As a Muslim, myself, I don't understand the stances these fringe groups take. Ultimately, we have two issues. Portrayal of the Prophet is a big big no no in our religion, yet Freedom of Speech/Expression is a pertinent human right in most of the civilized world.<p>Does it offend me to see any portrayals of a man we don't like to have portrayed? Yea, of course. But I'm pretty sure it offends me more to see the reactions from the people involved.<p>If someone caricatures the prophet as a violent person, how can people [angry extremist Muslims] think that VIOLENTLY rioting and giving death threats will make the person recant that?<p>"You think Islam's violent!? No, it isn't. And to prove that to you, I will kill you."<p>I'm offended every time I see things like this - even if I'm a fan of South Park - but I do the sensible thing, I don't watch it. I can go more, say, write to them (sans death threats), or not buy from them anymore, etc. But this response just makes no sense at all.
The best part of South Park exemplifying the double standard is at the end of the Cartoon Wars episodes where they show Jesus and the American flag in a pretty vulgar scene.<p>I'm sure Comedy Central received plenty of complaints from offended Christians, yet there was no censorship.
Similar thing happened here with Sikhs.
A young Sikh writer produced a play about child abuse in a temple (you thought catholic priests had a monopoly).
The local peace loving religious leaders threatened to burn down the city run theatre. So the play was taken off. The city then went further to suggest that all future plays with Sikh characters should be approved by the religious leaders.<p>Since no writer was going to go for that it simply removed all Sikh character from plays and to be careful from tv aswell.<p>So the result of this censorship is going to be that the only time muslims are seen on TV it will be in news reports about terrorists. Way to go guys!
I haven't read it yet and don't doubt that it's a great op-ed but:<p><i>Please don't do things to make titles stand out, like using uppercase or exclamation points, or adding a parenthetical remark saying how great an article is. It's implicit in submitting something that you think it's important.</i><p>From: <a href="http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html" rel="nofollow">http://ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html</a>
This situation really saddens. I hate the fact that people are self-censoring because of a minority of violent people. This lends them legitimacy, when they deserve none. Seeing this after reading about a girls school being poison-gassed in Afghanistan makes me say why kowtow to the violent ones? I've read the Koran and its no worse no better than the bible. My girlfriend is a Middle Eastern anthropologist who loves the culture and speaks Arabic. My research into the history of math show the ancient Arab world as a hot bed of science and literature. Yet nowadays when people think of Muslims they think of death.
The high point of my last week was having one of my university students (during a class on privacy issues) say that nobody has a right to ask you what your religion is on a job application. Unless, that is, you are from somewhere in the Middle East. Then its understandable that you need to ask. WTF...
But, if <i>some</i> Muslim feels the need to show pictures of murdered directors on then website as a <i>prediction</i> of what will happen to you if you make art, then it gets harder and harder to fight these prejudices.<p>I just wish the non-violent majority of Muslims would (could?) step up to the plate and counteract the extremists.
The last paragraph is stirring: "if a violent fringe is capable of inspiring so much cowardice and self-censorship, it suggests that there’s enough rot in our institutions that a stronger foe might be able to bring them crashing down."<p>But this bit a couple paragraphs up strikes me as complacent: "Happily, today’s would-be totalitarians are probably too marginal to take full advantage." A new one can and will arise. Totalitarians <i>love</i> a vacuum.<p>xkcd should do a stick figure of prophet mohammed.
This is actually getting really scary. A short while ago a cartoonist from Seattle suggested to make May 20 'Everyone draws Muhammad' Day worldwide. Her cartoon went viral, a Facebook page was created, the exacerbated mix of anger/resentment/stupidity in the air fueled the whole thing -- and now both her and the creator of the FB group want out:
<a href="http://guyism.com/2010/04/creator-of-everybody-draw-muhammad-day-wont-draw-muhammad.html" rel="nofollow">http://guyism.com/2010/04/creator-of-everybody-draw-muhammad...</a><p>I can absolutely understand the heat they must be feeling -- it's especially chilling since she's clearly not famous enough to require protection, but might become just enough so that she actually pays the heavy personal toll of constant fear of reprisal.<p>It's very sad to see this lifelike Prisoner's Dilemma happening -- we would all like to see people of goodwill the world over to show some spine and make a respectful but clear and strong resistance statement. But no one, absolutely no one can afford doing this anymore in an age of exponentials, viral growth, annihilated privacy and geocoded checkins broadcast to the world, where you can rise to (unwanted, in this case) virtual fame in a matter of hours. Anonymity is not a protection anymore.<p>I sincerely hope that being the first globally connected generation will somehow help us avoid tearing this planet apart over religion in the next 20 years...
