Why Jones is burning a Koran

(Note, Sept 9, 12:30 a.m.: Unfortunately I did not make a copy Jones’s articles for VFR, and all through Wednesday evening it has been impossible to load his church’s website to read them. I assume that this is because the site is overwhelmed with readers, not because the site has been blocked. I’ve also been unable to find a copy of the article at any other site. Update: here is Jones’s article.)

From the website of Terry Jones’s Dove World Outreach Center, an article dated September 2 on “Ten Reasons to Burn a Koran.” And here is a follow-up: “Five More Reasons to Burn the Koran.”

At the very least, one must say that Jones’s planned act is not mindless. He is performing a certain act, and he has laid out his reasons for performing it. His reasons are that Islam is anti-Christ, anti the West, anti liberty, and anti human decency. His view is that Islam is a danger to everything we cherish and everything we are. By burning a Koran, he is expressing his complete rejection of Islam, and causing other people to think about why he is rejecting Islam. Since I myself believe and have frequently stated that Islam does not belong in the West, how can I condemn a man who is expressing the same idea through a strong symbolic act? An act that is not illegal and is not harming anyone. An act that will force people to think—is Islam the enemy of ourselves and of everything we cherish, or not? Does Islam belong among us, or not?

People are saying that the Koran burning will cause Muslims to kill innocent people. Perhaps it will. But the Danish cartoons caused Muslims to kill innocent people. Islam demands aggressive war against non-Muslims, including the killing of innocents, because from the Muslim point of view there is no such thing as an innocent non-Muslim. The clearest and most frequently repeated message of the Koran, appearing on almost every page, is that all non-Muslims are guilty of the monstrous crime of rejecting Allah and his prophet, and thereby deserve death and eternal torture. Why should we respect such a book? Why should we respect such a religion? Sooner or later, people in the West (and people in the non-Muslim world generally) must come to recognize the nature and teachings of Islam. They can have that recogition sooner, and prevent much violence, or they can have that recognition much later, only after Muslims have gained substantial power over our societies and get in a position to harm anyone who opposes them. My view is: the sooner the truth comes out, the better; the sooner things come to a head, the safer we will be.

- end of initial entry -

Daniel S. writes:

Personally I have mixed feelings about the Koran burning event. On one hand, I think it important to do intentional acts which offend Muslims in order continuously to challenge the attempts by Muslims and their liberal allies to prevent any criticism of Islam. On the other hand, as I expressed with the Draw Muhammad Day, I wonder what is the practical outcome of such an event will be. Will this be a little more then a media circus used to undermine growing anti-Islam sentiments in the U.S. or will it play into the larger resistance to the Islamization of the West? I guess it remains to be seen.

That said, I reject the notion that David Petraeus and others are peddling that this somehow endangers America. Before the Danish cartoons, Pope Benedict’s Regensburg lecture, the late Rev. Jerry Falwell’s denouncing Muhammad as a terrorist, the false Newsweek story about the Koran being flushed down the toilet, and numerous other “outrages,” Muslims were working hard, night and day, to murder Americans. Such events are the pretext for jihad attacks, not their cause. If Petraeus and the other political elites are so concerned about this event inciting Muslims to further violence against Americans, they should start advocating the removal of American forces from Iraq and Afghanistan and the removal of potential jihad-inclined Muslims from America. Whether the Florida church goes forward with the Qur’an burning or not the forces of jihad will still continue their unending war against the West.

LA replies:

Yes. Quite a few Muslim terrorist attacks have been motivated, or so the terrorists have told us, by the presence of U.S. troops in Muslim countries and the killing of Muslims by those troops. Have Petreaus, Gabriel, et al. said that we should immediately withdraw our forces from those countries in order to prevent terrorist reprisals against us?

Stogie writes from the blog Saberpoint:

With so much stupidity being disseminated over Terry Jones, it was really refreshing reading your post on the matter. You nailed it, as usual.

