terrorist attack in Paris

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very thoughtful post pp.

Small blurb in today's Post: Judge orders women soldiers to stop accompanying 5 Guantanamo defendents as it is causing them religious distress.
So we have as a society fought for these women's inclusion in the armed forces, prepped and sent them to this locale, and now they are not allowed to perform their duties....because they are women? What am I.missing here??????

Cultural relativism.

Think about how these guys treat women back home, but we are having American women soldiers defer?

Thats like saying that if a woman is arrested in the US she has no right to have a female strip search her because it is a function of male guards job to strip search prisoners.

The women were escorting the prisoners to trial, not strip searching them

+1
It's not the same at all. Imagine if the guards refused to be escorted by black officers. Would the U.S. military cave? I think not. But for some reason women's equality is fine to sacrifice.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very thoughtful post pp.

Small blurb in today's Post: Judge orders women soldiers to stop accompanying 5 Guantanamo defendents as it is causing them religious distress.
So we have as a society fought for these women's inclusion in the armed forces, prepped and sent them to this locale, and now they are not allowed to perform their duties....because they are women? What am I.missing here??????

Cultural relativism.

Think about how these guys treat women back home, but we are having American women soldiers defer?

Thats like saying that if a woman is arrested in the US she has no right to have a female strip search her because it is a function of male guards job to strip search prisoners.

The women were escorting the prisoners to trial, not strip searching them

+1
It's not the same at all. Imagine if the guards refused to be escorted by black officers. Would the U.S. military cave? I think not. But for some reason women's equality is fine to sacrifice.

Sorry, meant "prisoners", not "guards", clearly.

[Anonymous]

I was just reminded that we used to watch Cabu on a TV show for kids when we were little.
There was one really awesome bit where he would show a half-finished drawing, and then ask the kids to send in what they thought the rest of the drawing should be. The following week he would announce some of the responses and then draw what he had in mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SpnzlC9Jb7Y

These bastards might as well have killed Santa Claus.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
No one here is blaming "muslims and Islam" for this. People here are blaming radical Islamic terrorists. The same way we'd be blaming radical right-wing Christian terrorists if they shot up the place or any other group. Pretending this attack isn't connected to *some offshoot* of Islam is silly.

In fact, I have deleted multiple posts that blamed the attacks on Islam. I simply will not stand for that sort of post and remove them if/when I see them.

In response to the query as to why I posted the religion of the Muslim police officer and didn't post about the other two police officers, it is because I am completely prejudiced in favor of Muslims and don't give a shit about anyone else. No, that's actually not it, though it appears to be what was being suggested. The explanation is much more simple. I saw in my Twitter feed that the officer was Muslim. I didn't see anything about either other officer until I read it here. Despite all my efforts, I am still not able to post things I don't know.

Yet we're supposed to know about deleted posts. Okay. Interesting.

Calm down. I didn't suggest you should know. I was informing you because I assumed that you didn't know.

I don't need to be told to calm down. I'm very calm. It's condescending and unwarranted.

I apologize. I should have said, "Don't be so sensitive."

Not sensitive either. If you read my other comments in this thread, you'll see I'm quite rational. I noted an apparent contradiction in your statements. That implies nothing about my emotional state. I do object to men frequently characterizing women who disagree with them as needing to "calm down" or being "too sensitive", though. I don't know if you personally do that regularly or not, but I'll note it when I see it.

You are not doing a particularly good job of demonstrating your lack of sensitivity. By the way, I had no idea whether you are male or female and actually had assumed you were male. Had I known you were female, I would have told you to shut up and make me a sandwich (joking, joking, joking, I swear I am joking). A need to be calm and less sensitive is not something that I attribute to one sex over the other. Members of both sexes can stand to do both.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Not sensitive either. If you read my other comments in this thread, you'll see I'm quite rational. I noted an apparent contradiction in your statements. That implies nothing about my emotional state. I do object to men frequently characterizing women who disagree with them as needing to "calm down" or being "too sensitive", though. I don't know if you personally do that regularly or not, but I'll note it when I see it.

