Deep breath, and… DUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUH.

“But he also revealed that producers had to consider the possibilities of ‘violent threats’ instead of polite complaints if they pushed ahead with certain types of satire.”

I think what he is saying there is Christians are easy targets, they are lambs…  If we were to ridicule Muslims as we do Christians…  we would probably get our asses blown up!

So he admits that they are cautious about Islam because well….let’s be honest – Jihadists will cut your British head off, while Christians for the most part aren’t going to hurt you.  So if Christians started to demand more respect, like say Islam, then BBC won’t attack them out of fear.

Pictures of the Prophet Muhammad = riots and death threats.
Placing a cross in a barrel of urine = art.

What he says is stupid.

First of all most of the West is Christian or identifies as such.

The West controls the global financial system, controls most of the weapons and controls the media.

The Powers that Be in the West only care about money and only use religion when it benefits them financially.

Yep, everyone knows the worst a Christian will do is call a teletubby gay. A muslim, well…..

Looks like TONY SOPRANO is “bleeding” the BBC!

Right, because that’s exactly what happened with the Cold War right?  The Soviets disallowed religion (for most part) and those mean/nasty Christians in the rest of the world ganged up on them and blew things up…

if you think the terrorists are blowing people up because they can’t get a good 401k, then you are absolutely irrevocably retarded. Do you think the mobs that freak out and kill people because a Dutch newspaper printed a picture of Mohammed are doing it because of their place in the geo-political/economical spectrum? Good god man, get a clue.

I agree with the dude. The Muslim radicals are f*cking insane. Yes, those morons are more dogmatic and militant than the Christians are. Another thing to look at is the power of said fringes within their respective religions. The extremist Christian fringe is very small and powerless in comparison to their counterparts in Islam. This is simple common sense….and also factual. It’s more dangerous to taunt Muslims than it is to taunt Christians.

I think his point went over your head.  If the muslims were in charge of the majority of the economy and the many other things that the West controls, and the Christians were a minority, things could be different.  But most of it probably has to do with what laws we are governed under.  Living under a dictatorship has a tendency to make matters worse than a democracy.  This is especially true under a ruthless dictator such as Saddam or Gadafi. 

Religion, the only area in the public debate where you can make the most fantastic claims
with absolutely zero proof of these claims.  It is actually a badge of honor to some the more someone pretends to have a contact with a supernatural being in today’s society.   Why don’t we have debates between the conflicting religions on which one is the true religion?  Why not debate religion as we do politics?   We debate everything else in society why not the one of the major things people claim to base their lives on and go to war about?  Why is it when someone stands up and claims that god told them to run for office we don’t ask follow up questions like how and when did you have this conversation with the almighty and if you lose does that mean you are hearing things or talking to imaginary friends.

Same Harris has a very good take on this. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FKo4nPyehE4

What a lot of people don’t seem to understand is, for the west, Christianity is a choice. We may be raised in a church but ultimately it is a personal choice as an adult whether or not to be a Christian. In Islam, it’s who you are. It is part of you much in the same was as eye color. When other religions verbally criticize Christianity, I can stand back and say, well, you might have a point. If you attack Islam, it is an attack on the person as well as the religion. It is very difficult for people in the west to understand the middle eastern or eastern mindset. Islam is religion, culture, ethnicity all rolled into one.

How manymore collage educated engineers have to fly planes into buildings before people get into their heads this is not about access to money or education?  One of the problems with moderates in the West is that they can’t get their mind around the fact that there are people so consumed with religion that they actually believe what they say.  The men who blow themselves up actually believe they will go to Allah and have 72 virgins, they actually believe in the cause they are fighting for.   The West is accustomed to picking and choosing which part of their particular religion they want to follow, these guys don’t.  We ignore the parts of the bible that condone murder, slavery, genocide and the commands to kill non believers, these guys don’t , they are fanatic and they are true believers in their cause.

The only place Muslims could be in charge of anything besides mostly marginal eco-systems no one else wants is in a fantasy story that takes place on an alternate Earth where idiocy is considered genius. That’s flipping.

a.k.a. Whitey keeping Muslims and pretty much everybody else on the planet down.

Please tell us how horrible we (the west) are… 

Even though we contribute 99% of all the charity in the entire world..  meanwhile Muslim women and children are treated worse than livestock… oh but it’s just a by-product of the evil west… pure tripe

Uhh… we solved both of those dictator problems for them… bombings and beheadings and threats didn’t decrease…

Inferior cultures…  Liberty and the value of liberty is a game changer, limited government is a byproduct of our culture (or used to be anyway)

It’s the largest religion in the world, particularly in the western world. Those that are Christians have the unofficial license to bash it just like how whites bash being white, blacks bash being black, Jews bash being Jewish, etc.

