Something I am wondering for some time, before I start, I want to announce this have nothing to do with metalstorm or behavior of people here (well, there were few examples though), it is about religion in general, actually, about anti-religion, some kind racism, precisely hate speech and religious intolerance. Also, I would like to say, I am not religious, I am an Orthodox Christian by birth, never followed or practise that religious since or any other.

Now to the point, in every day life I see a lot things and contradictories that are pissing me off, whole idea for a thread came when I saw Dutch movie Fitna, you probably already heard about it, it is about Islam, scenarist was accused for hate speech while movie is called racist?! (since when religion and race are connected) and hateful. In the movie, they put strong anti-muslim accent, doesn't matter does I support or not whole concept of the movie, to sum it up, man that made a movie was literally impaled in the media because of the whole project.

Also, we have a bunch of movies that never ever got permission to be shown on tv about anti-judaism, (and please do not invert my words, anti-judaism and anti-semitism is not one the same), they were immediately shown as racist and hateful in the media, not rarely people were even imprisoned for making them.

Now, we have a bunch of anti-Christian movies on tv, that no one never ever bash as racist, that are shown daily on tv, no one ever question religious correctness of those movies, truth, mostly Christian by birth made those movies, but again, as someone declare himself as an anti-Christian what difference does it makes?

Question is, WHY is it ok to bash on Christianity and it is NOT ok to bash on any other religion and immediately it is characterized as hateful speech?

Examples in music, Ukrainian band Nokturnal Mortum had both anti-judaistic and anti-Christian lyrics, no one ever question anti-Christian part cause that's ok, but everyone bitch about anti-judaism?! What's with that?

80% of you are openly anti-Christian, and bash on Christianity on this forum and real life most probably, same as some metalstormers I know, once, I said to one member in real life damn they want to build stupid mosque in the middle of the town and he looked at me like that I said Gods knows what and told me don't be a racist (again?!), but never ever he said anything to me when I dozens of times said that Cathedral in the center of the town should be burned? (yeah, a little of trve metal behavior..)

Once on this forum member said to other member stop with you judaistic crap, I remember that very well, post was deleted and he got warned for racism again, but I also saw DOZENS of time members saying similar things like stop your Christian crap to other members and no one ever got warned for that.

Why is it ok to bitch about Christianity and it is blasphemy to bitch about all other organized religions (especially Islam and Judaism)?!?

Looks like a double standard to me...

I conpletely understand your point, and nobody could of really explained it better than you could of man.

I wish I had an answer, or something to help reply.

The same concept goes on around the holidays. A shop could not call them "Christmas Trees" but had to call them "Holiday Trees" because of other religions. I said holiday comes from holy-day, and in Christianity there are only three holidays: Christmas, Easter, and Good Friday. I would like a CHRISTMAS TREE please.

I dont see why since this war in the middle east started that every other religion than Christianity must be more respected. I am a Christian, I have nothing to hide, but I also wont go bashing any other religion. It just pisses me off when people of other religions bitch about anything that has to do with their religion, then blaming Christians. I told this one guy from Egypt, dont know what his religion was but he was bitching about how there wasn't something in this town (he was an exchange student). I told him, "Stop your bitching, this town isnt going to change just for you". Suddenly my friends and I are "mean".

So yea, I get your point Anorax but unfortunately I have no answer or anything that could help make sense of this, even though there isnt anything for this to make sense. Your completely right and most of these people act childish over it all.

Interesting topic, I've been thinking about this actually. Like in this country any religion can come, worship in whatever way they want, build places of worship etc. whereas in many Muslim countries Christians arn't allowed to build churches or express thier faith, yet when people of other religions come here they whine on whenever someone says or does something that offends their religion. I hate political correctness!

I think the difference lies in the attitude of the religions themselves. From my own experience (which, granted is not much and does not mean much anyway), Christians are more relaxed about people who have different beliefs. I can be friends with Christians, even though I am not a Christian myself. Perhaps there are some people in my friends-circle who are Christians of which I simply do not know it. What I'm trying to explain, is that it does not matter that much overhere if you're Christian or not. However, this seems to work differently for Muslims*. They seem to be much faster offended, for example when I declare I do not believe in Allah.

