Beheading Journalists in the US

Another young man I met in Skypeland from Algeria told me some amazing things. At first he told me he had studied paleontology, but did not believe any of Darwin's theories or that there was any evidence for evolution. He handed me the old line, "it is just a theory".

He also objected to what he claimed was a biased view in the Western media to only use the term "terrorist" to mean Muslim. I disagreed and gave him counter examples of IRA terrorists, and Timothy McVeigh, and Aum Shinrikyo and the Dresden Fire Storm. This conversation became difficult since he had a disconcerting tendency to not want to listen, and to lecture me endlessly. My response is usually to do the same back. Sometimes I just stop talking if I am unable to respond to any questions or I am not permitted to. Many people in Skypeland do not want to let the person they are talking to respond to a question, and then mount ad hominem attacks. I sometimes return fire in kind, or just give up.

Things started to go downhill when we were talking about a free press. I told him that in some Arab countries journalists are jailed or even tortured or executed for reporting news or views that the government disagrees with. He disagreed vehemently that this was true in ANY Arab country, and claimed that in the United States, journalists who speak out against the government are jailed, prisoned and killed. I disagreed, and I will admit I became quite annoyed. After that, things went from bad to worse...Of course he became quite offended and said I was behaving like a monkey. He played innocent. He asked what he had said wrong, but then refused to let me explain. Ah Skypeland...

Here are some examples of assorted government attacks on journalism in Arab and Muslim countries in the last couple of weeks:

*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5269&Language=EN
*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5261&Language=EN
*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5249&Language=EN
*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5217&Language=EN
*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5214&Language=EN
*http://www.ifj.org/default.asp?index=5210&Language=EN

I will note that in the same time period, about half of the incidents reported by this international organization were in Arab and Muslim countries, and none were in the US or Europe or Japan or any other Western country, which have only slightly smaller populations. So...draw your own conclusions.