Critical Thinking vs. Muslim Bashing        Well, I see nobody posted any comments here yesterday to take me to task for Muslim bashing. Too bad, because if you had, I would have agreed with you. No matter, this is my follow up post to clarify that I was making two different, but equally important points. If you have been reading these blog posts all along you probably "got it", but I must explain it for those of you who came to class late. Anything I wrote that sounded like Muslim bashing came after the tragic deaths of those martyrs I dubbed "The Paris 12". The point of that was to voice solidarity with Charlie Hedbo or, as they say in France, "Je Suis Charlie". Muslim bashing is protected by free speech, but it is usually only practiced by bigoted jerks like myself. Satire is free speech, and critical thinking about philosophical concepts is also free speech, but do you know the difference between the two?
       That was a trick question. It is not always an Eith/Or option. Satire and insults are on a spectrum, and the point where each one falls on that spectrum is a matter of personal and/or social psychological construct. I will be posting my paper on SCA, Spectrum Construct Analysis, in the near future, but for now let's just say that the line between satire and constructive criticism is a fuzzy one.
       Calling myself a bigoted jerk is satire. Someone else calling me a bigoted jerk may also be satire, or it may be an insult. Obviously it is easier to tell the difference in person, face-to-face, with facial expressions, tone of voice, and other body language clues. But in the print media it is much more difficult. Another factor is cultural differences. Those murderous criminals who call themselves Jihadists and believe that death to the infidels is the appropriate response to criticism, have their own point-of-view, their own social construct. It is a localized cultural point-of-view that they were indoctrinated into by the culture in which they were raised. Sadly, they also control their cultures in a feed-back loop that perpetuates their stupidity and forces it, by threat of violence, on everybody around them. We have localized pockets of cultural stupidity here in the West too, but we also have both freedom of speech and protection against violence as safeguards. No matter whether some idiots take criticism as an insult, criticism and insults are both protected by freedom of speech, precisely because the line between them is so fine. Both satire and insult are in the ear of the beholder. If the shoe does not fit, do not wear it. And violent responses to criticism and insult are not protected, they are prohibited. Okay, I got that off my chest.
       My Muslim bashing, by the way, was accompanied by Christian bashing and Zionist bashing, so you can call me an equal opportunity bigot. I already posted a link to my essay on religion last week. Enough said about that.
       The big question we have to ask, here in the West, is why do so many Muslims want to migrate to Western countries? Do they really want to assimilate and/or escape the violence and repression they faced in their home countries? Or are they here as sleeper cell terrorists? Those are important questions, but you cannot begin to answer them without some serious and complicated research. An important rule of critical thinking is "you cannot generalize from a limited sample". What makes it complicated is that both questions, Assimilation & Terrorism, only have anecdotal, insufficient answers. My answer to the above questions is: do not assume anything. When in doubt, ask a Muslim. Better yet, ask as many Muslims as you can find. You may be surprised at what they have to say.
       This blog is not the venue for a whole sociology research paper on that subject so I am going to just list, randomly, some anecdotal evidence that you may, or may not, have read about, and let you, the critical thinker, figure out what it may, or may not, mean. Of course some of you may not be able to stifle your confirmation bias, but, oh well.

• Islamic State Executed Scores in Iraq This Month. From the New York Times, Wed. Jan. 21, 2015, by Nick Cumming-Bruce.
• From the Associated Press, Paris, Wed. Jan. 21, 2015. A story about a Muslim, Lassana Bathily, who was awarded French citizenship for heroism when he saved lives at a kosher supermarket that was attacked by terrorists.
• A French TV satire, Le Petit Journal, mocks Fox News for its false reporting that there are "no-go" pockets of neighborhoods in France and England where police and non-Muslims cannot go, and where Muslims enforce Shariah law. Officials in both countries testified that there is no credible evidence that these neighborhoods exist, and Fox News later admitted that their report was wrong and apologized. Story by Doreen Carvajal of The New York Times, Wed. Jan. 21, 2015.
• From the Associated Press, Cairo, by Jon Gambrell and Mari Yamaguchi, Wed. Jan 21, 2015. Story about Islamic State criminals taking two Japanese hostages and demanding $200M.
