Arabs attempt to murder Danish cartoonists.

[Robert]

Originally posted by Kidicious


Oh God No! Unless you can make them funny, and not just obvious racist crap.

Uuuuh, islam is not a race, it's a faith.

[Agathon]

Murg is right. Killing these cartoonists is an unjustifiable overreaction, but the cartoons should never have been published in that paper in the first place.

Let's say Condoleezza Rice failed to get agreement from the French government over some treaty. Would Americans think it appropriate for Le Monde to depict Sarzoky butt ****ing her and yelling "take this back to your cotton fields you n***er *****!!!".

Or what about if Israel was caught selling US technology to the Chinese again and the Washington Post published a cartoon of Hitler's ghost visiting GWB at night saying, "See I told you that you should have gotten rid of the ****s!"

Or what if a major paper started posting cartoons of the Japanese like the ones Dr Seuss used to draw?

OK. There you have a few major phobias of western civilization there. Remember this is a civilization where mainstream journalists get suspended or have their careers ended for joking that Hillary is whoring out her daughter, or for even the merest whiff of racism.

Turning Mohammed into a terrorist is about the most insulting troll you could level towards the Islamic world. Running it in a mainstream newspaper is about the worst thing you could do with such a meme. People criticize Islam and Mohammed all the time in academic settings. Most muslims don't get pissed off about that (about the same number as christians who get pissed off when someone picks up on that Jesus fellow). This was a deliberate insult and not an attempt to make a substantive criticism.

Friends who've lived in Denmark weren't surprised anyway. They to a man had wondered how long the appalling racism allowed in Danish society could stay hidden from the international community.

[onodera]

Originally posted by Agathon
Murg is right. Killing these cartoonists is an unjustifiable overreaction, but the cartoons should never have been published in that paper in the first place.

Let's say Condoleezza Rice failed to get agreement from the French government over some treaty. Would Americans think it appropriate for Le Monde to depict Sarzoky butt ****ing her and yelling "take this back to your cotton fields you n***er *****!!!".

Or what about if Israel was caught selling US technology to the Chinese again and the Washington Post published a cartoon of Hitler's ghost visiting GWB at night saying, "See I told you that you should have gotten rid of the ****s!"

Or what if a major paper started posting cartoons of the Japanese like the ones Dr Seuss used to draw?

Nah, it's not exactly like that. If Condie was depicted as a sterotypical black rapist, anally violating Sarkozy, and the African-American population reacted by raping every Frenchman they could find, including some Belgians, then it would be a comparable situation.

[SlowwHand]

No, it wouldn't. That would just be stupid.

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by CyberShy


Uuuuh, islam is not a race, it's a faith.

Really?

[Kidlicious]

Originally posted by Agathon
Friends who've lived in Denmark weren't surprised anyway. They to a man had wondered how long the appalling racism allowed in Danish society could stay hidden from the international community.

Yeah, it's interesting. I had no idea they were so racist. At first I thought it was just some racist journalist, untill everyone started defending him.

[Agathon]

Originally posted by onodera


Nah, it's not exactly like that. If Condie was depicted as a sterotypical black rapist, anally violating Sarkozy, and the African-American population reacted by raping every Frenchman they could find, including some Belgians, then it would be a comparable situation.

Are you some kind of nazi?

[DinoDoc]

Originally posted by Agathon
Let's say Condoleezza Rice failed to get agreement from the French government over some treaty. Would Americans think it appropriate for Le Monde to depict Sarzoky butt ****ing her and yelling "take this back to your cotton fields you n***er *****!!!".

Or what about if Israel was caught selling US technology to the Chinese again and the Washington Post published a cartoon of Hitler's ghost visiting GWB at night saying, "See I told you that you should have gotten rid of the ****s!"

Or what if a major paper started posting cartoons of the Japanese like the ones Dr Seuss used to draw?

OK. There you have a few major phobias of western civilization there.

We still let you and Mobius post. What's the difference?

[onodera]

Originally posted by Agathon
Are you some kind of nazi?

