I can understand, perhaps, if some publisher in a not terrifically lively place like Denmark decides he wants to make some money by publishing some cartoons that– perhaps– he doesn’t even know are actively offensive to a billion-plus of his fellow humans. What I don’t understand is that, after the offended people have expressed their deep hurt about these cartoons, a bunch of other publishers all over Europe should choose to reprint them.
And they call that “free speech”? To me, it is exactly like sexual pornography, which is an ideology and a billion-dollar industry that intentionally demeans and objectifies women and provides the ideological basis for the industries of prostitution and human trafficking that are built centrally on the human suffering of women and young girls and boys.
Liberal societies have laws against the free publication, display, and distribution of pornography, and I’m glad that they do. Many have laws against publications that incite race-hate.
Publishing cartoons whose main intent is– as we all well know– to cause predictable amounts of great offense to adherents of a religion is not a “free speech” issue. It is incitement to hate of the most childish and irresponsible kind.
Of course Muslims should also find effective and nonviolent ways to express their sense of deep hurt. The violent response that’s been seen in a number of Muslim communities does nothing, I think, to either defend or honor the values of the religion. Huge, disciplined, nonviolent protests of all kinds– demonstrations and possibly also boycotts– would achieve those things so much more effectively.
Meantime, maybe we should all have a calm and reasoned discussion about the nature of sacred-ness in our world– and how we can all learn better to respect the feelings of others about the sacred.
What does it mean, indeed, when we say something is “sacred” to us? Is free-speech absolutism a “sacred” value? Thoughts?
56 thoughts on “The “cartoons””
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In reflecting upon the question of freedom of speech and religious sensitivity in the Middle East, should we limit our purview to the recent European newspaper cartoons offensive to Muslims or must we also examine the cartoons, ubiquitous in mainstream Arab publications, offensive to Jews?
http://www.tmcnet.com/usubmit/2006/02/04/1342924.htm
It is quite irrational to take offense at a cartoon, even if it depicts a religious figure. Tolerance is lacking on the side of the religious fanatics who have chosen to result to violence and marching in the streets. I doubt that most of the protesters in the middle east even read the Danish paper prior to and after the publishing of the cartoon. It has been made in to an issue by those leaders in the middle east who want an issue. Regardless if the cartoons were meant to incite, responsibility has absolutely no implications for freedom of speech.
Hey, George, it’s an issue for me too, and I’m a rational humanist. See also xymphora at http://xymphora.blogspot.com/2006/02/danish-cartooning.html .
It’s an issue for Peele, who thinks it’s all about the Jews. I don’t quite follow, but what the hell. If that’s what it takes to have him on side for once, so be it.
As xymphora says, the cartoons are rank bad manners. I like Muslims and I can’t see the point in these simply offensive graphics. Away with them!
It’s an issue for Peele, who thinks it’s all about the Jews.
I don’t imagine he thinks it’s “all about the Jews.” He’s noted the hypocrisy of the arab media with respect to religious stereotyping, “hate speech,” etc. offensive ethic stereotyping is easy to find in the media of ANY society. big deal.
Has it occured to you that protestors , in burning the danish flag, are burning the symbol of your own faith?
not long ago a jewish lawyer named David Goldberger fought for the rights of Nazis and holocaust deniers to march in Skokie, illinois. where are the david goldbergers of the arab world?
and since when is an avowed revolutionary like yourself concerned with good manners?
Some of the cartoons were offensinve; some of them were inoffensive. As far as I can tell, the demonstrations are directed against any depictions of the prophet, and that is unacceptable. We have, in european countries, laws guaranteeing free speech, and an attempt is being made to overthrow these by force, and to intimidate artists, journalists, and anyone else. That has to be resisted because our laws aren’t worth anything if they can be bent by foreign mobs.
I don’t know if you have seen, Helena, the reports of the HT demonstration in London where they marced on the Danish Embassy shouting “Britain, Britain, you will pay: 7/7 on its way!” But if that is allowed, and protected by the police, then there will be a considerable and in parts violent backlash to the idea that it’s not OK to mock the prophet.
clash of ‘freedoms’
Sorry about the double post. I don’t know what happened above.
Salah, the problem comes out very clearly in the Asia Times piece you quoted: “First, for Muslims, nothing and no one is above Islam. No one should be allowed to be disrespectful about anything remotely associated with Islam.” If this is interpreted to mean “no one, anywhere”, it is a claim to global domination. This will be resisted. The problems of globalism cut both ways, and so long as we don’t have a world government we have to respect the decisions and values of differing nation states. I am opposed to these attempts to intimidate and threaten the Danish government for quite a lot of the same reasons as I opposed the Iraq war.
The right to be disrespectful about all sorts of things associated with Islam is one of our European freedoms, repulsive though it may be to many muslims. It may sound paradoxical to say that I believe it should be defended, rather than exercised: in concrete terms, I think it was wrong to publish some of the cartoons, but wronger to burn down an embassy because of this.
We have reached a sitatuation where both sides are feeling threatened and insulted. But surely you must see that no state and no country can tolerate Rushdie style threats against its own citizens for doing perfectly legal things.
With all that said, I agree with you that there have to be compromises. But who should compromise and on what? My own suggestion is that a global compromise is impossible. There just has to be an agreement to disagree. Many practices in Muslim countries are repugnant to sections of Western opinion, and vice versa. We just have to learn to ignore each other, and to grant others the right to make thier own mistakes.
