Lack of a sense of humour? Most definitely.

This cartoon issue is just another case of the seemingly ubiquitous, unquestionable and unfounded ‘silence of respect’ that we have to show religion, Nancy Graham Holm and the Guardian newspaper being yet more obstacle in the way of open, critical discussion.

Islam seems to be no go area for satire these days. Denmark is a secular society in which a free press operates. The press should not have to be particularly sensitive to one group of religious people within secular society. According to Islam it is blasphemous to make images of the prophet Muhammad, according to free journalistic practice it is not.

Either everything is ok for satire or nothing is.

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I’m so frustrated with the argument in this column that I refuse to put time into crafting a response. I think this comment posted below the piece by MaxwellW at 6:25 p.m. on Jan. 4 is an adequate response:

“The way I understand this article, I’m not allowed to be satirical unless some nutter who believes in things that don’t exist tries to kill me ... Insane proposition!”

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Unfortunately this “Insane Proposition”  seems to be often repeated..

From Times Online January 29, 2008

“The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, has called for new laws to protect religious sensibilities that would punish “thoughtless and cruel” styles of speaking. “

Apparently all the religious “nutters” , even the ones who are sworn enemies, have decided to stick together to insure that we all “bend the knee” to religious authority.

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There is a telling and sad clue in this forlorn communique. “As a journalist now living in the same town as Westergaard.” I am reluctant to pass judgement on someone who lives right where religion has already taken the shocked populace by the throat. It’s all the more reason for those of us in such relatively greater freedom to let our view be known whenever possible. We may just be sparing someone, somewhere, sometime being tortured or killed by religious people. The earlier we decisively and unremittingly resist, the lesser the cost. Assuming we could effect the perpetually renewing tides of credulity at all. It seems to me we are obligated to try, at the same time I do think Mr. Hitchens is probably correct.

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Wow.  That article simply portrays all that is wrong with religious apologists.

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Tolerance and respect for religion is the fertilized ground from which fundamentalism grows. Such irrational beliefs are not worthy of respect anymore so than are those who hold that the world is flat and that gravity is god(s) love pushing us down.

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This is a very complex situation, in which groups of people are trying to manipulate each other.  A few Muslims wanted to stir up hatred based on cartoons that not many people had seen.  Now, some people are trying to use the silly cartoons as a way of stirring up general hatred of Muslims.  Others are publishing the cartoons as a rather unimaginative way of demonstrating support for freedom of speech (why not come up with your own idea?).  I think few come out of this situation well.  And now Holm’s dreadful article tries to insinuate that the publishers of cartoons should be morally responsible for attacks.

One thing has to be beyond question:  violence as a response to insult or ridicule is absolutely unacceptable, and religion can’t be used to justify it, no matter how petulant were the publishers; even if it were remotely true that they were prejudiced.

Their actions may have resulted in violence: there is a causal link, but there was no moral responsibility, and Holm should be ashamed.

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Two things Mr. Zara. “Now, some people are trying to use the silly cartoons as a way of stirring up general hatred of Muslims.”- Is this true? you suggest an equivalence here. Muslims are not a race of people. This is not something encoded in genes. it is adherence to an ideology. I do hate Islam as I hate Christianity, Scientology or any other false and immoral ideology being as they are manmade dogmas. Why is it bad to hate Islam or Nazism? Also are the cartoons “silly”? Or do they make a devastating satirical illustration of the contradiction of hearing that the “prophet” is supposedly a peaceful loving figure?

Second your complaint that publishing the cartoons in not a sufficiently original way of resisting censorship strikes me as just wilfully bizarre. It’s not a theme for a symphony. The point is to be defiant. The purpose doesn’t require being imaginative. This is like complaining that someone wasn’t inventive enough in fighting off an attacker: “you pushed and punched, then ran away? that’s not very imaginative, why not cartwheel your way out of danger?...”

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We had a similar conflict in Sweden some time later firer up by a depiction of Muhammad as a dog in a roundabout (It’s a Swedish thing).

I wrote a paper at the university about the debate that followed in Swedish newspapers and did some research about the former conflict in Denmark.

I was not much surprised when studies of newspapers depictions of Muslims in Danish newspapers done previous to the publication of the cartoons showed them as a criminal, violent and undemocratic group. This was the picture of the whole group of Muslims painted from the exemplar of the very few. The art of propaganda and modern lynching.

I don’t defend extremists but I do defend ordinary Muslims who live their lives according to their private desires, when their desires are consistent with democracy, as most of them are. But this kind of media bullying is of the worst kind - even if I accept free speech almost to absurdum.

The worst problem is not the extremist Muslims, they are so few, and certainly not if you view this from a pragmatic standpoint with good humanistic ethics in mind. The problem is the mainstream western viewpoint that Muslims are a uniform group - easy to offend, always close to anger and violence. And our own desire to recreate them that way in ordinary daily speech and in our media.

In this fashion we alienate the larger mass who view them selves as moderate and in many cases cultural Muslims (or what ever they like as long as they abide by the law). This does not help in the fight against intolerance and extremism - both Islamic and the Western contribution to idiocy: Racism.

In the same fashion in Sweden there was a lot of double standard when some Muslims demonstrated against the newspaper (Nerikes Allehanda) who published the drawing of the roundabout Muhammad dog. They did so in a peaceful manner according to civil rights. A right that express respect and solidarity to democracy even if you don’t agree with the standpoint of the protest. This was a act of Muslim adherence to democracy but interpreted as an act against the freedom of speech.

By doing this we do not just say that Muslims are extreme and undemocratic as a group, we also take away from them their rights to democratic freedoms, the same freedoms we ourselves claim to advocate and protect. This is not a good way to behave, nor is it a exit door for it’s proponents to say: what about the death threats and the burning of embassies?

