Posted on 02/05/2006 4:58:10 AM PST by governsleastgovernsbest
by Mark Finkelstein February 5, 2006 - 07:51
Hey, I'm a multi-culturalist. I'm happy to see people observing their various religious holidays, from Christmas to Chanukah to Ramadan. But somehow, my multicultural enthusiasms run out of steam when it comes to . . . condoning the sacking of foreign embassies.
Not Julian Phillips. The co-host of Fox & Friends Weekend blithely condoned the current rioting and burning of foreign embassies around the world by Muslims angered by depictions of the Prophet Mohammed. His explanation-by-way-of-excuse: "different religion, different culture."
In the course of the show's opening segment, Fox's Yasmina Ykelenstam reported live from Beirut, where rioters had set fire to the Danish embassy. She reported that there has been violence across the city, including at the Norwegian embassy, and cars smashed and burned. Back in the studio, Kiran Chetry reported that in Damascus, Syria, rioters had also set fire to the Danish embassy.
Co-host Page Hopkins then opined: "I've seen these cartoons and don't find them that offensive when you see other things that are depicted." Hopkins was presumably referring, among other things, to the kind of vile anti-Semitic cartoons that, as here, are frequently published in the Arab media.
Phillips took exception to Hopkins' remarks: "Oh, Page. You put a bomb on the top of Jesus and I'm offended."
Hopkins: "I am too, but does it incite that kind of violence in the Christian community?"
That's when Phillips began his multi-culti riff:
"You can't compare apples and oranges. We're two different kinds of people. It's blasphemy to even show the Prophet Mohammed. This is how they're responding, hey," literally shrugging it off.
Page, seemingly sensing that she might have put her foot in it with her remark that she didn't find the cartoons "that offensive," decided to 'revise and extend her remarks' in these terms:
"Just to clear up what I said. It is offensive to depict Mohammed in a comic. However, what I was trying to say was I think the reaction is really upsetting. There's a double standard here, we're all tip-toeing around it. Jesus is depicted in blasphemous ways all the time in the media, and Christians are made fun of all the time and you never get this kind of outcry."
Phillips again rode to the rioters defense: "As I said, it's two different religions, two different cultures."
Chetry put things in proper perspective: "It's a double standard. You can't condone this kind of violence."
Yes, I heard him, too. I will give Kirin credit for asking the question, which, as you say, he dodged and went native.
i just saw that last weekend for the first time, and i went OFF. that is the most ridiculous thing i have ever seen and just wildly inappropriate, IMO!
I saw part of the referenced segment in which he said:"You put a bomb on the top of Jesus and I'm offended." My first impression was that he is a Christian. My second impression was that he would express his repulsion in a verbal and civilized manner while the Islamist fanatics express their repulsion in a physical and uncivilized manner.
I am not an admirer, but I think he is unfairly taking too much heat over this.
The point I was trying to make is that Phillips was excusing the Muslim rioting, explaining it away in terms of their different religion and culture.
We have pried open the soft underbelly of the beast!
Don't stop now!
DRAW MORE CARTOONS!!!
Then the world will begin to see this trash for the Nazis that they are.
DRAW MORE CARTOONS!!!
ALL ARTISTS TO THEIR PALLETTES!
What's the email address? Every time I go to the site to find it it's buried somewhere and I get frustrated. I'd like to send them an email also complaining about Phillips.
p.s. I don't like the commercial either.
More importantly, when can we expect FOX to fire his sorry A$$?
Phillips displaying the soft bigotry of low expecations.
Who'd'a thunk it.
"I'll have the roast duck with mango salsa."
OMG! ROFLMAO!
So what we get is strangely grating, unpredictable and disconcerting. Julian doesn't play the middle, he IS the middle.
I viewed it more as an explanation than an excuse. Of course, I did not see the entire discussion.
Sorry about that. I read your message, quickly composed and posted my reply, then went back and re-read your message and noticed you had requested a private reply. I sincerely apologize.
Phillips was/is making excuses.
It may be a part of Muslim culture to protest violently by harming people and destroying property, but it should not be condoned or shrugged away. It should be soundly condemned, just like the culture of uncivilized people who practiced child sacrifice or cannibalism.
I said I had only caught a brief segment of the show.
Exactly. Phillips will take one step forward, two steps back.
For example, after his original apologia, he tried to backtrack, claiming he isn't condoning the rioting. But with his next breath, he said "since people know how Muslims are going to react, they shouldn't have run the cartoons."
Julian would never have advised MLK, Jr., nor of course should he have, "don't go marching in Alabama. In light of southern white culture, it will only incite them to violence."
I heard that c**p coming out of Julian's mouth this morning too..
Wanted to comment on it but still struggle with "teh 133t haxxor" skills to put all of it together..
It's part of FOXNews's strategy to be "fair and balanced" I suppose, but I wish they would get rid of these Liberal apologists and become a "real" conservative news network..
Excellent point, randita. We can understand that a culture responds differently, but that is not an excuse. Just as I have to overcome my intense desire to punch certain people with whom I disagree (Julian Phillips comes to mind), Muslims should be taught to overcome their desire for mayhem and destruction as a form of protest.
And I understand your point about how Phillips could've been understood. And I'd be willing to give hime the benefit of the doubt. But I've caught the discussion this morning more than once and there's no mistaking what Phillips means: that excuses should be made for Muslims. And I find that attitude appalling and incredibly offensive on a number of levels.
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