Feb 02 2006

A Cartoon Will Show Us The Way

Published by at 10:04 am under All General Discussions,Bin Laden/GWOT

Updates at the end – keep scrolling

It is truly amazing how history works. Apparently it will be cartoons that provide the EU its much needed wake up call on radical Islamists. Michelle Malkin has the cartoons here and the story behind them here at Real Clear Politics. The basics of the story, for those who want a thumbnail version, has an enterprising Danish newspaper calling for cartoons of Mohamed last fall because a writer could not find and illustrator on the subject for a book. The calls was answered and submissions printed. The response was enlightening

The insecurity of the radical Islamists is well documented, from their treatment of women to their anger at every possible slight. The image of brave Moorish warriors from the historic heights of Islam is being replaced with modern images of suicide bombers killing little boys and girls – when not hiding in caves. I am not surprised at how this is panning out. Something was going to bring things to a boil in the EU between the West and radical Islam.

What I hope everyone remembers is that moderate Muslims represent the salvation of not only Islam, but world peace as well. America has been very clear in discerning our views on radical Islam verses moderate Islam. While we prepared for war against the Taliban and Al Qaeda we walked with Muslims to protect them from any out of control backlashes from people who cannot discern a radical movement from an ancient religion.

Unfortunately, it seems the cartoons may have pushed some moderates towards the radicals.

Despite how relatively tame the pictures actually are (compared not only to Western standards, but also to the vicious, anti-Semitic propaganda regularly churned out by Arab cartoonists), the drawings have literally inflamed the radical Muslim world and its apologists. Eleven Muslim ambassadors to Copenhagen immediately protested to Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen demanding retractions from the newspaper. The ambassador of Turkey urged Rasmussen to call the Jyllands-Posten to account for “abusing Islam in the name of democracy, human rights and freedom of expression.”

Rasmussen, in a rare show of European spine, steadfastly refused to appease the howlers.

Just as Christians here in the US rightly do not appreciate their religion derided by secular Hollywood in exercises of free speech such as ‘The Book Of Daniel’, insensitive caricatures about Islam can do the opposite of what we want regarding the salvation of Islam.

We have to be careful what signals we send that could recruit moderates into the radical’s camp. I am not sure what the answer is. The cartoons do not seem that offensive, but then again we here in the West have become numb to the idiocy of political cartoonists. Just yesterday Michelle and myself and others castigated the Washington Post for a truly sick cartoon. Here we are today on the other side defending something that hit some the same way as that Toles cartoon hit us.

Are moderate Muslims sending us a message to retune our positions? Are we listening?

We need to protect the cartoonists rights to free speech – no question. The paper needs to be backed for doing nothing more than asking and printing the voices of the people. But can’t we also explain to moderate Muslims that free speech means people say dumb and hurtful things and we do not need to lash out at them? How do we explain to a region that is not use to free speech that people are free to make fools of themselves, and the rest are free to peacefully echo back the view these people are fools?

The Palestinians, as usual, are setting the wrong example by storming an EU office with armed thugs. Leave it to them to dumb down Islam to a brutish image. The calls from Muslim Ambassadors for retraction are not realistic, but the fact they are peacefully expressing their hurt is not wrong either.

I don’t know what the answer is, but I am fairly sure I have not seen it yet. These cartoons showed us something, a way to stumble and repel moderate Muslims. But they may possibly show us a way to catch ourselves and help ME Islam to deal with something foreign to their life experience. Free speech.

UPDATE:

BTW, I am for reprinting these as a way to show solidarity, as long as there are recognitions of their impact and some outreach as I described above.

Broadening a debate that has set Europe against the Islamic world, several European newspapers on Wednesday reprinted cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad in an unflattering light, supporting a Danish newspaper that had inspired a huge outcry in the Islamic world by publishing them in the first place.

The newspapers’ actions fed a sharpening debate here over freedom of expression, human rights and what the culture editor of Jyllands-Posten, the paper that first published the cartoons last September, called a “clash of civilizations” between secular Western democracies and Islamic societies.

It doesn’t have to be ‘a clash’. It could be ‘a meeting’ or something less destructive. We need to remember free speech is powerful and hard to get used to. We in the West are the ones who are more experienced with it, so we should be the more calm about it.

UPDATE II:

Piglet joins the dicussion, but the heat is being raised by the radical jihadists in the hope the West will probably say or do something to push the moderates towards the radicals.

UPDATE III:

Are we paying attention? We have two moderate allies now raising objections to these cartoons:

While Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen’s government was bracing for further protests and planning an offensive to try to defuse the tensions, Egyptian President Hosny Mubarak and Afghan President Hamid Karzai strongly criticized the cartoons.

Is the West going to bungle this challenge?

UPDATE IV:

It appears this is a propaganda trick to push moderates muslims towards the radicals.