I hope you don’t mind, but I reprinted your post in its entirety, due to the importance of your message. Lots of neo-cons read my blog and I want them to see it.

Of course, I gave you full credit with a link back to your site.

Kathlene M. writes:

Let us contrast and compare:

Feisal Rauf continues to advance the building of the mosque at Ground Zero, with its opening scheduled for 9/11/11, despite the fact that this is a deliberately provocative act which has angered Americans who consider Ground Zero sacred ground. Lamestream media and politicians vociferously defend Rauf.

Pastor Terry Jones plans to burn a Koran on 9/11/10, despite the fact that this is a deliberately provocative act which will anger Muslims who consider the Koran sacred. Lamestream media and most politicians vociferously condemn Jones.

LA writes:

The discussion exemplifies the idea that our positions proceed from our premises. Thus Terry Jones and I both believe that Islam is a mortal danger to our society; and we both believe that burning a Koran is appropriate.

In the same way, Michael Bloomberg and his allies all believe that Islam is merely a religion like other religions, and they all believe that it’s absolutely indispensable that the Park 51 mosque not be moved.

Doug H. writes:

I was glad to see you weigh in on the Koran burning. This is a sticky subject. I do think it will cause loss of life. At the same time, I do not think this person can withdraw from his goal. To do so would show further surrender and further encourage the Muslims.

The shocking part of all this is that people such as Gabriel, Spencer, Laura Ingraham, and many more seem willing to join arms with Muslims and sing “kumbaya.” That is absolutely disgusting. If my family situation allowed, I would head out and help them start the fire.

We simply cannot allow further surrender to a culture that would destroy us. We can’t let them tell us what is and is not acceptable.

Scott B. writes:

Obviously staged book burnings, when the intention is to destroy every remnant of the arguments contained in the books being destroyed, is anti-intellectual and anti-Reason

But why would people, such as Pamela Geller and Mark Krikorian, make this analogy when it clearly doesn’t hold in this case?

This act is a gesture, i.e. an implicit demonstrative indirect form of speech attacking the speech contained in the book which is the target of the act, and equally as valid, and hence protected, as its target.

If this distinction weren’t of the essence, then wouldn’t my deletion of my personal pdf copy of the Koran, because I found the contents repugnant, also be antithetical to Western values?

What makes this apparent pandering to liberals all the more appallingly craven, is that liberals themselves have set such store in pointing out this difference, in order to justify, for example, the gestural commentary of burning the American flag!

Robert in Nashville writes:

I just read your article about not opposing the burning of a Koran and felt, Yes! He is exactly right! You are not afraid to say it and more, you can explain exactly why, in a way that I could not articulate, only feel. I agree with your short and spear-like explanation—it’s right to the point.

If one wants to be even more specific in expressing an objection to the ideas of Islam, I think they should toss in the Hadiths of Shariah of Sahih Al-Bukhari. Especially the chapters of The Book of Khuma, where Mohammad states at chapter 9, that if it had not been for the conquered becoming Moslems (darn it), “I would have distributed the land of every town I conquer … ” And the favorite of those peace loving Moslems, The Book of Jihad, which contains loads of directives to Moslems, like chapter 194, where he says, “It is not for the Prophet that he should have prisoners of war and free them for ransom until he has made a great slaughter.”

I can get worked up just reading the Jihad chapter: Such butchery, raping, enslavement and robbery. We are supposed to respect this teaching? This is what tolerance and multiculturalism mean?

In the meantime, it sounds like our generals and politicians are afraid.

Neil P. writes:

I notice that Obama has been silent on this, but prefers to speak through his surrogates such as Clinton and Petreus.

I wonder if he knows that people would ask how come he felt it ok to be silent on the NYC Mosque (after his initial stumbling comments), but OK to opine (through his subordinates) on a church of 50 members (or 50 families, depending on the media outlet).

Sophia A. writes:

When I heard about this Koran burning I thought it was quite stupid. You can guess at the reasons. But I must say he makes some excellent points here.

