Muslim Protestors Target Google

[Driekan]

-snip-

I think you should do some studying. Your history? You got it wrong. Apparently all of it.

 

[Illyasviel]

-snip-

Right. And you did not grow up in a primarily christian society, had no contact with christian iconography, symbolism or concepts, and had never seen an image of Jesus prior to first hearing these pieces from the bible - which I assume, of course, you first heard after reaching adulthood.

I have to be honest man, I cannot read what you just wrote and not think you're being disingenuous.

Oh, hey, always avoiding my point. Slippery man, you.

I lump all those texts together and treat them as fiction. I am my own man.

Oh, hey, one of your badges is a picture of Solid Snake. TELL ME ALL ABOUT HIM. IS HE DATING ANYBODY?! HOW MANY DUDES HAS HE SHOT?! HOW OLD IS HE?! WHAT WAS HIS FOURTH MISSION?! AND HIS EIGHTEENTH?! WHO WAS HE FIGHTING?!

Exactly. Its just noise.

 

[CrazyGirl17]

*Sigh* This again? And why doesn't Google want to remove the "offensive" video, but those of so-called "stolen media"? Or am I just overthinking it?

Anyway, I understand why they're mad... but they're going about it all wrong...

 

[cerebus23]

fail to see how a text cannot be translated, in this big wide open world. so you are saying because, i assume there is some law that it cannot be translated in muslim land, that means that noone else has done it? and therefore that poster could not possibly be reading an accurate translation of it?

yea stop applying a relgions laws to the entire world that is all. part of the reason we have these problems is because some idiots decided that their religion rules us all and if we disagree with that then we are evil.

only stuff i see "christians" get this worked up about is science judging from the way that stuff gets trolled constantly on youtube. gays do not even get the amount of hate anything science related gets.

and i also find the whole greece thing as a mix of amusing and disgusting, considering that whole nations history of homosexuality.

grats on reaching troll worthiness islam you deserve it.

There's two ways to look at it. One demands that you have respect for other people, and an awareness of how religious thought works. The other one is a bit more secular.

First one is pretty simple, really. The Qur'an is a religious work. It must be read with a religious lens, otherwise you are projecting onto it a reference invalid to it.

So you put the religious lens on to try and interpret this thing. Okay. Now part of the claim here is that this is a book written by god. God wrote it, in that language, in that way. He chose the words, one by one. He chose the terms, the metric, the rhyme, everything.

Now, still with the religious lens on. Can a human equal god's work? I would assume not. So can a human get this text, interpret it, and then write another set of words, with another metric, another rhyme, another everything and claim that it is just as good? That it is equivalent?

No, a human couldn't. That means that attempting to translate it invalidates the work. That means there is no true translation of the work.

So that's number one. You may not believe the claim that it is written by god, but I assume you can understand (And possibly respect) their belief in this matter.

It further serves to lead to number two. Due to this belief, there is no accepted, condoned, or in any way authorized translation of the Qur'an. There are interpretations and studies, and some of those are meant to help non-muslims who do not speak arabic have an understanding of islam. Yes, it's true. But they are not to be considered accurate. Having worked as a translator, that is a policy that makes plenty of sense to me: Accurate translations of complicated (As opposed to complex) cultural works are not possible.

However, if something claims to be the Qur'an, but is in english, and is being handed out in schools to anyone who wants one... And knowing what I just said... Should that not get some warning bells going?

PS: As said, my knowledge on the subject is second-hand. If I am wrong and someone has better knowledge about this, please correct me.

heck i was raised christian and i find it absolutely laughable that anything in those old books is the literal word of god.

religion is the work of man, period. most of the stories in the old testament we passed down orally from years past, many of the stores were fitted to their own cultures, noah and etc were stories from other cultures.

and the great social experiment, take a room full of people tell the first person in the room a story have that person tell the story to the next person and the detail maybe even the whole story is changed by the time it reaches the end of the room.

so yea i personally discount the idea that anything written down was the work of god simply because it makes zero sense in how people pass on stories, outside the navajo indians that developed code talking just to avoid the fail that is verbal communication, so their stores are absolute accurate.

