You know you're an Islamophobe when...

I've been sent a link to an article by a Tom Gallagher at Open Democracy about the attack on Glasgow Airport and the Scottish Muslim and Nationalist reaction to it.

A universal sense of shock was followed by vigorous official efforts to build bridges to the country's approximately 60,000 Muslims. A week later, on 7 July, the cream of Scotland's establishment gathered in George Square in Glasgow's heart to offer them protection and reassurance. The institutions represented included the ruling Scottish National Party (SNP), the police, the Church of Scotland, the trade unions, and the vocal anti-war movement ...

Muslims at the 1,500-strong rally mixed freely with the representatives of political and lobbying groups who made up the bulk of the crowd. The central spot was reserved for Osama Saeed, an articulate young Muslim activist (and former SNP candidate) whose intensity and fluency have made him a sought-after guide to the mood and concerns of Scotland's Muslims since the airport attack.

Gallagher goes on to say that anything I've said however, could be subject to taqiyya. This is a word I first came across at Harry's Place a couple of years ago when I was engaged with someone in the comments section, only to be accused of this. I had to go and look the word up.

So Muslims are now in a lose-lose situation. Say the wrong thing (or something that can be uncharitably construed) and get pilloried. Say the right thing and get accused of lying.

Speaking of Harry's Place, David Taub has had a "By jove, I think he's got it!" moment. Commenting on Inayat Bunglawala's CiF article about the likely formation of a future caliphate based on democratic principles and human rights (as any Islamic state worth the name should), he's realised Inayat B is not a fascist.

I wrote a similar piece a couple of years ago in the Guardian, for which T labelled me a "clerical fascist" for saying that in future years, based on democratic reform and economic advancement, the Muslim world may unite just as Europe has. Taub now says this is probably best described as religious conservatism rather than fascism. He is constrained by his own boxes, because looking at the state of the Muslim world at the moment, I'd just call it serious progress.

Comments

[aineliva]

What I feel we are experiencing currently is an environment where many Muslims feel that, to put it at it's simplest, they have been overlooked, left behind, and possibly betrayed by the "progressive" western countries.

Much of that progress is based on an energy source that mostly Muslim countries have supplied. And only in some small and very rich Muslim countries do education and health welfare for all exist.

On the other hand we have Western Europe, a societies where human rights, in particular to health and education have for some time been available. And we have fought vicious and bloody religious wars to arrive at this.

I'm not sure that it's actually a particular religion that people fear, it's just religion.

Personally Islam would have to rewrite it's views on women for me to consider it as a base ethic for governing.

Other than that I see little difference between those two religion's values.

There will always be those amongst us who use God to validate their actions, however inhuman those actions are.

Indeed just as there are some Muslims who use God and the Koran to validate violence, I note that there are also Christians who use God and the Bible to back up their right to wage war and have personal weapons.

Personally, the greatest danger faced by the human race is our inhuman use of Nature, who is about to strike back and give us a lesson we will not forget and may not survive.

[joe90]

Thersites,
can a society based on christian principles be compatible with democratic liberal principles?
After all, if you read St Paul then he tells us women have no place in decision-making in the Church - and indeed, ordinary people should obey the secular authority of undemocratic kings. The list of anti-liberal injuntcion in The New Testament is endless.

And Britian is still a theocracy-monarchy - the Church of England is not dis-established and Catholics can't become the head of the British state. It's hardly a liberal utopia.

You don't know what you're talking about when it comes to human cultures and legal frameworks.

Democracy is there so that people can live their lives they way they want to - you seem to think that law and order is incompatible with the diversity that is human culture - a typical fascist neo-nazi attitude.

Human culture, of whatever stripe is not incompatible with liberal democracy - indeed, the western corporate buisness system model are private totalitarian tyrannies in our midst - why don't you complain about these actual human rights abuses, rather than interrogate individual blokes about their future utopian pipe-dreams looking for excuses to get up onto your little tabloid soap-box of indignation?

So Thersites
does George Bush and the rest of his violent Global racist Jihadis act in a manner that is compatible with the code of ethics embodied in the Charters and Declarations of human rights you seem to be the champion of?

