Cartoon Clash of Civilizations
Bina Shah February 2, 2006
#72 Posted by omar_r_quraishi on February 8, 2006 12:46:52 am
http://www.dawn.com/2006/02/08/ed.htm#4
Nothing to kill or die for
AT the start of this week, the death toll stood at five and the situation seemed likely to deteriorate, even as commentators throughout Europe tried to hose down suggestions that what we have been witnessing is a clash of civilizations. It is harder to allay the impression that it is a clash of cultures, exacerbated by inordinate degrees of obduracy on both sides.
Simplistic views of the dispute reduce it to a contest between two absolutes: immutable religious beliefs and uncompromising freedom of speech. And never the twain shall meet, goes the argument, which is often deployed in defence of the stance that Islamic and European value systems are inherently incompatible. Invariably, the implicit or explicit corollary is that most Muslim immigrants will never really fit into Europe.
There is no incontrovertible evidence that this is what the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten set out to illustrate late last September, when it decided to publish a dozen third-rate caricatures of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH). It had apparently commissioned the drawings as a sort of test case after hearing from comedian Frank Hyam that he was scared of satirizing the Quran, and after learning that children’s writer Bent Bludnikow, who had written a book about the Prophet, couldn’t find any illustrators who were willing to put their names to their work.
Neither the poor quality of the caricatures, nor — more significantly — the fact that at least a few of them were explicitly racist deterred Jyllands-Posten from publishing them. The newspaper reputedly has a history of extremist inclinations, including support for Mussolini and Hitler back in the 1930s. More recently, Denmark has been among the European countries where xenophobia has been whipped up by right-wing forces. The conservative government of Prime Minister Anders Rasmussen depends for its survival on the parliamentary support of the Danish People’s Party, one of whose MPs has publicly likened Muslims in Europe to “a cancer”.
This context is obviously not irrelevant to the publication of the cartoons, which was followed by angry complaints from Danish Muslims, protest marches and, deplorably, death threats against journalists and cartoonists. After Rasmussen refused to receive a delegation of Muslim ambassadors, some local imams decided to go on a tour of the Muslim world with a dossier containing the offending drawings and their correspondence with the authorities, along with three further caricatures considerably more obscene and inflammatory than anything published by Jyllands-Posten.
The provenance of these supplementary drawings is uncertain: they are said to have been received in the mail by unnamed Muslims in Denmark. It is not clear whether the distinction between the two sets of cartoons was clear to all those who saw the dossier.
Was parading the sketches through the Muslim world such a a terribly good idea? Having made clear how hurt they were, it may have been wisest for the concerned Danish Muslims to leave it at that.
It would, no doubt, have helped if Jyllands-Posten had promptly apologized for its indiscretion and if Rasmussen had at least lent an ear to the protesters. The apologies came only after a boycott of Danish goods in the Middle East threatened to hurt Denmark’s economy, which raises doubts about their sincerity. Jyllands-Posten, incidentally, has expressed regret for injuring Muslim feelings, not for publishing the caricatures.
In retrospect, would it not have been best from the Muslim point of view if the matter had been restricted to Denmark? Among other things, that would probably have prevented the cartoons from being reproduced in newspapers throughout western Europe, as they were last week (with the notable exception of Britain). More important, that may also have kept the issue from being adopted by the international brotherhood of extremists.
Small bands of British Muslims, for instance, have chosen to express their anger through vows of further atrocities along the lines of 9/11 and 7/7. That’s precisely the sort of emotional bluster that feeds into the consciousness of those who, in turn, might choose to condemn all Muslims as terrorists or endow a representative figure with a fuse-bearing turban. Nor has the torching of embassies in Damascus and Beirut done wonders for the image of the followers of Islam.
It could be argued that even the commercial boycott and diplomatic ruptures have implicitly been based on the misapprehension that European governments exercise the sort of control over the press that is more or less mandatory through much of the Middle East. A plea to the Vatican by the Saudi interior minister, Prince Nayef, also hints at a naive misconception of the church’s role in Europe.