 

[IamGamer41]

There is absolutely nothing that this religion gives to the world other then the killing of innocent people or people who disagree with them.While you can say other religions do the same thing I have yet to see any Christens or Catholics blow themselves up in a crowed area or shoot a 14 year old girl in the head for speaking out for women's rights.

How this religion has brained washed the so called million's or so people who are Muslim's on this planet I'll never know.

 

[Driekan]

-snip-

We agree there. You see, if you believe that there is a god (Which a lot of people do, apparently) and he is omnipotent... Then he has the power to communicate a perfect concept to a human. I mean, he can do anything, right?

But if any human interferes with what was communicated in any way whatsoever, even adding a single dot or a dash... Then it is no longer the work of this omnipotent being who is capable of communicating perfect concepts.

The Qur'an is written word, written in a specific language, in a specific way... And if things are to be believed, it was always the way it is now. Which is pretty nifty.

Details like these are the things that make Islam one of the current major religions that I like the most. This concern with keeping things coherent.

In case you are wondering... I am, indeed, an atheist.

 

[Illyasviel]

We agree there. You see, if you believe that there is a god (Which a lot of people do, apparently) and he is omnipotent... Then he has the power to communicate a perfect concept to a human. I mean, he can do anything, right?

But if any human interferes with what was communicated in any way whatsoever, even adding a single dot or a dash... Then it is no longer the work of this omnipotent being who is capable of communicating perfect concepts.

The Qur'an is written word, written in a specific language, in a specific way... And if things are to be believed, it was always the way it is now. Which is pretty nifty.

And does not preclude others from gathering a meaning from it. Never read a Harry Potter book ( again, universal yardstick )? No problem. Magic happens at a place called Hogwarts. Magic also happens outside of Hogwarts too. Now you know something about Harry Potter.

Yes, I know that is a very simplified example. Don't try to extrapolate something silly from it.

And yet, you are telling me it is impossible to do what I just did.

I'm not saying what you are saying is untrue. I haven't read the rest of the book. If you say its full of good times and camaraderie, it probably is. But how about you go read the first six pages, and you tell me what it says and what impression it makes?

Oh wait, I already know the response to that. "I can't read it. It cannot be translated. Therefore, what you are saying is false."

Its great you can have an academic approach, but keep in mind that the majority of the Muslim world is highly uneducated. They blindly trust their Imams. I'm just trying to approach this like an average guy would.

 

[cerebus23]

-snip-

We agree there. You see, if you believe that there is a god (Which a lot of people do, apparently) and he is omnipotent... Then he has the power to communicate a perfect concept to a human. I mean, he can do anything, right?

But if any human interferes with what was communicated in any way whatsoever, even adding a single dot or a dash... Then it is no longer the work of this omnipotent being who is capable of communicating perfect concepts.

The Qur'an is written word, written in a specific language, in a specific way... And if things are to be believed, it was always the way it is now. Which is pretty nifty.

Details like these are the things that make Islam one of the current major religions that I like the most. This concern with keeping things coherent.

In case you are wondering... I am, indeed, an atheist.

Well i am not i just find more major relgions so full of absolute garbage that i cannot be bothered to give them the time of day, nor the idea that our god is the correct god b.s. that has invaded all the major religions for the last 2,000 some odd years.

that and they all worship the same god but they bicker over the details of it at best, and at worst they are killing each other over it.

i do not think "religious" people in general give god enough credit, nor do i believe that humans are the end all be all of creation that all our religions reinforce. i do not believe that universe threw up its hands when we became homo sapiens and said well thats it we cant do any better this is as good as it gets, god agrees and tells us all sure have it do whatever you want it is your planet to do with as you will.

to me all that stuff added in was men looking to control their people and religion is the perfect form of control as long as your religions agree with your civilization. which all sprung up when we went from nomadic tribes to agriculture and started cramming more people into more cramped spaces, and then assimilated or obliterated anyone that did not buy into that new agriculture mindset.

religions before and after the "agricultural revolution" were markedly different in their views, religions before were about balance and respect for nature and the god in nature, religions after were removing any respect for nature, and some were very much the excuse of why you could go slaughter your neighbors with a clear concience.

