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Originally Posted by dr wadd
And once again you completely miss the point. There is no value in me defining freedom in the general sense as everyone has a different definition. It is certainly not acceptable for me to define freedom for another country through the means that the coalition have been currently taking. Their concept of freedom is from their interpretation of the Koran. That is no different from you using the Christian bible as a guideline for how you live your life. I can`t comment on your personal views on this issue as I obviously don`t know them, but the recent news coverage has highlighted clearly the fact that by your definition the Christian church is unwilling to give "freedom" to homosexuals, treating them as second class citizens. I don`t see any difference in this case.
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I'm really not going to get drawn off-topic by discussing decisions taken by a single branch of a single Denomination of the Church in a single country, whatever it was they were making decisions about. Suffice it to say that if you base your view of my faith (and that of certain other members of this forum) on what you hear on the news about 'The Church', your conclusions will always be wide of the mark.
As regards 'freedom', I understand your point perfectly, but I think you are fundamentally mis-applying the relativist notion of all lifestyles and cultures being equally valid. 'Freedom' as a concept extends beyond the individual, because decisions I take will affect others. As such, I think there is great value in you owning for yourself a general concept of 'freedom' within which individuals and cultures can relate to each other. If you do not have any such definition, all that is left is 'might is right', and surely this is exactly what you have been arguing against all this time?
The definition I advanced for discussion is not a narrowly defined one; we could discuss exactly where lies the balancing point between individual liberty and responsibility to others and we could discuss what measures can legitimately be taken when that balance is upset.
To take Afghanistan as a specific example, a well-armed band of people with allegiance to a particular interpretation of the Qu'ran took control of the country by coup d'etat and then implemented their understanding by threat (and use) of lethal force against the population. I agree with you that they are perfectly free to live their own lives the way they choose (just as I am free to interpret the Bible and live my life accordingly). However as I said, they decided everybody else should live the same way and used force to back up their decision. Furthermore, they allowed like-minded people to set up camp on their territory, from where they planned the attacks on the USA of 11 September 2001.
This violates what I consider a reasonable definition of 'freedom' in two ways:
1. Their freedom of religious expression severely impeded the religious and cultural expression of the majority of the population of Afghanistan.
2. Their freedom of political expression ultimately denied the freedom to go on living of almost 3,000 people in New York and Washington.
So, to re-state the possible debating point I made above, where is the balance between expressing one's own freedom and impinging on others? Are (1) and (2) above justified, in the name of alowing the Taleban to enjoy their own definition of freedom?