July 16, 2012
"Calls to destroy the Pyramids were a hoax, begun by a satirical twitter account, which western news outlets took as fact."
And that's from Reddit, so maybe that's a hoax. I'm not untangling this for you, folks, but since I ran with the original story, I'm giving you this.
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45 comments:
Permission to have sex with your dead wife-- a hoax. Now this. What about those published plans to cover everything with wax?
We need Mary Mapes and Dan Rather to sort this shit out. I can see them calling it a hoax when a pile of rubble is all that's left, but that will still be an improvement.
I feel like I've believed an Onion article.
What about the stories of intentional destuction of historic buildings in Timbuktu? Were those a hoax?
Ok, guilty. We were taken in.
That said: What's sad about things is how credible such a report could be. After all, the Taliban did destroy the Bamiyan monuments. It's simply not unreasonable to expect that radical Islamicists in Egypt could come up with a reason to identify the pyramids as being idolatry. Those radicals have come up with similar insensibilities before; September 11 is an unfortunate monument to that.
If it was a "hoax," it went over so easily because Muslim clerics have been talking about this for a long time.
The Crusades started when Muslims started destroying sacred Christian sites in the Levant.
There is an artifact guarded in Egypt by an ancient priesthood that is said to be a sacred Christian artifact of huge significance.
After Timbuktu, who knows what will happen to that?
There was a story that they played the beheading of a Christian convert in slow motion on TV. I wonder if that was a "hoax" too?
Good, I hope this is the true report. Even though the pyramids represent an astonishing waste of production we should understand that about our past. In fact we should incorporate the accomplishment into the next high speed rail campaign.
What do you think happened to the face of the Sphinx? Erosion? Nope. Muslims, hundreds of years ago. The same thing was done to all of the faces in all the Catholic churches and monasteries overtaken by Muslim warriors.
I lived in the Middle East for years, and there were many Islamic "thinkers" who believed the Pyramids should be destroyed, just like the Buddhas in Afghanistan.
This is the Arab Spring in action. The ruling group in Egypt will do it if they can. Will it take the destruction of one of the great accomplishments of human civilization to awaken people to the realities of the Religion of Peace?
The Sphinx has a human face and is indisputably considered idolatry by Islam.
Jihadist Islamic organizations in Egypt have called for the destruction of the Pharonic monuments for decades - it's not like there is anything new about this.
Saudi Arabia deliberately destroys all pre-Islamic archeological sites in Saudi Arabia, along with Islamic sites inconsistent with Wahhabi Islam.
The Bamiyan Buddhas weren't destroyed by the Taliban either.
Also: Yeah, many of us are also slowly getting used to Twitter hoaxes, but it'll take a while. I myself was taken in by a sports one. Instead of being from a well informed, albeit gossipy NFL reporter (Adam Schefter), I and a lot of others fell for a tweet from "A darm Schefter" (in the tight confines of my TweetDeck window, exacerbated by the tiny font, "A darn" and "Adam" ended up looking an awful lot alike).
The messed up thing was that many of us were busy complaining about how improbable the assertion given was. At least we were attacking the argument, not the arguer! :D
A hoax to coax folks!
Still I would not put it past them to attempt some destruction. It is what they do.
I feel kinda gypped!
"The Crusades started when Muslims started destroying sacred Christian sites in the Levant."
Not true. The crusades started when the Byzantine Empire realized it could not maintain its borders without help after the disastrous battle of Manzikert.
I dunno...
I never doubted the idea of destroying the pyramids. I just wondered who was going to do the work, and pay for it.
This battle with the Muslims has been going on for well over a thousand years.
Whatever the first cause was, the destruction of Christian holy sites fueled the anger of the Europeans.
Not true. The crusades started when the Byzantine Empire realized it could not maintain its borders without help after the disastrous battle of Manzikert.
Historical disputes need support with cites.
Good night Mr. and Mrs. America from border to border and coast to coast and all the ships at sea. Let's go to press.
Apologies to Winchell ...
It isn't our stuff.
They are cool and all, and Boris Karloff and others were able to exploit their mystery, but it isn't our stuff.
Ah, I feel so superficial and liberated. I'll have another Jim Beam, please!
"The Crusades started when Muslims started destroying sacred Christian sites in the Levant."
Not true. The crusades started when the Byzantine Empire realized it could not maintain its borders without help after the disastrous battle of Manzikert.
This is a common misconception. The sacking of Plotenicum exacerbated latent Jalliboo distrust of the (over-extended, minority) ruling Hajken. The ensuing riots caused the crusades.
I figure they should be destroyed anyway. They're nothing more than a glorification of a slaveholding culture. Allowing them to sit there like that is tantamount to flying the Confederate battle flag from the Statue of Liberty. (Full disclosure: my house may or may not have been built in part or wholly by slaves. The man who built it neither owned slaves nor approved of slavery, but his son became a Confederate general).
