Originally Posted by
a5cent @bijak_riyandi
I realize that I'm being really forceful here, and that I'm being hard on you. I don't know you, but I think chances are high that if we met at a party I'd take you to be an absolutely decent and good person. That doesn't mean that good people cant simultaneously harbour dangerous views, and I think what you are describing here is such a view. I don't think this is in any way particular to Islam or any other religion, so I hope you don't take it as an attack on your religious beliefs. We can find flaws in any society, completely independent of religions. It is an attack on your view of tolerance however. I don't expect to convince you of anything, but I do feel very strongly about this, and hope that I can at least get you and/or others to think about this in ways you maybe previously haven't.
Either way, I wish you the best of luck.
I think your view is really dangerous, a5cent, because without understanding what you're doing, you're imposing your culture in an authoritarian way.
I suppose nobody is supporting the idea of freedom of speech without any limits. Because that would validate behaviors like 20 people insulting and making fun of a black child because of her skin. Or a pervert molesting a child with obscene speech, or someone refunding the Nazi party and talking of the necessity of killing all the Jews.
So, free speech and free action is limited in legislation for many cases, and not only in the legislation, we do it in our daily life too, because legislation is not the only mechanism of social control, public censure is even more effective in many cases.
So, the real question isn't if free speech should be limited, the question is what should be allowed and what should be censored. The thing is those are arbitrary decisions taken based on convenience, motivated by culture, by local conditions, not universal values, at the end motivated by how people FEEL about the situation.
For example, the body is just a lot of disgusting biological material that is deteriorating fast and will be dead in a few years. Somebody could say, well nobody should feel insulted because her body is being criticized, that level of identification with the body is unhealthy. If someone is disgusted by my body and doesn't want me near, I should understand that and not feel ofended. Any use of the body or part of the body in speech should be allowed, so racism should be allowed.
Other could say, nobody should identify so much with religion, you shouldn't feel bad if someone insult your prophet in a magazine that is published and visible on the streets in every kiosk.
Are those ideas correct? Correct is not a good term, because freedom of speech is not limited by theorems deduced of the axioms of the universal values. Free speech is limited by how people feel about things, and people feel very different about things in different cultures.
France is now a multi-cultural country, there is a big population of Muslims that have a very different view of life. So, they should adapt their legislation to that reality. The reaction of France and the west in general to this incident has been, screw them, we impose our culture, we decide what should be censored and what should be allowed, you just adapt. Maybe they could succeed with that, but the cost could be huge, because minorities could fight to defend their culture and views.
So, probably a better solution is to negotiate, and arrive to a consensus.