Look at how Bill Maher treats religion – it’s disgraceful. 

“Bluntly, the BBC chief said: ‘Without question, “I complain in the strongest possible terms,” is different from, “I complain in the strongest possible terms and I am loading my AK47 as I write.” This definitely raises the stakes.’”

So the moral of this story is that if Christians want to be treated better, they need to start doing unpleasant, ticked-off-Muslim-type things to people who offend them. 

Unless it was 30 years ago in Ireland

Fascinating that those that agree with your point would also probably have a problem with the concept of American exceptionalism- the truth is the founders of this country were motivated by changing the type of religious situation you describe in other countries, and it is a big part of what made this country great.

So what’s Bill Maher’s excuse?  Or Jon Stewart’s?

 You beat me to it. Well said.

By the way, I just watched a French movie that made Catholic priests in Central America (fictional stand-in for Mexico) look very evil. It was a semi-comedy staring Bridget Bardot.
Back to reality. Christians have been persecuting other Christians since the day Christ died. Some Muslim sects have been persecuting other Muslim sects since right after Mohammed died. They all fight among themselves, to one extent or another.

 I watched a minute or two of the video, and that is all I need to agree with the basic premise.

Here is where the problem lies: It is hard to disrespect someone else’s belief in the unprovable if that person can say that your religion has no more proof than his/hers.

Of course the answer you will get every time is that there is proof. It is the Bible or the Koran or whatever other book somebody has written or dictated to a scribe.

Or as I would phrase it, the myth of American exceptionalism.

Most of what we think we know about Islam is based on the most extreme variety of it. There is a culture mix with Islam that is different in Afghanistan than it is in Indonesia. An Arab Muslim is usually much more “traditional” in his treatment of women than an American Muslim.
Arabs are naturally angry and frustrated. It comes from being stuck in a desert region.

I cannot overemphasize this. We see the actions of less than 1% of Muslims, and we think they represent all Muslims. It in simply not true.

Look at it this way–Islam is about 500 years behind Christianity. What were Christians doing less than 500 years ago? Killing each other and Muslims and Jews and heathens of all kinds.

99% huh? I doubt that.
What do you know about the country with the greatest number of Muslims?
Do you know it is Indonesia? Do you know how women are treated there?
I am not an apologist for the Middle East. I do say it is not the only place where Muslims live and it is not the model for all Muslims, just like Italy is not the model for all Christians.

 Actually, the majority of Muslims who do kill themselves are suffering from extreme poverty, and are suicidal anyway. The Bin Laden’s of the world don’t blow themselves up. They recruit the most miserable people they can find to do that.

Then there are the just plain crazy, but we have those too. There was a recent school shooting incident in Ohio. There was Jared Lee Loughner, the guy who shot Representative Giffords. Here, they acted alone. In the Middle East, they would “work for” a Bin Laden.

Seems like you are demonstrating my point-   you originally point out the difference between America and other countries, but then turn around and say American exceptionalism is a myth.  The difference is one of the key things the founders had in mind when forming the country.

 How religious laws affect finance:

Why did Jews come to dominate banking? Because Christian laws were like current Muslim laws. The charging of interest (usury) was considered sinful to Christians. (High interest rates are still called usury.) At the same time, Jews in Europe were not allowed to own land. Thus, Jews could not become landlords, but they could become bankers, while Christians could become landlords, but they could not become bankers.

Christians changed that “law,” but Muslims still have it. Muslims still do not “make loans” or “collect interest.” They do, however, “invest” by giving money to people who then give that money back with a “profit” that happens to work just like paying interest on the loan.

I’m speaking of thought processes, not core beliefs. You, in fact, are demonstrating MY point.

And that is something that would divide and control the masses, of this country by using religions which are all idolatry. As prophesied they would be in Deut.32v17 by the prophet Moses from the Creator YHWH. 

Not true- you can claim Obama earned the Nobel Peace prize.

Clovis, there are over a billion Muslims in the world, but you beleive that the nineteen who (allegedly) took down the Twin Towers are representitive of all Muslims.

If just one percent of Muslims were extremists( as you  claim they all are) that would equal at least 10 million suicide bombersc. Since that hasn’t happened it’s more than likely that the terrorists on 9/11 used their religion to justify their actions.

