The Venerable Bede

Every now and again I am fortunate enough to come across a blog that is both interesting to read and good fun at the same time. After all, that is what we are after here. Well, in this case it came knocking, by way of adding itself onto What the..?'s followers list. What a pleasure then to bump into the Venerable Bede, who appears to hail from England, and announces without equivocation, the following:

"I dislike popular culture, moral cowardice, Fascism, hypocrisy and car showrooms."

Well, I most heartily agree with him on those sentiments, and I like a man that is upfront like that.

In his most recent effort he took to task the bruhaha over free speech, specifically as it ties in to the Islamic community in England. As a recent great post by blog fav Coco Rico touched on a related subject, it seemed like a good time to drop in on the Venerable Bede.  He was found to be commenting on the apparent spray painting of a Koranic verse passage number on the front doors of a mosque.  The passage referenced instructs Muslims not to befriend Jews and Christians.

"This is apparently the fourth time that the vandals have sprayed references to passages from the Koran urging the slaughter and subjugation of non-Muslims on the exterior of the building. The Mosque's president says the quotes to which they refer are being taken 'out of context'."

The Venerable Bede

to which the Venerable Bede opines:

"So here's the problem. Leaving aside for the moment the obvious criminality of illegal graffiti per se - which is obviously not what is causing such consternation here - can the simple, un-annotated citing of passages from a book that a religion believes to be the sacred word of God somehow constitute hate speech against that same religion?  A tough one to call."

That's good stuff. Read the rest here, and bravo Mr. Bede!