Europeans are justifiably proud of their right to free speech, won during a long struggle against the power of the very church that Prince Nayef appealed to, plus various other vested interests. However, it is not a right that has consistently been honoured during the past century. Even now, there are limits to free speech, some based on custom and common sense, others enshrined in legislation.
For instance, in Germany and Austria, Holocaust denial — that is, to contend that Nazis did not conduct a campaign of Judaeocide — is punishable by imprisonment. Whether or not this is justified, the point is that it is clearly a curb on the freedom of expression, in a country — Germany — where newspapers seemed a bit too keen to reproduce the Danish drawings, using the argument that to refrain from doing so would be tantamount to self-censorship. Other European papers contended that republication of the cartoons was necessary in order to show their readers what the fuss was all about. But would they have been quite so eager to go down that road had the story — and illustrations — in question related to, say, graphic child pornography or paedophilia?
Most probably not. Why? Obviously, in the interests of good taste, and in order not to offend public sensibilities. Does this mean Muslim sensitivities somehow matter less than those of other sections of the public?
Another argument that has been trotted out by numerous western commentators is that all sorts of satirical and sometimes even derogatory references to biblical luminaries are commonplace in their culture, so why should Islamic figures merit a different approach? There is some validity in this point. Depictions of Jesus Christ, for instance, that would once have invited charges of blasphemy and harsh punishment now generally elicit no more than a few polite protests, if that (although there are occasional exceptions).
However, one suspects there would be a wider and more emotional response were Jesus to be disrespectfully depicted in a Muslim or a Jewish publication. And, while we’re on the subject, it’s probably also worth pondering whether Jyllands-Posten’s efforts would have been reproduced quite so widely across Europe had the object of derision been Jews rather than Muslims.
Some European writers have compared the Danish caricatures to the open slather against Jews that culminated in the Holocaust. Others have noted that they would have sympathized more readily with the Muslim outrage had anti-Semitism not been so rampant in the Islamic world. Neither of these views seems altogether unreasonable.
Meanwhile, there are various other pertinent questions that need to be raised, and directed at Muslims — predominantly those who are always on the lookout for any opportunity to take up arms (metaphorically or otherwise) in the face of perceived insults to their faith, rather than the less excitable sorts whose moderate voices tend to be drowned out amid the cacophony.
The most obvious of these is, which of the following has lately contributed more towards reinforcing Islamophobia: the stupid cartoons, which in the normal course of events would have vanished from the consciousness of most Jyllands-Posten readers within a few days, or the violent protests in the Muslim world, the instances of arson, the unambiguous death threats and invocations of terror and hellfire on the streets of London and elsewhere?
Then again, is it reasonable to expect secular societies to abide by Islamic strictures against iconography (which aren’t accepted by all Muslim sects anyhow)? Besides, isn’t it sometimes wiser — and braver — to let sleeping dogmas lie? Furthermore, regardless of their validity, don’t Muslim complaints of victimization in Europe ring a little hollow when so many Islamic countries go out of their way to discriminate against religious minorities?
Echoing Oliver Wendell Holmes, Noam Chomsky argues: “If you’re in favour of free speech, then you’re in favour of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise.” It is also widely accepted that cartoons that don’t give offence to some section of the population are generally ineffective. It is important, nonetheless, to know where to draw the line.
Editorials in much of the British press have been at pains to point out that whereas Jyllands-Posten — and, by extension, Le Soir, Die Welt and all the rest of them — had every right to publish what they did, they were certainly under no obligation to do so. In other words, they ought to have known better. The same could be said of those Muslims whose reaction to what they saw as an unreasonable provocation has facilitated the further demonization of Islam’s adherents.
Sometimes the thoughts and actions of the supposedly ultra-devout hint at a cerebral malfunction.