You are not doing a particularly good job of demonstrating your lack of sensitivity. By the way, I had no idea whether you are male or female and actually had assumed you were male. Had I known you were female, I would have told you to shut up and make me a sandwich (joking, joking, joking, I swear I am joking). A need to be calm and less sensitive is not something that I attribute to one sex over the other. Members of both sexes can stand to do both.


"Butthurt" poster here. Way to dig yourself in, Jeff! You found several more ways, in several new sentences, to keep telling her to "calm down." Meanwhile you're not exactly ignoring her, instead you keep coming back to argue your side and to tell her to calm down again. I've been there: it's passive aggressive, it can be intimidating when it comes from the moderator, but most of all, it was uncalled for the first time you said it.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
You are not doing a particularly good job of demonstrating your lack of sensitivity. By the way, I had no idea whether you are male or female and actually had assumed you were male. Had I known you were female, I would have told you to shut up and make me a sandwich (joking, joking, joking, I swear I am joking). A need to be calm and less sensitive is not something that I attribute to one sex over the other. Members of both sexes can stand to do both.

"Butthurt" poster here. Way to dig yourself in, Jeff! You found several more ways, in several new sentences, to keep telling her to "calm down." Meanwhile you're not exactly ignoring her, instead you keep coming back to argue your side and to tell her to calm down again. I've been there: it's passive aggressive, it can be intimidating when it comes from the moderator, but most of all, it was uncalled for the first time you said it.

Ironic that you are posting this in a thread in which the right to be offensive is being so strongly defended. I was using humor. Doesn't that make it okay?

[Anonymous]

They will publish one million copies of Charlie Hebdo next week, instead of the usual 60,000 copies.
It would be great if there were a way to pre-purchase them online. Some of us can have friends buy them for us but I imagine lots of people across the world would like to buy one and have it sent to them.

[Anonymous]

According to a poll released today, 57% of Germans consider Islam to be a threat, and 61% think it's incompatible with western values (up from 52% in 2012).

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Muslima wrote:

Anonymous wrote:CNN just said that Charlie will be published next week and instead of 60,000 copies printed, there will be one million.

I find some of the cartoons questionable but I would gladly purchase a copy if I could.

And Yasir Qadhi couldn't have said it better:

"Can you imagine if a racist cartoon, or an anti-Semitic cartoon, caused some physical attack, that news agencies around the globe would reprint those cartoons?!
Somehow, when it comes to offensive images against Muslims, it becomes necessary to display those images continuously in order to make a point: "You had better allow us to say and do whatever we will, without the least care and concern of decency and morals!"
Again, this is NOT to justify these brutal attacks, but it is to point out the double standards that do seem to exist when it comes to mocking Islam. It will come as absolutely no surprise to us to find out that a satirist in the EXACT SAME newspaper was fired, and then put on trial, for an anti-Semitic article that he had written (See: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/…/French-cartoonist-Sine-on-tria…). And previously, I had quoted a story of a similar nature regarding the Danish cartoon controversy: the same newspaper had refused to print cartoons mocking the Holocaust.
There is no doubt that killing these cartoonists is not allowed (firstly, the entire issue of blasphemy laws and its application in the modern world of nation-states is being discussed by leading scholars, and there are multiple views on this; secondly, all those who quote incidents from the Seerah: I reiterate, it is impermissible for a person to take the 'law' into his own hands and be judge, jury and executioner even in an Islamic land - how much more so when Muslim minorities are living in a land that is not ruled by their laws).
At the same time, it is also idiotic to continue provoking a group of people who have a long list of their own internal and external political and social grievances that stretch back for many decades (here I mean the N. African Muslim population of France), and then expect that nothing will happen.
As usual, we are stuck between a rock and a hard stone. On the one hand, we have the excesses of our own internal angry followers, who always justify every violence because of what 'they' have done, and on the other hand we have the arrogance, intransigence and hypocrisy of segments of the Western world, who cannot see that they as well have a huge part to play in the rising tide of anger and violence."

