yeah, I feel the same way all too often

notice, by the way, how the media and various people's by now entrenched habit of inaccurately calling the building a 'mosque' rather than a 'community center' also serves the cause of intellectual dishonesty

'mosque' focuses the mind on purely religious activity, which makes it easier to view and speak of this affair in abstractions, like "Islam" versus the West

whereas 'community center' is a clearer reminder that we're speaking about multi-dimensional human beings who are not reducible to just the religion they practice, whose community is part of an American city and the American fabric, who are themselves Americans or permanent residents, and so on

Btw the media really should just refuse to go film this thing, the less coverage the better. They have the right to do something dumb and offensive like burn the Quo'ran, but they dont have the right to get wall to wall coverage on 24hr news when doing so.

As well as urging them not to do so they should also urge the media to keep away.

The point is that it is used as a rallying point and symbol for religious based conquest/violence.

See: The Crusades (hint: Constantinople was where the first one was assembled and launched).

And why exactly would Jerusalem (or Israel) be offensive to Muslims?

And this offends muslims according to you?

Because the situation of the Palastinian people concerns a lot of muslims. I'm not saying that it would offend muslims but if Cordoba would be offensive Jerusalem and Israel would be offensive too.

Well, sectarian violence between Coptic Christians and Muslims there flares up from time to time. It is nothing new in history.

Also, and my main reason for mentioning Egypt and Constantinople is due to the fact that Constantinople was the center of the Byzantine Empire, which conquered and ruled Egypt at one time.

This is how symbolism works.


Except Jerusalem is pretty much the third most holy city after Mecca and Medina to the Muslims, so Jerusalem shouldn't at all offend any Muslim and it would be completely puzzling if it did.

I'd say there would be a similar issue if, say, a Jewish community center called "Israel house" was built right at the site of a deadly IDF attack where a large number of Palestinian citizens in Gaza were killed. I think that would be a really ****ing stupid move in the same manner, too.

I guess Roman catholic churches, the church of England and mosques with imam's or financing from Turkey are offensive too.

Probably within certain contexts, yes. And they probably don't go very far in accomplishing the goal of "interfaith dialogue" either.

Surprise surprise, people get offended and react to symbolic things and gestures of stuff that happened way before they were born.

Except that it's a church, taunting them even more!

I still think being offended by the name is the dumbest thing I've heard about this center. If someone would be offended by the location I could understand it, although I disagree, but for some reason I can't understand the controversy about the name.

sounds like Hatfield/McCoy of religions feuding.

Montius,

This is Imam Rauf on the name "Cordoba House:"

(Source)

I hardly think "Cordoba" is the unequivocal insult you're making it out to be, and there is certainly an element of ignorance or willful offense-taking in reading "Cordoba" as an obvious taunt or sinister message. Calling the Imam's organization stupid (or worse) for choosing "Cordoba" is pretty much invidious cherry-picking.

It's especially loltastic considering the muslims lost Cordoba to christians...

Why?

To restore the good name of Islam in the eyes of non-Muslims? Who would care?

We're people, we see those within our tribe as individuals, and those outside are tribe as a unified "them".

So to a Muslim who hates terrorists, he doesn't have to do anything to distance himself, they already seem far away to him.

I hate the cowardly, wasteful foreign policy the US has had since 9/11, but I'm not going to take up arms to stop it -- or do anything to distance myself from it.

I know who the Imam is and I know why he says he chose the name.

But the historical fact of the matter is that Cordoba was not some magical place where Muslims, Christians, and Jews lived in harmony and equality. Claiming it was either shows a very dishonest narrative of history, or an ignorant one. It is also a fact that it was used as a symbol of Islamic triumph of al-Andalus. No ignorance here.

Either the Imam knew this and chose it anyway (draw your own conclusions here), or he is very ignorant of the history. Either it was stupid (from the standpoint of promoting interfaith dialogue, etc) and well-meaning, or it was...well...worse.

Where the **** do you think they are? They are at the front lines. Did you not read what happened in Iraq not too long ago? We passed the torch of fighting all the Evil Muslims there to...wait for it..........think for a second more....................that's right, a bunch of Muslims. Iraqis are risking their lives every single day fighting insurgents and terrorists so that Americans can come home to safety, and you'd have some pastor in Florida piss all over their efforts when they're doing the fighting for us?

It wasn't a magical place but it was probably the most tolerant area of it's time. Just like the Ottoman Empire was probably the most tolerant empire of it's day. Still not tolerant if you compare it with tolerance in some countries these days though.
It was also a symbol of wealth, knowledge and (relative) enlightenment. If you ban this name you can probably find a case for banning every name.