• Leonard Pitts, in the Miami Herald, Sun. Jan. 11, 2015, claims that terrorists have won the war against satire. His evidence? "Jon Stewart is quitting 'The Daily Show' to host a program on the Food Network, specializing in New Jersey cuisine. Mad magazine is going out of business and its famed mascot, the infidel Alfred E. Newman just became the latest journalist beheaded by ISIS. Bill Maher is teaching religious studies in Mississippi, Lewis Black is practicing Zen Buddhism and Stephen Colbert now claims that 'Stephen Colbert' was nothing more than a character he played."
• Yasmine Bahrani, professor of journalism at American University in Dubai, in the Washington Post, Sun. Jan. 18, 2015 makes several observations about the deteriorating relations between Muslims and the West.
  1. Why do we make a big deal about the Paris 12 but not about the thousands killed in Gaza, Syria, Iraq, Nigeria, etc. and countless Muslims murdered by drone strikes, or the 132 Schoolchildren slaughtered in Pakistan in December?
  2. Right-wing political groups like Britain's UKIP, Germany's Pegida and France's National Front gain popularity and Middle Easterners feel threatened and become defensive.
  3. Nobody in Bahrani's classroom believes Boston bombing suspect Dzhosker Tsarnev is guilty: they believe he was set up. The United States government has a serious credibility problem. Saddam Hussein did not have the WMDs that G.W.Bush used as an excuse for the Iraq war, the U.S. organized a fake vaccination drive in Pakistan to get to Osama Bin Laden, and the U.S. told Syrian dictator, Bashar Assad, that the use of chemical weapons would cross a "red line" but they did not enforce it.
  4. Bahrani explained that part of the reason some of the students didn't "get it" that even tasteless or offensive cartoonists should have the right to freedom of expression, is because "In Middle Eastern Society, we deny ourselves comfort to make some one else comfortable".
• Can my readers detect any logical problems in that last item? I have some, but I'm not telling. You figure them out.
• Okay, Readers, now it's your turn to go out and research more of these items. I've done my work today, I need a beer.

Coming soon:       Spectrum Construct Analysis (SCA); Thought, Speech, and Action; A rant on Immigration; A rant on Pre-emptive Self-Defense; and my ongoing research on peace through education.
Also see: www.peacemoon.org
      

Martin Luther King, Cops vs. the Military, and violent-self-defense        The World Peace Algorithm does not deny the right of both society and individuals to self-defense. The World Peace Algorithm also recognizes the duty of governments to protect their citizens from violence. In a civilized and democratic nation, both these rights and duties must be carefully regulated to insure against abuse of power. For instance, in civilized countries, police are not allowed to go into neighborhoods and start shooting at everybody in sight, just because a few violent criminals are hiding there and taking hostages. This should be taken for granted, and when the police step over that line, which they sometimes do, they should face severe legal penalties.
       This so-called "war against terrorism" is an example of that abuse of power. In the first place, it is not, and should not be, a "war". A war is violent action between countries. Also, terrorists should not be granted the status of a political entity. Terrorists are criminals, plain and simple. I don't think they should even be called "terrorists" as long as that word still implies political legitimacy. So what does that have to do with Cops vs. the Military?
       Governments have been using their military forces for police actions. This would not be so bad if they had to abide by the same strictures as domestic police agencies. If the police cannot go into a neighborhood and shoot everybody in this country, why can they get away with that on foreign soil? That right-wing motto: "fight them over there so we don't have to fight them over here" is just plain stupid. It doesn't even work, because the more troops we send "over there" the more criminals feel justified in coming over here. A surgical strike by a drone missile sounds like a good idea in theory, but in practice too many mistakes are made and innocent civilians become collateral damage. That sends the wrong message: that we really are waging a war on foreign territory. I repeat: we would not allow that kind of action here, so why do we allow it over there? Foreigners are not stupid just because they live in a different country. (They may be stupid for cultural reasons, but that is another subject altogether.) They know that we cannot treat our own people that way and they are righteously outraged that we think it's okay to treat them that way. Oh, yes, and that other right-wing slogan, "Preemptive self defense" is also morally indefensible. (More about that another day.)
