Houston Suburb Objects to Mosque Plans

[Judi Lynn]

Houston Suburb Objects to Mosque Plans
Thursday December 7, 2006 7:16 PM

By RASHA MADKOUR
Associated Press Writer

KATY, Texas (AP) - A plan to build a mosque in this Houston suburb has blown up into a neighborhood dispute, with community members warning the place will become a terrorist hotbed and one man threatening to hold pig races on Fridays just to offend the Muslims.

Many neighborhood residents claim they have nothing against Muslims and are more concerned about property values, drainage and traffic.

But one resident has set up an anti-Islamic Web site with an odometer-like counter that keeps track of terrorist attacks since Sept. 11. A committee has formed to buy another property and offer to trade it for the Muslims' land. And next-door neighbor Craig Baker has threatened to race pigs on the edge of the property on the Muslim holy day. Muslims consider pigs unclean and do not eat pork.

``The neighbors have created havoc for us and we didn't expect that,'' said engineer Kamel Fotouh, president of the 500-member Katy Islamic Association.
(snip/...)

http://www.guardian.co.uk/worldlatest/story/0,,-6265203,00.html

[no_hypocrisy]

1. If the town forbids the mosque to be built on that site, then they

can't grant a permit to any religious group wishing to develop it for their practices and purposes.

[Scairp]

2. Talk about the ugly Americans

Maybe someone should go door to door in that town distributing copies of the Constitution, with the 1st Amendment highlighted. What an embarrassment these white Christians are.

[maxsolomon]

3. those Atheists are so horrible!

why must they attack monotheism so relentlessly? monotheists just want to be left alone to practice their religion in peace!

if only Atheists weren't the majority in America...

the :sarcasm: simile, its a beautiful thing...

[Deep13]

17. And don't get me started on those animistic ancestor worshippers!

:mad:

[maxsolomon]

23. if only there were some way for the persecuted

monotheists to be protected from the pagan majority!

god jul!

[zreosumgame]

31. they need to stop the ritual cannabilism

and veneration of the kind of people who rape their daughters first...

[bluestateguy]

4. If someone wanted to build a Southern Baptist megachurch in my neighborhood

I might roll my eyes, but I can't think of any reason why it should be banned. That kind of religious intolerance is, ironically, what we see in places like Iran and Taliban controlled Afghanistan.

[Judi Lynn]

6. That space in Houston should be reserved for fundie Appalachian snake handlers.

Who do they think they are?

[TexasLawyer]

5. Texas, again.

sheeesh, what an embarrassment!

[HiFructosePronSyrup]

7. pig races?

what part of the Koran says "thou shalt not race pigs?"

Or more to the point "thou shalt not watch Dale Dribble over their make an ass out of himself trying to race pigs?"

[Deep13]

9. That would be an interesting day at the track.

Instead of a mechanical rabbit, they can chase a truffle.

[kestrel91316]

26. Hey. I'm gonna have to insist you come over here and clean up

the SPIT all over my monitor and keyboard, lol!

[man4allcats]

20. As noted in the memoirs of that well read 19th century

Texas Ranger, Augustus McCrae, the Koran does not, as you have correctly observed, say "thou shalt not race pigs" but rather "thou shalt not rent pigs." Mr. McCrae, being a truly egalitarian man who genuinely respected the rights and beliefs of others (with the notable exception of surly bartenders), did not himself rent pigs nor did he patronize those who did. Muslims do not rent pigs, and I do not believe they race them either. There are, however, certain rather bourgeois West Houston denizens who both rent and race members of the mammalian family Suidae. I must personally proclaim myself in agreement with both the Muslims and Mr. McCrae in that like them (and unlike members of Houston's Homo redneckus population), I also neither rent nor race pigs.

[Deep13]

8. "nothing against Muslims and are more concerned about property values"

That is a reason often cited by whites who try to keep Blacks out of their neighborhoods.

[GreenPartyVoter]

10. Seriously. How often do property values go down if a Xn church is built?

[maxsolomon]

13. depends on how friggin ugly it is.

does it look more like a walmart than a sanctuary?

church:


megachurch:

[GreenPartyVoter]

14. Well, there is that.

[Telly Savalas]

25. Oy. The last one looks like the minister would drive a forklift to get to the pulpit.

[Deep13]

15. Even if the concern was well founded,...

...it is not cause to exclude someone from the town. Towns can pass zoning laws that restrict building provided they do not discriminate against race, ethnicity, gender or the exercise of a fundamental right like religion. They cannot simply decide to exclude other Americans from their town. These Muslim-Americans have no duty to the property values of the town.

