The reviews of it weren't very kind either, which surprises me as its not often Tom Hanks puts out a dog. I haven't seen it or read the novel, but I just finished reading another one by him (Deception Point) that was pretty awful. The writing wasn't bad - okay dialogue, good pacing and narrative - but the main character kept having near-death encounters over, and over again (and escaping virtually unscathed). To give you a sample of what I mean (spoilers):

She gets shot by an ice bullet (do these even exist?) but her and 2 out of 3 of her companions still, despite being unarmed, escape the Special Forces asassination squad of 3 "trained killers";

however they do fall off the glacier - only to survive because the drop was only 10 feet;

but then the ice shelf they land on breaks off (assisted by the detonation of a flash-bang grenade lobbed into the crevice by one of the evil-doers) and the 3 plummet along with it into the arctic ocean several hundred feet below;

they survive the fall only to die of hypothermia;

only they don't because one of them had tapped an SOS onto the floating icepan which was heard by the sonar operator on a nuclear sub that just happened to be nearby;

then later that day they are attacked by the same hit-team and the main character is shot in the arm by the machine-gun turret of the helicopter gunship they are piloting, along with another who is shot in the leg and both end up in the heavily hammer-head shark infested water (they are off the coast of NJ now);

the main character happens to have been in an unpowered one-man submersible with a stuck hatch and its slowly sinking; her and the other characer survive (she is saved by the third character) who are all picked up by a Coast Guard helicopter that just happened to be in the area just as seemed certain our heroic threesome would perish in the water (again);

the 3-man hit squad, which has to be the most inept ever to wear a Special Forces uniform, are all killed during their attack by our previously cornered and unarmed heroic threesom.

The End (and no, I didn't make any of that up).

Jesus' message does not command his followers to kill people that were not of bis opinion, or to make them submit and treat them discriminative. He - as he is described in the bible - also did not do that himself. Muhammad did, and the Quran holds plents of quotes where it is calling for killing done by Muslims against infidels, where as the killing is forbidden (self-defense against Islam is forbidden!?) for the infidel, and if they do it, it is so much more an evil act than if a Muslim does it, for whom it is an opportunity to gain praise and honour. Where Chrstian religion leaves it to God to decide on life and death, Islam decides on the basis of Muhammad's will and does the killing itself in the place of Allah.

I have no sympathy for fundamentalists in principle, but Christians fundamentalists are a group within modern christianity, wheres as Islam is a fumdamental relgion in itself. It compares to Chrsitinaity as if the Christian religion never moved beyond the old testament. But it did, and here we are, but they still lag behind over a thousand years and have prevented and killed any developement that could have led to new scriptures or reforming minds giving them something like Islam'S pendant of new testament or Jesus. Islam is the origin of it'S own standstill and theological stagnation. It must solve that itself, we cannot and should not rry to do it in it's place. Will cost us only our heads. Our ancestors had a bloody time to raise Chrstianity beyond the old testament'S content, and Islam mjst suffer that same painful birtzh, or it will become the doom of all mankind and civilisation - the great destroyer, but no constructor. I do not see it has the potential to acchieve that objective, unfortunately, and that makes Islam to a problem for all non-Muslim mankind.

I also do not feel christian fundamentalists on a crusade to make europe submit and delete my home culture and force me to become one of them, or penalize me if I do not join. I also do not see them rage through the streets like a horde of raby monkeys that often and on that scale as it is the case in Islam.

I find it idiotic to compare Muhammad to Jesus, or Islam to Chrsitianity on the basis of Jesus and the new testament. That's like comparing Jesus or Siddharta to Hitler or Stalin.

Problem is, scandium, Christians being violent are so in violation to Jesus explicit message. Comparable with regard to Buddhist. But Muslims being violent are not violating their relgion, but they follow explciit rules of their religion. It is ridiculous to compare Christianity to Islam on a theological level. Both are worlds apart.

