An extraordinary and encouraging development. From AFP:
WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States urged Muslims angered by newspaper cartoons of the Islamic prophet Mohammed to also condemn frequent anti-Semitic and anti-Christian "hate speech" in the Islamic world.White House spokesman Scott McClellan denounced escalating violence over the drawings, which Muslims say are blasphemous, and urged governments and demonstrators to defuse tensions with "constructive dialogue."
"We would also urge people who are criticizing these cartoons to speak out forcefully against all forms of hate speech, including cartoons and articles throughout parts of the Arab world, which frequently espouse anti-Semitic and anti-Christian views," McClellan told reporters....
Global protests over the cartoons escalated Monday, with a total of five people killed in protests in Afghanistan, Lebanon and Syria, and warning shots fired outside a US consulate in Indonesia....
After a weekend that saw Denmark's embassies torched in Lebanon and Syria, fury over the images continued to spread with protests held across Afghanistan as well as in Indian-held Kashmir, Indonesia, Lebanon, Iran, Somalia and Thailand.
Perhaps the letters some of us wrote to the State Dept did not fall on deaf ears?! We may have, hopefully, rounded a corner. At least I'd like to believe so. Time to wait and see....
An extraordinary and very welcome speech by White House spokesman Scott McClellan.However the self proclaimed champion of 'Free Speech'-America-remains deafening in its silence and refusal to publish Danish cartoons. What's up Doc?
Encouraging, but ultimately not strong enough.
Where is C.A.I.R. on all this? Why haven't they spoken up for the freedom of speech and freedom of the press that they love to use so much???
Morgane writes:
"An extraordinary and very welcome speech by White House spokesman Scott McClellan.However the self proclaimed champion of 'Free Speech'-America-remains deafening in its silence and refusal to publish Danish cartoons. What's up Doc?"
Well, it's not up to the U.S. gov to publish those
cartoons, it is up to privately owned newspapers.
I don't know which have.
OTOH, it was disgusting for our state department to
come down on the side of the evil mohammadans. I
understand that the administration doesn't want to
cause more problems while we have boots on the
ground there, but we could have shut the !@#$ up.
An extraordinary and very welcome speech by White House spokesman Scott McClellan.However the self proclaimed champion of 'Free Speech'-America-remains deafening in its silence and refusal to publish Danish cartoons. What's up Doc?
Four of the cartoons were shown on Foxnews and two were published in the NY Sun. According to another poster the cartoons were also published in the Philadelphia Inquirer.
The statement from the White House is at once ignorant, stupid, and dangerous. It reeks of knee-jerk equivalence, cowardice, and defeatism.
1) The cartoons are not hate speech. To depict a self-proclaimed terrorist as having a bomb in his head towel is a judicious and fair commentary.
2) The Jews are apes and pigs statements are not hate speech, either. They are God's commandments, as set forth in the Koran and the Sunnah. The scowling furious Moslems are only being true to their faith.
3) If McClellan can't make these distinctions, then he should keep his mouth shut on Islam. We'll write it off as fearful silence. That would be preferable to misleading doggerel.
PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE
This is nuts: http://michellemalki...
MULTAN, Pakistan (AFX) - The Pakistan Medical Association has vowed not to prescribe medicines from firms based in some European countries where controversial cartoons portraying the Prophet Mohammed were published, said Shahid Rao, the body's general secretary for Punjab province.
The association will boycott drugs from Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Germany and France to protest the 'blasphemous' drawings, Rao said.
'We have taken a unanimous decision and it will be immediately implemented in Pakistan,' Rao told AFP.
'Doctors in the country are very motivated on this issue,' he said. 'We would use alternate medicines in future till a public apology comes from these countries.'
Pharmacists have also vowed not to sell such medicines, Rao said.
The association is advising patients against using medicines from the offending countries if they are mistakenly prescribed by doctors, he added.
Perhaps Pakistani's can be indignant enought to refuse any further earthquake aid.
Perhaps Palestinians can be indignant enough to refuse any further EU aid.
This statement will just anger Muslims more. How dare the USA call Muslims hypocrites? Everything seems to piss these dudes off.
"We would also urge people ... to speak out forcefully against ...anti-Semitic and anti-Christian views"
It ain't ever gonna happen until the Islamofascist backbone of their society is broken, humiliated, and discredited. The cartoons are a good start.
The Turkish and Spanish prime ministers make a joint plea for respect and calm in an article in the International Herald Tribune.
Screw off, Prime Ministers. I selfishly guard my right to think as I damn well please. And a big part of that is to maintain and express a deep, very very deep, disrespect for Islam and for all Moslems.
