About that Danish cartoon - It's a convenient distraction

[hedgehog]

Is it possible that it was seized upon as a way to move the focus from the Palestinian election results? Instead of Hamas and Fatah hotheads shooting at each other, they get to threaten Westerners while cooler heads work out a compromise behind the scenes. (Please note, I'm not saying that all Palestinians are hot heads, just suggesting that the cartoon was held up to distract the ones who are hot heads.)

[msongs]

1. can't criticize the cartoons since i have NOT seen them

like people who rag on a movie even though they have not seen it.

Msongs
www.msongs.com/liberaltshirts.htm

[hedgehog]

3. You can find them on Wikepedia

Apparently someone wanted pictures of Muhammad for a children's book and couldn't find an artist willing to provide them for fear of repercussions. The cartoons were comments on the fear of repercussions should anyone dare draw an image of Muhammad. Some people consider the cartoons to be racist. I think they range from typical editorial caricature to obscure European satire.

[Name removed]

4. Deleted message

Message removed by moderator. Click here to review the message board rules.

[Mika]

8. Much like xtians will if you wear a black jezzus t-shirt.

Its all medieval.

[sam sarrha]

14. the few Christians hat feel that way wont kill you for doing that.. and

..and i am talking 'medieval' in the 'Literal' sense ..not figuratively,...

I really mean Medieval.. cruel/dark/and as painful and bloody as it gets

[formernaderite]

18. the cartoons are very mild and some quite funny

Here's a link to look at them, I'd repost but don't know how:
http://www.di2.nu/files/Muhammed_Cartoons_Jyllands_Posten.html
Seems we need to send the comedy channel over there...and inoculate them with a sense of humor.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. I hope that was what it was used for

From my viewpoint, it was simply stating that every Muslim everywhere are terrorists (or veiled supporters of terrorists), thus stirring up anti-Islamic sentiments. To understand the depth of the insult, the Beloved Prophet was depicted in this way-it was like the time a crucifix was dipped in urine by some artist and many Christians became very upset.

[Selteri]

5. My opinion is that the hotheads need to develope a skin.

They're so upset about a piece of art or in the case of the cross and urine which seems a bit worse of a simbology for an allusional drawing. I hate to say it, but getting all upset is just a bad thing, it shows that while these people keep asking that their own freedom of expression be defended that they don't seem to be willing to do the same for those of us who are not religious.

This is an insane situation, I have seen the cartoon and while it's mildly offensive in nature it is hardly something I would call comparable to dipping a cross into urine, more I would consider it comparable to the cartoons that I've seen that ridicule Jesus.

The truth is that this issue is about two things, power and control. People want to control the way people can percieve their religion and control the people under thir fold. It is true the proper following of the Muslim Religions eschew releasing violence from ones life unless acting in defense. Mohammed was a warrior who reformed in essence. It is just like the Christian Religions are and have been used for the same thing and Jesus was a hippy in essence with how he spoke of love, peace, turning the other cheek and loving your enemy. Watch how the Religious Right finds it insulting to draw that allusion though, they absolutely hate it.

[Burning Water]

7. There's nothing

particularly wrong with them being upset. Either the Christians or the Muslims are entitled to be offended, especially if something was meant to offend. They are entitled to criticize, call names, and explain why, in their opinion the "art" is a piece of shit, the artist the spawn of Satan, or to call for a boycott.

What they are not entitled to do is use, or threaten to use, violence on the artist, the publisher or gallery, or innocent people.

Freedom of speech is for the offended as well as for the artist, and should be respected.

[Selteri]

16. I didn't say they didn't have the right to be offended

I said they didn't have the right to censor and that they need to develope a bit of a thick skin. I am an artist and I do cross some 'societal' lines with my work in some ways that has been viewed as offensive.

Yes, they can and should boycott and speak their mind, they can also do the same thing that many generations have had the choice to do as well. They have the choce to not look. We all have to share this ball of mud and we all need to learn to live with each other which means that we all need to develope a bit of a skin against some crass artist throwing out something offensive.

Recently Focus on the Family got the show Book of Daniel canceled, my mother even remarked that the show wasn't really that bad, just too gritty and realistic for these people to be able to handle the idea that some Christ might actually, gasp, crack a joke when he's closer to being the represenatation of how this man deals with his life which is beyond his control.

You are ight, they have the right to speak, they have the right to their opinion, they have the rights to do a lot of peaceful things like a boycott, yet they need to also realize that everyone else has to have those same rights or they are just trying to be totalitarians and might as well admit they want a theocracy, something that has been proven again and again to be a hugely bad idea that falls to corruption and overwhealming intolerance for the human factor of society.

