Austria passes law regulating Islam

[Balog]

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/2/25/austria-passes-law-on-islam-requiring-imams-speak-german.html

Interesting times we live in. If the reported numbers of Austrian Muslims who have left to fight for Isis are correct they have a significant radicalization issue.

[De Selby]

http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2015/2/25/austria-passes-law-on-islam-requiring-imams-speak-german.html

Interesting times we live in. If the reported numbers of Austrian Muslims who have left to fight for Isis are correct they have a significant radicalization issue.

?? Are Rabbis required to conduct prayers in german?  Or orthodox christians prohibited from conducting services in greek?

Stuff like this allows ISIS to claim that they're fighting the nazis when they are the nazis.  It's bad policy and doesn't address safety in the least.

[Hawkmoon]

Does the law require the imams to conduct prayers in German, or just to be able to speak German?

[Stand_watie]

Who was it on here who was commenting on just how fast that part of the world can go from merely overregulated to full on fascist?

[lupinus]

?? Are Rabbis required to conduct prayers in german?  Or orthodox christians prohibited from conducting services in greek?

Stuff like this allows ISIS to claim that they're fighting the nazis when they are the nazis.  It's bad policy and doesn't address safety in the least.

I dunno. Are Rabbis praying in Hebrew to aid them in blowing up markets and busses full of kiddies? Is the Greek Orthodox liturgy calling all Orthodox to descend on the homeland and kill all those who oppose them, or to commit their own random massacres if they can't catch a ride to the fields of Armageddon?

[De Selby]

I dunno. Are Rabbis praying in Hebrew to aid them in blowing up markets and busses full of kiddies? Is the Greek Orthodox liturgy calling all Orthodox to descend on the homeland and kill all those who oppose them, or to commit their own random massacres if they can't catch a ride to the fields of Armageddon?

Are you mocking the people who wrote this law or is that for real?

The muslims are not congregating in their mosques and calling for massacres. 

[lee n. field]

Are you mocking the people who wrote this law or is that for real?

The muslims are not congregating in their mosques and calling for massacres. 

No, that would be the Christian Reconstructionists.  (If you believe the overheated rhetoric of certain factions.)

[RevDisk]

Are you mocking the people who wrote this law or is that for real?

The muslims are not congregating in their mosques and calling for massacres. 

I would mock them. It's a bad law, and fascist. Thing to remember is a lot of European countries don't have the formal equivalent of a Bill of Rights. Informally and in practice, most Euro countries generally some or even most of the rights. But it's intentionally not absolute. There's a reason why we had to kill a bunch of British subjects to get everything listed in Bill of Rights written in essentially blood.

Stand_watie is correct. Europe can and has gone from squishy to full out genocide in staggeringly short periods of time.


That said, yes, some mosques do in fact call for massacres. It's a minority usually (Iran, previously Afghanistan, etc being an exception), but it does exist.

[Boomhauer]

I dunno. Are Rabbis praying in Hebrew to aid them in blowing up markets and busses full of kiddies? Is the Greek Orthodox liturgy calling all Orthodox to descend on the homeland and kill all those who oppose them, or to commit their own random massacres if they can't catch a ride to the fields of Armageddon?

Butbutbutbut Religion Of Peace!

[RevDisk]

Butbutbutbut Religion Of Peace!

And we're blowing up weddings on a regular basis because there's X military age males in attendance.

Not being an Islamic terrorism apologist. Having spent time even in a moderate Islamic country, I don't want to live in one. However, a lot of folks think their side is pure as new fallen snow, 99 times out of a 100, they're wrong. We shouldn't screw around as much as we do in the sandbox, and they shouldn't be blowing stuff up. 

[Stand_watie]

...That said, yes, some mosques do in fact call for massacres. It's a minority usually (Iran, previously Afghanistan, etc being an exception), but it does exist.

...and that said, any decent sized country with a decent intelligence service (and Austria is one) can find native speakers (listeners?) of most given languages to just go to church meetings and listen to if Muslims, Jews, Christians, Satanists or Atheists are actively soliciting murder or terrorism, and even provide adequate checks and balances to make sure they are not being wrongfully targetted.

I am not a Muslim apologist in any way other than being a 1st and 5th amendment supporter. I absolutely believe radical, militant Islam is the 2nd most (1st is just the natural bad side of human nature) driving force of terrorism in the world today, but freedom of speech and freedom to worship for me are just window dressing if the 90+% of Muslims who I know of that aren't terro-jihadis don't get it too.

[TommyGunn]

?? Are Rabbis required to conduct prayers in german?  Or orthodox christians prohibited from conducting services in greek?

Stuff like this allows ISIS to claim that they're fighting the nazis when they are the nazis.  It's bad policy and doesn't address safety in the least.

Oh.  My.  God.

I agree with DeSelby! 

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

Eh.  It's bad law, sure, but it's not OMGFASCIST!!!11 bad.  

It's not too much of a stretch for a nation with an official language to insist that preachers be able to speak it.  And it's not hard to understand why they'd want to get control of foreign funds flowing through mosques given how frequently those avenues have been used to support radicalization in the past.  

Balog's right, if there really have been that many Austrians joining ISIS, then they've got a real problem on their hands.  If true, then Austrians appear to be at far more at risk from radical Islam than they are from the government's weak sauce response to radical Islam.  

Again, I don't support the new law, but let's keep things in perspective.  

[Headless Thompson Gunner]

BTW, if the article is correct, imams are not required to preach in German.  They're only expected to be able to speak German.  So comparisons to Jews or Christians preaching in whatever language are non sequiturs. 

[Balog]

It should be noted that this is an update of a law dating to 1912, not an entirely new law. I'd be curious what the old law was like. It also only applies to Muslim orgs that want to be recognized by the state. I honestly don't know what that recognition means in Austria. Is it a tax break, or do you need official recognition in order to hold services, or?

[lupinus]

Are you mocking the people who wrote this law or is that for real?

The muslims are not congregating in their mosques and calling for massacres. 

No, but I figured if we were going to enter the hyperbole zone I'd raise.

I agree the law is silly and fascist, but it's a little silly to pull out the rabbis and orthodox and throw in a nazi for good measure.

So in the short answer, I suppose I was mocking you more so than the folks who wrote the law, silly as they may be.

[De Selby]

No, but I figured if we were going to enter the hyperbole zone I'd raise.

I agree the law is silly and fascist, but it's a little silly to pull out the rabbis and orthodox and throw in a nazi for good measure.

So in the short answer, I suppose I was mocking you more so than the folks who wrote the law, silly as they may be.

The law treats rabbis and Christians differently - not sure how it's silly to point that out.

Comparing ISIS to the Nazis seems quite reasonable to me

[Hawkmoon]

The muslims are not congregating in their mosques and calling for massacres. 

How do you know if you can't understand what they're saying?

[De Selby]

How do you know if you can't understand what they're saying?

Really?  It's that hard to find a translator if we're worried about it (not that we should be spying on religious meetings without cause anyway)?