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An Afghan court in northern Afghanistan sentenced a journalism student to death for blasphemy for distributing an article from the Internet that was considered an insult to the Prophet Muhammad, said the judge in charge of the court. |
The student, Sayed Parwiz Kambakhsh, 23…was charged with directly insulting Muhammad by calling the prophet “a killer and adulterer,” the judge, Shamsurahman Muhmand, said in a telephone interview…
Kambakhsh is a student at the faculty of journalism in Mazar-i-Sharif and also works for a daily paper, Jahan-e-Naw, as a reporter. He was accused of downloading a controversial article and adding some of his own paragraphs about the ignorance of the Prophet Muhammad on women’s rights…
You have to ask after a while – does a theocracy, by nature, have to become intolerant?
#3 – But, the question is should we tolerate intolerance?
No.
And if not, what should we do about it?
Kill zealots in mass numbers.
#10 – How is it that all-powerful deities are somehow incapable of dealing with heretics and unbelievers on their own?
I’m operating on the assumption that this is a rhetorical question.
0. Eideard. If a god-like person appeared and convinced you, without any question what-so-ever, that He indeed was the creator of the universe, would you obey if God asked you to kill all infidels? You’d think about it anyway to say the least.
RBG
Greg: “And it isn’t just Christianity — Hindus and Jews are currently engaged in bloody religious wars.”
Christians are fighting Moslems in Indonesia and the Philipines to keep from being converted or murdered.
Hindus are fighting Moslems in India to keep from being converted or murdered.
Jews are fighting Moslems in the Holy land to keep from being converted or murdered.
Moslems are fighting Moslems in Darfur, Iraq, Palestine, Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan (shall I continue)?
Christians, Jews, and Hindus are not fighting each other anywhere.
But, the people fighting for survival are as bad as the people trying to murder them?
You’d think he’d go down fighting or go into hiding instead of just sitting there waiting to be arrested.
The answer is: OF COURSE !!! Put any group of RELIGIOUS FANATICS IN CHARGE, and the will put the rest of the population through their own brand of religious hoops !!! And of course, it ends up with the FANATICS DEMONSTRATION THEIR “GOD-GIVEN” AUTHORITY WITH MURDERING NON-BELIEVERS !!!
I sure miss Jim Jones, them was some kind of christians and could teach them talibans a thing or two.
This article is interesting when looked at in conjunction with the above story about nuking Afghanistan. There’s a clash of civilizations underway and as long as there are those who ‘love death more than you love life,’ well, you can count on more killing for sure.
Best to keep your powder dry and your head down.
If a god-like person appeared and convinced you, without any question what-so-ever, that He indeed was the creator of the universe, would you obey if God asked you to kill all infidels?
Why would a god need me to do their dirty work? Sounds like a lazy ass god to me.
#21
Pot meet kettle
#29 – Whatever.
It’s religious extremists who are attacking the rest of us. Rather than advocating that we defend ourselves againsts them, would you be happier if I advocated inviting them over for brunch.
Extremists of all stripes have no intention to ever stop until we are dead or converted. It isn’t “intolerance” to destroy an enemy that is attacking you.
Killing zealots en masse is the way to go then? Sounds a lot like zealotry to me.
“Killing zealots en masse is the way to go then? Sounds a lot like zealotry to me.”
Hmm. OK. So, if, let’s just say, we were to find out, on unimpeachable authority, that a certain town in Afghanistan was 100% occupied by Taliban and al-Qaeda, no one else, and beyond any doubt, would you:
a) bomb said town out of existence;
b) send in U.N, peacekeeping forces to arrest all and hold them for Western-style trials; or
c) open dialog with them and try to convince them of the errors of their ways
Is solution a) zealotry? Or simply a proactive defense of civilization? Or what exactly?
#31 – I’m typing anonymously at Dvorak Uncensored… I’m not addressing the United Nations. I add a little extremism to incite a little feedback. In real life, I’m vaguely more even tempered.
But I stand by the principle. A very hard, aggressive stand must be taken against religious extremism no matter what the faith, in order to ensure that all (including the extremists) can live their lives freely.
When elected Grand Master Of Earth, I’ll have only two rules regarding faith… 1) Practice what you will freely, so long as you do not impose your faith on others. 2) Proselytize your faith with the barrel of a gun, and you will be met with overwhelming force and no mercy.
Since that isn’t gonna happen, all I can really do is bitch about it on John’s Blog.
(Hey John. Thanks again for the blog!)
#18, pedro,
Not to mention that I missed the last execution bradcasted by TV live from the vatican
Get out !!! Geeze, pedro, ya missed a real good one. The guy screamed for mercy while the guy in the mask pushed the splinters a little further under his fingernails. Oh, and then he got the thumbscrew. I swear, it was ready to pop through the other side. And they put that cage on his head with the hungry rat in it.
