[Buddha-l] Return of blasphemy?

[Jo]

Well said!
Yes, the situation today is so bad that one cannot deconstruct something
like the alleged prohibition on painting or visually representing living
figures (humans and animals) without suffering fanatical retaliation, as in:
my website was hacked a year ago because of this.
Joanna
-----------

On Behalf Of Vera, Pedro L.
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2011 9:12 AM


I don't really undertand why the issue ends up framed in terms of
"defamation" or "discrimination" when the discussion originated from a
definition of "religious tolerance".

I think a simple, straightforward definition of "religious tolerance" is:

You are allowed  to hold whatever absurd, crazy, irrational and inane
beliefs your particular flavor of religion holds to be "true", as long as:

         A) I am not forced to acknowledge them as true or to live by them;

         B) I am still allowed to call them "absurd, crazy, irrational and
inane" and no harm should come to me because of that.


I understand that part A will anger most fundamentalists of any flavor
(christian or muslin) and part B is likely to get individuals and newspaper
offices firebombed if they publish the "wrong" cartoon "defaming" some
flavor of religion or other (as seen recently in th news). However, I
frankly do not see the need for any more respect or deference to religion
than shown in the definition above.

Regards,

Pedro








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