Clipmarks | Pluralism Clips

Glenn Greenwald comments on Sue Myrick's calls for an investigation of CAIR

Sun, 18 Oct 2009 14:18:29 GMT

clipped by: enbar
clipper's remarks: I don't know the full context of this, but it's something I'd like to learn more about.

Clip Source: www.salon.com

Glenn Greenwald

GOP House members call for investigation of Muslim political activity

A group of House Republicans is calling for an investigation into whether a leading American Muslim advocacy group tried to "spy" on congressional offices by placing interns on key security committees.

Rep. Sue Myrick, North Carolina Republican, cited an internal January 2007 memo in which the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) discussed placing Muslim interns on Capitol Hill to "focus on influencing congressmen responsible for policy that directly impacts the American Muslim community."

That's consistent with what virtually every political advocacy group in the nation does; it's normally called activism and democracy. But because, in this case, it's a group of Muslims who are doing this, these House Republicans are depicting it as some sort of nefarious espionage plot against the U.S. that demands a criminal investigation.

Tags: activism, conservatives, gwot, islam, pluralism, politics, possible_blog_post, religion

It's Not About The Constitution

Sat, 10 Oct 2009 05:17:52 GMT

clipped by: nuttyriv3r

Clip Source: thelawmanchronicles.blogspot.com

October 7, 2009

by Tony Miano

It's not about the Constitution. It's not about the oft-misunderstood principle of the separation of church and state. It's not about pluralism or ecumenism. And it certainly has nothing to do with tolerance.

It has everything to do with hating God.

he was struck by a car while directing traffic.

Jason Zunker was a 28-year-old deputy sheriff

left two sealed letters to be opened in the event of his death.

was used as part of the inscription on a memorial

The text reads:

"I don't feel I have gone too soon. I feel lucky every day God keeps me here. When I die, I know where I'm going. Don't be sad because the Bible says it's greater than anyone can even imagine when it's your time to see it . . . You must ask Jesus into your heart. Believe he died for you and believe he rose again. Live a good life. Ask for forgiveness and believe. Then I will see you all again."

Of course, the usual cast of God-hating characters with the Freedom From Religion Foundation are offended

Tags: deputy jason zunker, freedom from religion foundation, scoffers, sovereign, the lawman chronicles, tony milano

Why are feminists like Azar Nafisi called "right wing" "neo cons?"

Wed, 07 Oct 2009 06:28:13 GMT

clipped by: Roque Nuevo
clipper's remarks: The quotes in the clip are welcome antidotes to the attitude our Beloved Leader is flacking towards the Islamic Republic of Iran. But the article itself leads into the story of <p>"a vibrant and beautiful young girl, Neda Agha-Soltan, and not the men who rule over Iran [who] has become a symbol of [the] Iranian people's fight for democracy and pluralism. Her murder, like those of Politkovskaya and Estermirova, gives the lie to the claims of those who vainly tried to silence them, and reminds the rest of us that we neither should or can evade the truth and its consequences."</p>

The article is about a journalism award in honor of the Russian journalist, Ana Politkovskaya. She says that it was Politkovskaya's

<p>"single-minded commitment to truth, and her demand for justice, that made her so dangerous to the tyrants in her country and inconvenient to leaders of western democracies.</p>

More than this, Nafisi takes us on a world historical tour of feminists and feminism.

Clip Source: www.guardian.co.uk

At the time of the Islamic revolution, women had been active in all walks of life, there were two women ministers, one a minister of women's affairs. What made Iranian women join the protests against the shah was not a desire to abdicate the rights they had fought for over a century but to gain the right to political freedom. Their rights were not something that a shah had granted to them to be taken away by an ayatollah.

For more than 30 years the Islamic regime and its apologists have tried to dismiss women's struggle in Iran as part of a western ploy.

Thus the regime has deprived Iranian women not just of their present rights, but also of their history and their past. The regime's victims are not only atheists, secularists, or people of other religions and faiths, but also Muslims, those whose interpretation of their religion is based on different principles, those who disagree with the Islamic Republic's views have been punished and deprived of their most basic rights.

From Religion Clause: Iowa school district releases new policy on religion in classrooms

Sun, 06 Sep 2009 00:40:52 GMT

clipped by: enbar
clipper's remarks: Interesting. I'm skeptical of this kind of thing, but it looks like they've got their hearts in the right place, anyhow.