As to the movie, they said in TV it has seen the most successful (financially) start there ever was after three days, don'T remember if it was meant on an international or national level, second only to one other film. Anyway, I always considered it to be possible that the biblic Jesus does not match the historical correct figure. I would not be surprised to learn that he liked women or maybe had a child, and I also would not be shocked. I do not believe in the miracles the bibles describes, for me they are metaphors. That Jesus maybe was a family man, and maybe someone else in his place was crucified, does not weaken the value of his words in the sermon on the mountain, and in so many other examples where he preached. In the end we all are just humans, in good and in worse, and some people's life is dominated by life and love, others by killing and aggression. That is true for you and for me, and for Jesus and Siddharta as well, and even for Muhammad. Some of us are just more wise and positive towards life than others.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

LOL! Someone is paid and they become a shill. Oh, they're right-wing, so it's OK.
If you would like to point out her follies, go ahead, though I suggest another thread for it.

And my point was that numerous people exist with all sorts of beliefs but that doesn't mean they have established foundations backing them up.
Nope.
Here's a quote from MSNBC:

• Acts of violence against abortion clinics and their employees have been carried out across the United States throughout the 1980s and 1990s.
  
  There were 1,700 acts of violence against abortion providers between 1977 and 1994, with four people killed in 1994 and one in 1993, according to statistics from the National Abortion Federation.
  
  The Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms has logged 167 attacks against abortion clinics over the past 15 years.
  
  In 1984, there were 18 bombings against abortion clinics. In 1993, there were 78 death threats aimed at clinic employees. And, in 1996, bombings, threats and harassment affected about one-third of U.S. abortion clinics.

What religious bodies unequivically sanction these acts of violence? How many people are involved?
We may be able to reach a point of understanding if you'll let me in on what history is being rewritten by whom?

EDIT: And everything that Skybird said. :roll:

He also died 2,000 years ago which means he isn't around to admonish those who pervert his teachings or selectively ignore them. All of which happens and has happened under the christian banner. In fact there is probably no better cover for irrational behavior on a mass scale than religion, including christianity.

No because being a more evolved religion, christianity exercises more subtle forms of control. The example I cited here has led to censorship, in many countries, of a movie that is pure fiction. More significant than this trite example would be the influence exerted by the christian abstinence lobby on the developed world, where their efforts have succeed in curbing safe-sex practices and condom distribution. This has profound effects on the Western hemisphere as well when sexually transmitted disease are further spread there and find their way here as people emmigrate and travel.

This is the problem skybird: you equate a critique on christianity with a criticism of Jesus. They are not the same thing. There is, in fact, considerable room for interpretation of the bible and the various christian religions are very diverse from the different faiths interpreting it in different ways - not all of them even remotely "mainstream". And not everyone who goes to church or adopts the banner of christianity is a theologist. Far from it. Many know little more than their pastor's/priest's/minister's interpretation and he can have considerable power over his congregation irrespective of whether or not he "gets it right" or what the New Testament actually preaches. Jonestown is an example. Waco, Texas, is another.

That is of little consolation to the victims. The fact is that, right or wrong, people who do bad things in the name of christianity are every bit as convinced of their righteousness as those who do bad things in the name of Islam.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

They're a shill if they consistently promote the ideology of only one political spectrum while attacking/undermining the other and making a living doing it. That about describes Malkin to a tee. She's a "right-wing" shill because she consistently promotes right-wing ideology while attacking the left-wing. If she were doing the reverse she would be a left-wing shill, but then you wouldn't be posting her commentary here, would you?


As you linked Malkin's commentary on Gore's global warming documentary to this point you really have me confused now. Are you suggesting global warming doesn't exist and comparing Gore's documentary on it to christianity? If so this seems kind of an absurd comparison to me. Whether you like Al Gore or not, global warming has been studied by actual scientists who seem to mostly agree that, if nothing else, the climate is changing and the globe is warming. The disagreement is mainly over the extent, the causes, and the consequences. That is quite a lot of different from a theological expert who is someone that knows everything to know about a single book and adept at rationalizing everything in the world that contradicts it. And who's evidence is impossible to observe or to measure.

Here are six remarks from the office staff here.


