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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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 Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2008 6:06 pm Post subject: |
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Government slams C4 over Ahmadinejad Christmas message
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The government has criticised Channel 4's decision to broadcast an alternative Christmas message by the Iranian president, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.
A foreign and commonwealth office spokeswoman said today that the move would cause offence around the world.
"President Ahmadinejad has during his time in office made a series of appalling anti-Semitic statements," she said. "The British media are rightly free to make their own editorial choices, but this invitation will cause offence and amusement not just at home but amongst friendly countries abroad."
Channel 4's alternative message, designed as a contrast to the traditional Queen's speech, has featured a number of leftfield figures in the past but the choice of Ahmadinejad, whose aggressive stance towards Israel and the west - including an alleged attempt to pursue a nuclear weapons programme, has proved particularly controversial.
The speech will be broadcast at 7.15pm, a change from previous years when the alternative message has gone head-to-head with the Queen's speech, which is screened on BBC and ITV. In his message, Ahmadinejad expresses his wish for a peaceful New Year.
Speaking in Farsi with English subtitles, he will say: "Jesus, the Son of Mary, is the standard bearer of justice, of love for our fellow human beings, of the fight against tyranny, discrimination and injustice.
"If Christ were on earth today, undoubtedly he would stand with the people in opposition to bullying, ill-tempered and expansionist powers."
The content of the speech has failed to pacify those angry at the choice of the Iranian president. Louise Ellman, Labour MP for Liverpool Riverside and chairwoman of the Labour Jewish Movement, accused Channel 4 of giving "an unchallenged platform to a dangerous fanatic who denies the holocaust while preparing for another and claims homosexuality does not exist while his regime hangs gay young men from cranes in the street".
However, Channel 4 received support from Ben Summerskill, the director of the gay rights group Stonewall. "In spite of his ridiculous and often offensive views, it is an important way of reminding him that there are some countries where free speech is not repressed," he said.
Channel 4 head of news and current affairs Dorothy Byrne defended tonight's message as "an insight into an alternative world view".
"Channel 4 has devoted more airtime to examining Iran than any other broadcaster and this message continues a long tradition of offering a different perspective on the world around us," she said.
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Channel 4 have been outraging Daily Mail readers for as long as I can remember. Good to see they are keeping up the tradition.  |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2008 6:44 pm Post subject: |
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| Big_Bird and On the Other Hand: please do not insult my intelligence. I remain very well aware of Jesus's place in Islam. I was not talking about Jesus's place in Islam. I said something very specific and you two replied off-point. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2008 7:02 pm Post subject: |
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Merry Xmas to you too, Mr Grumpy.  |
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Jandar
Joined: 11 Jun 2008
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| Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2008 8:20 pm Post subject: |
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Missing from dinnerjackets speech.
"If Christ was on earth today undoubtedly he would fight against the tyrannical policies of forced marriages of 8 year old girls." |
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bangbayed
Joined: 01 Dec 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Thu Dec 25, 2008 9:36 pm Post subject: |
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| Jandar wrote: |
Missing from dinnerjackets speech.
"If Christ was on earth today undoubtedly he would fight against the tyrannical policies of forced marriages of 8 year old girls." |
As he did when he was alive? |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 4:21 am Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| Big_Bird and On the Other Hand: please do not insult my intelligence. I remain very well aware of Jesus's place in Islam. I was not talking about Jesus's place in Islam. I said something very specific and you two replied off-point. |
You suggested that there was something weird about a Muslim extremist "citing Christ in his points and authorities." I guess I am just having a hard time figuring out what would be weird about that. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 8:04 am Post subject: |
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| How many other Muslim extremists can you produce who have cited Jesus Christ in their points and authorities? |
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bangbayed
Joined: 01 Dec 2005
Location: Seoul
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 8:42 am Post subject: |
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| Gopher wrote: |
| How many other Muslim extremists can you produce who have cited Jesus Christ in their points and authorities? |
Whether he's the first or not, doesn't make it weird. Islam recognises Jesus as a prophet. |
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mises
Joined: 05 Nov 2007
Location: retired
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 8:46 am Post subject: |
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| bangbayed wrote: |
| Gopher wrote: |
| How many other Muslim extremists can you produce who have cited Jesus Christ in their points and authorities? |
Whether he's the first or not, doesn't make it weird. Islam recognises Jesus as a prophet. |
You mean "islam appropriated Jesus as a prophet". Just like they appropriated the whole library of every civilization they Borged.
http://www.cnsnews.com/public/content/article.aspx?RsrcID=41260
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CNSNews.com
As Christmas Approaches, Muslims Erect �Allah Has No Son� Banner in Nazareth
Nazareth, Israel (CNSNews.com) � As Nazareth�s Christians prepare to celebrate Christmas, they are playing down the appearance of a confrontational Islamic banner that challenges an elemental Christian belief.
Journalists visiting the city saw two large banners--one in English, one in Arabic--hanging in the plaza in front of the Basilica of the Annunciation, with a verse from the Koran (112:1-4) contradicting the New Testament proclamation that Jesus is the �only begotten� of God.
