International Burn a Koran DayFollow

There are no words that adequately capture how warped your reasoning must have been to come to the conclusion that Belkira was somehow against book burning, or that anybody (well, anybody important, at least) was arguing that book-burning leads to Nazism.

If you disagree with me, show me how my belief that you are a ****** supports beastiality.

I think I'll skip over that "Because I eat strange things" thread now..

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HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHHHHhhhhhhhh....

And? Certainly, the idea would have been better received if handled that way than how it was, right? I didn't say that the end decision would have been to build that mosque at that location. They key point is that more people would have been involved, and the decision would have been made which they could all agree to *before* it exploded into a huge PR nightmare.

Your problem is that you seem to assume that the "win" here is to build the mosque at/near ground zero. But if the Imam's claim that this is about healing the wounds and cultural education and openness is true, then the "win" should be building a center which can accomplish those goals. Where it's built should incorporate those ideals, right? It shouldn't be about building a mosque as close to the ground zero site as possible, unless the objective is as some people fear; to declare an Islamic victory.

If it's really about healing and sharing, it should kinda incorporate the desires of those you're trying to heal and to share with, right?

Edited, Sep 13th 2010 3:56pm by gbaji

Good thing he said community center, not mosque, huh?

And I believe what you're trying to combat is that the space has been and is being used already for religious purposes, even if it is not a mosque yet. Except, uh... it has.




Yes, please follow your own advice.



yes gbaji. Obviously all of this controversy is because of iffy building permits, not because of

1. Fear of Islam
2. Political sparring before November
3. Media-born controversy to boost ratings

Because that's what the debate centers on, right? Building permits! I'm sure if they just came out and said "Hey, we wanna build a community center here, is that cool? By the way, we're Muslims and are gonna hold some prayer services!" everyone would have been fine with it.

You're ******* crazy, man.



Yes, because obviously the input thus far has been very "Yay, good idea!" and "Sure, we love Muslims!" Oh wait. No.

But, obviously when debating why people are upset, it's because of building permits, not because people are scared/angered by/hostile toward Muslims. Yeah. Building permits. That's the entire source of this controversy.

Oy vey!

It's more properly an "Islamic cultural center", which will include a mosque. The point being that whatever you call it, they are not simply rebuilding something that was already there until it was damaged during the 9/11 attacks.



But it was not being used for that purpose prior to being "damaged in the 9/11 attacks". That was the false implication I was responding to. I'm well aware that after they purchased it, they started using the existing space until they could start the construction. All of that happened well after the 9/11 attacks though.


This was not a religious center before 9/11.



If they had approached the 9/11 victims families and said that they wanted to do something in response to the 9/11 attacks, to show that there is a positive face to Islam, and to use that to help heal the wounds of 9/11 and advance the ideal of cultural and religious tolerance (which is what he's claiming to be doing), it's very possible that he'd have gotten a positive response. And if he'd then worked with those people on a project to do this, including a decision about where and how to build the center, there certainly would not have been such a negative response.


The negative response is because people found out, after the fact, that the city of NY had bypassed normal procedures in order to help a group of Muslims obtain a building right next to ground zero, and obtain building permits to rebuild it into a large Islamic community center and mosque. All of this done without anyone else knowing about it.

That's why people are suspicious of this. To label this as just anti-Muslim bigotry fails to recognize that the people involved in the process did everything they could to keep it secret until it was "too late". What did they think the reaction would be?



You're confusing "input" with "response". They didn't give "the people" a chance to have input. That's precisely the point.



The building permit issues are a sign that this was done deliberately to avoid public debate and keep the process hidden as long as possible. It's not about the permits. It's about the implications of *why* someone would do this.


And when the Imam does an interview claiming that he spoke with the 9/11 families prior to starting the process, but then in the next sentence admits that he didn't actually speak to any of them until after the public uproar, it speaks volumes about the lack of any real "outreach" on his part. I'll say again: It's hard to accept someone's claim at trying to bridge cultural and religious gaps when he didn't think to include anyone else in the process at the planning stages.

Ok. You seem to know a lot about this, so please show me all the victims' families who are out there protesting. I'm sure there are some, no doubt. I highly doubt more than a handful are protesting this center being built.



Genuine curiosity, source please. I'm not defending the imam, or Islam. I think Islam is as incorrect as almost all religions. But seeing the crap piled upon one religion by the majority of people for no reason other than ignorance is just... wrong. Everyone is free to believe what they want. If you bought the space, and got the permits, you can build what you want. But I get annoyed when you try to explain away a situation when you know as well as all of us that your reasoning applies to MAYBE 5% of protests against it. Do you deny that the overwhelming majority of protesters are likely just anti-Muslims and wouldn't know or care a lick about building permits?

Who are you talking about? The 9/11 victim families? The 71% of the US population who don't think the mosque should be built there? Who?

Had he involved other parties in this, and gotten their input *before* purchasing that land and pursuing his grand plan, the result absolutely would have been better received. I don't understand why you can't see this.




Huh? Bit over the top there. So apparently there was no religious motive or method at all involved in the 9/11 attacks? Really? Someone flew those planes...


It's not a black and white issue. Stop pretending that it is.




And you're conflating several different situations into one. You're painting the entire world in the context of bigotry and nothing else. Everyone just acts because they are bigots I guess. Sorry. I don't buy that. There are reasons for specific cases of public opposition. And while I'm sure there are some bigots who would simply oppose a mosque being built for any reason and in any place, it's pretty reasonable to conclude that the reason why 71% of the country opposes building this particular mosque in this particular place is because of the incredible insensitivity shown by those who planned its construction.


