Gay Pride Event Offends Muslims, How Is This Different From Koran-Burning Offending Muslims?
The following started as a response to a post's of cutelildrow at
http://cutelildrow.livejournal.com/2374591.html
in which she referenced the fact that Pakistanis, in Pakistan, are now demonstrating against an LGBT event hosted by the US Embassy.
KARACHI - Islamists held rallies in major Pakistani cities Monday to denounce a gay rights event hosted last month by the United States embassy, calling for a "holy war" against ally Washington.
Around 100 demonstrators in the southern port city of Karachi protested, calling the meeting "an assault on Pakistan's Islamic culture", while there were similar demonstrations in the capital Islamabad and in Lahore.
Well, clearly since we must respect the Muslim Street and the Muslim Street has spoken, in order to improve our diplomatic relations with Pakistan and other Muslim countries the US Government should cease and desist any support for LGBT events. Or at least not protect them should rightfully-outraged Muslims choose to punish the protestors. I mean, these Gay Pride parades are offensive and are viewed all around the world ... heck, we held this one in Pakistan (albiet on American soil in Pakistan) ...
Oh, nobody likes this argument? Then why were some people ok with this when it came to burning Korans?
http://jordan179.livejournal.com/182895.html
Specifically, marmoe, who said
Perfectly. The consequences they'll have to live with is that others will pay the price for their provocation. Just like kicking someone, who you know will lash out at anyone within reach when provoked, in the butt and then hiding behind a counter, leaving others to take a beating. But hey, they did not raise a hand, so they are innocent, aren't they? I dearly love those cowardly stokers of hate.
It seems to me that this argument makes even more sense applied to the Embassy LGBT event, which after all was carried out by a formal diplomatic embassy to a Muslim nation. Why not?
Oh, because book-burning is a deliberate act of offensiveness which protects no one, while a gay rights event is meant to increase gay pride rather than offend people? Sorry, there's at least two things wrong with that. First, to many Muslims an expression of support for gays is an insult to their religion, which demands that gays be stoned to death, rather than supported. This is the exact same reason why Bible burning shouldn't be stopped but Koran burning should be stopped, according to the appeasers). Secondly, gay pride events often DO have an "in your face" attitude toward conventional morality (as I've lived in both New York and San Francisco and have attended some of these events, I know whereof I speak). This second reason was precisely why marmoe argued that
Terry Jones' Koran burning was deliberately offensive and hence immoral, specifically
Any ideas, as to why Terry Jones Koran burning was given prominence in the news in the first place? It's a congregation of about 50 people. They want to kick the Muslims in the groins? It's their right and it's their right to live with the consequences.
Indeed, kishiriadgr rather cluelessly and hilariously made the argument
I'd be willing to just laugh this all off as "hahaha, look at this troll war between Phelps and Jones, and the media is enabling them, hahahaha" except unlike you I don't brush off Petraeus's warning with a "if the terrorists want to take it out on our troops, bring it on". It's not that simple, Jordan, and maybe one of these days you'll realize why.
...
Me, I'm spending today at Pagan Pride, which I think may be the sanest event in town today.
apparently not grasping that paganism is one of the many "offenses against Islam" which Muslims believe should be punishable by death. Pagans don't even get the option of dhimmitude -- they may be killed instantly at the whim of the Faithful, and it is no crime under shari'a for any Muslim to do so. By the same logic, any Western "pagan pride" event is offensive and should be at least disapproved on by lovers of peace with Muslim nations.
The normally-reasonable unixronin argued that
I have a problem with the idea of performing an action which (a) will accomplish nothing useful for anyone, except for getting him publicity; (b) will be deliberately incredibly offensive to all Muslims worldwide, including the ones who are friendly to us; and (c) would perpetuate a perception of Americans as lacking in respect for other cultures. I have more of a problem with it when the guy doing it dismisses the importance of any risk so posed to Americans overseas (largely, I suspect, because he wouldn't have been personally at risk).
I do not for one moment think that we need to bend over backward to avoid offending people of other faiths and cultures. But that doesn't mean it's a good idea to go out of our way to offend them.
If holding a Gay Pride event at the US Embassy in Pakistan isn't "going out of our way to offend" the Pakistanis, then what is?
And, before anyone brings this up. I support LGBT rights (not as "special rights," I simply believe that LGBT people should be granted the same civil rights as any other people, and that homosexuality and transexuality should not be discriminated against under the law). My point is that both the right to symbolically burn one's own books and the right to express one's own sexuality are subsets of the right to freedom of expression, and that when other countries become offended by our exercise of this right on our own soil, we don't have a problem. They do.
The point of the American Armed Forces is to defend our Constitutional rights. These rights are why America's worth defending. And if we yield these rights on one issue, because we fear harm to our forces or our country, then we cannot guarantee that it will be only on that one issue.
Appeasement has a momentum. The Bad Guys saw our weak response over the Koran-burning incident. So they were emboldened. Now, they want us to stop supporting gay rights.
Where will it end, if we continue to appease them? In the enforcement of shari'a on Americans without their consent, which is why we can't keep appeasing them.
Better that we turn and make a stand now, while we're strong and accustomed to victory and they're weak and accustomed to defeat. Because the longer that we pay moral tribute to them, the more they will accept it as their right, and the less likely that they will take us seriously when we do make our stand. Which will mean more bloodshed, not less, as America wreaks her revenge on the very same people whom the appeasers sought to placate.
Hurt feelings, or napalm burns, shrapnel wounds, and mangling by overpressure? It's our choice which the "Muslim street" will suffer.