However, the Danish Muslim delegation showed much more than the 12 cartoons published by Jyllands Posten. In the booklet it presented during its tour of the Middle East, the delegation included other cartoons of Mohammed that were highly offensive, including one where the Prophet has a pig face. But these additional pictures were NOT published by the newspaper, but were completely fabricated by the delegation and inserted in the booklet (which has been obtained and made available to me by Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet). The delegation has claimed that the differentiation was made to their interlocutors, even though the claim has not been independently verified. In any case, the action was a deliberate malicious and irresponsible deed carried out by a notorious Islamist who in another situation had said that “mockery against Mohamed deserves death penalty.”

A fabrication to trick the West into an over reaction? The Jihadists know we tolerate more free speech (or sick speech) and they know the middle east has little to no experience in free speech. Let’s not lose our self control and become puppets of the Jihadists. There is nothing wrong in condemning the mockery of a religious symbol and defending the right to mock.

12 responses so far

12 Responses to “A Cartoon Will Show Us The Way”

  1. […] Our good friend AJ has a good point here: Just as Christians here in the US rightly do not appreciate their religion derided by secular Hollywood in exercises of free speech such as ‘The Book Of Daniel’, insensitive caricatures about Islam can do the opposite of what we want regarding the salvation of Islam. I know some, including some of my regulars, do not believe that Islam is a religion of peace, as President Bush is fond of saying. I’m not an expert on the Islamic religion; I don’t have a great depth of its doctrine, nor do I know how seriously rank-and-file Muslims take the more inflammatory passages (and we must acknowledge there are inflammatory passages in the Bible, as well, particularly in what Christians refer to as the Old Testament). […]

  2. […] Meanwhile, AJ Strata has serious cautions about those cartoons: What I hope everyone remembers is that moderate Muslims represent the salvation of not only Islam, but world peace as well. America has been very clear in discerning our views on radical Islam verses moderate Islam. While we prepared for war against the Taliban and Al Qaeda we walked with Muslims to protect them from any out of control backlashes from people who cannot discern a radical movement from an ancient religion. […]

  3. European Media Displays Courage

    The European press deserves credit for not only running some controversial cartoons ridiculing the prophet Muhammad but for rerunning them all across Europe. In this article titled Offending Cartoons Reprinted Molly Moore of the Washington Post Foreig…

  4. Bomb threats made against Danish paper over Mohamed cartoons

    Radical representatives aka thugs of the so-called “religion of peace” have issued bomb threats against a Danish newspaper for printing cartoons some in the Muslim community determined were outrageous and ‘unfair’. Via the UK…

  5. Larwyn says:

    Has the WaPo received any bomb threats over the Toles
    cartoon?

    And when you considered who Toles dissed!

    The JCOS sent a dignified letter pointing out the disrespect
    the Toles cartoon showed.

    THEY COULD HAVE SENT A SPECIAL OPS TEAM!

    As could “Dr. Rumsfeld”.

    They didn’t – big difference.

  6. Identity Politics, Free Speech, and the Future of worldwide Liberalism

    For those of you who haven't been following the Allah cartoon flap too closely, Frontpage has a nice thumbnail timeline of the controversy to date that includes this editorial commentary:[…] Islam is not a race; the problems with it are not the …

  7. Seixon says:

    Next at 11, Muslim countries apologize for the actions of Osama bin Laden. Oh wait, nevermind. That would be stupid. Just like Norway, and Denmark having to apologize for what private persons do within their country without their involvement.

    The Reichstag has been burned, let the games begin.

  8. A Cartoon Will Show Us The Way

    HT The Strata-Sphere

    A Cartoon Will Show Us The Way

    Updates at the end – keep scrolling

    It is truly amazing how history works. Apparently it will be cartoons that provide the EU its much needed wake up call on rad…

  9. Snapple says:

    I think that in evaluating a religion it is more important to look at how it is actually practiced than just what the scriptures seem to say.

    Often when religions modernize, the more violent scriptural passages are treated metaphorically instead of literally.

    There are some passages in the Bible that I do not take literally, but I might look at them metaphorically.

    For example, in the Bible it says “Don’t suffer a witch to live.”

    I would look at that as an injunction to struggle against evil–not to go on a literal witchhunt.

    I think if the Muslim religious leaders are better educated the religion may modernize.

    When Jesus was asked what the most important commandment was, he said “love God and love your neighbor.” That is a very flexible rule that allows people to respond differently based on complicated circumstances.

    Islam has something pretty similar to love God and your neighbor.

  10. [Plutonium] Iran’s Two Front Pursuit of Nuclear Weapons

    HT The Strata-Sphere

    Iran’s Two Front Pursuit of Nuclear Weapons

    The focus of discussions and dialogue on Iran’s nuclear activities have centered the enrichment of uranium (graphic), a process necessary for producing nuc…

  11. […] I wrote yesterday we in the West had an opportunity to communicate with moderate muslims the challenges and frustrations that come with free speech. The Middle East has no concept of the double edge sword which is freedom. The responsibility for taking care of ones self, the anger at rude and crude zealots from all sides, the risks of not having centralized control over everthing. […]

  12. […] I fear we are seeing the start of the global war we have been trying to avoid for 5 years now. And it will be over some damn stupid cartoons. […]