This morning I opened the local paper to find a picture of a protest rally in Pakistan burning an American Flag.
The protest is in response to the Quran burning originally planned for tomorrow. Since no Qurans have been burned yet, seems they're using the Dubya playbook to hold a 'preemptive protest'. That's fine. However, this doesn't illicit the emotional response they were looking for. I don't think they understand what it means to actually respect freedom.
Should I have been shocked, outraged even? Was I supposed to cry, throw a tantrum, curse their name? Is this a "fighting word" to declare a holy war over? To commit violence and kill over? Do they intend that I quake in fear because someone somewhere doesn't like me? Is this an attack on our freedoms or America herself that must be avenged?
No, I felt none of those things. What I saw in that picture was, in a country that's 20% flooded with millions starving, a bunch of lawyers spent their day burning a piece of cloth, and accomplished nothing. Apparently even Pakistan has too many lawyers.
Rather than spend the last day of Ramadan helping their fellow suffering brothers, they decided to waste time worrying about some lone nut on the other side of the planet, who will also waste a day burning some paper, accomplishing nothing. Not only that, but they felt that the best way to criticize our freedoms, was to use our freedoms.
And that's supposed to offend me? Don't burn a Quran or another flag gets it? The flag is a poor hostage. Burn a whole crate for all I care, it doesn't mean anything. That's what freedom is, people get to do what they want. I don't have a right to tell anyone else what to do as long as it isn't causing someone else harm. And what someone else chooses to do has no hold over me.
So this is what it's devolved into, a handful of nuts on opposite sides of the planet, ginning up fake outrage by burning cheap copies each other's stuff, while nothing useful is done and the media flits back and forth telling us how insulted we all should be. Well I'm not insulted, and without that these actions have no power.