Within nations, a different, and more substantial form of compromise is possible, since everyone involved has votes and voices. That is to say that British Muslims and British newspapers may come to one set of rules; French, or America or Danish papers may draw different lines. But this suggestion rests on the idea that nationality is and should be more important than religion. I don’t see how we can compromise on that, if you disagree. We can be polite; we can try to avoid clashes. But sometimes nations — and religions — simply have to make a choice. If the choice is forced on me, I’ll take the secular nation state — and the cartoons — over any kind of multinational theocracy.
Renowned Swiss cartoonist Chappatte
The newspapers must have the right to publish cartoons of dubious quality. That they in fact do publish cartoons of dubious quality is disappointing. Muslims, among others, must have the right to protest anything printed. Even if it’s a protest against the weather report.
Nobody should have the right to burn the Danish embassy. It is not surprising that there are a few bad people in any society (such as Syria) that want to burn an embassy. It is extremely offensive and surprising that the Syrian authorities did not manage to prevent the crime.
Most political cartoons of all kinds are trashy and make baseless accusations and use false analogies and bad logic.
It is interesting that no Israeli newspaper has published the cartoons. It is more interesting that one Jordanian newspaper did publish some of them.
I actually would like to protest some weather reports, but that’s a topic for a different day.
Quite a surprising read. Since when are you arguing the same kind of moral absolutism that the Bush regime is trying to propagate?
While muslims have every right to be upset they are barking up the wrong tree. It’s not the job of the government to control what newspapers are printing and that is exactly what the question of “free speech” is all about. My problem with these protests is not so much that they are violent but that they are completely ill-directed after all it’s the danish embassy that got attacked and not the subsidiaries of the newspapers that printed the drawings.
You seem to suggest that government should intervene and only allow newspapers to print what is deemed “non-offensive”. Deemed “non-offensive” by/to whom?
The very suggestion that there should be a limit to “free speech” which would necessarily require some form of central authority that declares what is offensive and what isn’t sends shivers down my spine. Do I believe that printing these cartoons was a good idea? No. But that has nothing to do with free speech at all. What is “sacred” should be determined by the people and not by a government as you seem to suggest.
Andrew Brown –
Hi. I quite agree that the HT demo in London was unacceptable, though I do understand that Muslims are deeply offended and support their right to peaceful protest. You might be interested to know that the Muslim Public Affairs Committee UK have the same view –
Asghar Bukhari told the BBC News website: “The placards and chants were disgraceful and disgusting, Muslims do not feel that way. I condemn them without reservation, these people are less representative of Muslims than the BNP are of the British people.”
[Non-UK readers, the BNP are a fascist party who received 0.7% of the vote at the last election]
In fact Mr Bukhari went further, saying the HT protest should have been banned completely.
I’m curious, Andrew, by your claim that “we have, in european countries, laws guaranteeing free speech”.
I can’t think of a single piece of UK legislation that guarantees any such thing. In fact, people in the U.S. tend to view our libel laws as extremely draconian. Perhaps you can enlighten me?
There is a core catalyst to this entire situation – the historic contempt in Europe and the US for Arab/Islamic peoples, their values and their territories. This cartoon-reactive anger did not occur in a vacuum.
This Western contempt has manifested itself in many ways extremely hurtful to Muslim societies over the recent decades. The British invasion of Egypt in the 1880’s, the post-WWI mapping of Britain’s wishlist for the remnants of the Ottoman empire, the Balfour declaration, the unilateral imposition of a synthetic country of European Jews in historic Palestine, the CIA sabotage of Iran’s democracy in the 1950’s, and so on right up to the invasion of Iraq and now the moves by Zionist-oriented members of Congress to financially strangle the new Palestinian democracy.
The cartoons insulting Islam were obviously emblematic of this entire history of contemptuous oppression which continues right up to today.
On 9/11 there was a hue and cry to examine and correct “root causes”. We never did, because that would have necessitated objective examination of this hurtful history as the most realistic motive.
Now, with Hamas, with Iran, with a display of the extraordinary unity of Muslims the world over tired of this prejudice and oppression and its multiple manifestations in our Congress, in our biased definition of “terror”, in anti-Muslim European attitudes now fully unmasked, perhaps a consciousness of “root cause” will begin to surface in Europe and the US. That consciousness is imperative to the fundamental changes in perspective to achieve and end to the Long War, i.e. an end to the contemptuous oppression of Arab/Muslim peoples and lands.
Open season on the Arab/Muslim world is over. For the historic Middle East (of which Israel is not a part) the “Long War” is one against Western oppression which began over a century ago.
As is evident by the rash of “punish the Palestinians” bills introduced by the Zionists in our Congress, the so-called “pro-Israel” (really now in context “pro-Israeli oppression and occupation”) will ardently challenge even the idea that debate here about the real “root cause” can survive the ready-to-fire accusations of “anti-Semitism” at anyone who mentions the undeniable reality of what’s been going on in the Middle East for over 100 years.
Minimally, the restoration of “green line” Palestine (UN 242) to the Palestinian people, i.e. the termination of Israel’s military occupation of the West Bank, is an imperative and necessary juncture to reach the end-point of the “Long War”.
I think bin Laden understood all too well that the Muslim/Arab world had been losing the “Long War” against US/European oppression for decades, and that there was little to lose by a rash departure from the Arab/Muslim’s failing historic appeasement of Western oppressive impulses. His move on this game-board of history has minimally succeeded in baring to the eyes of observers everywhere the “root cause” reality. I think his bet was that the US and Europe would capture the poisoned pawn he offered and in a fit of hyper-aggressive but poorly conceived counter-moves expose the realities of contempt and oppression behind the “Long War” for what they really are.
