In this short RSA Animate, renowned philosopher Slavoj Zizek investigates the surprising ethical implications of charitable giving. It is certainly worth a watch and a think.

Is “a terrorist” and “Muslim” the same thing?

A mistake that lies at the very core of this particular discussion is how media and also many faith(Evangelical and mainline churches,Catholic and protestant, Jewish communities etc), political parties (in the states the democrats and Republicans united on this one) and anti faith movements( like all the new atheists Dawkins, Harris etc) had a field day in linking the fundamentalist maniac terrorist Islam with All Islam.

When Muslims want to build a mosque in New york (which we now know is not a mosque but a faith community far from ground zero) we look at them as the same people who flew into the twin towers. This is really a grave mistake, the two fields of faith are as far from each other as Night is dark and day is light. I certainly don’t want to be put in the same Christian category as maniac terrorist Christians in India,Northern Ireland, Russia or Uganda (where the christian terrorist groups are known for there usage of children soldiers) who blow up Muslims and others who do not believe as they do. See this is the mistake we now are doing with Muslims who wish to build mosques wherever they want to. They, like us, have nothing to do with terrorism, and want nothing to do with it. As we find it offensive to be linked with christian,Jewish or western terrorists they find it offensive that we even think the thought.

Only when we put all Muslims in the category “terrorist” will building a mosque in New York be a sick and horrendous provocation. And when we don’t, it certainly isn’t a provocation.
Now if we still want to put them in the same category as terrorists, my thoughts below might be food for thought;

My firstborn daughter Agnes was born 28 july 2010. She is as you can see very beautiful.

Agnes 6 weeks old

Photo taken by Daniel Korol

Agnes 10 days old

Photo taken by; Rose Korol

A few months back I wrote about the difference between the american Justice system and how we think and act here in Europe. Both the above video and the Time article below proves my point in that blogpost.

My point was; The Justice system in Europe seeks to rehabilitate more than punish. While in the states , revenge or true justice in relation to crime is the goal.

Time magazine ran a story of a new prison facitlity close to my home in Norway.  Its goal is to give prisoners a humane and good experiance even in a place regarded as the last resort and a place where no one should want to end up.

A couple quotes that give an idea of what the place is all about:

“Many of the prisoners come from bad homes, so we wanted to create a sense of family,”

“Our goal is to give all the prisoners — we call them our pupils — a meaningful life inside these walls.”

Imagine a world where every prison was like this one, and every prisoner was treated the way they are in this one.

Should prison only be used to punish in accordance to ones crime or can it also be a place of rehabilitating and giving respect and dignity back to those of us who get the least of it. Statistics from Norway prove that treating the outcast, hated and fellon with dignity and love actually gives us à much safer and healthy society!

Creativity expert Sir Ken Robinson challenges the way we’re educating our children. He champions a radical rethink of our school systems, to cultivate creativity and acknowledge multiple types of intelligence.

Watch the whole thing, its good!

A beautiful little movie from Amnesty!