Clip Source: religionclause.blogspot.com

Iowa School District Unveils Revised Religious Liberty Draft Policy

by Howard Friedman

After withdrawing its original draft policy on religious liberty in schools (see prior posting), Spencer, Iowa school officials today unveiled a new draft (full text). It provides in part:

Teachers shall prepare and teach lessons throughout the year and throughout the curriculum that:
Approach religion as academic, not devotional
Strive for student awareness of religions, not acceptance of religions
Study about religion, but do not practice religion in the classroom
Expose students to diversity of religious views, not impose any particular view
Educate about a variety of religions, not promote or denigrate religion
Inform students about various beliefs, not conform students to any particular belief
Demonstrate the impact of economic, social, political and cultural effects of religion throughout history
Are age appropriate

Tags: church_and_state, news, pluralism, possible_blog_post, religion, schools, teaching

"Islam is of the devil": a Gainsville, FL church attracts controversy

Fri, 10 Jul 2009 02:20:24 GMT

clipped by: enbar
clipper's remarks: The photo and the pastor's comments pretty much speak for themselves. I probably wouldn't have clipped this except for the final paragraph in the clip -- "we are definitely trying to open up dialogue." This baffles me. I wonder what they're actually trying to accomplish -- presumably the primary purpose of the sign is illocutionary in nature. To the pastor, I would point out that "All things are lawful for me, but not all things are beneficial" (1 Cor. 6.12). Is this beneficial?

Clip Source: www.gainesville.com

Anti-Islam church sign stirs up community outrage

Those behind a sign posted in front of their northwest Gainesville church, proclaiming in red letters "Islam is of the devil," say it's a way to express their religious beliefs and is a message of "a great act of love."

"It's an act of saying there is only one way, and that is actually what Christianity is about. It is about pointing the people in the right direction, and that right direction is Jesus and only Jesus," said the church's senior pastor, Terry Jones. "We feel the sign is an act of giving the people a chance."

"We actually posted the sign because there is a tremendous growth in Islam at this time. It is a violent and oppressive religion and does not have anything to do with the truth of the Bible," Jones said. "We are definitely trying to send the message that Jesus Christ is the only way."

"We are definitely trying to open up dialogue, create interest, create awareness, get people to think," Jones said.

Tags: christianity, evangelicalism, florida, islam, news, pluralism, religion, rels327, rels328

Patriotism

Wed, 08 Jul 2009 11:08:59 GMT

clipped by: chetler
clipper's remarks: Patriotism is another balancing act. It's easy to be gung-ho or dismissive. Live in the tension of freedom and slavery, democracy and corruption, churches and pluralism. It shows us how to be a patriot to Jesus above all.

Clip Source: www.christianitytoday.com

So the Right bashes the Left for its internationalism and critical spirit, while the Left skewers the Right for its confused consecration of national life.

Reinhold Niebuhr got it right in the early 1930s when he acknowledged that patriotism at least has the virtue of taking the self outside of itself to a broader community

We need to be able to say "yes, but" to patriotism. Yes, we love our country, but we do not fully belong here or in any earthly land. Yes, we want our nation to flourish, but every human being and human community is equally precious in God's sight. Yes, we value our nation's ideals, but they are not the same thing as the message of the kingdom. Yes, God blesses America, but he blesses other nations, too.

people who do not know how to demonstrate an appropriate fealty to their nation are not well positioned to learn how to transcend that loyalty for a higher one.

Patriotism simply says "thank you" for, and to, the particular national community

Tags: patriot, usa

Obama Revisionism, Adams and Jefferson, Friends of Islam

Sun, 07 Jun 2009 08:15:33 GMT

clipped by: merrie
clipper's remarks: . . . hostility to religion. Still, as usual, it's fascinating, especially this bit of history that Obama somehow failed to mention this morning when revisiting (or I should say, revisioning) Adams, Jefferson, and that oh-so-warm relationship between the Morocco and the fledgling United States:

I believe on the evidence that it was at this moment that Jefferson decided to make war on the Muslim states of North Africa as soon as the opportunity presented itself. And, even if I am wrong, we can be sure that the dispatch of the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps to the Barbary shore was the first and most important act of his presidency. It took several years of bombardment before the practice of kidnap and piracy and slavery was put down, but put down it was, Quranic justification or not.

Clip Source: corner.nationalreview.com

Hmmm. A couple of years ago, Chris Hitchens wrote an interesting article in Slate called "Jefferson's Quran — What the Founder Really Thought about Islam." Before getting to the third president, and the second, Hitchens expounds on Keith Ellison

In the first place, concern over Ellison's political and religious background has little to do with his formal adherence to Islam. In his student days and subsequently, he was a supporter of Louis Farrakhan's Nation of Islam

Farrakhan himself has boasted of the "punishment" meted out to Malcolm X by armed gangsters of the NOI (see the brilliant documentary Brother Minister: The Assassination of Malcolm X, which catches him in the act of doing this)

If Ellison now wants to use his faith to justify an appeal to pluralism and inclusiveness and diversity, he needs to repudiate the Nation of Islam

Then Hitch moves on. While I recommend the full article, be forewarned if this sort of thing agitates you that it is replete with the standard Hitchens

Tags: christopher hitchens, islam, "jefferson's quran", louis farrakhan's nation of islam, keith ellison

Against Method: Outline of an anarchistic theory of knowledge (1)

Tue, 02 Jun 2009 16:26:06 GMT

clipped by: JICWyllie
clipper's remarks: Anarchism is open. Method is predetermined. Yet, discipline and repeatability are necessities. Can there be such a thing as open methods that could make anarchism a bit more coherent?