If the Imam had really wanted to build a cross cultural center where people of all faiths could learn about eachother and heal the wounds of 9/11, why didn't he think to include anyone else in his plans? Why not ask them what sort of center would work best? Why not incorporate their suggestions into his proposal? It's kinda obvious that his intent was to build an Islamic center, for members of the Islamic faith, as close to ground zero as possible, and he didn't want or care about input or opinion from anyone else. His actions speak far more loudly than his words. Doubly so when those words only materialized *after* a controversy appeared.



And Joph. I didn't mean to imply that they actually bypassed legally required permits. I meant that the process was fast tracked. City planning commissions and Port Authorities have pretty vast powers to increase or decrease the number of steps of red tape a potential building project has to go through before it can start. They hand waved this through very quickly. Obviously, I can't speak to specifics in this case, but that usually means that they waive a whole set of steps which are optional, but which most projects end out going through.


A contrast is the St Nikolas Church. It was actually a church right next to ground zero. It was demolished on 9/11. It not only has not been rebuilt, but is in limbo. That is entirely because the same city boards chose to enforce every bit of red tape along the way. We're talking about a piece of property which was already a church before the attacks. Is already owned by the same group. But can't get permits to rebuild because of red tape. Meanwhile, this Imam shows up in 2009, purchases the building with no issues at all, and at a price reportedly 1/4 what previous offers had been, then manages to sail through the approval process to demolish the building and replace it with a 13-15 story Islamic center and mosque in mere months.


What's the difference? Someone in the city planning *wants* the mosque built and either doesn't want or doesn't care much about rebuilding a nearly century old church. It's pretty obvious that some strings were pulled in back rooms to get this done. Nothing about construction and city planning moves that fast.

Just give me an unbiased cite to what you're talking about so I can start to see for myself how big of a deal it was or wasn't. You've given it enough commentary but I didn't see any information when I looked. I'm perfectly willing to admit I just might not have found it but since you keep bringing it up, show us some source material. Thanks.

Speaking as someone who bids public work to the City of Chicago (and private work within the city) on a regular basis, I can tell you don't really know what you're talking about. Which is why I'd like some real cites and not just your opinions.

Edited, Sep 13th 2010 7:27pm by Jophiel

The people protesting? aka including but not limited to: the fraction of 9/11 families opposed, the people out on the streets protesting, the people getting on TV protesting, the people threatening to burn Korans in protest, the % of Americans that are dumbasses and think all Muslims are potential terrorists waiting to happen (see: Fox News Crowd), and the 70% that think that it would be an insult to the victims of the attacks on the World Trade Center.
Because that's ******** and you know it. There isn't anyone out there with a sign going "no fast tracking construction!", people are pissed about what's being constructed where, and that wouldn't be any different regardless of how the Imam approached this.
It wasn't done by the members of that community center/Mosque/clergy, no. We're not out preventing Christian churches from being built around the sites of Eric Robert Rudolph's attacks are we? It's ridiculous to block freedom of religion because a small minority of people are crazy, violent zealots.

Wait. You are or aren't citing how this was fast tracked?

So you just think 71% of the country is bigoted?

And you don't think you might just be oversimplifying things just a tad?



They're pissed because they found out about it after the fact. What part of that are you not getting? They aren't waving those signs to tell the Imam not to build the mosque there (although they'd love for him to change his mind on his own). They're waving those signs to get the city to not allow them to build it there. They're not pissed off at the Imam. They are pissed off at the city government not taking their feelings into account when making their decision.

Why don't you at least try to learn why those you attack are doing what they're doing? It might just help you.



And no one said they were. You are so convinced that this is "us vs them" mentality that you refuse to see all the signs that lead in other directions. The people don't want the city to allow the mosque to be built there. It isn't about that mosque or that group of Muslims. It's about the symbolism of building a tall mosque right next to the site where Islamic extremists conducted their greatest attack ever and it's about the insult to those who lost loved ones in that attack by providing what is essentially a signal of surrender to the very people who killed those people.


It has *always* been about that. What level of stupidity and ignorance makes you think it's anything else? No one cares why the Imam wants to build it there. There may be speculation about his motives, but at the end of the day it doesn't matter. It's the appropriateness of building that mosque in that location and the messages it sends internationally that people care about.

You don't want to acknowledge this, so instead you cast the entire thing into a childishly simplistic "they just hate Muslims" argument. Sheesh. Get your head out of the sand. It's not about that. It's never been about 6that. And certainly 71% of the US citizens don't hold an opposing view on this because of that.



Since I had to google who the hell that is, I suspect it's not the same. If he'd killed 3000 people in a single location, on a single day, and did so as part of a broad international group of people who are similarly fanatic for similar reasons, then yeah, we might just oppose building a church on that site if we thought it would be seen by the others in his organization as a victory.

Um... But that's not remotely the case, is it? There's just no real comparison here. I think your problem is that you don't realize that in many parts of the world where Islam is the state religion, the kinds of things we dismiss as "crazy and violent" are condoned by those states. We're really not talking about a small number of individuals. It's not the same thing and it's a really really really stupid mistake to dismiss Islamic terrorism as a small minority issue. While only a small minority are willing to kill themselves for the cause, there are whole nations full of people who hold the same sort of hard core beliefs which those of us from western nations should immediately condemn as violations of our principles of liberty and rights.


It's not the same thing.