It would be nice if you could supply some proof that the Bush, Blair christianist jihadis (who, as we all know, are responsible for creating and training the lesser jihadis of Al Quaeda etc) are actually law-abiding when it comes to international human rights - In contrast to economic rights and treaties of which they are rigidly conformist to, mainly because it has to do with private trans-national corporate buisness totalitarian tyrannies, and hence is something western governments love to promote because it undermines public democracy.

As for this David T,
the best way to move forward in the nebulous 'Islamic World' would be for the war criminals of the west, such as the US and UK governments, to stop destroying democracy whenever it appears in West Asia and South West Asia (ie Iran, Iraq, Algeria, and currently Occupied Palestine) and to stop supporting Arab totalitarian puppetships, all of which will collapse in a second as soon as western support for them is removed.

Every secular movement in West Asia has been attacked and destroyed by the western governments - the only thing these people have left to express themselves through is their religion. The one thing the west cannot steal, destroy, occupy, or vandalise - hence the current attacks 'Islam' (as there is nothing else left to attack), as emobodied by the great champion of secular liberal democratic pluralism here, the self-appointed inquisitor general David T.

It's a well known characteristic of fascists and neo-nazis to abuse liberal democracy - they consider it a weakness to be used and abused, as circumstances dictate.

As for Hezbollah and Hamas - they are legitimate resistence movements and are the direct creation of western policies of attacking, occupying and destroying these innocent defenceless peoples' communities. If the David T's of this world don't like the existence of such groups then he should do something about it - stop attacking them!

The Shia of southern Lebanon were as 'docile as doormat' (Robert Fisk) until Israel began to attack and invade south Lebanon, starting 1978 - these People hate our policies, not our freedoms.

Blame our victims!

As for this nonsense that its only the British Comrades of the SWP etc who are against the UK government's Hitlerian foreign policy - this is utter twaddle. Read any British public opinion poll on the matter. I suppose it was the British Commies and the SWP who, alone, managed to force Tony Blair to leave his Prime Ministership early, was it?

[Sohaib]

"A couple of days ago you were thinking I was a fascist."

No, Osama, a CLERICAL fascist. I guess I must be one of those too..? I'm so glad I can turn to people like David T to tell me who and what I am.

On taqiyyah: it's funny, I only used to see this term used by Sunnis who were engaged in online slagging matches with Shi'is. Then on horrible anti-Islam sites. It's something that's just never come up in Islamic da'wah or activism. Nobody ever said we can lie. But I don't know who'll believe me, since I could be taqiyyah-ing right now eh?

[joe90]

Sohaib mate,
you're never alone with cold-war paranoia!

Once we were told we had to be frightened of the commie-pinkos hiding under our bed - now it's the islamo-fascists who are coming to take us over, and take us away in our sleep - oooooh scary biscuits!

It is a common characteristic of western propaganda,
that the demons who are out to destroy us and our western liberal way of life such as the savage Red Indians, evil Saddam, Nicaraguan Sandanistas, Mad Dog Gaddafi and his hit-men, etc are the ones who are actually being crushed and destoyed by us.

I mean
with the euphemistically named 'US defence budget' at nearly a trillion dollars a year now, you really need very scary monsters indeed, such as 'clerical fascists' in order to justify it!

And this 'taqqiya' thing,
is very reminscent of the way witch trials used to be conducted - you couldn't ever trust the word of the heretic-victims until they'd been tortured.
And is also every reminscent of the way poor German Jewish folk were regarded under Nazi Germany!

So what if these neo-nazis don't trust anything anybody says to them - yawn!

all the best bro!

[Thetsites]

Joe90,
Of course a society based on christian principles would not be compatible with liberal democratic principles. However, unlike the case with islam, no-one has been foolish or dishonest enough to say it can be lately.

You'd better look up the definition of theocracy. The Church of England does not have or claim to have direct access to the true word of god, nor does it have powers to determine peoples' behaviour or control what can be publicly said or what religions may be publicly followed even in England, let alone the rest of the UK; as for the restriction on roman catholics becoming monarch, it is, no doubt regrettable as a principle, but it is not something which affects many people. Of course, you may think it the most important infringement on human liberty to be found anywhere in the world at the moment, but I don't think many people would agree with you.

