OK, I read this story quickly at Eye On The World; Canadian town to immigrants: You can't stone women
My first reaction is that I thought that would be in the books of all of Canada already. It went on:
"Therefore we consider it completely outside these norms to ... kill women by stoning them in public, burning them alive, burning them with acid, circumcising them etc." No face coverings for women unless it is Halloween. You don't like it, don't come here.
Sounds good. I'm in full agreement. I wonder what the Dearborn population would be like if this was spelled out like Herouxville, a town of 1300 people in Quebec, is spelling it out. Basically, take your Sharia Law and shove it up Mohammed's pooper. Don't even think about it.
One of Eye On The World's commenters stated:
So, in this case, the villagers of Herouxville are simply being islamoprudential.
I like it.
Even this sounds good:
"We invite people from all nationalities, all languages, all sexual orientations, whatever, to come live with us, but we want them to know ahead of time how we live."
That is cool. Except they really mean, "we don't just mean we don't want Muslims" and I'm ashamed to admit that my islamoprudence didn't allow me to see it. I then read this upon further research:
'The town also criticized Muslim halal and Jewish kosher dietary requirements.
"If our children eat meat, for example, they don't need to know where it came from or who killed it. Our people eat to nourish the body, not the soul," the councilors wrote.'
They went way too far for me. And I'm sure they are being hypocritical too. Do the children also not need to know if food contains peanut oil, for example?
Then I found out that the place is 96% Catholic. I'll bet they didn't get the Pope's memo that state the Jews didn't kill Jesus because they didn't bother translating it into their
They didn't stop at Jews either:
'The newspaper said Sikhs were angered by the town's refusal to recognize the ceremonial daggers called kirpans men wear on their legs, while Jehovah's Witnesses protested the town saying doctors didn't require permission to perform blood transfusions.'
You know what, I agree with the above too. But the stupid Froggies had to take issue with Kosher food.
I have no problem with food stores not carrying Kosher foods if it isn't economically viable, but to introduce this into legislation is the height of assmonkeyness.
I know many readers will think I'm getting over defensive of "my people," I just want to say that Jews don't blow things up in the West and they don't look for new members. They don't reject medical procedures that save lives, and they don't carry weapons for religious purposes. They don't cover their faces either, sometimes just the top of their heads....this doesn't allow for potential dangerous situations or identification problems which could pose security problems one day.
But to some religious Jews, staying Kosher is important to them. And it is not a threat to anyone else.
These Froggies showed they are not trying to be prudent, just intolerant. Maybe someone should translate this video into Froggie for them:
I realize Quebec is starting to find out what Islam is all about, but it might be too late. I'm still routing for separation. Ever since I was jealous that my grade 8 French teacher had more hair on her chin than I did, I've had it in for the Froggies.
I can understand people's hesitancy about having a large community of people who do not share the same religious beliefs. I don't think, however, that this should deter people from embracing new people based on religion.
ReplyDeleteWhat would deter me, is not so much that someone has different religious rituals etc, but that some groups, especially islam and to an extent christianity, have their political worldview dtermined by their religious beliefs.
Especially in the case of fundamentalist muslims and christians. Their respective worldviews are that their religions must determine civil and common law. That makes them a political party more so than just individuals with a personal religious belief that they don't want to impose on anyone else.
What to you care about kosher food? You admit to never keeping kosher in your life. Another example of your hypocrisy.
ReplyDeleteHey Bacon,
ReplyDeleteThanks again for posting, In all honesty, I'm not sure if I'm up for this blogging thing.
And what you were saying on one of your posts on my blog, about being born into a muslim family, you'd be a muslim, or whatever religion happned to be around, and I guess you've got a point, actually a real good point. It's funny how my family will sit around the table at times and critisize even the smallest differences between denominations, and mind you we believe whole hearted that if aren't a disciple ie in the International Churches of Christ you weren't saved. anyway we still would discuss the "old" denominations, sometimes with pride. Like "hey I was a mainstream church of Christer, and you were a Lutheran" or worse "you were a Methodist" and don't even get me started on Catholics, hell we had classes on how to convert each group, even Mormons and JWs.
I should take that Bible literalist off my blog too, but that's another story.
Just so you know I was taking what you said and thought about it, I can see a possibility of childhood conditioning, heck the Bible says "train your children in the ways of God and he will not forsake it". We all are trained to instill our values in our young.
Here's a question, are you really 100% sure there isn't a hell?
But then again, I'm not really sold on the heaven thing so much either.
It's so ridiculous, but still you get that fear of hell.
I wouldn't mind just ceasing to exist, nothingness, that would be refreshing, worrying about salvation gets tiring. Hey it's late, I shouldn't be smoking weed either so take care.
(it's a nice place without that one guy! I'm sorry if I'm off topic again, youv'e got a good blog!)
