Certainly, some Muslims seem to think so.As far as I'm aware, there have been at least two complaints to the Press Council and Ombudsman from Irish based Muslims about articles that appeared in the Irish Independent.One was a somewhat inflammatory piece by commentator Kevin Myers, whose flights of fancy I've previously examined here.The other complaint apparently relates to Ian O'Doherty (airbrushed above), whose otherwise interesting and light-hearted column I-Spy is regularly marred by his blinkered defence of all things Neo-Con or Israeli, and his blanket demonising of Islam.After yet another crack about Shariah law in Ireland from Ian, a large number of Irish Muslims finally had enough and collectively wrote a letter to the editor, which was published in today's edition.What I found...
There are fears of a major, violent reaction to the release on the internet of the short film, below, by bouffant blond Dutch right-wing politician Geert Wilders.Nevertheless, it is always wrong to bow to threats of violence.Therefore, with the aim of supporting freedom of speech, I am reproducing 'Fitna' below.It's short, and it seeks to examine the influence of Quranic verses on contemporary Islamic terrorism.In that way, it is simplistic. It is also provocative. But like Richard Dawkins, I believe that religions are not exempt from criticism, nor are religious faiths or teachings immune to critical appraisal.This is what Wilders has sought to done. For that he can be commended, debated or condemned.But it is wrong for anyone to be physically harmed or threatened because he has sought...
Belated happy holidays to everyone. I had a suitably grumpy Christmas, and am now back online to rant again.First up, though, let's move away from the Christian fairy tale for a moment to consider some other ones. Apparently six million people celebrate Kwanzaa in North America each year.It's a week long celebration of pan-African culture that runs, conveniently for those seeking to extend their Christmas break into New Year, from the 26th of December to the 1st of January.It's also totally made up. Some random Marxist invented it in the heady counterculture days of the late Sixties, because he reckoned that 'Jesus was a psychotic' that black people should distance themselves from.Fast forward to today and George Bush is dishing out the patronising 'Happy Kwanzaa' wishes.Maybe black...
Fair play to London's mayor, 'Red' Ken Livingstone for being probably the only politician in this hemisphere to own up to the fact that Muslims are being vilified on an unprecedented scale.According to Ken, nonsense 'debates' like that about the veil have been deliberately fomented in order to avert the public's eye away from real issues, such as the devastation of Muslim Iraq by the British and American militaries."Over recent weeks we have seen a demonisation of Muslims only comparable to the demonisation of Jews from the end of the 19th century," says Ken.This is actually a very useful analogy. Will we ultimately involve ourselves in statebuilding for the Muslim peoples we are currently occupying and killing, or will we simply commit genocide upon them? Or will we do both, as we did...