"Democracy is there so that people can live their lives they way they want to - you seem to think that law and order is incompatible with the diversity that is human culture - a typical fascist neo-nazi attitude."
You have an extraordinary ability to read what isn't there and an even more extraordinary ignorance of the attitudes of fascists and neo-nazis, for someone who throws the words about so enthusiastically. I think that "law and order" should be used to defend the diversity of human culture. In an open society that is what it should do. However, a caliphate would be based on the certainty that one particular human culture is superior to all the others and that the nearer other cultures approach to that ideal culture the better they are. I certainly wouldn't call it fascist or neo-nazi; i just don't think it's desirable, even as a pipe-dream. An open society is where "people can live their lives they way they want to", as long as they do no direct harm to others. A democracy may well not be such a society. a democracy is a state where the people- usually defined as a majority of the population- rules. It need not be an open society at all and a caliphate, democratic or not, as a muslim state for muslim people would very probably restrict the ability of people to live their lives they way they want to where other societies would not: adulterers, homosexuals and fornicators, muslims who stop believing in islam, polytheists, christians, jews, agnostics and atheists, for example.

"Human culture, of whatever stripe is not incompatible with liberal democracy" Really? Even a fascist and/or neo-nazi culture is not incompatible with liberal democracy? However, a culture which proclaims that it operates on the absolute and inerrant word of god is, if it follows its own aspirations, incompatible with liberal democracy for the reasons given. In such a society the rights of god must outweigh any merely human tights claimed by mere humans.
"indeed, the western corporate buisness system model are private totalitarian tyrannies in our midst - why don't you complain about these actual human rights abuses[/quote] Precisely which western corporate buisness system models are you referring to? Precisely what have they done in the way of totalitarian tyrannisation? You do know what totalitarian and tyranny mean, don't you, Joe90? What human rights abuses have- say- Marks & Spencers' or Sainsburys' practised lately?
"rather than interrogate individual blokes about their future utopian pipe-dreams looking for excuses to get up onto your little tabloid soap-box of indignation?" I think you had better sort out your metaphors as they appear to be inextricably tangled here.

I don't have a high opinion of Messrs Bush and Blair and I did what little I could to stop their adventure in iraq. However, the very fact that they are gradually being forced to withdraw, to abandon their millenarian fantasies, by the power of public opinion suggests that for all their faults the USA and UK can force governments to stop committing crimes. they are far from perfect, I'd agree, but certainly better than a state run by the supposed word of god as interpreted by a bunch of enthusiasts and bigots.

[Abu Sinan]

The taqqiya thing is a red herring. If you talk to most Muslims they would not even be aware of the concept.

It has mostly been used by the Shi'a, historically. But like I said, it is a joke. The concept basically is that you are allowed to lie if it will save your life or save you from persecution.

Any Christians out there who think that lying to save your life, or your family's lives, is a sin that God would not forgive?

This is how it works. The Islamophobes out there make their claims, ie "they never condemn terror, their religion tells them to kill people."

When Muslims have, and do condemn terror and tell people Islam doesnt sanction killing they simply tell you that nothing you say can be trusted because taqqiya allows Muslims to lie.

Basically this is a complete set up, no matter what you say you are either not saying enough, or what you do say is lies.

[joe90]

Thersites knows as much about what he's talking about as that other racist muppet david t -

Thersites says..
Of course a society based on christian principles would not be compatible with liberal democratic principles. However, unlike the case with islam, no-one has been foolish or dishonest enough to say it can be lately.

Now that's what I call a very big assertion. So none of these have ever called for a society based on christianity -
- The Moderator of the Genral Assembley of the Church of Scotland
- the Pope
- every American President since Carter (even Clinton made sure he was seen going to Christian Church every week)
- the British Queen as the head of the British state and the Church of England
- the Head of the Church of England
- those unelected Bishops of the Church of England who sit in the House of Lords
- the illiberal British Blasphemy Law
- Protestant fundamentalism
- etc etc on and on

On American currency are the words 'In God We Trust' - and those who recite the Amercian oath of alliegance have to prolcaim America as 'One Nation under God'. The current US President claims he talks to G-d, though I'm not sure if G-d answers him.

