Posted on 12/07/2004 7:28:32 PM PST by naturalman1975
IT was one of those extremely rare moments when I found myself agreeing with John Howard. Asked what he thought of Sydney Lord Mayor Clover Moore's reported plans to make Sydney's Christmas celebrations low-key and generic, the Prime Minister slammed them as "silly", "ridiculous" and "political correctness from central casting".
Out of sensitivity for a multicultural society, Moore was reported to have said she did not want the celebrations "to push any one religious belief".
In fact, Moore had said nothing of the sort. Quite the contrary: the council is increasing its Christmas celebration spending this year by 50per cent. The words were spoken by Jeff Fisher, chief executive of fast-food chain Oporto following news that the chain had banned a nativity display from its franchise in Hornsby in northern Sydney. Media had put the words in the wrong mouth, but Howard's assessment of them remained true.
Every Christmas it seems we go through this farce. Last year, Stonnington Council in Melbourne removed the word Christmas from its celebrations and prevented speakers at a carols night from quoting the Bible. Some kindergartens and daycare centres have stopped having Christmas parties, instead having end-of-year or fairy parties.
All this, it seems, is being done to include Australia's religious and cultural minorities. This is supposed to foster social harmony and tolerance.
But it doesn't. It does exactly the opposite. When Channel Seven's Sunrise recently ran an interactive segment on the issue, a common theme in the responses of viewers legitimately aggrieved by this emasculation of Christmas was anger towards minority groups -- especially Muslims -- who were cast as cultural warriors against the majority.
Muslims may not celebrate Christmas but it is ridiculous to suspect they are behind this absurd trend. Jesus is a revered, prophetic figure in Islam and, accordingly, we are the least likely to be offended by other religious groups celebrating his birth. An anti-Christmas campaign is more consistent with aggressive atheism than any Islamic imperative.
In fact, I know no member of any religious minority, Muslim or otherwise, who asked for or even wants this. In my experience, religious minorities are far more concerned that their right to religious expression is respected and protected. That, surely, is a right belonging no less to the majority than to minorities.
Driving Christmas underground only erodes this treasured Australian norm and that is far more troubling to me than any Christmas celebration. I find the idea of restraining religious expression substantially more offensive than I find any nativity display. The impoverishment of Christmas is done more on behalf of religious minorities than by them.
This is where political correctness loses the plot; what purports to inspire tolerance instead inspires hostility and intolerance. Diverse, vibrant and tolerant societies are created by allowing eclectic cultural and religious expressions, celebrations included, to flourish. You don't achieve that by surrendering a culture, replacing it with bland meaninglessness.
Denying the Christianity in Christmas or, worse, doing away with it altogether helps no one. This is not multiculturalism. It is anti-culturalism.
Waleed Aly, a Melbourne lawyer, is a member of the Islamic Council of Victoria executive.
Wrong. I don't mind being challenged at all, but I have lurked long enough to know a fake when I see one. And, as you can see, I am not the only one on this thread to reject your pious statements as window dressing.
So--3,000 is not a significant number for you? Well, be patient my islamic friend. If we don't tighten up our borders, your comment may be prophetic. No pun intended.
Thanks! My conservatism grows stronger every day, thanks to liberal idiocy.
Maybe you should embrace "Festivus" or some other pagan "holiday". That would go a long way towards moving you away from hypocrisy.
I have no problem with you not believing, God gave you that ability to choose, and I appreciate the honesty of people who say so, but,,,CHRISTmas is not a pagan holiday. It's a celebration for CHRISTians. It's insulting for unbelievers to try to make it secular.
Why would you do that?
Do you wish Jews a happy Ramadan?
Of course, he is not defined the same way as Christians define him. In this regard, they don't revere him at all.
The "Jesus" they revere is a mentally unbalanced kook.
First of all, it is NOT bigotry, prejudice, racism (these terms are always trotted out to silence the opposition) to reject islam, a death-cult which brings torture, death, and destruction to many of its adherents, and anyone who gets in their way.
It is NOT acceptable to sugarcoat what is going on. I will not do so. You can call me whatever you want to make me shut up, but I will not be cowed.
I will not submit to the sword of mohammedanism. I will not be a dhimmi.
Islam is a failed way of thinking.
I don't know if you're a nu convert to Christianity, a nu convert to atheism, a nu convert to the aclu way of thinking, a nu convert to the Nahdatual Ulama (NU or traditionalist orthodox Sunni Islam in Indonesia), whatever. It's not important.
What is important is that you are trying to make islam palatable to anyone you can win over.
Islam as it is practiced is antithetical to assimilation with the West.
Until there is a reformation in islam, it will never be acceptable to the majority of civilized westerners.
America is at least 85% Christian, moslems account for about one half of one percent here, and they will have to assimilate to our culture, it will not be the other way around.
If you are not an adherent of that religion, then you should not try to make it acceptable to others, whatever your motivation is.
Oh, and Merry Christmas.
I sympathize with you. My mother died on December 19, 2002; it is still very difficult for me because I have to think of my seven year old, and try not to be sad for her sake. I just want you to know I know what it is like and I empathize with your pain.
