Quote:Original post by LessBread

Quote:Original post by alnite
Anyway, I could draw an image of Holy Mary having sex with 10 men, and if that offends any one, I could always claim it to be freedom of speech and that I had no intention of insulting anyone.

Go for it!

Oh yes I would, but I wouldn't post it here. I'd submit it to Jyllands-Posten and ask them to publicize it. But it seems the Muslims have already done something similar, as noted in the open letter by Jyllands-Posten. And apparently those offensive drawings would violate their ethical code, but not the Mohammad's drawings.

Quote:Original post by trzy

Quote:Original post by alnite
Until the war is sparked and billions of people die. OK, that was the worst case scenario, but you know the response from the Islamic countries wasn't that pretty as well. If it continues like this, and if they think that freedom of speech is above all laws and ethics, then there will be conflicts which could be avoided.

Assuming you thought war or some other form of attack was imminent, restricting our free speech to avoid offending the other party is simply the wrong solution. At that point, it's the other side that's wrong and can't coexist peacefully so why should the rest of us sacrifice our free speech so as not to offend them?

I believe in freedom of speech, as long as its purpose is to critically points out certain things/errors in the other party. But to me, this specific cartoon only exists to mock and insult the Islam. The terrorists are Muslims, but not all Muslims are terrorists. If they want to say something about terrorism, they shouldn't use Muhammad as their point of reference.

Quote:Original post by trzy
Islamic world reacts against Danish cartoons.

Insulting someone's religion shows poor taste and is a recipe for trouble, but I think the reaction of the Muslim world to this has been silly. It just serves to underscore the fact that these societies are currently incompatible with Western ideas of freedom of speech and secularism. I'm with Denmark on this one -- I hope they don't budge on their position. They ought to continue to uphold freedom of speech and freedom of the press without giving in to ignorant fanatics half a world (and several centuries) away.

I once lived in Denmark for 7 months. Lovely place!

Goddamn farce.
It only proves one thing.
People are idiots, no matter who they are, and where they live.

First, how goddamn stupid do you have to be to print cartoons that explicitly tie Islam with terrorism, *and then be surprised when muslims get pissed off*?

Second, how goddamn stupid do you have to be in the Danish government to not react to something like this?
Especially when our dear prime minister only a month ago claimed that he could not accept any kind of attempt at "demonizing" (his word) any culture or religion. (Yeah, it sounded hollow even then)
How stupid do you have to be to not even say that "Hey, I'm sorry, this isn't Denmark as a whole, just one newspaper who can do what they like", but instead just say "I won't even listen to you, cos we have freedom of speech".

Third, how stupid do you have to be to demand that the government in a country with freedom of speech and free press apologises for what a single newspaper decides to do?

I hate people.

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I do think, however, that they should not have the freedom to beat up Danes who happen to be in the Middle East.

As far as I know, that hasn't actually happened anyway, so hardly a big issue...

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they should not be free to call for bombings against Scandinavian targets.

But we should be free to label an entire religion terrorists?
As I said, it's a farce. It's what happens when you have sufficiently blind, stupid, deranged, stuck up, ignorant and proud people on both sides.
Perfect examples that two wrongs don't make a right, or "an eye for an eye, and the entire world goes blind"

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why would Danish do such thing?

We wouldn't.
The editors on one newspaper would. I'm sure you can find a similar number of people in other countries who would have done the same. The ridiculous thing is when it suddenly is forced onto the entire country. Our government didn't want to comment (not say it was in bad taste or childish or anything, which is obviously taken as implicit support towards the newspaper), and suddenly a bunch of muslims decide that it must be Denmark as a whole that decided to do this.
And after that, people on a random internet forum are even asking why "the Danish" would do such a thing. [wink]

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Jyllands-Posten may have been insulting and childish (I do not agree that they were); that is not relevant. THey have a right to be insulting and childish. Nobody ever said a democratic right has to be nice.

Certainly, they have a *right* to do it. But they also have some kind of responsibility for what they say.
If they say that Islam = terrorism (which is basically how those drawings portrayed it), then yes, that is childish and insulting, and they have some kind of responsibility to at least take the consequences themselves, without smearing it onto the rest of us who weren't as stupid as them.
Knowing that newspaper though, it shouldn't come as a surprise... Bunch of deranged semi-racist small-minded assholes. It's one of those papers no one will admit to buying...

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It just serves to underscore the fact that these societies are currently incompatible with Western ideas of freedom of speech and secularism

I guess. But which side should be most ashamed of that? Sure, they might have a few tricks to learn about freedom of speech, but apparently, we have some much bigger issue with something even more fundamental. Respecting other people.
Honestly, if our societies are incompatible, I'm siding with them. At least they have the idea that you shouldn't piss people off for no reason.
I don't think they're as incompatible as people try to make it sound though.

