How far?

[visgoth]

CNN.com's current QuickVote is Do you agree with President Obama that Muslims have "the right to build a place of worship" near Ground Zero?
48 percent of current respondants say "No

Comments

[ravenblack]

Another complaint with the poll. Do I have a right to build a place of worship near Ground Zero?

Obviously I don't, because I don't own property there, the right to build whatever you want wherever you want isn't a right anyone has.

So a better question would be "do Muslims who own property near Ground Zero have a right to build a place of worship there?"

To which the answer is "probably not, do they have planning permission to build such a thing? Is their property zoned for it?"

So a better question would be "do Muslims who own property near Ground Zero that is zoned appropriately for building a place of worship and already has approved planning permission for building a place of worship on it have the right to build a place of worship within those approved specifications on that property?"

And then the answer is "duh".

[ravenblack]

An alternative question that might better fit the intent of the poll would be, if they don't already have approved planning permission, "given that a different religion in the same circumstances would get their request for planning permission to build an equivalent place of worship on an equivalent property near Ground Zero approved, should planning permission for a Mosque be granted to Muslims making this equivalent request? And we mean this question (legally/morally/ethically depending on what answer is desired)"

But I suppose saying "HEY THIS IS THE WAY WE ARE BIASED" in your poll might be a little too obvious. Even more too obvious.

[visgoth]

I'll give them a bit of flex based on the benefit of keeping the question short (i.e., people will actually read it). I'm willing to allow that "do you agree with President Obama..." encompasses his stipulation that the rights are subject to local laws and ordinances.

It really baffles me that somehow a statement that equates to "the government cannot arbitrarily deprive citizens of their rights," is somehow equated with "I think it is a good idea for them to do this." Obama specifically avoided commenting on if the facility should or should not be built, yet his statement that people's rights must be protected is taken as wrong-headed by the very people who were screaming our rights would be destroyed in a rain of fire and doom should Obama be elected.

[ravenblack]

Yeah, but "do Muslims have the right" is an outrageous form of the question, as shown by my first example - nobody outright has the right to build something near Ground Zero, there's a whole bunch of prerequisites. I would answer no to the question as asked, and I have no special objection to Muslims or 9/11-related things.

The short form of the question (with the answers reversed) that isn't totally stupid might be "should Muslims be denied the right to build a Mosque on their legally owned property near Ground Zero?"

[ravenblack]

My long answer to the question in that form is "no, but they also shouldn't want to because you know that such a property is likely to get firebombed on a regular basis, and they shouldn't get any special extra police protection against that, only the usual show-up-ten-minutes-later-and-get-told-there's-nothing-we-can-do protection that anyone else gets, and insurance companies certainly have the right to take that risk into account and absolutely deny fire insurance, so they probably shouldn't try to apply their right if they have any sense, but yes, they absolutely should still have the right."