And if an illiberal society, such as we find in Britian, disenfranchises say, Roman Catholics, then that is OK by Thersites because there aren't many Roman Catholics - ha ha ha - its not important ha ha ha h!!
As brilliant a definition of an illiberal racist as you can hope to come across. Thersites is not only is a bigot, but they are blind bigot as well. Not many Jews either, lets disenfranchise them as well - Hitler done this and so your definition of a 'liberal society' of excluding minorities that makes Nazi germany haven of democracy.

I don't even need to say anything - I just need to let Thersites open their mouth for them to prove my points for me!

And this Thersites claims to be a champion of 'liberal pluralist democracy' as well.

Thanks for the lessons about definitions Thersites but I don't need bigots like you to tell me what I know far better than than you do yourself.

Thersites is all at sea when it comes to private corporate tyrannies - top down authoritarian structures where people have no individuality, and have to follow their orders to the letter or they suffer the consequences. As perfect a desription of a totalitarian regime as you can hope to find and poor Thersites doesn't understand this, which tells you all you have to know about Thersites grasp of the world around them.

Oviously Thersites has never heard of the concep of 'industrial democracy' or knows anything about the history of the trades union movemnet and why the exist.

Meanwhile, as our own western governments are carrying out Hitlerian foreign policies and undermining democracy at home, and our western corporations are undermining democracy abroad and at home -
- lets all cower under our beds at the thought of maybe, possibly, who-knows, of this future 'Caliphate' where we will all be under the lash of fundamentalist backward regimes such we find in Saudi Arabia, which has been a very close friend of the US longer than fundamentalist Israel, before Israel even existed.

Saudi Arabia makes even theorcratic Iran look like a bohemian haven of wreckless individual abandoment.

The only two other fundamentalist regimes in the world are, of course, the US and Israel.

Extremist fundamentalist non-government organistaions include Hamas and Hezbollah both of whom owe their creation to Israel. Al Quaeda owes its creations, training and support to the CIA and the Yanks.

Still, lets all experience irrational unfounded cold war paranoia at the thought the Rusiian are coming... sorry, I mean the Asian hordes are coming!

And lets be clear about this - the only reason of the US abandoning their Hitlerian foreign policy isn't because of public opinion, its because the US government are a bunch of total moronic incompetents who are getting beaten by a bunch of third rate resistence groups in Iraq - it has do with success and failure and has nothing to do with morality or public opinion. They wouldn't have attacked innocent defenceless Iraq inthe first place if it had anything to do with public opinion or interational law or morality.

[joe90]

Hiya Abu Sinan
great to hear from you. I hope the family are all well!

All the best mate!

ps
the Scottish Palestine Solidarity Campaign have a delegation visiting Israel-Palestine at the moment - I am using their blog as my Homepage if anybody interested.

[joe90]

This is quite funny!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/07/20/wblair120.xml>US to keep Blair out of Middle East
By Tim Butcher
The Telegraph
July 20 2007

Tony Blair was told by the United States yesterday that he had no authority to tackle political negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians as he spent his first full day as special envoy to the Middle East.

[joe90]

My apologies for these multiple posts,
but here is another beautie from the great Lawerence of Cyberia -
http://lawrenceofcyberia.blogs.com/news/2007/07/muslim-its-the-.html>Muslim: It's The New Jew!
21 July 2007

all the best!

[Thersites]

Joe90: the assorted people you list may or may not- you have given no sources for your allegations- have "called for a society based on christianity"- a much more imprecise term than a society based on christian principles. That isn't evidence that such a society would be compatible with liberal democratic principles or that they favour a society compatible with liberal democratic principles.
There are assorted vaguely religious assertions on the US curency [fairly recently introduced] and in the US Oath of allegaince, though it isn't actually obligatory to take the religious version if you don't want to. On the other hand the US constitution goes to great lengths to separate- and to make it plain that it separates- church and state. The opinions held by individual Americans, whatever position they hold, are no concern of anyone else.

Now then, where have I said anything about disenfrachising Roman Catholics? Roman catholics have had the franchise for about a hundred and seventy years. The only topic concerning roman catholics we have discussed is the fact that the monarch [who is disenfranchised already, whatever their religion, if you are concerned about individuals not being franchised] may not be a roman catholic. A great French monarch once said that Paris was worth a mass and became a roman catholic; it is not much of a hardship if some future hypothetical monarch in Britain shoud face the reverse problem.

