Tensions are mounting as protests against a Danish editorial cartoon depicting the Prophet Mohammed continue to escalate. On Friday, protests expanded to Kuala Lumpur, capital of Malaysia, where over 1,000 protesters chanted, "Long live Islam. Destroy Denmark. Destroy Israel. Destroy George Bush. Destroy America." Large demonstrations have also occurred in Kabul, Dhaka, Islamabad, Beirut, Damascus and Gaza. On Feb. 6, at least eight people were killed in Afghanistan, as security officers tried to suppress violent protests. Despite these international security threats, large news media organizations and American newspapers have refused to depict the editorial cartoon. Incomplete coverage of the situation is nothing short of censorship.
Certain Muslim groups are offended by the editorial cartoon since Islamic tradition explicitly prohibits the depiction of Allah and the Prophet. Despite the dramatic response, the cartoons have been republished in over 30 countries, with editors announcing that the intention behind reprinting the cartoons is to support free speech. Several American news sources have not reprinted the cartoon, including the Chicago Tribune, which stated that "The Tribune has chosen not to publish the cartoons because editors decided the images inaccurately depicted Islam as a violent religion, and that it was not necessary to print the cartoons in order to explain them to readers." Ironically, the cartoon, which was intended as a critique of self-censorship, has now spurred massive censorship of the cartoon itself and has led to arrests of editors in Jordan, Yemen and Malaysia.
The irony of the violence following the publication of the cartoon in Jyllands-Posten, a daily Danish newspaper, is that the cartoon was accompanying an article titled "Profound fear of criticism of Islam," in which writer Kare Bluitgen recounts how he has not been able to publish his children's book about Mohammed's life because so many editors feared the Islamic response. Publishers cited the murder of film director Theo van Gogh and the attack on a lecturer at the Carsten Niebuhr Institute of Denmark, in which a lecturer was assaulted by five assailants who opposed the lecturer's reading of the Qur'an to non-Muslims attending the lecture. To go along with the article, editors decided to have artists submit their renditions of how they would illustrate Islam. Some cartoon panels were simply of a bearded man or a crescent moon, with the most controvesial being a depiction of the Prophet with a bomb in his turban.
The American people deserve to see the cartoon and make their own personal judgments about the ongoing international crisis. We do not need our news sources filtering information for us. One may argue that printing the cartoons is akin to yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, and therefore not reprinting the cartoons does not constitute an assault on free speech. Perhaps we feel secure enough in America to believe that freedom of speech is never impinged upon. But it is these moments of indifference that whittle away at the public's concept of free speech.
Critics state that the controversial depiction of Mohammed only enforces the stereotype of Islam being connected with terrorism. Yet it has not been cartoons that spur Westerners to connect Islam with terrorism; it has been fundamentalist violence, like that which followed the publication of the Jyllands-Posten cartoons, that connects Islam with terrorism in Western consciousness.
Obviously, the violent response does not represent the vast majority of Muslim people. Yet Westerners tend to lump Muslims into one group, perhaps because the leaders of many protesting countries are themselves fundamentalist, and often leaders of a country shape our perception of an entire region. 17 Islamic countries have demanded that the Danish government apprehend and severely punish the cartoonists. The Organization of the Islamic Conference and the Arab League have demanded that the U.N. impose international sanctions upon Denmark. Danish Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen has responded that "the (Danish) government refuses to apologize because the government does not control the media or a newspaper outlet; (punishment) would be in violation of the freedom of speech."
Islamic leaders cannot expect Den-mark to apologize when Denmark upholds the value of free speech. Islamic people cannot take offense when people outside of their religious faith do not follow their religious code. On the same note, the West cannot expect its values and customs to be openly embraced by Islam. The Danish cartoon is symptomatic of an ever-widening chasm between Islam and the West, one which our generation will not be able to ignore. The issue has allied Europe with America and Muslim countries with one another, creating two axes which were not previously united over a single issue. Isolationism is seeming more and more appealing.
Laura Martin '06 would like all news to be in cartoon form.