And, sad to say, it is clearly arguable his move has been a success, at least so far.
Amended last 2 sentences for my previous post:
I think his bet was that the US and Europe would capture the poisoned pawn he offered and in a fit of hyper-aggressive but poorly conceived counter-moves expose the realities of contempt and oppression behind the “Long War” for what they really are, with the objective of re-formatting and energizing Muslim/Arab resistance to both present and future oppression.
And, sad to say, it is clearly arguable his move has been a success, at least so far.
Ron F. There are plenty of European countries that the freedom of the press written into their constitutions. The British constitution, since it is nowhere written in one place, doesn’t have that kind of thing, and I know very well that our libel laws are too strict. But the House of Copmmons just managed last week a defence of free speech when it threw out the religious hatred bill.
I am glad that most muslims reject HT, and glad that the BBC has given prominence to this rejection. But the fact of the HT demo was about as provocative as anything could possibly be. It did undoubtedly stir up hatred, on both sides. HT sees “Islam” and “Europe” as two monolithic entites confronting each other, just as the BNP does. These two views are going to feed off each other and this is going to be very bad for British muslims, just as the murder of Theo van Gogh was for Dutch ones. One obvious outcome is that I don’t think there is a hope in hell now that the BNP leaders will be convicted, if retried, of attempting to stir up racial hatred, though this is undoubtedly what they were doing. After this week, no jury will be found without two people to defend them.
I regret this. I think it’s shameful and will have bad effects. But the larger and more internationalised these disputes become, the harder they will be to solve. Yet it is clearly in the interest of the losing side in any particular local dispute to globalise it. I don’t know how to stop that.
Very well said, Timothy L. I confess that before 9/11 I was almost totally eurocentric (although with an appreciation of Middle Eastern, Asian and Chinese artistic heritage). My view of Palestine was gained through “Exodus” (the book and the film).
After 9/11 I began reading Middle East history. Read for yourself, in dispassionate print, what the Western Powers have done to the Middle East during the two world wars and after, and all due to their “strategic importance”. Mainly, oil.
If the Arab and Persian worlds have been unable to channel their identity into nationalism (mostly due to the breaking up, by the European powers, of the Middle East into small states), then there should be no surprize that this search for unity should manifest itself through religion.
What a mess we have created.
What a disappointing post.
Yes, free speech is absolute, free speech is offensive speech, the Muslim world will be dragged into modernity, kicking and screaming if need be, and if they get offended, too bad.
And why, Helena, do you care more about cartoons than you do about the deaths of 1000 nameless, faceless Egyptian workingmen in this ferry accident?
Is it because you are easily manipulated by Muslim fury? Who sets the agenda in your world, them or you?
This whole affair is nothing but an over-reaction to a simple cartoon, you say? Not, if you remember a certain other cartoon that appeared in the British newspaper, The Independent, on 27 January 2003. It depicted Prime Minister Sharon of Israel eating the head of a Palestinian child while saying: “What’s wrong?
Reaction from Israrel, Jew
1- Israeli Foreign Ministry is considering if it can take any legal actions against the British paper, Maariv reported.
2- Shuli Davidovich, the Israeli Embassy in Britain’s press secretary, wrote to The Independent:
3- American Jewish Committee Executive Director David A. Harris.
http://web.israelinsider.com/Articles/Diplomacy/3020.htm
in my view, the publication of the cartoons is an issue worthy of a thread here and that Helena asked some very pointed questions that deserve examination. And her suggestion that “sacredness” is a competing value for some has merit. Freedom of speech IS a preeminent value in a democratic society but, like shouting FIRE! in a crowded theater, the present geopolitical context (especially since 9/11) may call for responsible, self-imposed journalistic restraint.
The question I posed in my post (#1) is whether there may be an element of hypocrisy when members of societies notorious for caracaturing Jews (not speaking of Israelis) in mainstream newspapers express schock at an offensive cartoon published in a Danish newspaper.
the Prophet Mohammad (صلى الله عليه وسلم)
He is a man whose actions and ambitions are held to be worthy of the closest scrutiny and imitation by his followers. And across the world every day 1.3 billion Muslims – almost a quarter of the population of the world – seek to do just that.
Beggars in the slums of India, wealthy oil sheiks in Saudi Arabia, scholars in Egypt, shopkeepers in Bradford, landless women in Indonesia, convert intellectuals in the University of Cambridge all seek daily to emulate Mohamed (صلى الله عليه وسلم )in every aspect of their lives.
http://news.independent.co.uk/people/profiles/article343048.ece
“free speech is absolute”
Obvious rubbish. Free speech is not by any means absolute, nor can it be. Every state, including the “land of the free and the home of the brave” places legal limits on speech. If you doubt that just try mentioning that you have a bomb in your suitcase next time you check in at an airport.
No freedom, including freedom of speech, is absolute. As Simon Jenkins recently wrote in the Times:
“Nobody has an absolute right to freedom. Civilisation is the story of humans sacrificing freedom so as to live together in harmony. We do not need Hobbes to tell us that absolute freedom is for newborn savages. All else is compromise.
“Every day newspapers decide on the balance of boldness, offence, taste, discretion and recklessness. They must decide who is to be allowed a voice and who not. They are curbed by libel laws, common decency and their own sense of what is acceptable to readers. Speech is free only on a mountain top; all else is editing.“
It should be noted that, in their original context, the Jyllands-Posten cartoons were not intended to be purely for offense. They were meant as satirical illustrations accompanying an article on self-censorship and freedom of speech in a atmosphere of fear created by violent attacks by extremist Muslims in the manner of the murders of Theo van Gogh and Pim Fortuyn. Specifically, they were a response to the difficulty that Danish writer Kåre Bluitgen had finding artists to illustrate his children’s book about Muhammad.