So basically, your question:

Why is it ok to bitch about Christianity and it is blasphemy to bitch about all other organized religions (especially Islam and Judaism)?!?

It appears to me because Christians simply care less about people with different beliefs.

* I cannot state often enough how this is not intended to be offending. This is from my experience, and I realizy very well that my opinion is based for at leaat 90% on what I hear through the media.

I heard that the piggies for gathering coins will be banned in the Netherlands since the muslim immigrants think that pigs are filthy animals....for sure...seems that because of the influx of the muslim immigrants whole Europe should ban Christianity all in all....my..some of them would be happy....
I personally have nothing against other religions but I dislike when a religion demands too many rights for itself on my territory and says that my way of life is evil....

I find it sad when people who preach open-mindedness and freedom for all (like the hippies in my town) complain about the radical Christian group "Repent America" protesting on my college campus. I understand that they are basically a hate group, with signs that say stuff like "FAGS WILL BURN IN HELL" and "NO MUDPEOPLE SHOULD RUN THE USA" (Obama was just in town speaking at my university), but if you believe that everyone should have the right to protest then that means everyone. People need to respect and appreciate the right to organized protest, especially when you look at the current situation in Tibet.

Written by Lucas on 08.04.2008 at 21:39

I think the difference lies in the attitude of the religions themselves. From my own experience (which, granted is not much and does not mean much anyway), Christians are more relaxed about people who have different beliefs. I can be friends with Christians, even though I am not a Christian myself. Perhaps there are some people in my friends-circle who are Christians of which I simply do not know it. What I'm trying to explain, is that it does not matter that much overhere if you're Christian or not. However, this seems to work differently for Muslims*. They seem to be much faster offended, for example when I declare I do not believe in Allah.

So basically, your question:

Why is it ok to bitch about Christianity and it is blasphemy to bitch about all other organized religions (especially Islam and Judaism)?!?

It appears to me because Christians simply care less about people with different beliefs.

* I cannot state often enough how this is not intended to be offending. This is from my experience, and I realizy very well that my opinion is based for at leaat 90% on what I hear through the media.

Well yes, that too is the reason, but I am talking about society in general, you know someone do not have to be a Muslim to call me a racist when I speak about islam, like my friend is, why is Islam, Judaism... taboo topic in society? I have a feeling that media strucked that crap into human minds that bashing on those religions is bad while it is ok to bash on Christianity. If you get me from my lame English, for example, anti-Muslim movie like Fitna will be bashed by everyone including Christians that would not be offended by Anti-christian movie, I mean, you're Dutch, you must know the situation since with Fitna movie.

By my opinion, why would I care anyway, if I am bashing on Christianity, I am not doing because no one cares so I can make myself important, but because I believe in what I am saying, I will laso bash on Islam and Judaism equally even though I know they're more sensitive, why? Because my intension is not to insult Christians, Jews or anyone else, but because I find it important, and I am brining out my opinion, not doing that cause of others, doing that for me.

Someone mentioned immigrants, damn, why would immigrants have more right in let say my country so I can't bash on their religion? Why would they dictate my way of life in my house? IF they already came here to live isn't it logical to accept and respect rules of the country they came in, and not to complain we don't want this, we don't want this, do not play that movie it insults our religion blah blah blah, that makes me sick. It is ridiculous that immigrants destroy half of Denmark just because they do not like some cartoon, common, and that is exactly what I had in mind.

Written by Ernis on 08.04.2008 at 21:41

I heard that the piggies for gathering coins will be banned in the Netherlands since the muslim immigrants think that pigs are filthy animals....for sure...seems that because of the influx of the muslim immigrants whole Europe should ban Christianity all in all....my..some of them would be happy....
I personally have nothing against other religions but I dislike when a religion demands too many rights for itself on my territory and says that my way of life is evil....

That pig, "Norbert", was the symbol of saving money from the bank Fortis. Indeed, they switched to a more neutral icon/symbol for their bank. But they are only one bank, and this will not mean that these saving-pigs are out of the stores or anything like that.

@Aronax Of Steel:

I think my argument does not only apply on the religious people themselves, but also on the society as a whole. The reason why your friend calls you a racist, or in other words, critizes you, is probably because he's scared for the judgment of the mass, or for muslims themselves.

