardinal tenet, in fact, of the politics of anger. People divided about their own constructive approaches to an issue can become united in the face of a perceived outside threat, as was the case for Nixon and Communism.

Violent extremists are a threat. That’s not a fantasy. But why single out the idea of Sharia? I personally also disagree with adopting Sharia law in democracies such as we have in the U.S. and have said so, repeatedly.

But to make what is a debate over ideas into a dangerous threat posed by Islam to the West, instead of focusing on violent extremism, is to make Islam itself a vague and yet all-pervasive threat in very much the same way that McCarthy made even general leftist ideas into a threat to national security. What is dangerous about the McCarthyism of conservatives like Gingrich is that making ideas in Islam into the threat, they risk fueling the very narrative about the United States “hating Islam” that violent extremists use to recruit young people. The only way to combat those who would use hatred of Islam as a reason to attack the United States is to actually practice our American values of religious freedom and political inclusion.

Newt Gingrich peppered his national security address about the threat of Islam with references to famous figures who fought Nazism as well as communism, though not Nixon. He quotes Harry Truman several times, but he does not quote Truman on the dangers of targeting ideas rather than acts in regard to fighting the threat of Communism. In 1950, Truman vetoed the McCarran Internal Security Act, and wrote this about his veto: “The basic error of these sections is that they move in the direction of suppressing opinion and belief. This would be a very dangerous course to take, not because we have any sympathy for communist opinions, but because any governmental stifling of the free expression of opinion is a long step toward totalitarianism. There is no more fundamental axiom of American freedom than the familiar statement: In a free country, we punish men for the crimes they commit, but never for the opinions they have.” (Italics added)

There’s another historical figure who was not featured in the Gingrich address, but whom we who venture into the media would do well to emulate: Edward R. Murrow, the famed CBS newscaster and analyst, who took on McCarthy and his tactics. On March 9, 1954, Murrow said these words that rebuked forever those who would use fear to manipulate our political processes.

“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. We must remember always that accusation is not proof and that conviction depends upon evidence and due process of law. We will not walk in fear, one of another. We will not be driven by fear into an age of unreason, if we dig deep in our history and our doctrine, and remember we are not descended from fearful men–not from men who feared to write, to speak, to associate and to defend causes that were, for the moment, unpopular.”

Let’s remember who we are as Americans who cherish religious freedom and value political dissent. It is the strongest source of our power as a nation. We should value Islam as a part of the American fabric of religious diversity, debate its many ideas in the public square, and not be afraid to do so.

I know the FA Islamic scholars here will disagree with Rauf’s interpretation and perception of Sharia; but here’s how he sees it.

For those of you who don’t know: Newt Gingrich has a Bachelor’s degree, Master’s Degree and PhD in history. He was also the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives after leading a very effective campaign to oust the Democrats in 1994 after many decades of Dem rule.

I’ll stack him up against some Duke University egghead any day.

@ILOVEBEESWARZONE very well said. I think in this instance that language barrier has actually been beneficial in cutting to the chase.

The real genius in the Islamic “struggle” against the west is their doctrine is a “kill your enemy message, while the west’s Christian philosophy is “love they enemy”.

McCarthyism is probably not the best argument to use. The assault on the US by communist/socialist forces from within was real. Perhaps McCarthy’s methods were not appropriate from a “Love they Neighbor” perspective but as we have seen with the election of the Obamanation, the socialist marxist quest for control of the United States did not diminish because McCarthy and HUAC were no longer looking for them.

It is true we quit actively seeking to root out communism in the US and it’s goal of violently overthrowing the US government and installing a communist totalitarian regime. Communists as described in previous post amounts to the extremist jihadists. It is equally true that Marxist/socialist philosophy is now well entrenched in one of the parties of our two party system. Marxists/socialists would be the equivalent of soft jihadists.

I don’t know what the answer is but in a clash of civilizations where the philosophies are so constructed…. what can we expect in the future?

having the right to do something does’nt mean it’s the right thing to do

everyone carrying water for the islamists who want this mosque have forgotten this. heres a reminder.

http://vwt.d2g.com:8081/jumper5.jpg

as for the islamists, if they really had the communities best interests in mind they would see the pain and withdraw

@Aqua: Good find. I’ll just drop it in here:

AUGUST 3, 2010
WTC Mosque, Meet the Auschwitz Nuns
Pope John Paul offers a model of tolerance for a heated controversy.
Wall Street Journal

With every passing day, the dispute over the planned Islamic Center near Ground Zero grows more acrimonious. These feelings will probably only get worse today, when the New York City Landmark Preservation Commission is expected to remove another hurdle by ruling against landmark status for the undistinguished old building the center will replace.

So maybe it’s time to look beyond the lawyers and landmark preservation commissions and regulatory agencies. When we do, it will be hard to find a better example than the grace and wisdom Pope John Paul II exhibited during a similar clash involving another hallowed site on whose grounds innocents were also murdered: Auschwitz.

In the 1980s, Carmelite nuns moved into an abandoned building on the edge of the former Nazi death camp to pray for the souls taken there. As with the dispute over the mosque near Ground Zero, the convent’s presence escalated into a clash not only between different faiths but between competing historical narratives. As with today’s clash too, it seemed intractable until the Polish pope stepped in.

Pope John Paul II wasn’t afraid to bend to others’ sensitivities.

[Excerpted…see link above for whole article]

Did the late Pope violate the “rule of law” by asking that the Nuns move elsewhere?

😈 😛 so im the bad guy in this huh? Im getting a good laugh out of that.

mataharley why do you think I pictured you as a water carrier?

people wanting to open churches, christian meeting houses, are routinely denied across this country for a variety of reasons, zoning is the usual excuse.

walmarts are routinely fought against by activists who dont want to see them go up,

I never see. neversee. the same outrage when christians are told they cannot gather.

I wont post links do your own search but it is prevelant.

why are we islamaphobic or anti constitutional or against the rule of law becuase we wan to make life difficult for the people who want to open the mosque?

you wish you could say the same about me? the same about me what? sorry that didnt make sense.

the only inference I can take out of that is that I am somehow not a supporter of the constitution because I want people to remember the poor souls who leaped to thier deaths holding hands. and I want people including the mosque builders to consider the pain they will cause.

you need to call me a racist next to really round out your pro mosque stance.