Email: mahirali1@gmail.com
Nothing to kill or die for
AT the start of this week, the death toll stood at five and the situation seemed likely to deteriorate, even as commentators throughout Europe tried to hose down suggestions that what we have been witnessing is a clash of civilizations. It is harder to allay the impression that it is a clash of cultures, exacerbated by inordinate degrees of obduracy on both sides.
Simplistic views of the dispute reduce it to a contest between two absolutes: immutable religious beliefs and uncompromising freedom of speech. And never the twain shall meet, goes the argument, which is often deployed in defence of the stance that Islamic and European value systems are inherently incompatible. Invariably, the implicit or explicit corollary is that most Muslim immigrants will never really fit into Europe.
There is no incontrovertible evidence that this is what the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten set out to illustrate late last September, when it decided to publish a dozen third-rate caricatures of Prophet Mohammad (PBUH). It had apparently commissioned the drawings as a sort of test case after hearing from comedian Frank Hyam that he was scared of satirizing the Quran, and after learning that children’s writer Bent Bludnikow, who had written a book about the Prophet, couldn’t find any illustrators who were willing to put their names to their work.
Neither the poor quality of the caricatures, nor — more significantly — the fact that at least a few of them were explicitly racist deterred Jyllands-Posten from publishing them. The newspaper reputedly has a history of extremist inclinations, including support for Mussolini and Hitler back in the 1930s. More recently, Denmark has been among the European countries where xenophobia has been whipped up by right-wing forces. The conservative government of Prime Minister Anders Rasmussen depends for its survival on the parliamentary support of the Danish People’s Party, one of whose MPs has publicly likened Muslims in Europe to “a cancer”.
This context is obviously not irrelevant to the publication of the cartoons, which was followed by angry complaints from Danish Muslims, protest marches and, deplorably, death threats against journalists and cartoonists. After Rasmussen refused to receive a delegation of Muslim ambassadors, some local imams decided to go on a tour of the Muslim world with a dossier containing the offending drawings and their correspondence with the authorities, along with three further caricatures considerably more obscene and inflammatory than anything published by Jyllands-Posten.
The provenance of these supplementary drawings is uncertain: they are said to have been received in the mail by unnamed Muslims in Denmark. It is not clear whether the distinction between the two sets of cartoons was clear to all those who saw the dossier.
Was parading the sketches through the Muslim world such a a terribly good idea? Having made clear how hurt they were, it may have been wisest for the concerned Danish Muslims to leave it at that.
It would, no doubt, have helped if Jyllands-Posten had promptly apologized for its indiscretion and if Rasmussen had at least lent an ear to the protesters. The apologies came only after a boycott of Danish goods in the Middle East threatened to hurt Denmark’s economy, which raises doubts about their sincerity. Jyllands-Posten, incidentally, has expressed regret for injuring Muslim feelings, not for publishing the caricatures.
In retrospect, would it not have been best from the Muslim point of view if the matter had been restricted to Denmark? Among other things, that would probably have prevented the cartoons from being reproduced in newspapers throughout western Europe, as they were last week (with the notable exception of Britain). More important, that may also have kept the issue from being adopted by the international brotherhood of extremists.
Small bands of British Muslims, for instance, have chosen to express their anger through vows of further atrocities along the lines of 9/11 and 7/7. That’s precisely the sort of emotional bluster that feeds into the consciousness of those who, in turn, might choose to condemn all Muslims as terrorists or endow a representative figure with a fuse-bearing turban. Nor has the torching of embassies in Damascus and Beirut done wonders for the image of the followers of Islam.
It could be argued that even the commercial boycott and diplomatic ruptures have implicitly been based on the misapprehension that European governments exercise the sort of control over the press that is more or less mandatory through much of the Middle East. A plea to the Vatican by the Saudi interior minister, Prince Nayef, also hints at a naive misconception of the church’s role in Europe.
Europeans are justifiably proud of their right to free speech, won during a long struggle against the power of the very church that Prince Nayef appealed to, plus various other vested interests. However, it is not a right that has consistently been honoured during the past century. Even now, there are limits to free speech, some based on custom and common sense, others enshrined in legislation.