He’s really getting a message across—the message is one of utter, brazen defense of one’s own culture. Fire with fire! And if you burn down the house, well, maybe the structure is too corroded to stand.

An aside: This is just wild and crazy performance art! I wonder what all the people who are viscerally drawing back in hatred from this rube and his crazy Koran burning (in their estimation) would say about Karen Finley covering her naked body with chocolate sauce at taxpayer expense? Piss Christ? Elephant dung over a representation of Virgin Mary? Ad infinitum.

Nope, then it’s freedom of speech all the way.

James P. writes:

Doug writes that the Koran burning “will cause loss of life.” Muslims may well attribute some future atrocity to the Koran burning, but if they didn’t have that as a pretext, they’d easily find something else as they have in the past. Ultimately, what “causes the loss of life” is Islam, not any particular action that non-Muslims take.

Glynn Custred writes:

The media could have simply ignored Terry Jones’s Koran-burning stunt and no one would have known any thing about it, the way they ignore so many things that do not fit their agenda. This incident, however, fits nicely into the elite’s agenda, or at least their mind set, since it allows them to identify what they are always looking for, an irrational “right winger” against whom they can rail and thereby show off their superior virtue. If anyone gets killed because of the reaction of barbaric elements in Islam to this stunt, it is the media and the self-congradulatory elites who are exploiting it.

September 9, 12:30 a.m.

Eric G. writes:

Regarding Terry Jones and his church’s planned Koran burning. It should be clearly evident now that the leaders of this country are terrified of Islam. The condemnation of his stunt was widely expected, but the breathless, frantic way that the media has blown this story up should tell everyone that the elites in power are afraid of the Muslim reaction. After years of trying to convince the American public that Islam is the “religion of peace,” it’s clear that they are deathly afraid of it. I live an hour or two away from Gainesville and the local news has run stories that the local police are advising residents that live near the church to leave the area by the 11th as they anticipate violence. The FBI has been on scene for a few days as well as the arbiters of truth and peace known as the New Black Panther Party. I believe that Jones will be arrested or somehow prevented from carrying out his demonstration by law enforcement. It’s private property so I don’t know what they could charge him with but at this point I don’t believe it will happen. Of course this won’t make any difference to the Muslims around the world who will riot and burn and murder anyway.

JC writes from Houston:

Looks like Dhimmitude is in full flower now. We mustn’t offend what Michelle Malkin once called “the religion of perpetual outrage.” Frankly, I say go to it Pastor Jones! Unfortunately even the Vatican is claiming that it’s outrageous to burn the Koran. As a believing but struggling Catholic (because of the bishops’ leftist positions on immigration and economic issues), I can only wonder, where is Pope Urban II when you need him?

Ferg writes:

I have decided to get one myself in order to burn it on the eleventh. I will make of it a tradition, like fireworks on the fourth.

Why doesn’t he get smart

Barbara V. writes:

The Tea Party needs you to keep their thinking straight. I fear they get so much “stuff” thrown at them, they are simply overwhelmed. I wish I knew someone of the Tea Party to whom to send your views. Maybe I can think of someone. Actually, I have—just now..

Van Wijk writes:

Robert from Nashville wrote: “In the meantime, it sounds like our generals and politicians are afraid.”

What’s the difference?

Statements like those from Petraeus are stand-alone evidence that we live in a nightmare world. Those who claim to admire and respect Islam are actually treating it like some dangerous animal which must be placated. We’re told that burning Korans or otherwise insulting Islam will “bring bloodshed” to the Muslim world. So if we burn Korans, will Grendel climb out of a sewer grate in Karachi or Paris and begin tearing people limb from limb? Or will the adherents of Islam itself, each blessed with free will, make a conscious decision to kill their fellow man on the flimsiest pretext?

In my opinion, Petraeus and his ilk have gone beyond being mere apologists. They are simply pro-Muslim, and can be expected to side with Muslims regardless of context.

September 9, 4:15 p.m.

Sophia A. writes:

Forgive the hurried nature of these remarks about Terry Jones.

