A Question of Provocation at Ground Zero? Lessons from The Satanic Verses

Noa Zrk

Ted Olsen's views should be the concluding voice on this matter, though they will not be.

I expect Mr Massie's increasingly prolix visitations to this subject will continue as long as there is a dribble of pseudo liberal sentiment to be wrung from it.

Uh, and the number of posts lurches into double figures.

Fergus Pickering

How you do go on, Alex If your arguments cannot be put on one side of a sheet of paper then I don't think much of them. The twin towers were destroyed by muslims, doubtless 'devout' in pusuit of the muslimhood. If a lot of American Christians don't want a muslim prayer-room there then their views should prevail, as the idiot President has belatedly come to recognise. And I predict it WON'T be there. Much better for all concerned I should say. And I really don't care what the 'liberal' position on this is. Why should anybody in the UK think this is our business. It isn't, Alex.

Chairman of Selectors

Another day, another 5 Massie blogs and yet another on this "Cultural Centre" or whatever Massie is now calling it, safe from his gloriously detached upper middle class, white, crime free Scotch bolt hole. Give it a rest Massie, you are tedious in the extreme.

Conservative Cabbie

I note that the reference to Nancy Pelosi is relegated to a footnote. There are two things going on here. People, opposed to the mosque exercising their constitutional and democratic right to protest and dissent. This warrants post after post in which Alex gets judgemental. And then we have Pelosi, a leading member of government saying that the exercise of free speech warrants investigation and Alex thinks this is worth nothing more than a one sentence footnote. If he thinks that failing to accomodate Islam is more dangerous to society than the suppression of dissent by government, then his em> is not something I want any part of.

Anyway, I look forward to ndm eviscerating Nancy Pelosi for what is actually a breach of the 1st amendment rather than the strawman arguments he's been making on the matter to-date.

Conservative Cabbie

Serious question Alex.

If an American organisation decided to build a Hussein-esque size statue of George W Bush at Haditha, would you take as much issue with the Iraqi peoples offense? Would you object to the , no doubt, liberal talking heads and their outrage at such a provocation? If yes, then fair play for consistency, but somehow I doubt it.

Rhoda Klapp

Stop digging.

Rhoda Klapp

You see the thing about Rushdie is, all those insulted (yes, truly insulted) Muslims had a right to complain. They had a right to be offended. Some of us would say they had no right to put out a fatwa, and indeed that a religion that even has a concept like a fatwa deserves a little caution. The equivalent of the fatwa would be someone blowing up the 'mosque'. Not someone suggesting mildly that a polite person would maybe not build it there.

christopher edwards

rhoda
how does one get the 'right' to be offended?

MikeF

'I don't believe that all opponents of the so-called "Ground Zero Mosque" are bigots.'

You don't, well that is very tolerant of you. But the way that you say it indicates that you think most of the people who do would deserve to have that rather ugly term applied to the. So answer me a question. What is your definition of the word 'bigot'? What mode or type of thought or action (note not what specific opinions) deserves this term of disapprobation and why?

Ricky

I know it is the "role" of contributors to be provocative but Massie is becoming a tedious cheerleader for tolerating the intolerable.

How about some real journalism for once and explaining the sinister network behind the Cordoba enterprise - mysteriously funded by whom and insensitively wishing to open the centre on the anniversary of 9/11?

I think we all have to look to France, Holland and Germany, to see how we must all protect ourselves against the tide of resurgent Islam, destined to rule us "by bullet or by ballot."

Helped along, of course by a well rewarded and compliant Liberal Elite that has been responsible for the decline of the West.

