http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/02/04/syria.cartoon/index.html
Over cartoons. You have got to be kidding me.
Missed Rune’s thread. Sorry!
Why kidding? These are the same people who mutilate young girls, stone women and fly planes into buildings to murder thousands of innocent people, cut off hands for petty crimes, believe in martyrdom, think they are gods chosen people…
Torch embasies over cartoons…pffft. Its all in a days work.
That’s all right. This doesn’t deserve to get lost in that other thread.
What could they be thinking? “We’re outraged that you drew a cartoon that implied that we were a violent religion, so we’re going to riot and burn down multiple embassies to prove you right!”?
There is a major disconnect here. God only knows what it is.
It would be funny if it weren’t so fucking awful.
Quick - what country are Johnny Hart and Bil Keane from? Let’s burn down their embassy!
Doors, are you suggesting there’s some kind of ironing in play here? Or macaroni? Or something like that? I can’t think of the word that we normally use here.
Yes, there’s a certain irony there. Wouldn’t you agree?
Oh, THAT thing. Because people are acting like crazy thugs in response to a cartoon that arguably depicts them as crazy thugs? I guess there’s some irony in that.
Well, the article says that the staff of the Swedish and Norwegian embassies are okay. That’s… good…
Note the line at the bottom of the article - “CNN has chosen to not show the cartoons out of respect for Islam.”
… and by “respect for Islam” they mean “desire to not have their international correspondents beheaded or set on fire.”
Man, I love religion. :rolleyes:
As I said in GD, the cartoons are pretty tame caricatures compared to the gross, demeaning caricatures these protestors make of themselves.
I try to believe religion isn’t stupid but reality always gets in the way.
Can you imagine if Christians did this every time someone drew a cartoon or made fun of God or Jesus in some other way?
Comedy Central alone would get burned down on a daily basis.
Well, not recently anyway.
You know, I’m a screaming leftist liberal who struggles to remain rational about this kind of thing. I try not to let my emotional response get the better of me, and to examine and discuss these things in the cold light of reason and tolerance.
But then, sometimes I just think, It’s time for the big smackdown. Nothing else is gonna work. These guys’ culture needs a reboot.
Now, I’ll regret having said that, and I’ll want to take it back, in the cold light of reason and tolerance. But damn. What can possibly cut through this situation?
If my understanding of the situation is correct, any picture of Mohammed, be it Mohammed wearing a bomb-shaped turban, Mohammed with a big smiley face reading to the happy children, or a picture of The Prophet Formerly Known as Mohammed is verboten.
That being the case, with no depiction of Mohammed for reference, who is to say that Mohammed can’t be a sunrise, a flower, or some other form? Do they burn all art, then?
dances- this is being discussed in at least one of the GD threads, and it sounds like not all Muslims feel the same way about the issue. There are, or at least were, some schools of Islam that were opposed to any depictions of people, others that felt you shouldn’t depict plants either, etc etc. I’m not sure what you mean about Muhammad being a flower.
Don’t try to find logic within religious laws. But still, the Taj Mahal is one of the most beautiful and complex artistic statements ever made, and it was all done without using a single piece of depiction: totally abstract designs.
I’ve cited in other threads examples of extreme reactions to perceived blasphemy from other religions. It happens. Portraying Mohammed is blasphemous to most Muslims. QED.
I hope by that you’re only including the people who are reacting in an incendiary manner, and not the rest. I’ve been standing up for peace-loving Muslims who do no harm at all, of whom there are many, and some of whom are friends of mine.
That said, I too wish the people making capital of this, and the rioters, would just fuck off.
Chefguy, why stop there when you can go all the way back to what led to the crusades: centuries of militant convert-or-die Muslim expansion.
Alternatively, we can reject the idea that things that happened centuries ago excuse contemporary barbarism.
Who are “the people making capital of this”, who presumably are just as contemptible as the rioters in your eyes?
I fear it’s gotten to the point that the only way Islam is going to be able to mend their image is for the peace loving Muslims to rise up and strike down the fools. This is a house that will most likely have to be cleansed from within.