If you can't disrespect a Moslem, then what good is respect at all?
You mean it's "extraordinary and encouraging" that some semblance of sanity and fairness has been restored? That would be the case if we were talkiing about Al Qaeda rather than the US State Dept.
"PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE"
so Islam comes before saving peoples lives.
they seriously are crazy.
Roxanne-
Here's a link to the Philadelphia Inquirer's publication- of the 'Bomb Turban Head Mohammad' caricature:
http://www.classicalvalues.com/archives/003272.html
And some other useful info on the way to it.
And, to remind those in the Press who waver about supporting Denmarks' blow for freedom, as Ben Franklin said:
"We must all hang together, or we shall certainly hang seperately."
The great British philosopher John Stuart Mill wrote in On Liberty, "Strange it is, that men should admit the validity of the arguments for free discussion, but object to their being 'pushed to an extreme'; not seeing that unless the reasons are good for an extreme case, they are not good for any case."
The cartoons in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten raise the most important question of our times: freedom of expression. Are we in the west going to cave into pressure from societies with a medieval mindset, or are we going to defend our most precious freedom -- freedom of expression, a freedom for which thousands of people sacrificed their lives?
A democracy cannot survive long without freedom of expression, the freedom to argue, to dissent, even to insult and offend. It is a freedom sorely lacking in the Islamic world, and without it Islam will remain unassailed in its dogmatic, fanatical, medieval fortress; ossified, totalitarian and intolerant. Without this fundamental freedom, Islam will continue to stifle thought, human rights, individuality; originality and truth.
Unless, we show some solidarity, unashamed, noisy, public solidarity with the Danish cartoonists, then the forces that are trying to impose on the Free West a totalitarian ideology will have won; the Islamization of Europe will have begun in earnest. Do not apologize.
This raises another more general problem: the inability of the West to defend itself intellectually and culturally. Be proud, do not apologize. Do we have to go on apologizing for the sins our fathers? Do we still have to apologize, for example, for the British Empire, when, in fact, the British presence in India led to the Indian Renaissance, resulted in famine relief, railways, roads and irrigation schemes, eradication of cholera, the civil service, the establishment of a universal educational system where none existed before, the institution of elected parliamentary democracy and the rule of law? What of the British architecture of Bombay and Calcutta? The British even gave back to the Indians their own past: it was European scholarship, archaeology and research that uncovered the greatness that was India; it was British government that did its best to save and conserve the monuments that were a witness to that past glory. British Imperialism preserved where earlier Islamic Imperialism destroyed thousands of Hindu temples.
On the world stage, should we really apologize for Dante, Shakespeare, and Goethe? Mozart, Beethoven and Bach? Rembrandt, Vermeer, Van Gogh, Breughel, Ter Borch? Galileo, Huygens, Copernicus, Newton and Darwin? Penicillin and computers? The Olympic Games and Football? Human rights and parliamentary democracy? The west is the source of the liberating ideas of individual liberty, political democracy, the rule of law, human rights and cultural freedom. It is the west that has raised the status of women, fought against slavery, defended freedom of enquiry, expression and conscience. No, the west needs no lectures on the superior virtue of societies who keep their women in subjection, cut off their clitorises, stone them to death for alleged adultery, throw acid on their faces, or deny the human rights of those considered to belong to lower castes.
How can we expect immigrants to integrate into western society when they are at the same time being taught that the west is decadent, a den of iniquity, the source of all evil, racist, imperialist and to be despised? Why should they, in the words of the African-American writer James Baldwin, want to integrate into a sinking ship? Why do they all want to immigrate to the west and not Saudi Arabia? They should be taught about the centuries of struggle that resulted in the freedoms that they and everyone else for that matter, cherish, enjoy, and avail themselves of; of the individuals and groups who fought for these freedoms and who are despised and forgotten today; the freedoms that the much of the rest of world envies, admires and tries to emulate." When the Chinese students cried and died for democracy in Tiananmen Square (in 1989) , they brought with them not representations of Confucius or Buddha but a model of the Statue of Liberty."
Freedom of expression is our western heritage and we must defend it or it will die from totalitarian attacks. It is also much needed in the Islamic world. By defending our values, we are teaching the Islamic world a valuable lesson, we are helping them by submitting their cherished traditions to Enlightenment values.
Iran’s biggest-selling newspaper has waded into the Muhammad controversy by launching a competition to find the 12 "best" cartoons about the Holocaust.
Farid Mortazavi, graphics editor for Tehran's Hamshahri newspaper, said that the deliberately inflammatory contest would test out how committed Europeans were to the concept freedom of expression.