Nope. Sorry. No. You don't get to say it's idiotic to have offensive satire about Islam. No. You don't. That same publication had satire about Catholicism, Judaism, etc. There's no special targeting of Muslims. And you don't get to say "well, if you satirize Muslims, you're idiots not to expect violence". No.
The truth isn't that people make a point of satirizing Muslims. The point is that EVERYONE gets satirized. And only Muslims seem to get violent about that.
If your God can't deal with satire, your God is too small.

+1. I love how some muslims like to pick and choose what to get incensed about. Somehow it was ok for these terrorists to go completely against their religion and view child porn, drink, use drugs and commit crimes. Yet it was absolutely not ok (to the point that you have to kill!) to see cartoons violating their religion. Guess what? You cannot control how other people view you, your religion, and choose to talk about it. It's not persecution. It's a matter of life. Suck it up and move on. Since when it's ok to expect murder as a price to pay when you disagree with someone?

I think the point of the post Muslima quoted is valid. Why does demonstrating support for freedom of expression require publishing offensive cartoons? I understand sticking it to the terrorists, but is it necessary to offend non-terrorists in the process? I don't remember newspapers publishing photos from Hustler after Larry Flynt was shot. This is like the point I was trying to make yesterday. It is one thing to say that you disagree with what someone says, but defend their right to say it. It is a completely different story when you are the one saying it.

I see that point, but I think in this case it's inapposite. In fact, articles writing about the Hustler free speech case *did* show the content of the cartoon. It was right there in my law school textbook (one of the few memorable things). The situation is that some people killed some cartoonist/journalists because of content that offended their religious beliefs. I think that the content of the supposed motivation for the attacks is part of that story, so it would seem odd to censor it when telling that story.
I would never have published cartoons like this in a fictional world where I had a magazine to publish, *before this attack*, because I do think they're somewhat offensive (though seem to be equal-opportunity offensive to so many groups, not just one or two) and it's not something that seems particularly interesting to me. But if I were a newspaper publisher now, I totally would, because they're part of a very newsworthy story.

I think you are confusing two separate things. The free speech case involving Jerry Falwell and Larry Flynt was about a cartoon. I am not surprised that the cartoon was published in law school textbooks. But, I pretty sure it was not published by the mainstream media that is now publishing anti-Muslim cartoons. But, I was actually talking about Larry Flynt getting shot, which is separate from the lawsuit. The shooter was upset because of interracial photos in the magazine. Nobody would expect the Washington Post to publish those X-rated photos to show that Larry Flynt's free expression wouldn't be infringed upon by someone with a gun. Ironically, nobody would expect the Post to publish x-rated photos because they would offend the Post's readers. But, apparently, offending Muslims is no big deal.

Also, I would distinguish between publishing the cartoons as a means of demonstrating the type of drawings published by CH and publishing the drawings as an act of solidarity. As a news item, I think a range of drawings -- not only those about Muslims -- should be shown. A full understanding of CH requires knowing how it represents Jews and Christians. Otherwise, a distorted view of the magazine would be presented. But, again, the media wouldn't want to show a cartoon captioned "Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost" that illustrates the trinity with a drawing of males engaged in anal intercourse. That would offend someone other than Muslims.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
You are not doing a particularly good job of demonstrating your lack of sensitivity. By the way, I had no idea whether you are male or female and actually had assumed you were male. Had I known you were female, I would have told you to shut up and make me a sandwich (joking, joking, joking, I swear I am joking). A need to be calm and less sensitive is not something that I attribute to one sex over the other. Members of both sexes can stand to do both.

"Butthurt" poster here. Way to dig yourself in, Jeff! You found several more ways, in several new sentences, to keep telling her to "calm down." Meanwhile you're not exactly ignoring her, instead you keep coming back to argue your side and to tell her to calm down again. I've been there: it's passive aggressive, it can be intimidating when it comes from the moderator, but most of all, it was uncalled for the first time you said it.

