Unquestionable Authority Quotes
The Sikhs had lived for hundreds of years in the Mughal Empire—under Muslim domination where they had been not only like second class citizens but they were periodically persecuted for practicing their religion, including the torture and murder of their Guru. Jinnah himself was a strong advocate of religious toleration and freedom of religion, and proclaimed that for Pakistan. He promised that to the Sikhs as well as total equality with no second class citizenship. However Master Tara Singh was very familiar with the Koran itself and the history of minorities in Islamic nations. The only Muslim country in all of history that had not treated minorities as Second Class Citizens and curtailed the minorities' ability to practice their religion on an equal status was Turkey after the Ataturk revolution, and he knew that most orthodox Islamic clerics considered Ataturk a heretic. They did not see Jinnah as an Ataturk who could revolutionize not only a country but a culture as well. As it turned out, even in the 21st century every month or so another minority person was killed in Pakistan for violating some Koranic prescription—actual of imaginary. The Sikhs turned Jinnah down and he then had Sikhs targeted for mass terrorist attacks and murders.
This concept was later formalized in British law. See Blackstone.
Geert Wilders, a far-right politician who was then seen as a likely contender to become prime minister was convicted by a 3 Judge Court of inciting discrimination and of insulting a group for saying that the Netherlands would be safer with fewer Moroccans. Wilders was one of the leading European Islamaphobes. He made this statement upon his conviction. The "logic" behind the statement is most unusual. He argued that since he was the political leader of millions of people whose beliefs were reflected by his offending statements, he was merely stating public opinion and that should never be a criminal offense. In reaality it was Wilders who rist fired uo a minority of the Dutch voters with his incendiary statements. The extension of his "logic" would be that no one who makes a statement that is beleived by a significant number of people, should be guilty of any criminal law. In the United States, our Constitutional protection for Freedom of speech and Freedom of the press, prohibits any criminal prosecution of political statemetns regardless of how false they are or how much harm that they do. Few otehr contries have such an absolute protection for speech, and the Netherlands laws were typical of then existing European law.
