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Man Sentenced to Death For Blasphemous Facebook Comments In Pakistan (gizmodo.com)
In what is believed to be "the first time the death penalty had been awarded in a case related to social media," a 30-year-old man in Pakistan has been sentenced to death for blasphemy in comments made on Facebook. Gizmodo reports: The prosecutor told The Times of India that Taimoor Raza was arrested "after playing blasphemous and hate speech material on his phone on a bus stop in Bahawalpur, where a counter-terrorism officer arrested him and confiscated his phone." It was the material on Raza's phone that led to his arrest. The Guardian reports that the accused's brother said Raza "indulged in a sectarian debate on Facebook with a person, who we later come to know, was a [counter-terrorism department] official with the name of Muhammad Usman." Raza's defense attorney told The Guardian the initial charges were limited to "insulting remarks on sectarian grounds," which carries a maximum two-year jail sentence, but that "derogatory acts against prophet Muhammad," which carry a death sentence, were added later. According to The Times of India, Raza will be able to appeal the ruling to the Pakistani High Court and the Supreme Court. Facebook said in a statement: "We are deeply saddened and concerned by the death sentence served in Pakistan for a Facebook post. Facebook uses powerful systems to keep people's information secure and tools to keep their accounts safe, and we do not provide any government with direct access to people's data. We will continue to protect our community from unnecessary or overreaching government intervention."
Christians might tell you that you're going to hell and say offensive things to you, but they're thankfully not killing people like the Muslims are.
"One of the delegates, Nabil Shaath, who was Palestinian foreign minister at the time, said: "President Bush said to all of us: 'I am driven with a mission from God'. God would tell me, 'George go and fight these terrorists in Afghanistan'. And I did. And then God would tell me 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq'. And I did.""
https://www.theguardian.com/wo...
"Tony Blair viewed his decision to go to war in Iraq and Kosovo as part of a "Christian battle", according to one of his closest political allies."
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new...
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
Hold the fuck on, what kind of an argument is this?! So when fundamentalist catholics hundreds of years ago used their interpretation in the past to justify war, slavery and genocide, that's not the fault of the religion because they've stopped now? What? Do you not understand youi just refuted your own argument essentially: ANY faith/doctrine easily turns into a tool of violent politics when it's taken fundamentally. Fundamentalism by its nature is the problem.
And even if we ignore the crusades, the catholic church openly supported the third reich, took one side over the other in the Rwandan genocide, not to even speak of the still ongoing tendency of the church to protect pedophiles it employs from facing criminal prosecution and so on. The church has done a lot of evil just within the lifespan of people who're still alive.
Now don't get me wrong, the catholic church today has certainly come a long way from the catholic church that burned witches at the stake and murdered their way through the levant in the name of their faith so I'm not comparing modern day catholic church to isis. But what I'm doing is trying to point out to you that the texts haven't changed. The same bible that was used to justify the enslavement, death and torture of millions because 'god wills it' (the catholic variant of allahu akbar) is still in use today. Attitudes have changed and the church has been slowly stripped of power by the secular states that rose to limit the power of the Holy see.
Do you think the popes of the past willingly wanted to give away their lands and essentially their position as one of the most powerful men in the world over to nation states and politicians? No. They had to because the enlightenment arrived and slowly christians started the lurch towards tolerating other christian sects. After the 2nd world war what little credibility the church had left was lost completely when they sided with Hitler because they were afraid. Yeah, the man supposedly selected by the overlord of all of existence was so scared of an angry German corporal that he did what apparently in his view Jesus would have done, which is join hands with this guy and his intent to kill all the jews and the gays and the cripples.
People don't realize this but christianity is essentially still in the process of being dragged from the middle-ages to the modern day and so is Islam. It's just that we've had a centuries upon centuries more time to try to beat the mantra of 'No don't slaughter the infidels, bad Pope, bad Pope!" into their heads. it's important to note that christianity was allowed to mellow down at the same pace with the surrounding societies, so while the dogma of christianity eventually turned against the mass slaughter of unbelievers no single christian individual went from 'death to the infidels' to 'love and respect for everyone regardless of their faith' during their lifetimes. The change was gradual.