Heck so-called Christian Republican politicians claim that their religion informs them of the political positions.

Oh really? When Obama made a reference to a certain segment of America clinging to their religion and their guns Republicans went ape-sh!t even though there was  a huge nugget of truth because that is all that some are left with when they are not economically upwardly mobile.

Wow. Talk about stupid comparisons.

Why not talk about the West’s relationship with the Middle East.

Let’s take Iran in the early 1950′s. From Wiki:

In 1951, Iran’s oil industry was nationalized with near-unanimous support of Iran’s parliament in a bill introduced by Mossadegh who led the nationalist parliamentarian faction. Iran’s oil had been controlled by the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company (AIOC).[6] Popular discontent with the AIOC began in the late 1940s, a large segment of Iran’s public and a number of politicians saw the company as exploitative and a vestige of British imperialism.[7] Despite Mosaddegh’s popular support, Britain was unwilling to negotiate its single most valuable foreign asset, and instigated a worldwide boycott of Iranian oil to pressure Iran economically.[8] Initially, Britain mobilized its military to seize control of the Abadan oil refinery, the world’s largest, but Prime Minister Clement Attlee opted instead to tighten the economic boycott[9] while using Iranian agents to undermine Mosaddegh’s government.[10] With a change to more conservative governments in both Britain and the United States, Churchill and the U.S. Eisenhower administration decided to overthrow Iran’s government though the predecessor U.S. Truman administration had opposed a coup.[11]
Britain and the U.S. selected Fazlollah Zahedi to be the prime minister of a military government that was to replace Mosaddegh’s government. Subsequently, a royal decree dismissing Mosaddegh and appointing Zahedi was drawn up by the coup plotters and signed by the Shah. The Central Intelligence Agency had successfully pressured the weak monarch to participate in the coup, while bribing street thugs, clergy, politicians and Iranian army officers to take part in a propaganda campaign against Mosaddegh and his government.[12] At first, the coup appeared to be a failure when on the night of 15–16 August, Imperial Guard Colonel Nematollah Nassiri was arrested while attempting to arrest Mosaddegh.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1953_Iranian_coup_d%27%C3%A9tat
Add to that the fact that the U.S. propped up dictators Mubarak in Egypt and Saddam in Iraq that should give you a clue as to why Muslims may not be fond of the West especially the United States.

Maybe you should study how differently civilians react when a foreign power overthrowing your government and the government is removed by domestic forces.

Also these countries have only been free of their dictators for a couple of years so give them time.

America is over 230 years old but African Americans have only been considered as full citizens for the past fifty years.

 You’ve never heard of the wars Bush got us into have you?

What is the worst a Christian can do? Well using Kerosene Napalm to burn the skins off 250,000 women and children while they were alive in the city of Fallujah, is just one. I personally think the Muslims in those nations that cut the heads off…what 25…are being very reserved in their actions.

Using Depleted Uranium that has a half life of 2.5 billion years..We’ll be causing Birth Defects for as long as you can think.

Hmmm  you are starting to sound a little bit like Ron Paul…  Stop it! 

This is exactly what we have been programmed to not look at.  I can’t believe how many people actually believe that all will be lost if we close overseas bases, or that it is our responsibility to participate in any and all conflicts in all corners of the world.  

Religion is really about seizing control & power as a result of human desperation, insecurities, & ignorance. That’s just how religions have operated since day 1.

Bill Maher is Catholic & Jewish, Stewert has writers of all religious groups.

 Evidently you haven’t read the Bible or the Koran. As mentioned by others there is quite a similarity between the two..Both have Jesus in them. But more to the point…Have you ever read the part about “boasting” about how much you give? When you do that you will not receive a heavenly reward. And that we are to give with one hand without letting the other know… Well….guess what. The Muslims believe in the same thing, except they actually follow those verses (well theirs are in the Koran of course). They do not boast about their giving, unlike Americans for example. Their religious figures live a relatively modest lifestyle, unlike our Televangelists who some have fortunes greater than $100 million. Especially when that fortune came from the people who could afford it the least. Those that were told if they didn’t give, God wouldn’t bless them.

 In Iran where the average person only makes less than $6300 a year. They have boxes something like a mailbox (many ornately decorated, so people know what they are) where people can put money in, for the less fortunate, No, they don’t get a receipt to be able to write it off as a Tax Deduction. But even the poor give as much as they can.

