Those cartoons

[robinturner]

Wise words from tmcm:

Put the situation into another context.

A newspaper requests cartoonists to send in drawings of black people for black history month. They receive 12 caricatures, which they publish. Leaders from the black community complain and say that the watermelon-eating thick-lipped caricatures drawn by the KKK members are offensive and they'd like an apology.

Remember that an apology is all that most of the protesting Muslims are asking for (I'm not talking about the nutcases handing out death threats here). I'm not saying that the newspapers are obliged to apologise, but I wish they would either apologise or come out straight and say, "Yes, we think Islam is a stupid religion and we wanted to offend as many Muslims as possible."

On a personal note, I tend to apologise even when I'm sure I'm in the right. I find usually saying "sorry" is enough to placate people to the extent that they don't pause to consider whether I meant "I'm sorry because what I did was wrong" or "I'm sorry that you were offended by my perfectly reasonable behaviour."

Comments

(ankh156) - Mooslems, mooslems...

[(Anonymous)]

I had a falling out with a girlfriend the other evening over 'intégristes' and 'the veil'. She wanted me to agree with her that any fundamentalist-looking attitude which (seemingly) denied the 'rights' of muslim women to walk naked in the steet is basically oppressive and fascho. I said I didn't agree (old anthropological relativism surfaced, here), I told her that things are not so simple as she was claiming, and that her attitude was arrogant and intolerant (seeing how many muslim women regard modesty as a virtue). Needless to say, I was accused of being a jackbooting nazi. I agree with your take on those rather unfunny cartoons.

[vret.livejournal.com]

I'm inclined to agree, I think. I don't remember you ever apologising to the Campus Crusade For Christ.

[vret.livejournal.com]

How about this?
"I'm sorry that you are offended, but I'm not sorry that I offended you".

... or this :

[ankh156.livejournal.com]

"I regret that you are so stupid and humourless." ?

[solri.livejournal.com]

I just liked to give them lots of opportunities to turn the other cheek. Actually, I got on quite well with their leader - he even gave me tea and carrot cake at his home once after I helped him carry a large picture.

When I was posting that, I was reminded of the "Godline" incident - all that kerfuffle because we distributed a questionnaire to help people find the god of their dreams. I think the difference between that and (some of) the Muhammed cartoons is that we were taking the piss out of religious gullibility in general, rather than targetting a particular religious group which happens to coincide quite closely with a particular ethnic group. If we'd done something aimed specifically at, say, Jews, the Union might have had more cause to get hot under the collar.

[vret.livejournal.com]

Islam doesn't coincide with any ethnic group.

[solri.livejournal.com]

Not in general, no. But in certain European countries it does, or is at least perceived to. For example, in Britain "Muslim" is seen as equivalent to "Pakistani"; in France, "Muslim" = "North African"; in the Balkans Muslims are still referred to as "Turks", despite the fact that most of them are Albanian or Slavic. Of course there are still plenty of people who think the whole of Asia constitutes an ethnic group ;-)

[cf.livejournal.com]

i made a long post describing my view on each cartoon.

i think some of them are funny, two are kinda, erm, offensive, and one is really nice looking, two i don't understand at all, and a few are hohum. Did you see the one of the kid in 7A? Its fcking hilarious. Apparently, the tag line reads 'J-P's journalists are a bunch of reactionary provocateurs"...

anyway, sorry. i lost the post somehow.

oh wait, i know how: i'm using a fucking MACINTOSH. maybe we should do caricatures of Steve Jobs...

[solri.livejournal.com]

Wow, that's the first time I've seen a Mac user making negative comments about Macintoshes. Normally Mac users are so enamoured of their machines, I suspect them of having carnal relations with them.

[vret.livejournal.com]

I was a Mac user originally, but when I had to pay for a machine myself I decided Macs were overpriced, and I found Windows 3.0 to be generally more reliable.

Also, all Macs seemed to be riddled with viruses, but there weren't any Windows viruses then. When I complained to the project manager from Apple UK that I had had to clear around 2 dozen separate viruses from the Mac they had supplied me with to design their new mailshot system, I was given what was obviously a standard lecture on why it was impossible for Macs to have viruses "because all Mac files have a resource fork". That made me think I might want to switch to a machine made by people who had a clue. Of course, the Concept virus debacle proved that MS didn't have one either.