       If we withdrew all of our troops from foreign territories, those foreigners would not be so inclined to travel to our country where our homeland security police can track them, capture them, and put them on trial as the criminals that they are. Remember, our current strategy has cost many more American and foreign civilian lives than were killed on September 11, 2001. Does that make any sense? If we had no troops over there, the locals could all go back to killing each other. That is not a good thing, but at least it would be contained. If we were no longer causing problems for them. they would have to admit to, and deal with, the fact that it is their own culture that is causing their problems, not ours.
       Yesterday was the day that we honored Martin Luther King, and I am wondering why the so-called "peaceful" religion of Islam has never produced any leaders of King's, or of Gandhi's, greatness. Do Muslims ever wonder about that? If so, what are they doing about it?
       Last week the Pope stated that religion was above criticism, so he wants the Catholics to be as bad as Muslims in that regard. I have no respect for either Islam, Christianity, or Zionism, but at least many Jews, Christians and Muslims in this country can engage in critical introspection without fearing for their lives. The Muslim attitude that they can command respect by threats of violence has just the opposite effect. And just as our own policy of waging violence over there has its opposite effect, so does the Muslim policy of allowing criminals the honor of calling themselves Jihadists has the opposite effect. Every violent action committed in the name of Islam only dishonors Islam.
       A word of warning to those right-wing Christian and Zionist shit-heads among us: All peaceful American citizens are protected by law from violence by home-grown terrorists, vigilantes, and other criminals. That includes Muslims! We cannot guarantee the protection of peaceful Muslims on foreign soil, but we can protect those here at home who really and truly want peace. Yes, we also have freedom of speech, so Muslims, as with any other religion, are not above critical discourse. So the violent Muslim hater's beware; you can talk shit all you want, but violence against peaceful Muslims cannot be tolerated. When the people in Muslim countries realize that, by law, we treat Muslims better here than they do over there, maybe they might, maybe, begin to question the values of their own culture. Many of my friends point out that the Muslim culture is so permanently ingrained in them that they will never "get it". That may well be true, but that is not really the point anyway. We have to be who we are and true to our peaceful and intellectual values. We have to deal with the bad apples in our own society. We have no time for another culture's bad apples as long as they keep them over there. (Yes, that brings up the subject of immigration, but I'll tackle that another time.)
       The Spanish Inquisition was a long time ago, and the free-thinkers of the Renaissance period gradually put the brakes on the Catholic Church's abuse of power. Ironically, during the time Christianity brought Western Civilization down into the Dark Ages, the Muslim controlled Byzantine Civilization, and Spain before Isabella and Ferdinand, were in their height of intellectual and scientific inquiry. Jews and Christians were respected and protected as "People of The Book". The ancient Greek and Roman philosophy that was lost to the West, was saved and preserved by the secular Muslim culture. What the hell happened to them!? They are now run by criminal gangsters calling themselves "religious" leaders, just as Christianity was in the middle-ages.
       We do not need to be over there, and we cannot afford to continue feeding into that sick violent, bullshit. I would like to see a mass protest against our present foreign policy by the families of our troops over there(Fathers, Mothers, Brothers, sisters, cousins, next-door neighbors, etc.). Bring our troops home, and let us spend our tax money on the Veteran's Administration to treat our own victims of war for post traumatic stress disorder. Coming Soon: A Rant on Immigration, a Rant on Pre-emptive Self-Defense, and Another Rant on Thought, Speech, and Action
      

The Art Of Mark Bryan       I know some of my readers are already familiar with the great art of Mark Bryan, but for those of you who are not yet, here is a link to his website. The Art of Mark Bryan.
      Also, you might want to know about the Sonoma County Peace and Justice Center. They publish the Sonoma County Peace Press in hard copy, but also have an online presence at Peace & Justice Center.
      As long as I'm doing social networking here, let me remind you about my siblings, Christopher K. Moon, photographer, and Carol Louise Moon, poet. Their combined efforts can be seen at Moonerisms

My Short Stories        A few years ago one of my short stories, "The Night of the Madness," was published in Twilite Times Ezine. I have also posted it on my website.