"The Western papers printed these sacrilegious cartoons on the pretext of freedom of expression, so let’s see if they mean what they say and also print these Holocaust cartoons," he said.
Karen Pollock, chief executive of the Holocaust Educational Trust, said that victims of the Holocaust and their families were growing used to insults from Iran. "It's just very sad," she told Times Online.
Iran’s regime is supportive of Holocaust revisionist historians, who maintain that the slaughter of Europe’s Jews during the Second World War was invented or exaggerated to justify the creation of Israel on Palestinian territory.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad courted international denunciation recently when he argued for Israel to be "wiped off the map". The President's vitriolic attacks on Israel have further soured relations with the West, already at loggerheads over the republic's nuclear research programme.
Mr Mortazavi said that tomorrow's edition of the paper would invite cartoonists to enter the competition, with gold coins as prizes for the 12 winning artists -- the same number of cartoons that appeared in the conservative Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten lighting the touchpaper for fury which has swept around the Islamic world.
Last week the Iranian Foreign Ministry invited Tony Blair to Tehran to take part in a planned conference on the Holocaust. Mr Blair said that such a conference was "shocking, ridiculous, stupid". The Prime Minister responded by inviting Mr Ahmadinejad to witness the evidence of the Holocaust in the countries of Europe.
Public protests against the publication of the cartoons have been relatively calm in Iran, although a crowd of about 200 smashed the windows of the Austrian Embassy in Tehran today.
The protesters, chanting "God is Greatest" and "Europe, Europe, shame on you", smashed all the diplomatic mission’s windows with stones and then tried to hurl petrol bombs inside.
Iran has withdrawn its ambassador to Denmark and has said it plans to review trade ties with all countries where the cartoons were published.
Mr Ahmadinejad has criticised the argument of freedom of speech employed by European newspapers to justify publication of the cartoons.
"If your newspapers are free why do not they publish anything about the innocence of the Palestinians and protest against the crimes committed by the Zionists?" the Mehr news agency quoted him as saying.
Andrew Kaufman, chairman of the Association of Jewish Refugees (AJR), said: "We deplore this despicable initiative to trivialise the brutality of the Holocaust that will cause enormous insensitivity to all survivors of Nazism."
The Metropolitan Police said they were investigating "a number" of complaints from the public over placards carried by some Islamic protesters in London on Friday and Saturday.
Slogans included "Massacre those who insult Islam"; "Europe, your 9/11 will come" and - in an apparent reference to the four 7 July suicide bombers - "Europe you will pay, fantastic 4 are on their way".
David Davis, the shadow home secretary, said: "Clearly some of these placards are incitement to violence, and indeed incitement to murder - an extremely serious offence which the police must deal with and deal with quickly. Whatever your view on these cartoons, we have a tradition of freedom of speech in this country which has to be protected."
And the Koran?
MORE KORANS MORE HADITHS MORE SIRATS MORE MOSLEMS MORE ISLAM MO' MO!!
As usual this will not be well recieved by muslims....
The only things Moslems seem to take well are mooch handouts and underage sex partners.
"PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE"
Good! Let them suffer from their self-imposed drug boycott. They are hysterical boobs.
What a STUPID religion.
"PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE"
...from a post above
There's a certain Darwinian beauty in this.
Poster Stephen at Harry's Place put it very succinctly: The Muslims are offended by the truth (about the Prophet and his followers) where the Jews are being offended by the lies (Holocaust denial).
If Jyllens-Posten set out to shine a light where it needed to be shone, they will be remembered for having done the world a great, if currently under-appreciated service.
The next Muslim outrage is being cued up. The excuse this time? Wiretaps.
Here are some quotes from Anderson Coopers' blog:
Is it time for a somber discussion of the limits of government intrusion in a free society? Time to root out the "few extremists" attending their mosques? Nope. Time for infidel beheadings! (insert uulation here).
"PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE"
Oh, so they want to play rough, do they? Well, we won't buy any more, umm, well, let's see, what does Pakistan make that we can boycott?
Werter5075 said
"PAKISTANI DOCTORS: NO MORE EUROPEAN MEDICINE
This is nuts: http://michellemalki...
MULTAN, Pakistan (AFX) - The Pakistan Medical Association has vowed not to prescribe medicines from firms based in some European countries where controversial cartoons portraying the Prophet Mohammed were published, said Shahid Rao, the body's general secretary for Punjab province.
The association will boycott drugs from Denmark, Norway, Switzerland, Germany and France to protest the 'blasphemous' drawings, Rao said.
'We have taken a unanimous decision and it will be immediately implemented in Pakistan,' Rao told AFP.
