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Look, as much as I may disagree with Terry Jones, the only direct victim of his "hate speech" will be an inanimate object. If he was planning to burn, say, 200
by zeteo 16y ago
Look, as much as I may disagree with Terry Jones, the only direct victim of his "hate speech" will be an inanimate object. If he was planning to burn, say, 200 copies of "The Audacity of Hope", there would be hardly any reaction to it. Burning a book does not kill troops and civilians overseas; suicidal fanatics, easily incensed by the smallest details of what Western democracy allows, do.
- pstuart 16y agoTry burning bibles and/or American flags down there and see how that goes.
- zeteo 16y agoRight, so is the main problem with the burning act itself, or with the reaction to it?
- pyre 16y agoWhen you are performing an act that you know will cause a certain reaction you are either: 1) trying to make a statement or 2) intentionally trying to cause that reaction.
- _delirium 16y agoPeople do actually burn American flags on a semi-regular basis, don't they? I've heard of some court cases stemming from it (which the flag-burners have generally won), but no violence, at least not in the past few decades.
- MichaelSalib 16y agoGiven that some groups of Muslims have had their places of worship firebombed for the terrible crime of worshiping while Muslim, I have great confidence that if Muslims ever got together in the US for a flag or Bible burning, they would face retaliatory violence.
- oiuygtfrtghyju 16y agoYes the worst 'offenders' are the Boy Scouts, Army, Veterans associations and Fire Depts. See USCODE Section 175(k), Chapter 1, Title 4
- ladeniran 16y agoWhatever consequence is direct in this case does not eliminate the logical reasoning that provoking the Muslims would have its effects on troops and civilians serving in Muslim communities around the world. Terry Jones probably doesn't see this 'DIRECTLY' but if the burning ceremony does happen, I bet it will become the headline speech for radical clerks and recruiters for Al Qaeda and the Taliban for months maybe years to come. We forget that not all non-militants in these areas like the United States...many only seek a more valid reason to join the cause. It amazes me that this guy who preaches peace and the 10 commandments does not think his actions could lead to the deaths of Christians one way or another. I don't go as far as saying "burning a book does kill troops and civilians overseas" but the indirect result of this action is probably the same. This is free publicity for radicalists, an event that would be preached as prove America is an enemy of the muslim world and their actions in the middle east are unsincere and what not.
- _delirium 16y agoI think that's probably true, but I'm wary of this line of arguments. For example, anti-Vietnam-war protestors were accused of endangering American troops by emboldening the Viet-Cong, and the journalists who published the Abu Ghraib photographs were accused of inflaming Muslim opinion by doing so, some commentators even going so far as to say that the decision to publish the photographs meant they had blood on their hands.
- hugh3 16y agoAnd that's all probably true. Anti-Vietnam-war protesters did endanger US troops and South Vietnamese civilians by emboldening the Viet Cong, and do in fact bear a great deal of responsibility for the fact that the war was eventually lost. The folks who chose to publish the Abu Ghraib photos and make a huge deal out of an incident of prisoner abuse no worse than what probably goes on a dozen times a year in any US civilian prison, likewise bear some responsibility for the provocation there.
- scott_s 16y agoSaying that antiwar protestors bear responsibility that the war was lost assumes that the war was winnable.