Ironic that you are posting this in a thread in which the right to be offensive is being so strongly defended. I was using humor. Doesn't that make it okay?

Telling her that she isn't helping her case, and wrapping up with some more stuff about calming down, is humor? Well you learn something every day! Or, you're being passive aggressive. I'll give you this: there was humor sandwiched in the middle.

Yes, it's ironic. Or maybe not. I guess I feel like you have, in the past, unfairly challenged my right to question some of Muslima's more dodgy statements. While Muslima brings a new perspective, sometimes she's full of it, whether she's your pet or not. No, you never banned me or kicked me off DCUM. But I interpreted the moderator's challenge to my right to speak my mind (and to challenge Muslima's more egregious claims) as a form of aggression. No kidding, and I've seen other DCUM users say similar things. People who get slammed by you wonder if they're going to be the next person you out, like that thrift shop owner or the GMU student.

Now maybe we can move on. Perhaps you can address my earlier post asking why you said Muslima's quote made a good point - but you ignored one of its key themes, which is that the journalists should have been smart enough to cave in to threats of violence. And whether the point of the cartoons was not to deliberately insult people, but rather to defy those who are threatening violence.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Very thoughtful post pp.

Small blurb in today's Post: Judge orders women soldiers to stop accompanying 5 Guantanamo defendents as it is causing them religious distress.
So we have as a society fought for these women's inclusion in the armed forces, prepped and sent them to this locale, and now they are not allowed to perform their duties....because they are women? What am I.missing here??????

Cultural relativism.

Think about how these guys treat women back home, but we are having American women soldiers defer?

Thats like saying that if a woman is arrested in the US she has no right to have a female strip search her because it is a function of male guards job to strip search prisoners.

The women were escorting the prisoners to trial, not strip searching them

I just think its interesting that while we mourn charlie hedbo our own freedoms are being quietly chip chipped away at and undermined.

+1
It's not the same at all. Imagine if the guards refused to be escorted by black officers. Would the U.S. military cave? I think not. But for some reason women's equality is fine to sacrifice.

Sorry, meant "prisoners", not "guards", clearly.

[Anonymous]

Sorry my response got absorbed - I think it is interesting that w Charlie hedbo on the front page our own freedoms are govt sanctioned being chipped away at on the back.page.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:
You are not doing a particularly good job of demonstrating your lack of sensitivity. By the way, I had no idea whether you are male or female and actually had assumed you were male. Had I known you were female, I would have told you to shut up and make me a sandwich (joking, joking, joking, I swear I am joking). A need to be calm and less sensitive is not something that I attribute to one sex over the other. Members of both sexes can stand to do both.

"Butthurt" poster here. Way to dig yourself in, Jeff! You found several more ways, in several new sentences, to keep telling her to "calm down." Meanwhile you're not exactly ignoring her, instead you keep coming back to argue your side and to tell her to calm down again. I've been there: it's passive aggressive, it can be intimidating when it comes from the moderator, but most of all, it was uncalled for the first time you said it.

Ironic that you are posting this in a thread in which the right to be offensive is being so strongly defended. I was using humor. Doesn't that make it okay?

Telling her that she isn't helping her case, and wrapping up with some more stuff about calming down, is humor? Well you learn something every day! Or, you're being passive aggressive. I'll give you this: there was humor sandwiched in the middle.

Yes, it's ironic. Or maybe not. I guess I feel like you have, in the past, unfairly challenged my right to question some of Muslima's more dodgy statements. While Muslima brings a new perspective, sometimes she's full of it, whether she's your pet or not. No, you never banned me or kicked me off DCUM. But I interpreted the moderator's challenge to my right to speak my mind (and to challenge Muslima's more egregious claims) as a form of aggression. No kidding, and I've seen other DCUM users say similar things. People who get slammed by you wonder if they're going to be the next person you out, like that thrift shop owner or the GMU student.