'Doctors in the country are very motivated on this issue,' he said. 'We would use alternate medicines in future till a public apology comes from these countries.'
Pharmacists have also vowed not to sell such medicines, Rao said.
The association is advising patients against using medicines from the offending countries if they are mistakenly prescribed by doctors, he added."
Shunkleash says...LOL!!!!
Lets see the pakistan muslim doctors orgainisation aka "Doctors Without Brains" have decided that no more medication should be bought from Norway, Germany, Denmark, France and Switzerland. uh huh...I see. Are we sure these people are really doctors? By my estimation Dr. Shahid has called every major pharmaceutical suppliers home country! Go figure?!?! Oh, of course, is patently obvious... the muslims are going for self extermination to show their love for their prophet. NOW THAT IS WHAT I CALL EVEN HANDED CRITICISM!!!
I wish them all lots of luck...im rooting for muslims to succeed so that they can all finally meet the prophet. Its so unfair that these poor muslims have to put up with this awful life when all they want is to meet the prophetmyhster.
This place is great!! When im down I come to visit Robert and friends and end up reading some absolute horse shit that a muslim says/writes and BANG BANG...im smiling all over the place! This is the real medicine folks!!!!...forget sex MAN!!!! Visit www.jihadwatch.org today!
Ok so I was getting carried away...
Regards
Shunkleash (PBUH)
Enough of these knee-jerk, nervous tick comparisons! Everytime there is a criticism about Islam, Muslims or Arab behaviour, someone has to compare it to anti-Semitism. There are 1 billion Muslims in over 21 states. There are 14 million total Jews worldwide with one country of 6 million people. The Muslim "narrative" (as the post-modernist pseudo-intellectuals would have it) is in no way similar to the Jewish "narrative," i.e. history. 1 billion Muslims are not a "oppressed minority!" The Mohammed (PBUH) cartoons are in no way similar to anti-Semitic cartoons published daily around the world. If Jews really were using Muslim or Christian blood for pastries, then I guess cartoons about it wouldn't be anti-Semitic, would they? The problem is that the Arab/Muslim world actually believes all the nut case anti-Semitic conspiracy theories that have been around for hundreds of years. This is why the sheiks are buying up so much stock in media companies, real estate, are now flooding Hollywood with cash to produce films. Any field that is considered "controlled by Jews" is now attracting Muslim money. OK, if I don't stop now I will rant on and on!
Many Arab-Americans now believe their loyalty to the United States is being questioned.
I for one do not question Moslem loyalty to the United States and her Constitution. Having read the Koran and Hadiths, it must of course go without question that all Moslems are disloyal. No question.
Having answered this troubling question, let's move on and dishonorably discharge all Moslems from the U.S. armed forces, and also fire them from law enforcement positions.
Muslims here us talking, and I imagine it's like the Charlie Brown characters listening to the grown ups...
We say: "Religion of Peace" hoping they'll get the message...
The Muslims hear: "ZIBBITY BLIBBITY BLOP"
We say: "We would also urge people who are criticizing these cartoons to speak out forcefully against all forms of hate speech, including cartoons and articles throughout parts of the Arab world, which frequently espouse anti-Semitic and anti-Christian views"
They hear: "MWAA MWAA MWAA" -- akin to a flugelhorn playing descending tones
hear
Lets see the pakistan muslim doctors orgainisation aka "Doctors Without Brains"
The cartoons have also been published in the US so Muslims should not use any medicine from the US either.This latest "idea" by the Muslims reminds me of their "idea" not to take polio vaccine because it had been "poisoned" by the US. That idea resulted in an increase in polio among Muslims.Muslims are becoming the laughingstock of the entire world.
Wow. Scott McClellan's polls just jumped a few points among Shinoliites aged 26 through 26.
And... no Western medicine?! Just when you thought you had a handle on how much they like death...
"My doctor said Mylanta," to quote a slogan they probably don't use anymore.
On the other hand, Mohammed recommended camel urine for stomach ailments. The slogan "My prophet said camel urine" doesn't have the same ring.
The American government is not seeing things clearly. The cartoons, almost all of them comically anodyne, were published because the writer of a book could not find anyone to illustrate it for fear of offending Muslims. This climate of fear could either be acquiesced in, in which case the non-Muslim world would have agreed to abide by Muslim demands and standards, which might later include the requirement that women be subject to the authority of men and treated as badly as they are -- by Western standards -- in the Muslim world, and acquiescing in much else as well.
