Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Sam Harris talking about Islam


In the following superb
video, the well-known atheist Sam Harris talks about Islam. The scene is part of a lecture called Can Science Determine Human Values? (November 10, 2010).




_____

Friday, October 22, 2010

Douglas Murray on Muhammad


Douglas Murray talking about Islam and its "prophet" Muhammad:




_____

Sunday, September 12, 2010

Speech Geert Wilders in New York


Here's a video of the speech from
Geert Wilders, yesterday in New York (followed by the text of the speech):



Dear friends, May I ask you to be silent for ten seconds? Just be silent and listen. Ten seconds. And listen… What we hear are the sounds of life in the greatest city on earth.

No place in the world, no place in human history, is as richly varied and vibrant and dynamic as New York City. You hear the cars, you hear the people, you hear them rushing to their various destinations, you hear the sounds of business and of pleasure, you hear the cheers, you hear the cries, the buzzing sounds of human activity. And that is how it should be.

Always. Now close your eyes – I know it’s a beautiful day, but close your eyes. I have been told that this day nine years ago was just such a beautiful day -- and remember, or try to remember, or try to imagine the sounds which were heard here on this spot under this same blue sky exactly nine years ago. The sound of shock, the sound of destruction, the sound of panic, the sound of pain, the sound of terror.

Did New York deserve this? Did America deserve this? Did the West deserve this? What, my friends, would you say to people who argue that New York, that America, that the West had itself to blame for those horrible sounds?

There are people in this city who argue this. And they are angry because we are gathered here today to commemorate, to make a stand, to draw the line. My friends, I have come from the other side of the Atlantic to share your grief for those who died here nine years ago. I have not forgotten how I felt that day.

The scenes are imprinted on my soul, as they are on yours.

But our hearts were not broken in the same way as the hearts of the relatives and friends of those who lost their lives here. Many relatives of the victims are here in our midst today.

I wish to take this opportunity to express my deepest and most heartfelt condolences to them and to all of the people of New York and America. Humbly, I stand here before you as a Dutchman and a European.

I, too, however, cannot forget. How can anyone forget?

Let me remind you of the words from Darryl Worley’s 9/11 song. Have you forgotten how it felt that day?

To see your homeland under fire And her people blown away Have you forgotten when those towers fell?

We had neighbors still inside going thru a living hell Worley’s response is our response: No, we will NEVER forget. We are here today because we have not forgotten all the loved ones that were lost and those left to carry on.

And neither has the world. When the forces of Jihad attacked New York, they attacked the world. Among those lost were people from 55 nations, people of every religion and every persuasion. No place on earth had a more multi-ethnic, multi-racial, and multi-lingual workforce than New York’s proud towers.

That is exactly why they were targeted. They constituted an insult to those who hold that there can be no peaceful cooperation among people and nations without submission to Sharia; to those who wish to impose the legal system of Islam on the rest of us.

But New York and Sharia are incompatible. New York stands for freedom, openness and tolerance. New York’s Mayor recently said that New York is “rooted in Dutch tolerance.”

Those are true words. New York is not intolerant. How can it be? New York is open to the world. Suppose New York were intolerant. Suppose it only allowed people of one persuasion within its walls.

Then it would be like Mecca, a city without freedom. Whatever your religion, persuasion or gender is, in New York you will find a home.

In Mecca, if your religion isn’t Islam, you are not welcome. Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf claims the right to build a mosque, a house of Sharia here – on this hallowed ground.

But, friends, I have not forgotten and neither have you.

That is why we are here today. To draw the line.

Here, on this sacred spot. We are here in the spirit of America’s founding fathers. We are here in the spirit of freedom. We are here in the spirit of Abraham Lincoln, the President who freed the slaves. President Lincoln said: “Those who deny freedom to others, deserve it not for themselves.”

These words are the key to our survival. The tolerance that is crucial to our freedom requires a line of defense. Mayor Bloomberg uses tolerance as an argument to allow Imam Rauf and his sponsors to build their so-called Cordoba Mosque.

Mayor Bloomberg forgets, however, that openness cannot be open-ended. A tolerant society is not a suicidal society.

It must defend itself against the powers of darkness, the force of hatred and the blight of ignorance. It cannot tolerate the intolerant – and survive.

