Leonard Peikoff on mosque near Ground Zero(peikoff.com)
peikoff.com
Leonard Peikoff on mosque near Ground Zero
http://www.peikoff.com/2010/06/28/what-do-you-think-of-the-plan-for-a-mosque-in-new-york-city-near-ground-zero-isnt-it-private-property-and-therefore-protected-by-individual-rights/
2 comments
Heres my take there are only three possibilities here:
1) The Mosque is of anti-american Muslims. That should be stopped.
2) The more likely scenario is that these are just Muslims wanting to build a Mosque in their neighborhood.
3) Maybe (2) but to show that Muslims care for the victims just as anyone do.
For (1) I say take the same action as you would with a confederate flag in a black neighborhood. If the people beat the shit out of them, great.
For (2) it should be allowed, period. It is their constitutional right to practice their religion and it is bigotry to blame all Muslims for the actions of the few.
For (3) more power to them, hope they succeed.
Edit: Since it seems to be point (1) then we should stop it. I don't feel property rights ever play into the argument though. The only argument I have is, if it is their property, they should have the right to build a religious establishment for the purposes of the community. If that is not the goal, they should be denied the right to build there.
1) The Mosque is of anti-american Muslims. That should be stopped.
2) The more likely scenario is that these are just Muslims wanting to build a Mosque in their neighborhood.
3) Maybe (2) but to show that Muslims care for the victims just as anyone do.
For (1) I say take the same action as you would with a confederate flag in a black neighborhood. If the people beat the shit out of them, great.
For (2) it should be allowed, period. It is their constitutional right to practice their religion and it is bigotry to blame all Muslims for the actions of the few.
For (3) more power to them, hope they succeed.
Edit: Since it seems to be point (1) then we should stop it. I don't feel property rights ever play into the argument though. The only argument I have is, if it is their property, they should have the right to build a religious establishment for the purposes of the community. If that is not the goal, they should be denied the right to build there.
Just in case that link breaks someday, here's a quote that you can use to search for the rest of it:
"As an opponent of the mosque, I wish to demonstrate the level at which I think this discussion must proceed. In particular I aim to show that if one regards the mosque as an objective threat, then building the mosque, not banning it, constitutes a violation of individual rights. On this view, its prohibition (or destruction) would neither entail granting exceptional powers to government nor fueling “the danger of rapidly accelerating tyranny.” Defending freedom can hardly be construed as tyrannical, unconstitutional or the lesser of two evils. Therefore to support the mosque, one mustn’t view it as an objective threat. It is this issue that must be decided.
As I see it, public advocacy of Islam assumed the status of a threat when first the Twin Towers fell in its name (and possibly before). This threat is infinitely more severe and unambiguous when issued at Ground Zero. If individual Muslims wish to separate their advocacy of Islam from the war being waged against us, they must explicitly denounce all translations of Islam into violent political practice—the opposite of erecting a mosque over the graves of persons killed by its enactment."