Yeah Nervel, got that, I knew that, but what I don't know is why is that?

It is not logical, damn...

Why? Because we don't dare to find this out for ourselves? Because our response to danger is to be scared, cause it provides a higher accuracy and awareness, thus a bigger chance of survival?

Or maybe because care more how we will pay rent for the house, car, care more what chick we'll screw tonight, care more how drunk are we gonna get?

It is not that hard to control the mass that don't even care to find out the truth or some other "dangerous" things, idiot will believe in everything you say, and bigger mass will easier believe in bigger lies than into the small ones, same works with propaganda.

It is not that much that we don't dare, I'd rather say we don't care, it is all about priorities.

Damn, I am sick of this, already said that dozens of times though haha

I agree with Anorax. Denigrating Christianity has almost become the norm in Western countries, but the moment anything is said about Islam there's a big uproar. However, I think the different reactions are more to do with the different levels of devoutness that these groups have. In Europe, religious fervour (i.e. Christian fervour) is slowly dying. Church attendance is low, fewer people pray every day, and in general not all that many give a damn about organised religion. I've heard the saying "In this country people only go to Church three times in their lives, and they're carried in on two of them" so many times from European people that it's gotten old. With Islam, it's different, as there aren't all that many "non-practising Muslims" going around. Therefore, they react really badly to anything that's said about their religion, because they take it so seriously. With Judaism, it's different again. I think people are always like "oh you can't say anything against the Jews and if you do you're a racist and a Nazi" because of all the crap that's been heaped on this group of people over a number of centuries. It's kinda like how blacks are allowed to be racist towards everyone, but if anyone is racist towards blacks then major shit hits the fan.

Written by Judas on 11.04.2008 at 11:38

With Judaism, it's different again. I think people are always like "oh you can't say anything against the Jews and if you do you're a racist and a Nazi" because of all the crap that's been heaped on this group of people over a number of centuries. It's kinda like how blacks are allowed to be racist towards everyone, but if anyone is racist towards blacks then major shit hits the fan.

Exactly!

...I am not going into on how many corpses Israely diplomacy is raised. :

Written by APOHAKC on 11.04.2008 at 14:43

Written by Judas on 11.04.2008 at 11:38

With Judaism, it's different again. I think people are always like "oh you can't say anything against the Jews and if you do you're a racist and a Nazi" because of all the crap that's been heaped on this group of people over a number of centuries. It's kinda like how blacks are allowed to be racist towards everyone, but if anyone is racist towards blacks then major shit hits the fan.

Exactly!

...I am not going into on how many corpses Israely diplomacy is raised. :

sorry dude but considering the fact that for 5000 years the Jewish people have been persecuted, i'm not at all surprised with the espionage and other shit that Israel pulled lately.

really, i'm not agreeing in any way with any of these double standards, especially the one about muslims(the piggies, the mohammed cartoons) imo all those i saw protesting about the stupid cartoons are complete brainless zealots. i mean, if someone else 'burns in hell'(LOL) why should you care? there was one emir or something that promised a heap of gold to whomever killed the guy who made those comics...

Judas: Christianity = religion. Jews are an ethnic group.

Regarding Judaism, as many people have mentioned before, the hole halocoust things that makes it sensitive, but I think the biggest reason is that jews can be both a "beliver of faith" and simply an etnhic group, that make things more complicated. That's why most people get uppset when you are anti-judaism, as they think you mean the ethnic group and not the religion.

When it comes to Islam, I think people's generalizion is to blame. We know that many muslims are from the middle east, but people think that ALL from the midlle east are muslims. So when you insult Islam, many think that you also insulting ALL people from the middle east, and not their religon. That's why people react.

Yup, do not get me wrong, I am not talking about Jews, but about Judaism.

What 5000 years of persecution, that's ridiculous, couldn't care less for Judeo-Christian myths, that is exactlywhat I was talking about. Christians were more persecuted in the times of Rome by those stories and yet no one whines about that anymore, maybe we should ask people of Jordan and similar countries what kind of payback Israel had in the region, I am not talking about mindless wars in the modern history, excuse me, but I will keep my right of free speech and call myself upon the declaration of human rights, article 19. which stands for:

"Every person have the freedom to speak or give its own opinion on the matter, and can spread information and its own ideas with any means, regardless of the boundaries"

So, if I speak about things I hate in Judaism and they will call upon their biblical suffering and forbid me to talk I'll call that violation of human rights, beside pathetic is the person that can defend his believes only by shutting the other persons mouth, especially with some thigns that may or may not happen.