Clip Source: www.marxists.org

The only principle that does not inhibit progress is: anything goes.

Hypotheses contradicting well-confirmed theories give us evidence that cannot be obtained in any other way. Proliferation of theories is beneficial

There is no idea, however ancient and absurd, that is not capable of improving our knowledge.

Facts are constituted by older ideologies,

No theory ever agrees with all the facts in its domain

Copernicanism and other essential ingredients of modern science survived only because reason was frequently overruled in their past.

Popper's version of Mill's pluralism is not in agreement with scientific practice and would destroy science as we know it. Given science, reason cannot be universal and unreason cannot be excluded. This feature of science calls for an anarchistic epistemology. The realisation that science is not sacrosanct, and that the debate between science and myth has ceased without having been won by either side, further strengthens the case for anarchism.

Tags: 1-anarchism, 2-change, 2-increase, 3-advocated, 4-intl

Navid Kermani on Islam in Germany - A Plea for Cultural Pluralism

Sun, 17 May 2009 11:05:21 GMT

clipped by: Johanna_G
clipper's remarks: Deutsches Original dieses Artikels: ↗dort

Clip Source: en.qantara.de

during a roundtable discussion on a charter proposed by the Central Council of Muslims in Germany that was meant to serve as an avowal to the basic principles of the German constitution, two German experts on Islam reproached the Muslim representatives.

They claimed the impossibility of such an avowal Islam is fundamentally irreconcilable with the constitution. According to their arguments, Islam does under no circumstances recognize the separation of politics and religion and, in addition, promotes the use of force to spread the faith. The Muslim position, they hold, is therefore contradictory.

This scene depicts the collision of two ways of interpreting Islam. On the one side is the orthodox, conservative interpretation that believes in the literal truth of the holy text and represents a reactionary and almost archaic conception of Islam

It's social – not religious – differences

One-dimensional identity as an illusion

Navid Kermani

Muslims are often reduced to their Islamic identities.

Tags: islam, social integration, muslims, identity

Ethics/ Philosophy

Fri, 24 Apr 2009 16:12:29 GMT

clipped by: Antara
clipper's remarks: good resource

Clip Source: ethics.sandiego.edu

Ethics MATTERS

". . . dedicated to promoting the thoughtful discussion of difficult moral issues."

Founded in 1994 & edited by
Lawrence M. Hinman
University of San Diego

Ethical Theory

Applied Ethics

Resources

Abortion

Bioethics and Reproductive Technologies

Death Penalty & Punishment

Euthanasia

Poverty and Welfare

War, Peace, and Terrorism

Guide to Writing Ethics Papers

PowerPoint Presentations

Utilitarianism

Theories against Theories

Rights Theories

Religion and Ethics

Race, Ethnicity, and Moral Theory

Pluralism & Meta-Ethical Concerns

Kant and Deontology

Justice

Introduction to Moral Theory

Gender and Moral Theory

Ethical Relativism

Ethical Egoism

Contemporary Anti-Theory

Aristotle and Virtue Ethics

Philosophers on War, Terrorism, and Peace

Ethics Courses

Ethics Videos

Classic Texts in Ethics

Suggestions or contributions ?
Send email to hinman@sandiego.edu

Page Cite: Ethics Updates - Home Page
http://ethics.sandiego.edu/index.asp - 11/19/2008

Tags: philosophy, ethics, san diego edu, lawrence hinman

A 40 Years Struggle Towards Islam

Wed, 15 Apr 2009 17:12:23 GMT

clipped by: jebat99

Clip Source: www.readingislam.com

My name is Salwa Abd-Allah. I was born Edwina Mariea Fauntleroy to Reverend and Mrs. Jerry Cornelius Fauntleroy in Newport News, Virginia, US, in 1946. I have three brothers and I was the third of the four of us.

I have been striving to be a Muslim for approximately 40 years. I became socially aware in the 1960s in America during the Vietnam War era and the turbulent years of racial unrest as descendants of slaves in general began protesting the subtle and not-so-subtle discrimination that was spread in America at that time.

There was no voice in the mainstream media about the separatist option until the CBS TV news program aired The Hate That Hate Produced.

Having studied five years of French, I had an immature idea of how an alternative language offered greater choices.