      My website also contains three other short stories in a mixture of genres. By that I don't mean that some stories are mysteries and some stories are science fiction, I mean that some stories are both mysteries and science fiction.
      Here is a link to the FICTION page on my website. Buck Moon's Short Stories.

My last word on Religion        My upcoming blog posts are going to be about the role of education in the world peace algorithm. I have wasted too much time talking about religion. I said that in yesterday's blog post, and I gave you a link to my last word on the subject on my website: "Nailed to the Door of Faith."
       Back in my undergraduate days, I wrote a paper on the Clifford - James Debate. As many of you know, William James and William K. Clifford had different views on religion. Since I do not want to talk about it anymore, you can read what I have already written on my website at "Clifford - James Debate" That paper also has a reference page at the end so you can research my research on Clifford and James, and also John Dewey.
       Race is another module (subroutine) in the world peace algorithm, and I also don't want to talk about that anymore. I posted "My Last Word on Race" on my website. Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!! If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one day publishing a diatribes, offensive or not, against a stupid religious belief, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for intellectual and cultural progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.

Empiricism and Spirituality        As a philosopher, I understand that logic alone cannot give us all the answers. Empirical experience has its limits, and so many philosophers have looked beyond scientific empiricism for answers. The 17th Century philosopher, Rene Descartes left us with the mind/body conundrum, the idea that the material and the immaterial worlds can never connect. This has caused the cognitive extremes of religious metaphysics and scientific reductionism to bookend the middle majority of people who want to believe in both, but cannot figure out how that would would work. Some so-called intellectuals are even saying that philosophy has come to an end, or is just irrelevant. Philosophy is being attacked from both sides and, if you will look at the budgets of most colleges and universities, the Philosophy Departments are getting the most severe cuts.
       However, philosophy is now more important than ever, because the relatively new subject of process philosophy, a subject on which I have written a textbook, has shown that the immaterial and the material are not mutually exclusive. (Hint: check out quantum mechanics.)
       Yesterday I ended my blog with the question: "So, who am I to criticize other people's religious beliefs?" My religious policy is "Don't ask, don't tell." And if everybody did that we wouldn't have so many problems with conflicting religious beliefs. It is nobody's business what my spiritual beliefs are, That is between me and my higher power, and I would not care about other people's beliefs if they were not violently stuffing it in our faces by their actions. Case in point: Today's Santa Rosa Press Democrat ran a story about two Mississippi state legislators, Tom Miles and Michael Evans, who are trying to make the Bible the official book of Mississippi. What? Nobody in Mississippi has ever read Kant, Kierkegaard, or Whitehead?
       The freedom to believe stupid ideas does not logically translate into the "right" to freedom of action. But more about that tomorrow.
       Religion is only one of many modules in the World Peace Algorithm and, using a calculus of economic opportunity costs, I find I cannot afford to waste anymore time on it. For those interested in my previous writings on Religion, here is a link to an article I wrote many years ago, Nailed To The Door of Faith. Stay tuned for more rants        In an upcoming blog, I will explore the differences between thought, speech, and action, and discuss the relationships among them. In my future blogs I will also be discussing my current research on the relationship of education and world peace that I have doing for MA in ED at SSU. Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!! If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one week publishing diatribes,offensive or not, against stupid religious beliefs, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for intellectual and cultural progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.

Remembering the Paris 12 Part III
       A boycott is not censorship. Censorship is when the government restricts your freedom of speech. Censorship is imposed from the outside. Self-censorship is imposed from within. An individual or group decides to censor themselves for whatever reasons they see fit. It may seem wrong to others, but it is their right, and it is not censorship by government. And here is where the line gets fuzzy. Extortion and violence by terrorists can also cause self-censorship; the terrorism is wrong, but the victims have a right to self-censorship. Not all essayists and cartoonists are as brave as the Paris 12 martyrs, but every journalist and editor has to decide that issue for themselves.