I realized from the get-go that Jones is most likely a fanatic with dodgy assocations. I don’t care. I’m supporting him strictly on free speech grounds.

Let us look at the big picture. A pastor of a tiny fringe church has world leaders’ in an uproar because he’s going to burn some book on his own property. This is not comparable to the Westboro Baptist Church guy, whose name I can’t be bothered to look up. I’m not a lawyer, but I know that there are some limits on free speech. The Westboro Baptist Church pastor must keep a safe distance from the people he is cruelly tormenting. Jones is, as he says on his website, burning a book that he owns on his own property. He is not causing violence, he is exposing it.

The very fact that world leaders are foaming about this is proof that Jones is right. What other gesture could cause such a reaction? Please google the phrases “piss Christ,” “piss Quran,” “piss Koran,” and “piss Muhammad,” (keep the quotation marks because that will limit your results to those exact phrases) and see what I mean. “Piss Christ” gets thousands of hits—all the other phrases yield but hundreds. The fear of provoking Islam is like that of an abused spouse, afraid to speak openly in his/her home!

Another reason to support Jones is how cleverly he has exposed hypocrisy on free speech. Do you remember the controversy over flag-burning some years back? There are laws against flag desecration, but I believe that the issue was resolved in the following way: you have a right to burn the flag if you are burning it on your own property and you aren’t endangering anyone. Maybe I’m wrong. I haven’t the time to research this. Perhaps it varies municipality by municipality. But that’s how I remember it was resolved.

I think burning the flag is a stupid and provocative thing to do. So it’s my job not to get provoked. Our founding fathers had a little faith that the majority of humanity in a civil society would make the right choices. Most of us choose to honor the flag and all it symbolizes. So I don’t get provoked when some jerk decides to burn a flag that he bought on his own property. I’ll turn away in disgust. But it is his right to be a jerk.

Jones may be a bit of a madman, but his actions expose the fraudulence of the people who claim to form a government, “Of the people, by the people, for the people.” Yeah, right. I heard this morning that Obama has appealed to Jones not to do this. I don’t know whether he’s doing it out of pure political desperation, calculation or what. I only know that it has strengthened my feelings that we must support Jones’ right to free speech, however offensive we may find it.

Robert Vandervoort writes:

I just wanted to say I appreciated your thoughtful and eloquent response to what Rev. Jones is doing. I’m in full agreement with it. It’s interesting to me to see our establishment, our elite class, denounce his act, and say it will “lead to violence”—but never question the underlying reason as why it will lead to violence, and why we should tolerate and seek to accommodate a group with such violent proclivities. Your readers comments on this have been outstanding as well, i.e., he should put the Koran in urine (and at taxpayer expense I might ad!). I also liked the comment from the fellow who noted how one pastor in a small church in FL was upsetting the whole apple cart. To throw in another metaphor/analogy, it reminds me of the story about the emperor who had no clothes and one courageous boy actually had the temerity to point it out to everyone.

Robert B. from Minnesota writes:

I hesitated to respond till I saw your other readers response.

First, it has already been established that CAIR is conducting a smear campaign against Jones—first accusing him of being arrested for child pornography and spreading that over the internet, so be cautious as to what you believe concerning his other affiliations. The media is out to destroy this man in an attempt to appease our new Muslim masters.

Second, it is astounding to me the breadth and depth of outright cowardice in this country on both the right and the left that this nobody of a man and church has exposed. That, in itself, is a good thing. Western Man has shown himself to be the coward that he his, hence the downfall of his civilization. This man is inconsequential, as he himself has stated, so why all the fuss? I will tell you why, because our elite knows full well what Islam is and represents—that there is no such thing as moderate Islam and that this lone character is capable of exposing the charade of the “Religion Of Peace” makes it absurdly obvious to anyone with a brain. From “conservative” talk show hosts to the military and the mothers and fathers of those serving in the military, they have spoken with one voice—“we fear Islam, so let us not provoke their wrath.”

