About Those Danish Cartoons

Jeff Goldstein doesn't think the Leftosphere has dedicated enough coverage to the controversy surrounding those Danish cartoons. Here are my thoughts, which I also left over at Jeff's:

I think newspapers should have the right to print whatever they want to print.

I think newspapers should have the right to self-censor.

I think news readers have the right to be upset and protest if newspapers print items they find distasteful or untrue.

I think violent reaction to speech is the wrong reaction.

Interestingly, what you usually find throughout the blogosphere is the disconnect in thinking that nations of people who live with the "let's react violently to criticism of our religious figures" worldview can somehow be instantaneously democratized. A purple finger does not a democracy make.

UPDATE: Upon re-reading, I think my statement above may be miscontrued by some as anti-Muslim. It is not. Josh Marshall sums up my view pretty nicely here:

So liberal mores versus theocratic mores. Where's the possible compromise? There isn't any. On the face of it this gets portrayed as an issue of press freedom. But this is much more fundamental. 'Press freedom' is just one cog in the machinery of a society that doesn't believe in or accept the idea of 'blasphemy'. Now, an important cog? Yes. But I think we're fooling ourselves to reduce this to something so juridical and rights based.

I don't want to imply this is only a Muslims versus modernity issue. I know not all Muslims embrace these views. More to the point, it's not only Muslims who do. You see it among the haredim in Israel. And I see it with an increasing frequency here in the US. Is it just me or does it seem that more and more often there are public controversies in which 'blasphemy' is considered some sort of legitimate cause of action -- as if 'blasphemy' can actually have any civic meaning in a society like ours. Anyway, you get the idea.

Comments

[newswriter]

hear hear

[KathyF]

I thought that was nicely done too. He said exactly what someone on the BBC said, only better.

I also find it interesting that a government that was ready to pass a draconian "religious hatred" bill a few days ago and has already made it illegal to "incite violence" is turning a blind eye to "Death to Europeans" chanters in Regents Park.

[MSchannon]

Good post & well argued. I know it's not fair, but the Islamic world does itself no favors with these hysterical outbursts. Hamas has even called for the death of the cartoonists and publishers.

One thing it does show is the extraordinary divide between the West and Islam. Whoever believes the notion that Islamic nations can create a democracy that in any way resembles ares is smoking really powerful stuff & not sharing--the hogs.

In Jamesons Veritas

[Ben Wood]

Let's remember to be plenty outraged right here in the United States when the government tries to put people in prison for a year or more for desecration of a venerated object. Sure, it ain't a death sentence or a burn the embassy sentence and it's not done by the mob ... but it's more a question of degree than of principle. I am outraged by this reaction to a cartoon. But that cartoon pissed a bunch of people off just as badly as burning the flag pisses a bunch of people off in this country. And with the new Supreme Court appointees, we are a a hare's hair away from locking up those who desecrate the holy flag in a Federal Prison. Then you're gonna see plenty of hysterical outbursts right here in the US of A in the halls of Congress as many call for harsh punishment for those who blaspheme the flag. For more on this check out my blog: www.roryshock.blogspot.com

[Gotham Image]

The reaction was of a level and intensity that suggests it was just waiting for an excuse to express itself.Rox, you put it well.

[Jeff G]

Hi Rox --

Actually, I linked to a site that claimed there wasn't much leftist coverage, then concurred to a point, noting several exceptions.

I also wrote a follow-up post addressing the point Josh Marshall makes above. A good read on the subject is Stanley Fish's essay on "Boutique Multiculturalism".

[The Heretik]

And yet somehow I can’t for a second imagine a guy could write so long a sentence with all the right words in all the right order from the right in a way explaining to “intolerant” leftoids and “extremist” leftical leaners what they must already "know" (read: understand)—even by those who don’t understand anything—as he does this morning explaining to intolerant "others" how the deeply-held right views must be respected (read: obeyed), even by those who don’t hold with them—and even if doing so means that discussion is sacrificed in the process to a post requiring neither re-writing or condensing for the sake of a perceived "clarity" (reading "editing:" unobeyed) a rewriting of the social contract that gives him de facto control of the post country.

Or something.

[fred]

Does Fish ever address motivations? People usually do things for at least two reasons – the ‘official reason’ (“I’m looking out for you”), and the ‘real reason(s)’ (cash, attention, opportunities to loofah young chicks, etc.). I wonder what the real motivations are behind this anti-cartooning crap.

[john_m_burt]

A cartoon depicting a smiling, beneficent Muhammad comforting a crippled beggar child would be regarded by a Muslim in much the same way that a devout Christian would a painting of Jesus sodomizing Mary while on high God the Father fellated the Holy Ghost.

The fact that the cartoons were, to put it politely, less flattering (the MSM repeatedly printed the least offensive of the bunch), the product of a "let's make blasphemous cartoons" contest, doesn't help matters.

On the other hand, a painting such as I have described would probably be displayed at most college art departments with some pride, and likely the worst that would happen is Bill O'Reilly popping a blood vessel on TV.

[fred]

No. With few exceptions, uncontrolled emotional reactions to perceived threats to ones own quality of survival beats ideology every time, meaning O’Reilly would only fake the popped blood vessel unless his job was on the line. This is human nature, as preached by some conservatives I know.

[DBC]

Roxanne, Roxanne ...

What kind of orientalist crap is this?

"nations of people who live with the "let's react violently to criticism of our religious figures" worldview can somehow be instantaneously democratized."

You sound like Bernard Lewis, or maybe worse Fareed Zakaria. I'm not clear on what your assumptions are, but you sure as hell seem to be confirming the warmed-over racism that urges "go slow" on democracy in the Muslim world b/c "they" are constitutionally "not like us" and can't handle it. "They" haven't had a reformation, "they" have a too legalistic religion, "they" have no civil society, "they" are have no tradition of free exchange, "they" are all but genetically inferior to "us."

It's the same argument the British used in India, and the cold warriors used to justify supporing--well, you name the dictator, Pinochet, Marcos, Mboto, Sadat, Pahlevi, Ayub Khan, Suharto, Sadat--oh and let's not forget Saddam Hussein.

Yeah, there's something wrong those "nations,"--they get no support from the American left. Aqil Shah said, in Pakistan the liberals see the Americans as saying, "democracy for us, dictators for you." Is that your attitude?

[eli]

i smell a strawman. good of you to slink out of your neocon think-tank to school us.