Enough is enough. Enough with the bigotry and the hate. Enough with the race-baiting and the fake debate about the Ground Zero Mosque. Enough of white Americans putting up fences to keep their fellow humans out. Enough of the birthers.
Enough of Christian hypocrites who thump their Bibles while denying men and women the right to marry the one they love. Enough of conservatives holding up the Constitution having never actually read it and preaching about one nation under God and also denying that every American has the right to worship the God of their choosing.
Enough of Progressives and Democrats who engage in these debates rather than attack these bigoted racist hypocrites. Enough of the hate-mongers getting all the attention and press.
You have to draw the line somewhere. Guess what? Now's the time.
You are entitled to your own opinion. After all, this is America and there is freedom of speech. But just as important, there is freedom of worship. Because of our freedoms, there, ironically, is the freedom to burn books. However.
Because we are Americans, because we defend and fight and preserve the right of free speech, because we have seen what happens in countries who don't defend these freedoms, we do not burn books. Let me repeat that.
Americans don't burn books.
We print books that maybe you don't people want to read. We print books filled with hate. We print and print and print books of all kinds, but we don't burn books. By defending everyone's right to speak, we defend our right to speak. By defending everyone's right to their own religion, we defend our own right to our own religion.
We have gone to war with people who do burn books; Adolph Hitler comes to mind. Stalin. Pol Pot. There are others. Our military graveyards are full of the men and women who protected us, who gave their lives for us. Not one soldier has ever died, so we could burn books.
And we especially don't burn the books of another person's religion.
You may or may not believe in the Bible, but if you think the Bible is the worst book in the world, as an American, you don't have to read it, you don't have to believe, no one can force you to or hold it against you if you don't, but you can not burn the Bible.
You may or may not believe in what is in the Torah. You may think the Torah is the worst book in the world, as an American, you don't have to read it, you don't have to believe it, no one can force you to, or hold it against you if you don't but you can not burn the Torah.
Buddhist books, Pagan books, Hindu books. You can't burn them.
And you can't burn the Koran.
You may or may not believe in what is in the Koran. You may think the Koran is the worst book in the world; as an American, you don't have to read it, you don't have to believe it. No one can force you to, or hold it against you if you don't but you can not burn the Koran.
I salute my friends at Human Rights First who are standing up against the bigots who would burn the Koran on 9/11. And if you want to, you can click here and get a free bookmark from Human Rights First. It says:
Americans don't burn books.
But other people do. Notice the crowd watching the book burning and who is in it.
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Parvez Ahmed: Burning the Quran Is Like Burning the Gospels
C'est la Free Speech!
Books constitute speech, but buring privately-owned books is itself a demonstration that is a form of speech. It may be that the Koran-burning constitutes a crowded-theater yell of "fire!". But that is a separate issue. You are wrong, damned wrong, when you say we cannot burn someone's holy book. We most certainly can. What do you propose to do, shoot them? They bought the bloody books. Are you also going to forbid them from throwing them away? Must they keep them clean and free of dust as well? Sad that you've let these bigots destroy your own common sense and dignity.
Get reall with this one: do you support a ban on flag-burning? Is that really any different (other than your own conception of what side you're on?)
And before you point point a finger, I'll tell you this: I am more progressive that you can dream!
As long as the books they are burning belong to them, I don't see where this is an issue. I doubt the Quran publishers mind, ultimately they sell more books.
Harry Potter was burned in Texas when it came out.
Last year the Bible and other books by certain christian authors were burned in the South.
If you want to know to what extent books are burned, censored or otherwise banned in the U.S. check out the American Library Association website, which not only keeps track of that sort of thing but also sponsors Banned Books Week to bring attention to book burning, banning and censorship in America. ala.org
Banned Books week is Sept. 25 - Oct 2 this year.
What we don't do is barge into our neighbors houses and burn their copies too.
(OK..it would be bad for the environment but....)
I appreciate the writer's sentiment but freedom of speech is freedom of speech; not matter how repugnant or inane. Best to not fuel their fires (sorry) by bestowing undue attention and significance to their bigoted political protests. Calmer heads will prevail so long as they can stay above the fray.
They go into libraries and schools and challenge any book they don't like to have it removed so that no one can read it. They've even put pressure on publishers to try to prevent some books from being published so that people cannot even buy one to read.
Wasn't Christ's message "violence must beget more violence so don't turn the other cheek"?