People being offended by the name choose to be offended by this imo. I bet most protesters didn't even know (and still don't) where Cordoba is and what it's history was.

By the way, Cordoba is also a symbol of christian dominace over muslims...

Man how stunning was it when No.1 Pencil started out like "I'm just playing devil's advocate I'm really quite liberal" and then a few posts later ended up writing **** like "I have nothing against Muslims, but am of the opinion that they should be at the forefront in the war against fighting these extremist terrorists who have (as they should claim) hijacked their religion for violent means. I could be wrong, but I'm not sure I see this as being the case."???

It'd have been a little more surprising if the same thing didn't happen in the GZ Mosque thread, but whatever.

Cool.

Here is a fairly short, layperson-friendly article that gives a glimpse into the reality and subsequent historiographical signification of "Cordoba." Like you say, it was not "some magical place" and did not in fact embody a perfect ideal of harmony and equality. But it was also not some brutally repressive Islamic regime that exemplified intolerance and that straightforwardly insults non-Muslims. As the article shows, Cordoba displayed a temporally limited and 'medieval' level of cohabitation, interaction, and more or less fragile coexistence between different faiths.

Yeah, this is where you lose the thread. "Cordoba" is a complex historical signifier whose meaning and symbolism are not straightforward, neither on the side of idealized interfaith harmony, nor on the side of sinister messaging about Islamic supremacy and the belittling of all else. The Imam -- in choosing the name "Cordoba" for his initiative -- is guilty neither of massive stupidity and ignorance, nor of nefarious plots and intentions. He is guilty at most of idealizing a prosaic and ambivalent past. The alternatives you offer are hysterical, in the medical sense: Either the Imam is "very ignorant" and "stupid" or (and this is were you grow positively ridiculous) his choice of Cordoba "was ... well ... worse" and "draw your own conclusions." This kind of hinting at obscure malevolence and shadowy motives simply from the selection of the name "Cordoba" is juvenile.

Your complaints and posts on this issue reduce essentially to sober historical criticism of an idealized symbol chosen by the Imam -- which is fine as far as it goes -- but you go on to inflate the importance, ominousness, and severity of all of this in your tone and phrasing -- which is cheap and inflammatory.

Stop it.

Yet you conveniently said in your OP the group had their rights but forgot to mention the general had his too. And you know what I find funny? The fact that you keep saying/implying that Patraeus is a coward, but haven't said anything like that about the book burners. Sorry, but you're coming off as very slanted here...

Censorship =/= telling fanatics to not do something ridiculous, pointless, and guaranteeing to piss off enemies. Patraeus isn't trying to take away another person's say, he's just telling them not to rattle a beehive. I mean, just what the hell does their little stunt accomplish? Besides, he would absolutely suck at his job if he didn't try to limit the number of things that could endanger us, right?

What's the difference who says it? I don't care as long as the message gets out that what they're doing isn't logically sound and will stir unnecessary raw emotion.

imagine if no one said what the possible repercussions would be of the book burning. It happens, some violence breaks out and American Soldiers are killed.

You know someone would be mistified that no one gave warning.

There is NO mosque why do people still think this?

Give me a ****ing break. Pencil was correct earlier in this thread when he said he was seeing Stockholm syndrome.

Why is it that people like [Phil] bash Christians at every opportunity but does not at all question the intention of Muslims.

Also to JasoninDallas you call those who are offended by the ground zero mosque idiots? I would like to hear you say that to the families of the 9/11 victims who are offended.

Do not be intimidated by people on this forum who call everyone who disagrees with them a bigot.

I've said in another thread - I think this is largely political. Its very useful for politicians to foster the belief that the world is divided into us versus them. Apparently the anti-mosque attacks started by a right wing blogger, was picked up by Fox news and then spread. I know the other day I had Fox on and saw anti-mosque ads running (that I have not seen anywhere else)

Then you had the Beck rally which, from what I heard, sounded very much like 'its time for the real Americans; Christians, to take back the country.' You have conservative pundits (like Beck) who constantly paint the threat that the US is on the verge of collapse.

Since Obama's been in office there's been many attempts to paint his as a Muslim.

We have politicians campaigning that if you don't vote Republican, Christianity will disappear and a Godless society will emerge.

And suddenly we have Muslims being attacked (physically and through words), their places of worship are arsoned, attempts are made to block them from creating new places of worship and, of course, we have a preacher burning their Holy Books.

And the elections are just around the corner. Wheeeee!