Those disgraceful acts are not the property of main stream Muslims, nor is it theirs to explain or be burden by. Those are the act of our common enemy.

Was is right in a democratic spirit to publish the cartoons? Yes, absolutely. Was it nice, did it achieve anything good, did it help a minority or throw light on a critical problem? No, absolutely not. Did it reinforce a previous problem? Yes, it did, and still do.

It is the cowardice and the moral faulty, the enemy in my mind, who advocate actions that produce what he or she already has determined. The advocacy of propaganda and fear. In this case the view that Muslims are a threat and a danger to us all and our most precious rights. A dangerous group with some good apples, not the other way around, a group with just few bad apples who seem to be highlighted to represent the whole.

We ask for it and we sure know how to be ignorant enough to create and receive it - time and again, as history pass by.

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While I agree that tha majority of muslims are peaceful, the are also silent when the small minority commits atrocities in their name.  Where are the riots against their fellow muslims who have fouled their image by their barbaric actions and statements?

I think the best response to violent attacks aimed at supressing free speach is to make sure the result is the opposite of the attacker’s intent.  The best way to punish this extremeist is for him to recieve dozens of letters daily saying, “I never would have seen this delightful cartoon if it weren’t for you.  Thanks to you millions of people have seen it who hadn’t seen it before.”

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Much of the responses here take the tone of an “us vs. them” attitude, albeit with a better command of prose than found elsewhere. This is troubling, as such an attitude almost necessarily dehumanizes those with an alternative (or conflicting) discourse, meaning the “religious apologists” and anyone else made an “other” is seen as a foe, rather than a fellow human. This is against the humanist spirit.

Further, the responses to this article/excerpt are most often emotional utterances, saying no more than “Look! Something conflicts with our discourse community, it makes me feel ____ way.” Yes, we all recognize “apologist” themes and the many ways other ideas conflict with our account of the world, however, let us respond, if I may make such a suggestion, by engaging the author of the article/excerpt and discussing his/her misunderstandings, et al..

It is my position that threads addressing the authors of particular subject matter, that is threads that engage an author in discussion, better serve the humanist “cause” than abundance of incestuous echoing found here.

In solidarity,
Meursault

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Ray Burleigh
Your question about Muslims against Muslims, “Where are the riots” is a significant one. I agree with you but feel somewhat unfair at the same time due to the activism many Muslims do take part in, both locally here in Sweden and globally.

Yemen, a former home of Osama bin Laden are now hunting domestic Al Qaida cells as I type these words on my computer. The battles in both Afghanistan and Iraq are first of all battles between secular Muslim (democracy) and adherents to political Islam (theocracy).

The people who are targeted and killed are not westerners; they are mostly fellow Muslim of different denomination and groups as Christopher Hitchens so often points out. They fight the battle against extremism everyday and you have to consider their questions about western interests in the past fighting against democracy, for example in Iraq, Iran and Saudi Arabia, when it suited our economic interests.

Where are the riots against that? Where are the excuses, where are the acknowledgments in public discourse that western democracies has had a large part in the current mayhem?

Well. You can be fierce both ways.

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(I tried to post earlier but it seems that my comment never made it to the board.  I do not know what I am doing incorrect.)

I had mentioned in my previously attempted post, that I had learned a bit from the other posters about this topic. 

I did want to add that if something is an affront to someone’s principles, then a person (or group) ought to take a stand for them.  And, to not do so, for the fear of being seen as badmouthing your religion, carries two ugly truths.

1)  Anyone who passively does not condone an atrocity is a passive supporter of said atrocity.

2) If you see someone of your race, religion, etc doing something horrible, and you do not criticize them for it, due to the fear that you might be labeled a “hater,” then you have no value as a human.

-MM

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Mathemagician
I agree on both #1 and #2 if I understood you correct.

But adherents to one out of many Muslim faiths in the overall sum of a billion do say something about the complexity of this affair. And the overall problem with religions. Sam did well to write so extensively on this subject in his book: about the problem with the moderate as a shield for extremism.

I concur with you but must, for sake of reality and pragmatism, point out that moderate Muslim, Jewish, Christian (etc.) adherents don’t view themselves as part of the ‘extreme’ problem. They seem, in my perspective, to view themselves as ‘a part’ from them as I as a Swede am from take guilt for what Americans are doing - in this comparison, as a westerner and supporter of democracy.

A smart step and progressive step for main stream Muslims must be, like you point out, to openly disown extremism, like they do in some cases (http://www.cbc.ca/canada/story/2010/01/08/canada-muslim-fatwa-attack-canada-united-states.html)

You put your finger on it when you say that moderates (or whoever) must, in the shape of individuals, oppose the things done wrong if they are to adhere to a democratic ideal. The Nuremberg syndrome “I didn’t know, I was under orders, I just happened to look the other way” etc.  Won’t do! Or, in the religious context: It’s their religion, or: They read the same book but has nothing to do with us! It won’t do, not by far.

This is crucial, and why we need to be fair and seek dialog before confrontation- and be as strongly opposed to a general intolerance of Muslims as we are on any other subject, impartially practice democracy for the benefit of all. And by this be able to persuade the majority of Muslims to fight and disown the extremists by themselves. In the end, this is a fight that the Muslims themselves will be the best to resolve, especially if we as a species are to avoid further acts of aggression and hatred, and maybe full out wars.

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Here’s the rub.  I can respect your rights to practice your law-abiding belief system in your home and in your religious institutions.  HOWEVER,  you must mutually respect my right to REJECT your belief system and publicly expose its horrors.  You have NO right to expect others to conform to your wacked-out ideas about authority and morality.  If we did conform, we’d be just as miserable as you.  How about a little mutual RESPECT?

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