       A boycott is not censorship, but nor is it self-censorship. When you ignore something or refuse to have anything to do with it, it has not been censored; it still exists, unrestricted. I like to know who the racists and war mongers are, but after I've heard all the stupid racist rants and heard all the self-serving right-wing excuses for perpetuating war, I get tired of it and I invoke my "opportunity costs" rule of philosophical economics. I have better things to read and write about. so I boycott them. Everyone knows that only 1 person boycotting something has absolutely no effect on the target of the boycott. That's why social activists call for large groups of people to boycott things of which they disapprove. And that brings us to the topics of government and corporations.
       We already established that censorship by the government is wrong, but also that boycotts are not censorship. That is why government economic sanctions against other racist and/or terrorist governments is a legitimate tactic. But now we get into a really sticky problem here. Both individuals and groups (corporate bodies) have the right to free speech. Even non-democratic corporate bodies? If a corporate entity is run by a dictator, and his personal free speech is in direct conflict with the free speech of everybody under him, isn't that censorship? Because I am a journalist, I will use a hypothetical newspaper as an example. Suppose the whole staff of this hypothetical newspaper decided that they wanted to run some cartoons about Catholics being against, not only abortion, but also against birth control methods which would have made abortion unnecessary in the first place, and furthermore, that their ideas are based on questionable interpretations of scriptures of questionable origin, but accepted on blind faith, not on logic or critical thinking. But now suppose that the publisher, or the editor, of this hypothetical newspaper (or magazine) decided to self-censor the controversial cartoons in the name of cultural sensitivity. If he was running his own blog, or a small one-person publication of handbills and flyers, it would be legitimate self-censorship, and he would have a right to it. If the majority of the staff of the newspaper agreed with him, by a democratic vote, that would also be legitimate self-censorship. But in this case it is censorship, but not by a government, we are still theorizing within the realm of the private sector. So what are the options of the majority of the staff who want to publish the "culturally offensive" material? For one thing, they can boycott the publication either by staging a strike or just quitting their jobs and going on to another publication before the publisher could fire them for then strike. But if they couldn't get work elsewhere they would lose their salaries and medical benefits, which means that the publisher is actually extorting, (blackmailing) them into submission. I really do not have an answer to that problem because, having been a journalist for other publications in the past, I am now in the position of an independent blogger. To self-censor or not, that is the question.
       So, who am I to criticize other people's religious beliefs? My religious policy is "Don't ask, don't tell." It is nobody's business what my spiritual beliefs are, and I would not care about other people's beliefs if they were violently stuffing it in our faces by their actions. The freedom to believe stupid ideas does not logically translate into the "right" to freedom of action. Stay tuned for by blog tomorrow, when I will explain my own spiritual beliefs.
Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!! If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one week publishing diatribes against stupid religious beliefs, offensive or not, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for intellectual and cultural progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.

Remembering the Paris 12 Part II
       Many people think that freedom of speech means the right of anyone to say anything. They are right, and it does. But the corollary to speaking is hearing. I have the right to hear what ideas are out there. Sure, racists have the right to hate speech, but not just for their benefit; we have a right to know who they are, who is saying what. I want to know who the racists are and what they are saying so that I can write logical essays opposing their views. Verbal and literary dialogue is the real point of this whole discussion. A terrorist sympathizer might write "Death to the infidels" and be protected by free speech, but he crosses the line when he acts on it, when he commits murder, which is not covered by free speech. And now we segue into two other topics: "race" and "cultural sensitivity".
       A Religion is not a "race". I have written elsewhere about race, about how there is no such thing as race; it has no scientific basis. It is just a psychological construct which becomes a social construct when shared by a group of people. Since I have already covered this elsewhere, I don't want to waste any more space here on race. But when people of some religions actually believe they are a race, or have a race-based religion, it is still just a social construct, but it confuses people who are sensitive to racism.