In fact, one reason why I don't think islam and a society compatible with liberal democratic principles are compatible is the claim that islam is the best way of life and that muslims are the best of mankind. A society based on muslim principles would- as I said- be a muslim state for muslim people and other people- and other peoples' beliefs and behaviour- would be tolerated or not on islamic terms.

"private corporate tyrannies - top down authoritarian structures where people have no individuality, and have to follow their orders to the letter or they suffer the consequences." Which company are you thinking of? Do you speak from direct experience? I have never worked for a company where people have no individuality, and have to follow their orders to the letter or they suffer the consequences, and I rather doubt that such a company would last very long. It would be so rigid and inefficient that it would soon go bust. And what would be the consequences if someone, in this unnamed company fails to follow unspecified instructions to the letter? At worst someone has to get another job, assuming that the Trade Union does not deal with the problem. After all, that is why Trades Unions exist- to stop companioes behaving like authoritarian structures. Either they do it pretty well- as I think- which means that companies can't behave as you say, or they don't do it at all, in which case, why do they exist?

[Pablo]

'Islamophobia' is a word rendered meaningless because it has been emptied of all significance by people like you, who use it as a catch all phrase akin to 'racist' in order to slander and attempt to bully anyone that disagrees with Islamists and political Islam or even criticises aspects of Islam and Muslim culture that are ripe for criticism. It betrays a fundamentally intolerant and closed minded aspect of those who use it as a slander --- and thankfully, you have over played your hand. The whole thing was coined to shut down debate, but more and more people are realising this, and recognising the sinister attempts at declaring thought crimes that the employment of this word entails --- especially when it is used against pefectly rational and non-prejudiced individuals. Unfortunately, Islamists like you continue to cut your own throat.

[joe90]

Thersites says about bigotry against Roman Catholics -
Of course, you may think it the most important infringement on human liberty to be found anywhere in the world at the moment, but I don't think many people would agree with you.

So, until others behave themselves, we don't need to - until others achieve perfection then we can act and behave as we please, no matter how depraved. I'm sorry, but my behaviour isn't dependent on others behaving themselves - it is dependent on me behaving myself. We are responsible for our own actions not those of others.

Nazism and fascism are not human cultures - they're primarily buisness methods used to control populations, and it is significant that they have arisen from out of the Western Establishment and its on-going fight against the spread of human rights, universal equality etc

Totalitarian corporate buisness regimes such as Racist Murdoch's 'Media Empire' are run on the exact same lines as any fascist regime. The lies and racism that Raving Murdoch spewd out about Iraqi WMD, for instance, makes it possible for US and UK governments to commit the worse crime possible - altho Thersites says there are worse crimes being committed elsewhere, worse than the ones we in the west are responsible for. I'm waiting to hear what they are. Probably some blokes pipe-dream about a government based on religious doctrine - yawn! Quick someone phone the Thought Police!

The West carries out the most atrocious crimes possible ie 'unprovoked aggression' against Iraq -
- but according to Thersites, so it seems, there are worse crimes than ours being committed in the world at the present time, by non-westerners I presume - I can't wait to hear what these crimes are that are worse than the ones committed by liberal US and UK governments against Iraq.

The West supports the most despical totalitarian regimes imaginable - and the vast majprity of the squalor, disease and poverty of the Global South is directly related to their exploitation by western corporations. Hence the reason why its so poor and backward - it is deliberately kept that way by the west, including Marls and Spencer who exploit Third World workers in conditions not that far short of concentration camps.

You can have vote for any political party you want as long as Thersites and his Thought Police over at Hilter's Place approve - democracy McCarthy style!

[joe90]

I'm not interested in your tittle-tattle Thersites -
- how do you know, for a certainty, how the future is going to turn out just because of some bloke's pipe-dream?

I can't believe that you think that people's beliefs and dreams about the future ( which are all perfectly legal and perfectly rational as most religious systems of thoughts go) can be used as some kind of rational basis for holding some kind of fear - and also ought to be the basis for policing certain groups of people in our community.