This means that we must not give a free hand to those who want to subjugate us. An overwhelming majority of Americans is opposed to building this mosque.

So is an overwhelming majority everywhere in the non-Islamic world.

Because we all realize what is at stake here. We know what this so-called Cordoba mosque really means. Imam Rauf maintains that American secular law and Sharia law are based on the same principles.

He refuses to condemn terrorists because he says terrorism is “a very complex question”. He says America is “an accessory to the crime that happened on 9/11.”

“In fact,” he literally said, “in the most direct sense, Osama bin Laden is made in the USA.”

He also says that “terrorism will only end when the West acknowledges the harm it has done to Muslims.”

That is why this man should not play the game he has in mind here in Manhattan. His “Blame the West, Blame America”-message is an insult. Americans – and by extension, all of us whose civilization was also attacked on 9/11/2001 – are not to blame for what happened here nine years ago today. Osama bin Laden is not made in the USA.

The West never “harmed” Islam before it harmed us. Most Americans do not want this so-called Cordoba Mosque to be built here. They understand that it is both a provocation and a humiliation. They understand the triumphant narrative of a mosque named after the Great Mosque of Cordoba which was constructed where a Christian cathedral stood before the land was conquered by Islam.

An overwhelming majority of Americans is opposed to building an Islamic cultural center close to Ground Zero. There is no lack of mosques in New York. There are dozens of buildings in which Muslims can pray. It isn’t about a lack of space for prayers.

It’s about the symbolic meaning. We who have come to speak today, object to this mosque project because its promoter and his wealthy sponsors have never suggested building a center to promote tolerance and interfaith understanding where it is really needed: In Mecca – a town where non-Muslims are not even allowed to enter, let alone build churches, synagogues, temples or community centers.

Ordinary Americans object to the mosque project because currently no fewer than ten major multi-million dollar mosque projects are being planned in the United States as well as dozens in Europe, while not a single church is allowed in the kingdom of Saudi Arabia, while Jews are not even allowed to move their lips in prayer on the Temple Mount in Jerusalem, while the oldest Christians in the world, the Copts, are not free to renovate their churches, let alone to build one in Egypt.

My friends, that is why we are here today. What happens in New York must be seen in the perspective of the world.

The events nine years ago made an enormous impact everywhere. Most people shared your pain, but, unfortunately, some did not.

Nine years ago, when the news of the terrible atrocity in New York reached Europe, Muslim youths danced in the streets. In a poll, two thirds of the Muslim immigrants in the Netherlands expressed partial or full understanding for the 9/11 terrorists.

If a mosque were built here on Ground Zero such people would feel triumphant. But we, we will not betray those who died on 9/11.

For their sakes we cannot tolerate a mosque on or near Ground Zero. For their sakes loud and clear we say: No mosque here! For their sakes, we must draw the line. So that New York, rooted in Dutch tolerance, will never become New Mecca.

But, let us also express our gratitude for the heroes of 9/11, those who went down in that Pennsylvania field, those who were standing freedom’s watch at the Pentagon, and those who were here in New York nine years ago to risk and lose their lives for the victims.

Friends, in honor of these victims, these heroes and their families, I believe that the words of Ronald Reagan, spoken in Normandy on the 40 th anniversary of D-Day, resonate with new purpose on this hallowed spot.

President Reagan said: “We will always remember. We will always be proud. We will always be prepared, so we may always be free.” And, we, too, will always remember the victims of 9/11 and their loved ones who were left behind; We, too, will always be proud of the heroes; We will always defend liberty, democracy and human dignity; In the name of freedom: No mosque here!


_____

Friday, May 21, 2010

What Islam Fears: Laughter

.
The following video is from the atheist philhellenes, responding to ridiculous arguments from the Muslim baadshah143. For more mirrors of this hilarious video, click here.



_____

Saturday, May 15, 2010

Islam is disastrous for artistic and academic freedom

.
The following video shows the aftermath of the attack on the cartoonist Lars Vilks at the Uppsala University in Sweden (with English subtitles). It's a disgraceful scene of Islamist intolerance towards Western artistic and academic freedom (and freedom of speech in general). Muslims who think their religion is above criticism and mockery should go live in backward countries like Saudi Arabia and Pakistan, not in Sweden or the Netherlands. In the free West everything can be criticized and mocked upon. Religious totalitarianism is disgusting. Freedom of speech is not negotionable.



