The Danish cartoons crisis: Let's see some Egyptian editorial cartoons ...

Full archive here.

Some typically charming highlights:





Here's another interesting article.

This sort of thing is a daily occurence in the Arab media, and its various governments don't mind it because hatred of the outsider is a very useful political force (as * knows only too well). And be clear that this cannot be shaved away with semantic arguments that it is criticism only of Likud, or of Zionism, or of the present Israeli establishment. These are direct racial and cultural slurs.

The Jyllands cartoons were foolish and insulting, calculated to provoke. However, the massive escalation of the situation is Broadly down to the complicity of some Middle Eastern goverments as part of an established strategy to divert attention from their own shortcomings.

I've been stating the Leadership of Muslim Nations are just using this cartoon crisis as a further tool to keep their own people blind to their ridiculous and terrible rulership.

Don't focus on our destroyed infrastructure or backwards medicine or schools, it's the evil Jew and Western Islam Haters who are keeping you down...

applies in this case. They can dish it out to the Jews but whack out totally when its directed at them.

Thanks for posting this.

offensive and educational. I'd never seen cartoons out of the Arabic world.

if you want to find them, it's easy. An old one I saw that stuck in my mind involved a Star of David formed out of snakes.

Arab Media Review: Anti-Semitism and Other Trends May - June 2005
Click on any of the countries, and it will show you a number of recent cartoons. There some in the archives, as well.

But, that doesn't mean the comic depicting Mohammed as a terrorist was OK.

Editorial cartoons often reinforce negative and/or inaccurate stereotypes. That's what makes them kind of funny while giving the creator a chance to air a political view. It's funny when George W. Bush is shown with big ears and buck teeth with a dunce cap or, even though if we disagree with the characterization, of Ted Kennedy as a fat buffoon. It's funny and generally harmless.

But, religion is too sensitive a topic. There are too many wars, too much violence done in the name of God. So, a comic that portrays Israelis or Jews as jack booted neo-Nazis (aside from just how horrifyingly insensitive such a comparison is) or Muslims as terrorists makes things worse.

That being said, I believe in free speech even if it means sometimes some people will be offended. I sometimes wish writers/artists would exercise more discretion and realize that some of their creations are provocative, and not always in a good way.

The problem here isn't the cartoons, it's the rigid fundamentalist religious nuts who are opposed to them. It's only when a cartoon or piece of literature advocates violence against others that the speech should lose it's "free" designation.

And BTW, I thought the cartoon was disgusting and pretty unfunny.

People kill each other over religion. They don't really kill each other for thinking Dubya is a facist idiot or Clinton is a lying dog.


But hey, I think papers have the right to publish stuff like this, I just wish they would be a little more sensitive. There are religious nuts out there (all religions) with no sense of humor or perspective whatever.

Someone needs to point out the things that make these religion fundamentalists undesirable to a safe and secure global environment. I'm not saying that that's what the cartoon in question was doing, but if we cave in to the extremists in this instance, what's stopping them from doing the same thing when an innocuous cartoon is published? It's a slippery slope that will be very dangerous to venture down.

As an atheist, I'd probably be pretty pissed if a paper published a cartoon showing an inaccurate portrayal of atheists. Would I commit violence over that cartoon? Hell NO!

of Jerry Falwell having sex with his mother in an outhouse we all thought that was just dandy.

So why different when Muslims?

If they don't like it they should sue like Falwell did. The courts will decide whether something went over the line or not.

I'm completely on the newspapers side just like I was compleely on Flynt's side.

Did he go too far? I thought so, but who cares what I think. We have courts who deicde these things, not mobs chanting for death to artists.

sleeping with his mother in an outhouse?

the groups being misrepresented in the Egyptian cartoons aren't rioting.

While a large share of muslims might not be violent terrorists, there is a large segment of the muslim world that is virulently fundamentalist. Rigid black and white thinking leads to decisions based on absolutes, without nuanced discussion or even common sense. Shit, why is that so familiar?

against artistic representation of living beings has taken a toll on political cartooning in the Muslim world.

Damn! Those are some really awful cartoons! Awful from the standpoint of the racism inherent in them and awful from a "somebody-obviously-better-not-send-in-that-Draw-Spunk-free-art-test point of view.

What dreck!

But also some that are insulting and provocative - like the Danish one.

Religious, cultural and ethnic slams are rampant in their press. It's pretty shocking if you've never travelled there.

They're considered prophets of Allah, and wouldn't be mocked in that way.

Maybe the Hindu gods get rough treatment in south Asia, where there's Muslim/Hindu communal trouble, but I don't know. India has some quite strict laws about not inciting communal violence, so none there.

toppled the religious Bamiyan Buddhist monoliths carved into the mountain side? Errr...NO. Are they upset when christian churches get blow up in their regions? No. As an atheist, I think these superstitious beliefs have always caused problems....but I think the muslims are completely hypocritical. It probably stems from worshiping a religion that tells you, your guy was the last guy who corrected the previous record.

The Buddha statues were blown up.

As Taxloss says, Jesus and Moses are held in high esteem in Islam although their depiction by Muslims is considered blasphemous to Christians.

The Hindu community was upset about a "Xena" episode that included the Hindu gods. They protested. The show even explained they meant no offense and were trying to honor the Hindu pantheon. However, I do not remember the New Zealand (where the show is filmed) embassy being destroyed in an nations where Hindu is the official or majority religion.

on satirical/insulting cartoons...if there could be one. I am mostly amused at the ignorance displayed, and if there were a cartoon mocking Buddha (means "teacher," which one? there were/are many), it shouldn't upset a follower.