— Source: Wikipedia
There is also the issue of three extra cartoons of unknown origin and the involvement of an Islamist lobby group (Islamic Society of Denmark) which has been touring the Middle-East in an effort to create awareness about the cartoons. They apparently added the three extra cartoons, which were especially offensive and were not in the original bunch; and refuse to identify the artists. Akhmad Akkari, spokesman the Muslim organization which organized the tour, explained that the three drawings had been added to “give an insight in how hateful the atmosphere in Denmark is towards Muslims. — The Brussels Journal
The first of the three additional pictures, which are of poor quality, shows Muhammad as a demon.
The second shows Muhammed with a pig snout.
The third depicts a praying Muslim being mounted by a dog.
For more see Gateway Pundit – Islamic Society of Denmark Used Fake Cartoons to Create Story! and Wikipedia – Additional Images.
Helena,
This episode has been a paradigm shift of sorts for me.
By that I mean there’s any number of ways for westerners to conceptualise Muslims. And indeed for them to conceptualise us.
That said, I’d never – previously – conceptualised them as two billion consumers. I had lots of mental “drawers” to fit them into. But not that one.
Thanks to what’s happened that’s all changed. Changed utterly. That conceptual “option” – to use Bush and Co.’s horrible little code word – is well and truly on the table. On the table here, there and everywhere.
I think what triggered this was the Danish butter company’s woes. Is it Lurpak? Heard on the radio the other day that they’re losing a million dollars a day. That’s a fair old whack up the side of the head.
And of course since the Bush administration and their neocon “opinion formers” are manifestly hell bent on pushing all of us over the edge – turning their puerile, simplistic, comic book, war of the worlds, “clash of civilisations” fantasies – into a real World War III (or IV if you please)…and since “ours” – the rest of us that is – is not to reason why, but just to do and die – i.e., since the locomotive is hurtling along on their tracks and since – alas – there’s apparently nothing anything the rest of us – the millions upon millions of us – can do to head off or even deflect ever so slightly where they’re taking us (was it ever clearer that it’s not our country, it’s their country?)…and that state of affairs is so nightmarish that you look and look and look..what can be done? where’s the chink? where’s the Achilles heel?…well, maybe we’ve been running around like chickens with their heads cut off – simpering, “oh, if we could only pick up ten seats in the mid-term elections” blah blah blah – and doing so we’ve in a sense overlooked the obvious: namely that it’s the people whose countries we’re “intervening” in who will in the end see Bush and Co. off.
Two billion consumers saying to American CEOs: “you attack Iran we’re not buying America anymore – whether it’s Coca Cola or Ford cars or Apple Macs or whatever.”
“And the same goes for your sojourn in Iraq. You’re not welcome there. You want us to buy your products you need to go home. Now.”
Etc.
It’s certainly food for thought.
Maybe the “free speech”/clash of cultures chord is the important thing here. But maybe it isn’t. I mean certainly my initial reaction was: well, actually the Danish newspapers – and every other western newspaper for that matter – was/is free to publish those cartoons if they see fit. And the Muslim world’s consumers are free to respond how they see fit. If they respond by breaking the law, well then they should be brought to justice. If they respond by not buying Danish butter…and if that furrows some American CEO’s brows…well, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.
If they respond by not buying Danish butter…and if that furrows some American CEO’s brows.
interesting non sequitur.
“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”
Thank you Shirin for giving me the opportunity to clarify my thoughts.
If Muslim consumers wish to boycott Danish products, or any other product, that’s their choice. It’s their money. The Danes will figure out ways to cope.
They have the highest per capita GDP in the world Source: CIA Fact book. Look it up yourselves. The Danes have an income something like 10 times that of every Arab country I bothered to look up. I wonder why.
I don’tknow where you are located, but you don’t make the rules here, Shirin. Tough. And next time try to formulate your responses with your own words instead of appealing to the stale formulations of a newspaper hack.
“Every state, including the “land of the free and the home of the brave” places legal limits on speech.”
I’m not a lawyer but where I come from, the only legal limits on speech are those that could be demonstrated to cause actual harm.
Can you cite precedents? I don’t know of a cartoon published in a newspaper that would fall into this category.
And you can’t libel a dead person, which is what Muhammad is.
How many embassies did Israelis burn after the cartoon of Sharon appeared? There is no comparison between the two responses.
Finally, I personally agree that issues of taste ARE important. I don’t think it was in good taste for the Arab European League to publish cartoons of Adolph Hitler and Anne Frank post-coitus. But I don’t think that legal action should be taken against the AEL for that. There are plenty of reasons to expel Abu Jahjah from Belgium and back to Lebanon, but not for that.
If they respond by breaking the law, well then they should be brought to justice. If they respond by not buying Danish butter…and if that furrows some American CEO’s brows…well, I’m not sure that’s a bad thing.
Which law you talking about?
Destroying a complete state of Iraq? Killing 2500,000 civilians? Tortured hundreds of Iraqi? Using White Phosphor to weeping towns and cities?
This law you believing, I think the it’s western Hypocrisy, read our friend what Timothy L at February 5, 2006 10:06 AM, rights here about the attitude of western.
look to The Europeans colonises, the Danish in South East Asia, Portuguese , then Brits in US how those nations slaughtered the peoples and steal their wealth and land. It’s all about the wealth and richest that God gifted to them and its you, your jealousness inside you for to their nation and your attitude to be masters.