You do know that the Muslims believe in Moses, in fact this past December 4th the “Day of Ashura” was celebrated. It was a celebration of Moses leading the Jews escaping the Pharaoh and his army through the parted Red Sea.

That is a nice post, but what does it have to do with what I wrote?  I never said these fanatics are representative of the Muslim population but wrote about the mindset of the fanatics themselves.  I have also written about the Christians, including Rick Perry who would base his foreign policy regarding Israel on the bible. 

My point is that moderates make excuses for the Muslim fanatics,
that they are poor or uneducated, and maybe some are, but the driving force behind their actions is their spiritual belief, not socioeconomic.

You can map their fanaticism on to the people who picket dead soldiers in this country.  We look on in horror at this reprehensible behavior but to them they are doing god’s work.  They are just taking the next step from those who think homosexuality is an abomination to god and acting on what they think is right. To them homosexuality is a choice (which is ironic because if there is anything that is a choice it is religion yet we have laws to protect that choice) and gay men and women are choosing to mock god.

So please read things into posts that aren’t there.

Is that the thing you can come up with to defend your beliefs?  If so don’t feel bad I have heard worse.

That is the point, there is no objective way to prove any religion is the right one, they are all based on belief and faith.  Which is probably why we don’t see debates in the town square, they would all look foolish.

Look at how the religious treat each other – it’s disgraceful.

I know, it is ridiculous because all religion is a human construct, and does more harm then good.  Jesus said some good stuff though, quite a man.

Thanks for sharing your opinion and offering nothing to support it.  Good job lightweight.

Well said in both posts.  Osama came from one of the richest families in the world.  Granted, many of the antagonists in Iraq are poor uneducated youth, and have been recruited much like many young white supremists, promised something bigger than their crappy lives.

A lot of charity doesn’t show up on tax returns, but I always appreciate wild exaggeration.

Yah, but it’s more dangerous to taunt Hell’s Angels than Muslims, and that is factual.

 100%
Wars are not fought because of religion. They are fought because someone uses religion to cover for greed.

 His parents are Catholic and Jewish. He is an atheist.

 Since Maher is an atheist, he cannot be attacked back. No one can say, “Your religion is crazier than mine, or as unproven as mine.”
Stewart, believe it or not, does not attack any religion.
In fact, the “war on Christianity” is a small one fought by atheists who attack all religions. The vast majority of that “war” is a figment of Fox News.

Having lived in England amongst British Christians, I was impressed at how the British are as good a moral people as any other Christian country, but they don’t take organized religion very seriously, even though Protestant Christianity is the state religion. The American revolutionaries didn’t take Christianity very seriously either and certainly wanted a complete separation between all religions and the government. How on earth did we ever wind up with the hypocritical, semi-literate and very unChristian Fundamentalists who want to control our lives?

Yes, the propensity for violence from “The religion of Peace” fanatics makes spineless journalists quake and shake! Christianity’s adherents don’t need murderous maniacs to prove their points, which are manifested by example!

I’ve never understood the “I’m an American who thinks the USA is a terrible place, and anything bad that happens to us is justified” type people, Boo.

I once met a girl who said that we got what was coming to us on 9/11. For those folks, my question is, why does it always have to be someone else who pays for “our” mistakes? If you believe that a few dead Americans is a good thing to make up for (alleged) American interference, why not start with you and your family, instead of someone else? In other words… why not go off and make a martyr out of yourself, instead of wanting other people to do it for you.

Ah well, it’s probably just another one of those, “No, no me… you do it” type situations.

Anyway, those “Christians” you speak of… did they do that in the name of Christianity? Did they declare war on all “non-believers” like these radical Muslims have? And what does that have to do with the topic of this thread? Do you approve of journalists attacking Christianity because it’s “safe,” while being too cowardly to do the same to Islam?

Truther alert!

Because America allows all kinds of people to speak their mind… not just the ones you personally agree with.

But anyway, any comment on the subject of this thread? Why are journalists too cowardly to criticize Islam, and is that a good thing?

Non sequitur. Hells Angels a religious group?  You are free to showcase your idiocy. 

Agreeable. It does not conflict with what I said though. Note: I was specifically talking about the radicals. 

Why do we treat any fairytales with sensitivity?

No conflict intended. :-)

You also contribute 99.9% of all weapons and bombs.

 First very soon Islam will be the largest per demograph projections.  Why do muslims get a free pass with you LIBS. Google slavery and muslim. The greatest slaver in the history of the world by far is Islam yet all thats printed is white christians slaved.  I’d guess from your mom’s basement you wont know that.