Now maybe we can move on. Perhaps you can address my earlier post asking why you said Muslima's quote made a good point - but you ignored one of its key themes, which is that the journalists should have been smart enough to cave in to threats of violence. And whether the point of the cartoons was not to deliberately insult people, but rather to defy those who are threatening violence.

NP. I get that some posters get very upset by Jeff's postings.

From an outside perspective, the pp looked either oversensitive or a jerk.

[jsteele]

Anonymous wrote:
Now maybe we can move on. Perhaps you can address my earlier post asking why you said Muslima's quote made a good point - but you ignored one of its key themes, which is that the journalists should have been smart enough to cave in to threats of violence. And whether the point of the cartoons was not to deliberately insult people, but rather to defy those who are threatening violence.

I disagree that journalists should have caved into the threats of violence. I also disagree that threats of violence should be countered by lifting normal content guidelines. If a newspaper wouldn't have published one of the cartoons last week, it shouldn't publish one of them this week. It is wrong to let people with guns change your behavior one way or the other.

[Anonymous]

jsteele wrote:
I think you are confusing two separate things. The free speech case involving Jerry Falwell and Larry Flynt was about a cartoon. I am not surprised that the cartoon was published in law school textbooks. But, I pretty sure it was not published by the mainstream media that is now publishing anti-Muslim cartoons. But, I was actually talking about Larry Flynt getting shot, which is separate from the lawsuit. The shooter was upset because of interracial photos in the magazine. Nobody would expect the Washington Post to publish those X-rated photos to show that Larry Flynt's free expression wouldn't be infringed upon by someone with a gun. Ironically, nobody would expect the Post to publish x-rated photos because they would offend the Post's readers. But, apparently, offending Muslims is no big deal.

Also, I would distinguish between publishing the cartoons as a means of demonstrating the type of drawings published by CH and publishing the drawings as an act of solidarity. As a news item, I think a range of drawings -- not only those about Muslims -- should be shown. A full understanding of CH requires knowing how it represents Jews and Christians. Otherwise, a distorted view of the magazine would be presented. But, again, the media wouldn't want to show a cartoon captioned "Father, Son, and the Holy Ghost" that illustrates the trinity with a drawing of males engaged in anal intercourse. That would offend someone other than Muslims.

Yes, it's obviously an act of solidarity. I don't understand why you're busy trying to make various semantic distinctions. I think you have the wrong end of the stick here.The cartoons against Muslims are the cartoons that elicited threats of violence and that eventually led to the murders. The cartoons about the Pope didn't lead to mass murder. So solidarity is going to involve cartoons about Islam and not about the Pope. Republishing the cartoons is not about defying the Pope, it's about defying Muslim radicals.

Why should the Pope be insulted all over again because some Muslims killed the cartoonists? I don't get that logic.

As for the Larry Flint thing. As you said, those photos were X-rated (like your Trinity example) -- as opposed to the CH cartoons, which I agree were bigotted stereotypes, but the dozen or so I saw were not x-rated. Are you arguing that the Post should take up posting Xrated photos, in order to ensure equality of acts of solidarity?

Also, Flint was killed by a loner. The lone killer is dead, and he can no longer intimidate anybody or be discouraged by mass publication of the offensive photos. Whereas, the threat against freedom of speech in those cartoons continues.

And.... now it's somebody else's turn to call you "butthurt." What's with the childish grumbling about offending "someone other than Muslims"? Really, grow up. Also, that's not even correct. CH publishes lots of cartoons aimed at Christians, Jews, and many others. Heck, it's open season on Catholics every day here at DCUM, with constant quips from one poster in particular about how every single priest wants to screw kids - yet you're completely unbothered by that, apparently. (Why? Oh, who cares. Carry on ignoring the people who are just as scatological about Wiccans and Catholics every day on your own website.)