How cowardly, how shameful, how truly disgusting to see the U.S. get down on its knees and demand that this inconsequential man and his inconsequential church give up their 1st Amendment right to free speech so as to placate Islam and honor Sharia law’s prohibition against “defaming” the Koran.

Whatever else Terry Jones is, perhaps he can be the John Brown of public opinion on Islam in this country—igniting a fire the burns so hot, it burns the house of diversity/race card to the ground.

K writes:

I don’t believe American officials are fearful of Islam: they have totally accepted it and this proposed Koran-burning act is a perfect opportunity for them to advance the cause championed by the OIC (Organisation of Islamic Conference) which is to silence all discussion, analysis and criticism of Islam and, therefore by extension, Mohammad and Sharia. In fact, I would say it is essential for the Islamic goal of world domination that all free speech concerning Islam must first be stopped; after all, anyone who has read the Koran and trawled through the Hadiths (Bukhari and Muslim) is in no doubt of the evil, destructive, intolerant and degrading nature of this ideology, nor of the need to expose it publicly in order to alert people to its dangers. Also, of course, silence over Mohammad is a dire necessity: the very words of the Koran, the Hadiths and the Sira condemn him by our standards and his position as a “prophet” would never survive the public’s revulsion and outrage. And, can you imagine the fury of the public, in all Western countries, were these facts to be openly exposed and acknowledged: the billions spent already on placating its adherents, allowing them to colonise and invade our nations, destroy our social infrastructures and attempt to turn them into Islamic hell-holes and us into their dhimmied slaves while they parasitically enjoy our civilisation’s material benefits? I can picture one or two politicians, a la Mussolini, hanging from meat hooks and “the Tiber red with blood.” So, the politicians are doing all they can to inculcate Sharia Law by demanding our “respect” and obeisance to Islam, thereby stopping any further public discussion by implying our collective guilt for any blood spilt by its adherents in their “righteous indignation.”

Meanwhile, unobserved by most, the OIC is sponsoring a Conference entitled Islam and Muslims in America in Chicago on September 28-30. The OIC has an “Islamophobia Watch” campaign on and has already achieved a notable success in getting the UN to pass a (so far) non-binding Resolution condemning “blasphemy of religion” as a “crime” and urging UN-member states to put such a crime into their own national statute books.

This Koran-burning act will be one more useful tool to the OIC to push the present Obama regime into legislating against “Islamophobia.” That said, if it weren’t a Koran burning, it would be something else: Islam denies freedom of belief and freedom of speech and will use any perceived “disrespect” to advance this enforcement. The media is hyping this proposed Koran-burning to help the OIC’s efforts. What would be far more effective than burning the tract is a public reading campaigns of the Koran, or passing out pamphlets with the most apt verses and also explaining the Doctrine of Abrogation and Taqiyya and Kitman so no one will be fooled by Moslems trying to counter such a campaign with the abrogated, more peaceful-sounding verses. And let’s not forget to explain Zakat (“alms”) and how it is intended, as the Koran states, “For Allah’s Cause”——-to fund Jihad. That should alert everyone to the fact that all Moslems, especially the false moderates, know exactly what Islam requires of them.

As my part in the campaign, I encourage all readers to start using the spelling “MOSLEM” (in use just as long as “Muslim” in the English language when discussing Islam). The reason Moslems try to enforce the “Muslim” spelling in preference is that if you pronounce the “o” in Moslem as a long vowel, and the “s” as a long sibilant, it can sound like “mawzlim” which means “one who commits evil” rather than “one who submits.” Rather apt, I think. And none of that nonsense about “qur’an” either: Koran also has as long a pedigree in English as the former and, anyhow, that accent mark was only added centuries after translations. Haven’t you noticed, just this past week, how many Moslems keep informing the dhimmis of the supposedly “correct” spellings? First, you learn to spell it correctly, and then we will teach you how to “do” it correctly … SUBMIT.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at September 08, 2010 02:21 PM | Send