Are the Swiss onto Something with Banning Minarets?
Comments (8)
December 2nd, 2009
This week it was announced that a majority voted to ban the construction of minarets in Switzerland. This has brought up a great discussion and many questions have followed suit.
An article in Huffington Post stated that the vote should not be considered racist. It should however be viewed as a statement by the Swiss that they will not stand for the radicalization of Switzerland. For many the minarets represent radicalism and not Islam in general. The article explains that the western freedoms and liberties were hard to come by and citizens are not ready to give them up to Sharia law.
Tawfik Hamid writes that, “It seems strange that Muslims would insist on building minarets for mosques in Switzerland while thousands of mosques exist inside the Muslim world without minarets. The minarets are seen by many as representing the superiority of Islam, especially when they are taller than the churches; this sheds some light on the hidden intentions of Muslims who insist on building minarets in the heart of Europe. It is important that Muslims in Switzerland explain why they insist on using such historical symbols of Muslim superiority when it is neither mentioned in the Koran nor considered vital to building a mosque.”Is Switzerland onto something? Is this a breach of freedom of religion? Or, is the ruling acceptable if it is understood that the goal of the minaret is to show Islam as a superseding power over others? It will be interesting to continue to watch this story unfold and see if other countries follow in Switzerland’s footsteps.
Comments
@GQ
I must respectfully disagree, GQ, with your assertion that none of the holy texts of Islam advocate violence against non Muslims. Check out http://www.thereligionofpeace.com/Muhammad/myths-mu-home.htm as it's quite illuminating and draws exclusively on Muslim texts as its reference points.
S. Levy,
always glad to see comments posted by uneducated and mindless sheep that believe every bit of hate propaganda thrown in their face just so you can have some sense of belonging to a crowd. first off all, just like Sigvard von Douche, you have nothing to back up your inane claims and opinions. nowhere in the koran/quran does it ask muslims to murder non-believers. that is what the radical mullahs and clerics preach to people they know they can recruit for their mindless and unnecessary mission of terror and hate against christians, jews, buddhists, hindus, shi'a muslims, and other non-radicals. you my friend, fell for it too but instead of joining, you became afraid and cowered and ran to join another hate group at the other end of the spectrum. and are you seriously allowing your pitiful self to let Moamar Qaddafi represent muslims around the world? really? i knew you were dumb right off the bat, but for the love of Yaweh, are you kidding me?! i dont know how basic human rights apply to stupid people such as yourself. and i dont see how you can back up your claim that the west is a "zillion" times better off jews rather than muslims. let's see, what did islamic culture contribute to western...no...global society: algebra, calculus, geography, architecture, arabic numbers, the concept of zero (which also defines your purpose on this earth: zero), chemistry...need i go on. and not to mention, i think the tables are turned now because even us Americans are getting a little ticked at israel now with your expansion...your cute little version of manifest destiny. but check it, the minute the US pulls the plug on you guys (and by pull the plug, i mean stop sending israel billions of dollars worth of money and weapons), you're pretty much not going to really stand a chance. not to mention the countries and groups that do hate the US might not hate us so much anymore. then we'll see how tough you are.
oh, and with your wretched fear of all muslims being terrorists, maybe this will help you sleep at night: there are 1.2 billion muslims. not only that, back in the late 1990s, a very respected member of the American entertainment industry, known as Sean Puff Daddy Combs (ever heard of him? you non-american thrive on American pop culture like junkies on heroine so i assume you have) wrote a song for muslims across the world, and especially for those living in Palestine. it's quite uncanny really, and it goes a little something like this:
We ain't, go-in' nowhere
We Ain't. Goin' nowhere
We can't be stopped now, cause it's bad boy for life.
Mahzoltov!
If you want to be treated as equal you have to treat others as equal.You cannot do what you do in Islamic countries to other religion,and expect that the others will still give you a fair treatment.Before throwing stones see if you are without sin.Do unto others ab you would have others do unto you.
In a certain way islamism comes as a vengeance: the Western world always hated and loathed Jews -semites- such that it either expelled them, murdered them, restricted them, etc. It now has to cope with the other semites, the Moslems. In any case Western World countries were zillions of times better off with us Jews.
One out of every three or four 'Suras' advocate that '...unbelievers (i.e.non-moslems)should either be coverted or or eliminated...' and Muammar Khaddafi said at the Timbouktou conference '...we don't need weapons, planes, guns, tanks! we shall conquer the West by our numbers settling there and by havings always more children...'
Moslems have the right to their beliefs but now way to impose these on others. In my opinion each and every moslem is a potential terrorist and murderer.
Once long ago (keeper of time like a fine swiss watch)the prophet daniel was given by an angel of the LORD a secret to chew and swallow. It was sweet to the taste (like swiss chocolate)but soured his stomach. Now-a-daze daniel vomits (like a big swiss bank that looses it's blood money)and more secrets are revealed about the little country in the heart of Europe that thought they were the "keeper" of 777. Even the anti-christ known as hitler did not evade the swiss!DA! Oh and even their cheese has "holes" in it!
@Sigvard von Brevern
@Sigvard von Brevern
you sound almost as radical as the islamist fundamentalists or terrorists: "Islam has it's beedy (you spelled "beady" wrong in the first place) eyes on the church...". granted, radical islam is wrong and the destruction of churches, buddhists temples, and even mosques of other sects of islam is completely unacceptable, and yes the construction of minarets is not required, nor does it have to be taller than church towers, however there could have been at least a limit set by the ruling that minarets cannot be over a certain height or too overwhelming. terrorist muslims are the ones that destroy churches, not all of islam. if you are willing get rid of, and stopc construction of mosques and call Allah a pagan god (who, to your misfortune, is the SAME GOD YOU WORSHIP, just a different name if you ever studied your own or any other religion), you might as well join the Ku Klux Klan (ever heard of them? you dont seem to be so keen on your history as it is). i am a US solider and have fought against these terrorists and insurgents in Afghanistan so i'm not biased by any means.
PS: by looking at your name, you must be swiss? aren't you guys famous for your "neutrality". what happened now? apparently Hitler didn't seem to be a problem for you back in the 30s and 40s. trying to figure out where you're going with this.
My question is this - why should we in christian countries allow the building of
mosques with minarets that are higher than church-steeples, just to get their
message across? We are not allowed to build churches in Islamic countries, those
that have been in existence such as in Bethlehem before Islam took over are one by
one systematically destroyed. Now Islam has it`s beady eyes on the church of the
Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem. We in the west should honor their pagan god and we all
should convert to Islam, when they in turn do not tolerate the Judeo-Christian God,
but blaspheme Him constantly. Should we tolerate this, be politically correct or
should we say that enough is enough and stop the Muslims in their tracks all over
Europe and other free countries?