Thursday, March 15, 2007

A woman I respect

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a remarkable woman. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ayaan_Hirsi_Ali
She is the daughter of a Somali warlord, who escaped Islamic fundamentalists, and turned in to an influential Dutch politican and prominent atheist. After she wrote the script for the film "Submission", a fundamentalist killed the director, Theo van Gogh, and left a 5 page letter attached to his body, threatening her death too (she now is under protection from the Dutch).
She is part of a minority that understand why our principal concern must be the concept of human rights, rather than our traditional understanding of what constitutes respect. If we want a peaceful society.
Chomsky, now: "The beauty of the democratic systems of thought control, as contrasted with their clumsy totalitarian counterparts, is that they operate by subtly establishing, on a voluntary basis (aided by the force of nationalism and media control by substantial interests) - presuppositions that set the limits of debate, rather than by imposing beliefs with a bludgeon"

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Death to those that call us murderers

1 comment:

Eastcoastdweller said...

And she's as courageous as hell!

Her every public word only strengthens the determination of more idiots to silence her by any means necessary.