All the time the Jesuit kept asking him if he was the devil. Every time the guy said no the Jesuit would nod to the guy in the mask.
The best part was at the very end when he finally said “YES, I’M THE DEVIL” and he cried. The big baby cried. Then they put tied him to a post on top of a pile of wood and tossed a flaming faggot on. It is so exciting when the fire build slow like that. Geeze, he was crying so hard I thought he would put out the flames. But that Jesuit just kept praying for his soul.
And as the fire reached higher and higher all he kept saying was “Jesus, why do they do this in your name?”
It was so fun to watch !!! Well, I guess that heathen won’t be a tool of the Devil for a looooong time. But his soul will be in heaven with the baby Jesus.
33 OFTLO. Grand Master-in-training: Will it be ok to proselytize faith with free schools, hospitals, meals, shelter, support groups, group pressure, $ bribes, brainwashing, and unlimited advertising?
RBG
Clarification: voluntary brainwashing & group pressure such as when attending weekly meetings.
RBG
#34 man, sounds like I missed a good one. Did you tivo’d it.
What’s some hundred years difference for this matters, huh?
Far off in the future societies will contemplate how we lived toady with religions such as Democracy, Communism and their various sects.
They would study the Religion of Democracy from the first instance with the USA being the “Holy land” with the first “Pope” George Washington upholding the sacred text “The Declaration of Independence” and the “Constitution” written by the ‘Holy’ Fore Fathers.
Of course like all religions, Democracy broke out into various factions and sects all claiming to be the pure faith with the Democrat and Republican sects being predominant.
The followers of Democracy would elect their religious leader every four years, of course there were Bishops, Cardinals and local clergy elected at various times.
I am sure there will be some “Democratic Republics” in the future that will be seen as barbaric with our type of legal system, prisons and capital punishment.
Sounds far fetched? No this is how people lived 2000 years ago and is how people 2000 from now will look back at us.
Cheers
T_H
How very nice. Except labelling political ideologies as “religious” ones is inaccurate in many ways. It is enough to identify both as being ideologies. That accurately delineates their common aspects. Otherwise they are markedly different and the primary reason for that is that one is based in historical fact and the other in popular mythology. George Washington actually existed.
And you make another large and commonplace error in your last there. Human development, cultural and social, are not measured along a linear graph. That development has followed an exponential curve. We have seen more change in the last 100 years than in the 2000 preceding that.
2000 years in the future? No one, and I mean absolutely no one is remotely foolish enough to suggest that we can even begin to imagine what society will be like 200 years from now. It is utterly, literally inconceivable. Only a few foolhardy souls would even suggest what things might be like, in one or another isolated aspect, in 40 years – and even then, they will concede that they are very likely to be completely wrong.
One thing that IS going to remain the same; the majority of the human species will remain (relatively) poor – and unintelligent. And therefore will contribute, as always, very very little to our progress, but will, as always, markedly hinder that progress, in ways some of which we cannot possibly foresee.
#39 THC – said How very nice. Except labelling political ideologies as “religious” ones is inaccurate in many ways.
Swing and a miss…
Early this century saw three political ideologies becoming substitute faiths
1/ USSR – Communism! The Marxist concept existed for 75 years and socialism longer yet until Russia brought the Marxist Leninist doctrine into the status of a creed with formal and functional parallels with organized religon. It was a way of life, a substitute faith with messianic urgency that Marxist Leninist Communism is the salvation of the world and there will never be peace while capitalism exists!
When Lenin died Stalin elevated Lenin to Godlike proportions. His body preserved for pilgrimages and other religious context…
This is actual liturgical text with choruses which is not a parody of a religious rite it is intended to BE a religious rite:
In departing from us Comrade Lenin enjoined on us to hold high and keep pure the great calling of Member of the Party.
(CHORUS) We vow to thee, Comrade Lenin, that we will honorably fulfill this thy commandment
In departing from us Comrade Lenin enjoined on us to guard the unity of the party.
(CHORUS) We vow to thee, Comrade Lenin, that we will honorably fulfill this thy commandment
and on it went.
2/ The Nazi Party! I won’t get into the details here – but it was a new faith for all the world.
3/ Mao’s version of Communism! Again I won’t get into all the details here – but it was a new faith for all Chinese and the world.
Hmmm, political ideology and religious beliefs all rolled up as one and the same, I wonder if that ever happened before in the past?
You said: Otherwise they are markedly different and the primary reason for that is that one is based in historical fact and the other in popular mythology. George Washington actually existed.
So did Jesus, and like Jesus George Washington has been depicted somewhat “larger than life”
http://tinyurl.com/3dsbee
http://tinyurl.com/2tetoh
(Scroll 3/4 down the page)
Mythology? George Washington cannot tell a lie – the cheery tree and the hatchet incident which many believe never happened.
As well as others myths…
http://tinyurl.com/2tm6f9
Hmmmmmmmm
Cheers