Qwertyuiopasd wrote:daftbeaker wrote:Someone is quite welcome to buy their own copies of everything written by Darwin, Dawkins, Pratchett and Sharpe and burn it all. I can either throw a massive incoherent rage and shoot people or I can accept that they did what they wanted with their property.
That's not exactly a fair comparison. You don't believe (and keep in mind I mean a very strong belief) that those books are written by, or at least inspired by God, and that it's the most central message in the entire universe.
I was just taking the closest approximation. If someone burnt my stuff I would promptly set about them with my cane. Burning their own stuff may well be a waste of books but it's their decision and my getting annoyed about it is a choice, as is any subsequent action of mine.
Qwertyuiopasd wrote:One interpretation of Karzai's statement is "It really doesn't accomplish anything to burn the Qu'ran, except to piss off people with guns. It's also really insulting to many of us who won't necessarily do anything violent about it, so for both our sake, and the sake of world peace, could you not do that?"
I read it as "I'm a Muslim. Despite there being a massive war with huge deaths to remove my country from a theocracy, I'm hell-bent on installing my own version of a theocracy." Destroying a Qu'ran may be an insult to Muslims, it is no more an insult to a country than me blowing my nose.
Qwertyuiopasd wrote:I would agree with Yudhoyono, too. Perhaps not with those same words, or any implied violent/forceful actions, but I personally won't be satisfied until everyone realizes and agrees that this kind of behavior is stupid and unhelpful, and doesn't do it.
And it's stupid and unhelpful because? It's the same thing as Draw Muhammad day, which I think you were in favour of (can't check, the thread's been pruned). It's a gesture designed to piss off Muslims and remind them that not everyone believes what they believe, that their reactions are overblown and stupid.
Qwertyuiopasd wrote:And as far as Petreaus's comments, I'm not going to defend any actions of the U.S. in the middle east, but from their perspective, what they're doing as the military is necessary, and burning Qu'rans isn't. I mean, no one wants to go to war in general terms, we do it because the results we're looking for outweigh the cost, at least from the perspective of the people in charge. Burning the Qu'ran is a net loss. It doesn't accomplish anything in the middle east, it only is fuel for the fundamentalists, and will increase violent acts against U.S. soldiers, and possibly others.
I objected to the idea that burning private property in the US is going to put coalition troops in more danger than they were already in or that it's somehow worse than murdering people trying to get the wounded to safety.