this post was submitted on 25 Aug 2023
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All of that is fine. Limit where you can burn something, limit the toxicity of the item burned, but do not limit burning things based on "offense".
You need to see the difference between limiting something because it's dangerous vs causing offense. That is a dangerous road no democratic government should go down.
Inciting violence in public by burning symbols of a minority group is a threat to democracy and should be prohibited. Take it from a German, we have experience with escalating hatred and because of that we also have proper laws against hate speech now.
Burning a religious book is a form of hate speech and serves only to incite hate.
Listen to what you are saying.
I for one refuse to cower to those threatening violence in return for burning a piece of paper. Any person that threatens violence in retaliation to a symbolic action is not to be treated with tolerance or respect, because they themselves are not giving any.
How tolerant are those same people towards atheists or other religions?
The core of all of this is simply that, you taking offense, whatever that means, should not be enforced by the state in the form of punishing me. It is a slippery slope that can't end well.
Take whatever offense you want, ban it in your private house or business, just keep the government out of deciding what is "offensive" and what is a matter of protest.
I for one find a lot of the text inside the Bible / Qur'an idiotic / offensive, but I'd never advocate for the government to step in and ban the books.