I can see why Albert Brooks' film Looking for Humor in the Moslem World was a flop. Apparently there is no sense of humor there, especially the more subtle forms like irony. The recent controversy over the two cartoons published in the Danish newspaper Jylands-Posten highlights the humorless hypersensitivity of the Moslem world quite dramatically.
In response to these two relatively harmless and not terribly biting cartoons violent protests have errupted all over the world, with Danish embassies being burnt, cars overturned and general mob outrages. Arguably these two cartoons have struck a harder blow against Islam than the War on Terror has, at least to judge by the reaction. The photo to the right from a protest in London sums the irony of the issue up quite well, showing young British Moslems using their right in a free society to protest, and in that protest condemning the very freedom that lets them speak out in the first place. We've pretty much entered Orwellian IronyWorld when people are protesting against freedom.
For those who haven't seen them, the cartoons along with others on similar topics have been reprinted in various newspapers. I found them on the Brussels Journal website. The ones which started the controversy are the 5th and 11th ones on that page. Mohammed with a bomb in his turban - not terribly subtle or funny. The heaven running out of virgins gag - pretty sharp and amusing. Better than most of the lame cartoons that get published.
The problem isn't just that fanatics have no funny bone. Fundamentalist Islam comes from a long tradition which views any depiction of the human form as a sacrilege, even more so when it's a depiction of a religious figure like Mohammed. They aren't terribly tolerant of outside ideas or cultures in any form. These are the guys who destroyed innumerable great paintings and sculptures when they conquered the Byzantine Empire and who burnt the Library at Alexandria for the second time.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Bliffle
You're right.
2 - Mark Edward Manning
I definitely think you're right that Europe has finally woken up to the nightmare that Americans felt on 9/11. As if 3/11 in Spain and 7/7 in London weren't enough. For Europe, terrorist attacks weren't enough, it was the backlash against their right to free speech that provided the catalyst. At least Europeans have finally gotten the message. I only hope they don't soon forget it.
3 - Dave Nalle
In some ways this is worse than 9/11, because the reaction is so extreme and the causes are so trivial. It highlights the complete alienness of radical Islam in a way which the simple, almost warlike attacks of 9/11 did not.
Dave
4 - Elvira Black
What truly enrages me are those who live in a secular pluralistic society like, say, London but expect that society to give special dispensation to them above all others and to follow their rules for "correct" governing. If they don't like freedom, they can always go, or go back to, their "own land."
The mindset of religious fundamentalists in general is in direct opposition to democracy. What we see as good, they see as evil. However, in our country it is possible for fundamentalists to (for the most part) have their say without holding the whole nation hostage.
Moreover, peaceful protests and boycotts are part of our way of life as well. I can even understand how a Muslim might be outraged by this, just as I would be offended by an anti-Semitic cartoon (which from what I've read, is, I think, far from unknown in Islam). I've also seen video clips from Islamic countries which portray the Jews in the most reprehensible ways possible. These are not presented as satire or humor, but as the vilest propaganda (aka their version of the "truth") which would have made any Nazi proud.
In any case, there are certain stereotypical, inflammatory cartoons which may make some groups justifiably upset. But when threats of violence and burning of embassies are part of the mix, I say that's where the line is drawn for me.
BTW: What's more egregiously offensive: a political/satirical cartoon in a newspaper or a religious/political leader declaring as fact that the Holocaust was a myth?
In any case, you make an excellent point.
5 - Dave Nalle
The mindset of religious fundamentalists in general is in direct opposition to democracy. What we see as good, they see as evil. However, in our country it is possible for fundamentalists to (for the most part) have their say without holding the whole nation hostage.
Except when it comes to issues like abortion and gay marriage, of course. In those areas they seem to feel they have the right to impose their version of morality on everyone else involuntarily.
Moreover, peaceful protests and boycotts are part of our way of life as well. I can even understand how a Muslim might be outraged by this, just as I would be offended by an anti-Semitic cartoon (which from what I've read, is, I think, far from unknown in Islam).
They're easily found in the editorial sections of almost any middle eastern newspaper and no one bats an eye. For that matter, you'll see insulting portrayals of actual living heads of state like Bush, and that's a lot more offensive than the mildly negative depictions of a long dead mule broker we're dealing with here.
BTW: What's more egregiously offensive: a political/satirical cartoon in a newspaper or a religious/political leader declaring as fact that the Holocaust was a myth?
I'm taking that as a rhetorical quesiton.
Dave
6 - Gordon GoHah Mellencamp Hauptfleisch
Great summation on the entire situation.