Hat tip: GalneGunnarTV.

_____

Thursday, May 13, 2010

TV ad Dutch Freedom Party

.
Here's the new TV ad from the Dutch Freedom Party of Geert Wilders (with English subtitles):



Hat tip: Vlad Tepes.

_____

Thursday, April 22, 2010

'South Park' and Mohammed in a bear suit

.
In the following videos, CNN's Anderson Cooper reports on the radical Muslim death threats against the creators of South Park. In the first video, Cooper talks about the nature of the death threats. In the second video he interviews Ayaan Hirsi Ali about the death threats, and the intolerant nature of Islam in general.





_____

Saturday, March 20, 2010

Diana West on Geert Wilders and FOXNews

.
A quote from Diana West:

When Glenn Beck, Charles Krauthammer and Bill Kristol each from their respective Fox News perches branded Dutch political phenom Geert Wilders as beyond the political pale, it was shocking and outrageously so, and for several reasons.

One. I've grown used to Fox News and all other media ignoring not just the Wilders story but also the cultural story of the century, altogether -- namely, the Islamization of Europe, something Wilders, a great admirer of Ronald Reagan and a committed supporter of Israel, is dedicated to halt and reverse.

Read further at the website of The Washington Examiner.

_____

Sunday, March 14, 2010

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Pat Condell on the trial against Geert Wilders

.
As a freedom-loving Dutch citizen, I can say that every sentence of this commentary about the trial against Geert Wilders
is spot-on:



Two quotes:

Well, this week in an Amsterdam courtroom we saw the beginning of what could be both the trial of the century and the crime of the century. What an honour for the Netherlands, so early in the century. In the most determined statement of dhimmitude we've yet seen in Europe — and that's saying something — the Dutch authorities are pushing ahead with the prosecution of an elected parliamentarian, for the crime of embarassing them with the truth. There's an ideological fervor about this prosecution that's almost religious in its intensity, because — let's be clear — this is a heresy trial by any other name. They can't refute mister Wilders' statement(s), so instead they resorted to the kind of cheap legal stunt that we'd espect from of the likes of Mugabe to shut their opponent up. They've accused him of being divisive and inflammatory. And yes, sometimes the truth can be divisive and inflammatory if it's being suppressed for long enough, and it's become sufficiently taboo, as it clearly has in the Netherlands. Because according to the prosecution, it doesn't even matter that what he says is true. What matters is that it's illegal. Well, when the truth is against the law, then there's something seriously wrong with the law. Because when the truth is no defense, there is no defense. And the law has no anchor. So it will drift wherever the wind of political expedience blows. And this week it blew straight into a crooked courtroom in Amsterdam. Where justice will now be made to fight for it's life, starved of the oxygen of truth that gives it life. These are desperate tactics of desperate people, who've tight themselves up in such knots of relativist guilt, they're incapable of acknowledging the truth, let alone dealing with it.

You know, in the English language we have an expression: "Dutch courage". It is not really courage at all. It's the kind of courage you get when you've had a bit to much alcohol to drink. Well, now there's a new expression: "Dutch justice". It's not really justice at all. It's the kind of justice you get when you've overdosed on cultural relativism and your spine has completely disappeared. Shame on the Netherlands. Shame on the Western media, for not raising a howl of protest against this outrageous attack on our basic freedom. And shame upon shame on the crooked judges of Amsterdam.

Video via Vlad Tepes.


_____

Friday, January 1, 2010

Obama administration systematically downplays Islamic terrorism

.
Toby Harnden
notices that the Obama administration is systematically downplaying Islamic terrorism:

There has been a pattern developing with the Obama administration trying to minimise terrorist attacks. We saw it with Abdul Hakim Mujahid Muhammad, a Muslim convert who murdered a US Army recruit in Little Rock, Arkansas in June. We saw it with Major Nidal Malik Hassan, a Muslim with Palestinian roots who slaughtered 13 at Fort Hood, Texas last month. In both cases, there were Yemen connections. Obama began to take the same approach with Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab. We’ll see whether this incident shakes him out of that complacency. Whether it’s called the war on terror or not, it’s clear that the US is at war against al-Qaeda and radical Islamists.

_____