Written by -tom- on 11.04.2008 at 23:00

Judas: Christianity = religion. Jews are an ethnic group.

Actually, a Jew is anyone who adheres to Judaism, therefore it's a religious designation. There are ethnic differences between the Jews. Ashkenazi, Sephardic, Mizrahi... Not to mention the other groups further afield like the Bene Israeli, the Beta Israeli, the Cochin Jews etc. But I do understand that in today's day and age, we don't distinguish between Judaism and Jewry, so for practical purposes your statement is sound.

Written by APOHAKC on 12.04.2008 at 03:29

What 5000 years of persecution, that's ridiculous, couldn't care less for Judeo-Christian myths

well ok not actually 5000 years, but:

-there are factual evidences for the Egyptian slavery, which lasted for 400 years
-the persecution during the roman times
-medieval persecution(by collective resent towards the money-lending jews who were ocasionally slaughtered casually, also the ban from the Jerusalem area by the Byzantines and the Crusaders)
-modern day persecution(holocaust, munich 72 etc.)

the Egyptian slavery was not against jews, it was against people of Israel, not all of them were jews actually judaism itself came during this period, and promesed saving its followers to be saved from the pharaonic persecution.But no one would deny that jews went through very severe periods.

Written by Valentin B on 13.04.2008 at 19:31

Written by APOHAKC on 12.04.2008 at 03:29

What 5000 years of persecution, that's ridiculous, couldn't care less for Judeo-Christian myths

well ok not actually 5000 years, but:

-there are factual evidences for the Egyptian slavery, which lasted for 400 years
-the persecution during the roman times
-medieval persecution(by collective resent towards the money-lending jews who were ocasionally slaughtered casually, also the ban from the Jerusalem area by the Byzantines and the Crusaders)
-modern day persecution(holocaust, munich 72 etc.)

- Egyptian slavery was proved wrong, and whole myth that pyramids were built by slaves.

-Both Jews and Christians were persecuted during the roman period, although, there is no much difference between jew and a christian anyway.

- The fact is that much more christians were killed during the middle ages than jews, a lot more.

- A lot more Christians and members of other religions were killed during the WWII, let's state official statistic about the victims of the war, although, I do not believe in statistics anyway.

Anyway, things that happened in the past does not give anyone right to put himself in front of others.

Written by APOHAKC on 08.04.2008 at 15:49
Why is it ok to bitch about Christianity and it is blasphemy to bitch about all other organized religions (especially Islam and Judaism)?!?

Looks like a double standard to me...

I'm with you on that question. I'm a born roman-catholic but I don't really follow any of it. I've a very similar idea of most organized religions - they can't be all bad, or all good - so I really don't see a reasonable cause for this apparent discrimination.
But this happens in religion as it also happens in politics: why is it that right-wing organizations get censored and bashed, and equally radical left-wing organizations don't? Once again, I'm not affiliated to neither (I don't have political sympathies at all, they all suck), but I don't get how people don't see the resemblance in both tendencies.

Written by APOHAKC on 14.04.2008 at 13:08

- Egyptian slavery was proved wrong, and whole myth that pyramids were built by slaves.

-Both Jews and Christians were persecuted during the roman period, although, there is no much difference between jew and a christian anyway.

- The fact is that much more christians were killed during the middle ages than jews, a lot more.

- A lot more Christians and members of other religions were killed during the WWII, let's state official statistic about the victims of the war, although, I do not believe in statistics anyway.