These irrational and rigidly held frightening certainties you ascribe to your chosen victims are just so much childish paranoia - if it wasn't for the fact that they have an impact on the lives today, in the real world, of your racist victims you and your kind over at harry's sewer wouldn't be worth my time.

You seem to have unfounded and irrational fears - I'd go an see a psychiatrist if I were you. This isn't normal for someone who claims to be a 'liberal democratic pluralist'. Schizophrenic double-think. You claim to be one thing but are actually intolerant, suspicious and fixated.

And you claim you stand for progress and enlightenment as well !

[Thersites]

"Thersites says about bigotry against Roman Catholics -
Of course, you may think it the most important infringement on human liberty to be found anywhere in the world at the moment, but I don't think many people would agree with you."
No, Joe90, I did not say that about bigotry against roman catholics. If you had read my posts you would know that I said that specifically about the fact that- as you complained earlier- "Catholics can't become the head of the British state." A rather different and much smaller injustice, affecting many fewer people.

"Nazism and fascism are not human cultures - they're primarily buisness methods used to control populations, and it is significant that they have arisen from out of the Western Establishment and its on-going fight against the spread of human rights, universal equality etc"
If "Nazism and fascism are not human cultures" where did they come from? In what way are they " buisness methods used to control populations"? As both were very enthusiastic about large families how did they control populations? The concepts of "human rights, universal equality etc" are products of the west too.

"Totalitarian corporate buisness regimes such as Racist Murdoch's 'Media Empire' are run on the exact same lines as any fascist regime. " How many divisions- or concentration camps- has Rupert Murdoch?
"The lies and racism that Raving Murdoch spewd out about Iraqi WMD, for instance, makes it possible for US and UK governments to commit the worse crime possible - " What did Murdoch publish except what he was told by the British and US governments, so you can hardly say he was the instigator; what, precisely, was there racist in what he said? AS for the invasion of Iraq being "the worst crime possible", you obviously don't have much imagination. How many Iraqis have been nuked- or wouldn't that be worse? Where do I say "there are worse crimes being committed elsewhere"? Exact reference required. The invasion of Iraq may well have begun in someone's pipedreams. In dreams begin resposibilities, they say. After all, we have seen where religious pipe-dreams lead when they are used to try to create a perfect state, as much in the Inquisition or Calvin's Geneva as in Khomeini's Iran or Saudi Arabia.

You are also mistaken in your claim that " the vast majprity of the squalor, disease and poverty of the Global South is directly related to their exploitation by western corporations". Indeed, you almost have it the wrong way round. It is those countries- South Korea and Taiwan the most obvious examples- that interact most with the west and western corporations that have least squalor, disease and poverty. Western corporations require stable and honest governments, good infrastructures and well-fed, intelligent and educated work-forces. It is those countries that don't educate their children, that don't fit into the nexus of world trade that miss out on the benefits as well as the disadvantages of it.

[joe90]

Just look at the rubbish above -
- and this 'Thersites' claims to be civilised, enlightened, rational and progressive etc etc, as well !

There seems to be a slight dislocation - between actual reality VERSUS Thersites solopsistic narcissitic view of themselves and the world they claim as superior (shades of western racism) but is under some kind of threat.

I'll just highlight one insane irrational statement from all the above -
Thersites says -
What did Murdoch publish except what he was told by the British and US governments...

I don't know wether to laugh or cry at this!

What job is it of western journalists to investigate the truth of claims made by western governments on the brink of carrying out the worst crime possible of 'unprovoked aggression' - is it true Saddam has got WMD and is 45 minutes away from using it against us, whenever he feels like it?

Well, western journalists don't know - they're just following their orders from Josef Murdoch, just as journalists did in Nazi Germany under Rupert Goebbels

The best of it is, Thersites actually thinks that this is evidence in support of their claim that the west is open and democratic - when it actually proves the opposite!

This is what western propaganda does to you!

As I said,
we aren't meant to question powerful western instutions carrying out war crimes and robbing people blind - we are meant to follow our orders and 'believe' what we are told, that we live in a free and open democratic society.

We aren't meant to question these powerful anti-democratic institutions which we are led to believe are not a threat to anyone, in the real world, at any time.