       Racism is when someone makes judgments of other people based on superficial physical characteristics such as skin color, hair texture, eye shape, etc. This is why the concept of "race" has no scientific basis: no racist groups can agree on how many "races" there are, or which of our superficial, physical characteristics counts in determining a "race". The problem is that racists are not only people who judge others by race; racists are also people who self-identify by race. Racists always divide the human race into "Us" and "Them". People do not have a choice about the genetic markers they inherit from their parents, but they do have a choice about the culture and social constructs they accept. Social constructs are beliefs, but culture is both beliefs and actions. Culture is learned behavior, and anything that can be learned can be unlearned. And now we come to the topic of cultural sensitivity.
       As I said in the previous paragraph, people have no choice about the genetic markers that give them their superficial physical characteristics. Also, looking at a person and describing their physical characteristics (the construct of "race" is only good for describing missing persons), does not tell you anything about who they really are. Describing their clothes, speech, and actions might give you clues to their general cultural affiliation, but not always, and that still won't tell you who they really are, what they really believe, what their individual life-experiences have been and how they have reacted to them. Racism is just plain stupid and hurtful. But the problem here is that groups of people whose culture is based on racial identity will cry "racism" when someone criticizes their culture or their religion. Liberals cave in and enable this racism when they self-censor themselves in the name of "cultural sensitivity". I agree that it is hypocritical to criticize other people's cultural beliefs when one is too cowardly to question one's own culture. Ironically, that is my main criticism of other cultures; that they are too cowardly to question their own beliefs and values. But most Progressives do question their own cultures first, and that is what makes us different than your standard establishment liberal or conservative. So where does that get us on the self-censorship topic?
       Stay tuned tomorrow for Part III of “Remembering The Paris 12”, when I will discuss the different levels of self-censorship. I will also deconstruct the social construct of “cultural sensitivity”, maybe not as extremely culturally offensive as some of you would like, but culturally (to some) offensive all the same. Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!! If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one day publishing a diatribes against a stupid religious belief, offensive or not, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for intellectual and cultural progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.

I Also Have Talented Siblings       Two of my talented siblings, Christopher K. Moon, photographer, and Carol Louise Moon, poet, have posted their work on the net. Check it out, friends. Moonerisms

Remembering the Paris 12 Part I
       Two columnists (among many others, I am sure) had perceptive things to say about free speech v. terrorism. I am referring to Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post and David Brooks of the New York Times, published in the Santa Rosa Press Democrat on Fri. Jan 9th and Sat Jan 10th respectively. Both essayists were eloquent.
       Eugene Robinson's column, was a great essay warning against self censorship by journalists, reminding us all that we cannot let terrorism and extortion stifle our free speech, no matter the quality of our writing.
       The next day, David Brooks (nominally a conservative, but I call him a "closet liberal")also stepped up with an essay in favor of free speech and against censorship.
       Usually social conservatives, especially religious ones, would agree, speaking out against govt. censorship in principle, but warn against "offensive" writing and call for self-censorship. Brooks did not do that; he also warned against self-censorship. He went even further, using his conservative persona as a front, pointing out that the kind of satire that the Charlie Hedbo journalists and cartoonists were doing would have been been censored as "hate speech" if a high school or college newspaper had tried publish it.
       I am in total agreement with Brooks on his criticism of "liberal cultural sensitivity", but I see it as a Progressive political point of view, one that makes Progressives different from liberals who are still living in the 1960s and 70s. Progressives are not conservatives, we are more to the left of liberals, but we seem to (almost)share a common view with (some) conservatives about free speech and censorship. But as I pointed out in a previous paragraph, religious social conservatives are easily offended by our secular, ant-religious rhetoric and are kind of conflicted about where to draw the line between censorship and self-censorship. This is why some Progressives think that culturally sensitive liberals are just caving in to the social conservatives.
       Brooks went on to say that there are different levels of quality and civility in political essays that range from "adult" to "kids" but still, none of them should be censored. (I think it was cool that Brooks put both Bill Maher and Ann Coulter in the same category with the "jesters and holy fools". I disagree with hum about Bill Maher; he had to say that to preserve his Con Cred, but the closet liberal in him appropriately trashed Ann Coulter.)
Tomorrow, Part II of "Remembering the Paris 12"        Today's blog post will, (I hope), have raised more questions than it has answered. There are two ways to deal with this. 1. Send me an email with your questions and criticisms. 2. Keep reading this blog because tomorrow I will explain how I define my terms such as "freedom of speech", "self-censorship", "cultural sensitivity", "boycott", "race", "Government", and "corporation", with brief essays on these topics.
