Don't Eat a Danish with Your Coffee!!

[talktooloose]

One more thing for today:

In light of the protests and threats of assassination, etc. regarding the publication of cartoons featuring the Prophet Muhammed, I am moved to return to an old hard-line position that I had softened recently.

Fuck Yahweh, fuck Jesus, fuck Muhammed, fuck Buddha. If things these teachers allegedly wrote or said move you to be a better person, that is wonderful. It is your job to study these words and add to them in the context of your own life and times. If you worship these dead or mythical figures above living human beings, you are an idoloter and an irresponsible human being. Our job is to love the human race, not worship idols and ideologies.

All fundamentalist religion is evil. All spirituality is suspect. You have been warned.

Comments

[beetlebummer.livejournal.com]

you don't know me or anything, but ... well said!

[corduroyarmy.livejournal.com]

I'm going to be inflammatory and say: Weak!

[corduroyarmy.livejournal.com]

I think these protests are pretty legit- it's insulting and was meant only to be racist. That was its only purpose, to incite hatred.

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

I agree the cartoons were not great and not in great taste and probably reflected underlying racism of the cartoonist. The tone of a lot of the protests was "You may not depict the Prophet. Period." and "Death to those who do so". One response cartoon had Jesus, Buddha, etc. comforting Muhammed saying, "Don't worry too much about it. We've all been satirized before." It's the fundamentalist idea of non-human sacred cows being more important than human beings that I have no patience for.

[corduroyarmy.livejournal.com]

Man, I don't really think we're talking about satire. It was hate literature. It was depicting their prophet as a terrorist murderer and in doing that painted all Muslims with the same brush. That is about as satirical as a swastika on a synagogue.

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

You know what? You might be right. Which part of the international response do you feel is appropriate?

How do you feel about attempted embassy burnings and death threats as a response to "insulting the prophet." That is the stated reason for the protests, not the racism behind the cartoons.

[corduroyarmy.livejournal.com]

You're right in that, if measured by our standards, this is crazy. As a result, you don't see that kind of outrage here in the West. But the fact of the matter is that there is an EXTREMELY widespread outcry of the kind you describe, and I'm reluctant to dismiss that large a group as crazy animals as readily as some. If your idea of appropriate response is to say 'Fuck Jesus, fuck Muhammed', I'm pretty sure you're not according the slightest bit of thought to WHY they would feel this way. I've not once said that the violent response is right, but I can certainly see what's behind it. The West is engaging in a cultural war against Islam, and this sort of thing is part of it. It's such a cop out to blame it on religion- if there was no religion, we'd still be in the same boat.

As for the last point you made, you don't think anyone is angry about the racism behind the cartoons?

I find it so infuriating that people think that this is about the cartoons- the cartoons are just the spark. There is so much anti-Islamic hatred in the West, and if you think that the Muslim masses would have reacted similarily to these cartoons in the absence of any other factors, you're dead wrong. The current state has been two hundred years in the making. It's so bad, violence is inevitable. Just because they threw the first punch doesn't mean they started the fight.

Hmmm...

[lautreamontg.livejournal.com]

I make a pretty poor idolater, but I'd make a better one than someone who can possibly love the human race. I'm a misanthrope to the core.
In any case, if all the religious figures are devoid of a transcendant existence outside of what humanity has created for them, then shouldn't we ascribe all the good AND bad parts of it to human nature alone?

Re: Hmmm...

[talktooloose.livejournal.com]

No, no. God is good. Devils are bad. When we act bad it's not us, it's a devil.

Re: Hmmm...

[briseur.livejournal.com]

shouldn't we ascribe all the good AND bad parts of it to human nature alone?

Yes.

[painglass.livejournal.com]

Rock it on! Lovein' that second paragraph. I've no problem with people who believe in god(s), but when they start killing other people and/or themselves, it starts to really piss me off.

All fundamentalist religion is evil. All spirituality is suspect. You have been warned.
I came to this conclusion at 13.