Correct me if I'm wrong, but Halal and Kosher involve a slower death and a great deal more suffering to the animal. I agree absolutely with banning both as the fantasy nonsense of an individual or group should not give the deluded the right to inflict suffering on anything.
ReplyDeleteBeep, pretty much anyone who is against separation of church and state is what I'm against, and anyone who has a main desire to convert me or kill me is what I'm against.
ReplyDeleteRickey, on topic:) I think your hatred prevents you from thinking rationally. I am against any religious rules that would affect me.
Yes, I don't care if food is Kosher, I even said I could understand if there wasn't one Kosher item sold in that frog town, but it is retarded and intolerant to make it a law. The same is true with not allowing bibles in Saudi Arabia....and I'm not pro-NT either.
HG, interesting, I thought the main reason to be Christian is for the everlasting afterlife, not because of the fear of hell.
No, I can't disprove hell, but no evidence of the supernatural exists, so why should I believe it. If Christians are wrong and Muslims are right, Christians are screwed anyway....so we can play that game: what if the Muslims are right.
You only live once, enjoy it, smoking weed is OK as long as you don't get addicted to it or do harder drugs like coke and heroin, that are highly addictive.
As far as your blogging goes, it is up to you. Be as active or inactive as possible. You are still young, and at your age I was an Agnostic. Your views may change, the more you read and learn....you may become a Buddhist:)
CD, I am against not labelling food Kosher food. This town is doing it out of intolerance, not because they are animal rights advocates. And they are talking about all foods, not just meats.
I am an animal lover, though I regularly eat meat. I want animals to be slaughtered as humanely as possible. The Kosher slaughter is a debatable topic. Here is what Wikipedia says.
I'm not sure, if it makes the animal suffer more or not, if you are right, then of course, I would agree with you. There is no reason to make an animal suffer more over religious belief.
RE: BEAJ
ReplyDelete"Beep, pretty much anyone who is against separation of church and state is what I'm against, and anyone who has a main desire to convert me or kill me is what I'm against."
My sentiments as well.
RE: food and religious rituals
I couldn't care less what anyone else eats according to their religious rituals as long as they are not so convinced that they have "the truth" that they try and make it compulsory for me as well.
Since judaism by definition is bound by religious principles, your atheism thing is nothing more than a sham, like your life. You make up your own definition that doesn't fly.
ReplyDeleteBEAJ - that's a fascinating link re the kosher meat/food. I notice that a kosher slaughter is just one that went well and that the animals they fuck up on whilst slitting their throats so nicely just get sold to non-Jewish punters. Nice. There are also plenty of other groups out there contradicting the suffering message of the wikipedia article.
ReplyDeleteWhat a bunch of absolute nonsense it all is and how fantastically absurd that anyone takes it seriously. It's stupid enough that people think there is a god, but to think god obsesses about whether geletin has been changed by processig so sufficiently as to be considered ok is a bigger insult to their faith than I could ever think up. Utter madness! Good luck watering down the atheist message by coming out in support of that sort of twaddle.
Personally I see it rather like an English pacifist coming out in support of English football hooliganism over German football hooliganism because, well, they're English.
Rickey, Hitler didn't ask Jews if they believed in God, to what extent, and even if they were religious. So to Hitler and even to Jews and most of the world, a Jew is a Jew by religion and/or Atheist. You are the hypocrite, because I know for a fact that you go by ethnicity too.
ReplyDeleteCD, again I'm not trying to whitewash anything. I'm not an expert on animal slaughter, and I don't want to be one either. Of course, the idea of God worrying about what food someone eats is just as ridiculous an idea as God itself....but 90% of the planet believes in God and everyone has their own rituals.
How humane is a hunter with a not so great shot?
I believe the world would be a much better place if superstition was elimated, however, superstition is hardwired in us, and it will be light years before it disappears, if it ever disappears. In the meantime, I would rather have the superstitions stay out of government and public arenas as much as humanly possible.
And again, the French town doesn't care how an animal is killed or how much suffering it goes through, they want to ban people from labelling Kosher....and this includes pickles.
BEAJ - I agree with everything you say in your last comment. I just find it a bit odd to come out in defence of kosher. I don't know about Canada and the US, but in Europe halal and kosher means that groups are given special exemption from existing laws intended to reduce suffering based solely on their idiot religious beliefs. Anywhere that is stopped I see it as progress and, as an atheist; I certainly wouldn't invest a second of my time fighting against myself in support of their barbaric nonsense.
ReplyDeleteI don't see the bible in Saudi and the right to cut the throat of some animal to please a sky faerie as parallels. One is a personal, albeit stupid, choice; the other is choice over the life of something else. Individual fantasies should make absolutely no difference to best practices defined in law. Slaughter house practices require by law that the animal be stunned with a bolt in the head because it is deemed to cause less suffering. Exemption from the law due to ridiculous superstition is unacceptable. Separation of church and state is partial when the law of the state has special conditions for faith based actions. All of these special conditions need to be stamped on and the legal value of a faith should be the value of the sum of its evidence. Zero.