The companionship of the Qur'an has taught me to value every command and every prohibition.

Imperial Hypocrisy

Thu, 19 Mar 2009 01:27:11 GMT

clipped by: baydawg
clipper's remarks: US and our blindness exposed

Clip Source: www.amconmag.com

Imperial Double Standard

the U.S. is the arbiter of which interests are legitimate, and which are not. And the standard is not exactly uniform. The Russians can’t exercise a “veto” over nations directly on their border, but when the U.S. decides it wants to travel halfway around the world and depose Saddam Hussein on the grounds that he’s an intolerable threat to our interests, that’s acceptable. The Russians can’t have a sphere of influence immediately adjacent their national border, but the U.S. can claim the Middle East, Asia, Europe and the Western Hemisphere as arenas of its primacy and veto the foreign policy decisions of governments therein. The Russians can’t corner the Central Asian energy market through cozy relationships with dictators and related thugs, but the U.S.-Saudi alliance is another matter - one born of a mutual and abiding respect for pluralism and human rights. Or something.

It goes without saying that our desired result is always legitimate.

Tags: america, hubris, imperialism

What is Shi‘a Islam?

Fri, 27 Feb 2009 17:30:43 GMT

clipped by: arifsali
clipper's remarks: Recent scholarship has created a more balanced view of Shi‘ism. Thus, it is now possible to move beyond stereotypical assumptions and reject the view that there is an ‘orthodox’ or ‘authentic’ Islam, from which Shi‘ism is a departure.

Clip Source: iis.ac.uk

The historical formation of the worldwide Muslim community or Umma, as it is known in Arabic, has resulted in a great deal of diversity that reflects a rich intellectual, spiritual, and institutional pluralism. In seeking to express a response to the primal message of Islam, Muslims have developed distinct perspectives that have led various groups to coalesce around different interpretations of the core message of the Qur’an and the example of the Prophet Muhammad. One such perspective is that of Shi‘a Islam. Rather than perceive these expressions as sectarian in a narrow sense, it is more appropriate to recognise them as representing different communities of interpretation with diverse views of how the ideals of Islam might be realised in the life of the Umma. Unfortunately, much early scholarship on Shi‘ism has represented this perspective as a dissident voice or heterodoxy, and in some cases has even characterised it as a ‘Persian’ response to ‘Arab’ Islam.

Tags: islam, muslims, shia

How I Learned Not to Fear the Anti-God Squad

Sun, 22 Feb 2009 12:54:42 GMT

clipped by: tabsey
clipper's remarks: The clipped section has a ring of reason. He goes on to cast doubt on all surveys, blames Obama for atheism coming out of the closet, and I couldn't go on with his crap.
Worth a look, if just to see the working mind of a devious simpleton.

Clip Source: online.wsj.com

As I read celebrity atheist Christopher Hitchens's recent Newsweek attack on the pope in particular and Roman Catholicism in general, I remembered an incident that happened when I was in the U.K. in early January. Walking out of London's Victoria Station, I was stopped by a TV reporter who asked me what I thought about the British atheists' newest ad campaign. It was one of those typical man-in-the-street interviews, with a reporter and a cameraman buttonholing passersby to find a snappy quote for the evening news.

Britain has actually recognized atheism for some time now. As a country with an officially established church, it requires all its state primary schools to include religious-education classes.

Yet one mandate of all these classes involves introducing students to religious diversity and pluralism rather than teaching any specific dogma. In 2004, the government decided that pluralism requires that all schools include some instruction on atheism.

Tags: crap

Archbishop Chaput: "Don’t get trapped by politics..."

Thu, 12 Feb 2009 14:24:17 GMT

clipped by: Efrain Alvarado
clipper's remarks: The next two “don’ts” cited by the Archbishop of Denver were, “Don't let divisions take root” and “Don’t get trapped by politics -- especially partisan politics.”

Clip Source: www.amazon.com

Clip Source: insightscoop.typepad.com

“First,” he recommended, “don't let yourselves be tricked into an inferiority complex.” Drawing on a point made in his book “Render Unto Caesar,”

Critics like to say that religion is divisive, or intellectually backward, or that it has no proper place in the public square. … But this is nonsense. Democracy depends on people of conviction carrying their beliefs into public debate -- respectfully, legally and non-violently, but vigorously and without apology. If we are uncomfortable being Christians in a public debate, then we've already lost the war. In America the word "pluralism" is often conjured up like a kind of voodoo shield to get religious people to stop talking about right and wrong. In reality, our moral beliefs always shape social policy. Real pluralism actually demands that people with different beliefs should pursue their beliefs energetically in the public square. This is the only way a public debate can be honest and fruitful. We should never apologize for being Catholics.

Tags: politics