For instance, in Germany and Austria, Holocaust denial — that is, to contend that Nazis did not conduct a campaign of Judaeocide — is punishable by imprisonment. Whether or not this is justified, the point is that it is clearly a curb on the freedom of expression, in a country — Germany — where newspapers seemed a bit too keen to reproduce the Danish drawings, using the argument that to refrain from doing so would be tantamount to self-censorship. Other European papers contended that republication of the cartoons was necessary in order to show their readers what the fuss was all about. But would they have been quite so eager to go down that road had the story — and illustrations — in question related to, say, graphic child pornography or paedophilia?
Most probably not. Why? Obviously, in the interests of good taste, and in order not to offend public sensibilities. Does this mean Muslim sensitivities somehow matter less than those of other sections of the public?
Another argument that has been trotted out by numerous western commentators is that all sorts of satirical and sometimes even derogatory references to biblical luminaries are commonplace in their culture, so why should Islamic figures merit a different approach? There is some validity in this point. Depictions of Jesus Christ, for instance, that would once have invited charges of blasphemy and harsh punishment now generally elicit no more than a few polite protests, if that (although there are occasional exceptions).
However, one suspects there would be a wider and more emotional response were Jesus to be disrespectfully depicted in a Muslim or a Jewish publication. And, while we’re on the subject, it’s probably also worth pondering whether Jyllands-Posten’s efforts would have been reproduced quite so widely across Europe had the object of derision been Jews rather than Muslims.
Some European writers have compared the Danish caricatures to the open slather against Jews that culminated in the Holocaust. Others have noted that they would have sympathized more readily with the Muslim outrage had anti-Semitism not been so rampant in the Islamic world. Neither of these views seems altogether unreasonable.
Meanwhile, there are various other pertinent questions that need to be raised, and directed at Muslims — predominantly those who are always on the lookout for any opportunity to take up arms (metaphorically or otherwise) in the face of perceived insults to their faith, rather than the less excitable sorts whose moderate voices tend to be drowned out amid the cacophony.
The most obvious of these is, which of the following has lately contributed more towards reinforcing Islamophobia: the stupid cartoons, which in the normal course of events would have vanished from the consciousness of most Jyllands-Posten readers within a few days, or the violent protests in the Muslim world, the instances of arson, the unambiguous death threats and invocations of terror and hellfire on the streets of London and elsewhere?
Then again, is it reasonable to expect secular societies to abide by Islamic strictures against iconography (which aren’t accepted by all Muslim sects anyhow)? Besides, isn’t it sometimes wiser — and braver — to let sleeping dogmas lie? Furthermore, regardless of their validity, don’t Muslim complaints of victimization in Europe ring a little hollow when so many Islamic countries go out of their way to discriminate against religious minorities?
Echoing Oliver Wendell Holmes, Noam Chomsky argues: “If you’re in favour of free speech, then you’re in favour of freedom of speech precisely for views you despise.” It is also widely accepted that cartoons that don’t give offence to some section of the population are generally ineffective. It is important, nonetheless, to know where to draw the line.
Editorials in much of the British press have been at pains to point out that whereas Jyllands-Posten — and, by extension, Le Soir, Die Welt and all the rest of them — had every right to publish what they did, they were certainly under no obligation to do so. In other words, they ought to have known better. The same could be said of those Muslims whose reaction to what they saw as an unreasonable provocation has facilitated the further demonization of Islam’s adherents.
Sometimes the thoughts and actions of the supposedly ultra-devout hint at a cerebral malfunction.
Email: mahirali1@gmail.com
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#71 Posted by omar_r_quraishi on February 8, 2006 12:16:25 am
raw moron -- actually i live in reality and must accept, whether i like it or not, that freedom of speech is not absolute and comes with limitations -- you on the other hand live in your cubby or is it shitt hole on chowk -- and you can believe whatever you may -- including that the next few years will be agonizing for me and mohd`s soul -- sheesh what a loser hahaha
and oh by the way , no one is denying that neo nazi speech and actions do not constitute hate speech -- the point, which one is now repeating ad nauseum but is clearly lost on morons like you, is that there are limitations in europe on some kinds of free speech but not on others -- the word for that in the dictionary, moron, is `double standard`
now go shoo
arey arjun jee aap kahan hain -- still defending that paper`s right to free speech eh?
and oh by the way , no one is denying that neo nazi speech and actions do not constitute hate speech -- the point, which one is now repeating ad nauseum but is clearly lost on morons like you, is that there are limitations in europe on some kinds of free speech but not on others -- the word for that in the dictionary, moron, is `double standard`
now go shoo
arey arjun jee aap kahan hain -- still defending that paper`s right to free speech eh?
#70 Posted by harish_hyd on February 7, 2006 10:52:09 pm
In the past, toilet seats, footwear, and even lingerie have carried images of Hindu gods. There were protests, but nowhere did Hindus burn embassies, kill and get killed, or boycott western products.
#69 Posted by harimau on February 7, 2006 6:55:56 pm
Bina Shah wrote [What astonishes me is that in a time when relations between the Western/European/American world are so delicate, people would want to do something to fire up Muslim sentiment against Europe....]
I don`t remember the Taliban showing any such sensitivity to Buddhist opinion when they blew up the Bamiyan Buddha statue. Nor were you out there decrying their lack of sensitivity.
[....For France to follow the Danish example and publish the cartoons out of spite seems also extremely foolish given that they`ve not yet cleaned up the ashes of the last Paris riots.]
The right way to clean up the ashes of the Paris riots would be to deport every single Muslim back to his home country and to deny landing rights in France for Air Morocco, EgyptAir, Air Alegeria, Qatar Airways, Saudia, Middle East Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Pakistan International Airlines, Emirates Air, Kuwait Airways, Iranian Airlines, Malaysian, Garuda Indonesian or any other airline with the slightest connection to a Muslim country. All passenger lists for planes arriving in France should be vetted before the plane leaves its point of origin (like the US requires for its war on terrorism) and the plane should be denied even overflight rights should there be a single Muslim on board. All Muslims should be quarantined in their home countries or should be permitted to mingle with other Muslims only. They don`t have to read Jyllands-Posten but if they do and are offended by the cartoons of Mohammad, maybe they can show their contempt for the cartoons by using them as toilet paper.
A few strategically dropped H-bombs ought to do wonders to improve Muslim sensitivities to other people`s rights to express themselves. If not, at least we would have an abundance of glass (fused silica) that might come in handy for bottling beer, wine and other haram stuff.
I don`t remember the Taliban showing any such sensitivity to Buddhist opinion when they blew up the Bamiyan Buddha statue. Nor were you out there decrying their lack of sensitivity.
[....For France to follow the Danish example and publish the cartoons out of spite seems also extremely foolish given that they`ve not yet cleaned up the ashes of the last Paris riots.]
The right way to clean up the ashes of the Paris riots would be to deport every single Muslim back to his home country and to deny landing rights in France for Air Morocco, EgyptAir, Air Alegeria, Qatar Airways, Saudia, Middle East Airlines, Turkish Airlines, Pakistan International Airlines, Emirates Air, Kuwait Airways, Iranian Airlines, Malaysian, Garuda Indonesian or any other airline with the slightest connection to a Muslim country. All passenger lists for planes arriving in France should be vetted before the plane leaves its point of origin (like the US requires for its war on terrorism) and the plane should be denied even overflight rights should there be a single Muslim on board. All Muslims should be quarantined in their home countries or should be permitted to mingle with other Muslims only. They don`t have to read Jyllands-Posten but if they do and are offended by the cartoons of Mohammad, maybe they can show their contempt for the cartoons by using them as toilet paper.