Ban halal and kosher slaughter or let any weirdo who claims the spirit in the rock at the bottom of his garden requires that he buggers his sheep to death before he eats them have his jollies. Anything else is hypocrisy, pure and simple.
Edited Edition of Rickey's new comment:
ReplyDeleteNow I understand the "atheist" *jew" thing: You c... Now I understand the "atheist" *jew" thing:
You can ignore the religious and most important side of that species. You can ignore all of the tenets. You can intermarry and assimilate. You can ignore the high holy days. You don't have to have kids. It's a free for all, you can do whatever you want without regard to your family, relatives, upbringing, etc. And if the rest of the siblings do it, it must be ok.
***********************
My reply, this is the last time I will publish an edited comment. Either it will entirely on topic and lay off personal insults, or it will be rejected.
Also, the Atheist Jew thing is pretty easy. I'm an ethnic Jew who doesn't see any evidence for the supernatural, so I reject it. But I will always be an ethnic Jew until the day I die. No human is obliged to believe or disbelieve anything.
Bacon correct me if I'm wrong but he's not so much coming out in favor of Kosher as he is coming out in favor of eating what ever the heck you want to eat.
ReplyDeleteJeffery Dahmer accepted, how is interfering with people's food choices ever anything but over invasive?
Traum, you are right. It is within everyones rights to know how an animal is killed, how the meat is cooked, or even who is cooking the meat, if someone wants to know.
ReplyDeleteCD, is talking about a different issue. He is sort of putting Kosher killing on an equal playing field with Jeffrey Dahmer cooking.
Actually I'm saying that I find it hypocritical that you defend a religious practice that virtually every animal welfare group on the planet, including those set up by government to advise on policy, says grealy increases the animals suffering over alternative methods of slaughter. I find it very hypocritical that you talk about separation of church and state but think nothing of the special status given to religious beleif in law that in this case trumps other law determined to be the right thing for the rest of us and the animals in question.
ReplyDeleteSo BEAJ - why the special status for Jewish reiligous eating practices that justifies their slaughter methods special status under law? As an atheist you agree with that? I find that pretty odd. I wonder what happens in your non-religious mind to justify religious exception.
If you think that's a different issue and I'm talking about Dahmer that's up to you. But you are defending ritualistic killing of an animal for what reason? Because you are ethnic Jewish and that's it. That's a pretty poor reason but perhaps you don't see the conflict between the rest of you attempts to model your thoughts rationally and this post in which you want to defend the right of others to follow cruel religious practices that are outside of the law with the absence of that faith.
CD, I don't know why you ignoring the points I've made:
ReplyDeleteI'm not an animal slaughter expert and I don't know whether an animal suffers more in general during a Kosher killing than a regular killing.
I've said that if it is in fact a more cruel way to do it, then I'm against it.
I've read bits and pieces both ways on this. So to me a this time, it is a disputable argument.
Again, the town isn't taking into consideration whether a Kosher kill is more or less humane or equally humane, it is making a law to basically prevent religious Jews from moving there. It is akin to making a law that shuls, mosques, or baptist churches aren't allowed to be erected in the town.....but y'all could come live here if you want.
Sure, my Jewish ethnicity is making more sensitive to this issue, but I've explained that here many times. I have family members who are religious Jews, many very secular, but who believe in God. And you can call it irrational to go to bat for them, but then again, you think it is irrational to support a sports team too.
BEAJ - sorry to push the point but it isn't the same as a law that shuts mosques or limits other religious practices because the faith based practice (and yes, I know I'm focussing on the meat here) is something that has been given special exception from existing law based solely on religious faith. Kosher and halal slaughter practices are just one example of the foot in the legal door way that religion already has and to defend one aspect of that is to invite that foot to stay there until they manage to push the door wide open.
ReplyDeleteI'm certainly not trying to irritate you with this line of reasoning but I think it's worthwhile to consider that opposing a ban on halal/kosher is supporting the right to exemption from law based solely on faith.
And yes, I do think supporting a sports team is irrational. Does that invalidate all of my opinions or just this completely unrelated one ;)
I don’t see what the big deal is. It’s a farm animal. It’s very creation is more to do with science money and digestion than anything else. Whether it gets its throat cut or a bolt in the head one way or another someone ends up throwing the thing on a bbq or their car seat.
ReplyDeleteHave you spent anytime near live cattle? They are basically big gold fish. Kosher cattle and chickens get fed without steroids and have to live in a way that they can walk around and have at least a semi animal like natural existence. Same thing for free range. Non Kosher chickens never leave the coop and get pumped full of steroids. 3 weeks from the first cell division to the market shelf. If they tired to stand up their legs would break the bones are so weak.
