When somebody tries to fire up people to riot, destroy and kill…well I do not see that as a free speech right.

It is not an either or situation and it gets more difficult as we hit grey areas. Years ago, for example, the ACLU, which is heavily supported by Jews, including my parents back in the day, sued Skogie, Illinois on behalf or either the Nazis or the KKK for preventing them from marching. These are organizations know for racism, violence, murder etc., but did this group of people have a right to express their opinions??? It was quite the controversy.

I’ll bitch all day about what the Brits did to my people, but I won’t even think about killing the Brits who are alive right now. There is a difference.

If we’re talking about the First Amendment, it’s not really “Freedumb of Speech”. I know it’s fun to say, because it’s a play on words, but the First Amendment is actually pretty cool.

Either way, I wouldn’t maintain that an Indian minister offering $11 million to anyone who murders the Danish cartoonist, is honestly validated by “freedom of speech”.

Here is what I wrote awhile ago on another post:

As far as laws restricting free speech go: In the U.S. the rule of thumb is that you cannot falsely shout fire in a crowded theater. In Europe, speech preceded the Holocaust. It was speech, like in Rwanda, that made the unimagineable possible. This is recent history in Europe. For them, holocaust denial is like shouting fire in a crowded theater. I am sure that as the distance between the event and the possibility of its repetition in Europe grow, the laws will mature and change.

You know how boring the world would be if people always protested peacefully. Sigh… reminds me of Canadian politics.

You know, the ancient Chinese used “may you live in interesting times” as a curse for a reason .

Kapo, yes some Jews would call him that.

Well, that’s extremely ridiculous. Anyone who isn’t a staunch supporter of Israel is an anti-Semite. People who support this idea are absurd, extremely misled, and quite frankly I feel sorry for them. It’s a horrible way of thinking and drawing conclusions. Even labeling them anti-Israeli is crossing the line. Am I any less Muslim or Arabic because I oppose what our governments do? When you think something is wrong, you reserve the right to question or say it, and no, it doesn’t make you a traitor. It makes you a normal human being with the ability to think without being misled like a flock of sheep.

Moral equivalence is a disease.

So is blind nationalism.

.

There are and should be restrictions on freedom of speech.

Like I said, if you want to apply this rule, you need to equally apply it to all citizens. You can’t ban hate speech on Israelis but allow hate speech against Arabs and Muslims, for example, which in many countries seems to be the case. In fact when I went to a conference in Ukraine, a journalist there gave a speech called “It’s not hate speech if it’s directed against Arabs,” (sarcastic title,) and he pretty much filled the report with relevant examples from several different countries, the U.S was one of them, I believe Israel might have been another. Though the focus was mainly in Europe.

In any case, he couldn’t be more right. Any person who’s listening to what’s being said about mainstream Islam, and anyone who actually falls for these absurd and unbalanced claims, should admit this at one point or another. One day you will swallow your pride and be able to do this like many of us already do.

Does anyone have a problem with this argument?

Yes, I most certainly do. But not to get too off topic, as I like to stay on topic with these posts, I will not go to lengths here!

Chomsky, as far as I know, is against the idea of Israel existing as a Jewish state. This goes in parcel with his whole post-modernist paradigm of the world. He would rather Jews and Arabs live in a unitary, binational state.

Kapo, yes some Jews would call him that. Not me, since I know that he is no anti-semite simply because he is against the idea of a Jewish state of Israel.

You having nothing to apologize for…so please don’t. The way I see it…many Iranians were terribly betrayed many times…by the Brits. Americans (though both probably did save your asses from Stalin) and then by the great Ayatolah himself with his promises of freedom back in the late 1970′s.

Now you are trapped under the thumb of a brutal government that has ripped your country from the inside and aliened a good part of the world, at least the democratic world.

I live in an area that, I believe, has the largest Iranian population in the world, outside of Iran itself. I get many insights into what happened there. It is a disaster for Iran, for freedom and now becoming a disaster for the region and maybe the world.

But YOU apologize? Hell…any of us that do not admire your open mind and your courage are morons.

Be careful..be strong