Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

washingtonpost.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 284 posts

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#201

Post by PaulHoule »

Well, I'd say that one of the reasons why muslims get along so well in in the U.S. is we have separation of church and state (which plays into free speech)

Christians can't use the state in the U.S. to harass agnostics, athiests, pagans, jews, muslims, buddists, whatever. If our government could stop people from spreading hateful lies about islam, we'd have Christians saying that you can't have a Koran or atheists saying that it's blasphemy to even say there is a God.

You can't say our American Way is the best of all possible worlds, but you can say that it's the least worst.

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#202

Post by snambi »

mcantelon wrote: post #65
snambi wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

while talking about mathematics, please include this as well. Islamic conquest of India bloodiest in the history http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/32812 History may paint a different picture, but essentially its terrorism in its true form.

Does Muslim violence negate arab achievement in mathematics? If so, does the US killing of native Americans negate US scientific achievement?

btw, many of the arab mathematics "innovation" is simply copied from India. Since, Europe found those through arabs, they were named as "arab" innovation. If they were so advanced 1000s of years ago, how come there is no one coming out of it now?

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#203

Post by anon198263 »

intended wrote: post #97
snambi wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

while talking about mathematics, please include this as well. Islamic conquest of India bloodiest in the history http://www.danielpipes.org/comments/32812 History may paint a different picture, but essentially its terrorism in its true form.

No it's not. Firstly you are talking about WAR. That's when armies of men, logistics and materiel are fired at each other. Terrorism is assymmetric psychological warfare. It's done by forces who are extremely and utterly outclassed in strength. You essentially are stretching the definition of terrorism so that you can use the hotter buzzword to demonize them and that period of Indian history.

when 100s of barbarians surround a village populated with unarmed, un-prepared people and kill them all, do you call them war? No, It is not war. And it is not "terrorism" as well. Its worse than that, may be "genocide" is a better word. Today, the rest of the world is caught up with these barbarians, so their only option is "terrorism".

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#204

Post by jlgreco »

tlear wrote: post #161
jlgreco wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think it is fair to say that both Islam and Christianity were spread with more or less the same mix of techniques. The two religions have a great deal in common. However that should not be interpreted as praise of Islam. In fact, I think that comparison is extraordinary damming .

Not really, big coup for Christianity was conversion of the Roman empire and that was most definitely peaceful. Contrast that with how Middle east, and North Africa became Muslim

That is pretty much when the religious violence started...

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#205

Post by tomjen3 »

netfire wrote: post #191

We should be careful to not limit other rights in protecting the right of free speech. I defend the right of people to express their opinions, views, thoughts, etc in society, but I also believe you must have balance and allow people to choose whether they want to listen to someone's opinion or thoughts. It is one thing to go listen to someone from the KKK speak about their thoughts or to read their opinions in a pam…

The problem with the second part of your argument is that you force me to pay, through my taxes, to a subway and then prevent me from posting things I want to say (but allow the other guy, because all he wants to do is sell soap).

By obviously you should have the right to not listen to a particular radio or tv show or not to look at a particular billboard. And yes, Fox News shouldn't have to argue points they don't want to.

But protecting you from seeing something you don't want to see? I don't want to see niggers, should the government lock them up?

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#206

Post by tomjen3 »

ominds wrote: post #141

Many sites speak against Islam and its prophet, many of them speak against the Koran and its teachings. No demonstrations have gone all out against them. They hold a POV that is not acceptable to Muslims, but that's fine. Many of them even attempt to do research about the topic they talk about to prove their POVs. The question is, would you consider someone who creates a film portraying Jesus or Mohammad as a child m…

With no hesitation, yes.

And I would expect everybody else to do the same.

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#207

Post by tomjen3 »

ommunist wrote: post #136
guard-of-terra wrote: post #124

In any war between the religious man and the atheist, support the atheist.

Means, you will support war. My suggestion - pacify both.

That would be nice, but the atheist would die.

Part of the reason atheists give a shit about what religious idiots say is that not too long ago they were burning us at the stake.

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#208

Post by aristidb »

DanielBMarkham wrote: post #166

99.99% of disgusting hateful speech is just that: disgusting hateful speech. The other .01% is the only hope we have as a species of honestly addressing our situation and problems and adapting and moving forward. The mob cannot tell the difference between these two groups. In fact, unless you are from the future looking back, nobody can. People who change society for the better through their speech are almost univers…

Publicly, that is. In a private forum like Hacker News, exclusion of disgusting hateful speech is legitimate and even necessary for the survival of the community - or people would leave because the "trolls" have taken over.

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#209

Post by w1ntermute »

Volpe wrote: post #188
w1ntermute wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm amazed at the hubris shown towards a civilisation that has existed far longer than your own. I don't understand why the age of a civilization should be a matter of pride. This is an entirely arbitrary point of distinction and has no real relevance to the conversation at hand. > Your "solution" to this problem is just to oversimplify everything and solve these simple problems. A clear flag, that you lack the edu…

> I don't understand why the age of a civilization should be a matter of pride. This is an entirely arbitrary point of distinction and has no real relevance to the conversation at hand. > And your inability to literal make any meaningful statements other than ad hominem attacks against me suggests that you need to go back to high school and study logic and debate. It is arrogant to assume a single countries path is c…

> It is arrogant to assume a single countries path is correct vs a much older civilisation, given that single country has not stood the same test of time.

Once again, the point flew over your head. This has nothing to do with correctness, it has to do with maintaining America's global hegemony.

And Arab "civilization" is a tenuous concept. Many modern Arab countries didn't exist until less than a century ago. Given the horrific exploitation the Arab peoples suffered at the hands of Europeans, I'd say that their countries haven't withstood the test of time very well.

> Only that a meaningful debate could only be made with you, were you open to learning the full history and reasons behind the current problems. After reading your comments so far it is apparent you aren't open to learning these things.

The only thing that's apparent is that you're completely misunderstanding the purpose of my initial comment. It wasn't intended as a normative dismissal of Arab or Muslim culture, it was intended to be a suggested improvement of America's geopolitical current strategy.

Re: Shut up and play nice: How the Western world is limiting free speech

#210

Post by w1ntermute »

randomchars wrote: post #186
w1ntermute wrote: post #172

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, you're the one that still doesn't get it. Who invented algebra 1000 years ago is entirely irrelevant to modern geopolitics.

It's not irrelevant. Without math we wouldn't have a modern society. But if you insist that it's irrelevant than Arabs being desert nomads is irrelevant to modern geopolitics too.

Once again, my point flies right over your head.

> It's not irrelevant. Without math we wouldn't have a modern society.

Correct, but who made those discoveries has no relevance to modern geopolitical strategy.

> But if you insist that it's irrelevant than Arabs being desert nomads is irrelevant to modern geopolitics too.

I already stated how that fact is relevant, but you chose to ignore it. If the Arabs weren't desert nomads, they might be a credible threat to the US even without oil.

It seems that everyone here is taking offense at the fact that I called Arabs "desert nomads". The point I was trying to make is that without oil, the Arabs don't pose a threat to America.

Post reply on HN