No, why would you ask?

[C0ckney]

he's just bitter because your very good analogy blew his extremely poor one out of the water.

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by BeBro


Yeah, killing would be a bit much. Maybe they could just be publicly beaten, incl. their family members.

Selected items to be amputated- perm any two per person (as appropriate) from:

fingers

toes

noses

foreskins

clitoris

earlobes

tongues


I'm sorry, but the exploitation of religious sentiment and general ignorance by both reactionary cartoonists and populist ideologues in Muslim countries can only lead to one (unfortunate) conclusion...


At least the B.B.C. was only sued by 'Christians'...

So, the BBC went ahead and broadcast Jerry Springer: The Opera in its entirety last week, enraging a hardcore band of extremist humourless oafs who decided before they'd even seen it that it was blasphemous and despicable and hideous and ghastly and wrong, and therefore Must Not Be Shown because They Didn't Like It.

Let he who is without brains cast the first stone. And cast they did. Prior to broadcast, they jostled, they shouted, they published contact details and made threatening phone calls - all in the name of Our Lord Jesus Christ, who, unless I'm grossly mistaken, was actually rather keen on tolerance and forgiveness and turning the other cheek.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguide/columnists/story/0,,1390622,00.html

All you need is lurve...

[molly bloom]

Originally posted by Agathon


Are you some kind of nazi?

You must be thinking of the WWII Mufti of Jerusalem....

[C0ckney]

Originally posted by Murg
Free speech is only about the government. Threatening people with violence is another illegal activity and it has nothing to do with free speech (it would be just as illegal if you were doing it to keep someone from posting a comic as it would be if you threatened then to close down their business).

you rather miss the point here. if every time someone makes a controversial comment about, or makes light of, a religion, he is threatened with violence, then pretty soon no one is going to make these sort of comments at all. these subjects become taboo and will not be discussed in the public domain. therefore this is clearly limiting free speech and free expression, even though the government is not involved.

also i would point out that a discussion on free speech does not begin and end with the US constitution.

[Fake Boris]

Originally posted by onodera

No, why would you ask?

Because you're Russian ?

[Murg]

Originally posted by C0ckney you rather miss the point here. if every time someone makes a controversial comment about, or makes light of, a religion, he is threatened with violence, then pretty soon no one is going to make these sort of comments at all. these subjects become taboo and will not be discussed in the public domain. therefore this is clearly limiting free speech and free expression, even though the government is not involved.

also i would point out that a discussion on free speech does not begin and end with the US constitution.

I think we are both saying the same thing just coming at it from different points. You are saying that it is wrong for a group to threaten violence because of what another says, which I defintily agree with. But my argument was that it is wrong to threaten violence regardless of the action, be it what someone said, their sexuality or the fact that they talk in the movie theater (okay, that last example might be okay). So it isnt just that the threat aginst speech is wrong, so much as the threat in general.

From a legal pespective "Free Speech" is specifically the freedom to speak without infringement from the government. There are hundreds (if not thousands) of limitations on what you can say for a ton of very good reasons. The concept that we can say whatever we want in public isn't true or even a goal of any society.

So my counter to the point that the artists should be able to post the comics because of free speech was only that since no one in this thread had suggested that the government arrest the artists that the free speech arguement really didnt apply. Likewise since no one in this thread suggested that threatening the artists was okay I believe we all already agree with your point.

There are a lot of wicker man arguments here so I'll restate my side.

1. The paper showed bad taste in printing the pictures.
2. I would hope other papers wouldnt run the comics.
3. Running the comics should be legal.
4. People are welcome to boycott the paper/artists because of its decision to run the comics.
5. Threatening the artists for the comics is wrong.
6. Threatening the artists should be illegal.

I believe 1 and 2 are the points that people here may differ on. They may not think the comics were in bad taste. But I would hope that they were open minded enough to realize that others (like myself) may differ in that opinion and continue through those 6 points as listed. And that they would respect that the difference of opinion is reasonable.