FSTDT Forums

Community => Religion and Philosophy => Topic started by: ironbite on July 06, 2017, 09:26:47 am

Title: Hobby Lobby funds ISIS
Post by: ironbite on July 06, 2017, 09:26:47 am
Well....not that cut and dry but I do find this funny as hell.  Hobby Lobby, the company that demanded a religious exception to the ACA in order to not allow women to have sexual freedom, just got hit by a huuuuuuuuuuuuuge fine by the Justice Department for smuggling in 5500 clay cuneiform tablets from Iraq.  But that's not exactly the story.
 
Source: https://www.nytimes....uggle-iraq.html

Quote
he packages that made their way from Israel and the United Arab Emirates to retail outlets owned by Hobby Lobby, the seller of arts and craft supplies, were clearly marked as tile samples.
But according to a civil complaint filed on Wednesday by federal prosecutors in Brooklyn, they held something far rarer and more valuable: ancient clay cuneiform tablets that had been smuggled into the United States from Iraq.
Prosecutors said in the complaint that Hobby Lobby, whose evangelical Christian owners have long maintained an interest in the biblical Middle East, began in 2009 to assemble a collection of cultural artifacts from the Fertile Crescent. The company went so far as to send its president and an antiquities consultant to the United Arab Emirates to inspect a large number of rare cuneiform tablets — traditional clay slabs with wedge-shaped writing that originated in Mesopotamia thousands of years ago.
 
In 2010, as a deal for the tablets was being struck, an expert on cultural property law who had been hired by Hobby Lobby warned company executives that the artifacts might have been looted from historical sites in Iraq, and that failing to determine their heritage could break the law.
 
Despite these words of caution, the prosecutors said, Hobby Lobby bought more than 5,500 artifacts — the tablets and clay talismans and so-called cylinder seals — from an unnamed dealer for $1.6 million in December 2010.
 
In addition to the complaint, the prosecutors on Wednesday filed a stipulation of settlement with Hobby Lobby that requires the company to return all of the pieces, and to forfeit to the government an additional $3 million, resolving the civil action.
 
The government will post a notice online giving the artifacts’ owners 60 days to submit claims. After that, the Iraqi government can submit its own claim. The Justice Department will ultimately decide where the items go.
The agreement also requires Hobby Lobby to adopt internal policies to better govern its importation of cultural items, hire qualified customs brokers and advisers and submit quarterly reports to the United States attorney’s office in Brooklyn describing in detail any further purchases of antiquities over the next 18 months.
In a statement, Hobby Lobby’s president, Steve Green, said the company had cooperated fully with the federal investigation into the deal for the artifacts.

The best part of the article isn't in the submitted portion though.  It's at the end.

Quote
Mr. Green said that Hobby Lobby’s collection of historical Bibles and artifacts like the tablets was “consistent with the company’s mission and passion for the Bible.” He added that the company had planned to display the items it bought in various museums and public institutions.
As for the smuggling allegations, Mr. Green said in the statement that Hobby Lobby was “new to the world of acquiring these items, and did not fully appreciate the complexities of the acquisitions process.” He added that “regrettable mistakes” were made and that he should have “exercised more oversight.”

Yes they used that defense to try and excuse themselves.

Ironbite-*dies laughing*
Title: Re: Hobby Lobby funds ISIS
Post by: BobRumba on July 06, 2017, 09:46:26 am
Hobby Lobby fuels fundamentalism.  Christian fundamentalism, Muslim fundamentalism, it's all the same.
Title: Re: Hobby Lobby funds ISIS
Post by: RavynousHunter on July 06, 2017, 10:54:19 am
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ypUz1WYens
Title: Re: Hobby Lobby funds ISIS
Post by: Askold on July 06, 2017, 11:22:02 am
Before reading about their artifact smuggling operations the only thing I knew of Hobby lobby was that the name popped up in media from USA occasionally.

Turns out that their anti-women stance has been exaggerated.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/381637/hobby-lobby-actually-lavishes-contraception-coverage-its-employees-deroy-murdock

They offer 16 types of contraception to employees and help pay for them. The list basically has everything from condoms to three types of sterilization. It's missing abortion and day-after pills as well as few other types that they consider to be the same as abortion as they believe that life starts at contraception.

So, they may lobby for anti-abortion laws because of their religious moral code but at least they seem reasonable in their approach to contraception. (Well, I still think that in some situations abortion is the best option and haven't found out yet what if HL has any exceptions in their anti-abortion stance.)

And their relic-smuggling operation may have helped ISIS but seeing how much of history those terrorists have destroyed so far at least HL helped save some of it.
Title: Re: Hobby Lobby funds ISIS
Post by: ironbite on July 06, 2017, 12:51:11 pm
Askold...no.  Just no.

Ironbite-stop.