As to blowing up the Buddhas in Afghanistan, my opinion is: only the physical manifestation of those statues were destroyed, they are really still there, one just cannot see them.

Only a pretty sick mind would somehow see that as making them any better.

From the Palestinian Media Watch:

http://pmw.org.il/cartoonphoto-De-humanization%20of%20Jews.html

Hook noses, octopus arms, blood drinking, hunched ... Frankly, the Danish cartoons are mild in comparison.

Akhbar al-Khalij, January 29, 2006 (Bahrain)
As the Islamic world reacted with anger to caricatures of Muhammad in a Danish newspaper, this cartoon claimed the controversy was a result of “The Penetration of Zionism to Denmark.” The cheese, shaped like a Star of David, is labeled “Danish products.” The text on the far left reads, “Boycott it!”

I wonder if the cartoonist even knew the hypocrisy in his actions.

No matter what it is, no matter what country, no matter the offense, big or small, some how, the Jews had something to do with it. It is nauseating.

that showed Ariel Sharon, naked, eating a baby. The Israeli Embassy in London complained. The newspaper apologised. And that was the end of the matter.

On edit: http://www.guardian.co.uk/israel/Story/0,2763,961357,00.html

In fact, it removes the excuse of the rioters - that their delicate sensibilities have been bruised by a Danish cartoon. Arab newspapers are daily filled with grotesque racial, cultural and religious slurs.

Why do you think the rioters are rioting? Is it because they hate freedom?

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Saying that the Arabic press is riven with bigotry = it's OK to be bigoted against Arabs = they hate our freedoms = I am a Freeper.

Flawless logic. I salute you. The Anti-Defamation League must be a bunch of Freepers as well.

My actual point, which you chose to ignore, was that a double standard operates here. They ae rioting because they have been stirred up by radicals and the disturbances are endorsed by their elites. The rioters are being manipulated to divert attentions from the failings of the Arab elite. They do not hate us for our freedoms; they are stirred against us by authoritarian elites to discredit our freedom.

Joan Smith explains it quite neatly in today's Independent:

http://comment.independent.co.uk/columnists_m_z/joan_smith/article343238.ece

I suppose the Independent are all freepers ...

'Putting it in perspective' is such a slimy way of saying 'get over it!'. Here's a cliche for you - two wrongs don't make a right.

btw, yr comment about Arab newspapers on a daily basis... is a very gross overexaggeration. Actually sitting down and reading various Arab newspapers on a daily basis would show you how wrong that particular perception is...

Violet...

It even happens in the Arab titles produced in the UK, which are now under rather intense scrutiny. The popular press in the Arab world is far, far worse.

Yes, I am saying "get over it". Here's a cliche for you: Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.

Or: Those in glass houses ...

You appear to endorse the actions of the rioters. How very tolerant of you. You presumably support the fatwa against Salman Rushdie? The slur against the prophet there was far, far worse.

Incidentally, the cartoons were published in September 2005. For four months the only thing that stopped it being forgotten by history was the agitation of a tiny band of extremist Danish Muslim clerics. It took a lot of hard work to blow this up into the present crisis. And it wass done for political gain.

The hatred towards Israel is without limitations, in cartoons especially.

But let someone draw Mohammed, and that will not do!!

It should also be noted that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said, "the caricatures showed the "impudence and rudeness" of Western newspapers against the prophet as well as the "maximum resentment of the Zionists (Jews) ruling these countries against Islam and Muslims.""

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20060205/ap_on_re_mi_ea/prophet_drawings

Thus, compounding both the bigotry and the deflection from the issue - trying to pin the blame for the cartoons on these mysterious Jews who rule Europe (as if) whilst deflecting attention from the embassy burnings, etc.

if a European paper printed a cartoon of Moses bulldozing a Palestinian house or shooting a Palestinian child, would you be offended?

Wouldn't you rightfully take that as a bigoted attack on Jews?

That's the difference.

are not a proportionate response to this sort of bigotry.

In fact, the virulent reaction is only aiding the influence of the vicious bigoted propaganda being displayed.

The Danish cartoon is described by you as merely 'foolish and insulting' while the Egyptian cartoons are described in terms such as hatred, racial slur etc. Is there any particular reason that you use such markedly different language when describing those two different cartoons?

Violet...

:rofl:

It's just that for some pathetic souls, they refuse to acknowledge that any intolerance or hatred against Muslims or Islam is bigotry...

Violet...

If you can't see it, what's the point of discussing it?

Reread the post you replied to, gargle, and repeat. Eventually you'll see that such a thing as anti-Muslim bigotry exists and that the cartoon is an example of it...

Violet...

I'm all ears...

(Not that that would indicate "bigotry")

The cartoon with the bomb in the turban isn't showing Mohammed as a terrorist.
Think about the cartoon a little more deeply.

I've thought about the cartoon much deeper than you have, and I'm very relieved that I don't agree with you and hope I never will...


Violet...

Jyllands-Posten is a right wing paper, and they were being deliberately provocative. I see it as a profoundly irresponsible move. I'm sorry they did it. Just because they have the right to do it, doesn't mean they should have. On the other hand, you tend to cloak yourself in a mantle of evenhandedness, when it's clear by your posts that you're not.

I want as many people to see this as possible. We are not seeing spontaneous outrage, this is an orchestrated campaign of pandemonium for political gain. This is as coordinated as the "Two Minute Hate" in 1984.