The essential principle of modern Western democracy -- as opposed to the jokey purple-thumbed kind that the Administration holds up for admiration in Iraq -- is free speech. The wars of religion are long over; blasphemy laws no longer exist. In the Western world, one may deplore the "Piss Christ" of Serrano and write letters. One may also suggest that there is no constitutional guarantee to be supported by taxpayers' money in one's exercise of free speech. But otherwise, unless one is attempting to suppress the kind of speech that incites to imminent lawless violence (the Brandenburg test) in the United States other kinds of speech cannot be banned.
What happened is clear: a Danish newspaper, written for a Danish audience, employed Danish cartoonists to make a series of cartoons around and about Muhammad. No one showed Muhammad in flagrante delicto with nine-year-old Aisha. No one depicted Muhammad smiling with evident pleasure at the sight of the lifeless body of Asma bint Marwan. No one depicted Muhammad observing the decapitation of the 600--900 helpless prisoners of the Banu Qurayza. No one depicted much of anything, save for a few comic-opera scimitars and, in one case, a turban in the shape of a bomb, and a fuse on that bomb.
Now comes the temptation: the Temptation of Symmetry. There is "hate speech" perhaps here, but then there is "hate speech" on the other side, and both are to be deplored. Are they? Are we by sleight of word, and false symmetries, to give up the defense of free speech in the Western world quite so easily, by suggesting that "we are all guilty" and that the embarrassed defense of Western principles should descend to the level so often used by Muslims themselves, that of "Tu Quoque"? Is that it?
What is shown every day in the Egyptian, Saudi, and other Arab and Muslim presses certainly ought to be reprinted here and there and everywhere, so that the Western public can get a good long look, and a look that is repeated at intervals. They should also read the hatred and hysteria poured out day after day, in official speeches, in khutbas (sermons), in editorials, on the airwaves, in the fantastic depication of Western "atrocities" that Al-Jazeera specializes in. They should look, if they can, at the recruiting sites for Islam -- the ones that provide videos of decpatitation of Infidels, and ask again and again, what kind of people not only are not apologetic about such things, but put them up proudly, as ways to encourage others to join in.
What if the Islamic world, however, were not full of such things? What if it did not possess the satellite channels, the radio stations, the printing press (as for so long the world of Islam resisted the printing press, which finally came to it from Ibrahim Muteferrika, the Hungarian Jewish convert, in 1729 -- several centuries after Gutenberg had helped transform the West), and so did not have on record all those examples of "hate speech" that Scott McClellan refers to?
Then what? Would that mean that we in the Western world are therefore not to print pictures of Muhammad if we see fit, because we must tailor our freedoms to the demands of others who in every respect offer a world of despotism and cruelty that we would not tolerate one minute for ourselves? Do we only possess our freedoms in the Western world if the Muslims give us the okay, or if by their own behavior we can point to "their hate speech" as being the only justification we can come up with for our own exercise of free speech? Since the Danish cartoons hardly amount, in any case, to hate speech, the false symmetry infuriates.
It would have been better to have drily noted the hypocrisy of the Arab and Muslim world, rather than making that hypocrisy the main theme, and then gone on to say that "in a certain sense this is irrelevant." All that is relevant is this: Danish cartoonists, hired by a Danish newspaper, for a Danish audience, published some cartoons which were intended to both test, and reaffirm, the exercise of the right, recognized in Denmark and in the United States, of free speech.
That is the issue. Do Danes, and Italians, and French, and Dutch, and English, and Germans, and Americans, and all those who subscribe to the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Man, have the right of free speech, without death threats against indivdiduals and institutitions, attacks on embassies, and all the other horrifying displays of whipped up mass hysteria that offend -- and will not be forgotten by -- the civilized.
That's it.
So now, in this spirit of moral equivalence, we hear that iran's thug-in-chief is soliciting cartoons about the Holocaust (that's right, the one this nut-case denied ever took place.) May I suggest one showing the grand mufti, dressed in a skimpy little cheerleader's outfit, waving koran-like pom-poms, as hitler is thowing Jews into the ovens?
Wow Hugh, I can't possibly match your insights. You may become my role model here. Anyway, I only have a few thoughts to share
Saudi Arabia locked a girls school when it was burning rather than allowing the girls outside without proper dress. That is not something noble nor would it be tolerated in Western socities.
We have the hard won right of expression, even at the risk of seriously pissing someone off (you can tell I'm American, I don't mean getting them tippsy). There should only be verbal retaliation, everyone doesn't have to agree with me.
Islam is a religion that states it will make use of what the infidel has to offer so it can have a stalling effect. They will say what we want to hear and then use it against us.
As an American I'm glad that some moderates in Europe may be seeing that trying to appease the muslim community will NOT work.
