Death To Islam.org

As mentioned here previously, earlier this month a group of Salafist radicals attacked members of Pro-NRW during a street demonstration in Bonn. One of the Islamic radicals on the scene that day was the cute ’n’ cuddly Reda Seyam.

Below is Mr. Seyam’s answer to a question posed by a reporter from Spiegel TV regarding his participation in the riots in Bonn on May 5, 2012. Many thanks to Hermes for the translation, and to Vlad Tepes for the subtitling:


A full transcript is below the jump:

00:02		Berlin, Friday morning. Spiegel TV is on its way
00:06		to Reda Seyam, one of the main Islamists in Germany.
00:10		He was last seen at the Salafist riots in Bonn.
00:13		‘Reda Seyam!
00:15		Mr. Seyam, for Spiegel TV, Hello.
00:17		You were also in Bonn, why were you there?’
00:20		‘Make no questions.’
00:22		‘Mr. Seyam, what are you doing?’
00:24		‘Make no questions.’
00:26		‘What are you doing?’ R.S. - ‘Make no questions!’
00:31		Bring here the camera.
00:33		Give me the camera.
00:35		GIVE ME THE CAMERA!!!’ Reporter: ‘Mr. Seyam!’
00:39		‘Give me...’ (growls)
00:41		The attack on the freedom of the press ends with material damages
00:45		worth thousands of euros, and for Reda Seyam a formal
00:49		charge from the police due to an attempt to cause serious injuries.
00:52		More on this Sunday evening at 22:15 from Spiegel TV in RTL.

For a complete listing of previous enrichment news, see The Cultural Enrichment Archives.

Today is the third annual “Everybody Draw Mohammed Day”. In honor of the occasion, Proud Kafir has contributed his latest impression of Islam’s prophet:


(Click the small image to see a larger version, or visit Vlad’s place.)
Thank you, Proud Kafir!

I don’t know how many people will observe EDMD this year — interest tailed off after the first year — but this blog is a staunch upholder of tradition. May the blasphemous Mohammeds multiply!

An author and former Christian missionary in Murfreesboro, Tennessee wants Christians to reach out in friendship to Muslims. He says that’s what Jesus would have done.

Meanwhile, Muslims in Kansas rallied in front of the statehouse to protest against the newly-passed “American Laws for American Courts” bill. They urged Gov. Brownback not to sign the Islamophobic bill into law.

In other news, if you live in England, make sure you don’t miss the “invisible art” exhibition in the Hayward Gallery in London. It’s certain to be the most significant aesthetic event of the 21st century. Interestingly enough, the architectural style of the Hayward Gallery is listed as “Brutalist”.

To see the headlines and the articles, open the full news post.

Thanks to C. Cantoni, Egghead, Insubria, JD, JP, Steen, and all the other tipsters who sent these in.

Notice to tipsters: Please don’t submit extensive excerpts from articles that have been posted behind a subscription firewall, or are otherwise under copyright protection.

Commenters are advised to leave their comments at this post (rather than with the news articles) so that they are more easily accessible.

Caveat: Articles in the news feed are posted “as is”. Gates of Vienna cannot vouch for the authenticity or accuracy of the contents of any individual item posted here. We check each entry to make sure it is relatively interesting, not patently offensive, and at least superficially plausible. The link to the original is included with each item’s title. Further research and verification are left to the reader.

The accusation of “censorship” in our comments recurs from time to time. The issue is as old as the conflation of liberty with license.

Some people seem to think that unless they can say whatever they want to say, to anyone, anywhere, any time, under any circumstances, then their “freedom of speech” is being violated.

This is, of course, nonsense. But the accusation of “censorship” keeps cropping up, despite my earnest and repeated attempts to refute it. Two would-be commenters whose comments were not approved hurled it at me tonight.

So I will repeat myself one more time: “Censorship” cannot possibly occur here, because this is NOT a public forum.

This is a private forum, the virtual equivalent of our living room. Readers are invited into the room to enjoy tea and sarnies with their hosts. But if they become rowdy or pugnacious, they may be ejected. The judgment of whether ejection is necessary resides with Dymphna and myself, and no one else.

This is not censorship, because you remain free to establish your own blog and say what you wish to say there. In fact, one of tonight’s complainants already has his own blog (another Blogspot account, if I remember rightly), and he promptly published his comment as a post when I failed to approve it.

In other words, he had exactly the same freedom of speech that Dymphna and I enjoy. Same privileges, same platform. So how exactly was he “censored”?

Good grief.

Even if we failed in our attempt to avoid the wrath of Blogger, and Blogger were to shut us down, its action would not constitute “censorship”. This blog is hosted by a private commercial service, to whose terms we agreed when we opened our account. They may close our blog at their discretion, and that does not violate our right of free speech in any way.

