jihad of comic proportions

there has been a recent outbreak of violence in islamic countries over... cartoons. political cartoons to be more precise. the offending comic that was published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten had 12 different cartoonists drawing what they think the Prophet Mohammed might have looked like. as you might imagine, some of these were not in the most flattering light. and of course, the best way to engage in suitable dialog over such difference of opinion is to:


a) ignore it. who cares? it's the danish; who listens to them anyway?

well, in April last year the queen of Denmark was quoted by the Telegraph newspaper as saying that we (Denmark) “should show our opposition to Islam”.

She said: “We are being challenged by Islam these years — globally as well as locally. It is a challenge we have to take seriously. We have let this issue float about for too long because we are tolerant and lazy.

“We have to show our opposition to Islam and we have to, at times, run the risk of having unflattering labels placed on us because there are some things for which we should display no tolerance.”

the imam's in denmark have changed their tone- they no long demand apologies from Jyllands-Posten for the publication. Instead they said they just want two things: a guarantee from the Danish authorities that Muslims can freely practice their religion without being “provoked and discriminated.” And a declaration from Jyllands-Posten that the cartoons were not published with the intention of mocking the Muslim faith.

b) respectfully disagree with them; publish your own cartoons stating how you feel
the image at the right is from a play; it depicts a bare-breasted virgin mary with a bowl of blood holding a crying baby. the shield is the coat of arms for flanders (north of belgium). the playwright chokri ben chikha, is a tunisian muslim and his play is sponsored by the state. the play not only expresses his opinion of roman catholicism (the major religion in the area-- it's a rather pessimistic opinion in case you missed that), but is laced with anti-semitic dialog. the author's statement, "I am convinced that you have to talk about antisemitism. I am not going to solve it, but I have to show it. Moreover, not only the Arabs dislike Jews. My stepmother, a Polish woman, is very antisemitic as well. I think one should be able to laugh at anything, even at antisemitism."

c) boycott the products of the nation that provides them these freedoms, burn said nation's flags, oh yeah, and burn their consulate. this is the Danish consulate in Beirut. threaten to bomb the newspapers too. we saw this before, the artist, Theo van Gogh, who created a movie of the abuse of women in Islam; here is an image from that movie of a woman with some verses of the Quran on her back, was killed in a ritual murder (they shot him 8 times, slit his throat, then left two knives in his torso [one had a note attached]) in public by Muslim extremists.






hmm... maybe all of the above?

read today's opus (cartoon in sunday's paper) for an interesting perspective on the way americans are about things like this... can i get my pancakes with a side of apathy?