OK, now that you have read it, you may agree that three issues jump out at the reader:
- Islam, the only religion specifically mentioned by name in the document, is said to be "wrongly" associated with terrorism and human rights violations.
- The document was submitted by, Belarus, Venezuela, and Uganda. Uganda's sumbission was "On behalf of the States Members of the United Nations that are members of the Organization of the Islamic Conference." (Emphasis mine.)
- This resolution constitutes a shocking encouragement to member states to criminalize the 'defamation of religious beliefs.'
While they are inexorably connected, I will address these issues separately.
ISLAM IS "WRONGLY" ASOCIATED WITH TERROR
Iin naming Islam, the document is not at all factual. The resolution says that the UN:
"...Expresses deep concern in this respect that Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism." (Emphasis mine.)I would agree with the UN's sentence if the word "wrongly" were to be removed. I, too, wish to "express deep concern that Islam is frequently associated with human rights violations and terrorism." My concern is that it not WRONGLY associated with terrorism but that it is PROPERLY associated with terrorism.
I want to make it clear that I am not singling out Islam. I believe that history proves that almost all religious texts (especially the monotheistic ones) contain enough admonitions to believers to kill 'enemies' of their faith as to make them all dangerous and cause them all to contribute, directly, to terrorist acts. This article is a reaction to a specific claim made by the UN. Namely, that Islam is wrongfully associated with terrorism. My stance is that since almost ALL religions (including Islam) are PROPERLY associated with terrorism, to state that Islam is wronglfully associated is erroneous. Since I am refuting a spcific claim made by teh UN, I will address that claim only. Therefore, while I address other religions sporadically, I focus on Islam's track record.
ISLAM IS A RELIGION OF PEACE?
Everywhere you turn there are Islamic apologists trying to convince people that "Islam is a religion of Peace." As many authors of all leanings have argued, we must all face the fact that this is not entirely true. Indulge me for a moment as I give an example. Imagine the following, based on the introduction to The End of Faith by Sam Harris:
You are sitting in a restaurant and you hear the TV at the bar blurt out a soundbite stating that some person somewhere in the world has apparently strapped many pounds of explosives to their body and filled their pockets with nails, ball bearings, and rat poison (so that more innocent people will die either immediately or after long, painful struggles) and blown themselves up in a crowded part of a town, killing almost 100 people who were shopping. That is all you hear.
Now what are you almost 100% sure of? Experience and the statistics can not tell us if the person was unschooled and illiterate or well-educated. (The 9/11 attackers were all "fully formed, well-educated adults, [and] true believers.") We don't know if they were dirt poor or extremely wealthy. (Bin laden comes from a very rich family.) We don't even know if they were male or female. (Especially recently, many women have been becoming suicide bombers.)
So what DO we know? What would we be willing to bet a full paycheck on at even money? Were they atheists? Of course not. You never hear of an atheist terrorist act. Ever. We only think of ONE thing when we hear of such things: religion. As Monsignor Lorenzo Albacete said, "From the first moment I looked into that horror on Sept. 11, into that fireball, into that explosion of horror, I knew it, I recognized an old companion. I recognized religion."
So if they are religious, what set of myths do they believe in? Jainism? Doesn't seem likely since, unlike the monotheistic religions, the Jain "scripture" makes is CRYSTAL CLEAR that peace and love are the only acceptable moral positions and that one should never harm another living being. Full stop. Compare such guidance to that of all the monotheistic religions which contain so many theologically defensible positions in support of murder and terror as to make the clarity of their moral guidance laughable.
So if we don't think the person subscribed to a religious belief that has crystal clear instructions on the imperative of a morality of peace and love, what other religions have all sorts of sections of their scripture that are frequently used to justify such murderous acts?
Was the bomber a Christian? Maybe. While most Christian terrorists do not use suicide bombings, Christian suicide bombers are not unheard of. (E.G. Take this quiz.) However, they seem to be very rare on the scale of things. (See, also, the Christian Japanese Kamikazes. Granted, they were at war, but fits the definition of suicide bomber. Also, in 2003, a Christian Archbishop instructed his lambs to trun into exploding sheep.) I recognize that there are probably MORE examples of Christian atrocities throughout history than any other religion (See, The Inquisition, the Crusades, and Amway) but if we confine ourselves to suicide bombings in the post-scientific-revolution world, the numbers do not point towards Christianity as a source. (The discussion of non-suicidal Christian terrorist acts is left for another day.)
I obviously don't have room to analyze every option, but I am willing to bet that the vast majority of people would assume that the bomber's religion was Islam. To some degree, this is an argument from personal experience, however, it seems supported by reserach that shows that the vast number of terror attacks in the last 50 years have been committed by those of Islamic faith, especially ones involving suicide bombings.
