The Koran Bonfire

Rev. Terry Jones plan to burn copies of the Koran in Gainesville, Florida to commemorate 9/11 may merit a second – or even third – consideration.. My first thought when I heard about this was that it was another silly stunt by an overzealous religious group, trying to stir up controversy so they could claim religious persecution. Then I realized the parallel between what Rev. Jones was doing and what the Imam Muhammad Musri was doing by establishing a mosque at ground zero.

As stated in an earlier post, nobody argues about the constitutional right to build the mosque. Likewise, nobody argues about Rev Jones’ constitutional right to burn a book. But how can the Obama administration consider plans to intervene in one case but not the other?

We can burn the flag, burn the Bible, burn your most hated politician in effigy, smear feces on a picture of Jesus and put a crucifix in a jar of urine and call it art… why draw the line on freedom of expression at burning the Koran?

Don’t get me wrong, I’m not endorsing Rev. Jones plan. But I do have some respect for the stones it takes to make his point. The only reason we discourage his form of expression is fear: Fear of an international Al Qaeda recruiting spree, fear of radical Islam, fear of terrorism. Nobody worries about Christians blowing up car bombs or hijacking planes to use as WMDs. And despite heated debates between Republicans and Democrats nobody worries about one side trying to mass-murder the other. But we have, apparently, allowed radical Islamists to rob us of our constitutional freedom of expression when it comes to their beliefs. Jones has poignantly shown how the whole “constitutional rights” shtick about the Mosque is a double standard for Muslims.

Terrorism is defined as “the use of violence and threats to intimidate or coerce esp. for political purposes”. Looks like the Muslim extremists have succeeded in using terrorism to get us to treat their holy book differently than any other.

So should we grab our marshmallows and have some Koran smores this weekend? Not necessary. Terrorism only succeeds if it gets people to change their habits or lifestyle. Most of us weren’t planning on a Koran barbeque this weekend, so we don’t have to worry about canceling one to avoid Islamic violence. If the international community told us we cannot hold commemoration ceremonies on 9/11 or that we couldn’t build 9./11 memorials because they find them offensive, I doubt we would be as quick to appease them. But it can’t help but embolden Muslim extremists to know their threats can mobilize the US government to intervene in the freedoms of their own citizens. It’s something worth monitoring.