[Burning Water]

20. My point was

that it is not just like the Christian religions. Yes, Christians get offended, but there is no comparison between what they do about it, and what some Muslims are doing.

We are all inhabitants of the 21st century, not the 14th, and not the 7th.

[sam sarrha]

10. Islam never had an "Age of Reason" like the west... you are often dealing

with people from the 7th century.. a lot of the hatred and mistrust comes for the sect that is still following Saladin ..spl.. when i was in the peace corps they warned us not to piss off the Muslims, that they still held grudges all the way back to the days of Mohamed.. and they dont forget even imagined insults.. and they have a really long list of real insults..

and dont be nieve thinking they will ever 'get over it', or grow thinker skins.. it isnt going to happen.

[Burning Water]

6. The difference being that

there were no threats by Christians to kidnap innocent people, Their boycotts fizzled. They were laughed at in the MSM. And no one claimed that their religious sensibilities should trump freedom of expression.

Not saying all, or most, Muslims need to learn to live with other religions. Obviously they already can. But there seem to be a substantial minority who think that because they know Allah's will, everyone else must agree with their opinion, or die.

This is a problem for all human beings, but most particularly for the peaceful, decent Muslim community who must realize that the actions of the few is dragging the name of all Muslims through the mud in the larger world community.

[hedgehog]

9. But we're talking cartoon now instead of Hamas vs Fatah

That's my point. It took everyone's attention off of the political situation Palestine at a very tricky point. The guys with the guns are pointing them at symbols of the West instead of each other while the politicians work thing out. I don't think the cartoon is the real issue at all.

[sam sarrha]

13. we are talking about "Blasphemy".. you want to die over a cartoon, go ahead

your point will not be missed or remembered.. this is serious stuff to them.. it doesnt get any more serious than this.

[Burning Water]

17. I can't blaspheme Mohammad.

I am not a Muslim, and Mohammad is just a man to me, not a particularly appealing one, either. Though if people want to follow the path he brought from Allah, what is it to me?

I am armed and not afraid. I will not give up my liberty for George Bush, I surely will not do it for someone who thinks I should worship his God rather than my own.

Blasphemy is totally legal in the USA, and Denmark, and France, for that matter. Christ gets blasphemed everyday. He's a lot more important, in this culture, than Mohammad is. So what makes Mohammad so special that we have to give up or freedom of speech?

I'm not saying to do it. I would find this offensive, maybe racist. What I am saying is that it is more offensive, and more dangerous, to curtail our liberties.

[Burning Water]

15. I'm going

to have to disagree with you on this one. I think the Palestinians, the Arabs, and Muslims in general, are perfectly capable of giving their attention to more than one issue at a time. I suspect that for those friendly people storming EU offices, and threatening to take hostages, it is a real, actual issue.

Just my own personal opinion, of course.

[Selteri]

12. Not recently, that is true, look into the way way back machine though...

and you'll see that Christianity has been even more thin skinned in the past. Europeans burned people at the stake for heresy. Jailed people for following the demon of science, killed women for being raped. Ah, if only we could go back to the GOOD OLD DAYS eh? We shold understand that those fanatics in all of these religions are just as dangerous.

It is true that the US doesn't have terror-religious groups, those who have done such have been generally caught in Wyoming or Waco or other places out in the boondocks in cult forms and have been kept from being allowed to amass too many rocket and grenade launchers or machine guns.

This doesn't make their actions acceptable, yes, they are not a majority in any fashion, but they are enough of a problem that they cannot be catered to. Real terrorists fear an opposing opinion more than they fear death because they feel they must force their views upon other people and that is not a reflection of a psychologically healthy mind.

[Burning Water]

19. Unfortunately, I

don't live in that alternate reality where time-machines work. I am not particularly interested in what happened 200 years or more ago. While those problems must be remembered so that they are not repeated, they are not the problems of today.

Today, the fundamentalist groups to be most feared are not Christian, but Muslim. Their whack jobs far outnumber Christian whack jobs, who do, as you say, exist, and are dangerous. But no state funds them. I don't know how long it's been since the last beheading they've conducted. And, frankly, while I've seen boycotts, LTTES, and even protests by them, I can't remember any kidnappings, or threats thereof. There have been attacks on a few abortion clinics, but there do not seem to be well-run networks supporting them.

Don't take this as support of American policy, by the way, I don't support it, and that's not what I'm discussing anyway. I'm discussing whether Western nations should cater to Muslim sensibilities so far as to limit our own rights to speak, publish, draw, even evangelize. My answer is "No". After all, I've got my own sensibilities which Muslims do not seem to respect. A loud proportion of them, anyway.

[tritsofme]

11. This controversy has been brewing since the fall

The US media is just picking up on it now though.