       In another future blog I will be discussing my own spiritual and moral beliefs. After that I will begin my series of academic research on Education and World Peace. Stay tuned. Remember The Paris 12!!!        They cannot kill us all!!!
       If every journalist and cartoonist in the world just spent one week publishing diatribes against stupid religious beliefs, offensive or not, maybe a clear message will be sent that those Paris 12 were real martyrs, not just for freedom of speech but for cultural and intellectual progress through mutual dialogue and non-violent action.

Muslim Outrage Against Terrorism
      Yesterday I implied that a certain religion was not outraged enough by atrocities committed in their name. I have often heard Muslims claim that they are outraged by violence committed against civilians in their name, as the Koran forbids these terrorist attacks. Their claim is that it is our Western news media that is biased against them. Their accusation does have merit.
      Yesterday, in San Francisco, the Northern California Muslim community held a vigil for the victims of the Paris attack. They are outraged by terrorism in their name. So my next question is to the northern California New media; SF Chronicle, SF Examiner, Oakland Tribute, Santa Rosa Press Democrat, et. al.:If you can put the terrorist attack in the main headline of your papers, why can't you put the Muslim Outrage in the headlines, or at least give them equal space? Are not these peaceful Muslims justified in their frustration at being ignored? Also, why give the terrorists the honor of letting them control how the debate is framed? Why call them Muslims in the first place, why not call them murderers and criminals, which is what they really are, and murderers and criminals is what defines them more than the "Muslim" label.
      As long as the media give them the recognition that they are asking for, they will continue murdering civilians. On the other hand if the Peaceful Muslim community gets the recognition they deserve from the media,the terrorist criminals can be discredited.
      But I still stand by what I wrote yesterday. The peaceful Muslims really do have to do more than they have been doing. The media thing is a two-way street. If they want headlines and more space for their message, they will have to show their outrage more openly and forcefully. They must force their attention on the media.        If there were vigils for the victims of terrorism in every major city in America (and there well may be) the news media would have to give it more space. It is the job of editors to assign such stories to reporters.
       But Muslims must also question their own attitudes about Western Culture in general and free speech in particular. If the Muslim religion forbids this kind of dialogue, then the Muslim religion will be totally disgraced and discredited by history. In a civilized world extortion and threats of violence do not earn honor and respect. Terrorists are only gangsters, and any religion that uses or condones such tactics is really a criminal organization. And as I said yesterday, this applies to Jews and Christians equally.
      www.peacemoon.org

Remember the Paris 12! Jews, Christians, and Muslims of the World: Read This and pass it along.

       I feel terribly sad today, reading about the 12 people killed at that Paris satire magazine yesterday. Last week I missed my own self-imposed deadline to post on my blog, but now I am enraged, and the adrenalin is grinding my nose back into the whetstone, sharpening words, not swords.
       Those people killed in Paris yesterday were not carrying weapons or killing any body. Neither were the the people in the twin towers on 9/11. I am not trying to kill anybody, nor do I advocate killing anybody.
      I have a philosophical problem with all political religions; there is nothing spiritual or moral about them, and so I have refrained from calling them out by name. However my liberal cultural sensitivity is now in direct conflict with my moral and spiritual beliefs, and I am wondering if "cultural sensitivity" is just a cover for my cowardice.
       Certain people who subscribe to a certain political religion have declared a violent war against my spiritual and moral sub-culture. I am going to try to continue "cultural sensitivity" for the duration of today's blog post because what I have to say about stupid, superstitious, ignorant, uncivilized religions applies to all stupid, superstitious, ignorant, uncivilized religions. But if there are any more killings of innocents by the time of my next blog post, I will accept the challenge, as did the brave 12 martyrs who died in Paris yesterday. Our words against your swords. Now let us discuss the specific issues, and remember that since I am not naming names,what I have to say applies to all political religions. You know who you are and if the shoe fits....