 

[katsabas]

Haven't seen the play or the movie but there are some things I wanna get out of my chest.

I know a doctor. He is a Muslim married to a christian and they have 3 kids. What's more, his wife is Greek and they live in Athens. The hatred towards other religions and fanaticism is not something Muslims are born with but rather of the blind trust that the population shows to their religion representatives, the Imams.

Being that they are the ones responsible delivering the word of Allah to the (mostly) uneducated world of Pakistan, Iran etc., the blame falls squarely upon their shoulders for each and every protest around the world that ends in bloodshed and has something to do with the laws of the Coran being broken. Freedom of speech and creativity is a dead concept in these regions.

A simple example: The Coran doesn't forbid people from eating meat. It acknowledges that it is their body but states that the pig is a filthy animal and the meat produced from it is not healthy. There is a difference between 'don't' and 'shouldn't'.

The uneducated problem shows up here as well. They protested in front of Google in order for Youtube to take down a trailer to a movie ? Good luck, here is your tent and the WC is down the road to the left.

Now as for the shining example of Mr.Ilias, the guy is scum. Complete and total scum. He tagged a fellow politician on air because he couldn't retort against the arguments presented to him. His whole political party are carbon copies of him, except for the age difference.

We do not need him or GD to intervene for us in such cases. They were nowhere to be seen in the rallies against political and economical oppression that Greece now has to deal with. Besides, we fucking fought against the Axis in 1940. GD share pretty much share the same beliefs with NeoNazis. People voted for them cause 1) of the large number of illegal immigrants in the country (Omonia in downtown Athens is a place filled with black markets, shops opening without respecting the legislation or paying taxes and where crackpots inject their genitals with cocaine in broad daylight while in front of small children who simply want to go to a puppet theater) 2) cause they thought they would be a good change.

GD are attention hounds. The best weapon against them is ignorance. The representatives of the church, while not liking the perspective from which the story of Jesus is being told (it's natural, they are only human, everyone diapproves what they do not like), actually damn the fact that some people chose to side with GD in order to protect the identity of Christ and claim that the only thing the protests managed to do is draw attention.

Both the play and the movie are expressions of art. Art by its defintion, is defined by the one watching it. Every person watching it gives it a different meaning.

On a totally hilarious note, in their first press conference, a big part of the reporters there, were thrown out cause they didn't stand up and salute when the party leader came in.

 

[Driekan]

There is absolutely nothing that this religion gives to the world other then the killing of innocent people or people who disagree with them.While you can say other religions do the same thing I have yet to see any Christens or Catholics blow themselves up in a crowed area or shoot a 14 year old girl in the head for speaking out for women's rights.

For a person with such a strong opinion on the subject, you seem to know little about it.

On the blowing themselves up... Bombs are fairly recent things, but you'll still find plenty of examples of christians doing it throughout history. Wikipedia alone has a string of fairly famous occurrences. The assassination of russian Tsar Alexander II is a specially cool example. Read through lists like these, and you'll find examples from all major cultures and religions, making it almost seem like this thing, like so many other things is kind of universal.

As for killing young women. You may have heard of the inquisition, and the salem witch trials, or of any other witch hunt down the religion's history, or the conquest of the americas, or the sacking of jerusalem, or the religious justifications for the second wave of colonialism... List goes on. Religious justification for killing young women found in all of them. But damn, that is a specific thing you picked there, huh?

