Mohammed Cartoons controversey

[The Lost One]

I heard a good comment this morning about this issue on the news, being, Muslims are violently protesting over a defamatory comic and yet, when radical Muslims groups were beheading innocent civilians, there was no protesting over how the beheading placed Muslims and Arabs in a negative light. I have to start thinking that the Muslim/Arab community needs to think a little bit more about what issues will enrage it.

[42]

Well, looks like Iran found a better way to protest. Tasteless, but a better way.

http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/asiapcf/02/07/cartoon.protests/index.html

[Skar]

This is disturbing.

If you postulate that the muslims of the world, in general, are of the opinion that anyone who is not a muslim of the right stripe is sub-human it explains both those reactions.

I'm not posing that as a serious comment on what muslims are like I'm just pointing out it would be easy to come to that conclusion given recent events.

[The Lost One]

I agree with 42 that this is a better way but also tasteless. I'm also starting to thinks that Muslims aren't use to having their religious beliefs publicly mocked (which is a good thing in my opinion). Maybe if more Muslims attended liberal-American universities, they would be more use to having their religious beliefs scorned and tastless cartoons wouldn't enrage them into violent protests (although they would still have a right to be offended).

[Harbinger]

As I understand it, the protesting Muslims have two issues:
1. The offensive cartoons ahould never have been written or published;
2. Since they were, those responsible for said writing/publishing should be punished.
The Danish government's response is, "We will not censor the printing of legal, offensive material."
The response to this response by certain Muslim individuals has been rioting, killing, and destruction; the response by certain Muslim governments has been to cut off trade with Denmark.

If I have all of that right, what purpose will the printing of Holocaust cartoons serve? Will they call the West hypocrites if we peacefully protest the printings, but do not kill Muslims, attack the embassies of Arab nations, or cut off trade with them? And as far as freedom of press, I assume that the Iranian government will not be censoring the cartoons, so that's a complete non-issue.

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I'm not sure it's a better way. A lot of Muslim educational systems depict Jews as hated monsters. This would only serve to encourage that behavior.

The root of the problem, as lost one points out, is the inherant hypocrisy. They don't understand what they're doing, I think. They haven't thought about anyone else's position, only their own. It's an innately selfish position that these protesters are taking. That's what I think of anyone who would kill over a cartoon.

[Spriggan]

I don't know if this has been posted yet, I'm not going to read through through the rest of this thread, but several of the cartoons that sparked off the riots weren't even cartoons nor were they ever published in Denmark.  One was of a French pig-caller, at a contest, dressed up as a pig, it was the one that the Danish cleric was showing around to incite this.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,184174,00.html
about half way into the article

[The Holy Saint, Grand High Poobah, Master of Monkeys, Ehlers]

I don't think it was in this thread, but it's in the wikipedia article Ent linked to.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Even Family Circus? Or Cathy? I could kill over a Cathy cartoon.

Seriously though, I think the bigger issue that most news broadcasts have missed is that these riots are happening because the individual state controls much of the media in the middle east and freedom of the press is almost non existant. For many muslims dealing with the idea of the government not being able to tell the press what to do is unsettling. For the less intelligent or educated it looks like the government told the press to print it and it reinforces the belief that the west has it out for the muslim world. Its a result of cult of personality leadership which incidentally has been fanning the flames for its own ends.

I found myself partially agreeing with the sentiments of the French Press the other day, who have been defiantly reprinting, and discussing the event in a particularly french way. My favorite was the magazine Soir with the headline "Oui, on a le
droit de caricaturer Dieu" or " Yes, we have the right to caricature god". Inside they reprinted the Danish cartoons, and then added a few of their own ridiculing everyone. My favorite has God, Budda, and the Prophet Muhammad sitting on a cloud over the Earth with god saying to Muhammad "Don't complain Mohammed, we've all been caricatured here."


An interesting side note to the anti-Danish crusade in the Middle East is the boycotting of Danish goods including Danish cheese and Danish Insulin made by Novo Nodisk (the worlds largest manufacturer of insulin.)

Honestly, who boycotts essential medicine?

[Entsuropi]

http://www.csmonitor.com/2006/0206/dailyUpdate.html

Seems that the Anglo press is refusing to show the cartoons.  The article above lists the reasons given by various papers and the BBC.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

Im not sure I know how to judge our reactions to the cartoons in the media. Its safe to say that in the US I think papers are scared, and thanks to the Anthrax attacks in congress and multiple bombings and the general attitude of the US in the muslim world I think they decided to be safe. In addition, I think they may be trying in their own small way to protect reporters in the middle east (especially in Iraq and Afganistan) who have a dangerous enough time.

Or as they say it could just be that this story is past that. The real issue isnt the cartoons, but rather the inappropriate reaction to them. Protesting is fine, burning down property and killing people isnt.

[Skar]

Danish editor Flemming Rose solicited the drawings precisely because of their sensitive nature. He says Europe is being cowed into self-censorship by Muslims. Publishing the toons plants the flag for free speech.

Yes, there's no reason to offend people of any faith arbitrarily. We owe all faiths respect. But the Danish cartoons were not arbitrarily offensive. They were designed to reveal Islamic intolerance--and they have now done so, in abundance.

The above quotes were from the article Entsuropi linked.  I find them particularly enlightening.  Newspapers all over the world have published cartoons of an equally offensive nature to, for example, Christians and no furor has erupted.  And those cartoons have often been widely reprinted.  
Why did we not hear or see discussions on why those cartoons should or should not be reprinted?  Because there were no fire-bombings, deadly riots or trade embargos that resulted from them.  
Reacting with cowed politeness and carefully tiptoeing around Muslim sensibilities (or anything other than the scornful mockery such behavior deserves) in THIS case merely reinforces, for everyone everywhere, the idea that behavior like we have seen, riots and so forth, gets results from the western press.  Being "extra-careful" not to offend muslim sensibilities (far more careful than they are about Christian sensibilities) further merely reinforces their current behavior as effective.

I feel confident in saying that everybody in the western world who is following the story wants to see the pictures that are causing the furor, and would probably buy a newspaper or magazine that printed them, just for that.   So there's a good business reason to reprint them.  Why aren't they?  Because of the violent reactions of the muslim world. That's a terrible reason not to print something you normally would and just begs for more violent reactions in the future.  If you meekly give the bully your lunch money when he hits you he's going to hit you again the next time he wants your lunch money.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

At the same time, its an entirely a natural reaction however inappropriate. No one likes being hit by said bully, and even in the schoolyard most kids would rather take it than get into a tussle.

I dont think that its a good reaction, however.

[Skar]

Absolutely.  It is a natural reaction.  It's just not one that's going to convince him to stop hitting you.

[Mad Dr Jeffe]

I think the thing is, in our society getting that angry at a comic is completely alien to us.
Its a shock, and why I think the rioting is more important than the images. Frankly nothing written or drawn trumps the value of human life, I may think its horrid, or in poor taste, or blasphemous but it certainly isnt worth killing over.

In a lot of the Arab world (primarily where the riots are) people have learned to be bullies because thats all people in power respond to. To an extent of course. You didnt see riots like this in Iraq, or nearly the same reaction in Iran which is ironic in some ways (considering the Fatwa they have against Salman Rushdie). But places close to anarchy or where the government has an agenda (Syria for instance where President Al-Asad has been exercising tremendous pressure on his media to print only what he says, especially when it lashes out against the West which is angry about the whole Lebanon thing) are exploding in an orgy of violence. The clear thing is that the rioters are pawns, and desperately in need of the free speech they advocate against.