“What a load of hype over nothing the book was rubbish and the film is also rubbish�

“I fell asleep from boredom watching the film�

“I gave up on the book and threw it on my log fire�

“The film was weak�

“Droll and predictable�

“Slammer�

As for me I never read the book and I am not wasting money on seeing the film. And why it dose not interest me one bit as for the hype get a life.

Coming in 2007 The Simpson’s film now that’s worth seeing. :up:

I'm happy to say that I have not purchased or read a single Dan Brown novel.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

I would place Malkin in the same group as Ann "Thrax" Coulter and Michael "Moronic" Moore. She is a verbal bomb thrower.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

Why?

shill ( P ) Pronunciation Key (shl) Slang
n.
One who poses as a satisfied customer or an enthusiastic gambler to dupe bystanders into participating in a swindle.

This belongs on a separate thread but I asked you before to show us her deceptions.
This does not define a shill. It defines an idealist or possibly an idealogue.
Something strange going on here. My link is to an article titled Eco-Terrorism 101. Watch the movie.

And the point was that there are lots of people with personal beliefs that violence is a legitimate means to achieve an end. Some people base themselves on their own decisions of right and wrong, others on what is dictated to them.

I don'T get what you want to point out.

Islamic violance against infidels is because it is acting in conformity with this ideology's rules and dermands. Muhammad practiced it with his own hands. He ordered it, Quran demands and praises it black on white. Several Hadiths call for it. Where Muhammad felt just offended, he took revenge and answered with massacre of males and boys and ensalving of women and girls. A Muslim being violent for these causes is in congruency with his religion's very basics.

Jesus did talk against violance. He did not raise his hands aginst others, he discouraged his followers to be aggressive against others. Nowhere in his teachings you find a writtendemand to kill and to overcome those that disagree with Jesus. Nowhere you find the written demand to wage war against infidels. Where jesus not only was offended, but even treated brutally and brought to dfeath - he did not call for revenge, but forgave his attackers. Where a Christian is acting violantly against someone of other faiths, or is oignoring the suffering of others caused by his own way of living, he is not in congruency with his religions basics, but he is explicitly violating it.

You cannot compare modern Christianity with Islam. Islam's clerics very much are in conformity with the teahcings of their religion, although sometimes being creative in finding reasons in the scriptures that are justifiying their doing (a good part of the Hadith may have been created that way, eventually). But the christian church IS NOT in conformity with the teachings of Jesus and the new testament where it is acting with war and powerpolitics like in the medieval (I exclude the crusades, becasue they would not have taken place if europe and the ancient Roman heritage of Christianity would not have been attacked by Islam first). Islam is right in it's critizism that the priests of the infidels have abandoned and distorted their own scriptures. In all my posts, for that rreeason I make clear distinctions between church and Christian religion in the understanding of new testament and Jesus, for that reason. I wrote that often enough. So far, so well. Problem is that Islam does not have to offer an altermnative that is of more value. The church in the past acted intolerant in violation of it'S religious basis. Islam still acts intolerant because that is it's religious basis. Chriszian countires have opened their societies for other cultures and religions, and now are overrun by Islam. Islam has progressed with a program of ethnical and cultural cleansing in it'S countries since it's very beginning, until today. The secret service of the Vatican, I referred to that repeatedly, said early in this decade, they have counted 100.000 slaughtered christians in Muslim nations per year, until today, victims of intentional and targetted murder and local progroms. It takes place in ALL Muslim nations, in some more, in some less. Now show me where this happens in Christians countries today! In Germany there is a weeks-long scandal every time there is a single assault against a single foreigner of dark skin or Muslim looking, and I can hardly imagine that in North America and all eiurope Muslims get slaughtered in progroms by the tens of thousands each year.

There has never been a valid fatwah against the slaughtering of infidels in Muslims countries, btw.

Really, I do not understand what you are aiming at. Are you trying to make Islamic danger appear less harmful by distracting attention towards the cruelty of other factions or times? Okay, interesting historical or political comment, then, but in no way it decreases the threat Islam poses to the rest of the world.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

Michael Moore lies and distorts. Coulter, IMO distorts and has some absurd opinions. But please find me where Malkin does the same? Again, I would prefer a new thread for this issue.

