Islamic Countries Seek Ban on Insults at The United Nations

The Washington Times ^ | Monday, September 24, 2012 | Guy Taylor

[DogByte6RER]

Muslim-led nations seek ban on insult

As the U.N. General Assembly convenes this week in New York, several leaders of mostly Muslim nations are suggesting that the world body consider sanctions on blasphemy, amid widespread protests against an amateur movie that denigrates Islam’s Prophet Muhammad.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he will focus at least part of his remarks on the film when he addresses the U.N. General Assembly on Tuesday.

“I am the prime minister of a nation, of which most are Muslims, that has declared anti-Semitism a crime against humanity. But the West hasn’t recognized Islamophobia as a crime against humanity. It has encouraged it,” Mr. Erdogan told reporters last week.

Turkey heads the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, a body of 57 nations, which has long pushed for a U.N. resolution condemning the “defamation of religion.”

Nonbinding versions of the resolution have been adopted, but the effort was crushed last year by religious groups and human rights activists who argued that it represented a dangerous step toward an international law against free speech.

The debate has been reignited by “Innocence of Muslims,” a crudely produced film made in the United States that has sparked fury in the Muslim world. Protesters have breached the walls at U.S. embassies and desecrated American flags in sometimes violent demonstrations. A protest in the eastern Libyan city of Benghazi ended with the deaths of the U.S. ambassador and three other Americans.

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton appealed Monday to Muslims to show “dignity” and not resort to violence as they protest the film, the Associated Press reported.

“Dignity does not come from avenging insults, especially with violence that can never be justified,” Mrs. Clinton said at her husband’s Clinton Global Initiative.

[SERKIT]

What do you think of this kind of satire...

Satire is clearly imbedded and protected by free speech. What I am afraid of is that all free speech is in jeopardy when we see out gubmint going to the UN in support of the suppression of free speech, and VERY disturbed that an Army general contacted a pastor to suppress his speech about Mohammedans. We seem to be clicking through that pesky document known as the Constitution's Bill of Rights and eroding them. This is the same document that our President wrongly refers to as a "charter of negative liberties". The Second Amendment is necessary to protect the First Amendment.

We are fighting an ideology that has declared war on America, and America refuses to engage in the fight. This is worse than the common definition of assymetric conflict in that we don't seem to recognize that these idiots could win using the tools and freedoms in our own founding documents to hide behind their version of free speech.