tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-620033997567463526.post5477498990664492014..comments2023-04-02T01:24:09.580+11:00Comments on The Michael Duffy Files: Irfan Yusuf, Nicolas Sarkozy, burqas and Muslims who agree the burqa is offensive and degrading to womenUnknownnoreply@blogger.comBlogger3125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-620033997567463526.post-81407984382170920122009-07-12T11:48:12.935+10:002009-07-12T11:48:12.935+10:00Actually as I recollect it was you that wrote the ...Actually as I recollect it was you that wrote the column, speaking out boldly about the way Sarkozy would alienate the majority of French Muslims, while neglecting to explain why moderates should be outraged by the banning of extremism and fundamentalism (try belonging to the Darwin police force and wear a sheet and perform a necking ceremony and see how far you progress your career). <br /><br />And it was you that mentioned how somehow moderate Muslims might become entangled in becoming apologists for fundamentalists as if fundamentalism was a right that deserved protection.<br /><br />And actually I do expect Catholics to speak out against kiddy fiddling priests, and I do expect lefties to speak out against Stalinist ratbags (let alone FARC) and I do expect sensible people of any persuasion to resent the delusion that suicide bombing is a meaningful tactic, as opposed to a nihilistic gesture of absolute darkness and despair, based on the absurd notion that you might end up in heaven as opposed to a hole in the ground along with your innocent victims.<br /><br />Why do you use straw dogs as a form of argument? It's slippery slithery thinking. You had a chance in your column to make a useful contribution, but you slithered away and you still keep slithering. If you think the burqa oppresses women, don't dance around the point with semantics, or hide behind the skirts of the abundance of moderate Islamic women.<br /><br />It's surely the business of moderates to speak out against fundamentalism wherever they find it, especially if they happen to be writing a newspaper column about moderates and fundamentalists - and in that column ostensibly claiming to be a moderate, while somehow hinting that a minority of fundamentalists can oppress women because ... well because they can ... even if the writer's a free thinker who doesn't believe in the oppression of women. <br /><br />In short between Sarkozy taking a stand against oppression - even if it involves oppression of the rights of fundamentalists - and your ambivalent stand - which suggests that freedom should include the freedom for fundamentalists to oppress - give me Sarkozy any day.dorothy parkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00816807935021738560noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-620033997567463526.post-67987007916778821582009-07-06T21:12:49.800+10:002009-07-06T21:12:49.800+10:00Actually I don't find x-rated videos offensive...Actually I don't find x-rated videos offensive. Come to think of it, I don't find most xxx rated videos offensive, or even Paul Verhoeven's Showgirls, or if I do, I let others have their fun and walk on by. If you're liberal, you should be liberal.<br /><br />That's why I don't say so. Guess I'm just an apologist for pornography. <br /><br />I'm certainly not an apologist for Stephen Conroy's attempts to censor the internet. But since you find pornography offensive I dare say you can join in his campaign to censor the internet and ban pornography. Pardon me if I don't join the campaign (which is not to say that I'm an apologist for Australian men who think a glassing is a kind of foreplay).<br /><br />But then I've never had problems with sex or virtual sex. Sadly, my problem has always been the problem religion has with sex.<br /><br />And why not then, since you find the burqa offensive, spend your time explaining and arguing how it should by peaceful means cease to be imposed on women by men, and over time removed from the community? Instead of taking the easy way out by flapping your hands and saying do we have to ban it? <br /><br />Speak out agaInst it loud and clear, and campaign for its eradication. I'd have been more impressed by a column explaining how by persuasion and education the burqa could be seen as the culturally conditioned repression of women, without religious justification. <br /><br />And then how it might be removed by education and cultural awareness by active campaigning by moderate Muslims, thus making the talk of banning it irrelevant. China shouldn't have needed the Communist party to stop foot binding; moderate Islamics should not need a Sarkozy to adapt to a world where women are equal to men.<br /><br />I went to the Garden of Love,<br />And saw what I never had seen;<br />A Chapel was built in the midst,<br />Where I used to play on the green.<br /><br />And the gates of this Chapel were shut<br />And "Thou shalt not," writ over the door;<br />So I turned to the Garden of Love<br />That so many sweet flowers bore.<br /><br />And I saw it was filled with graves,<br />And tombstones where flowers should be;<br />And priests in black gowns were walking their rounds,<br />And binding with briars my joys and desiresdorothy parkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00816807935021738560noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-620033997567463526.post-80504837724573503472009-07-06T17:13:28.572+10:002009-07-06T17:13:28.572+10:00Dorothy, isn't it obvious I regard the burqa a...Dorothy, isn't it obvious I regard the burqa as offensive? But does that mean we have to ban it?<br /><br />I find x-rated videos offensive. Do you? Why don't you say so, then? Or are you just an apologist for pornography??Irfhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12032825228704836828noreply@blogger.com