Posted on 03/06/2006 5:19:23 PM PST by Libloather
Brouhaha Context
By John Hammer
Despite what Americans have been led to believe by the mainstream media, the protests about the Danish cartoons are about as spontaneous as the canned laughter on an old network sitcom.
Imagine for a moment that you are so outraged by the riots in Pakistan that you and 10,000 of your closest friends and family decide to protest. So you go to your flag locker and pull out your Pakistani flag to burn. What? You don’t have a flag locker with flags of every nation in the world? Wow, if one is to believe the tripe the mainstream media is publishing about these spontaneous peaceful protests, which occured in different countries four months after the cartoons were published, and where the average death toll was 20 or 30 people, then every Muslim in the world has countless flags of every nation in case they need one to burn at a protest.
Would you know where to go buy a Pakistani or a Danish flag if you needed one to burn this afternoon? I wouldn’t.
The mainstream media has led people to believe that the average Muslim finds these Danish cartoons so offensive that when they hear they have been published they immediately go out and riot. The truth is that after the cartoons were published in Denmark not much happened at all. Some radical imams in Denmark were upset, but they couldn’t get much support. So they waited until there was a big meeting in the Middle East and these radical Danish Muslims went to the meeting to stir up some trouble. The Danish Muslims were afraid that the cartoons published in Denmark were not offensive enough to justify worldwide riots, so when they took their case before the big wigs, they added a couple of cartoons that had not been printed in Denmark. One of the extras was of Muhammad with a pig’s face. But it turned out the original Danish cartoons were evidently bad enough to call for riots and killing. So the riots started months after the cartoons had been printed. The radical Muslims keep the pot stirred by having riots in different countries. Evidently someone provides the Danish flags to burn. And just to prove that the riots are orchestrated and about much more than some rather mild cartoons, the people who are rioting also burn American flags and Israeli flags while chanting “Death to America” and “Death to Israel.”
Why death to America? The United States has had nothing to do with the cartoon controversy. Up until recently, only two non-student newspapers in the US had even printed the cartoons. The US had nothing to do with the production of cartoons and the vast majority of Americans had never seen the cartoons because mainstream newspapers were too intimidated to print them. The cartoons were drawn by Danes, not Americans, and they were published in a Danish newspaper, not an American newspaper. The same could be said about Israel. Dr. Ibreeham Kateed, who appeared with me on Friday, Feb. 25 on the Dusty Dunn Show on WGOS 1070 am, said that Muslims don’t hate Jews. This is nice to hear, but why are Muslims all over the world who are protesting Danish cartoons chanting “Death to Israel” and burning Israeli flags?
Our local Muslim leaders, instead of saying that The Rhino Times didn’t have the right to publish the cartoons, might want to write a few letters to the editor explaining the behavior of their Muslims brothers in Syria, Libya, Nigeria, Pakistan and anywhere else they rioted and killed people.
Another explanation I would like to hear is why the rioting Muslims burned Danish embassies and consulates. The Danish government didn’t publish the cartoons; it was just a newspaper that happened to be in Denmark, but it wasn’t the fault of the Danish government or the Danish people. The editors and publisher of one newspaper decided that publishing cartoons about Islam would be a good idea, not the Danish government.
Perhaps the Muslims rioting in Muslim-controlled countries don’t understand freedom of the press and that in some parts of the world the government doesn’t control every publication in the country. Five newspapers in Muslim-majority countries have published the cartoons and all have been closed down by the government and the editors put in jail.
So much has been written about these cartoons, but these questions about the riots have not been answered.
Then we move on to the local level. The Rhino Times in Greensboro and in Charlotte published the bomb-in-the-turban cartoon on the same day. In Charlotte, we received a couple of telephone calls and a couple of beeps. In Greensboro, we received over 300 telephone calls in one afternoon, countless beeps and letters to the editor. We had the mayor come by twice to talk to us about our terrible sin. We received a telephone call from the city manager saying that protestors were going to be on the sidewalk in front of our building. Protests were scheduled for the Friday after the cartoons were printed, and every Friday thereafter until we apologized.
We also received three or four threats. What was the difference? The difference was that someone was stirring things up in Greensboro but evidently in Charlotte the Muslims had better things to do than worry about some cartoons that had first been printed in Denmark in September.
The Fayetteville Observer published two of the cartoons on Feb. 11, almost a week before we did, but no one even knew about it. They didn’t receive much attention from the other news media or from the Muslims in their own community or in any other community. Why is it a grave sin to publish cartoons in a weekly circulation paper in Greensboro but not even a small sin to publish the same cartoons in a daily paper in Fayetteville?
The other huge fallacy that is being perpetrated in this whole controversy is that printing any image of Muhammad or any prophet is offensive to all Muslims. Museums such as the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York have had images of Muhammad on display for years. If Muslims are disturbed over any image of a prophet they should have been protesting every day in front of theaters that were showing The Passion of the Christ. The Muslims who I’ve talked to, and many who have written and called, say they believe that Jesus Christ was a great prophet and no images of him should be made. This was an entire movie about Jesus Christ. There were no riots and no flag burnings.
Two problems with the protests over our printing of the cartoons should be disturbing to all Americans. Of all the Muslims who I have spoken to about this issue, plus the ones who have called and written the newspaper, I have found a complete lack of understanding of the First Amendment. When I have said that we had a right to publish the cartoons because of the First Amendment, I have received two responses. One is that, no, we didn’t have the right to print the cartoons because they are offensive to Muslims. As my brother Willy says, “Happy speech doesn’t need any protection.” He’s right. Only offensive speech needs to be protected, and these cartoons fall well within the realm of protected speech.
The second is not nearly as crucial but is interesting and that is a lack of understanding of what a political cartoon is supposed to be. One Muslim woman, who agreed that printing the cartoons in Charlotte was a good idea (we haven’t received that response from a single Muslim in Greensboro), said that she saw the cartoon as representing an attempt by violent radical Muslims to usurp Islam for their own purposes.
Most of the Muslims I have had contact with have said that either the cartoon is depicting Muhammad as a terrorist bomber or depicting all Muslims as terrorist bombers. It’s a cartoon. The viewer is allowed to interpret the cartoon as they see fit. I like the interpretation from the woman in Charlotte of radical Muslims bombing in the name of Muhammad. Not a single caller has mentioned the other cartoon, the one with the suicide bombers approaching heaven and being told “Stop. We’re all out of virgins.” Maybe that one isn’t mentioned because it is funny. It is sick, but funny, and that is how a lot of political cartoons are – a little sick but funny.
Then there is the irony. Most of the Muslims with whom I have spoken have told me that Islam is a religion of peace, that Muhammad was a man of peace, and that is why it is so wrong to print a cartoon with Muhammad with a bomb in his turban. But the result of the cartoons have been riots, embassies and KFC stores being burned and over 200 people being killed. The followers of this peaceful prophet respond to a cartoon with extreme violence. Something is wrong and it isn’t the cartoon.
A group of NC FReepers came to Greensboro to form a "human shield" around the offices of the Rhino Times, and sing "Kumbayah," but the Mohammed cartoon protesters at the old Federal Courthouse up the street failed to materialize, so they repaired to Natty Greene's Brew Pub to quaff a few of the area's finest microbrews. This was to have occurred at noon on Friday, which by chance was precisely the timing of the attack over in Chapel Hill.
That cartoon is WHITE. That is institutional racism.
I think you might be onto something there, because the only black in the cartoon is marginalized.
"I think you might be onto something there, because the only black in the cartoon is marginalized."
Wow what a great line! Too bad hardly anyone around to read it.
Good one.
LOL!
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