[Osx-nutters] The separation of church and state.

[Stefano Mori]

On 2007-Dec-03, at 16:26, Charles Bennett wrote:

> I think it was a 'progressive' Swedish politician who said that Swedes
> should be "nice to Muslims while we are in the majority so that when
> they are in the majority they will be nice to us"


I guess the broader point is, what do you do with incompatible cultures?

One culture may generally see "tolerance" as having one's own  
religious beliefs respected, where "respect" means not causing  
offense, and "offense" means anyone saying anything blasphemous.

A little anecdote, I once made a comment about a friend's brother, and  
even though the comment was 80% true, and of no particular importance  
anyway, and even through the friend was very Westernised, and seemed  
to think that he had no particular ties to Islam, in an instant his  
blood turned to rage and he was ready to pummel me into the ground to  
defend his family's honor.

It gave me a taste of the context that makes honor killings work.

The fascinating thing is that he thought that his reaction was normal,  
period.

Stefano