For censorship to occur, we would have to be arrested and hauled into court by the government for voicing our opinions. That is the meaning of the word “censorship”.

To recapitulate the history of the issue: we have never allowed totally open, no-holds-barred commenting. Before we started moderating comments, Dymphna and I had a policy of deleting comments that violated our clearly-posted guidelines, but such comments were not removed until after they were posted.

Our motives for doing this were twofold: to enforce an atmosphere of civil discourse, which we feel enables a more productive exchange of ideas, and to avoid being sanctioned for the words of commenters who engage in incitement or other activities that violate Blogger’s terms of service.

After the Butcher of Utøya went on his murderous spree last July, the spotlight of scrutiny was directed at us in a way that had never occurred before. It quickly became clear that the Multicultural Left, with its allies in the media and government, was waiting for us to make a misstep. We experienced a surge of provocateurs, trolls, and other infiltrators, some of whom were obviously tasked with creating a casus belli in our comments section that would justify action against us.

As a result, we shut down comments for a time. Later in August we reopened them, but from then on they were moderated — every comment required pre-approval. This allows us to keep the comments of the trolls and the moles from ever seeing the light of day.

The new regime inspired a new rule: If we have to think more than thirty seconds about whether a comment should be approved, we delete it. Period. We rely on our intuition: if a comment seems hinky, it’s hinky — out it goes.

Does that irritate you? Very well, then; you are irritated. The stakes are high, and irritating a commenter here and there is inevitable. It’s an unfortunate side-effect of our current working environment.

*   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *   *
I recommend that anyone who feels he is being “censored” by our failure to approve comments read the guidelines for commenters, as referred to in this blog’s comments form. You’ll see this reminder:

The most important thing to remember about the rules is this: The determination of whether any comment is in compliance is at the sole discretion of this blog’s owners.

This may seem unfair, but there is a good reason for the tightening of our standards. We are now under close scrutiny by hostile observers who are eager to find a pretext for shutting this blog down.

The consequences of a mistake are different for commenters than they are for the blog’s owners. You, the irritated commenter, may suffer the inconvenience of having your comment fail to appear here and be forced to post it at another site, or have it go unread.

We, on the other hand, face the possible closure of Gates of Vienna if the language appearing on our site is inappropriate. When our choice is between irritating a would-be commenter or having our blog closed, it’s no contest.

That was true last August, when the Breivik madness first descended upon us, and it’s true today. I’m very aware of the extent to which our writings are monitored. I have no intention of handing ammunition to those eager apparatchiks who would use it against us.

To refer to comment-screening as “censorship” debases the very currency of the English language. It’s like calling a cutback in NEA grants “the equivalent of the Holocaust”, or referring to Tea Party people carrying signs as “terrorists”. It makes certain words and phrases essentially meaningless.

After a while, the word “censorship” means no more than “I didn’t get my way! WAH-H-H-H!”

To those who say you have been “censored”: You have not. Your assertion is spurious.

Your speech is as free as mine. Go ahead and exercise it. The Internet is open to you.

We simply enforce our own rules, in our own forum.

Deal with it.

The Endowment for Middle East Truth sends this invitation to a notable event to be held just over a month from now in Washington D.C., honoring five staunch opponents of shariah.

Endowment for Middle East Truth
presents

7:00 PM June 21, 2012 in the Nation’s Capitol

Our Annual Rays of Light in the Darkness Dinner
is proud to award the Speaker of Truth Award to:

• The Hon. John Bolton: Former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations, advocate for American and Israeli security
  
• Senator Mark Kirk: Leading Republican Sponsor of the Kirk-Menendez amendment tightening sanctions against Iran
  
• Rep. Allen West: Retired U.S. Army Lt. Colonel, and one of the most articulate andoutspoken opponent of radical Islam
  
• Simon Deng: Former child slave, abolitionist, advocate of South Sudan independence, strong supporter of Israel and advocate for UN reform
  
• Cynthia Farahat: Coptic Christian, Egyptian political activist and scholar

Register Today at www.EMETonline.org

Don’t Delay, Prices Go Up May 31st!

EMET makes every effort to honor Republican and Democratic lawmakers at each Rays of Light Dinner. We are awaiting confirmation from our Democratic honoree, but act now and secure your seat for this wonderful event!

EMET is pro-democracy, pro-USA, and pro-Israel with the mission to educate policymakers on Capitol Hill and the general population by organizing panels and briefings with international experts, and we meet face to face with Senators, House Members and their staff. We are a tax exempt 501(c)3 think tank and policy shop focusing on issues regarding the Middle East, Israel and U.S. national security.