Cartoon Cartoon

Here's a cartoon about Christians and Muslims by Tom McMahon. And he has a right to express his opinion.


I had a long post written up about the cartoon issue and when I went to post it, the site was down and I lost it all. I haven't felt like putting all that effort back into creating another posting about it until now. Especially since a Muslim Dutch Member of Parliament came out supporting the Danish newspaper. She is really an ex-Muslim who is very critical of Islam, and I happen to agree with her. The rioting Muslims around the world need to be given a loud and resounding united message: that you cannot use YOUR religious doctrines to squash MY civil liberties. What if we insisted that they conform to Jewish laws? Granted, it may not be too much different since they are two branches of the same tree, but I'm sure there are Jewish laws that Muslims don't agree with. Here is her personal blog.
One thing I haven't heard anyone talk about yet is the historical context of the prohibition against images of Mohammed. Who set it? What time period was it set in? At that time, virtually the only reason for creating an image of a human was to make a religious figurine or icon. This would have been in direct violation of Islamic, Jewish and Christian laws. But now, we have the capability of being able to create images of people that are NOT icons. No one seriously thinks that if you take a photograph of Nancy Reagan that people are going to automatically begin praying to her because she has an image of her captures on paper. A cartoon is the same thing. There is no way a caricature can be compared to an icon created for religious worship. No one is making that distinction--that the rule is stupid in the first place. Some people are making the case that religious taboos can't dominate secular liberties. Iran threatened to create satirical cartoons of the Holocaust. First of all, their president said the Holocaust never happened, but even if it did, there's nothing wrong with a cartoon about it. I think European papers need to beat them to the punch and publish their own cartoons about the Holocaust. Just to show what freedom of press and freedom of speech means. We absolutely cannot cow-tow to religious fanatics in this case. Some people believe that the European countries "blinked" when the Muslims around the world began rioting. I disagree. Europe hasn't blinked yet. The riots are just an example of terrorists taking more hostages to get the West to do what they want. This time, the hostages are dollars in the form of business and assets instead of people. The terrorists will "give back" the business and stop torching the embassies when Western governments ban pictures of Mohammed and apologize for the insult. I hope this solidifies the West in their uniform decision to just say "no" to terroristic threats on our civil liberties. We've been letting Bush whittle away at them for five years now, we don't need to curb them because someone in another country doesn't think they fit in with HIS religious perspective.

Here is a good narrative of the values of Danes, as observed by a Canadian who married one.
Here's a timeline of the cartoon controversy from CBC news.
Here's proof that an Egyptian newspaper printed the cartoons in October, 2005, and there was no protest or outrage.

I officially demand that every newspaper in the world print the cartoons on the front page immediately. I would be willing to exempt the Arab newspapers, of course. Historically, Communism is atheist. There are large protests planned in Hong Kong. I love this quote:

Khan Muhammad Malik, vice-chairman of the Islamic Federation of Hong Kong, said
he had wept at the portrayal of the Prophet.
"We love the Prophet more than our family, more than money, more than life itself," he said. "All we want is for our religion to be treated with the same respect as others."

And, here's an op-ed that asks fellow Muslims to lighten up and points out many of the inconsistencies in the arguments of the Arab governments condemning the cartoons.

Here's a rather intelligent op-ed on a website written by an Iranian that brings up the great point that not allowing cartoons of Mohammed is in itself creating a form of idolatry of him by exempting him from being portrayed, but allowing cartoons of Mary, Jesus and God (point #5).
Point #6 also points out that the governments of western nations are not responsible for the information printed in newspapers, since the media is not stat-owned.

There are a few other points that are not readily taken into consideration:
1) The cartoons were not protested against until December, when a group of Danish Muslims went around the Middle East showing the 12 cartoons that were printed in Denmark, along with additional, more inflammatory cartoons that were not among the originals. These men should be hunted down as terrorists and held responsible for the deaths that have occurred from their actions.
2) As mentioned above, the cartoons were printed in Egypt in October with no violent protests.
3) There is no actual ban on a cartoon of Mohammed anywhere is Islam. It is tradition not to portray him, but not Islamic law.
4) There is no way a sensible human would confuse a cartoon with an icon. Lacking a crucifix, a priest would not grab a piece of notebook paper, draw a cartoon of Christ, and tape it above the altar.