The Dove World Outreach Center of Gainsville, FL, is encouraging people to send in copies of the Muslim holy book (the Qur’an or Koran) to be burned “in remembrance of the fallen victims of 9/11 and to stand against the evil of Islam.” This event will be held on September 11, 2010, on the church’s property.
The response to this in the Islamic countries is, of course, the typical US-flag-burning and standard hate speech against America and the usual threats and actions against Americans. In general, it’s the expected swirling vortex of hatred and bigotry.
First off, I support this “International Burn a Qur’an Day” because it is a form of protest, ie. Freedom of Speech/Expression. It is being held on private church property and is not directly harming anybody – assuming they are safe in their Qur’an burning activities. I support this in the same way that I support the freedom for people to burn the US flag should they so choose, or burn the Bible, or whatever else, so long as it doesn’t directly or deliberately infringe on the Rights of others.
Secondly, I condemn “International Burn a Qur’an Day” not only because it is an insult to the memory of those who died in the terrorist attacks of 9/11 but it is a blatant, irresponsible act of intolerance that potentially places others at risk from Islamic extremists fighting to “protect” their mythology.
My last point; if this church decides to go ahead with this event, we should not interfere. It could be argued that this activity places others in danger due to the high likelihood of violence in “retaliation” from Islamic extremists. However, if we force this church to not hold this event, not only are we infringing on their Freedom of Speech but we are telling the world that we give into terror and the extremists will have that much more resolve knowing that we can be so easily bullied.
If we stop this event we let the terrorists win.
--That’s my 2¢. If you have anything to say on the topic, please comment!
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