141–150 of 213 posts
Apologies if this is not appropriate for HN. I just find this disturbing and felt that I need to do something.
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> How it doesn't? Well, lets start with the fact that it doesn't say anything about a group of people at all. It specifically speaks to only a few individuals. No where in the content of this video does it advocate any sort of physical or political action against Muslims at large. The fact that some people have decided to take it as a personal attack is immaterial and reading more into what was actually said than is…
The video strongly implies that Muslims as a group are violent (watch the part with the father and daughter early on). It presents Islam's founder as a horrible human being, and a religious fraud. This is not quite as mild as it gets with regard to criticism of religion, but it's pretty close. If this particular video were to be legally actionable, no criticism of a religion where it intersects with testable reality…
Well, they walked right into that one, didn't they. Mobs rioting, setting embassies on fire and killing people etc.
I remember seeing an interview where Chrisiane Amanpour is told by an Iranian member of parliament, "I don't think there is a place in the world where freedom means that people can say whatever they want, where they can lie or make whatever accusation they choose. For example, in the United States, can someone say or write something against their country's national interest and security?" Ms. Amanmpour replies, "Yes. Yes, they can".
Here is the clip:
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"The oath is to protect the Constitution." Are you insinuating they've violated the Constitution somehow?
I am saying that the White House tried to interfere with someone's 1st Amendment rights which is not in keeping with the oath to the defend the US Constitution.
YouTube is free to remove content, and others are free to ask YouTube to do so. To say otherwise is to limit their freedom.
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Just a heads up on your link: The guy wasn't charged for pointing out "this isn't a miracle". He was charged for following it up with a series of accusations -- claiming that it was a scam set up by local priests (defamation), and making comments about how religious people are "gullible", "regressive", "irrational", etc. (provocation). He went well beyond debunking and into the realm of conjecture/speculation, and en…
And what was the verdict?
As far as I know, none of his appeals relate to the "scam" remarks, which even in the US would fall under defamation laws.
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Freedom of speech =/= freedom from consequences. You can go all Fred Phelps and tell some marine's family he's in hell now at his funeral and that they are inbred hillbillies that could never have invented the internet but don't expect shock on my part if his dad and brothers decide that would be a good time to beat the shit out of you.
... and that would be illegal for them to do, and for good reason. The solution to bad speech is not violence. It's more speech.
My point is that freedom of speech doesn't mean your speech never has negative consequences.
Nonviolent, legal example: you insult a customer and your boss fires you on the spot.
What is the common thread? None of this really has anything to do with freedom of speech in the west. It's a massive red herring that people keep bringing up in this thread.
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I was expecting some sophisticated propaganda piece. And not some crappy community theater actors doing some play for a public service television show. "Somebody" is really easy to troll.
Honestly, the first time I got linked to that video I thought it was a joke. I would swear those production values could only be that bad if done on purpose for comedic effect. Especially the random dubbing in of "Islam" or "Muslim."
Something that looks like amateur-hour to us in the West (and the video is amateur) might not look that way to someone in Egypt/Libya/Etc.
Have you seen any Middle Eastern TV? It isn't exactly high on the production value.
This might have some effect on how this film is being perceived as well.
And yes I'm being serious.
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> just because someone in a free country laughs or scorns at their delusions. Give me a break - by all indications, the author of the video made it for his own religious reasons, because of his own delusions, rather than as some kind of enlightened critique, which explains why it's, y'know, so extremely crude. He made his video specifically to cause maximum insult to a culture: that doesn't put him anywhere near the…
"suggests an image of cultural superiority" I think it is safe to say that something is wrong, I don't accept that it is statistically insignificant noise of crazy and misogyny. I am not sure exactly what is wrong though. It clearly is not race, and I don't think anybody on this website would think it was. Similarly, I don't think it is religion; their religion and science/progress historically have not been mutually…
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You're getting into dangerously ignorant territory with those words, and you haven't even done your research. Stop. That has no place here. The protest, by some accounts, was for the most part not violent. The violence that did happen was a planned and targeted action perpetrated by a highly trained militia exploiting the cover of the protests. Reinforcements were delayed intentionally, and the second attack clearly…
You're talking about 1 small part, of a much larger picture. The protests are still going on strong and spreading, and while they might have been started by 1 specific covert agenda, they are now being driven by anti-American and anti-Western sentiment, which appears to be deep seated.
I don't think that the President being seen to support deliberate antagonism of deep religious prejudices (by parties interested in more and worse war) will help.
You don't see the President publicly supporting strident anti-semitism or holocaust denialism or racism or eugenics, either - though those are taboos for western society more than for predominantly Muslim societies; consider how much Ahmedinejad's casual holocaust denial has done to maintain anger about Iran in the West.
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> just because someone in a free country laughs or scorns at their delusions. Give me a break - by all indications, the author of the video made it for his own religious reasons, because of his own delusions, rather than as some kind of enlightened critique, which explains why it's, y'know, so extremely crude. He made his video specifically to cause maximum insult to a culture: that doesn't put him anywhere near the…
"suggests an image of cultural superiority" I think it is safe to say that something is wrong, I don't accept that it is statistically insignificant noise of crazy and misogyny. I am not sure exactly what is wrong though. It clearly is not race, and I don't think anybody on this website would think it was. Similarly, I don't think it is religion; their religion and science/progress historically have not been mutually…
"something is wrong"
This is where people tend to, wrongly, paint with the biggest brushes.