Belly,

You're the one who first decided to split this discussion down gender lines.

Do I appear to you like a woman who congregates "...in the corner getting into the plonk talking about men"?

Surely, in that case, I must be frequenting the wrong forum.

"...for sure as many women speak bloke until his wallet is empty....even the poor soles walking two paces behind a fat man in a dress who regards them as property."

You're a charmer this morning, Belly.

I'll just add....that if I was walking behind "a fat man in dress", I'd make bloody sure I was more than two paces behind him - so he wouldn't hear the sound of my mirth.

Danielle,

Merci beaucoup : )

>>I have greater difficulty understanding why someone like stevenlmeyer would be mixing it with the likes of Jay of Melbourne>>

What on Earth are you talking about?

For the record I agreed with Burton Joseph at the time and said so. It earned me considerable brickbats. I'm actually old enough to remember these incidents.

And I have also fought for the right of Australia's Gerald Toben to propagate his Holocaust denial views. As I have stated numerous times on these boards the right to free speech is not restricted to the right to say things that meet with my approval. It includes the right to say things that I find abhorrent.

Apart from EXPLICIT incitement to violence NARROWLY DEFINED I think people should be allowed to say pretty much what they like.

There should be no such thing as a right not to be offended.

I have expressed these views many times both on OLO and elsewhere.

Nice try, Poirot :)

Now back to topic.

Steven, I fully agree with you, that the right to free expression necessarily includes the right to say and write things that we might disagree totally with.

This may even include inciteful expressions such as "Feck Australia!" provided they are not accompanied by the throwing of bottles or bashing of police with poles.

So on the one hand, free speech must include the right to offend, but on the other, it should not incite violence, such as "Behead all those who insult the prophet." Such a banner in the hands of a child should invite enquiries by child welfare authorities.

The Australian has two terrific articles today, on pages 15 and 16, one by the brilliant and courageous (take note, Poirot) Ayaan Hirsi Ali. As the first article notes about the issues facing all of us, in relation to the Muslim Brotherhood [and by implication, many other Islamist organisations]:

"For them, a rightfully ordered Islamic world satisfies the laws God decreed for the faithful in the Koran, and these are closed to the slightest modification, his words unalterable forever."

The writer goes on:

"Obedience is the demand placed on the faithful, with the death penalty obligatory in cases of disobedience. Scholarship long ago took the mystique of divine revelation out of the Christian bible, but nothing like that has been done with the Koran. Like communism, Islam is an ideology with no conceivable half-measures."

I would disagree slightly on that last point: there are strands of communism which are much more libertarian, free-thinking if you like, which put humans before models, practicality before Utopias - Erich Fromm's democratic socialism, for example. And of course, there still are backward Christian sects who rely on revelation, groups which Poirot, to be consistent, would have to defend.

But the gist is that, in modern societies, based on the rule of law and human equality, and the infinitely correctability of everything, there is no role for pre-feudal philosophies, to fix everything in place forever.

Joe

Loudmouth,

I'm not averse to discussing the subject of any thread. (my initial contribution to this thread was dismay at mankind's penchant for aggression) I am, however, averse these days to interacting with "you" - having been the recipient repeatedly of your targeted animosity.

It seems increasingly likely that when I go promenading down OLO's shady avenues, that you'll spring out from behind a tree and throw a rhetorical pie in my face....simply because you enjoy lobbing them in my direction.

Mostly when you address me lately you are extremely antagonistic and often belligerent. That is not the action of someone who wishes to debate the issue. It is the behaviour of someone whose only object is to goad and provoke a fellow poster.

Perhaps it's time to find another hobby.

(Btw, I expect you'll have much fun pulling apart my earlier "promenading" metaphor....go for it!)

Ahh, hum, gee, not sure I should speak.
Ah, well OK but forgive me, did I see an insult or two aimed at us men, from about the start of the thread.
A bit of condemnation for?, well saying what I think.
Is it wrong to do that.
Many say things here I do not believe but being upset, convinced an element in the Muslim community are bad for this country.
Being the racist male pig I am, well not actually, I think Rechtub has every right to be as upset as he is.
But is on the wrong track wanting to outlaw the creed or its practice.
So placing myself, not on the edge but squarely in the middle of Australian mainstream thought.
Saying get the dresses of get the atitude packed away, give us the respect you demand of us.
And know the film was not reason to get back in to the dark ages, a short trip for SOME of you, or go.
Then know I am not moving on this issue.

Poi rot:

It seems increasingly likely that when I go promenading down OLO's shady avenues, that you'll spring out from behind a tree and throw a rhetorical pie in my face....simply because you enjoy lobbing them in my direction.

Mostly when you address me lately you are extremely antagonistic and often belligerent. That is not the action of someone who wishes to debate the issue. It is the behaviour of someone whose only object is to goad and provoke a fellow poster.

Perhaps it's time to find another hobby.

Dito

Jayb