This past week, the power of the press has been demonstrated once again while exposing deeper issues than simple “freedom of press” surface-level discussion. I’m writing of course about the global uproar regarding the cartoons printed in some European countries of Islam’s Prophet in certain manner so as to depict him with bombs and other stereotypical shots.
Not being a moslem, I may not have the depth of feeling of insult that many feel at these cartoons, so I must advise upfront that my viewpoint is without the emotion I might otherwise have if I was a moslem.
There has been much debate on television about the concepts of respect, freedom of speech and violence as an answer to address these issues. It all brings to the forefront the real chasm between cultures which leads different peoples to read the same expression either as a joke or as an insult. In the end, my conclusion is that there is so much context to attach to these events that one cannot have a debate about it within the thin focus of simply the cartoons themselves. Let me explain.
Pre-holocaust, a cartoon depicting Jews being killed would have had a different reaction than post-holocaust. Does anyone remember the outrage that the song “Aqualung” created in the 1960’s in the US bible belt states, which today is played on airwaves without any furor? As Einstein once said about having given the same exam two years in a row “the question is the same today but the answer is different”. We cannot remove the current context of islamic villification, invasion and extremist fundamentalist or reactionary forces from the current debate. As a pure distinction from Christianity, there is no single voice at the top of Islam today. So whereas a “pope” could have a calming effect on Catholics upset about something a muslim might have written or drawn, the same cannot be said about moslems worldwide.
And yet would Christians react with the same violence level as there have been in the past two days in arab and other islamic-dominated countries? Likely not. Nevertheless, let’s also remember that freedom of the press is not something that many of those people are used to. They are used to a single line of thought, whether government or religiously led. Variety of opinion, democracy of thought and freedom of expression are not so common in countries led by sheikhs, dictators or self-elected (and sometimes falsely) so-called “democratic” leaders.
Therefore in the end, we must judge actions within context. And in no way,shape or form will I ever condone violence as an answer to anything. Just as the west must look inwards at the context of the world today and the changes within its own societies that might change the legal definition of libel and slander, so must islamic communities consider the change of reaction that is necessary when dealing with such affronts.
A real eye opener that once again confirms the age-old adage that one man’s freedom is another man’s prison.
Sass
3 Comments
sass: well put….
human psychology, tolerance and understanding are complex topics…..combine that with religious fundementalism, poverty, lack of education and the broadening of an individual’s outlook which education provides, and you have a stewpot of irrational bedlam. it seems to me that the muslims who are rioting over the Danish cartoons are examples of the above. they have no peaceful outlets for their emotions and their energies….. the religious fundementalism and anti-semitism virulent today is the same as what our parents and grandparents had to deal with daily 50 to 100 years ago. it is very sad that the world today is less peaceful and more strained with violence and upheaval than 5 – 10 years ago. however, the US can be a great force for uplifting the world – which as Jews is one of the first things we learn – “tikkun olam” – repair the world, if we get the right leadership…… i, as one person, will work toward that……so that we can leave this earth a little more peaceful than that which we were born into.
A few comments, after reading various articles in the Herald Tribune:
– apparently, the initial intent of the Danish editor who commissioned the drawings was to test whether Danish cartoonists were feeling intimidated by the current climate of tension. half of the cartoonists he approached balked and the other half provided cartoons.
– then, having already secured the response to his test, this editor COULD have used a more considerate approach, and just posted these cartoons on a webpage somewhere, and published the web address instead of the cartoons themselves. So that they would not be seen by people unless they deliberately went to same webpage.
– then again, i doubt that any of the protesters in the Middle East actually were confronted with physical copies of the actual Danish newspapers. More likely, the internet as well as existing channels of anti-western activism have been used to propagate copies of he cartoons. The IHT hints that additional cartoons (not from the Danish editor’s batch) have been circulating too, far more insulting in nature, so as to inflame public spirits.
There we are dealing with the complex networks of manipulated demonstrators and agitation groups, mixing official politics with terror tactics which, as we are seeing, are being blended more openly than ever in Palestine and Lebannon.
So my stance is: the Danish editor had an interesting intention, but was foolishly inprudent in implementation (especially considering the Koran/toilet precedent).
Nevertheless, he bears limited responsibility for the scope of the uproar, which is likely being doctored by “anti-western groups” with local agendas…
Sass
Funny, I came to this site looking for a supplier of Solar systems to market in Iraq, just to find myself involved in a political (or is it religious) debate.
Now that I am involved I want to state an opinion of an Arab who has been living in the west for the last 30+ years and think of himself as a “westernised” animal.
For as far as I remember, we have been told to be sensitive to certain issues that are of “sensitive” nature such as the holocaust and 9/11 tragedy.
I have always undestood the sensitivity of these issues after all a dictator and his regime resposible for the death of so many people just because of their religious belives is not an issue that I (or any human being) should take lightly.
The cartoons themselves did not insult me in any way or shape, this is freedom of speach in practice, what insulted me is the imprisonment of a British historian for a speach that he delivered 14 years ago presumbly against the existing of the holocaust while in the meantime we condemn some stupid and ignorant people in Middle East for thier uproar.
In this instant I feel targeted by the same western values that I have believed in for the last 30 years, for no valid reason but being an Arab or a Muslim.
I hope the Arabs and Moslims re-think their ways of responce to provocations, and the western world re-think its ways of dealing with matters in double standards when it comes to Moslims.
And I still think that we can sell Solar products in Iraq.