Reply #16: Interesting situation. Sounds like the guy went to A LOT of trouble to express his ideas [View All]

[Peace Patriot]

and should be considered an artist-without-big-rich-backers or a journalist-without-corpo/fascist-investors. In other words, the only thing that makes him punishable is his lack of money and power. Artists/journalists without money and power don't have a lot of choices as to venue. Art and journalistic commentary/news require some kind of public airing--whether a street corner art display or a soapbox in a park--by their nature. This is a fundamental human right, not to mention need--and not to mention the linchpin of democracy. The prayer room is obviously a public place where anyone may leave literature on their religious ideas. Why not literature about religions' failures and hypocrisies? Adherents of the different religions represented in this prayer room would be wise to think about these failures and hypocrisies of the institutions to which they belong. But they have a choice, too: they can think about it or not. A poster or a pamphlet does not force them to meditate on that subject. It's a PUBLIC place, not a church. Why not criticism of religion? That, too, is religious. In fact, every major religion on earth has a history of dissenters, some with excoriating criticism of established religious institutions.

His action is also comparable to Martin Luther's "95 Theses" tacked on the cathedral door--an attack on the corrupt practices of the Roman Catholic Church, for which Luther was threatened with arrest (he managed to slip out of town) and was ultimately excommunicated by the pope (a dire punishing in those days, meaning consignment to Hell). The Roman Catholic Church was a pervasive, powerful, international corporation (not unlike Exxon Mobil) which imprisoned the human soul in order to extract human coin. Although current religious institutions are by no means monolithic (thanks, in no small part, to Martin Luther), they do indeed-for all their squabbles--comprise a powerful establishment, which NEEDS criticism. What better evidence is there, of their power as an establishment, than that they were given a collective "prayer room" in a public airport? Why is the government of Great Britain defending this religious establishment FROM criticism in a public venue? Are they not acting just like Pope Leo X who tried to arrest Martin Luther and "excommunicated" him?

From any angle--art, journalism, democracy, religious dissent--this was an unjust prosecution and punishment. He did not vandalize the place; he merely added food for thought. How is that a crime? If Time-Warner had published a book of his expressions, would their execs/editors be sentenced to prison and fined? If Bill Gates had given him a gallery, would Interpol be hunting down Bill Gates so that he could be extradited to Great Britain and punished? Money and power, that is the key here. Money and power does what it damn well pleases--including slaughtering a million innocent people to steal their oil, torturing prisoners and massively looting and exploiting the poor. Who among the rich and powerful have been punished for those heinous acts? But dare to criticize one of their establishments--the one with a "prayer room" in a public airport, the one with chaplaincies in the military and the U.S. Congress--and the money and power that controls the state comes down on your head like a ton of bricks.