I so hope that doesn’t happen. The world, especially European countries, needs to just suck these images up with a heavy heart, shake our heads in the direction of Iran and then turn our backs and go on about our business.
I don’t think HD is ‘offensive’ to most westerners. Certainly not in the rabid religious way imaging Mohammed seems to be. We might not like it, we might see it as a dangerous falsehood but we don’t have the same visceral reaction. It’s not a fundamental component of our belief system.
Read rest of post. Fact can’t be denied and fiction - it doesn’t the hell matter if you deny it or not.
I guess you’re right. Maybe their rhetoric will betray them a little more clearly in future.
As another non sequitur, I will just point out that Steve Bell is a genius.
I agree completely.
I read the rest of your post. I still fail to see how it has any relevence to what we’re discussing.
It stems directly from your quote but I’ve not got time to play ‘cute’ with you. Ignore the posts.
Fair points: amend what I said to apply only to those European countries where Holocaust denial is illegal, and I think the point remains.
Daniel
Certainly if there’s a government that has banned holocaust denial and also claims to fully uphold free speech regardless of the offense it may cause, then they are speaking with forked tongue, but is there any such government involved here, or is it the case that folks in Brussels are simply stating that they will not interfere?
Actually, yes, it probably will be a fair test.
The Islamic fundamentalists respond with riots and murder. Jews and other folks with a commitment to historical accuracy - don’t.
Regards,
Shodan
:smack: I believe I was, as I often do, getting confused between Denmark and the Netherlands. I though HD was illegal in Denmark.
Phew. I don’t like thinking that any Holocaust Denier has a point about anything. Yep, he’s an idiot. Thanks for the corrections, y’all!
Daniel
Not exactly the first (nor likely the last) time Isreal and/or Jews have been dipicted in such a manner by newspapers… not even that unusual in the last few years (esp in Iran, Syria, Lebonon, and Palestine)…
Let them put all the cartoons out they want… as is their right…
Hmmmm, now there’s an argument. “It isn’t a double standard to print cartoons that offend Muslims after refusing to print ones that offend Christians. Because, you see, we solicited anti-Muslim cartoons and not anti-Christian ones.” Ah yes, I see, not a double standard at all. Thanks for clearing that up for me.
Well, it may not be shocking, but it is a somewhat embarrassing revelation for a paper that was bragging about being such a champion of free speech. This behavior does rather smack of the attitude that free speech is okay if it only offends the other guy, but not so much if it offends you.
Which is the attitude that I thought we were condemning (and rightly so, IMHO) on the part of Iran and other Muslim nations that permit scurrilous anti-Jewish caricatures but won’t tolerate scurrilous anti-Muslim ones.
No, I actually disagree quite strongly with this one; freedom of speech means being able to say what you want to say, regardless of whether it praises, excites, bores, shocks, offends or insults anyone else. It is absolutely NOT about being compelled to say what other people would like you to say, to appease their sense of fairness, or any other of their motives.
That’s reasonable. But by that standard, unwillingness to “provoke an outcry”—which was one of the reasons Jyllands-Posten gave for passing on the Jesus cartoons—is not a legitimate reason for refusing to publish something.
If you publish whatever you damn well please without caring at all whether anybody is offended by it, that’s one thing. But if your publication decisions are influenced by a wish to avoid giving offense to Christians, while you’re perfectly willing to give offense to Muslims, that’s something else again—something called “hypocrisy”.
Many people around here have complained (and rightly so, IMO) that the press and the arts are too willing to apply a double standard, freely satirizing Christian or Jewish beliefs while refraining from doing the same to Muslim ones, out of fear of violent retaliation. Well, if we’re going to criticize that kind of double standard, we should also criticize it when it’s applied the other way around.
That’s a fair criticism, but being fair and balanced is not the same thing as having free speech and we shouldn’t conflate the two things; free speech permits expression of hypocrisy, and it permits criticism of hypocrisy.
Well we could go into the ins and outs of free speech all we want but I doubt the details will matter much to the people on the streets and the people stirring their anger. As I said
Whether right or wrong do you really think this isn’t going to be used to show that the Danish paper and by extension the Danish government and people* are indeed anti-Muslim.
BTW a poster on another board seems to have found what looks like some of the Jesus cartoons. Here
The translations of the text are “Ressurection with a twist”, “Sideways ressurection”, “Ressurection in darkness over water” and “Savior-cam”.
If these is the cartoons in question they seem rather tame IMO.
*This is the way these fuckwits are extending their BS after all.
[The first couple of times I read this thread, I skimmed and thought it said “Iran sponsors Holocaust conference.” I thought the idea of a Holocaust denial conference was bizarre.]
Anyway, I think this is a great idea. When Iran runs these cartoons and the world’s Jews voice their displeasure without rioting, throwing bombs and calling for the death of the people who drew them, these fanatics will look even stupider.
that will be nice–are you perhaps too \optimistic? Remember The Cave of the Patriarchs?
[quote]
Kimstu: If you publish whatever you damn well please without caring at all whether anybody is offended by it, that’s one thing. But if your publication decisions are influenced by a wish to avoid giving offense to Christians, while you’re perfectly willing to give offense to Muslims, that’s something else again—something called “hypocrisy”.
I wonder if the Danes thought the Mohammed cartoons were amusing. They didn’t find the ones about Jesus to be funny. I don’t take Danes too seriously when they say they were concerned about offending Christians. I’ve never seen a more irreverent bunch or kinder folk.
Does that include the Jessica Christ issue? Oh, wow. Head rush!!!