A Tale of Two Inflammatory Stunts: Comparing Koran Burning to the Ground Zero Mosque

Not sure if you followed this recent story, but a Reverend Terry Jones, the leader of a tiny Florida church, had been planning to burn a bunch of Quran's on Saturday, the ninth anniversary of the September 11, 2001, extremist Muslim terrorist attacks. He has a tiny congregation of only 50 people and is not considered to be a leading authority or leadership figure in the wider Christian church. When word got out that he planned on doing this, a lot of people decided to write about it and advise him not to, including President Barack Obama, who urged him to listen to "those better angels" and give up his "stunt." Liberal bloggers and Democrat activists jumped out of the woodwork to condemn this pastor, and liberal talk radio was filled with criticisms and caricatures of him and 'crazy nut Christians'.

Reverend Jones prayed about what to do and probably listened to what people were urging him to do, and after all that the crazy nut decided that it was probably a better decision to not go ahead with the Koran burning. In the end, he made the correct decision and did the right thing for society. One other reason that he gave though was that he was promised that be calling off this inflammatory stunt, another inflammatory stunt would also be called off- that be cancelling his Koran burning, he says he was promised that the Ground Zero Mosque would not be built on Ground Zero but would be moved somewhere else.

Let's connect these two events, and compare the building of the Ground Zero Mosque to the Burning of Korans.

Liberals, Democrats, and liberal talk radio was filled with people defending the building of a mosque on Ground Zero because it was 'someone's legal right to do so' and that by Americans letting it be built would be a good demonstration of how tolerant our nation was. And yet those same radio stations, Democrats, and liberals were criticizing, mocking, and rejecting Jone's plan to burn the Koran, even though that is an even more clear example of First Amendment Freedom of Speech and that by letting him burn those Korans, it would be giving Muslims a great chance to demonstrate their toleration. It appears that these people pick and choose who they feel should get First Amendment rights, and they choose the opposite people than I would choose (if I could choose, which I can't). It appears that these liberals and Democrats are all about forcing America to show that it is tolerant and nice and welcoming to Muslims, but fearful and afraid that if Muslims are given the same chance that they'll demonstrate that they aren't tolerant, peaceful, loving, or welcoming in turn. The difference in liberals and Democrats feelings on these issues was striking.

For example, look at the reaction of the leader of the Democrat Party, Barack Obama, to the two planned events. Both building a mosque on the site of Ground Zero and burning Korans on 9/11 are inflammatory stunts designed to bring publicity and raise intense feelings. Both were destined to turn out badly- tying the mosque to 9/11 by building it on that location will increase anti-Muslim feelings in our nation, and burning the Koran will make Christians look intolerant and could lead to increased casualties in our War on Extremist Militant Islamic Terrorists. But Obama and the Democrats came out and supported the building of the mosque, but tried to put a stop to the building of Korans. This difference in reactions is troubling- why is Obama and the Democrats willing to cause damage to our society and inspire bad feelings in one situation, but unwilling in the other situation? I'll let you answer that question in your own mind.

And in the end, it was the crazy nut small time Pastor of some backward town in Florida who made the correct decision and decided not to go ahead with his plan, and it was the well-respected and esteemed Imam who is being paid by the US State Department to travel around the world as a spokesman for tolerance or something who is rejecting as 'radicals' the 70% of the nation who feels it would be wrong for him to build his mosque on that location in spite of the consequences. This demonstrates something else- one person made the correct decision and decided not to inflame the situation further, and another made the wrong decision and decided to inflame the situation further. Both of course had the legal right to inflame as much as they wanted to, both had the right to demonstrate which religion was more tolerant and accepting, but in the end, only one person decided correctly that just because you have the legal right to do something and just because it could send a message, that doesn't mean that you do it.

Pastor Jones eventually made the right choice, the Ground Zero Imam is making the wrong choice, and anyone who supports anyone who believes otherwise needs to really think about the choices they are making in their own lives.