Let's choose the less violent course.
http://cutelildrow.livejournal.com/2374591.html
in which she referenced the fact that Pakistanis, in Pakistan, are now demonstrating against an LGBT event hosted by the US Embassy.
KARACHI - Islamists held rallies in major Pakistani cities Monday to denounce a gay rights event hosted last month by the United States embassy, calling for a "holy war" against ally Washington.
Around 100 demonstrators in the southern port city of Karachi protested, calling the meeting "an assault on Pakistan's Islamic culture", while there were similar demonstrations in the capital Islamabad and in Lahore.
Well, clearly since we must respect the Muslim Street and the Muslim Street has spoken, in order to improve our diplomatic relations with Pakistan and other Muslim countries the US Government should cease and desist any support for LGBT events. Or at least not protect them should rightfully-outraged Muslims choose to punish the protestors. I mean, these Gay Pride parades are offensive and are viewed all around the world ... heck, we held this one in Pakistan (albiet on American soil in Pakistan) ...
Oh, nobody likes this argument? Then why were some people ok with this when it came to burning Korans?
http://jordan179.livejournal.com/182895.html
Specifically, marmoe, who said
Perfectly. The consequences they'll have to live with is that others will pay the price for their provocation. Just like kicking someone, who you know will lash out at anyone within reach when provoked, in the butt and then hiding behind a counter, leaving others to take a beating. But hey, they did not raise a hand, so they are innocent, aren't they? I dearly love those cowardly stokers of hate.
It seems to me that this argument makes even more sense applied to the Embassy LGBT event, which after all was carried out by a formal diplomatic embassy to a Muslim nation. Why not?
Oh, because book-burning is a deliberate act of offensiveness which protects no one, while a gay rights event is meant to increase gay pride rather than offend people? Sorry, there's at least two things wrong with that. First, to many Muslims an expression of support for gays is an insult to their religion, which demands that gays be stoned to death, rather than supported. This is the exact same reason why Bible burning shouldn't be stopped but Koran burning should be stopped, according to the appeasers). Secondly, gay pride events often DO have an "in your face" attitude toward conventional morality (as I've lived in both New York and San Francisco and have attended some of these events, I know whereof I speak). This second reason was precisely why marmoe argued that
Terry Jones' Koran burning was deliberately offensive and hence immoral, specifically
Any ideas, as to why Terry Jones Koran burning was given prominence in the news in the first place? It's a congregation of about 50 people. They want to kick the Muslims in the groins? It's their right and it's their right to live with the consequences.
Indeed, kishiriadgr rather cluelessly and hilariously made the argument
I'd be willing to just laugh this all off as "hahaha, look at this troll war between Phelps and Jones, and the media is enabling them, hahahaha" except unlike you I don't brush off Petraeus's warning with a "if the terrorists want to take it out on our troops, bring it on". It's not that simple, Jordan, and maybe one of these days you'll realize why.
...
Me, I'm spending today at Pagan Pride, which I think may be the sanest event in town today.
apparently not grasping that paganism is one of the many "offenses against Islam" which Muslims believe should be punishable by death. Pagans don't even get the option of dhimmitude -- they may be killed instantly at the whim of the Faithful, and it is no crime under shari'a for any Muslim to do so. By the same logic, any Western "pagan pride" event is offensive and should be at least disapproved on by lovers of peace with Muslim nations.
The normally-reasonable unixronin argued that
I have a problem with the idea of performing an action which (a) will accomplish nothing useful for anyone, except for getting him publicity; (b) will be deliberately incredibly offensive to all Muslims worldwide, including the ones who are friendly to us; and (c) would perpetuate a perception of Americans as lacking in respect for other cultures. I have more of a problem with it when the guy doing it dismisses the importance of any risk so posed to Americans overseas (largely, I suspect, because he wouldn't have been personally at risk).
I do not for one moment think that we need to bend over backward to avoid offending people of other faiths and cultures. But that doesn't mean it's a good idea to go out of our way to offend them.
If holding a Gay Pride event at the US Embassy in Pakistan isn't "going out of our way to offend" the Pakistanis, then what is?
And, before anyone brings this up. I support LGBT rights (not as "special rights," I simply believe that LGBT people should be granted the same civil rights as any other people, and that homosexuality and transexuality should not be discriminated against under the law). My point is that both the right to symbolically burn one's own books and the right to express one's own sexuality are subsets of the right to freedom of expression, and that when other countries become offended by our exercise of this right on our own soil, we don't have a problem. They do.
The point of the American Armed Forces is to defend our Constitutional rights. These rights are why America's worth defending. And if we yield these rights on one issue, because we fear harm to our forces or our country, then we cannot guarantee that it will be only on that one issue.
Appeasement has a momentum. The Bad Guys saw our weak response over the Koran-burning incident. So they were emboldened. Now, they want us to stop supporting gay rights.
Where will it end, if we continue to appease them? In the enforcement of shari'a on Americans without their consent, which is why we can't keep appeasing them.
Better that we turn and make a stand now, while we're strong and accustomed to victory and they're weak and accustomed to defeat. Because the longer that we pay moral tribute to them, the more they will accept it as their right, and the less likely that they will take us seriously when we do make our stand. Which will mean more bloodshed, not less, as America wreaks her revenge on the very same people whom the appeasers sought to placate.
Hurt feelings, or napalm burns, shrapnel wounds, and mangling by overpressure? It's our choice which the "Muslim street" will suffer.
Let's choose the less violent course.