Islamic apologists will point out the many admonitions in the Koran to be peaceful and to only "act defensively" etc., but they can not dispute the evidence that the overwhelming number of suicide bombings are performed people who were brought up by Islamic parents, lived in Islamic communities, and believed that they, themselves, were Muslims.
Most apologists argue in response to the historical record that all of these people are "misinterpreting the Koran." Therein lies one of the atheist's core concerns with religions. How does a supreme being who wanted to give man moral rules to live by create books (Torah, Bible, Koran) that a reasonable person could EASILY use to justify any act of terror? (This applies equally to the Bible and many other religions who claim that people who do bad things in the name of their religion are "misinterpreting" their scripture.) If humans can write something that is crystal clear on not killing other people, that is not internally self-contradictory, and gives no wiggle room for epople who would murder thousands of their fellow human beings, why can't God? "God works in mysterious ways," is often the answer. To that I say, "Bullshit." "God works in mysterious ways" is the same as saying, "I don't know why this is the way it is, but I will assume that there is a good reason." This is where religions' claim to a legitimate voice in any public debate on collective community actions fails. The fact is that the UN resolution is flat out wrong when it says that Islam is "wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism."
Side Note: Don't even get me started on the human rights violations clause. E.G. Iran executes 16 year old homosexuals. Saudi Arabia sentences a 75 year old woman to 40 lashes for being in the same house with two men who were not her relatives. The basic rights missing from the CDHRI. Etc. Not that Islam has the corner on human rights violations, mind you. The Pope still hates on The Gays to the point that he still thinks it is OK to execute them.
THE RESOLUTION IS SUBMITTED BY ISLAMIC STATES
As documented above, this resolution is basically being submitted by the Organization of the Islamic Conference. (I am not sure of the motives of Belarus and Venezuela since they are mostly orthodox or Catholic Christians.) The upshot here is that this is not an initiative of some multi-denominational organization or a coalition made up of many different religions around the world in a legitimate attempt to "get along." It is an organized Islamic effort. This represents a pattern emerging in Islamic states of trying to characterize critical claims about Islam as "defaming" their religion. Basically, rather than fixing the problems with Islam that lead to so many Islamic terrorists, they want everyone to stop talking about it, under the threat of criminal convictions and possible application of the death penalty. (See also, Iran's plans to execute heretics.) This leads me to...
CRIMINALIZATION OF SPEECH
While the resolution doesn't directly criminalize "defaming religions," it gives UN member states more than enough justification for doing so. This will make strange bedfellows out of me and various religious communities. (EG: See the evangelical reaction to the UN resolution.) The religious should oppose this measure because it creates an ambiguous international law situation regarding what a person can say about their beliefs.
Sooner or later, an Islamic state will arrest an aid worker and imprison them for saying something like, "I believe that the way to get into heaven is by accepting Jesus Christ as your personal savior." Since this logically means that if you follow Islam, you are going to burn for all eternity, it will be counted as defamation and justifiably criminalized under this resolution.
It should be noted that Islamic states claim that these types of resolutions and other realted actions are not designed to limit free speech but to "stop publications like the Danish cartoons showing the Prophet Mohammed that sparked bloody protests by Muslims around the world in 2005." Ignoring the obvious comment about the frailty of a belief system that causes people to kill others upon seeing a cartoon, the Islamic argument that "we will only use this to justify certain supressions of speech" is NOT a counter argument. It is an admission of exactly the thing we are worried about. It supports the concern that states will now be more justified in locking up people for drawing a picture or preaching their beliefs form the pulpit or from even producing scientific research that tends to disprove a claim in some religious scripture.
Now while people like Chuck Norris may get excited at the prospect of governments adopting an official state religion and locking up those who would argue against religion, the rest of us find this unacceptable. Many Christians are very uncomfortable with the secular community documenting why all religions, including Christianity, are a massive delusion and how all myths like Christianity and Islam should be abolished as soon as possible for the safety of us all. However, with the exception of Mr. Norris, I haven't heard of any who would outlaw speaking one's mind on such matters in the US. Most of them still defend our right to argue against their beliefs because they recognize that a law used to squelch free speech against the secularists today will likely be used against them tomorrow.
Write President Obama and tell him what you think about this!
UPDATE: After a technical issue and an absence, I have had to re-post all of my old posts. As a result there will be many posts listed as published today, Dec 3, 2009, that were posted sometime earlier in the year, but I do not know the exact date. this post is one of them.
0 comments:
Post a Comment