For the record though, a couple of things happened today. The newspaper finally apologized for pissing so many people off today, said it wasn't their intention (I don't believe that for a second, but anyway), and our prime minister finally (after what, two months) actually said that he didn't support it and that it didn't reflect our official stance or anything. If he'd done that two months ago, I might still have had a bit of respect for him (That is, if I'd had any to begin with, which I didn't)

Btw, has anyone here actually seen those infamous drawings? I don't know if they're online anywhere... I know the artist who made one of them though... Cool guy. His drawing just made fun of the editor on the newspaper though. [wink]

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When it comes down to it, they were satirical cartoons of the Muhammed based on the image of Islam that the terrorists have created. It's legitimate free speech no matter which way you slice it.

Oh right, so because a handful muslims are terrorists, suddenly it's ok to label *every* muslim a terrorist? Suddenly it's legal to tie their entire damn religion with it?
In that case, Christians are terrorists too, to at least the same extent. And has been for hundreds of years.
Or wait, maybe we shouldn't let a few hundred people define the religion of over a billion people.

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At that point, it's the other side that's wrong and can't coexist peacefully

That doesn't even make sense. It takes two sides to be unable to coexist.
And there are a lot of things you can get into trouble for saying in any country with free speech. That's nothing new, and people accept that, because obviously, free speech relies on people being sensible enough to handle that freedom.
Just like the freedom to walk around outside relies on you being sensible enough to not use that freedom to kill a dozen people. If you do that, you lose the right to move freely pretty damn quickly.

It's not a question of limiting free speech, no one in their right minds would accept that.
It's a question of accepting a minimum of responsibility for exercising your rights. Obviously we in the west (And from reading your post, not only in Denmark) have some big problems accepting this. Freedom is fun. Responsibility less so.

Quote:Original post by deathtrap
I love the way people use freedom of speech whenever someone gets pissed off at something they say. I think anyone that is going to advocate freedom of speech must pass a rigorous test to ensure that they will accept the consequences of their actions. Cowards.

Actually that's the whole point of freedom of speech. To be able to say what you want without fear of being harmed for it. The American government ideally is supposed to exist to protect these rights. Whether it is actually doing so in many cases is debatable, but that was the intent. It is probably the same with the Danish.

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Why do most people say 'freedom of speech for everyone yay!' and then turn around and say 'this book should be banned'...etc .

I don't know about most people but that is a pretty frickin hypocritical to say.

Quote:Original post by OBeH
Actually that's the whole point of freedom of speech. To be able to say what you want without fear of being harmed for it. The American government ideally is supposed to exist to protect these rights.

There's a bit more to freedom of speech than that.
It doesn't give you the right to say anything without facing consequences. It just means you shouldn't be censored.

Quote:Original post by Spoonbender
There's a bit more to freedom of speech than that.
It doesn't give you the right to say anything without facing consequences. It just means you shouldn't be censored.

Yes but there are the normal limits built into society. One should not be killed, hurt, or otherwise threatened with physical abuse for saying what they wish.

If I ran said newspaper for example, I shouldn't be surprised when they call for a boycott...

Quote:Original post by LessBread

Quote:Original post by alnite
Oh yes I would, but I wouldn't post it here. I'd submit it to Jyllands-Posten and ask them to publicize it. But it seems the Muslims have already done something similar, as noted in the open letter by Jyllands-Posten. And apparently those offensive drawings would violate their ethical code, but not the Mohammad's drawings.

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Yeah, if you posted it here, you would likely be banned. Those Mohammad drawings are pretty tame by Western standards. They look like typical fare for a political cartoon and really no different than typical cartoon depictions of Islamic terrorists.

Except those typical cartoons don't generally depict the person who more than anyone represents Islam as a terrorist.

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If the pictures had been captioned "Osama bin Laden" there would be no international outrage.

Of course, because then the statement would have been "Osama is a terrorist", rather than "Muslims are terrorists".
I'd get pissed off too, if anyone called me a terrorist. Wouldn't you?
Even if they do it in a satirical drawing, or even if you say "I have freedom of speech", or "I didn't know it'd offend you".

Quote:Original post by Spoonbender
First, how goddamn stupid do you have to be to print cartoons that explicitly tie Islam with terrorism, *and then be surprised when muslims get pissed off*?

How stupid do you have to be to not see the connection? Clearly, there are features of Islam that readily lend themselves to terrorism. In contrast, how many Tibetan Buddhist Terrorists have you ever heard of?

How many muslims have you heard of who are *not* terrorists though?
By that logic, Christians are every bit as much terrorists (as well as plain murderers).
There are features of any big religion that lends itself to terrorism. It's just a matter of interpreting things the right way. Islam isn't particularly bad in this respect. But when you have a small group dedicated to *finding* connections between Islam and "We need to destroy the West", then yeah sure, it's amazing what they can find.

Just like small groups of Christians have been able to convince themselves that they have a duty to do anything from launching crusades to killing black people to starting wars.

But this is besides the point. (At least the point you quoted).
My point in that quote was simply that it shouldn't surprise anyone that hey, if you print a drawing of a religious figure as a terrorist, then quite a lot of believers in that religion will take it as an insult.