       Your poor little feeling are hurt because people who have more intelligence, education, spirituality and morals than you, are criticizing your belief system. So, to prove we are wrong and you are right, your religion tells you you have the right to cut off the heads, or shoot, or blow up anybody who disagrees with you. That makes your religion morally superior to mine? I could just rest my case to the jury on that paragraph alone, but my outrage has got me on a roll and I am not going to quit any time soon. You believe you have the right to kill people who disagree with you, but I do not. I mean, I really do not. That would be against my spiritual and moral beliefs.
       I understand that those of you who are not killing people, and who claim that your religion is a peaceful one, are upset at people who subscribe to my moral and spiritual beliefs, because you think we are blaming all of you for the crimes of only a few. I get that, and that is why I have previously refrained from naming names. But understand this jerks, your coreligionists are not only blaming, but killing, innocents for the crimes of others. You claim that your scriptures have divine origin and are therefore absolute. But if that were really true the absolute nature of your religion would prevent you from killing other human beings, and that, obviously is not what is happening. Your religion is political, not spiritual or moral. It can be interpreted by any thug and gang leader to give him or her power over you. And you submit to it because you are cowards. Some of you are even submitting to your leaders by waging violent war against your own kind. One political religion against another political religion. But those "peaceful" persons among you are too cowardly to stand up to your own leaders because it would mean admitting that what you believe in is just ignorant, superstitious nonsense. Instead, you blame us for your troubles. You claim that our civilization is immoral and degenerate, and you are willing to wage war against all of us. Oh, wait, that would be blaming all of us for the crimes of a few and you don't believe in that, right?
       Some of you have accurately pointed out the violent crimes perpetuated against you by persons who claim to represent our culture. So let us discuss your concerns, your reaction to them, and the results of your actions against us.
       Certain governments in the west, (not mentioning any names) to further their political-economic policies have committed crimes against you. There are a great many of us "progressives" who are sympathetic to your plight and are trying to peacefully take down those criminal governments. Also there are many organizations of like-minded people among us who would love to stop the crimes against you, and work towards a more peaceful world. But there are two things which prevent us from succeeding.
      1. Everytime some shithead from your side kills somebody from our side, the shitheads from our side use it as an excuse to crack down on our rights and freedoms. And every time some shithead from our side sends a drone to kill a wedding party or cause some other "collateral damage" to your side, the shitheads from your side use it as an excuse to send more stupid, ignorant suicide bombers to blow us up. It does not even matter who started it; it has been going on for so long that the shitheads on either side have taken control.
      2. The other problem that prevents us from solving this problem is your religion. You think it is so absolute that it is above criticism. Well, our side believes in freedom of speech and so we try to use words, instead of swords, to defend ourselves. No belief system is above criticism, including ours, so you are free to criticize our beliefs, but with words, not threats of violence.
       The shitheads on our side often try to restrict our freedom of speech, the same freedom of speech that we have been trying to use to stop the crimes our shitheads have been perpetuating against you, and they are using your violence against our innocents as their excuse to do so.
       We still believe in freedom of religion, but apparently you do not. So far, I am trying to maintain cultural sensitivity here, and so far I still believe in freedom of religion, but when I am faced with a religion that claims to be absolutely the only religion allowed and is so far above criticism that it can justify killing people who believe in freedom of speech and religion, then maybe I might have to rethink my "liberalism" about your religion.
       My progressive brothers and sisters are waging a non-violent, anti-war against the shitheads on both sides of this cultural divide. If your religion was so divine and perfect, the majority of you would be joining us in our non-violent struggle against the bad-apples on both sides, and together we could solve your political-economic problems. But if you cannot do that, then your religion will be disgraced forever, as an impediment to world peace.
      Remember, I am addressing this rant to all political religions, not just one. And consider this, if the 12 martyrs hadn't died in Paris yesterday, I would not have felt compelled to write this rant. Instead I would be continuing my verbal attacks against the shitheads in my department. That is another thing wrong with your religion, you think you are so righteous that you waste time attacking our culture when you should be seriously questioning the beliefs of your own culture. That is what we do here because we do not claim to be perfect. www.peacemoon.org.