Get APLawrence.com by RSSNo offense, but get over it
2006/10/19
There's been a bit of a furor about supposed Muslim objections to Apple's Fifth Avenue store. I suspect it's mostly or perhaps even all complete nonsense. Maybe some crazy troublemaker somewhere really believes he has a grievance, but even that seems far fetched.
However, several things disturb me about this story. First, I think too many people are all too ready to believe it. That's dangerous, because it helps perpetuate a climate of fear: those Muslims are all insane, we should..
We should what? Hate someone for their religious beliefs? Assume that they hate us for the same reason? Assume that we are so far apart that we cannot avoid offending one another?
Of course not. But it's so easy to stir up that kind of feeling, isn't it?
There's a larger issue here too, and that's the whole concept of "offense". It's something the human race needs to get away from if we expect to live together in a rapidly shrinking world. Our insular customs and cherished beliefs are only customs and beliefs: we should not assume that our distaste for dissimilar cultures is anything but a conditioned response. Given that, we have no automatic right to "take offense" when someone from a different culture does something that "offends" us.
Of course this covers everything from clothing or lack thereof to sexual activities and even choice of language. It covers religious expression and lack of religious expression. Simply, we need more tolerance and more acceptance.
It's not easy. It's particularly hard to be tolerant toward someone showing intolerance back to us. There are gray areas, and situational morality, and no matter how hard we try we will never achieve a perfect world. But that doesn't mean that we can't be better, can't be more accepting of cultural diversity, can't recognize our own cultural nonsense. We can try.
The next time you feel "offended", step back and examine the roots. Are you justified or is it simply discomfort? Is anyone really being hurt or is it simply "out of the norm"?
Try to learn not to be offended.
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Thu Oct 19 21:28:47 2006: Subject: drag
It's just them pulling the same stuff people have been suing over for years. Now it's their turn to use the law to push their political agenda through the court system because they can't get their way through legislative means.
Things like, oh, people suing to remove crosses on war memorials on public land.
Thu Oct 19 21:32:13 2006: Subject: TonyLawrence
Well, crosses don't belong on public war memorials. Wars were not fought only by Christians and weren't fought for the sole benefit of Christians.
Fri Oct 20 02:03:07 2006: Subject: drag
Ya so we should go around and chop of the crosses so we can be more tolerant, right?
Makes sense to me.
:-)
Fri Oct 20 02:19:18 2006: Subject: TonyLawrence
No, of course not. But they probably shouldn't have been there to start with.
I wouldn't want them torn down, but a better society would have realized that pushing their religion on others isn't the right choice. On the other hand, if the memorial was able to express that this was just one of many religious beliefs, then it's fine.. context is everything.
Fri Oct 20 11:56:31 2006: Subject: anonymous
Of course. Still though I have a hard time figuring statues and such push religious beleifs. Now if you passed a law saying that they always should do this or that then that's something else entirely.
The more 'extremist muslims' so to say have successfully gotten Sharia law in place in parts of Canada and such. It's pretty messed up if you think about it. Right now it's limited to government acknowleging the legality of civil abritrations, but there is no oversight or disclosure on what is going on.
Stuff like that and people trying to get it so that you an get legal photo id with your face hidden and such.
I figure they are picking on Apple because Apple wants to keep a very, umm.. gentle or PC image that appeal to a lot of it's customers. So its more likely that they are going to cave into their demands unlike some other orginizations. If that works out then they get more political cloat in how they go about treating other businesses and individuals.
Corporations and individuals in public office tend to loose their backbone when they feel that they are going against the grain or may be behaving in a manner that may hurt them financially and politically. So if it becomes common that you get people caving into pressure put on by the more unreasonable Muslim groups then less and less people are going to be willing to stand up to them.
This sort of thing happens all the time with different political pressure groups, both conservative and liberal and all things in between. Sometimes it can get quite profitable with groups bullying companies into giving 'donations' with threat of public emberrasment...
Hopefully Apple doesn't do anything other then continue with business as usually. They should they don't have any obligation to bend or even aknowledge oddball things like this.
Fri Oct 20 12:35:37 2006: Subject: TonyLawrence
The important point about the crosses is the word "public". If you put up "Praise Jesus" on your lawn or wear it as a sweatshirt, that's your business. Do it with public money, and it isn't.
On the other hand: I think some of the people on my side of the fence can be overly sensitive. That's probably because there is so much abuse and ourageous pushing of religion, but still: we shouldn't sweat the small stuff, even when it is irritating. Live and let live..
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