On the bit about "not giving anything to the world"... You may want to think twice. The symbols you used to write that "14" on your message is arabic in origin. In fact, a disturbing volume of knowledge, science and culture in the world can be tracked to the arabic, muslim world, who kept culture alive while the christian nations were happily butchering each other.

The muslim world brought us startling examples of religious acceptance (such as the Ottoman Millet system), and was for a very long time the most fertile, most liberal and most rich breeding ground for new ideas both practical and philosophical.

These nations did all this while being, to a very significant degree, islamic and it would be disingenuous to affirm in any way that muslim values played no part in making it happen. It would be like trying to affirm that our ("Western") legal system does not derive from christian morals and values: Both are absurd statements.

How this religion has brained washed the so called million's or so people who are Muslim's on this planet I'll never know.

It's billions, actually.

-snip-

You are comparing reading a book written 10 years ago by a person from the same overall cultural background as yours to reading a book written 1300 years ago by a person from a completely different culture? Uhh... Seriously?

What I am trying to point out is that we in "The West" generally lack the cultural repertoire to adequately understand the Qur'an, especially if we do not seek secondary sources for explanation.

If you give a copy of Harry Potter to a sentinel islander (Assuming it was translated into his language, by some miracle), he will be at least as bewildered by it as you are about the Qur'an, and he will derive as much understanding as you did. Not much.

Well i am not i just find more major relgions so full of absolute garbage that i cannot be bothered to give them the time of day, nor the idea that our god is the correct god b.s. that has invaded all the major religions for the last 2,000 some odd years.

That's a reason to like Islam more than most other religions. It is the one that recognizes the prophets of a lot of other religions as being, indeed, holy people who did bring the word of god.

religions before and after the "agricultural revolution" were markedly different in their views, religions before were about balance and respect for nature and the god in nature, religions after were removing any respect for nature, and some were very much the excuse of why you could go slaughter your neighbors with a clear concience.

Those are dangerously broad blanket statements, and not ones I think you should be comfortable saying unless you've spent a lot of time with pastoral or hunter-gatherer communities.

 

[cerebus23]

There is absolutely nothing that this religion gives to the world other then the killing of innocent people or people who disagree with them.While you can say other religions do the same thing I have yet to see any Christens or Catholics blow themselves up in a crowed area or shoot a 14 year old girl in the head for speaking out for women's rights.

For a person with such a strong opinion on the subject, you seem to know little about it.

On the blowing themselves up... Bombs are fairly recent things, but you'll still find plenty of examples of christians doing it throughout history. Wikipedia alone has a string of fairly famous occurrences. The assassination of russian Tsar Alexander II is a specially cool example. Read through lists like these, and you'll find examples from all major cultures and religions, making it almost seem like this thing, like so many other things is kind of universal.

As for killing young women. You may have heard of the inquisition, and the salem witch trials, or of any other witch hunt down the religion's history, or the conquest of the americas, or the sacking of jerusalem, or the religious justifications for the second wave of colonialism... List goes on. Religious justification for killing young women found in all of them. But damn, that is a specific thing you picked there, huh?

On the bit about "not giving anything to the world"... You may want to think twice. The symbols you used to write that "14" on your message is arabic in origin. In fact, a disturbing volume of knowledge, science and culture in the world can be tracked to the arabic, muslim world, who kept culture alive while the christian nations were happily butchering each other.

The muslim world brought us startling examples of religious acceptance (such as the Ottoman Millet system), and was for a very long time the most fertile, most liberal and most rich breeding ground for new ideas both practical and philosophical.

These nations did all this while being, to a very significant degree, islamic and it would be disingenuous to affirm in any way that muslim values played no part in making it happen. It would be like trying to affirm that our ("Western") legal system does not derive from christian morals and values: Both are absurd statements.

How this religion has brained washed the so called million's or so people who are Muslim's on this planet I'll never know.

It's billions, actually.

