Mosque follies

[erudito]

If one reads a commentator such as Prof. Stephen Walt, the controversy over the mosque near Ground Zero is a very simple matter. Opponents of the mosque proposal are preaching demagogic anti-Muslim intolerance and are therefore simply wrong. Or, as he says:
You know that someone is engaged in demagoguery when they keep using demonstrably false but

Comments

[fizzyland]

It doesn't help, calling people useful idiots, it just leads to more polarized viewpoints. If there is sinister financing behind the project, then I expect the anti-terrorist apparatus within the U.S. govt. to take action. Otherwise, it's just a lot of unfounded b.s.

I keep reading back and forth and I've yet to find any reason not to allow the builders their Constitutional rights. But then, I'm kind of anti-religious so I can't really buy into the 'Burlington Coat Factory is sacred ground because a plane grazed it' arguments. It offends people, it makes them afraid, six months after it's been built, we'll likely never hear about it again.

[jordan179]

If there is sinister financing behind the project, then I expect the anti-terrorist apparatus within the U.S. govt. to take action. Otherwise, it's just a lot of unfounded b.s.

Your argument is that a threat by definition can't be real unless the US government is currently taking action against it?

Well, let's see, by that logic, the people in the hijacked airliners should have simply disbelieved in the threat from Al Qaeda on 9-11. I'm sure that if they'd explained your theory to reality, the hijackers would have just vanished in a puff of logic, saving the day. That would have saved a lot of lives!

[catsidhe]

That's a bullshit excuse for an argument, even for you.

So you and the Fox News Commentariat have decided that this community center is being funded by terrorist organisations.

Strangely enough, it's illegal to receive funding from terrorist organisations.

I'm sure you can arrange proof enough to have the project shut down. I mean, surely you have evidence beyond Glen Beck's blackboard.

Right?

[enrobso]

They just don't get it.

I got the joke about terrorist funding in relation to Fox. Cheers to John Stewart's researchers for that one.

[marycatelli]

why in blue blazes wouldn't the militants do so? Cheap way of eliminating apostates.

[cutelildrow]

This assumes that the militants don't simply declare the mosque as part of a 'westernized' or 'minority' sect, or some other form of sophistry, and bomb even fellow Muslims in the mosque to hell

Sacred ground means nothing to an extremist, but as a means to put additional hurt on their targets and victims.

(edited to add: I used to think they'd at least respect that it's, well, a MOSQUE, and not blow it up or something... but it's fast showing that they don't hold anything sacred. Not even their own religious symbols.)

[fizzyland]

The Pentagon has one, it's been there for years.

[villana]

Forgive my confusion/ignorance (I find the issue a bit yawn worthy and start tuning out) but I wondered about your statement "building a mosque on land that is only available due to the damage caused by 9/11".
I thought it was an existing building, currently in use as some sort of community centre that they were hoping to convert. Did I get that wrong?

Also, I thought there was another mosque actually closer to the ground zero site already.

[jordan179]

It's an old Burlington Coat Factory building, which is available for demolition because the landing gear from one of the planes that hit the WTC fell on it. And no, the other mosques in Manhattan are not closer to the site.

(for one thing, pretty much everything within a block or two of the site was wrecked when the towers fell down).

[villana]

aaahh OK. Thanks, I get it now.
=)

[fizzyland]

It still won't be visible from the actual ground zero, where a proposed Sacred Office Building will eventually be constructed. Muslims may work in said SOB, leading to future broadcasting fodder for the reactionary right.

[kenshi]

My attitude toward the whole Ground Zero Mosque kerfluffle can be summarized in the following sentence:

When idiots fight one another over something stupid, we all win.

Smile

[erudito]

ROFL :)

[enrobso]

Long time since I've popped in to visit here and I'm rather saddened by this post