As many Europeans said after 9/11 We're now all Americans. Well, now we're all Danes. We MUST stand together on this issue. Defend our rights, defend our freedoms and not let ourselves becomes slaves to one what? religion, nation, culture, mindset? I'm just not sure any more. I think they are all that.
Enough.
miku said
I haven't heard that one, do you have a link to more info? For example, did the Shar'ia police set the fire (because girls should not be learning anything other than subservience to their owner/husband) before locking the doors?
The more I learn, the more I cannot believe it.
Re pakistan and their boycott of European medicine; and what they make that we can boycott. Well, I know for a fact that they made most of the leather footballs used in previous world cups. And there is a world cup coming up later this year in Germany. They must be very hard at work right now . . .
I found the link about the 14 Saudi girls burned to death to avoid the embarrassment of being seen without their burqua:
Brown University OpEd
USA Today story
Note that the tone of the dhimmitude USA Today story is that Saudis were shocked by this event and their society would soon be changing to allow more freedom for women, etc. It happened in 2002. Uh, yeah, right.
Like I said, the more I learn, the less I can believe it.
The difference between the White House and the State Dept.
Sorry Special Guest,
I had a post all ready for you, but was timed out. I read the article years ago and then was reminded when I read Robert Spencer's book on Islam. I had the text for you, but now you don't need it.
Yes, I agree, the more you learn, the more unbelieveable it becomes. I agree, the notion of more liberty was all lip service. I wonder if the father's of those girls thought they died in a just cause. Frightening thought.
M.
l heard several talk radio personels today talk about the duplicity of these arab muslims, they have in their own papers, cartoons debasing Jews and Christians and you do not have violence and threats of beheading arabs newpaper editors! one thing in common was the defence of freedom of the press..except for the UCLA, they rather only defend muslims, if these crooked lawyers existed at the time of Licoln they would of been jailed or kicked out of the country!
More Danish cartoons (not offensive, but apparently lacking trademarks)
http://savethehumans.com/culturebashing/outbursts/danish_cartoons/index.shtml
Dutch cartoons (in support of the Danes), note that some of them cartoons have very ADULT themes and may be *HIGHLY OFFENSIVE* TO SOME BUT TREMENDOUSLY FUNNY (several are in English, but many are in Dutch which even German speakers amongst us will have some difficulty understanding entirely)
http://retecool.com/comments.php?id=13539_0_1_0_C
Are there any Hollanders here? I'd love a translation on a couple of them.
A thought,
As I was reflecting on the posts, I remembered what someone told me in Morocco. We only teach Islam for the first 7 years. If we have the child for those years, he will never go back. Clearly that's a paraphrase, but telling never the less. I was younger then and it didn't scare me as it should have. But something in me remembered.
M.
A thought,
As I was reflecting on the posts, I remembered what someone told me in Morocco. We only teach Islam for the first 7 years. If we have the child for those years, he will never go back. Clearly that's a paraphrase, but telling never the less. I was younger then and it didn't scare me as it should have. But something in me remembered.
M.
Didn't mean to hit post yet in the above post, forgive the grammar.
Let's not get too excited. All any of this means is that we are just that much closer to open conflict on a larger scale.
It's inevitable really.
Yikes, I loved the Dutch cartoons!! Way edgier than the VERY placid Danish cartoons. Go Holland. Hell, I think I'll take my next short vacation in your country!! I can try to help make up for the Muslim ban on European stuff. Americans are free spenders, so I'll put my bucks with you.
M.
Foehammer,
Like the Lord of the Rings/Hobbit reference by the way.
Anyway, perhaps we're better having the conflict come sooner. I'm concerned that we may be getting a "Chamberlain" critial mass; those who would rather appease than stand firm.
M.
So, the Muslims want to boycott European drugs. They would be better off boycotting their own Muslim drugs, like heroine.
You're right AlarmedPigFarmer, this "hate-speech" talk is dangerous, and very Orwellian.
But that's the new Sovietized Psychotheraputic State we live in.
We're all sick, ya know, we're in need of some Humanistic Psychotherapy so we don't fight or offend, or....
Enlightened nations should enact a "Reciprocity Statute" which states that the practice of Islam will be sanctioned within their countries only to the extent that the practice of infidel religions are sanctioned within Saudi Arabia.
The more I learn, the more I cannot believe it.
--- special_guest
Islam has many strengths going for it. One is that this ideology (Islam is not a religion) is so rotten, so savage, so... low, that Moslems continue to reap the benefits of denial and self-delusion.