What we are meant to believe is a real threat today is some individual bloke's utopian pipe-dreams about some future way of life -
- oooooh scary biscuits !

[johnmellor77]

Joe are you suggesting newspapers shouldn't poublish anything they're told byt he government?

Do you realise just how brainwashed and sycophaphantic you sound?

[Thersites]

Come on, Joey, my boy, where did I claim to be "civilised, enlightened, rational and progressive"? You're indulging in fantasies yet again here. You still haven't produced any evidence that Rupert Murdoch is racist or raving or that "Murdoch's 'Media Empire' [is] run on the exact same lines as any fascist regime." Certainly Murdoch and his journalists were- at best- rather foolish to accept the claims made by the British and US governments without question; the sign of an open society is that many other newspapers and journalists did not and questioned them publicly. Certainly, you need only compare what happens to journalists who annoy the state in Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Britain to see why Murdoch's journalists didn't take the risk of trying to find out what Saddam was actually doing. If the only source of information available to the public was Rupert Murdoch's papers and TV channels you might have a point. You would have a strong argument too if you argued that Murdoch has been allowed to control too many instruments of information; you don't though, you simply repeat your paranoiac imbecilities more shrilly than before. You need only compare Iraq, where Saddam's own generals were as convinced as their enemies that he must have hidden weapons until it turned out he didn't to see something of the difference between a an open society and a closed one.
In the mean time, Joey, i'm still waiting for you or Mr Saeed to explain quite how an open society and the claims to absolute moral and plitical superiority of islam- and especially its claim to govern the sexual, religious and political behaviour of everyone in the state- can be correlated.

[joe90]

Come on, Joey, my boy, where did I claim to be "civilised, enlightened, rational and progressive"?

I don't know whether to laugh or cry at the utter stupidity of this person.
You're right Thersites, you are none of things. After all the evidence you have provided to the contrary, silly me to harbour such assumptions.

'Caliphates' and Democracy -
Just to correlate Thersites questions. Here is the first one -
How is a caliphate based on "democratic principles and human rights" going to differ from any other state "democratic principles and human rights"?
http://www.osamasaeed.org/osama/2007/07/you-know-youre-.html#comment-76328686>First Question

Here is Thersites final which is not the same as their first -
i'm still waiting for you or Mr Saeed to explain quite how an open society and the claims to absolute moral and plitical superiority of islam- and especially its claim to govern the sexual, religious and political behaviour of everyone in the state- can be correlated.
http://www.osamasaeed.org/osama/2007/07/you-know-youre-.html#comment-77124200>Last Question

The answer to the first question -
- I'll leave the explanation to those who have some ideas of a future state based on a 'Caliphate' model, as Osama has already done.

As for the second question -
- I have never claimed any absolute superiority for any system of government - it is you Thersites who is making this claim for the current system of western corporate domination of domestic and foreign populations.

If people want to vote to live in a society governed by Islamic Holy Scripture, then that's their democratic right - that's democracy for you and there's nothing you can do about it, unless you are as anti-democratic as western governments are when it comes to West and South West Asia wester puppet dictatorships?

Western Corporate Fascism -
You still haven't produced any evidence that Rupert Murdoch is racist or raving or that "Murdoch's 'Media Empire' [is] run on the exact same lines as any fascist regime."
- well, I have.
Western corporations are top-down, authoritarian structures where people are not required to think for themselves or act as moral agents and human individuals. Their job is to follow their orders, nothing more. Responsibility travels downwards whilst power travels upwards. In practice this means those at the top are irresponsible and are unlikely to be held account for their actions, unlike those below who are, even though they have little power to change anything without approval from above first.
A good example of this is Tony Blair's irresponsibility in breaking the law and attacking Iraq. He isn't in jail - but millions of his Tony's victims suffer the consequences of his irresponsible illegal actions.

As for being able to leave your job if you don't like it, of course you can - but that is outside the control of private tyrannies such as western corporations. I am talking about what happens inside them - not outside hence the reason I call them 'private' tyrannies rather than 'public' ones.

