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We Will Not Censor Our Speech

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  • We Will Not Censor Our Speech

    WE WILL NOT CENSOR OUR SPEECH
    John Mark Reynolds [author, academic]

    theOneRepublic, CA
    Sept 28 2006

    This story is why elaborately constructed reasons that Pope Benedict
    XVI was wrong in the most recent flap with radical Islam are wrong.

    Radical Islam wants no criticism of its major figures or of its
    truth claims.

    I do not believe that we should gratuitously insult persons others
    revere. There is no place in a multi-cultural society at war for
    thoughtless offense.

    Contributor John Mark Reynolds

    John Mark Reynolds is the founder and director of the Torrey
    Honors Institute, and Associate Professor of Philosophy,
    at Biola University. His personal website can be found
    at www.johnmarkreynolds.com and his blog can be found at
    www.johnmarkreynolds.info.

    Christians live in a public square where they are happy to defend
    the freedom of atheists to state their views about the divinity of
    Christ. The free and open society built mostly by Christians over the
    last two hundred years demands this. We respect those who disagree
    enough to engage in polite and reasoned discourse.

    But we will not give up our right to make reasonable, but tough
    arguments against ideas we think are bad.

    As usual the story is in plain type below and my comments are in
    italics:

    Censor comments on Islam to avoid violence: Muslim expert 20th
    September 2006, 11:00 WST

    As the Byzantines discovered, even becoming the servants of the
    Islamic invaders did not appease radical Moslem aggression. Not all
    Moslems were radical in history, but many that were not were killed
    by Moslems who were.

    Did the victims of 9/11 say offensive things? Did they deserve to
    die for anything they had said?

    Non-Muslims should practise self-censorship to avoid triggering
    violent reactions, a prominent Perth Muslim says.

    Why? If we do, then Muslims will have removed themselves from
    the civilized nations of the world. No person should trigger a
    violent reaction when he or she speaks at an academic conference on
    controversial items.

    The civilized world cannot practice science or any form of academic
    discourse in such an environment. Just as Christians and non-Christians
    can criticize the origins of the New Testament, so we must all have
    the right to do textual criticism (for good or bad) of the Koran. Just
    as Christian history and ethics come under (sometimes) withering fire
    from academics, some even employed in Christian colleges, so Islamic
    scholars must allow the same sort of free and reasoned look at their
    own history and ethics to be part of the free world.

    In the wake of violent attacks over a speech by Pope Benedict XVI
    that linked the Prophet Mohammed's teachings to violence, Perth
    academic Samina Yasmeen said religious and community leaders should
    stop speaking about Islamic icons to avoid causing offence.

    No. We will never give up the right to follow the truth where it leads
    us. That is the heritage of Socrates and Plato that is precious to
    us and has brought such great advances to the world.

    No Christian, indeed no gentleman, would condone giving needless
    offense, but we will not stop saying what we believe the truth to be.

    Associate Professor Yasmeen, director of the University of WA's centre
    for Muslim states and societies, accused the Pope of deliberately
    provoking the aggression by inviting criticism of Mohammed.

    The Holy Father did not invite criticism of Mohammed, but even if he
    had that is the right of a free person living in a free society. The
    Pope needless to say thinks that Islam has false beliefs. Moslem
    followers have a right to those beliefs and there is much to admire
    in the Islamic resistance to secularist decadence in the modern world.

    But better a bit of Vegas than a society where free men cannot freely
    say in a calm and rational way what they think the truth to be.

    She said the Pope and other religious leaders had the same
    responsibility as Islamic clerics to avoid encouraging violence
    by followers.

    What violence by the Pope's followers? I deplore violence against
    innocent Moslems but I know of no Christian provoked to violence by
    the Pope's speech.

    Just as it is unjust to blame the victim in a crime ("She was asking
    for it, coming into this neighborhood."), so it is unjust to blame
    the Pope for wickedness caused by others based on a reasonable speech.

    Stalin was not provoked to murder by the writings of the dissidents.

    Islamic extremists need no real excuse to kill. The question is this:
    will Islamic moderates defend the Pope's right to make what they feel
    is a bad speech and courageously attack the violent?

    To make any moral equivalence between a speech like that of the Holy
    Father and the burning of churches, the murder of a nun, and other
    acts of violence is morally bankrupt.

    Attack the content of the speech. Call the Pope names if you must,
    but violence is the fault of the violent not of the man who gave a
    paper making an argument.

    Previous emotive reactions, such as the violence following the
    publication of cartoons depicting Mohammed and Salman Rushdie's 1988
    novel The Satanic Verses, should have warned people not to criticise
    Islam.

    Do the Islamic radicals of Egypt really need an excuse to torch a
    Coptic Church?

    Here is the future if we do not take this War seriously: first
    non-Moslems will be afraid to criticize Islam, then we will be forced
    to adhere to Moslem practice to avoid offense. Outrageous tyranny
    of those willing to be violent for their beliefs will force even
    the majority in the West to adhere to the will of the most extreme
    members of a minority unwilling to police its own.

    As the Christians of the Middle East know from practice, there
    are no equal rights for a religious minority in the Islamic east
    today. If this Australian professor is the voice of moderate Islam,
    then my critics are correct and there is no moderate Islam. This is
    not neither moderate nor tolerable in a free society like Australia.

    I refuse to believe my friends, Moslems of good will, would say this
    thing. Let's argue about the truth of the Pope's speech, but give no
    ground to those who loot and murder in its name.

    Professor Yasmeen denied that the first reaction of many Muslims to
    perceived insults was violence, despite calls by some clerics to kill
    those who insult Islam and the murder of an Italian nun in Somalia.

    If it is not the first reaction, then is it acceptable as a second
    or third reaction? No matter how often the "provocation" violence
    cannot be tolerated based on free speech.

    We are war not because we do not like the views of Radical Islam or
    the speeches the leaders of Radical Islam make, but because we are
    defending our way of life.

    This article in which an academic, paid by the West to teach our
    children is the best example of our tolerance. This Moslem scholar
    has the right to her views. . . we should publish them . . . and
    argue against them, but we must not allow them to silence us.

    Right now, this very night, seminary faculty all over America in
    places like Harvard defame my beliefs. I lose no sleep over it and
    I contemplate no violence even though such an assault on my view of
    my precious Lord has gone on for decades.

    "I am not supportive of people killing and blowing things up, but
    people need to start looking at self censorship," she said.

    If only that would end the murder, but the Christian Armenians know
    it would not because they were a defeated minority and the radicals
    killed them anyway.

    They were silent and they died in the hundreds of thousands and the
    Turkish government still will not admit they were murdered.

    Professor Yasmeen said aggressive reactions were mainly limited to
    countries with low literacy rates and limited understanding of global
    politics, where Mohammed was seen to be the most important figure in
    a person's life.

    Do Christians kill as Moslem newspapers print defaming articles about
    Christianity and the Holy Father? Even in countries with low literacy
    rates? Would this Professor rather hold an Islamic cartoon about the
    Pope in a low literacy rate Catholic nation or be a Christian with
    the Pope's academic address in hand in any Islamic state?

    The Pope's apology and explanation would have had little impact,
    she said.

    Why? Does Islam seek dialogue or only silent serfdom on the part of
    Christians and Jews? Can we evangelize Moslems? I would give her the
    chance to make her best case for Islam, if I can do the same safely
    in a similar size Islamic university. But then, if my students convert
    to Islam, their parents will be very sad, but if most Moslems convert
    to Christianity, they must fear for their very lives in the Moslem
    controlled world.

    http://www.theonerepublic.com/archives/Col umns/ReynoldsJ/20060927ReynoldsCensor.html
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