But that's the new Sovietized Psychotheraputic State we live in. - posted by kentim
I've gotten the impression from my limited reading on the subject that Soviet "therapy," where it didn't involve "re-education through labor" was simply sedating the hell out of the patient. (Insert "opiate of the masses" joke here...)
Allegorically, then, the "Soviet psychotherapy" label works even better, with the sanitization of language as the "drug" of choice.
You haven`t heard much boycott incitements against France,Germany,Switzerland,Spain,Italy,Holland,Ireland,Poland,Hungary,Czech Republic,etc...all these are countries where the Mo cartoons have been published.
Interestingly enough,Denmark is the focus of all muslim rage.
A less talked about fact,soon the chairmanship of the council of the IAEA,will pass to ....Denmark.
So the muslim countries have all ganged up against Denmark,to help their friend,atomic Iran.
I like this article and want to share it with you:
http://service.spiegel.de/cache/international/0,1518,398853,00.html?partnerid=160
The forgotten hero's in all of this are the cartoonists. I hope they are safe. I imagine there are some "offended" cult-members hunting for them right now, and it's pretty much disgusted me that the rest of the "free" Western media hasn't shown more support , especially in the US and Australia.
The excuses given by editors down here for not publishing are shamefully pathetic, making statements like "why put anyone at risk by publishing". And we have polititians echoing the mafia-style threats from Islamic clerics in Australia by suggesting "shit" will happen if they are published, but defending free speech in the same sentence. I'm not sure if it is pure cowardice on their part, or a lack of understanding of the Islamist's agenda or a combination of both.
I think one day this will be seen as an embarrassing episode in our history.
ugh 'politicians'
I too like Shunkleash get a good laugh here on JW/DW from the doings of the Islamaniacs. Imagine: We're going to punish you infidels by not using your medicine. Now, if we could get the cartoons published in more places, everywhere where good medications are produced, then they would have to stop using those horribly modjren infidel healing methods and would have to go back to hemlock, wormwood and deadly nightshade.
Iss vet zey helfn vi a toytn bankes.
עס וועט זיי העלפן ווי א טויטן באנקעס
Hi, Shinolite,
They got a combo-thing going on, first they try to plant certain ideas and responss to words in our head through repetition and endless examples of what is "inapropriate" and 'appropriate", or "tolerant" etc, etc, then when some people have difficulty with the cognitive dissonance, those people who still retain the capacity to logic and reason but may be too busy and distracted otherwise to resolve it truthfully, those people will be told that the stress they are experiencing(living in a half-mad society) is due to a "chemical imbalance" or an unrelated stressor, and presto!, they've got a new drug that can take care of the problem.
Funny(not)thing is, most of the drugs are mind-numbing,and actually destroy a part of the personality. It is a mechanical(easy) fix to a non-biological problem. It centers around control more than medicine.
This is'nt to say that all cases are this way, for some people, though I expect the number would be very small, it may be the only thing that can give them peace of mind.
The fact is they really do not know what these drugs do to the brain other than effect some known chemical responses/triggers. It really is a very simplistic approach to a very complex issue. And it's all basically experimental.
Of course, then there are the "illicit" drugs, interesting how popular they have become over the last 35 years or so. Makes one wonder, why? What has happened in the last 35-40 years that has made it so popular to escape the pain of reality?
There are some statistics that can be used to measure the mental-health of a society, and when they are analyzed from 1950 to the present, it becomes obvious there is something SERIOUSLY wrong. And shrinks and drugs are NOT the answer. They are a large part of the PROBLEM. A very LUCRATIVE and POWERFUL industry that is intertwined with the government.
The emperor is naked:
www.anglicansforisrael.com/docs/2006/02/06/dangerous-hypocrisy-world-reactions-to-the-danish-cartoons/
"Dangerous Hypocrisy: World Reactions to the Danish Cartoons
by Roberta Seid, PhD and Roz Rothstein
Westerners are agonizing about whether the twelve Danish cartoons of Mohammed
showed unforgivable prejudice against Islam. Enraged Muslims in Europe, the
Middle East and Asia are rampaging in protest against the cartoons, demanding
apologies, boycotts, blood and even beheadings. But in all this, the real
outrage is overlooked: the sheer hypocrisy of these reactions.
These angry Muslims demand that the world honor Islamic symbols and
sensitivities, but adamantly refuse to grant the same to other religions. They
don’t just draw satirical cartoons or limit their insults to words and
discriminatory laws. They have intentionally and regularly desecrated and
destroyed religious icons, holy sites and houses of worship sacred to other
faiths. Yet the world, including progressive democracies whose core ideal is
tolerance, has remained silent about these assaults on other religions.
Why was there no effective protest when the Taliban destroyed pre-Islamic
masterpieces, including the almost 2000-year-old 165-foot statue of Buddha?