Charlie

Before supporting any organisation, it is important to check the back ground, especially any comments made by leaders and their source of funding. The potential problem is that senior people within the Cordoba Organisation may have said or written articles in Arabic or another language which may show them in a different light. Unless someone has read all articles and listened to all speeches by leaders of the Cordoba Organisation and their funders, they have not undertaken due dilligence. Supporting an organisation such as the Cordoba Organisation is similar to buying a company or undertaking an investment : thorough and competent due dilligence must be undertaken. Up to the end of the 80s there were many front organisations for Soviet activities. Unless Massie has undertaken a thorough due dilligence , which includes being able to understand communications in foreign languages by those associated with the the Cordoba Organisation, he should not support the attempt to buils a mosque.

Stuart Seacole Smith

Massie's efforts to bore ground-zero-mosque opposers into submission go on. Interesting that there was some grain of common sense in his original reaction.

But of course, realising that this might not fit with the supine position towards islam which is expected of any self respecting lefty-liberal, he's employed a bit of Cartesian stylee jiggery-pokery to adjust his position to a supposedly logical, dispassionate, and above all "tolerant" position.

Massie: the corpulent, vulnerable soft white underbelly of the west, personified.

Anyway, if this mosque/cultural centre/ inclusive outreach intitiative or what have you does go ahead (which I hope it does not), at least muslims can be assured that despite deliberately thumbing their noses at ordinary americans there will be no government or church sponsored initiatives aimed at murdering them or destroying it. Would that the situation were the same if the muslims themselves were leaping into the familiar position of taking offence in the name of the prophet at some slight, be it real, or more likely, imagined.

Indy

You don’t need to be a lefty-liberal to see how stupid and dangerous this debate is becoming.

We are told that building an Muslim Centre near Ground Zero would be offensive because the terrorists who perpetrated 9/11 were Muslim extremists. Allowing a mosque to be built at that site would be the equivalent of putting up a tribute to the Nazis at Belsen or a tribute to the Japanese at Pearl Harbour.

The logic is that “Muslims” in this context are the equivalent of the Nazis to the Jews or the Japanese to the Americans. They are the aggressors. They are the guilty party. What they have done is so shameful and unforgiveable that they should have the decency to keep away from the site of their outrage.

Except … “Muslims” did not perpetrate 9/11. Extremists did. Muslims have been the victims of Islamic extremism just as much as Americans have. Indeed, more so.

More Muslims have been killed by Islamic extremists than have Americans.

More Muslims have died fighting Islamic extremism than have Americans.

Muslims are dying every single day fighting America’s enemies in the Middle East. Then their families switch on TV to hear that decent Americans don’t want a mosque to be built anywhere near Ground Zero – why? Because they blame all the Muslims for 9/11. All Muslims - even the many thousands who have died fighting on or with the American side.

That’s kind of stupid isn’t it?

Stephanie Tohill

Indy,

Nail. On. The. Head.

Jonathan Woolf

Given a lot of Muslims died when the First Crusaders sacked Jerusalem in 1099, should the surviving churches in that city all be demolished in case Muslims are offended and upset? The Crusaders were Christians, albeit extremists, and Christians use those churches today.

You can't have it both ways - either societies have the rule of law, applying blindly to all, or they don't.

David T

Spot on Alex.

It is interesting though that a majority of New Yorkers take this point - a recent poll showed that although a majority thought that the Mosque should not be built, a majority also thought that they had a constitutional right to build the Mosque. That's hopeful, at least.

Augustus

"Muslims did not perpetrate 9/11, extremists did." And suicidal terror reaches every corner of the world as well, and threatens the everyday life of countless millions in Europe, America, Asia and the ME alike. They hit cafes, hotels,restaurants, churches, government institutions, transport etc. It is frightening because their catchphrase: 'You love life, we love death' has already infected entire societies. There was even a Hezbollah TV show in which a little girl thanks God for hearing her prayer and letting her father be killed in battle with the Israelis. This culture of death, this unimaginable robotic destructive instinct can only come from one ideology: Islam.

ndm

Augustus writes:

-- This culture of death, this unimaginable robotic destructive instinct can only come from one ideology: Islam.

How soon we forget that in since 1967 more than 3,500 people died in the UK as a result of the Troubles. I don't think Islam had anything to do with their deaths and ne ither did Christianity.