�In the name of Allah, the most beneficent, the most merciful, Say (O Muhammad): He is Allah, (the) One and Only. Allah, the Eternal, the Absolute. He begetteth not, nor was begotten, and there is none like unto him,� the banner reads.
Nazareth Mayor Ramiz Jaraisy played down concerns that a banner effectively denying Jesus� deity was provocative to Christians, although he did question its position, in front of Nazareth�s most prominent landmark.
�I don�t think that it�s provocative against anyone,� he said. �My point of view [is] that it�s not the right place to put it and it�s not the right way to do that.�
But Jaraisy said he would not remove the banner because some Islamic fundamentalist groups were looking to provoke a confrontation in order to promote their cause. He did not want to provide them with that opportunity.
Situated in northern Israel, Nazareth is the largest Arab city in Israel. It also has one of the highest concentrations of Christians here.
Although Jesus was born in Bethlehem, Christian residents of Nazareth are proud to point out Christianity�s roots in their town.
Mary, a Jewish virgin, lived in Nazareth when the angel Gabriel appeared and told her she would give birth to the promised Jewish Messiah and call his name Jesus. He would be God-incarnate, the Bible says. After Jesus� birth in Bethlehem, he grew up in Nazareth.
The Basilica was built over a small grotto which, according to Catholic tradition, marks the remains of Mary�s house.
(Another Koranic verse, 4:171, declares in part: �Allah is only one God; far be it from his glory that he should have a son.�) |
Well god damn!! That's intolerant! |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 10:11 am Post subject: |
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| How many other Muslim extremists can you produce who have cited Jesus Christ in their points and authorities? |
Does Osama bin laden qualify as a Muslim extremist?
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"And did you know that the name of the Prophet of Allah Jesus and his mother (peace and blessings of Allah be on them both) are mentioned in the Noble Quran dozens of times, and that in the Quran there is a chapter whose name is "Maryam," i.e. Mary, daughter of 'Imran and mother of Jesus (peace and blessings of Allah be upon them both)? It tells the story of her becoming pregnant with the Prophet of Allah Jesus (peace and blessings of Allah be upon them both), and in its confirmation of her chastity and purity, in contrast to the fabrications of the Jews against her. Whoever wishes to find that out for himself must listen to the verse of this magnificent chapter: one of the just kings of the Christians - the Negus - listened to some of its verses and his eyes welled up with tears and he said something which should be reflected on for a long time by those sincere in their search for the truth."
"He said, "verily, this and what Jesus brought come from one lantern": i.e., that the magnificent Quran and the Evangel are both from Allah, the Most High; and every just and intelligent one of you who reflects on the Quran will definitely arrive at this truth. It also must be noted that Allah has preserved the Quran from the alterations of men. And reading in order to become acquainted with Islam only requires a little effort, and those of you who are guided will profit greatly. And peace be upon he who follows the Guidance."
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http://tinyurl.com/a259kz |
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mithridates
Joined: 03 Mar 2003
Location: President's office, Korean Space Agency
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:19 am Post subject: |
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Sure, On the Other Hand. But also a propagandist aiming to justify his jihad. Listen, to make this simpler: Islamic extremists, in my view, spend virtually no time asking themselves "what would Jesus do?" in their everyday spiritual lives -- especially where they engage in unmitigated violence against others, strap suicide bombs onto themselves, etc. When they do, such as Imadinnerjacket and your Osama bin Laden, they do so dishonestly and manipulatively. No more no less.
I did not realize it would be such a contentious point.
________
No, Mithridates, I do not believe anyone considers Saddam an Islamic extremist.
________
| bangbayed wrote: |
| Islam recognises Jesus as a prophet. |
Absolutely. The penultimate prophet, to be precise.
What does this have to do with my point here?
Last edited by Gopher on Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:30 am; edited 3 times in total |
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On the other hand
Joined: 19 Apr 2003
Location: I walk along the avenue
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:23 am Post subject: |
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You mean "islam appropriated Jesus as a prophet". Just like they appropriated the whole library of every civilization they Borged.
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Well, that appropriation happened right at the beginning, didn't it? I assume it was either Muhammed or his ghostwriters who put the stuff about Jesus and Mary in the Koran. |
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Gopher
Joined: 04 Jun 2005
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 11:28 am Post subject: |
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Read M.S.G. Hodgson's Venture of Islam, volume one, sometime, On the Other Hand. Yes, Muhammad did it. He did it because he and his followers emerged in a cross-cultural trading space between the Byzantines and the Persians, with a sprinkling of Jewish influences as well. He and his followers, especially in what Hodgson calls Islam's "classical" period, consciously aimed to supersede all that came before them; they presented their new religion as God's final word; everyone should have paid them their respects and followed them in world affairs from that point forward.
Since approximately the sixteenth century, Muslim extremists - which does not refer to all Muslims, by any means, On the Other Hand -- have found themselves increasingly frustrated that no one else is listening and/or converting, and that, indeed, Western civ and its "obsolete" religion has outpaced them in every conceivable way since the Columbian Exchange. |
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Big_Bird
Joined: 31 Jan 2003
Location: Sometimes here sometimes there...