-snip-

You are comparing reading a book written 10 years ago by a person from the same overall cultural background as yours to reading a book written 1300 years ago by a person from a completely different culture? Uhh... Seriously?

What I am trying to point out is that we in "The West" generally lack the cultural repertoire to adequately understand the Qur'an, especially if we do not seek secondary sources for explanation.

If you give a copy of Harry Potter to a sentinel islander (Assuming it was translated into his language, by some miracle), he will be at least as bewildered by it as you are about the Qur'an, and he will derive as much understanding as you did. Not much.

Well i am not i just find more major relgions so full of absolute garbage that i cannot be bothered to give them the time of day, nor the idea that our god is the correct god b.s. that has invaded all the major religions for the last 2,000 some odd years.

That's a reason to like Islam more than most other religions. It is the one that recognizes the prophets of a lot of other religions as being, indeed, holy people who did bring the word of god.

religions before and after the "agricultural revolution" were markedly different in their views, religions before were about balance and respect for nature and the god in nature, religions after were removing any respect for nature, and some were very much the excuse of why you could go slaughter your neighbors with a clear concience.

Those are dangerously broad blanket statements, and not ones I think you should be comfortable saying unless you've spent a lot of time with pastoral or hunter-gatherer communities.

I do feel relatively comfortable saying a major change had to occur in the mindset of people living nomadically, where over hunting, grazing etc could destroy your local ecosystem for the coming seasons.

Not to say i believe in the noble savage thing, where all nomad peoples got along like hippies, i am sure back then tribes were competing over hunting areas, water sources and depending on feast and famine conditions those conflicts could get pretty bloody.

Vs agriculture where you have to toss out that balance, and because your population can expand beyond what your local ecosystem can support you tend to expand rapidly. also the idea that we have destroyed 90 some percent of peoples not living our way. The story of kain and able is a story about that war between the old ways of living and the new WAY of living.

The few olden peoples that do exist yet are a dying breed, and the elders will lament the fact that their children are seduced by missionaries that win them over with radios and flashlights and ipods and convince them they need these things to survive and run off to the cities with dreams of cool stuff that hardly ever work out because they do not have the skills needed in modern societies. we do not destroy people with smallpox and genocide of the local animal life, and bloody conflict, we simply give them stuff.

 

[LordLundar]

what? you were being very unspecific at first so i was trying to clarify what you meant. no, i hadn't realized a mosque was there 4 blocks away, which i have no problem with it being there actually, i never said i did? i'm sorry that i don't do research on every building in a city that i don't live in nor have ever been to.

So you didn't even bother to do research about the very thing you were talking about? Are you just that goddamn lazy?

the reason why i was pissed off had NOTHING to do with that mosque nor ground zero. I've said MULTIPLE times in this thread and before that you are welcome to have your beliefs, that i have no problem with, but when you get pissed off/try to do something about every little thing that doesn't line up with your beliefs, that's when i do have a problem, and if they don't like the fact that the people who made the video have those rights then they can simply ignore it/deal with it like a normal person, or simply not use the internet.

"Deal with it like a normal person"

This is what you just said, right there. You have openly admitted that you don't think they're "normal people" because they're exercising their rights as UK citizens to have a peaceful protest to invoke a change that they believe in. And you're trying to tell me that if it was a bunch of Catholics you'd be saying the same thing? So when do you start calling any christian protest as infringing rights and comparing them to abortion clinic bombers? I'd be willing to bet it doesn't happen.

a far worse incident? what are you referring to? i'm too lazy to go back and look so please, enlighten me if you really think i'm blindly bashing muslims.

Maybe I should retract that first question as you clearly are to lazy to do anything yourself. Let's see, how should I respond to this...

NO.

It's not my responsibility to spoon feed a lazy ass like yourself information. Learn to read and find it yourself (here's a hint: I told you where you could find it in my previous reply) THEN try and prove your point. You're either a bigot or ignorant. Take your pick.