And nor does Islam when people do in its name what thousands of killers did in the name of their brand of Christianity.

Noa Zrk

ndm writes

And nor does Islam when people do in its name what thousands of killers did in the name of their brand of Christianity.

ndm:
What thousands of killlers?

Are you equating Al Quaeda to the PIRA, UDF et al and that these sectarian extremists conducted their terrorist actions as Christian warriors?

If so you are extremely misinformed.

phil

Alex ,you have over complicated a very simple matter -It is not necessary to build a mosque in such a sensitive area -It was bound to cause hurt to those who lost friends and family -The USA IS HUGE ,there are many places to build mosques and ground zero is not one of them -plain and simple.We are not talking about freedom of expression ,loss of human rights ,religious denial ,just plain and simple common sense -lets cut out all the intellectual crap and realise it was wrong ab initio.

Baron

Indy @ 11.24 reiterates for the blind and deaf: ‘We are told that building a Muslim Centre near Ground Zero would be offensive because the terrorists who perpetrated 9/11 were Muslim extremists’.

without being told by Indy, we also know there have been others since 9/11 who wanted to carry out similar acts of terrorism, got caught, or succeeded (Madrid, London, Glasgow, Mumbai…). We also know that there were many who rejoiced and danced as the Towers were crumbling, the occupants jumping. We are also told by the people whose job it is to protect us that others continue plotting to do us harm, many a mullah keep on injecting hatred into the minds of the young, celebrating the 9/11 hijackers as martyrs to the course of Jihad …. You follow so far?

well now, do try and exercise your pseudo-liberal brain some more. Who do you reckon is more likely to rush to pray in a mosque that’s as near the spot at which the worst atrocity on the US soil occurred perpetrated by a bunch of self-confessed Muslims? The law abiding Muslims who immigrated to the West to better their chances in life, to escape the application of a deeply orthodox interpretation of Islam? Or the other lot that see the hijackers as martyrs, Islam as a continuous Jihad against the peoples of the book, ha?

the mosque will not aid the integration of the two polarised religious communities; more to the point, it will make the job of those who strive to segregate the deluded Jihadists from the mainstream Muslim unwashed much harder.

Just spotted phil @ 7.23, he’s spot on.

Baron

small planet this, and shrinking, too, what with high speed travel, population growth, natural resource depletion, we all of whatever creed have no choice but to share it, at the least to be civil to each other, the less squabble the better because if we ain’t careful the 60mn dead during the last world blow up will look like a drop in the ocean. Agreed, Alex?

well then, tell please by how much did either the Verses or the siting of the mosque contribute to that peaceful sharing, ha? How many Muslims, having struggled through Rusdie’s barely readable tome, thought ‘G (or rather A), what a powerful read, must go hug the other lot’. Similarly with the mosque, how many of those suspicious of Islam will cross the line and kiss a mullah?

Flatdog

"Even if those involved mean no harm and don't mean to "provoke" they should have been wise enough to appreciate that their proposal was bound to provoke a hostile reaction. Which means they should think again."

Should Galileo have thought again because his scientific ideas caused hostility?

Should Winston Churchill have thought again because his early warnings about Hitler caused hostility?

Should Ian Douglas Smith have thought again because his early warnings about Robert Mugabe et al caused hostility?

Alex, Maybe you should follow your own advice and think again about your choice of career, because your blinkered world view and unwillinges to see the obvious as expressed in these pages causes hostility!

Stuart Seacole Smith

Flatdog: fear not, Massie's credentials as a liberal surrender-monkey remain ingloriously intact. He was just putting the other side's view so he could (rather unconvincingly) try to knock it down.

By the way, Galileo, Churchill etc had some crucial underlying reasons for their actions, which they deemed worthy of whatever offence might be caused.