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| Posted: Fri Dec 26, 2008 9:40 pm Post subject: |
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The double-hype of Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
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A couple of Christmases ago I spent five weeks in a small town in Virginia. I used to tune in once in a while to the fringe Christian TV stations. I didn't follow the big musical production-style services, with their cast of thousands, choirs and dynamic preachers; I was fascinated by the shows which featured a single fellow in a suit, drily explaining how the Bible predicted this or that current world event, and how it fitted in with the narrative of the coming Armageddon, the second coming of Christ and the rapturing of the American faithful to heaven in a divine liposuctory slurp.
I didn't expect Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, the president of Iran, to remind me of those Bible prophecy pundits in his Channel 4 Christmas Day broadcast. But amid Ahmadinejad's phoney what-would-Jesus-do pieties - stand up against the stoning of women to death for adultery, no, Mahmoud? - there was an unexpected snippet: support for the anticipation, much more widespread in the United States than here, of the second coming.
"We believe Jesus Christ will return, together with one of the children of the revered Messenger of Islam and will lead the world to love, brotherhood and justice," he said. "The responsibility of all followers of Christ and Abrahamic faiths is to prepare the way for the fulfilment of this divine promise and the arrival of that joyful, shining and wonderful age."
Bundling the second coming of Christ together with the mainstream Shia Muslim belief in the emergence from hiding of a messianic Imam was a sly reference on the president's part. If the polls don't lie, most Americans believe in a version of divine transformation that is similar to Ahmadinejad's, except that it is darker and more chauvinistic. Millions of fundamentalist American Christians, as well as some in this country, sincerely believe in the imminence of the "end times", when good evangelical Christians will be whisked off to heaven, titanic battles with the Antichrist will take place in Israel, Jesus will return and all non-Christians - atheists like myself, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists - will be consigned to eternal damnation in the bad fire. For such Christian fundamentalists, who believe the Bible is an exact guide to the future, the possibility that Iran might attack Israel or that Israel or the United States might attack Iran is tremendously exciting, because it seems to bring the end times closer.
I was sceptical, then, about the indignation from the likes of the Foreign Office and the Jerusalem Post towards Channel 4 for giving the Iranian president a pulpit on Christmas Day. True, he is part of a nasty regime, and he has called for Israel's destruction. But, quite apart from the fact he has neither the means nor the authority to destroy Israel, I'd be as interested to hear his unvarnished take on the world as I was to listen to the unmediated ravings of the likes of America's internationally televised Pastor John Hagee, the waters of whose fundamentalism mingle in the same noxious river as Ahmadinejad's.
But at least a Hagee sermon - or one of Ahmadinejad's speeches when he's on the stump at home - give you something to get your teeth into. Just as the infamous Danish Muhammad cartoons fell at the first hurdle - even before they were or weren't offensive, they failed because they weren't funny - so did the Ahmadinejad address: even before it was or wasn't offensive, it failed because it wasn't interesting. My goodness, was he anodyne, murmuring stiffly away there next to a vase of roses, as if his model was the soporific sermonizing of the Ayatollah Khomeini, a staple of late night Iranian TV.
As little as the Christmas message told us about Ahmadinejad or Iran, it told us something about Channel 4 - about how they've yielded to the phenomenon of double-hyping, where a celebrity and his critics share an interest in exaggerating the celebrity's importance.
Last year, when Ahmadinejad was invited by Columbia University in New York to address its World Leaders' Forum, there were mass protests outside. Lee Bollinger, the university's president, introduced Ahmadinejad with a stirring defence of the rights of free speech, or, as he put it, "the genius of the American idea of free speech" which "asks us to exercise extraordinary self-restraint against the very natural but often counter-productive impulses that lead us to retreat from engagement with ideas we dislike and fear." Then, without giving Ahmadinejad a chance to speak, he launched into a 1,500-word denunciation of the Iranian, calling him "a petty and cruel dictator".
Apart from being the hospitality equivalent of shooting the guy with the white flag during a truce, Bollinger's fear of letting his students judge Ahmadinejad for themselves was an important part of the double-hyping of the Iranian president into an American-Euro hate figure out of all proportion to his significance, a hyping that Channel 4 bought into.
"In referring to him as a dictator," the Iranian-American writer Reza Aslan said after the Columbia episode, "you're giving this man far more credit than he actually deserves. This is a completely powerless person. He's not in charge of the army, he's barely in charge of the budget, he makes no foreign policy decisions whatsoever, he's not part of the intelligence apparatus in Iran, he can't suggest or pass any laws."
Channel 4's alternative Christmas message has often, in the past, been a sort of double opposition to the Queen - not just from somebody putting a counter-establishment point of view, but a non-celebrity; a wounded Afghan veteran, a 9/11 survivor, Doreen and Neville Lawrence. If Channel 4 had wanted to put up a leftfield Iranian voice to provoke thought, why not invite Maurice Motamed, the only Jewish member of the Iranian parliament, a voice of Iran's 25,000 Jews - the second largest Jewish community in the Muslim world - and someone who has spoken out against Ahmadinejad's Holocaust denial? Channel 4 avoided Bollinger's crassness, only to turn what was becoming a good tradition into another celebrity status game.
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