BTW, you were talking about “losing a million dollars a day.”
SHELL which Danish Petroleum Company made the biggest ever in the history profit, and BP made also the biggest profit of its history, they make money of 1.3millions/hour!!!!! Tell me you accusing and looking jealously to our nations s as we are ripe you off by petrol, isn’t?
SHELL which Danish Petroleum Company made …
er, not to interrupt a fantastic screed, but Shell is Anglo-Dutch, not Danish. Not many Danish shareholders for that matter.
Russian liberals and Danish cartoons
In general, Russian pro-Western journalists take American and European conservatives pretty much same way as their Soviet predecessors took the Central Committee of CPSU. Certain liberal variations around the party line are possible, but anything close to real independence is simply unthinkable. Another generalization is that in Russian liberals we see all nightmarish anti-liberal stereotypes from Fox and NaRe coming live.
So, Russian liberals are completely different from American Arabists. First, they don’t care to know much about the obscure object of their desire. Second, their attraction is unconditional and uncritical. In this respect, they are a carbon copy of American neocons with their unbreakable determination to make the case even for the most ugly sides of their fixation.
Typical Western rightist assessment of the cartoons crisis comes from UPI’s Martin Walker /1/. Basically, we are supposed to believe that Western media are 100% free to publish whatever political cartoons they want while Muslims are supposed to take all this as climate – take it or leave it. Those who disagree, are supposed to face the consequences.
Fyodor Lukyanov belongs to the moderate wing of the Russian liberal movement. In this respect, he is close to Friedman and Kristof from the NYT. His affection for the neocons is deep, but liberally loose. Exactly like Friedman, Lukyanov is perfect in his simulated criticism and genuine enthusiasm for the neoconservative / neoliberal cause. Secondary details aside, his position /2/ is undistinguishable from that of Mr.Walker. So, together with Western neoliberals, Lukyanov disagrees with American neocons who condemn the cartoons. This way, he plays a bad cop – good cop game with American neocons for the goodies.
On the contrary, Grani’s Rubinstein does not get into any regional details, his essay is supposed to be intelligent, cute and funny /3/. So, in the genuine Orientalist tradition, he takes infuriated Muslims as kids who fail to comprehend the Western humor in the mature responsible way. This does not mean that Rubisntein is actually familiar with Edward Said’s theories – metaphorically, one does not need to study the libido to enjoy its effects.
Finally, Simon Jenkins, Aljazeera’s Shujaat Ali and Juan Cole give objective regional analysis of the cartoons crisis /4,5/. Yes, of course, cartoonists, as any other professionals, are not “free” to do whatever they want! Good political cartoonist knows and understands his audience and what are the delicate lines between moderate, strong and inappropriate offense. Professionally designed cartoons always belong to certain cultural and historical context.
On the contrary, poorly designed and vicious political cartoons are actually more effective than typical pornography. Crimininal exceptions aside, industrial porn is nonviolent, but still inappropriate for unrestricted use. This explains why nonviolence by itself does not make political activism appropriate – even perfectly nonviolent political action still can be as inappropriate as industrial porn! As for viciously hard cartoons, they are part of black PR, that’s specific form of weapons.
What is also important, artistically, cartoons on Aljazeera.net and Arabnews.com sites are among the best on the Net, they are much better than most American and Israeli ones /7-9/. On the pro-Israeli side, only Ranan Lurie can compete with the Arabs as a cartoonist.
So, from this prospective as well, Muslims have all grounds to take the Danish cartoons as acts of war, black anti-Muslim PR. As with any conflict, those who, like Russian liberals, don’t want to understand what exactly they are doing and kind of war they are fighting, have only themselves to blame for the consequences of their ignorance.
1. UPI. MARTIN WALKER. What’s funny about Islam?: http://www.upi.com/InternationalIntelligence/view.php?StoryID=20060203-030230-9753r
If Muslims who choose to live in Denmark or another European country where this tradition is valued and understood do not like it, then they are perfectly free to leave for more devout and authoritarian shores. They are also free to write letters of protest to the editor, march in protest around his newspaper, boycott the paper and its advertisers and adopt all the other forms of expressing strong, principled and peaceful dissent that are also intrinsic to democratic societies.
Muslims abroad are also entitled to express their views, although wild threats to kidnap European diplomats and the armed takeover of the European Union offices in Gaza Thursday are foolish and self-defeating. Those EU offices have disbursed over $3 billions to the Palestinians, and are one of the few life-support systems that Palestine has. If a poll were taken among Europeans today, there would probably be a considerable majority for leaving the empty offices to the gunmen and keeping the money for deserving causes in Europe.
Some of that European money the gunmen of Gaza are spurning might even be used for a referendum on which Europeans are asked if all the mosques in the EU should be closed until such date as the Saudis welcome some Christian churches and missionaries into their land.
2. Fyodor Lukyanov. The return of the cross: http://www.gazeta.ru/column/lukyanov/531132.shtml
3. Lev Rubinstein. They are like kids with these cartoons: http://grani.ru/Culture/essay/rubinstein/m.101518.html
4. Simon Jenkins. These cartoons don’t defend free speech, they threaten it: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,2088-2025511,00.html
Despite Britons’ robust attitude to religion, no newspaper would let a cartoonist depict Jesus Christ dropping cluster bombs, or lampoon the Holocaust. Pictures of bodies are not carried if they are likely to be seen by family members. Privacy and dignity are respected, even if such restraint is usually unknown to readers. Over every page hovers a censor, even if he is graced with the title of editor.