 

[Darth_Payn]

Sometimes I don't want to live on this planet anymore.

captcha: buffalo wing
Now I want one to help me forget this silliness.

 

[Eldrig]

The sheer amount of ignorance and hate for muslims on this comment section is bewildering for me. How can anyone living in the modern age feel comfortable making such huge and sweeping generalizations of a religion based on the actions of a tiny minority? It boggles the mind. Muslims are no more inherently violent or evil than any other religious group, and in fact, looking at some of the tenants of their religion, I have to say that it has far more provisions for tolerance than christianity. In any case, good for these people protesting. I think the video should be taken down. Not because I am against free speech, just that I think it absurd that google seems to place a higher value on trying to take down videos that violate copyright laws rather than a video that's only purpose is to engender hate towards a specific group -ANY GROUP-.

 

[TeletubbiesGolfGun]

what? you were being very unspecific at first so i was trying to clarify what you meant. no, i hadn't realized a mosque was there 4 blocks away, which i have no problem with it being there actually, i never said i did? i'm sorry that i don't do research on every building in a city that i don't live in nor have ever been to.

So you didn't even bother to do research about the very thing you were talking about? Are you just that goddamn lazy?

the reason why i was pissed off had NOTHING to do with that mosque nor ground zero. I've said MULTIPLE times in this thread and before that you are welcome to have your beliefs, that i have no problem with, but when you get pissed off/try to do something about every little thing that doesn't line up with your beliefs, that's when i do have a problem, and if they don't like the fact that the people who made the video have those rights then they can simply ignore it/deal with it like a normal person, or simply not use the internet.

"Deal with it like a normal person"

This is what you just said, right there. You have openly admitted that you don't think they're "normal people" because they're exercising their rights as UK citizens to have a peaceful protest to invoke a change that they believe in. And you're trying to tell me that if it was a bunch of Catholics you'd be saying the same thing? So when do you start calling any christian protest as infringing rights and comparing them to abortion clinic bombers? I'd be willing to bet it doesn't happen.

a far worse incident? what are you referring to? i'm too lazy to go back and look so please, enlighten me if you really think i'm blindly bashing muslims.

Maybe I should retract that first question as you clearly are to lazy to do anything yourself. Let's see, how should I respond to this...

NO.

It's not my responsibility to spoon feed a lazy ass like yourself information. Learn to read and find it yourself (here's a hint: I told you where you could find it in my previous reply) THEN try and prove your point. You're either a bigot or ignorant. Take your pick.

yes because every single person ever has researched everything they've posted to the upmost degree..i did not express that as fact, but as merely my opinion, i'm so sorry for not realizing there was a mosque four blocks away, my research only led me to 3 blocks away, next time i'll research even further!

hahah 'normal' has nothing to do with your religion/race/gender/etc.. it's being able to deal with a situation like a normal person does, which is, they say/believe their two cents and then go on with life. and i said i had a problem with who they are doing it to, which is random google employees. hypothetical example:

say the local supermarket sold sandwiches, and accidently they were shipped a bad set of meat unknowingly, but the meat processing plant knew this, would you:

A) get mad at the supermarket (youtube)

or

B) get mad at the meat packing plant (douchebag who made the movie)

I would get mad at the meat packing plant, because they are the ones who made it and shipped it out, which is not what these protesters are doing, they are grilling the wrong people.

you keep going off on random tangents, which is why i question you so much in your posts, you randomly switch every sentence which is why i was asking for more citations/details on what you were referring to, i'm sorry that i don't research enough...asian dad would be very disappointed in me.

bigot or ignorant?

mehh, i'll take both, a big ant!

Spoiler: RAWR RAWR BEHEAD THE INFIDELS

 

[Illyasviel]

You are comparing reading a book written 10 years ago by a person from the same overall cultural background as yours to reading a book written 1300 years ago by a person from a completely different culture? Uhh... Seriously?

