The Truth Shall Set You Free

Alright, I know this is coming a little later as expected, but with work and taking care of my son, I've literally been smothered by time. As I stated in my last post, I am going to be writing an article that means a lot to me. In February of 2012 the media got a hold of a story. It was one that was so interesting, they couldn't let it go. The problem was, the whole story was a lie, and I will prove it. Before you post any story, you need to get two sides to the story. The media finds something negative or something interesting in which they may be able to twist so that they can make some money. Unfortunately, with this, they only get one side to the story, and they make a lot of people mad. Back to my story, there was a judge in Mechanicsburg, Pennsylvania who heard a case between a muslim man and an atheist. In October of 2011, the atheist was marching in Mechanicsburg's Halloween parade dressed as a zombie "prophet Mohammed." I am not a muslim. In fact, I am a Christian, and I found this very offensive, but I was with my son, and did not feel it appropriate to walk out in the street and tell him and his friend (zombie pope) that they shouldn't be doing that. I was not courageous enough, but another man was. He was a muslim man, and he started to tell the atheist that what he was doing was wrong. I think part of what brought the muslim man out to the streets was when the atheist started screaming "I am the prophet Mohammed, rising from the dead!!" The atheist man, pulled out his camera phone as he got close to the muslim man. It was obvious that the atheist was provoking the muslim man. The atheist spotted the muslim, and he "knew" it was going to be war. Immediately, the atheist started saying "he's choking me, he's choking me." As the "altercation" was happening, a police officer rode by on a bike and didn't see any sort of violence happening. In fact, they both walked together for a few blocks before they approached a police officer and stated what happened. The police officer charged the muslim man with harassment. "The police officer charged the muslim man with harassment." -Something a lot of newspapers and members of the media got wrong was that they thought it was either a trial on "assault" or that the judge was the won who made the case about harassment. The case was heard in December of 2011. Both men were disagreeing with each other on what happened, but there was one piece of evidence that helped determine the outcome of the case. It was a piece of evidence in which most members of the media failed to even mention. It was the styrofoam sign that was hung around the neck of the atheist man. It was attached by strings. The average person would assume that styrofoam breaks very easily. It may even get dinged up a little easily. The styrofoam sign had no marks, nicks, scratches, tears, or "anything" suggesting the muslim man choked the atheist. In the end, it was all just heresy, and the judge had nothing to rule that the muslim man "harassed" the atheist. In fact, if "anyone" did any of the harassing, it was the atheist. After all, he was the one doing the provoking. I found several laws stating that provoking someone or instituting violence is illegal (saying that the muslim man "did" do some form of violence against the atheist, which he did not). In fact, provoking someone is so bad that it's smack dab in our constitution. It's under the military code, but there's more, just wait. In U.S. Code Title 10 (Armed Forces), Subtitle A (General military law), Part II (Personnel), Chapter 47 (Uniform Code of military justice), Subchapter X (Punitive articles), §917 (Provoking speeches and gestures), it states: "any person subject to this chapter who uses provoking or reproachful words or gestures towards any other person subject to this chapter shall be punished as a court-martial may direct." People don't understand that just because we live in America, they think we have the right to say and do whatever we want. The judge, in this case was in the right book when he said something similar. He didn't give any laws against it, but I knew about them because I heard about them in one of my political science classes. I was a political science major, and law is my forte, so of course I payed special attention to this. The judge said, "just because you 'can' say or do something, doesn't mean you should." I wanted him to go further with this, but I just don't think he knew there are more laws. I'll give you a little bit of an easier example, rather than USC Title 10, Subtitle A, Part II, Chapter 47, Subchapter X, §917. Many people have heard the saying "don't yell fire in a theatre." Surely, if we have a first amendment right, we can say whatever we want, right? Wrong, and this is only one example. Saying there is a bomb on an airplane is another common one, but others people don't typically think about are obvious ones. If you make a terroristic threat against the country, you can be arrested. If we had a freedom of speech, that wouldn't have happened. I'm just pointing out, and adding on to the judge's ruling, that "no, we actually can "not" say and do these kinds of things." "Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969), was a landmark United States Supreme Court case based on the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. The Court held that government cannot punish inflammatory speech unless that speech is directed to inciting, and is likely to incite, imminent lawless action." BAM!! So, this case is stating that "if" the muslim man "did" attack the atheist, he would be allowed to because it was very obvious that the atheist was instigating an attack. Now to the juicy stuff. During the hearing, after the judge made his decision, he gave the atheist a good talking to. He educated the atheist on the heritage of muslims (since the judge is a Lieutenant Colonel and is currently serving his fourth tour as I write this). He knew a little bit about their heritage because of being around them. The atheist had asked the judge beforehand if he could tape the hearing. The judge said "no," but the atheist did it anyway. He altered the tape to make it sound like the judge said "I am an atheist and I am offended." Immediately, people jumped to conclusions. They started saying that the judge was in favor of sharia law, and that he should have recused himself from the hearing. Now the judge is "not" a muslim. He's actually a Christian. Does that mean he should recuse himself from every case a Christian is involved in? Of course not. This specific atheist has gotten a lot of hate from "other" atheists because he instigates things "all" the time. Something else people got mad at was the fact the judge held up a Koran. The reason he did that was because he has a book for every faith so that people of every faith can swear upon their holy book when taking the oath. Now to the kicker...I gave the second side to the story, and do you want to know "why" I know this side? It's because the judge is my dad. My dad made the right decision, and I stand behind him, despite what the media says. Here is a little video in which so many people in the world say they see the muslim man attacking the atheist...sounds like a little bit of exaggeration to me, considering you can't even see anything at all. Anyway, if you have any questions, please feel free to ask. It's been several months since I've talked about this issue, so I'm sure I missed some of the talking points, but I just wanted to get it out in the air that the media messed this story up "bad." They mutilated it. Anyway, here's the video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yP-X3hpCfR8&NR=1

Bring the positivity back

So, as we all know, yellow journalism runs our country, thanks to William Randolph Hearst and Joseph Pulitzer, but especially Hearst, who didn't think there was any problem with writing lies and bending the truth. Now all our country wants to read are things that cause controversy. They don't care if it is bending the truth or not. They just want an interesting story. I rarely read anything positive in the media anymore. So, although I don't have many followers on my blog, I will start with small steps. When I read a story in the media, and if it sounds juicy, I am going to do some research on the topic. I will write stories on positive things going on in our lives, but I will also correct the media on the lies that they wrote. Tomorrow, I will start with a controversy that most Americans (and even people in other countries) got a hold of, and since they were misinformed by the media, got the wrong idea on a topic.