To imply that some great issue of censorship is raised by the Danish cartoons is nonsense. They were offensive and inflammatory. The best policy would have been to apologize and shut up. For Danish journalists to demand “Europe-wide solidarity” in the cause of free speech and to deride those who are offended as “fundamentalists . . . who have a problem with the entire western world” comes close to racial provocation. We do not go about punching people in the face to test their commitment to non-violence. To be a European should not involve initiation by religious insult.
Many people seem surprised that a multicultural crunch should have come over religion rather than race. Most incoming migrants from the Muslim world are in search of work and security. They have accepted racial discrimination and cultural subordination as the price of admission. Most Europeans, however surreptitiously, regard that subordination as reasonable.
What Muslims did not expect was that admission also required them to tolerate the ridicule of their faith and guilt by association with its wildest and most violent followers in the Middle East.
The Danes must have known that a depiction of Allah as human or the prophet Muhammad as a terrorist would outrage Muslims.
5. Juan Cole. Muslim Protests Against Anti-Muhammad Caricatures: http://www.juancole.com/2006/02/muslim-protests-against-anti-muhammad.html
Of course people are upset when their sacred figures are attacked! But the hurt is magnified many times when the party doing the injuring is first-world, and the injured have a long history of being ruled, oppressed and marginalized.
…the Muslims honor Moses and Jesus, so there is no symmetry between Christian attacks on Muhammad and Muslim critiques of the West. No Muslim cartoonist would ever lampoon the Jewish and Christian holy figures in sacred history, since Muslims believe in them, too, even if they see them all as human prophets.
…it is insupportable to say that the Nazi ideology was right and to praise Hitler. In Germany if one took that sort of thing too far one would be breaking the law. Even in France, Bernard Lewis was fined for playing down the Armenian holocaust.
…the Likudniks in Israel protested the withdrawal from Gaza, and there were dark mutterings about what happened to Rabin recurring in the case of Sharon. The “sacred” principle at stake there is just not one most people in the outsider world would agree with the Likudniks about.
6. “Professional Cartoonists Wouldn’t Do This”: http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,398792,00.html
SPIEGEL ONLINE: As a cartoonist working for Al-Jazeera, how did you respond when you first saw the Danish caricatures of Muhammad?
Shujaat Ali: It is the responsibility of journalists to be ethical. Religion is a very sensitive issue, and I think no truly professional cartoonist in the world would ever try to pick on a religion like this. There’s an informal code of ethics among cartoonists in the media, and it includes two kinds of censorship: one is self-censorship; the other is professional censorship. Religion is one of the very important things that we should respect and not criticize. I grew up reading the cartoons of Herbert Herblock and they really impressed me. There are many cartoonists, in the US and Europe, who are really very professional. They would never treat a religion like this.
SPIEGEL ONLINE: You speak of “censorship” as if it’s a good thing — as a kind of act of self-discipline.
Shujaat Ali: Yes, yes, yes. It is a journalist’s responsibility to follow this code of ethics — it’s very important.
7. Arab cartoons
8. Israeli cartoons
9. Guardian cartoons
But the hurt is magnified many times when the party doing the injuring is first-world, and the injured have a long history of being ruled, oppressed and marginalized.
typically patronising remark. juan has a very bad case of nostalgie de la boue. I think it’s going around the faculty lounge.
salah, interesting obervation re: BP.
now read this:
http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:XSCy7ojwatwJ:www.guardian.co.uk/oil/story/0,,1664139,00.html+%22One+of+BP%27s+biggest+shareholders,+the+Kuwait+Investment+Office%22&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1
Vadim,
Let me spell it out for you.
Two billion Muslims responding to “shock and awe” with some economic shock and awe of their own: refusing to buy Coke or Cheetohs or Maytag washing machines or Jockey shorts or, for that matter, Kool-aid or…well, it’s their “shopping list”.
You get em by the bottom line their hearts and minds will follow.
Two billion Muslims responding to “shock and awe” with some economic shock and awe of their own
That sounds nice but it doesn’t speak to the wisdom or feasibility of any such boycott. And as noted earlier, Denmark is not the USA. The CEOs of Coke and Maytag haven’t offended any Muslims. Nor have the management & shareholders of any of the Danish companies involved. A boycott of the newspaper I would understand.
of course the “first world” countries, their inhabitants and institutions look alike in the dim light of the faculty lounge.
http://www.dailystar.com.lb/article.asp?edition_id=10&categ_id=5&article_id=21654
Mona Eltahawy knocks one out of the park.
“it doesn’t speak to the wisdom or feasibility of any such boycott”
As for feasibility…I wouldn’t have thought they’d be able to cut Lurpak off at the knees they way they have. I suspect it’s metastasized – that’s maybe not the happiest of verbs but it’s late here – the way it has because of the internet.
As for wisdom: given what Bush has done to Iraq and what he’s slavering to do to Iran…well, I think if I were from that part of the world I’d be looking for – and squeezing down real hard – on any and all pressure points.
I believe the Coke/Pepsi Middle East market question is in fact rather more complicated than you suppose. As I understand it Pepsi has made a much more overt “pitch” for the Arab market. Whereas Coke…well, why don’t you go and have a look for yourself.
And do keep poppin’ open those cans of “faculty lounge” whup ass. It’s so no bull, crew-cut, mensch. Phwoar.
well, I think if I were from that part of the world I’d be looking for – and squeezing down real hard – on any and all pressure points.