Ultimately its like you are arguing over the treatment of the egg you are frying or the burger you are eating.
CD, you did that experiment where you said you seeded a human egg with sperm then applied bleach and fire to it after cell division started. I can hardly believe you are busting BEAJ’s chops over this.
I thought it was nice of the Hulkster to go out of his way for his Kosher neighbours. I always thought he was a mench even when he went Hollywood.
Excellent points on the quality of the life of a Kosher animal prior to the slaughter Jhrhv, and the bred to be slaughtered point too, although uncomfortable to think about, is right on as well.
ReplyDeleteCD, I brought up the sports team analogy not to invalidate you but to validate my support of Jews. We had this "debate" in an earlier post. No matter how irrational it is, I got a big ruchs when the Toronto Blue Jays won the World Series...and the rush and happiness were real. I do have a sense of pride when a Jew accomplishes something, no matter how irrational it is. These feelings don't make me believe God is a possibility though.
I agree with Bacon! How the hell does selling religious food infridge on the rights and liberties of others.
ReplyDeleteAs far as Kosher goes, I agree that its need updating for the 21st century.
But lets not forget that the whole point of Kosher laws was to be as humane as possible (for the time). It was thought that eating a calf's meat and drinking his mothers milk at the same time was cruel, hense no milk and meat.
But as technology in the last 50 years has changed the game, so should Kosher laws. Rabbis should recognize the spirit and reasons of the laws and not the focus on the details.
Jhrhv,
ReplyDeleteIt wouldn’t matter if kosher cattle are read poetry, given twice daily massages with aromatic oils, given ipods full of relaxing music and driven to the slaughter house in a Rolls Royce because the point is not their life but the special legal status of the method of their death – based solely on faith.
It wasn’t me that did the experiment. That was Vile Blasphemer over at Desecrate Holy Books. The only human eggs I’ve fertilized are both doing well in secondary school.
I’m not trying to bust BEAJ’s chops over this or anything. I just find it distinctly odd and possibly not very well thought out to come out in defence of a practice that is certainly against his wider beliefs because it is a defence of special recognition and treatment of an otherwise illegal action due to faith. If the law makes any exception on religious grounds then you are in the very dodgy territory of having to negotiate where to draw the line. For an atheist to support that situation is very difficult for me to understand, and I think very difficult to justify.
BEAJ – Enjoy what you enjoy. I have no problem with that. But I sincerely doubt that evolution resulted in a trait to feel massive and genuine joy dependent upon where you see some strangers hit a little ball. I also doubt that you find any rational grounds to consider where the ball goes to be important unless you have money on the game. Most people would have a problem if I said I’m a white guy and I’m proud when other whites accomplish something but as soon as we enter ethnic territory suddenly being proud of actions you had nothing to do with based solely on an ethnic similarity is an admirable and valid view. It’s all rubbish.
If no one had told you that you are a Jew you wouldn’t even know about it, let alone feel proud for the actions of strangers because of it. Likewise if you hadn’t been educated that baseball is great you wouldn’t give a toss where the little ball goes and you’d be dumbstruck to explain why so many people seem to care. But all of this is irrelevant. The only point I actual want to make is already made – opposing the kosher/halal ban is supporting special exemption from the law for a religious practice, and in this case one that involves the death of another animal.
CD, we are told what we are. And we are hardwired by evolution to route for anyone near and dear to us or closer to us by territory.
ReplyDeleteHave you ever seen how tribal and territorial chimps are?
Do you think a chimp in one tribe routes for chimps of another tribe when a territorial war begins?
Do beta monkeys worship alpha males from other monkey tribes?
They are the same species. Who taught them that one monkey is better than another.
Who taught chimps that one tribe is better than another?
It is part of survival which is innate in us, to support those most like us.
Family and things like the Holocaust forever bond me with being a Jew, and being proud of Jews who accomplish something.
I'm the same way when it comes to Atheists too. And Canadians as well. It trickles all the way to local team support, where I live.
I'm not saying it isn't irrational today, but it wasn't so irrational on our journey to become rational humans.
We are prewired to believe in fantasy as well, it comes with our ability to think ahead, and create and invent.
I agree this law is misguided, but what does this have to do with the "froggy language"?
ReplyDeleteDon't you find it a little ironic to try to fight intolerance by posting slurs and generalizations about other ethnicities?
Just today I posted a bunch of photos of shops in my town that are cultural oddities. I thought about posting a picture of my friendly neighborhood kosher market, but decided against it because it's not a curiosity and I couldn't think of a funny caption for it... ;-)
C.L., it is my way of being affectionate:)
ReplyDeleteActually you are just being your usual hypocrite self.
ReplyDeletejackass.