I think the planners of this mosque, at this particular location and at this particular time, also have some crucial underlying reasons, and not only do they deem these worthy of the offence which will be caused, the offence itself actually is one of the reasons. Just one of them though. Still, great stuff when you look at it from their perspective.

Western quisling proponents are mainly "useful idiots". Or just idiots.

Build it somewhere else.

John Norman

If a coalition of interested groups bought parcels of land close to Ground Zero in Hiroshima and Nagasaki and then decide to build an Evangelical church on each of these sites, who would oppose them and who would applaud them. Massie, I assume, would be amongst the anguished decriers of the project. Hell, Massie, they only want to pray. What's wrong with that?

Noa Zrk

Baron

"..how many of those suspicious of Islam will cross the line and kiss a mullah?"

Not I m'lud. Not whilst I have breath in m'body.

Frank P

My very last word on the Obamosque and I'll let Bill Whittle say it much more eloquently than I ever could:

http://americandigest.org/mt-archives/american_studies/something_essential_bill.php

Get a glass of something and some nibbles; it's a thirteen minute pièce de résistance Any pusillanimous prick who comes back whining after this afterburn must be afforded the coup de gras by means of a bullet through the forehead to put them out of their misery and prevent their contagious cowardice from disaffecting the credulous.

h/t Gerard Vanderleun (of course).

(duplicated on the other Obamosque threads).

John Norman

The refusal of the left to recognise the truth about the mass murderers' work on 9/11 is a poison as subtly distilled and poured into the self de-educating public's ears as that poured into the ears of Hamlet's father.

The same poison is being fed to us about Gaza - the biggest open prison-camp in the world when it is evident beyond doubt that the description fits one state alone in Asia: North Korea.

Clear Memories

Can somebody explain to me how it is that if I oppose anything the fashionable ones consider a cause, I become a bigot?

I oppose Islam because it opposes freedom. End of. No other reason. I recognise there are Muslims of all skin shades and nationalities. I don't care, I oppose the lot of them.

Opposing blind stupidity is not bigotry.

Rice/Weber had a great line in Jesus Christ Superstar

'If you'd come today, you could have reached a whole nation,
Israel in 4BC had no mass communication"

Well, we have mass communication now and we can see Islam for what it is - a brainwashing cult from 8AD that if it came today would be banned by every civilised nation on the planet.

People like Massie make me sick. Get your foreskin removed, put your wife in a bag and join up. Heavy forbid you might be fashionably gay because then you're in real trouble.

Mike

As an atheist I believe I have the right to question, condem or pass comment on any religion and of course this includes Islam. I also believe I have the right to pass comment on actions I consider provocative whoever makes them. However,l I do not have the right to pay a hit man to take out someone I disagree with and certainly not to kill 4000 people on 9/11. That is the difference between radical Muslims and the rest of us Mr. Massie

Vern

And also: given the gist of this prolix and unconvincing piece of Massie blather, I must say that I am looking forward to the day you reproduce not only the Danish cartoons on this b log, but also the super offensive ones the Imam slipped in. Not that I'm saying you're a hypocrite and a fraud or anything, O holy Massie.

Herbert Thornton

Mike -

I heartily agree with your last three sentences, but not with the first one, where you refer to 'any religion' and add that 'this of course includes Islam'.

I grant that English usage nowadays is different, but I very much incline to believe that the men who enacted the U.S. First Amendment regarded their use of the word 'religion' as meaning 'Christian Religion' and that they would be horrified to think that the word they chose would later be used to guarantee tolerance of non-Christian belief systems.

Thugee (a cult that some people would describe as a religion) was, I understand, eliminated in India by the British but if it were to be revived, ought it be entitled to the protections of the First Amendment?

Unfortunately, merely asking that question makes me suspect that the answer of modern Liberalism would be 'yes'.

JohnAnt

But the Islamic Centre building isn't about 'free speech' at all, is it. It's about providing yet another local bastion for a minority which explicitly condemns freedom of speech, thought and religious expression - and whose aim is expansionist cultural dominance.