Peak Oil News and Message Boards

Bas wrote: the Fitna movie seems to, paradoxally, have started a more or less constructive dialogue, between the West and the Muslim world, but maybe more importantly within the Muslim world.

Its not paradoxical at all.

Its in the very nature of free speech. When people are free to express their views on controversial issues, then it leads to constructive dialogue about those issues.

Its the death threats and soft censorship that cause the problems, not the cartoons or the movies or the museum exhibits or the plays or the exercise of free speech.

Plantagenet wrote:
Its not paradoxical at all.

Its in the very nature of free speech. When people are free to express their views on controversial issues, then it leads to constructive dialogue about those issues.

Its the death threats and soft censorship that cause the problems, not the cartoons or the movies or the museum exhibits or the plays or the exercise of free speech.

it's funny to see how all the western media and governments are falling over eachother to say that the vast majority of the Muslims are moderate peace loving people, after focusing for years on the negative aspects of Islam, giving the fundamentalists more attention than they deserve etc, brainwashing the populace and you in the process.

On the other hand many here "feared" that the movie would be more insulting etc than it finally turned out to be; I'm still not agreeing with it's message but with this aftermath (the West has obviously learned from the cartoon debacle) I indeed feel strengtened in my belief in freedom of expression (and freedom to disagree with that expression)

Bas wrote: many here "feared" that the movie would be more insulting etc than it finally turned out to be

Its best not to allow fearful people to control what can be shown in movie theatres or written in books or drawn by artists.

Plantagenet wrote:

Bas wrote: many here "feared" that the movie would be more insulting etc than it finally turned out to be

Its best not to allow fearful people to control what can be shown in movie theatres or written in books.

oh I agree, and I'm glad we have very good laws for that here, though there is a law against "godslastering" here, not sure how to translate it; blasphemy would be too strong. As I understand it it's a very general law that hasn't been applied in a case for 50 years but wouldve been applied if Wilders had been ripping pages out of the koran in his movie (which the speculation was he might do, if you see what I mean)

are you self censoring now Plant? All American Muslim hating...ehh Plant?

Fitna is back on the web. "Livelink" took it down after threats, but now they say they've improved their security and they've made it available again If you want to see the horrible, evil Fitna movie, here it is again.

horrible evil controversial supposedly anti-Moslem Fitna movie

Note: this is the english version.

A question-and-answer session with Imam Abdul Makin in an East London mosque asks why Allah would tell Muslims to kill and rape innocent non-Muslims.

"Because non-Muslims are never innocent, they are guilty of denying Allah and his prophet," the Imam says, according to the report. "If you don't believe me, here is the legal authority, the top Muslim lawyer of Britain."

The lawyer, Anjem Choudary, backs up the Imam's position, saying that all Muslims are innocent.

You are innocent if you are a Muslim," Choudary tells the BBC. "Then you are innocent in the eyes of God. If you are not a Muslim, then you are guilty of not believing in God."

Choudary said he would not condemn a Muslim for any action.

"As a Muslim, I must support my Muslim brothers and sisters," Choudary said. "I must have hatred to everything that is not Muslim."

--BBC

You forgot the link (and before you click, this is NOT Rick Astley):

http://youtube.com/watch?v=maHSOB2RFm4&feature=related

Wilders fears he will be found guilty and sent to prison in only a few months.

"Even before Fitna was released early last year, Doekle Terpstra, a leading member of the Dutch establishment, called for mass rallies to protest the movie. Terpstra organized a coalition of political, business, academic, and religious leaders, the sole purpose of which was to try to freeze Wilders out of public debate. Dutch cities are riddled with terrorist cells and crowded with fundamentalist Muslims who cheered 9/11 and idolize Osama bin Laden, but for Terpstra and his political allies, the real problem was the one Member of Parliament who wouldn't shut up. "Geert Wilders is evil," pronounced Terpstra, "and evil has to be stopped." Fortuyn, van Gogh, and Hirsi Ali had been stopped; now it was Wilders's turn.

But Wilders--who for years now has lived under 24-hour armed guard--would not be gagged. Thus the disgraceful decision to put him on trial. In Dutch Muslim schools and mosques, incendiary rhetoric about the Netherlands, America, Jews, gays, democracy, and sexual equality is routine; a generation of Dutch Muslims are being brought up with toxic attitudes toward the society in which they live. And no one is ever prosecuted for any of this. Instead, a court in the Netherlands--a nation once famous for being an oasis of free speech--has now decided to prosecute a member of the national legislature for speaking his mind. By doing so, it proves exactly what Wilders has argued all along: that fear and "sensitivity" to a religion of submission are destroying Dutch freedom."

Submission in the Netherlands