7 - Dave Nalle
Thanks, bizarrely long-named person.
Dave
8 - Gordon GoHah Mellencamp Hauptfleisch
it's short for Gordon Cougar GoHah Mellencamp Hauptfleisch
9 - troll
very well presented - what a picture - !
party on...
until the people of the books choose to throw aside dogma they will remain petty barbarous and cruel
troll
10 - Dave Nalle
I think it might help a lot of the people of at least one of the books would use their Madrassas to teach the kids something other than just reading that one book and shouting 'death to the USA' over and over.
Dave
11 - alien
Try going into a meeting of the NAACP and address those attending as niggers.
That might give you a clue as to where free speech has limits.
12 - Dave Nalle
Alien, why would anyone in their right mind do that? And how is it in any way comparable to this? They didn't print derrogatory racial slurs about Moslems, they printed relatively bland political criticisms involving a guy who's been dead for 1400 years.
Dave
13 - Richard Brodie
Try going into a meeting of the NAACP and address those attending as niggers. That might give you a clue as to where free speech has limits.
Free Speech has its limits at the property line of the auditorium where the the NAACP meeting is taking place. Those who rented it have the right to call the police and have the disrupting individual ejected from the premises. On the other hand, said disrupting individual has the right not to be assaulted and battered.
It's all really very simple, until and unless the government starts in on the slippery slope of trying to legislate emotions, by setting up special categories designated as "hate" speech as being exceptions to the general Freedom of Speech.
A society of adults cannot operate on rules designed to prevent people who act like children from getting into fights. A certain minimal ability to exercise self-control and restraint in the face of insults, must be assumed to exist in the general adult population. Otherwise Freedom of Speech will be chipped away at by idiot politicians until there's nothing left of it.
14 - Ruvy in Jerusalem
Dave, there are a lot of times where I have trouble with the comments you put froth, but in this instance, your last paragraph will be the final and authoritative one on this topic, when all the laundry is dried and done.
15 - Dave Nalle
Thanks, Ruvy. I hope that my last paragraph proves to be as true as it ought to be, but already I'm hearing a lot of backpedaling and minimizing and excuse making from the European left, so as usual I despair that common sense will ever enter their thick skulls.
Dave
16 - Imran
Could it not be the case that had it been a US newspaper that had printed these Cartoons the reaction would not have been as explosive. if we look at it from the otherside for a moment maybe its us muslims thinking not only is it the large super power bullies kicking our butts but now the nerdy teachers pets are also taking a run up.....and so its the muslims turning around and kicking the danes back in the Arla. The cartoons could just be the icing on this fantastic cake we been eating !
17 - Dave Nalle
I think it makes a great deal of difference that Denmark has a largely unassimilated muslim population, while the US population of muslims has made a lot more effort to fit in, and been treated with more acceptance.
Dave
18 - lol
I say kill all the lawyers and blame the cartoonists for it.
19 - gracefulboomer
lol- you must have a crystal ball, although a Danish lawyer was just shot and not murdered.
'Danish lawyer shot as fury of Muslims sweeps world'
GETHIN CHAMBERLAIN- 02/07/06
A DANISH lawyer was shot and several Muslim demonstrators died as protests against the publication of cartoons showing the Prophet Muhammad continued around the world yesterday.
The lawyer was wounded in an incident in a Moscow cafe by a man from the Muslim Caucasus region of southern Russia.
Meanwhile, the prime minister of Chechnya announced that Danish humanitarian organisations would be expelled. cont.
Sorry, I don't know how to light up the link.
That was a pretty amazing statement you made!
20 - Imran ( muslim, proud but hurt )
No more virgins......what a horrid thought! thats what must have caused the uproar.
21 - Dave Nalle
If they were Christians then they could undergo revirgination when they are born again in Christ. Or so some of the more whacko fundamentalist street preachers would have us believe.
Dave
22 - Nancy
Just out of curiousity, if good muslim men get 70+ virgins (I presume female? altho I've never seen it specified as such) what do good muslim women get on arriving in paradise?
23 - Dave Nalle
I believe they get beaten and told to go cook dinner, Nancy.
As for the virgins for the men, I hear they're out of human women and are using goats now and no one is complaining.
Dave
24 - Nancy
Mmmm...seems muslim women get the same treatment as mormon women. Wonder if there's a connection there?
25 - Purple Tigress
According to an Op-Ed in the New York Times there is a question about the translations.
This suggests that in the same way that the Bible has been used to justify many inequities or cultural prejudices, so has the Koran.