Never Take Your Blogging Freedoms for Granted
In the United States, we take freedom of the press and freedom of speech pretty much for granted. Some may argue that we are more limited than we should be, but that’s an entirely different arguement than the one I’m looking at today.
There’s a report on Wired about an Egyptian blogger, Abdel Kareem Nabil, being sentenced to 4 years in prison for insulting Islam in his blog. To any self respecting blogger, that’s a pretty terrible thing to see.
I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know anything about what he actually said or the accuracy of his statements. But he should have the right to express his opinion!
It’s hard to criticize Islam in a Muslim country. Dangerous in many cases. Extremists really don’t like being disagreed with and have a nasty habit of taking things into their own hands. Frankly, Nabil may be lucky in some ways that the courts dealt with him. But that doesn’t make it right for the courts to have done so. And it also depends on what happens to him in prison.
It will take brave people like him to help regular Muslims take back the core of their religion and show their peaceful side. I really salute him for having the guts to say something.
As you can probably guess, I’m not one to blame the entire religion for the actions of some. I’ve met enough Muslims to be comfortable with that. But just as any Christian should condemn the actions of those who use it as a front for racism and hatred, I would like to see more Muslims speak out when their beliefs are abused by the extreme factions in their own religion.
Technorati Tags: religion, Islam, Muslim, Christian, Egyptian blogger
