To: Muentzer2005
You mention Islam. We are all aware that some adherents to that religion commit murder and suicide because of things written by their prophet. Would you defend his writing as the exercise of free speech?
To: gas0linealley
I would not ban the Coran if that is what you asking me, no.
Ideas are defeated, ridiculed, marginalized, not banned.
(it only increases their allure)
To: gas0linealley
I don't know about Muentzer, but I'll answer "Yes". First of all, suicide bombers don't blow themselves up "because" of Mohammed. They aren't robots. They decide for themselves that they're going slaughter innocent people. Human beings are responsible for their own beliefs as well as their own actions. Mohammed preached what I view as a violent and dangerous religion.
Now, if you're saying that Mohammed had no right to free speech because he lived centuries before the Constitution and the Bill of Rights were written, wrong again. As an American, I know that our Creator endowed in us, as human beings, certain unalienable rights, one of which is liberty. Note I said our Creator, as in God, not the government. These rights are the universal heritage of mankind, and they don't just apply to Americans. Now, I don't believe it is the responsibility of the U.S. government to protect the rights of everyone on Earth, that's not what we created it for. But our normative right to liberty as men exists prior to and independent of the Bill of Rights, and Mohammed ought to have had that right, whether he knew it or not, just as you or I do.
The moment we start picking and choosing which forms of speech are protected and which aren't, we negate the entire principle of free speech.
To: gas0linealley
You mention Islam. We are all aware that some adherents to that religion commit murder and suicide because of things written by their prophet. Would you defend his writing as the exercise of free speech? In many Muslim countries disparaging of Muhammad or denial of Koran is a crime. Are you guilty of this crime?
100 posted on
02/16/2007 6:43:20 AM PST by
A. Pole
(Lord Palmerston: "Nations have no permanent enemies or allies only permanent interests")
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson