February 19, 2006
From lunacy to idiocy
Judging by this AP report, the whole "Mohammed cartoon saga" has now gone from lunacy to idiocy.
According to the report, a Danish Lutheran Bishop met with Grand Imam Mohammed Sayyed Tantawi of al-Azhar University in Cairo, supposedly "the world's highest Sunni Muslim seat of learning."
Tantawi said the Danish prime minister must apologize for the drawings and further demanded that the world's religious leaders, including him and Pope Benedict XVI, should meet to write a law that "condemns insulting any religion, including the Holy Scriptures and the prophets." He said the United Nations should then impose the law on all countries.
Faced with one of Islam's brightest minds, the poor bishop had to explain the concept of a free press. He didn't even attempt to educate the Grand Imam on the concepts of national sovereignty and freedom of religion, which is probably for the best; after all, one's head can only take just so much beating against a brick wall.
The cartoons depict Mohammed and Islam as perpetrators of violence. Muslims are outraged about the cartoons, so they are responding with...violence. Muslims claim that images of Mohammed "could encourage idolotry," and, to prove their point, they are indeed idolizing the violent caricatures, to the point that the Muslim masses are now rioting against anyone and anything that sets them off, regardless of whether or not it has anything to do with the cartoons.
Certainly many areas have seen non-violent protests, but those seem to be the exception rather than the rule, and non-Muslims are nervous even in these "peaceful" areas. How many Christians reacted violently to "The Last Temptation of Christ" or to Robert Mapplethorp's garbage? Were people edgy around Hindus after the Taliban ripped down their ancient shrines in Afghanistan? But a few cartoons cause the Islamic world to come unhinged, to the point that even a peaceful protest incites fear of violence.
And let's talk about the concept of a "boycott." When Americans got tired of Disney's anti-faith, anti-family films, they boycotted Disney; in other words, they stopped buying Disney products. They did not force retailers to strip Disney products from their shelves, they did not request an official apology from the U.S. government for Disney's lousy movies, and they did not riot in the streets. Disney initially responded by crying "censorship!" over this free-market boycott, but they soon realized the difference between censorship and a boycott: people had a choice, they chose to avoid Disney products, and Disney lost money. Now Disney is once again producing family-friendly films, and recently acquired Pixar Studios, which is well-known for its creative family-friendly animatons. That's how a free-market boycott works.
Contrast this with the Muslim world's response to the cartoons. All Danish companies are being held responsible for a free newspaper's publication. I live in a Muslim country, and I can't purchase Danish products because the retailers have been forced to take them off the shelves. That's not a boycott; that's censorship. Islam thus recognizes no individual right to evaluate the cartoon situation and respond according to personal convictions. They're going to tell you what to think, and what to do, and you're going to like it...or else.
My knee-jerk response is to be highly unsympathetic to their cause. I might be critical of the cartoons themselves, but I am even more critical of the Islamic response to them. I encourage mass publication of the cartoons, not because I think they were in good taste, but rather so that everyone can see exactly what it is that has the Islamic world in an uproar. I definitely encourage mass purchase of Danish products, because these companies should not be punished for something in which they had no part.
In another sense, though, can you blame Muslims for being so ready to riot? They are trapped in a religious culture that calls for the killing of non-Muslims, the beating of incorrigible wives, and is responsible for keeping hundreds of millions of people in the Islamic equivalent of the Dark Ages, slaves to power-hungry imams. Instead of hearing the words of Christ, they are taught to slaughter their enemies, and terrorize those who persecute them. The concept of "forgiveness" is nowhere to be found, nor is the idea of salvation by grace through faith. Allah would never give his life for them, and they know it. The Muslim world is a powder-keg of pent-up hopelessness and rage, and rubbing a couple of stick-figure drawings together is enough to spark the fuse.
The very reason that the cartoons aren't funny is because they're so accurate. In fact, nobody's laughing; we're all watching in disbelief as the Muslims of the world give even more credence to the notion that perhaps Islam really isn't a "religion of peace" after all, contrary to what W says. Perhaps the Crusades really were about defending Europe against violent Islamic hordes, and nothing's really changed since then. Perhaps they really do take the Koran seriously when it says, "Make war on them until idolatry is no more and Allah's religion reigns supreme" (Sura 8:39). Perhaps Islam really is fundamentally incapable of coexisting with other religions and cultures, as a philosophically competitive alternative among peers.
The rest of the world awaits a reasonable response from Islam. I hope we don't have to wait too long.
Posted by jon at February 19, 2006 10:12 AM