Xeni Jardin interviews Matt and Trey about the 200th episode and the Mohammed controversy. <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSVU-8X8T7U" rel="nofollow">http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSVU-8X8T7U</a>
The reason this is always such an "outrage" when the Muslim religion is parodied is historical.<p>The religion was founded on the idea of spreading the itself as widely as possible. Certain leaders (the founder himself even) achieved this through conquering and control. Which was fine thousands of years ago when being invaded was just part and parcel of life. :)<p>Nowadays the original edicts don't really have any answers of what to do when you get a detractor from the religious teachings (i.e. a parody such as this). Hence extremists turn to literal interpretations and go for violence.<p>EDIT: hmm, not that I mean to suggest Islam is a violent religion - this was meant as an explanation to the other comments that were wondering why slamming Islam elicits such a violent response from extremists compared to other religions - it is historical.<p>(I've scrapped all the respectful nonsense - it was a quick opinion at the end of a comment relating to something different. I never intended it to be taken so seriously :))
For those interested, this week's South Park:
<i>NEW YORK, April 26, 2010 - JIMMY AND TIMMY head off TO SUMMER CAMP WITH ALL THEIR HANDICAPABLE FRIENDS in an all-new episode of "South Park" titled "Crippled Summer," premiering on Wednesday, April 28 at 10:00 p.m. on COMEDY CENTRAL.<p>Competition is the name of the game this summer. There is no time for Jimmy and his friends to slack off. They're working to be this year's champions at summer camp. Jimmy suits up and prepares to shred in the annual surfing contest.</i><p><a href="http://www.southparkstudios.com/news/3880" rel="nofollow">http://www.southparkstudios.com/news/3880</a><p>Interested to see what lines they push given recent events. They certainly have been in this territory with <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cripple_Fight" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cripple_Fight</a> & <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_the_Down_Steroid" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Up_the_Down_Steroid</a>
Has anyone read an official statement from Comedy Central about this? This situation seems so counter to their reputation and public image I'm surprised they'd let it stand and not respond to all the trashing.
I find the comparison between Apple's lost phone and Muhammad (PBUH) drawing interesting.<p>While most around here are with Apple's now legal tackling and their defence of their future commodity (<a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1295964" rel="nofollow">http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1295964</a>), many are sceptics and sometimes hostile when some call for understanding of why they could be offended of other's 'freedom of expression'.<p>Edit: spelling, concision.
Man I would love a real Super Best Friends t-shirt (and not the cheap rip-offs on cafepress right now or the the one with the black censor box).<p>Funny, I was just watching an illegal stream of SouthPark over the weekend and they showed the original superbest friends ep and there was no censorship at all on Muhammed. In fact, they treated him kind of cool, if anything.
Man there are a lot of [deleted] comments on this thread. Don't do it! Seriously, the discussion is worth having - resist the urge!<p>Otherwise downvoting becomes an effective censorship tool as well.
"...there’s enough rot in our institutions that a stronger foe might be able to bring them crashing down."<p>This may be the white space behind the type.
So what if Stone and Parker just announce to the world they are now Muslim? Wouldn't that be an easy way to solve this for them and then do whatever the hell they want? Sort of like the dentist on Seinfeld that changes religions 'just for the jokes'?<p>In all seriousness, it worked for some Fox News reporters a few years ago who were capture by muslim extremist. That's almost a South Park ep right there it so absurd.
Are people this short memoried / one sided / blind?<p><a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piss_Christ" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Piss_Christ</a><p>Others <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_controversies#Visual_arts" rel="nofollow">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Religious_controversies#Visual_...</a><p>And go ask the grieving families of abortion doctors if they think only Islamic fundies murder for their religion?
For a great response, see Glenn Greenwald's takedown: <a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/26/douthat" rel="nofollow">http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/26...</a>
And a well-stated counterpoint
<a href="http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/26/douthat/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/glenn_greenwald/2010/04/26...</a>
Probably worth while to mention that depicting Jesus in an inappropriate manner is _greatly_ disrespectful to Muslims as well. Jesus(peace be upon him) is among the most renowned Prophets of God in Islam.
I haven't taken a position on this matter yet, but is anyone (credible) looking into whether the hype around this story was generated on purpose as an attempt to smear American Muslims? See:<p>The Radical "Muslim" Group That Threatened South Park Creators Was Founded and Run by Joseph Cohen, a Former Israeli Radical Who Used to Live in a Settlement in the West Bank
<a href="http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/bvnsa/" rel="nofollow">http://www.reddit.com/r/worldnews/comments/bvnsa/</a>