I guess I’m not the only one swilling cans of whoop-ass tonight. This sounds menacing, but what on earth could it possibly mean? Slaverin’ George Bush couldn’t find Denmark on a map. Lurpak sells “the best butter in the world, renowned for its fresh, light appearance and creamy smooth taste” — not cluster bombs or refined petroleum. It’s a “pressure point” in neither the mortal struggle against the slavering hegemon nor the resistance to “first world” economic exploitation and colonialism. If anything the boycott is likely to boost the regional sales of US-based rival Kraft.
Henry, thanks so much for the great links and research (which I haven’t had time to do, still swimming around as I am in matters Mozambican.) I must confess I was really disappointed in Martin Walker’s contribution there. Does anyone know what’s happened to him? Has he caught the dread Hitchensiensis virus?
I liked Simon Jenkins’s robust, no-nonsense argumentation, though.
And then there’s Vadim… Vadim, what do you mean “patronizing”? Are you contesting what Juan says about the gross disparities between “the west” and the Muslim world regarding history of oppression, and present exercize of violent coercion? How is it “patronizing” for Juan to point this out? Isn’t it more patronizing (not to mention morally culpable) for you or others to try to pretend that it doesn’t exist?
(Btw, friend Upharsin– it took me a while but I just found out what I think your name is referring to. It seems a little coded and obscure to me. I’d love your explanation sometime… )
Mene, mene, tekel upharsin!
Have you never seen Rembrandt’s picture of Belshazzar’s Feast?
I saw the original once in the National Gallery, I think, in London (it was on loan from some other place). It moved me to tears.
Now that’s how to do it!
Those stupid cartoonists should be made to stand in front of that picture and feel shame for their crudeness and their vulgarity.
Vadim,
let’s try one more time.
I’m not advocating, supporting, endorsing, favouring, speaking up for, backing, pick-your-own-verb the Lurpak boycott.
What I’m saying is:
1) It’s remarkable, whatever its “rights” or “wrongs”. Remarkable for its reach, the speed at which it’s spread, and, indeed, its financial impact on Lurpak.
2) It might be a one off.
3) It might not be.
4) Were two billion Muslim consumers to train those crosshairs on Brand America chances are it would be noticed in the “Board Room”. Certainly Lurpak noticed.
5) Those CEOs have some clout, maybe even “access”
6) Phone calls to the Oval Office would presumably be along the lines of: “George, we’ve got a problem. You’ve gotta stop pissing off the Arabs because if you don’t they’re gonna Fallujah my bottom line. And just generally, the shape this country’s in – the hollowing out of our industrial base – we really don’t need to have the door to a market comprising two billion people slammed in our face”.
7) And if the Prezznit’s not taking calls, well you can rest assured that fellow CEOs will take them. Calls along the lines of: “Gentlemen, we’ve got a problem. If that idiot doesn’t stop pissing off the Arabs…see 6
All clear? So to speak.
Quoth Reuters:
The Guardian.
Boycotts?
M. Upharsin has discovered boycotts! The Arab League states tried that for 50 years against Israel. In 1967 Coke broke the boycott by setting up bottling plants in Israel. You know what, despite the Arab boycott that resulted, I don’t think they missed a beat.
I wonder how much Tourborg will lose from a Muslim boycott?
It is interesting that no Israeli newspaper has published the cartoons.
Correction for this, two Israeli news papers and channel 2 Israeli TV
Why be so confident without at least seeing how, say, the second act turns out? After all, the ab ovum of this tack is that the Lurpak boycott does seem to be having some effect.
Other thing of course is that 50 years ago – ten years ago even – the internet wasn’t a factor. As Bush is forever reminding us about 911, it’s changed everything.
And for that matter, why gloat?
http://www.zombietime.com/mohammed_image_archive/
Here is an extensive catalogue of pictures of Mohammed, from Shriner’s murals, to greek bas reliefs, to 19th century commericals, to cartoons, to manuscripts, to persian and indian paintings, 15th century mms from Afghanistan, and contemporary Christian propaganda.
Rather interesting, actually.
I assume if you’re Muslim, you won’t peek. If you’re not, feel free to do some academic research. While you still can. It’s all sounding very much like Eco’s Name of the Rose right now, isn’t it?
Helena,
I wonder where is the setup of Sunni Shaia and Kurds or other minorities that the west propaganda divided the Muslims.
What are their dreams with these insulting acts by Danish?
Just have to say, I find the enthusiasm I read here for kicking people who are down a little sickening. Even if a free speech right to be offensive exists, isn’t it beneath people of any decency to exercise it so as to offend those who suffer from the economic and military power of one’s society?
When Ann Coulter called for America to conquer the Islamic world and force all Moslems to convert to Christianity, I saw no Moslem protests about that hate speech. Instead, it made her into an American media superstar for about 2 years until Americans began to wake up to her insanity and cruelty. (And Diana’s remarks about dragging Moslems into “modernity” by force are just capitalist code-speech for the same thing.)
Why do people have the right to protest? Because they can’t get a redress of their grievances, no matter how bizarre, from their sovereign government. The Anglo-American empire has worked for a century to ensure that no Moslem government will take the side of its citizens against the empire in anything that’s relevant. So that leaves that which is irrelevant.
Meanwhile, if Jews are offended by anti-Semitism, not only will the Israeli government be quick to protest, but so will many affluent businessmen who will keep the offender from access to corporate media in the only place that counts, the West.
And we can all watch right now as the US builds the machinery for punishing Evo Morales for his criticism and disobediance, which based on our history will eventually involve training guerrillas, economic sanctions, and the complete ruination of Bolivia. A State government punished Ward Churchill for his speech. Corporate pressure punished Bill Maher for his speech. The FCC punished Howard Stern for his speech.
