In the video Galloway also goes on to say that he's had several Israeli citizens on his show and who he's on platform with. Galloway specifically states that he doesn't consider every Israeli citizen the problem

2:45 in Gorillaman's video, "I don't debate with Israelis", again at 8:44 and again at 11:08. Galloway only declares that his problem is not with Jewish people, he repeatedly declares that he absolutely will not debate Israeli's.

What is your response to the gorrilaman video which Galloway explains his reasoning.

My response is disgust, outrage and disbelief. Galloway declares that on principle, his boycott of Israel extends to the point of refusing to even engaging any Israeli in debate. I had hoped that much was clear, and if that point isn't agreed let me know. I don't know how Galloway could make himself any clearer but apparently some still don't hear him.

On the face of it, his position on that isn't even what I find most offensive, though I do find it so. I insist it is no different than any other nationality I've mentioned up thread. What is intolerable is Galloway's own past record.

Saddam Hussein committed genocide against his own people not once, but twice. Killing nearly a half million people across the two. George Galloway did NOT refuse to engage Saddam(let alone Iraqis) in debate. In fact, George went to Baghdad and met Saddam, telling him "Sir, I salute your courage, your strength and your indefatigability. I can honestly say when I was speaking with my comrades about coming here, each one wished me to extend their fraternal greetings and support."

Bashir al Assad is continuing on the work of his father, brutally repressing and killing his own people. Galloway again went to Damascus, to praise Syria and tell the people how lucky they were to have Assad. He even squeezed in praise for the Iraqi suicide bombers then blowing up Shia mosques and neighbourhoods.

Galloway's moral 'high' road towards Israel is revealing in the extreme when looking at his eagerness to not only engage, but actively praise other war criminals in the region.

Your video, TYT - Mosque Arsonist Says Fox News Inspired Him, has made it into the Top 15 New Videos listing. Congratulations on your achievement. For your contribution you have been awarded 1 Power Point.

and cinema, and college, and congresswoman, and immigration centre, and ex-workplaces, and mosque, and abortion clinic, and Luby's cafeteria, and military base, and....

>> ^Fletch:

>> ^SDGundamX:
You've been registered since 2007, so surely you must know that there exists a segment of Sifters who are hardened Islamophobes (though they hate being called that).
"Islamophobe" is a word the reality-challenged use so they can more easily compartmentalize and parse a confusing world. I am no more islamophobe than I am a cilantrophobe, Romneyphobe, or panflutophobe.
I've been registered since 2006, but that has nothing to do with recognizing there are some hardened ignoramuses here (although I'm sure you don't like to be called that). There will be Islamic "extremists" and "fundamentalists" (or, as @gorillaman correctly stated, Muslims) as long as the Koran exists, because they are simply following what it tells them to do. Moderate or peaceful Muslims are not (at least, on the whole). They ignore much of the cornerstone of their religion, choosing to cherry-pick from it those tenets that suit them and the kind of life they wish to lead, just as all the various Christian "sects and factions" selectively follow the Bible.
Now, I'm all for muslims who choose to live peaceful, tolerant, and inclusive lives. If you're going to believe in magic and ancient fairy tales, I'd much rather your delusions lead you to First World, socially acceptable life choices. But portraying them as true Muslims is just ignorant, and denies what Islam is. Islamic "fundamentalists" are far, far from a fringe group.


Just for the record, I wasn't implying you specifically were an Islamophobe. Certainly there are lots of Sifters who have submitted anti-<insert pretty much any religion name here> vids to the Sift because they know they'll get a little traction and probably get Sifted. Congrats on getting Sifted, by the way.

Also for the record, Islamophobe is a word used to describe an irrational fear of Muslims that usually leads to discrimination in some form, whether that be people calling for the prevention of the building of a proposed mosque or spying on the entire population of Muslims without cause across multiple states and trying to pass it off as "anti-terrorism tactics" (i.e. the NYPD).

So the view that Islamophobia is "reality-challenged" seems itself to be "reality-challenged" as the above real-world examples indicate.

P.S. Calling someone who disagrees with you an ignoramus says tons more about you and your argumentation skills than it does about your opponent.

Malaysia, Turkey, Indonesia, Mali. I'm sure there are others. I have traveled extensively in Malaysia and Turkey, where mosques are as numerous as churches in the USA, and the people of those countries belie every disparaging remark posted in this thread. >> ^messenger:

@chingalera
Well stated. I agree with your comparison of the two religions, but I think my point also stands that Muslims (or anybody) in countries without basic freedoms, especially freedom of speech and a free press are bound to be a lot more screwed up than those living under democracy and the freedoms that we enjoy. I think the corporate oligarchy is a red herring here. Sure, it's real, but that doesn't mean our democracy is zero. We have lots of freedom and power, even if our governments aren't as much "by the people" as they ideally could be. Could you imagine if elections were taken away altogether, if our leaders had no accountability whatsoever, and we didn't have a free press? Muslim or Christian or atheist, we would be a lot less civilized and a lot easier to manipulate to hate the "other". I mean, does anyone have any fears of attack or takeover by Muslims from Indonesia, Mali or Malaysia? Not that I've ever heard of, yet they're Muslim majority countries. The difference: democracy.
In a nutshell, you can't impose Iran- or Saudi-style Islamic rule on an existing democracy. Western Europe might change, and sure it'll cause discomfort and conflict, but nothing even remotely approaching deserving any of the comments cited in the video.

