WSJ Editorial: Islam and Free Speech

Congratulations to the Wall Street Journal and Mr. Peter Hoekstra for the wonderful editorial piece on Islam and free speech. Mr. Hoekstra has got it 100% correct by declaring that free speech has been bought with blood and it would be cowardly for any nation to cave in to threats. I'm afraid that's not the case in many countries were free speech is not the hallowed God given right which we in America think it is. It's a real shame that Europe appears to be caving in to Islamic threats of violence.

Here's a snipet of the the WSJ editorial:

Islam and Free Speech

By PETER HOEKSTRA
March 26, 2008; Page A15

The Netherlands is bracing for a new round of violence at home and against its embassies in the Middle East. The storm would be caused by "Fitna," a short film that is scheduled to be released this week. The film, which reportedly includes images of a Quran being burned, was produced by Geert Wilders, a member of the Dutch parliament and leader of the Freedom Party. Mr. Wilders has called for banning the Quran -- which he has compared to Hitler's "Mein Kampf" -- from the Netherlands.

After concern about the film led Mr. Wilders's Internet service provider to take down his Web site, Mr. Wilders issued a statement this week that he will personally distribute DVDs "On the Dam" if he has to. That may not be necessary, as the Czech National Party has reportedly agreed to host the video on its Web site.

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Reasonable men in free societies regard Geert Wilders's anti-Muslim rhetoric, and films like "Fitna," as disrespectful of the religious sensitivities of members of the Islamic faith. But free societies also hold freedom of speech to be a fundamental human right. We don't silence, jail or kill people with whom we disagree just because their ideas are offensive or disturbing. We believe that when such ideas are openly debated, they sink of their own weight and attract few followers.

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Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a Somali born Dutch member of parliament. Read about her troubles in Slate.com.

"Entering politics to try to alert the European left to this danger, she was first elected as a deputy for the Labor Party, but after 9/11 she changed her allegiance to the Liberals. This, she explained, was because many Labor spokesmen preferred to think of immigrants as possessing "group rights." They had become so infatuated by their own "multi-culti" style that they had ignored the rights of individuals—especially women and girls—who were imprisoned within their own ghetto. (That, by the way, was precisely Spinoza's problem as well. The Dutch rabbis cursed him and condemned him in their own sectarian "court," of which the Christian authorities approved because it took care of dangerous secularism among Jews.)"