Saturday, February 18, 2006

Stop the insanity Mr.Muhammed

I was reading Imran Anwar's In My Humble Opinion to get some ideas about what the other side has to say about the controversial cartoons. But he is not very convicing (at least to me) since his arguments are pretty baseless. He gives the following example:

"...Would all these "fair and balanced" media and publications, from Denmark to France to the USA, publish cartoons (in the name of free speech if not on merit) showing Prophet Jesus Christ as a nasty, pedophile, Homosexual telling his homosexual apostles and followers to become Christian priests and rape little boys in Churches?"

I am a christian and I have no problems with that whatsoever and it did not get infuriated as the muslim world did. Why do they care so much about what a non-believer has to say about their beliefs? A better response would have been to simply express their disagreement through BoyCott of the publications or media that is not sensitive to their feelings and start a more meaningful dialog instead of burning the embassies or killing the people.

He goes on to say the following:
"... I also don't think either cartoon would get published - at least in America or Europe because they would be considered "offensive" or "bigoted" .... Sorry, free speech is not so free and it depends on what country you are in and what group you dare to attack. Shameful double standards!"

Even if that happens in America, I am sure people are not going to burn the newspaper building or kill people. Sure there will be some protests but I am not expecting to see stupidity. Since he mentioned this, it occured to me what if an American newspaper invites cartoonists from Middleeast and portray Jesus the way they want to and pusblish it? It would teach the world muslims how different we are from them. But I don't think anyone here has the courage to even think or do it.

My word to the muslims is, Grow up guys!

Sunday, February 05, 2006

OMG, OMG, I got one!

You sure heard me complain a lot about it. But I had the luck of getting "My precious" XBox 360 last week. It wasn't a planned hunt and was checking out something else in CompUSA and happened to ask the store clerk if they had anything in stock and the rest is history. The funny part was that I almost got that for free. The sales person thought I had already paid for my 360 and was letting me walk away w/o having to pay for it. Being a very honest person :-), I told her that I hadn't paid for it and duly paid $435 and took it home with a lot of pride.

I sure enjoy the device for its HD gaming experience and Dolby Digital 5.0 channel audio and its seamless integration with "XBox market place" which is a cool idea and I am starting to like it.

The only thing that isn't working out well for me is connecting the 360 to my PC. Will have to call tech support to figure that one out.

All because of cartoons?

Muslim world enraged by cartoons

I don't believe this. This more or less confirms my belief that the Islam is not a progressive religion at all and Muslims by far the most close minded compared to any society.

Well, there is always a camp that says "Hey, not all muslims are like that yada yada yada...". But if that camp is a minority and cannot control the events that are happening (I am talking about the violent protests and burning of embassies), I am to believe that most are on the other camp.

With most of the Islamic nations having blasphemy laws that could hang a person just for his views or for exercising his freedom of speech or expression, I don't think I would ever consider living in one of those nations and they shouldn't expect my sympathy and support ever.

To me, there are no sacred cows and everything is subject to scrutiny and I strongly believe in freedom of speech no matter what they have to say.

Grow up guys for your good!

[Update on Feb 6th, 2006] Wikipedia has the most comprehensive report I can find on the web. Fantastic and be sure to check that out.