So ordinary American Christians, unlike ordinary Moslems, have many respected institutions punishing those who utter the wrong prejudices. Yet many of them are so fanatical in their bigotry that recently a professor at the University of Kansas had to give up his departmental position after he criticized Creationism and got beaten up by thugs. Yes, that happened in America. I also saw protestors in Wyoming cheering the murder of a gay teenager. Every woman who tries to get an abortion must face rotating shifts of Christian fanatics denouncing her for her (not yet a) crime. These are the people who got their guy into the White House and his finger on 10,000 nukes.
The difference? Moslems aren’t ENTREPRENEURIAL. So they’re poor, and the poor are subhumans and deserve what they get. A thousand years ago, Islam was the light of civilization and reason and the Christians were dirt-poor losers living in the ruins of a great empire, and what kept them together, learning the violent skills that would later lead them to the top? Religious bigotry, ignorance, and a talent for weaponry. Now that we’re on top, we demand that the world open up to the corporate brainwashing crafts we’ve developed, and organize their governments for quick one-stop shopping by our corporations. Thereby ensuring no other society can do unto the West what it did unto others. Democracy and free speech are for sale, and the only Moslems who can afford to shop are the Saud family.
This cycle will never stop because inequality itself is the root cause of oppression, revolution and vengeance. But I still believe in freedom of speech because I think we must all expose our hatreds of each other loudly, face to face, until we have no illusions that our neighbors, bosses, police, or priests give a damn about us. We won’t go to war for our countries once we all understand that.
And every time a white Southerner raises a Confederate flag, black Americans should raise a statue to Nat Turner.
V for Vendetta.
A very germane statement from Efraim Karsh’s recent review of Robert Fisk’s latest book:
Such is the general standard Fisk applies as an “impartial witness to history.” Massacres of innocent civilians by Arab and Islamic militants throughout the world—from Jerusalem and Tel Aviv to Manhattan, Bali, and Baghdad—are for him not acts of terrorism but rather the understandable and altogether patriotic response of people brutalized by colonial occupation. The curious effect of this effort to absolve Middle Easterners of any blame or responsibility for their region’s problems, or their own deeds, is to make Fisk guilty of the sin for which he endlessly berates the West; he patronizes his subjects in the worst tradition of the “white man’s burden.” [emphasis added]
Hmmm. I have often seen Fisk comment in his columns on the responsibility of Arabs for their own behavior, so my immediate reaction is to question the impartiality of Ephraim Karsh. Not having read the book I can’t say. Have you read the book?
My opinion of the cartoon controversy is that the p freedom of speech should be inviolate and must be defended. At the same time, the cartoons should not have been published, and it was childish for those European newspapers to publish copies. What were they trying to prove – that their freedom to publish was seriously at risk?
It’s also interesting to see people like the Boston Globe’s Jeff Jacoby come to the Danes’ defense, when he’s just the kind of guy to support efforts by European supporters of Israel to quash criticism of Israeli and/or Israelis as “antisemitic”.
It’s also interesting to see people like the Boston Globe’s Jeff Jacoby come to the Danes’ defense, when he’s just the kind of guy to support efforts by European supporters of Israel to quash criticism of Israeli and/or Israelis as “antisemitic”.
I don’t recall anyone saying that Muslims did not have a right to react to the cartoons by calling them “islamophobic”. I think that there is a a qualitative and perceptible difference between countering an offensive act or statement with words in a newspaper and burning down an embassy or threatening people with bodily harm. Don’t you?
Liberal societies have laws against the free publication, display, and distribution of pornography, and I’m glad that they do. Many have laws against publications that incite race-hate.
Helena, what was your reaction to “the satanic verses?” Would this work also constitute “incitement to hate?” What about Andres Serrano’s work depicting a crucifix immersed in urine? Would you term a screening of “Brokeback Mountain” in rural Alabama “incitement to hate?” Should the movie “not have been made” as it offends the sensitivites of religious christians?
prudishness isn’t progressive, especially when vicariously felt (the patronising kind) or ideologically opportunistic.
A trenchant piece in the Guardian today by its award-winning Middle East correspondent, Chris McGreal. It’s called Israel and Apartheid – A Special Report
http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,,1703245,00.html
It seems to me that these recent events and the discussion here are quite revealing, particularly the attempts to justify the violent reactions in the Muslim world by reciting the litany of grievances against the West without regard to the historical contexts (cf. Timoth L. and particularly super390 for prime examples).
I think that Diana’s forthright observations about living as part of a global society in the twenty-first century are quite to the point. Certainly the cartoons may be offensive, but so are the violent demonstrations and overt threats. Well, to quote from a previous post:
“What a bunch of childish, self-absorbed little bully boys. Really. And anyone wants to think we should trust them with nuclear weapons, as well?”
Posted by Helena at February 5, 2006 10:54 PM
My pleasure :-)))
I think that there is a a qualitative and perceptible difference between countering an offensive act or statement with words in a newspaper and burning down an embassy
In no way do I approve of burning down an embassy or threatening people with bodily harm. But that’s a reaction of people who don’t have, as some do, the option of shutting down free expression by other means.
But that’s a reaction of people who don’t have, as some do, the option of shutting down free expression by other means.
At least, unlike some others here, you call a spade a spade.
I didn’t think that “sutting down free expression” was a goal to be admired.
Henry James,
Spasibo vam bolshoi.
I didn’t think that “sutting down free expression” was a goal to be admired.
I don’t think it is either. But that’s the goal of those in Europe who have vigorously tried to shut down criticism of Israel, Israeli leaders, or Zionism as “antisemitic”.