The Cartoon Wars Grow More Surreal

The Great Mohammed Cartoon Caper continues to cause unrest and turmoil, as the radicals within Islam continue to prove that they (a) have no sense of humor, (b) would have trouble beating a second grader in a debate, and (c) are pathetic on every level. Now, the head of Hezbollah wants President Bush to "shut up." Perhaps next they'll call him a poo-poo head. Allow me to correct my earlier statement -- the second grader would kick these guys' ass in a mature debate.

Amir Taheri breaks down the lies of the radicals rather nicely...

There is no Quranic injunction against images, whether of Muhammad or anyone else. When it spread into the Levant, Islam came into contact with a version of Christianity that was militantly iconoclastic. As a result some Muslim theologians, at a time when Islam still had an organic theology, issued "fatwas" against any depiction of the Godhead. That position was further buttressed by the fact that Islam acknowledges the Jewish Ten Commandments--which include a ban on depicting God--as part of its heritage. The issue has never been decided one way or another, and the claim that a ban on images is "an absolute principle of Islam" is purely political. Islam has only one absolute principle: the Oneness of God. Trying to invent other absolutes is, from the point of view of Islamic theology, nothing but sherk, i.e., the bestowal on the Many of the attributes of the One.

The claim that the ban on depicting Muhammad and other prophets is an absolute principle of Islam is also refuted by history. Many portraits of Muhammad have been drawn by Muslim artists, often commissioned by Muslim rulers.

...Now to the second claim, that the Muslim world is not used to laughing at religion. That is true if we restrict the Muslim world to the Brotherhood and its siblings in the Salafist movement, Hamas, Islamic Jihad and al Qaeda. But these are all political organizations masquerading as religious ones. They are not the sole representatives of Islam, just as the Nazi Party was not the sole representative of German culture. Their attempt at portraying Islam as a sullen culture that lacks a sense of humor is part of the same discourse that claims "suicide martyrdom" as the highest goal for all true believers.

The truth is that Islam has always had a sense of humor and has never called for chopping heads as the answer to satirists. Muhammad himself pardoned a famous Meccan poet who had lampooned him for more than a decade. Both Arabic and Persian literature, the two great literatures of Islam, are full of examples of "laughing at religion," at times to the point of irreverence. Again, offering an exhaustive list is not possible. But those familiar with Islam's literature know of Ubaid Zakani's "Mush va Gorbeh" (Mouse and Cat), a match for Rabelais when it comes to mocking religion. Sa'adi's eloquent soliloquy on behalf of Satan mocks the "dry pious ones." And Attar portrays a hypocritical sheikh who, having fallen into the Tigris, is choked by his enormous beard. Islamic satire reaches its heights in Rumi, where a shepherd conspires with God to pull a stunt on Moses; all three end up having a good laugh.

Eh, God pulled enough stunts on Moses, in my opinion, but that's for another day. The Journal and Powerline both have far more on the contrived nature of the controversy (hat tip: Instapundit). Maybe the MSM might finally start wondering why these protestors have Danish flags so readliy available.

Truth be told, the outrage in the Islamic world seems largely to be the type of manufactured rage that's designed to provoke fear and unify disparate people under one banner of fighting for the desecrated Prophet. The problem with this construct is that it leaves Muslims in the awkward position of demanding respect for their religion, while providing absolutely none for the religious faith of others. And top of that, they're trying to enforece these views with force.

This puts them at odds with Western liberals, who otherwise like to identify the Muslims as oppressed; when the oppressed deign not treat all people equally in all ways, it's rather inconvenient for the Left. When they proceed to do it in a violent manner, it's downright rude. Normally, the Left can avoid nasty stories where Islam comes into conflict with the Left's views on tolerance, but it's hard for newsmen to ignore burning buildings (most of them started in local news, after all).

Of course, the left-wing dishrag, and most of its followers here in the mainstream media, won't publish stuff like this, let alone something as hysterical as this (hat tip: Instapundit, yet again). At least one paper saw their entire newsroom walk out...

The editorial staff of the alternative weekly New York Press walked out today, en masse, after the paper's publishers backed down from printing the Danish cartoons that have become the center of a global free-speech fight.

Editor-in-Chief Harry Siegel emails, on behalf of the editorial staff:

New York Press, like so many other publications, has suborned its own professed principles. For all the talk of freedom of speech, only the New York Sun locally and two other papers nationally have mustered the
minimal courage needed to print simple and not especially offensive editorial cartoons that have been used as a pretext for great and greatly menacing violence directed against journalists, cartoonists, humanitarian aid workers, diplomats and others who represent the basic values and obligations of Western civilization. Having been ordered at the 11th hour to pull the now-infamous Danish cartoons from an issue dedicated to them, the editorial group—consisting of myself, managing editor Tim Marchman, arts editorJonathan Leaf and one-man city hall bureau Azi Paybarah, chose instead to resign our positions.

We have no desire to be free speech martyrs, but it would have been nakedly hypocritical to avoid the same cartoons we'd criticized others for not running, cartoons that however absurdly have inspired arson, kidnapping and murder and forced cartoonists in at least two continents to go into hiding. Editors have already been forced to leave papers in Jordan and France for having run these cartoons. We have no illusions about the power of the Press (NY Press, we mean), but even on the far margins of the world-historical stage, we are not willing to side with the enemies of the values we hold dear, a free press not least among them.

Now that's standing up for free speech and freedom of the press. Kudos also to the Philly Inquirer, which actually ran the cartoons, showing that people in Philly don't get intimidated (yes, Mohammed would get booed if he was playing the Eagles... or playing for the Eagles). And Muslims responded by picketing the paper, peacefully, which is perfectly fine. Of course, their logic seems to miss the point...

One demonstrator, 54-year old Aneesha Uqdah of Philadelphia, argued that precedent exists for newspapers to withhold some information to prevent harm: "If a woman was a rape victim, you wouldn't publish her name," she said.

Luckily, she's referring to the harm caused to the reputation of Islam, not harm to editors if the cartoon is published. But if I'm a Muslim, I'd be more worried about the damage being wrought to my faith by co-religionists who burn down buildings in response to cartoons. A group of Muslim youth have issued this apology, which seems to make more sense if you want to do some PR for Islam.

Back to the media. Harry Shearer, in my first-ever reference link to the Huffington Post, makes a legit point -- why did the media seem so willing to offend people's sensibilities by showing the pictures of Janet Jackson's wardrobe malfunction two years ago, yet now back away from offending Islam? Both John Podhertz and Andrew Sullivan make the legit point that newspapers and TV networks may be erring on the side of discretion out of fear. But in that case, they should probably acknowledge the reason is fear, rather than any deep thought. Sullivan sums it up succintly...

I just wish the MSM were honest about this and confessed that they are making a decision based on legitimate fear of violence against them. That would clarify things, at least. If the NYT can publish "Piss-Christ" and the Virgin Mary made out of dung, then it cannot logically claim to be a paper dedicated to respecting religious sensitivity. It respects religious sensitivity when the religious threaten violence. And this stance therefore rewards the violence. Where am I wrong here?

He's not wrong. But the MSM and radical Islam are.