Yes, they say Jesus is revered. But they do not consider Jesus the same way the bible considers. Infact, the Book of Jihad or the Muslims are not even sure if Jesus is born to Mary!!! Infact, the violent writer aka the Pedophile that wrote the Book of Jihad is so confused of the lineage of Jesus!!! You can observe this by reading the Book of Jihad. So, you can expect that all they can say being so confused is to say "We respect Jesus and acknowledge him". While in reality they do not consider Jesus as the way the Bible considers him. To someone weak in his cognizant skills, they will fall for this trap of these "anti-infidels". This is how the conversion starts. I come from a country where these anti-infidels are a sizable population. So I am pretty familiar with these tricks they use. Simply, if the Islamists are the majority of a country, then they will convert you forcefully, they will do this for sure either one way or the other. Just look at the life of Coptic Christians in Egypt. These Islamists that practice the so called "peaceful" religion kill them and violate them in unheard ways. Yet these violent practicers of the pedophilic Book of Jihad try to make the gullible Americans that Islam is peaceful!!!!! However, if they are in minority, this is how they lie by dutifully following Taqiyah and saying "oh, no no, Islam is a very peaceful religion. Infact, we do respect Jesus(peace be up on him aka PBUH)..." this is how they will start ensnaring someone who is weak in spirit.
However, on the other hand, as history has seen, they slaughter Christians and Jews exactly how they are supposed to, based on the Quran aka the Book of Jihad's teachings. I will be glad to provide a reference if our friend "nuconvert" is lagging behind reading his Quran aka the Book of Jihad. Now I hope, he doesn't say the English translations of Quran aka the Book of Jihad are inaccurate!!! Because that is the common refuge they will seek when they cannot cut someone's throat that speaks against the violent Book of Jihad.
Thank you. Sorry to hear of your loss, too. Although it's been 8 years now, when this time of year rolls around it's difficult not to think about it. And while I hadn't lived with my parents or been able to be with them at Christmas every year for a while, we had our traditions when we were together and without my father here it's not the same.
Stay strong, time does dull the pain somewhat, eventually.
Excellent summation! Glad to have the air support on this one.
"What is important is that you are trying to make islam palatable to anyone you can win over."
No. What I'm doing is trying to get people to see muslims the same way our military in Iraq must see them. There are "good muslims" and "bad muslims", just as there are good and bad in any religion, ethnicity, etc. Not all muslims are terrorists and extremists and radicals. Muslims can't all be lumped together. There are different sects. When people start labeling all the members of a group without regard to individual's differences, or making distinctions between the members of that group, that type of thinking gets a name. You may not like it.....
The only thing I'm trying to "win people over" to is fairness, religious tolerance, the right for people here to practice their religion in peace, and the idea that there is NO ROOM within the Conservative Movement for people who won't accept that.
Maybe you don't realize that there are muslim FReepers, who are conservative Republicans. These remarks about ALL members of their faith are rude, ignorant, and hurtful.
Thank you for those kind words. It is still pretty raw and she died in so much pain. Plus my father still grieves, they were married quite young and were very close. But God got me through, and He will get me through again. And kind words like yours.
There are enough of us who are not gullible, and are on to this death cult, velo.
We're not falling for it, America is waking up.
Oh, maybe many will never understand the deception that is islam, but enough of us do.
And we won't be told we're bigoted simply because we don't believe the lies they tell us.
Why? Because they probably assume I'm a Christian, and even if I or they are not, we can share the sentiment of the season.
"Maybe you don't realize that there are muslim FReepers, who are conservative Republicans. These remarks about ALL members of their faith are rude, ignorant, and hurtful."
Looks like CAIR trained you really goooood!!!!!
Try harder and harder....we know who the pedophile is that had sex with a 9 year old girl, ehehe!!!
I believe this thread (and I can direct you to others much worse) reveals an increased problem on FR. It seems there are an increased number of newbies (in particular) who don't understand that when William F. Buckley proclaimed that racists, bigots and anti-Semites had no place in the Conservative Movement or the Republican Party, it was to try to remove the "stain" put there during the 50's and 60's. He deliberately separated the George Wallace-types from the Conservative Movement and denounced them from representing or being connected to the philosophy of the Republican Party. This was his greatest "gift" to Republicans. To condone any form of racial or ethnic bigotry feeds into the Left's stereotyping of the Right.
Maybe a thread stating the 'posting rules' more clearly would be helpful?
That would make sense for them to wish YOU a Merry Christmas if they knew you were a Christian.
and even if I or they are not, we can share the sentiment of the season.
The sentiment of the season is "I hope you have a nice holiday celebration of the birth of the Lord and savior of the world, Jesus Christ, God's only son, who came to earth as a gift from God, to reconcile sinners to himself so that we might all be saved from otherwise certain eternal death".
THAT is the sentiment. Why on earth would you wish a Muslim or Jew or pagan or atheist such a greeting? Makes no sense at all.
Maybe we have misjudged you, but perhaps you should have been more intellectually honest in your initial posts. You started on this thread, last night, by making snide remarks. That is certainly no way to engage in reasonable debate, and people are naturally going to respond accordingly. If there are muslim FReepers who truly support conservative principles and this country, then I cannot think they are "good" muslims, who put loyalty to their religion above loyalty to their country. I have spent far too many years on the loony left to get fooled again. And as patriot, a Bush supporter, a Messianic Jew (Jews who believe that Jesus is our savior)AND a Zionist, I am naturally suspicious of posts like yours, and, I don't deny it, of Muslims in general. It is not bigotry that prompted this mistrust, but the actions (or inactions) of the Muslim community. If I am proved wrong someday, I will own it. But so far, I have not seen or heard anything that alters this perception.
Look, most of us know that not ALL moslems are islamofascists.
My point is this, that in spite of that fact, the hard-core fascists of islam are the ones driving that cult.
The rest of the followers won't speak up, out of fear.
Most of us get that.
However, it is wrong to try to make islam acceptable, the islam that we know today, and the islam that has been practiced for centuries. It is just plain wrong.
Until there is a reformation in islam, we don't need it in the West, it's too dissimilar.
Why don't you work on islamics to make them see what's wrong in their culture, instead of trying to make Americans accept what is a failed system?
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