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You are attacking persons who could be your allies. You prefer the attack on religion and the religious to a broad movement.

Eh, no.

I'm responding to people who are demanding special deference and recognition for their religion, above and beyond what is given to vegetarians, cat lovers, Dungeons&Dragons players, or any other practitioners of private eccentricities.

If your vision of a progressive coalition is one that throws everyone who doesn't pay at least lip service to some officially sanctioned religious movement gets thrown under the bus, then yeah, I'm not going to help you build your dream coalition.

- Jake

Friends come and go. Enemies accumulate.

by JakeS (JangoSierra 'at' gmail 'dot' com) on Fri Jan 4th, 2013 at 08:37:12 AM EST
[ Parent ]
False. My vision of a progressive coalition respects every human being and their human dignity and not only the atheist ones. Apparently I won't find it here.
by Katrin on Fri Jan 4th, 2013 at 03:12:18 PM EST
[ Parent ]
If you decide to stick around you'll find most of us do have respect for human beings and their human dignity.  You'll also find it can get ... h'mmmm ... "forthright" very quickly, sometimes.


She believed in nothing; only her skepticism kept her from being an atheist. -- Jean-Paul Sartre
by ATinNM on Fri Jan 4th, 2013 at 04:16:01 PM EST
[ Parent ]
"Forthright" isn't what I mind, but that people enjoy the harassment of a minority... And these poor people are now under observation: if they react violently to these mindless provocations it just shows that more harsh measures must be taken against them. If they protest, they are self-segregating and don't integrate and more harsh measures must be taken. If they don't do anything, it shows that the harsh measures of the past are functioning, and more of them just make sure... How can anyone support this? I don't get it. I am horrified.
by Katrin on Fri Jan 4th, 2013 at 06:52:55 PM EST
[ Parent ]
I completely agree with you on the harassment of a minority angle being the main issue, but I think it didn't help your cause and set the tone of the debate that you made some less nuanced categorisations. In particular, when pushing the line that Charlie Hebdo is a racist magazine: anyone familiar with France will know that CH is not some French equivalent of Sarrazin and does in fact repeatedly risk retaliation by regularly attacking the rich and powerful, and these readers will react with that in mind. I think it would have been a different debate if, instead of assuming a non-existent editorial policy, you'd kept focus on how this particular campaign is part of and cannot be viewed isolated from a broader obsession with Islam that can be considered at least implicitly racist (a point you made here and later Migeru here).

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.
by DoDo on Sun Jan 6th, 2013 at 05:21:21 AM EST
[ Parent ]
It's not the first time Charlie Hebdo does that. No accident then: they are consistently making fun of humans of a persecuted minority. It reeks of an editorial policy, doesn't it?
by Katrin on Sun Jan 6th, 2013 at 05:45:31 AM EST
[ Parent ]
I'm responding to people who are demanding special deference and recognition for their religion

Who, specifically? Surely not anyone here in this debate.

above and beyond what is given to vegetarians, cat lovers, Dungeons&Dragons players, or any other practitioners of private eccentricities.

All of those combined don't receive the amount of deliberate provocation in public which Muslims do in France. Surely you won't blame Muslims for that. Or, let's look at another country: where is the witch-hunt against animal rights activists in the Netherlands since the Fortuyn murder that matches the one against Muslims since the Theo van Gogh murder?

*Lunatic*, n.
One whose delusions are out of fashion.

by DoDo on Sat Jan 5th, 2013 at 05:01:50 PM EST
[ Parent ]

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