What I am trying to point out is that we in "The West" generally lack the cultural repertoire to adequately understand the Qur'an, especially if we do not seek secondary sources for explanation.

If you give a copy of Harry Potter to a sentinel islander (Assuming it was translated into his language, by some miracle), he will be at least as bewildered by it as you are about the Qur'an, and he will derive as much understanding as you did. Not much.

So you're attempting to frame everything through scholarly academia, where everybody has a degree in anthropology, history and religious studies. And that's fine and all.

And I'm attempting to approach this from a natural, realistic point of view of an average person. And you're telling me I'm doing it all wrong. And also that's fine and all.

So what are you going to tell the teeming masses of actual Muslims in the Middle East, a large portion much of undereducated, potentially illiterate, and blindly believe in their Imams? At least I'm freaking reading the thing for myself. I'm trying to appreciate it as an average person. For that matter, how many people really read religious texts while holding a degree in anthropology and history? Maybe merrily LARPing away. You know. Just to really get in the mindset? Your view is unrealistic so why don't you come down to this level where reality happens? Or hey, read the second chapter for yourself and tell me what you glean from it: http://www.alislam.org/quran/search2/showChapter.php?ch=2&verse=1.

Remember, what I said was exactly that the first six pages are full of intolerance and that it creates a bad impression. Tell me how I'm wrong. Don't try to be a wuss and dodge it. "Oh, I can't read it because its not supposed to exist! Waahhh." Man up.

 

[The Unworthy Gentleman]

He's currently in jail.

For his own protection or an actual crime I hope.

An actual crime. He violated the terms of his probation that outright stated that he couldn't use computers or the internet at all for 5 years. By posting the video online he violated his probation and went to jail.

Fucking idiot, he really went out of his way to get this started. As long as he's not just been detained to keep a few of the less rational protesters happy; it's not right that I jumped to that conclusion but it's hardly unjustified these days.

 

[Techno Squidgy]

Do you know what the worst thing about this whole debacle is?



The film was absolutely terrible. Terrible writing, terrible acting, terrible sets, terrible effects.

I wish the muslims would just shrug this off the way most Christians would. Barring the Westboro Baptist church and various fundamentalists/extremists, most christians are generally pretty chill when people take the piss out of Jesus or God. Yet the Muslims declare that someone should be murdered for depicting Mohammed (pbuh). I just don't get it.
Perhaps Mr/Mrs Garrison was onto something
http://youtu.be/eNtDrUhcKyQ?t=47s

I suspect most people around where you live deposit more of their personal faith and values in things other than religion. I'm gonna go on a wild hunch and assume you're north american (Beg forgive if you're not, but building up a point here).

I suspect you, or people around you, react somewhat more powerfully when other values are threatened. In my experience, most americans place a huge burden of importance on 9/11, to a degree that seems irrational to anyone looking from the outside,much like their reaction to this film seems irrational. Not to diminish a tragedy, merely pointing out that to most people in the world, it was "A building fell down, couple thousand people died", an event far less shocking than most tragedies that happened around the same time, or since.

I am an English agnostic (it's not the right word for my beliefs but I can't find a definition that sits comfortably), as are most of the people I spend my time with. Some are atheists, others are Christian. We tend to keep a firmly open mind about religion, generally mocking each others beliefs in good fun.

We react strongest to threats against freedom, be it freedom of speech, freedom of expression.

I think I might actually buy an English translation of the Qur'an and read it, see if I can't understand a bit better. It just doesn't make sense to me why the Muslims react so violently.

 

[ReinWeisserRitter]

Seems like Muslim protestors are targeting everything lately. They could stand to chill out a bit.

 

[prowll]

Every burned book enlightens the world. Every time someone makes a huge stink, and tries to 'ban' a book, movie, or whatever, it just brings more attention than it ever deserved in the first place. Had there been no protest, nobody would notice or care about the crappy movie.