Are you having a stroke?
aere your'e haiveng uh srocket?

>> ^westy:

This guy is making some very tenouse conectoins ,
In no way have muslims evan dented amercans acconamy with the world trade center attack.
thing is amerca is going to detry its self from the inside anny way it alredy is pritty much with the ritch pore devide , id be way way way more worried about welth distrabutoin , welfair , and the damage the midea , and people like palin and beck, are capable on onflicting to the country.

who are you and what have you done with spell check? Dear god, man.
>> ^westy:

well its obvouse if your a muslim then u goina have find the cards like that funny , fucking hell , jokes are going to use imagary of a culture.
allso there is not annything inherlty bad about there been a load of mosks in NY city as much as Chirches , the issue is if the Mosks play by the rules or not or are going to be opressive.
My thing is let people build religouse shit if they want to but dont let them abuse women . dont let them indoctranate children with obvouse bullshit.
I think there is an argument for noise polustoin with mosks that would be a big concern of mine , i dont apreceat them bing so fucking noisy calling to prayre , same with chirch bells. Unless its a 1 off occasoin maby 15 x a year max.

The main thing about this thats amausing is how insacure amaercans are ,

Yea I think they're taking the wrong message from this story.

ITS FUCKIN AWESOME THAT THEY'RE BANNING KIDS!!. I hope this filters up to all the churches, mosques and sinofgods the world over.

I completely disagree with his definition of what terrorists are. Look at what Israel are doing to the Palestinians:

They've built enormous fences around hundreds of thousands of them, often separating them or isolating the people there from other villages. Arrests, delays and degradation at these checkpoints is commonplace, and this is often just so they can go to work, or visit friends. During special events such as Jewish holidays, the West Bank can be under military closure for more than a week.
http://mideastposts.com/2011/05/02/humiliation-and-degradation-easter-at-qalandiya/

The Israeli's then illegally settle or continue to expand on what is often privately owned Palestinian land.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/11/21/world/middleeast/21land.html?hp&ex=1164171600&en=2e03da87b76e6581&ei=5094&partner=homepage

Then they burn their olive trees, desecrate their mosque's, beat their children and kill adult civilians.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/204101.html

What can the Palestinians do to fight back? Well pretty much nothing due to the fact Israel receives billions of dollars in military supplies and funding each year from the US Government. The UN criticizes Israel's actions and International law states that expansion of many of the settlements is illegal, however the Palestinians are literally powerless.

Many Palestinians over the years, including women, have decided to blow themselves up in public, often killing many people, children included - these people therefore are labelled terrorists. So I have to ask, which of the actions I've described that the Israeli's/US are involved in against the Palestinians would be considered as moving them more towards a type 1 civilization?

What's all that about, eh?
Lately, it seems that our conservatives are becoming more like american republican senators, which is a shame since there are very few people in Canada an MP with an American republican political stance could accurately represent.

I do agree that the TV shows such as Wild Roses, Little Mosque on the Prairie, Insecurity, Republic of Doyle, Being Erica do not deserve public funding. They aren't worth much at all as far as entertainment goes.

I don't think CBC television should be terminated completely; CBC in the past has brought us Kids in the Hall and helped keep SCTV on the air. This Hour has 22 minutes used to be funny, but that was a long time ago, and not much has come since. More recent canadian comedy successes were not a result of CBC, Corner Gas, for one.
I don't think most Canadians would oppose a budget cut to CBC TV, but definitely would to termination of funding full stop.

And don't touch CBC Radio!!!!


>> ^kymbos:

Wow, what happened to Canada? It used to be so progressive!

Oh critics say something...well they must be right...make crimes harder to prosecute...yeah must be true. Please present some evidence for your claims.

http://articles.latimes.com/1995-01-29/local/me-25875_1_hate-crime-cases

Also I disagree it's Orwellian unless it's the powerful subjugating the weak with thought crimes. When it's a law for protecting the weak and minorities, I don't agree. Just doesn't make sense unless the scales are balanced.

What's more powerful than government and its badly written, randomly-enforced laws?


----

Here is the simplest way I can think of to describe it. @quantumushroom

Say some teenagers spray paint their names on one side of a Mosque and a neo-nazi group spray paints 'death to all Muslims' on the other side. Is there a difference between these crimes? Is there a difference in intent? Absolutely. The teenagers have committed vandalism. The neo-nazis have committed both vandalism and a targeted act of terrorism against a group of people.

Attacking someone because of their sexual orientation is both battery and a calculated act of terrorism against a group of people.

You don't have to agree with it, but do you at least get the distinction?

I'm aware of the difference, however, if someone hands out flyers and holds a sign saying "Exterminate all left-handed albinos", that is protected speech. What the 'hate crime' lobby is saying is, if the same individual spray paints this message on a wall that is not his property, he is to be punished both for vandalism AND the message; the latter would then be punishment of thoughtcrime.

