Comments on: What are People Afraid Of? http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2006/09/what_are_people.html Dispatches from a Small Business Sun, 12 Feb 2012 09:39:47 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.2.1 By: JoshK http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2006/09/what_are_people.html/comment-page-1#comment-3693 JoshK Mon, 11 Sep 2006 14:24:25 +0000 http://coyote-blog.com/wordpress/2006/09/what_are_people.html#comment-3693 <p>I think it's just about a certain decency standard. Would we give Idi Amin, Hitler, or Stalin a visa to come in and speak? Yeah, to most people outisde of the readership of the NY Times, they come off as deranged, but still, offering them a chance to get any flattering PR on US soild just seems wrong.</p> <p>You can see the headline. "In speech at Yale, Khatami accuses US of ongoing human rights voilations in Middle East"</p> I think it’s just about a certain decency standard. Would we give Idi Amin, Hitler, or Stalin a visa to come in and speak? Yeah, to most people outisde of the readership of the NY Times, they come off as deranged, but still, offering them a chance to get any flattering PR on US soild just seems wrong.

You can see the headline. “In speech at Yale, Khatami accuses US of ongoing human rights voilations in Middle East”

]]> By: Bob Smith http://www.coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2006/09/what_are_people.html/comment-page-1#comment-3692 Bob Smith Mon, 11 Sep 2006 10:14:58 +0000 http://coyote-blog.com/wordpress/2006/09/what_are_people.html#comment-3692 <p>Is a Saudi student (almost certainly Islamic) going to have his eyes opened as to the desirability of western life, or will exposure to it confirm his imam's warning that the US is a decadent, vile, sinful place, which he should forever reject while he learns infidel science? That such a place deserves jihad being waged against it, and Sharia law instituted, so it can be saved from itself (and not coincidentally, its wealth plundered, as all previous Islamic wars against the west have done)? The notion that people naturally yearn to be free, even people taught from childhood that total submission to Islam is the only true freedom, is insanely naive and foolish. Every Muslim nation reacts the same way to its problems: they can be solved only by more fervent, more "pure" devotion to Islam (and a few more murders and rapes of non-Muslims, who are the cause of all our problems, while we're at it). The majority of university degrees in these nations are in Islamic theology, utterly useless for advancing the welfare of their citizens (a western judgment, since they would deny it) but good for helping spread that "purer" Islam that's going to solve everybody's problems. I am reminded of the classic definition of insanity being repeating the same acts over and over and expecting different results.</p> Is a Saudi student (almost certainly Islamic) going to have his eyes opened as to the desirability of western life, or will exposure to it confirm his imam’s warning that the US is a decadent, vile, sinful place, which he should forever reject while he learns infidel science? That such a place deserves jihad being waged against it, and Sharia law instituted, so it can be saved from itself (and not coincidentally, its wealth plundered, as all previous Islamic wars against the west have done)? The notion that people naturally yearn to be free, even people taught from childhood that total submission to Islam is the only true freedom, is insanely naive and foolish. Every Muslim nation reacts the same way to its problems: they can be solved only by more fervent, more “pure” devotion to Islam (and a few more murders and rapes of non-Muslims, who are the cause of all our problems, while we’re at it). The majority of university degrees in these nations are in Islamic theology, utterly useless for advancing the welfare of their citizens (a western judgment, since they would deny it) but good for helping spread that “purer” Islam that’s going to solve everybody’s problems. I am reminded of the classic definition of insanity being repeating the same acts over and over and expecting different results.

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