Honour Killings are Morally Justified; No Discussion Required, I would have thought.

For the most part the title of this thread came from the following source;

Festival of Dangerous Ideas

From the source;

Sydney-based Muslim speaker Uthman Badar, from Islamic group Hizb ut-Tahrir, was to give the speech, titled 'Honour Killings Are Morally Justified' at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas in August.

I would encourage all to read the source material first before commenting.

Firstly, it's obviously important to point out that this discussion has been cancelled as a direct result of public complaint and fair enough too.

Clearly this is an inflammatory title for a point of discussion and that's my point as I will make shortly.

As readers of the source would be aware the principal speaker has claimed, and I quote;

"What's interesting is that I'm being attacked left, right and centre without having opened my mouth yet."

Admittedly and with fairness I should also note this following quote;

His tweeted response to one critic who wrote "Anyone who condones or justifies the murder of defenceless women is a gutless creep", was: "I'm with you on that. Calm down."

On face value I have no doubt that some will take these comments as entirely reasonable and indicative of someone with a sense of moral sensibility. That would be an error of judgement from my point of view.

For me, any individual(s) with a deep understanding of the culture within which they live would surely realise that any discussion, yeah or nea, relating to this matter would be abhorrent to their very own "multi-cultural" communities. There is no discussion to be hand here, it's just plain wrong.

In quoting the speaker one last time;

"I anticipated that secular liberal Islamophobes would come out of every dark corner, foaming at the mouth, furious at why a Muslim 'extremist', from Hizb ut-Tahrir no less, was being allowed a platform at the Sydney Opera House to speak," he wrote in a Facebook post.

Does the proposition of this proposed discussion and the above anticipated acknowledgement underline a fundamental clash of civilisations that are diametrically opposed, personally I believe so. There is no doubt that's it's inevitable for the speaker to claim that his deriders are "Islamophobes", easy call really for his part.

What say you ATS ?

Kind Regards
Myselfaswell

Going off what he says the speech was going to be and what discussion he wanted to have, would you say that the only reason his speech was cancelled was the title?
The discussion he wanted to have could have been thought provoking. A less Risqué title could have helped him have it.

Would rather have him speak and logically see what he says than emotionally attack before he gave arguments. I feel that it is good for people to know the arguments that people can make for honor killings so that they have information on why a group can become so insane on dogma to do honor killings and call it justice.

A problem hiding and not brought to the surface is a problem still existing.

“Uthman’s view is that no form of vigilante killing is justified,” Longstaff said.

“So while honour killings are not what he believes in, he does believe there is a context in which this does happen and where those people believe they are justified.

“We wanted to begin having a conversation about these killings, which should never happen and yet the fact is, there are societies that allow it to. We wanted to examine how that is the case.”

www.theguardian.com...

Funny how a Muslim that seem to want to examine the problem is being attacked as a supporter of the problem.

a reply to: myselfaswell

I would have liked to view the source, but the page appears to have been removed. Having been a speaker at conferences, I would guess that the "Title" of his talk had a lot to do with the blanket rejection of it from all sides.

Some things are simply too controversial to EVER suggest as an intellectual subject.

Are honor killings ever justified? No. Would he have made that point in the end? Presumably.

OOp! Now it's there! Odd....okay, I'll go read it.

"It is clear from the public reaction that the title has given the wrong impression of what Mr Badar intended to discuss.

"Neither Mr Badar, the St James Ethics Centre, nor Sydney Opera House in any way advocates honour killings or condones any form of violence against women."

Mr Badar says he did not choose the title of the speech, but did consent to it. He also said he wanted to discuss a different topic.

"I, in fact, suggested a more direct topic about Islam and secular liberalism - something like 'The West Needs Saving By Islam' - how's that for dangerous?" Mr Badar said.

"But the organisers insisted on this topic, which I think is still a worthy topic of discussion, for many reasons."

(from the OP's source)

Ah - see - it WAS the title that caused the outrage...and the title was CHOSEN BY the organizers, NOT by the speaker himself.
I think the organizers did the man a disservice by insisting on their title - which was clearly intended to be inflammatory and provocative. They should have thought longer about it - and listened to the man's protests.

They provoked the response with the title - and it's a shame. I'd have liked to hear what the man had to say. It might have done some good toward correcting the wayward Muslims, or toward giving well-meaning Muslims ideas about how to stop the deranged practice amongst their "co-religionists".

sigh

It actually amazes me that in this day an age "honor killings" still exist and continue to be argued for instead of against in certain areas and cultures. I personally see the justification of honor killings (at any level), to be nothing more than an unevolved person trying desperately to defend the indefensible, which is the ego.

According to him the title of the speech was given to him and he took it. Whatever reasons..
Here is a press release of him after the incident
Sydney morning herald

There is no honor in murdering someone. It is pure evil and anyone that disagrees is probably evil too.

In an attempt to deflect from the outrage caused by the sermon topic, set to be preached at the Festival of Dangerous Ideas event, group spokesman Mr Badar said any violence stemming from the Islamic community, such as honour killings, paled into insignificance in light of the atrocities orchestrated by the US and its allies.

a reply to: myselfaswell
This is the usual response from them . Does it make it alright to kill women and children ?

The group also came under fire for an article on its website that suggested the practise of adult men taking child brides could be deemed “morally acceptable” if there was no coercion and the girl was mature. It was a statement in direct response to the charging in January of a 26-year-old Muslim man who married a 12-year-old girl.

My Facebook page had a petition being shared around to plead for the mercy from certain death penalty for a child bride in Iran who had finally killed her husband after years of abuse from him
my source
www.themercury.com.au... e-eastern-invasions/story-fnj3ty2c-1226965416737

a reply to: myselfaswell

The basic question is; do you value memes more than human beings?

For many, the answer is yes. For humanists, the value is a clear and emphatic "no".

After reading the article and the post's here on ATS my question is , if they think there smart enough to have a discussion on such a touchy topic, why did they come up with such a horrible title ?

Were they not smart enough to realize the firestorm the title would create, I think not, I think they believe in honor killings and the title is in your face cultural beliefs.

It's almost as if the title were chosen to prove the point, as if they could care less if the speech itself were actually given.

It's almost as if they said, "Well, we'll say we want an actual discussion and thought-provoking topic, but let's give it a title that's inflammatory it's almost guaranteed that we'll never get that far, and then we can pat ourselves on the back and tell ourselves how right we knew we were."

I love the indignant rage the speaker has, at being so insulted with the direct outrage such a title caused... Yet one he willingly accepted.

So get the feeling that he himself was overjoyed at this turn of events, so that he could then go public to claim how he was only wanting to discuss the topic, and how the 'islamophobes' are howling without thought.

This group he is associated with is well known for their anti-west beliefs, they have in the past been very vocal in supporting the death of citizens of this country, a country they supposedly call home.

It was not so much a discussion either, as one man's opinion without the right to reply. His opinion, stemming from his fundamental beliefs, in order to show justification for the minds of others who do believe that honour killings are acceptable.

I do not doubt this munafiq does agree with them either. Lies to the faces of us all, yet secretly agrees. And that is my opinion of this despicable man.