This reminds me of when after Katrina a bunch of people who were trapped in NO tried to cross a bridge to the neighboring town. A bunch of yokel cops prevented them from crossing ostensibly because the town was unable to provide for them. Well, shit, last time I checked, Americans could go anywhere in this country they want. That stupid little town had no right to keep them out.

[smirkymonkey]

30. I'd move out.

I hate those ugly Christian Megachurches - they are a satanic blight on the landscape. Besides, wherever there are Mega Churches, there are Mega Christians and that alone would cause me to flee.

[YankeyMCC]

24. Very familiar sounding argument isn't it?

[Tight_rope]

11. I live in Houston...And I have a beautiful Mosque about 1/2 mile from me

I don't mind at all. Katy is basically an annex of Houston. Just a stone throw away. I have many Muslim friends and I don't have any problems with Mosque. Muslims have built some beautiful Mosque all over Houston, they truely add beauty to the city.

[krispos42]

12. As long as the Muslims can hold manger races on Friday

Then the Christians can hold pig races.

Man oh man...

Christian George Bush let 3,000 people die on 9/11, sacrified over 2,900 American fighting men and women so secure is "I'm better than my daddy" wartime legacy, and caused the deaths of some 700,000 Iraqis directly and indirectly because "national security" and "oil" are one and the same to him.

The Arabs and the Muslims have a reason to hate us. Some of it is stupid religious stiff-neckedness, some of it is rational. We've (the western world) been dicking around in the MidEast since the First World War, always for the same reason: access to oil. We've directly or indirectly shitcanned any regime that might not simply given us unlimited access to the crude, and we've supported any regime that did, regardless of humanitarian policies. Not to mention the unresolved Israeli-Palestinian problem which Bush, like so many other problems, simply refuses to address.

Yet Christians can have a church every couple of dozen yards. Hmmmm, and wasn't the Christian terrorist McVeigh from Texas?

I heard somewhere, I think on the DU, that if you took out 9/11, more people have been killed in domestic terrorism by white Christian people than dusky Muslim people. Atlanta 1996, the Ohio highway sniper, Oklahoma City, Columbine, and the anti-abortion movement (including the 9/11/06 Iowa clinic attack, the Birmingham clinic bombing, and several shooting of abortion doctors in the '90s) are all terrorist attacks done by white Christians.

[AnneD]

16. Back the pick up truck up....

and cool your jets before adding gas to the flames...folks got upset around here because Craig Baker thought they were trying to throw him off land his family had owned for over a hundred years. Excuse me, but ranchers can and do have grazing rights in many places. Ranchers often buy grazing rights and take the cattle out to pasture. It seems his grazing pasture includes the land that was sold. In the process of dealing with Mr Baker, some poorly chosen words were exchanged and Mr Baker felt that they were telling him to get off his land (the homestead). Well one thing lead to another. While they are entitled to use the land as they want-they cannot force him to give up his farm (no matter what the SCOTUS says) and must abide by all rules. We have many mosques here and we try to respect one another. This flap will die down, although I will have to admit there was less brouhaha than this when they built the Hindu temple in Pearland-and that is a huge temple.

[Bridget Burke]

21. It does appear that this got blown out of proportion.

Lots of ugliness, but things will probably settle down. The mosque will be built.

I've been meaning to get down to Pearland to see the Hindu Temple. www.pluralism.org/research/profiles/display.php?profile=67892

[AnneD]

22. Hubby is not particularly religious...

but he goes to another temple (BAPS). I tell him he can't come back without buying some sweets. If you ever go; check out the sweets. They cost more but they are so good. Yummy.

[Judi Lynn]

18. Wonder what a couple of these dandy praying hands would do for their property values?

[The Stranger]

19. This is the xenophobic, bigoted, racist, hate you get from Chimp's "wars" on various things.

And that good ol' fashioned Christian love!

[kestrel91316]

27. I can pretty much guarantee you if some FUNDIE CHRISTIAN sect

wanted to build a megachurch there, it would be fine with the locals.

[DBoon]

28. This guy wants to hold pig races?

I didn't even know he had siblings who could run fast!

[Strawman]

29. And once that idiot races those pigs to exhaustion...

after he runs 'em so hard that there's no more fight left in 'em after dark on Friday night when ol' Craig is drunker than a skunk on Natty Light, look out Porky, if you catch my drift.

[Zero Division]

32. There goes that right wing love of "freedom of religion" again..

Seriously, why can't they just be honest and admit that they only want the freedom to express and practice the religions that they approve, rather than falsely claiming that they support true freedom of religion? Yes, that's a rhetorical question, in case anyone thought otherwise.