How can you parody extreme muslims? It's like trying to think of something so stupid even a libtard won't believe it. It can't be done.
Do I recall the raiding of museums in Cairo and the destruction of antiquities last spring?
I also seem to recall similar incidents in Baghdad a few years back!
Probably a hoax?
"Crimso said...
They're nothing more than a glorification of a slaveholding culture. Allowing them to sit there like that is tantamount to flying the Confederate battle flag from the Statue of Liberty"
I think it's closer to maintaining a former plantation as a historical site. You might look at it as an economic accomplishment but when you get to the slave quarters it should be clear it's not a cause for celebration.
The Moslems have been destroying monuments of other cultures for about 20 years now.
Why believe the Pyramids are exempt?
"Bob Ellison said...
This is a common misconception. The sacking of Plotenicum exacerbated latent Jalliboo distrust of the (over-extended, minority) ruling Hajken. The ensuing riots caused the crusades."
This mistakes marketing for cause. Such events were used to stir outrage and thereby improve recruiting.
Crusades were impossible without Byzantine support, and before Manzikert they were absolutely against them.
"campy said...
How can you parody extreme muslims? It's like trying to think of something so stupid even a libtard won't believe it. It can't be done."
Yes. That's exactly what Poe's Law is. "Without a winking smiley or other blatant display of humor, it is impossible to create a parody of Fundamentalism that SOMEONE won't mistake for the real thing." And the reason it's impossible to create such a parody is that a real Islamic radical can always find a way to say something even more ludicrous than any of us can come up with.
The slow beheading of a Christian convert is not a hoax.
However, as long as they leave the pyramids alone, they're still good folks. So, nothing to worry about.
Marshal,
I was being somewhat sarcastic. I know it doesn't translate to blog comments, but it's my default state.
"Crimso said...Marshal,
I was being somewhat sarcastic."
Whoops.
Quick, cancel the wax order! Cancel the wax order!
I am with Crimso on this. I think they should be torn down anyway. As the Professor pointed out in the original post, they were build with slave labor and serve as a reminder of the hegemony of the Ptolemy whose attitude towards women was not all that swift either. Further, they are a safety hazard and a magnet for tourists who are an easy target for the terrorists who occasionally get the shit bombed out of themselves for daring to go to Egypt.
The smooth outer stones of the pyramids were removed centuries ago and used to build? ... Yep! mosques.
After the previous treatment of the pyramids, the giant buddha statues in Afghanistan, cathedrals in Spain and Turkey, and the church of the Holy Sepulchre when the Pals first launched #occupychristianitysholiestsiteandusethebiblesfortoiletpaper does anybody really doubt they would find some way to get rid of the pyramids and other ancient religious artifacts of other religions?
Better go see Stonehenge while you can. After that goes, you're stuck with Jazz Odyssey.
The Reddit story may be a hoax, but this story is not.
"According to Egypt’s Interior Ministry and figures published by the Associated Press, the number of illegal digs has increased by 100 times to a mind boggling 5,697 cases. Since the revolution, there have been 1,467 cases of illicit trading in antiquities and 130 attempts to smuggle them abroad. Thirty-five people have been killed while looting Egypt’s treasures, including 10 people buried alive just outside the tourist mecca of Luxor."
The above from Rock Center, with video at this link.
It has to be announced as a hoax to avoid crimping the incumbent's campaign. It's not a hoax, but politics in USA, on one side, says it has to be called so. "We don't want no stinking facts, much less need them, and particularly not that one, not at this time, later perhaps, when we have more flexibility. Say it's a hoax."
I have no doubt there are Islamists calling for the pyramids to be destroyed. There are Islamists calling for nearly everything to be destroyed.
BTW, I thought the French used their canons on the Sphynx. I guess that must have come later.
"they were built with slave labor"
Uh, are you aware that every ancient culture had slaves?
The code for sarcasm or sarcastic comments is "insert sarcastic comment"
We're gonna have to start using it so people don't get confused.
dammit messed it up
Supposed to have brackets and sarc /sarc
@Michael,
The Ptolemy family ruled Egypt from about 300 B.C. to about 30 B.C. Their rule was one of the results of the sudden death of Alexander the Great.
See Wiki.
The Pyramids were built by various Pharoahs. The oldest was built in ~2600 B.D., the most recent was built in ~660 B.C.
You're a little off if you call the Pyramids the legacy of Ptolemy.
well if some guy named "kosher nazi" says it was a twitter hoax then that's good enough for me....except for the fact that i had read of calls for the destruction of the pyramids months ago in the arab/islamic press...but those guys are all just a bunch of twittering jokers, aren't they ?
Karrade. Irony not your thing.
Let's Stick Together by Wilbert Harrison
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