Anyway, things that happened in the past does not give anyone right to put himself in front of others.

well yeah i've heard stuff about the exodus proven or disproven, but the pyramids weren't built by slaves? then by who? who else would work so hard and for such a huge amount of time? UFO's?

oh come on. 'a lot more christians were killed'.. dude, the number of christians killed during the crusades is huge compared to the number of jews, but look at this: 90% of europe's population was christian, and about 4-5 % jews or something. and they were persecuted and mistreated EVERYWHERE, mostly by christians.

and of course lots of christians died during the wars, but no-one actually killed them for being christians(which makes the holocaust even more horrific), but jews were killed just for being jews.

i agree that the past is the past, i also don't agree with someone of a specific nation, religion or something being more privileged than someone else, it's just that with all the bloody history of the jews, i'm not surprised at all with the measures they've taken to build their state.

Pyramids were built by professionals workers that worked for food and other supplies, that is the newest theory that is proved by best historians around, don't put words in my mouth, I never mentioned any UFO, check the British museum for additional info, I am sorry, but I'd rather believe to people that spend whole their life learning and researching that than to some ridiculous book full of myths and fairytales.

About middle ages, I did not meant on Crusaders, and beside that, crusaders were criminals anyway, couldn't care less for one dead Crusader, but on people being tortured by church for failing to pay their "depts", do you know how many people were impaled, burned alive, hanged... how many peopled were tortured and killed on Balkans, Armenia... by the Ottoman invasions? In Spain by the African muslems? for ridiculous accusations by the church? And yet no one whines about that today. As I said, playing with numbers is incredibly rude and disrespecting.

Of cause, they were not killed just for being Christians, some were killed just for being Russians, Germans, Poles or Serbs, and yet no one of them whine about that, why were people in England killed in the air strikes? Why were innocent Germans killed in the bombing of Dresden? Why bunch of innocent Americans died in Japanese air strikes? That's war, War is war, people get killed for nothing, that is horrible, but yet doesn't give right to anyone to whine about that 60 years later and accuse someone else for something their grandfathers may done.

Written by APOHAKC on 14.04.2008 at 16:07

That's war, War is war, people get killed for nothing, that is horrible, but yet doesn't give right to anyone to whine about that 60 years later and accuse someone else for something their grandfathers may done.

That's true....I never whine bout that nor accuse anyone....I just pointed out the fact that there are lots of people round there who ARE whining bout things like that and there are politicians who use that and whenever they want they may just point "Hey, look at them! They're not like us, they are the reason of all our problems!" and people will make the "click" inside their minds and start blindly hating these "others"...

That's how jews may say "Arabs are reason of our problems, let's kill'em."
That's how arabs may say "Israel is a pain in the ass, let's eliminate'em."
That's how Nero might have said "Christians are the cause of our problems, let's burn'em."
That's how men of church said "These people owe us money, let's just frame'em as witches, burn'em and take the money."
That's how Spanish said "Indians are supposed to have gold, oh btw, they're just weird and we need some land, let's just slaughter them, it's fun too."
That's how some in Estonia say "Russian language bothers me, WW2 monument bothers me, I just want all Slavic people to drop dead!"
That's how some in Russia may say "Estonians are such whiny fascist bitches, I hope someone'll nuke'em or something."
That's how some say "His granddad was a bitch to my granddad. I'll now ruin the life of his grandson just to make him pay."
That's how people say "He bitches with me, ok I'll bitch with him worse next time."

I honestly say....I am not whining nor wishing bad to anyone....I just pointed out that unfortunately there is many people in the world who start to think like that very easily....

Well some faiths are connected with certain races of people............with Rastafarai and Nation Of Islam, the blacks are the chosen people.............in the more Abrahamic religions, the semetic races are the chosen people (Christianity is Abrahamic too, but it's spread so far into the world that people forget that the 'Jews are god's special people'). Most of the main religions are just fundamentally racist! , if a divine creator / deity shows favouritism towards one race of people whom he has created, then the religion is racist. It's mostly only the Eastern belief systems that show equality .

It's just people have forgotten that thing I pointed out about Christianity. Judaism and Islam get away with more because they are linked to specific ethnic groups.

Race and religion have nothing in common, in most religions all races are accepted to adopt, this is not a racialist question.

@Viggo, I'd give you reputation point if there is such option on metalstorm.

Written by APOHAKC on 15.04.2008 at 15:19

@Viggo, I'd give you reputation point if there is such option on metalstorm.

Thanks....just buy me a beer and it's fine

Double standards - Its OK to shout everywhere "Varg Vikernes is legend", yet we cant have Temnozor on MS.