Can you please explain why you always forget the bombings

when you mention the violence.

I’m aware that you do not feel the need for it, but I’m sure you would appreciate when somebody, and not just anybody I might add, not surprisingly shares the following simple notion:

“…we do not stop individual citizens from expressing their views no matter how distasteful they may be. There are of course different views around the world about the outer limits of free speech and free expression. But there should be no debate about the simple proposition that violence in response to speech is not acceptable” – Hilary Clinton, this morning.

[Daphne – Values are not necessarily valuable or good.]

You mentioned incidents whch occurred more than a generation ago. It is highely unlikely that similar incidents would happen again today or in the future in Malta. As far as I know no one has been arraigned for many of these incidents.

[Daphne – They will not happen only because the political climate does not permit it, and because the police now will not tolerate it, still less participate in it. And not because the inclinations of the Maltese have changed. As you saw amply demonstrated in the crude and savage reaction to what I wrote about Mintoff, lots of people here are as primitive as ever.]

On the other the situation in many Islamic countries is different and violent incidents tend to flare up quite regularly. We all remember the Mohammed cartoons incidents. The Islamists who perpetrate this violence seem to want to prove that what anti-Islamists claim, that Islam is violent and intolerant, is correct.

[Daphne – It’s pretty much the same with Mintoffjani, I’m afraid. And with the hysterical reaction of Maltese people to any perceived criticism by outlanders.]

However, I feel I need to say this: so we made a whole brouhaha over Vella Gera’s ‘porno’ piece and Labour’s Owen Bonnici took up the cudgels in his favour. Fine.

He has a right to express himself.

But I did not see Bonnici, or any PL member, defend your right to express yourself in the way you thought fit over Mintoff. How frighteningly selective.

Some Maltese reacted strongly against perceived insults to them and their country. The reaction was probably excessive and therefore not completely justified.

However the murder of the ambassador is nor just an intolerant overeaction. It is violence and savagery at its worse. I think that the view that this is terrorism or an equivalent is not off the mark. In Malta we never saw violent protests against embassies let alone the murder of an ambassador.

[Daphne – No, we only saw newspaper buildings set on fire with employees trapped inside, Opposition HQ ransacked, leader of the Opposition’s house ditto, Catholic HQ and law courts broken into and smashed up, a young man murdered inside a PN club and another man murdered at Police HQ. We never saw violent protests against embassies because nobody fomented discord against foreign states. But we sure as hell saw violent protests against other significant buildings, my dear, and of exactly this nature, too.]

Must be seen to be believed: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qmodVun16Q4

And how’s this for hysterical over-reaction to an inane remark?

http://www.timesofmalta.com/articles/view/20120912/local/italian-restaurateur-gets-himself-in-hot-water-over-insulting-malta-comments.436612