Now we don't have centuries to deal with islam which is a genuine problem. The nature of the islamic holy texts is also different from the bible which is an additional problem. That is, unlike the bible which contains very small parts of god supposedly directly speaking to people and even the christians have long agreed that the bible is the work of erran
"It is the business of the future to be dangerous" -Alfred North Whitehead
Short version: American Christian nuts went to Uganda in the last couple decades and pushed hard for antigay shit. So its basically state level adoption of American Taliban policy.
Yet Pakistan is a classic example of a majority muslim country, and this is what happens. If you transferred all the Pakistanis in the world to the United States, do you think their beliefs and personalities would magically change just because they were standing on a different piece of land? Probably...
It is up to people in the free (i.e. non-muslim) world to continually expose and fight against the evil that is Islam, before the entire planet is living under this insane, tyrannous system.
maybe, just maybe, the problem isn't a particular religion (or religion in general). maybe the problem is human nature. take away religion, we'll find some other idea to exploit for power and control.
The problem with christianity as well as islam is both holy books are filled with multiple instructions both to be nice to everyone and fucking kill anyone who's not the same as you. Especially the old testament in the bible. Try reading it one day.
yes, but Christians by their name, tend to follow the 2nd book, you know the one that says love thy neighbor.
Where is the book of Islam that focuses on being nice to others...
Only a few months ago: (google facebook helps pakistan monitor speech)
Pakistan asking Facebook and Twitter to point out blasphemers ...
www.theblaze.com/.../pakistan-asking-facebook-and-twitter-to-point-out-blasphemers-a...
Mar 29, 2017 - Facebook has signalled its intent to help Pakistan identify thought .... promise to PROSECUTE anyone guilty of "ANTI-MUSLIM" speech.
https://www.infowars.com/facebook-helps-pakistan-identify-thought-criminals/
Pakistan asks Facebook to help fight blasphemy - BBC News
www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-39300270
Mar 17, 2017 - Pakistan says it has asked Facebook to help investigate "blasphemous content" posted on the social network by Pakistanis. Facebook has ... ...
Facebook Helps Pakistan Ban "Blasphemy" Under Islamic Law
pamelageller.com/2017/03/facebook-helps-pakistan-ban-blasphemy-islamic-law.html/
Mar 9, 2017 - Pakistan: Facebook helping Pakistani officials remove ... Pakistan is already a barely functioning democracy, and to stifle free speech further in ...
Matthew 10:34-36
Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I have come to turn a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.
Luke 14:26
If any man come to Me and hate not his father and mother, and wife and children, and brethren and sisters, yea, and his own life also, he cannot be My disciple.
Luke 19:27:
But those enemies of mine who did not want me to be king over them—bring them here and kill them in front of me.
How this connects to the story of the minas right before where Jesus essentially says that capitalism is a great idea is beyond me, though.
But anyway, it doesn't really matter. For all the nitty-gritty OT stuff stays valid. Said the boss himself:
Matt 5:17-20
Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them. For truly I tell you, until heaven and earth disappear, not the smallest letter, not the least stroke of a pen, will by any means disappear from the Law until everything is accomplished. Therefore anyone who sets aside one of the least of these commands and teaches others accordingly will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever practices and teaches these commands will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the Pharisees and the teachers of the law, you will certainly not enter the kingdom of heaven.
Your turn.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Governments are religions?
As a non-American, it strikes me as quite... interesting... how worshipful Americans are of their politicians and institutions. The US constitution, its amendments, and the declaration of independence, are quoted as if they were scripture. The Founding Fathers get this Very Important Uppercased Title of Utter Respect and are quoted all around by all sides as if they were some kind of prophets or sages possessing of final wisdom. A mountain was carved so that the faces of the tetrany (?) of the Greatest Presidents Ever is forever remembered. And so on and so forth.
The US government might be secular, but secularism alone isn't enough to nullify religious impulses. They just shift around and resettle in a different shape and form.
Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.