[hyperina.livejournal.com]

Wise words from tmcm:

Put the situation into another context.

A newspaper requests cartoonists to send in drawings of black people for black history month. They receive 12 caricatures, which they publish. Leaders from the black community complain and say that the watermelon-eating thick-lipped caricatures drawn by the KKK members are offensive and they'd like an apology.

Nah, it'd be more analagous if the newspaper requested cartoonists (who were too scared of retaliation from, say, prominent figures in rapper gangsta violence to illustrate a book about them) to send in drawings illustrating their conflicts with self-censure. But they do it anyway. ANd some, not all, of the cartoons depict black gangsta rapper thugs with uzis hanging from their bling. There is some basis in fact, there, as with most stereotypes. But it'd be inaccurate to suggest it's just a stupid KKK race thing. Much more subtle than that.

Some of the Danish cartoons were quite innocuous e.g. Mohammed standing under a bright sun, though one had him with a bomb on his head. I understood the anger was more at having portrayed the prophet at all; they are not making a distinction between the cartoons. There is no reason for the newspapers to bend to the pressure and say, "Yes, we think it is perfectly reasonable for Muslims to expect that all portrayals of Mohammed made by non-Muslims should be made with invisible ink or charades, even when the visible portrayal is relevant to a particular social discussion at hand -- i.e. feeling free to illustrate the prophet as a historical figure -- and even though people are not normally bound to abide by the strict tenets of a faith they do not share." Doesn't fit in quite so nicely with the two options you wish for in your either/or list, but I think it'd be much more fair.

Religious tolerance is a two-way street. The protesting Muslims who are trashing foreign embassies were pretty darned quiet when the Taleban blew up the Buddhas, weren't they? And if they are willing to concede that there was a difference between the Taleban govt and the will of the Muslim people for that fiasco, then maybe they ought to be able to concede that in the west, there's a difference between the press and the will of the govt.

Hypocrisy abounds.

Meh.

[solri.livejournal.com]

And this is where it gets complicated. There are certainly some Muslims who object to any depiction of Mohammed at all (in fact there are some who object to any depiction of anyone). There was, for example, a storm in a teacup when a German (?) magazine featured a picture of Mohammed a few years ago. However, most Muslims know that the prohibition was originally instituted, not because the prophet was too holy to be depicted, but to avoid those depictions being used as objects of worship. Those who were genuinely offended by the cartoons (as opposed to just using them as an excuse to stir up trouble) saw some of them as not just an insult to the prophet but as an attack on Muslims in general, and that certainly seems to be the case with some of the cartoons.

Perhaps a better analogy than either of the race ones would be anti-Semitic cartoons of the kind that (ironically) are popular in the Arab press. Here we have a legitimate target for satire in the form of the Israeli government, but the satire (if you can call something that heavy-handed satire) spills over into stereotypes of Jews in general.

As for the Afghan Buddhas, I don't know what the official Islamic reaction - if any - was, but I know plenty of Muslims who were outraged by it.

[hyperina.livejournal.com]

I remember reading lots of Muslim intellectuals -- and whoever else whose opinion of the blown-up Buddhas was deemed worthy to print -- who were pretty disturbed about it, definitely. Maybe it's fair to say that the mood has changed since then, because of the war, the French ban on head coverings in school, etc., so the rioting Muslims are pissed at what they interpret as this latest affront. I dunno. I think their actions really are just a result of their belief systems, which they are pretty passionate about. Also I read in, (was it the Guardian?), that the cartoons were embellished, i.e. additional ones were added by some sneaky Muslim shite disturbers -- there was one of Mohammed with the head of a swine -- or at least they were described that way. Zbut maybe that's no more offensive to them than the head-bomb one? I dunno. I worry when the editor of a Jordanian newspaper who printed the original cartoons with an accomopanying op-ed that asked, to paraphrase, "which is worse for the image of Islam, these cartoons or Al Jazeera showing innocent hostages being beheaded by terrorists?" was not only sacked, but arrested! There seems to be a huge difference between the press-govt relation in the west vs. the "arab world". However I don't believe the press is completely immune to govt influences anywhere. They are businesspeople, after all.

It's all so sad, in the end.