CommentsDisplaying anth's 10 most recent comments.

• Home Depot Co-Founder Apologizes for Being a ‘Monster’ That Created ‘320,000′ jobs

  September 18, 2010 at 2:40pm

  Can anyone help me understand what this guy is talking about? Who is he reacting to that’s portraying business owners as monsters and horrible human beings? I’ve not heard that be part of the current discourse. It seems like a straw man.

• Boston TV: Chaperone Defends Mosque Field Trip Prayers

  September 18, 2010 at 2:28pm

  In reply to grannyjojo.

  1) As was pointed out elsewhere, the course includes trips to a church and a synagogue. You ought to both check facts better and make fewer assumptions.

  2) Separation of church and state applies to any religion. But there’s no separation issue here. No legal body has ever construed the separation to prohibit education *about* religion (as distinct from “religious education”, which of course is a separation issue). It’s a standard part of social studies curriculums across the country; this school simply has a particularly thorough instance.

  3) I have no idea how this was presented in the context of the class, but given that we know the course similarly included visits to other religions houses of worship it seems likely that it was set up as a comparative lesson. If the teacher’s doing his/her job right, it’s easy to present such things as only representing one of several views. That certainly seems to be consistent with what the students interviewed got from it.

• Boston TV: Chaperone Defends Mosque Field Trip Prayers

  September 18, 2010 at 2:21pm

  In reply to Greyhound424.

  Sued… for what, exactly?

  There’s no prohibition on saying “God” in public schools or anywhere else.

  And I just love the racism. Nice.

• Boston TV: Chaperone Defends Mosque Field Trip Prayers

  September 18, 2010 at 2:19pm

  In reply to Joseph.

  Heh. So much for that theory. So I guess the real question is: why is the uproar only about the Mosque trip? Some serious bigotry there.

• New Mosque Vid Exclusive: Rep Tells Kids ‘Holy War is a False Definition of Jihad’

  September 18, 2010 at 2:13pm

  There’s so much wrong with this video.

  1) The video provides violent quotations from the Koran (out of context), but then gives a total pass to the holy books of other traditions (like the Bible) under the “well, it’s everywhere; that stuff’s old” hand-waiving. That’s dishonest: either it matters across the board, or it doesn’t matter anywhere.

  2) The Byzantine empire failed for a whole host of reasons, but Islamic jihad – using any definition you like – was a relatively minor one. Much more significant were the mass migrations of western Europeans in the Crusades and their extracting wealth and resources to bring back to the west. Probably the single biggest blow to the empire was the sacking of Byzantium in the 4th Crusade – by the Christian crusaders!

  3) The fact that various leaders have used “jihad” as a propaganda tool does not affect the meaning of the word. Similarly, when Bush II foolishly used “crusade” as a propaganda tool, it does not affect the actual meaning of the word. Again, an unexamined double standard.

  4) Even if one takes a view of jihad which includes warfare (under the terms self-defense or not), that does not define the term itself. Similarly, in simple english, warfare could be construed as a type of struggle, but no sane person would argue that every time someone says “struggle” they mean warfare. The word jihad means struggle, and that’s what this woman is – correctly – pointing out. The folks at the ironically named IPT are willfully propagating a serious logic error here.

  5) Using bin Laden as a representative of what mainstream Islam teaches is dishonest, transparent, and disgusting. The credibility of this video drops to zero with this one problem alone.

  6) Even moving past that huge issue, IPT still gets it wrong: they’re willing to assert that bin Laden has distorted the meaning of “self defense”, but not the meaning of anything else in the book? If you’re willing to believe he gets such basic concepts as self defense wrong (which I’d certainly agree with), why do you believe he’s accurately and fairly representing more nuanced concepts like “struggle” in the general sense?

  I could go on and on, but what’s the point? It’s just another Islamophobic hatchet piece by a propaganda outfit with an agenda.

• Jim Wallis: Beck Doesn’t Understand Christianity — Jesus was a Liberation Theologian

  September 18, 2010 at 1:47pm

  In reply to wyldibrouse.

  You have to stretch your reading pretty far – and pretty willfully – to believe that Jesus was *only* talking about the spiritual realm. There’s absolutely no textual reason to believe Luke 4:18, for example, is talking about anything other than the physical world. This is a recurring biblical theme, and Jesus (or the authors of the various gospels, if you like) intentionally calls back to, for example, Isaiah 61:1. Recall, similarly, this bit, which shows up in 3/4 of the gospels: “Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.” Or recall how the sheep and the goats were divided at judgement.

• NY Residents Don’t Support Mosque at Ground Zero

  September 1, 2010 at 2:18pm

  In reply to I.a.n..

  That makes no sense. It’s a fair assumption in American civil society that our citizens assume our law to trump others. Park51‘s leaders aren’t addressing that question because nobody’s asking them – because it’s a silly question. Do we ask the leaders of any particular church or synagogue whether they believe the law in the Bible trumps US law (say, by stoning disobedient children)? No, of course not. And if members of that organization behave in a way at conflicts with US law, it’s a straight-forward civil or criminal matter. This is no different. The same assumption holds for membes of other, non-religious organizations: corporations, sports clubs, political parties, or social groups. They may have their own rules, but we assume their members recognize US law as the supreme law of the land.

• NY Residents Don’t Support Mosque at Ground Zero

  August 31, 2010 at 11:56pm

  In reply to I.a.n..

  Why? I’ve never talked to an American Muslim who believes that Sharia law should trump US law in the face of a conflict. The vast majority of American Muslims are very moderate. Further, I.A.N. asked about the “Mosque advocates” generally (we‘ll ignore for the moment that we’re not talked about a Mosque here) – the majority of whom are not Muslim, and thus would, we’d expect, not even consider whether Sharia law came out on top. This whole thing seems like a non-question, and if it’s being posed as a pre-condition to supporting the Park51, I‘m glad we’ve now moved past such an easy bar.

• NY Residents Don’t Support Mosque at Ground Zero

  August 31, 2010 at 10:00pm

  In reply to I.a.n..

  Isthis a serious question? The answer is an obvious yes. I’ve not heard any significant leader in the US suggest sharia law ought to trump US law.

• NY Residents Don’t Support Mosque at Ground Zero

  August 31, 2010 at 1:22pm

  In reply to anth.

  Provided the circumstances of the hypothetical Japanese shrine were the same (legally obtained private land not otherwise running afoul of local building regulations, &c), I’d be equally happy to support that – because our Constitution and our founding principles say we should. That’s what it is to be an American and care about principles: to stand side by side with someone who may well stand for ins you don’t believe in.

  You argue against a lot of things I’m not saying, which is weird. Yes, the fact that many Muslims (and Jews, and Hindus, and so on) died that day is irrelevant. I never suggested otherwise. And the whole “you’re intolerant of my intolerance” gag is seriously tired. This is *obviously* a religiously-based issue: the objections only exist because it’s a mosque. Or do you think people would be as upset if Rauf were trying to open s Macy’s? Your claim there just makes no sense.

  Seriously: if this isn’t about rights, what are you on about? What action would you like to see taken by what party? Do you really believe Rauf hasn’t heard the concerns of people opposed to the project? You are of course entitled to believe with all your being that this project is inappropriate, but Rauf and his backers is equally free to ignore you.