Where was the outrage when Muslims destroyed churches in Indonesia, Pakistan,
India, Thailand, Iraq and Sudan, and 175 Nigerian churches in 2004?[1] Where
was the indignation when armed Palestinian Muslim terrorists forced their way
into the Church of the Nativity in 2002 for 38 days and shot bullet holes in
the walls and used the pages of Christian holy books as toilet paper?[2] Why
was there no outcry when Palestinian Muslims repeatedly attacked Jewish holy
sites, such as Rachel’s Tomb, or when they destroyed Joseph’s Tomb, burned its
prayer books, Bibles and religious articles and converted the age-old Jewish
holy site into a mosque? Why was the world silent between 1948 and 1967 when
Jordanian Muslims destroyed all 57 of Jerusalem’s ancient Jewish temples,
libraries and yeshivas and used the sacred stones for urinals and sidewalks?
The world has been strangely silent, too, when Muslims have gone beyond
attacking holy symbols and have persecuted and murdered men, women and children
for the crime of not being Muslim. The Laskar Jihad movement of Indonesia has
killed 5,000 Christians and made a half-million of them homeless. In Egypt,
Copts are persecuted and dozens in el-Kusheh were killed in January 2000 alone.
Muslim youth rampaged in Nigeria in 2002 and killed 100 Christians and injured
200 others.[3]
How can Muslims demand that their sensibilities be respected when they assault
other religions and don’t even begin soul-searching to rethink their own
intolerance and religious prejudices? Why aren’t Western democracies
consistently denouncing this violent behavior? Is it because they have double
standards and believe Islam must be treated differently than Christianity,
Judaism, Buddhism and other religions? Is it because they have become so
secular that they see no reason to defend or protect the historic religions of
the West? Or is it because they are intimidated by the threats of violence
against them if they speak out? Do they fear they will share the fate of the
brutally murdered Theodore Van Gogh or the fate of Salman Rushdie who was
forced into hiding after a fatwa was issued that condemned his novel and called
for his execution.
But something far more profound and ominous has been exposed by the cartoon
incident. The radical Muslim message is clear: We can insult your religions. We
can desecrate and destroy your holy places and kill your co-religionists, but
you cannot do something as trivial as publishing satirical drawings of our
sacred symbols. Only our religion should be honored and respected. The world
must defer to our rules and sensitivities. If you violate them, we will erupt
in riots and violence and call for your deaths.
In short, the incident has laid bare radical Islam’s impassioned battle to
dominate the West and impose Islamist values and a radical Islamist world
order. They are trying to get us to respect Islam according to their rules not
through persuasion but through intimidation and violence. Those who do not obey
will be subject to a savagery and rage that radical Muslims will
unapologetically justify in the name of Allah and Mohammed. Anti-Western
governments like Iran and Syria and radical Islamists will cynically fan the
flames.
We are face-to-face not just with hypocrisy, but also with radical Islamists’
stark bid for religious dominance. Let us hope that democracies and moderate
Muslims have the clarity, self-confidence and strength to win this battle of
the 21st century.
——————————————————————————–
[1] www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2003/002/36.82.html
and
www.asianews.it/view.php?l=en&art=4609
[2] “‘Greedy Monsters’ Ruled Church,” Times, May 15 2002, p. 1
[3] jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/10429.htm
This just in from Reuters:
Muslims accept US plea for even-handed criticism of 'hate speech'
February 7, 2006
Reuters
Pan global Muslim leaders, including many of the most prominent religious scholars voiced solidarity with the recent Amercian plea for Muslims to show even-handedness in their criticism of "hate speech"... The recent riots in Muslim nations and communities sparked by the publication of cartoons in a Danish newspaper of the prophet Muhammad (pbuh) have convinced the Muslims to reconsider their position. It is accepted Islamic thought that depictions of the prophet Muhammad are considered blasphemous, and punishable by death. While the Muslims are correct to blame the Danes, and the West in general for misunderstanding Islam, for oppressing Muslims, and for generally not being very Islamic, the Muslims have been convinced that a more even handed approach will be a good thing. In the future, Muslims will respond with the same anger, fury, and outrage whenever anyone in the Muslim world publishes a cartoon which defames Jews, the Jewish religion, Christians, the Christian religion, or uses their religious figures and symbols in a disrespectful manner... And the notion that blashphemy is punishable by death has also been conclusively rejected by these Muslim leaders.
In a related story, pigs were seen to be flying out of a mans ass in New York City -- it is rumored that someone even took a video, but as of the dateline of this article, no video has been forthcoming.