I think it's funny that people think that Muslims, particularly in Afghanistan, might be offended by the burning of a book as opposed to say, what happened at Guatanamo Bay, Abu Graib or, more recently, what these fine specimens of the American military machine got up to:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-11252987A group of US soldiers murdered a number of Afghan civilians and took body parts as trophies, documents released by military officials allege.
The charging sheets relate to allegations that five US soldiers were involved in the murders of civilians in January, February and May of this year.
A further seven servicemen are accused of a conspiracy to cover up the crimes.
And sure these are only allegations, and sure innocent until proven guilty, but you don't make an allegation of soldiers taking body parts as trophies unless you find some body parts.
Anything some southern white trash preacher does to a bunch of books pales into insignificance alongside the actions of the US military in Afghanistan and Iraq. If you're some angry Islamic type bloke you can find plenty of reasons that aren't completely retarded to pick up an AK in the name of Admiral Ackbar. Everybody from the Pope to the President is slating that guy for burning some books and how it might provoke Islam, when the US military is romping around Iraq and Afghanistan fucking up everybody's shit. It's bordering on the surreal. Where was the concern over provoking the enemy when the US Army was taking pictures of people it was torturing in Iraq? Why don't they care about provoking Islam when they give shitloads of cash to Israel? Obama and his ilk are willing to talk about respecting this and not wanting to anger that, but fundamentally talk is really fucking cheap.
Regarding what Lunatic said about being held to ransom by Islam, I think this is an illusion more than anything. The media is not scared of Islam, people are not scared of Islam, but the media acts like it is, because it fits with the accepted belief that Islam is a crazy religion full of lethal nutters. If they didn't act like Islam was this scary bunch of people you don't want to mess with then it would be much harder to convince people that they were dangerous. You're more likely to see a Christian murder an abortion clinic employee than a Muslim murder a guy for offending Islam in the West. The threat is nothing, the 'ransom' is the media pretending to be scared. Think of it like this, when there's a war how many journalists turn up? Hundreds, from all over the place, because believe it or not plenty of journalists are extremely brave. Men and women who will rock into a war zone, unarmed, often embedded within the lead combat elements. They risk their lives, the TV channels and so forth are willing to let them die for the cause, and yet these self same news agencies claim to be scared of Islam? My arse. Any threat Islam appears to pose to free speech is a total fake.
You want to see a religion actually hold the media to ransom, check out Scientology. Nobody, but nobody, fucks with them. Hajjis only have bombs. Scientologists have lawyers.