I am feeling sick about all of this hype about Da Vinci -code.The book was absolutely rubbish and i think the film is also.
And i am atheist but i like good literature.
Da Vinci - code was one of the worst books i have tried to read.Maybe i compared too much for Umberto Eco :hmm:

My goal was actually to point out that christianity can incite the same fundamentalist authoritarian behaviour that Islam can attract. In Islam's more notorious recent case it was the cartoons and the outrage we sensible Westerns felt toward their protests and how quickly people were to condemn them for protesting. Here we have something fairly similar: a harmless movie which is purely fictional generates a totally out of proportion response (boycotts, hunger strikes, protests) that results in the movie being banned from at least two countries - so far - and yet there is no similar Western outrage to these christian protests that are limiting freedom of expression in the countries that have banned this film as a result.

In fairness I'm not even that outraged myself, but then again the Danish cartoon thing didn't get my blood boiling either. But then I personally view religion, with its basis firmly rooted in the irrational, as something similar to an international mental illness so their protests and such almost make sense when viewed this way.

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

One doesn't have to lie to be a political shill. To me its sufficient if they make their living on attacking only one political ideology while promoting the other. Consider for a moment that with the right-wing in power, someone who shills for them is essentially shilling for the government - you are reading something they consistently write in order to make the government look good and its opponents look bad. You are essentially reading Pravda, since that was Pravda's job as well.

If the left-wing were in power then left-wing authors who promoted the government's policy while attacking its opponents would, similarly, be Pravda as well. However until that happens those of us who read such left-wing rants will simply be practicing our right to dissent ;) That is the difference, subtle though it may be.

(in fact all political authors who write with this modus operandi are shilling for one wing or the other, but naturally if we're political and if our politics gravitate to one side of the spectrum especially, then we won't mind those shills who happen to share our world view... whether its ideological or pure opportunism).

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

Besides abusing the word "shill", this is unbelievable rhetoric.

I once again challenge you to point out any untruths that Ms. Malkin has stated.

Simply astounding. Do the protests against TDVC come anywhere near these messages or the same extent of violence, destruction and deaths that were a result of the Mohamed toons? :nope:

Re: Da Vinci Code provokes protests ahead of premiere
 

You previously asked for distortions to which I have pointed in this new thread as per your previos request:

http://www.subsim.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=52814

And I answered that one does need to realize that there is a difference between the church and its' followers, and Jesus teachings, whereas such a discrepancy is not given with regard to Islamic ideology (pendant to "church") , and Muhammad's commandments (pendant to "Jesus' teachings"). maybe because Jesus has not created and authorized any church and it's queer thinking at all, but all teaching of Islam has been created by Muhammad himself? ;)

You can twist it as you want, you cannot bypass the fact that Islam's scriptures and teachings explicitly call for violance and war against the infidels (it is no case of interpretation, but explicitly formulated black on white, beyond all doubt), while Jesus teachings as to be red in the bible do exactly this NOT, but the opposite. So when you be violent in the name of Islam, you are in confomrity with it, whereas you are violent in name of Jesus, you abuse him.

One would think that with regard to motivations, this makes an enormous difference.

A quote by one of my favourite writers, a quote that is often given in essays and articles: H.-P. Raddatz: "Von Allah zum Terror?", the second of three books analysing the challenge Islam poses to the West by comparing both cultures' different histories and different dogmatic theologies (my translation):

"In no other culture, not to mention religion, one can find the codyfying of murder, robbery, enslavement and enforcement of tribute payments as an obligatory religious duty. In no other religion one can find the sacred legitimation of violence described as the will of God against believers of different faiths, like Islam has integrated it as an integral part of it's ideology and codiefied it in the Quran, and confirmed it's validity in it's historical praxis. Last but not least beside Muhammad there is no other founder of a great religion, whose exemplary effect does not only includes warfare , but also the liquidation of opponents and critics by ordered murder."

That kind of thing was all over the place during the middle ages; the Futile System, the Barons, the Weak Kings, the Spanish Inquisition, Armadillo etc.

I find myself liking the word "Shill" now for some reason lol...?

Forshills... :)