Jon's Blog

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.

Cheney's Quayle

Dan Quayle was ridiculed for giving a schoolboy an alternative (but correct--check the dictionary) spelling of "potato." Dick Cheney will no doubt be ridiculed for shooting a fellow quail hunter. According to the Associated Press story, "Katharine Armstrong, the ranch's owner, said Sunday that Cheney was using a 28-guage shotgun and that Whittington was about 30 yards away when he was hit in the cheek, neck and chest."

Assuming that the AP writer who can't spell "gauge" actually reported the correct gauge, Whittington can be very glad that Cheney was shooting a small shotgun (only the diminutive .410 is smaller). Loaded with federally-mandated steel shot, the 28-gauge is barely usable for hunting, holding just over half the shot of a 12-gauge round (a good thing for Whittington!). I'm surprised Cheney was using one, unless he was just trying to give the quail better odds of escape.

Whittington had changed positions without informing the other hunters, did not announce his new location, and was thirty yards away from guys who were hunting quail--which meant that they would almost certainly be swinging their guns in his direction when they flushed a covey. For those of you who have never had the pleasure of hunting quail (and I encourage you to try it), please note that spotting an orange vest at thirty yards out of the corner of your eye, while tracking a quail on the wing as it relates to the end of your shotgun, is a difficult endeavor. Whittington assumed that the other hunters would see him. Bad assumption.

The rest of the hunting party should have made sure they were all aware of the physical position of everyone in the party before shooting at anything, but they assumed that they knew where Whittington was. Another bad assumption.

Will the White House PR crew take advantage of this situation to better educate Americans on firearm and hunting safety? Will they remind us that yes, guns are dangerous, because in order to be useful they have to be dangerous, and should be handled properly? Will they encourage all Americans to educate themselves on gun safety, perhaps recommending some of the excellent materials available from the NRA? Or, will the fear-mongering bed-wetting anti-gun crowd jump on this as yet another proof that guns are evil and should be banned from the universe forever?

Time will tell, my little potatoe.