As to Racist Murdoch,
try these search results from Islamophobia Watch -
http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/display/Search?searchQuery=The+Sun&moduleId=1290238>The Sun and http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/islamophobia-watch/2005/5/20/melanie-phillips-finds-a-muslim-she-likes.html>Murdoch

Thousands of Gullible Western Liberal Journalists -

Certainly Murdoch and his journalists were- at best- rather foolish to accept the claims made by the British and US governments without question

- just like their so-called journalistic counterparts in Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia. Just mere foolishness rather than instruments of state-corporate propaganda campiagns. The west claim's to be 'liberal' makes western propaganda even more poisonous than any totalitarian journalism, because at least people in Soviet Russia knew they were being fed state propaganda. Also journalists in totalitarian states have an excuse for writing propaganda instead of the truth - it's called fear. The bewildered herd of western journalists have no such excuse.

Certainly, you need only compare what happens to journalists who annoy the state in Saddam Hussein's Iraq and Britain to see why Murdoch's journalists didn't take the risk of trying to find out what Saddam was actually doing.
- I don't quite know what this gibbersih is trying to say, but evidence of Saddam's WMD programme were available in the west to journalists who were willing to do their jobs, rather than follow their orders.

Murdoch and his journalists were- at best- rather foolish to accept the claims made by the British and US governments without question; the sign of an open society is that many other newspapers and journalists did not and questioned them publicly.
- well fine then, let's see the proof you have neglected to furnish for this outrageous allegation that western corporate journalism investigated their own governments lies about the existence of Saddam's WMD.

All these foolish journalists had to do was look up back issues of their own newspapers to find out what John Pilger easily discovered -
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article4808.htm>Breaking The Silence
ICH
23 Sept 2003

Where he quotes Colin Powell -
"In Cairo, on February 24 2001, Powell said: "He (Saddam Hussein) has not developed any significant capability with respect to weapons of mass destruction. He is unable to project conventional power against his neighbours."

And Condoleeza Rice in the same year, but pre 11-9 -
Condoleezza Rice also described a weak, divided and militarily defenceless Iraq. "Saddam does not control the northern part of the country," she said. "We are able to keep his arms from him. His military forces have not been rebuilt."

Or they could have the former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter - here is a list of his articles on ZMag.org
http://www.zmag.org/search/index.cfm?action=database>Scott Ritter

The thousands of journalists Murdoch employs worldwide, needed only look up a few websites on the internet, from their office, and they would have got all the facts they needed on the existence of Iraqi WMD. I found all the above quite easily and I'm not a journalist and never even had to leave my house.

Strange how thousands of western liberal journalists employed by Murdoch were all unable to uncover the truth about Blair adn Bush's claims about Saddam's WMD! That sounds like the perfect functioning of ideological totalitarian regime to me - its exactly what I would expect.

Also at the BBC -
Andrew Gilligan who, on BBC Radio 4 in the morning claimed New Labour's 'Iraq Dossier' was 'sexed up' - he was sacked as well as subjected to an inquiry. His boss Greg Dyke was sacked, Greg's boss was sacked and the government employee who advised Andrew Gilligan was publicly subjected to New Labour abuse during a Commons Select Committtee hearing and subsequetly was found dead in woods - it's not yet really clear if he committed suicide or not.

Iraqi WMD or Democracy Building -
But I thought the US and UK attacked and invaded Iraq to bring it democracy?

[joe90]

Erratum

Here are those search results again for
http://www.islamophobia-watch.com/display/Search?searchQuery=murdoch&moduleId=1290238>Murdoch
over at Islamophobia Watch

My apolgies for that error

[Thersites]

How is a caliphate based on "democratic principles and human rights" going to differ from any other state [based on] "democratic principles and human rights"?

...

i'm still waiting for you or Mr Saeed to explain quite how an open society and the claims to absolute moral and political superiority of islam- and especially its claim to govern the sexual, religious and political behaviour of everyone in the state- can be correlated.

Apologies for the typo in the first question.
I'm still waiting for an answer to either, so drop the rhetoric, Joey, and just answer them if you can.

[Anirban]

joey simply can't neither can Mr. Saeed 'cause the whole hogwash of 'islamophobia' silences any debate and they have nothing to explain any further. Such is the brillaince of the term Meantime anybody can utter fascist , neonazists white supremacists, racists and still don't expect Gestapos knocking at the door. Islamic states have miles to go. get used to it.