BURNING THE KORAN
An attack on a UN base on Friday in the city of Mazar-e Sharif killed 14 people, seven of them UN staff this was said to be a response to the burning of a copy of the Koran by an American Pastor. At least 10 people were killed and many more were injured in the southern Afghan city of Kandahar on Saturday in a second day of protests.
‘A top UN official has blamed the pastor who burnt the Koran for the violence.’*
I think I have already made clear my position on book burning, it’s not really my sort of thing, I’m against it, however to absolve those who have murdered 24 people wholly of blame is extraordinary, it seems the logic of this statement is that murder is bad but book burning is worse! Someone completely unconnected to you burns a text that I hold dear and this justifies my killing you?
This appallingly cowardly cringe turns the stomach. There is also something profoundly disquieting about this statement, a sort of latent racism, a sense that to provoke a 'primitive' people will inevitably lead to disorder and the consequence may be severe disorder, even murder. I do not share this view, I believe that persons carry culpability for their actions. During the whole of the Rushdie affair when The Satanic Verses was being routinely burnt I felt no urge to crash the Iranian embassy and butcher the staff on duty, had I done so I very much doubt that my actions would have been defended on the grounds that it was the book burners of Rushdie’s novel who bore culpability for my actions.
To hear a truly disgusting apologia for these acts of appalling violence you need to visit the BBC and listen or download the Sunday programme on 03/04/11, a certain Professor Malik from Bath Spa University and of course he would have to be an academic, you would have to be that stupid, who ultimately ascribes responsibility to ‘the government and media in the west,’ it’s all our fault!
The time has long passed when we should tolerate this kind of nonsense, enough already.
*BBC News 03/4/11
‘A top UN official has blamed the pastor who burnt the Koran for the violence.’*
I think I have already made clear my position on book burning, it’s not really my sort of thing, I’m against it, however to absolve those who have murdered 24 people wholly of blame is extraordinary, it seems the logic of this statement is that murder is bad but book burning is worse! Someone completely unconnected to you burns a text that I hold dear and this justifies my killing you?
This appallingly cowardly cringe turns the stomach. There is also something profoundly disquieting about this statement, a sort of latent racism, a sense that to provoke a 'primitive' people will inevitably lead to disorder and the consequence may be severe disorder, even murder. I do not share this view, I believe that persons carry culpability for their actions. During the whole of the Rushdie affair when The Satanic Verses was being routinely burnt I felt no urge to crash the Iranian embassy and butcher the staff on duty, had I done so I very much doubt that my actions would have been defended on the grounds that it was the book burners of Rushdie’s novel who bore culpability for my actions.
To hear a truly disgusting apologia for these acts of appalling violence you need to visit the BBC and listen or download the Sunday programme on 03/04/11, a certain Professor Malik from Bath Spa University and of course he would have to be an academic, you would have to be that stupid, who ultimately ascribes responsibility to ‘the government and media in the west,’ it’s all our fault!
The time has long passed when we should tolerate this kind of nonsense, enough already.
*BBC News 03/4/11