---

The idea is that the crime is politically motivated. It is their status within society that is being targeted not themselves as individuals. What makes it a hate crime is the likelihood of it triggering others to do the same in a way that a non-politically motivated instance of crime would not.

You are smart enough to know this already QM.

Per my previous excellent examples, we can only make assumptions as to the intent of a criminal. Do you seriously think some violent teenaged punk targeting a weaker target has political motivations? How do you prove it? You cannot. A much more plausible but equally unknowable motive is that this school does not swiftly punish offenders for committing acts of violence.


Changing tracks slightly, this video is also an excellent example of how you cannot expect government to save your bacon and watch over you all the time. Every feminine-acting boy--indeed, every picked-on youth--must decide for himself at some point, though he may not like training, whether it would be worthwhile to learn rudimentary boxing or martial arts, or at the very least, how to take a punch. Krav maga on youtube: 25K videos.

Here is the simplest way I can think of to describe it. @quantumushroom

Say some teenagers spray paint their names on one side of a Mosque and a neo-nazi group spray paints 'death to all Muslims' on the other side. Is there a difference between these crimes? Is there a difference in intent? Absolutely. The teenagers have committed vandalism. The neo-nazis have committed both vandalism and a targeted act of terrorism against a group of people.

Attacking someone because of their sexual orientation is both battery and a calculated act of terrorism against a group of people.

You don't have to agree with it, but do you at least get the distinction?

I actually took Religion in High School. It was an interesting class to say the least, but didn't sway my opinions on anything religion wise.

In fact, it was one of my reasons for becoming an Atheist. It's where I found out that Jesus wasn't the first "Miraculous" birth, in fact, Zoroaster and Buddha were also born in the exact same fashion.

My favourite part of the class, however, was the field trip. We went to three places, a Hindu temple, a Mosque, and a Buddhist temple.

Hindu temple and Mosque were interesting, but nothing special. The Buddhist temple though was nifty, I walked into the main hall and there were 3 giant golden Buddha statues there, with thousands of candles lit around the room. I was amazed by this, and eager to learn about it expecting our tour guide to be a monk of sorts.

Turns out he was a little middle-aged white guy, who turned out to be a dick. When asked "Why did you become a Buddhist?" we all expected some result that included soul searching, or because of it's outlook on everything. The exact answer we got was "Well, my friends were something different, so I decided to be different, too."

Needless to say, by the end of our tour, none of us were too impressed with this guy. Chinese new years was coming up so they showed us the basement that was being decorated in silks and lanterns, and looked pretty cool. The guide asked us "So, any of you know how to say 'Happy new year' in Chinese?" with a slight smirk on his face.

I looked him square in the eye and said "Happy new year in Chinese."

That's when we got kicked out of the temple.

Worth it.

I'm upvoting the video and the program for shining light into these matters, but I disagree with his argument in this particular situation.

As a person living in NYC, I've had my share of bomb threat experiences. The closet one I've had was back in 2008 or 2009 when a man from Jackson Heights was planning to bomb the 42nd street Times Square station via the 7 train line. I too was living in Jackson Heights at the time, and know that there is a sizable Afghani and Pakistani community there.

I used to pick up lunch and did my groceries from Indian restaurants and supermarkets. And when I've heard of the news of this terrorist attack attempt, I personally felt the dangers and the seriousness of the problem. The alleged attacker was from the very community I was living in, where I assumed I knew and was comfortable in, in the same neighborhood and rode the same train I rode in.

But the most important point to me was that this man was willing to sacrifice people's lives, not just any people but his own community, to get the job done. he wasn't planning to bomb the wall street, the city hall or U.N. Building. This man was going to plant the bomb on the 7 train line, the exact same line where majority of riders are from Jackson Heights.

The most shocking point of the story is that he got the terrorist attack idea from his local imam from a Mosque in Jackson Heights. Their own fucking neighborhood. And yet, the community had no idea about their doings.

Now this got me thinking. if you are a muslim, you must take care of your community and throw out the bad seeds. When someone is using your name or what you stand for something you do not identify yourself with, PUT A STOP TO IT. Blissful ignorance does not help anyone. These crazed people from your own neighborhood was about to kill you, and yet nobody had any idea this was happening in the community.

Just claiming that you are different from them, and blaming others for not being able to tell the difference is an excuse to your laziness. You haven't done anything to pull yourself apart, and identify those who are different from what you stand for. If the muslim community was more active in sifting out the bad seeds from their own community, then there would be no need for government to step in and invade your privacy. It is ultimately your laziness that gets your rights violated.

You live in this country, you live in the same neighborhood, your life is threatened by the psychos who really don't care how many innocent people they kill, including people of their own community, as long as they do whatever they feel like doing. This is YOUR problem (more like your life) as it is for every other ethnic groups in your community. Stop being selfish, stop being lazy. Stop making excuses. If you want your rights back, then TAKE CHARGE OF YOUR COMMUNITY FIRST.