This beautifully written piece has assuaged any fears I might have had about the intentions of the people behind the “Ground Zero Mosque”:

Well, for a start, it won’t be at Ground Zero. It’ll be on Park Place, two blocks north of the World Trade Center site (from which it will not be visible), in a neighborhood a jumble with restaurants, shops (electronics, porn, you name it), churches, office cubes, and the rest of the New York mishmash. Park51, as it is to be called, will have a large Islamic “prayer room,” which presumably qualifies as a mosque. But the rest of the building will be devoted to classrooms, an auditorium, galleries, a restaurant, a memorial to the victims of September 11, 2001, and a swimming pool and gym. Its sponsors envision something like the 92nd Street Y—a Y.M.I.A., you might say, open to all, including persons of the C. and H. persuasions.

The point still stands though. If free expression doesn’t mean protection for the most extreme or offensive thoughts and words and symbols, then it doesn’t mean anything.

I struggled with this one a bit. At first, it seemed like a no-brainer: religious tolerance all the way. But as I read more about it, I realized that the odious right wing might have one point in this case. There is a distinct possibility that this mosque is meant as a symbol of “victory,” to rub 9-11 in New York’s face so to speak. And that thought makes me.. uncomfortable at best.

And so, I can at least understand the impulse to want to fight against it. But, as long as that’s all we’re talking about, words and symbols, then so be it. If that really is the motivation, then fine. That just makes them dicks, and us still the freest city in the freest nation in the world. I can live with that.