A few strategically dropped H-bombs ought to do wonders to improve Muslim sensitivities to other people`s rights to express themselves. If not, at least we would have an abundance of glass (fused silica) that might come in handy for bottling beer, wine and other haram stuff.
#68 Posted by teshah on February 7, 2006 6:49:10 pm
Re: # 16
Raw_Dust
``nasah sahib:
the answer is in mohammad` grotesque and indefensible Sunnah which needs a cover of Blasphemy law or else the whole intimate-church of Islam will come crumbling down. we are living in interesting times``.
But the Blasphemy law imposes deah sentence only on Paky citizens of any faith so as to terrorise them to submit to the Mullah. For the world at large we cn only protest and be killed unless we have an international blasphemy law to take care of the `freedom of expression` of the west. But then the sectarian mullah may be considered its worst violator by the international court.
BTW, the cartoon is now appearing on the internet and saved on millions of computers. What will become of them?
Raw_Dust
``nasah sahib:
the answer is in mohammad` grotesque and indefensible Sunnah which needs a cover of Blasphemy law or else the whole intimate-church of Islam will come crumbling down. we are living in interesting times``.
But the Blasphemy law imposes deah sentence only on Paky citizens of any faith so as to terrorise them to submit to the Mullah. For the world at large we cn only protest and be killed unless we have an international blasphemy law to take care of the `freedom of expression` of the west. But then the sectarian mullah may be considered its worst violator by the international court.
BTW, the cartoon is now appearing on the internet and saved on millions of computers. What will become of them?
#67 Posted by Raw_Dust on February 7, 2006 1:40:10 pm
RE: omar_r_quraishi:
``so raw moron, you`re saying that moses and muhammad arent given the same protection, or shouldnt be given the same protection, as given to messrs bush and blair?``
nope. my position is absolute (as an Individual) on freespeech. i oppose all kinds of censorship that includes censorship on holocaust denial.
by the way, you sure you wanna equate censorship tactics to deflect criticism on Bush and Mohammad in the same sentence? not to mention equating a major plank of NeoNazism and Islam to oppose freespeech? think again.
``and another thing raw moron -- by your own logic, then those who published the cartoons against Muhammad, it could be argued, are racists against Muslims``
You in your infantile rage equated gemran position with my position. I made an aside on german position in #46.
Please, do accept my sympathies in advance as next few years will be even more agonizing and deeply disappointing for you and Mohammad`s soul.
Ayan Hirsi Ali is working on another movie project. :-)
``so raw moron, you`re saying that moses and muhammad arent given the same protection, or shouldnt be given the same protection, as given to messrs bush and blair?``
nope. my position is absolute (as an Individual) on freespeech. i oppose all kinds of censorship that includes censorship on holocaust denial.
by the way, you sure you wanna equate censorship tactics to deflect criticism on Bush and Mohammad in the same sentence? not to mention equating a major plank of NeoNazism and Islam to oppose freespeech? think again.
``and another thing raw moron -- by your own logic, then those who published the cartoons against Muhammad, it could be argued, are racists against Muslims``
You in your infantile rage equated gemran position with my position. I made an aside on german position in #46.
Please, do accept my sympathies in advance as next few years will be even more agonizing and deeply disappointing for you and Mohammad`s soul.
Ayan Hirsi Ali is working on another movie project. :-)
#66 Posted by aquaris on February 7, 2006 7:01:21 am
TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- A prominent Iranian newspaper says it is going to hold a competition for cartoons on the Holocaust to test whether the West will apply the principle of freedom of expression to the Nazi genocide against Jews as it did to the caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed.
Hamshahri invited foreign cartoonists to enter the competition and said it wanted to see how open the West was to caricatures of the Holocaust.
Does the West extend freedom of expression to the crimes committed by the United States and Israel, or an event such as the Holocaust? Or is its freedom only for insulting religious sanctities?`` Hamshahri wrote, referring to the Prophet Mohammed cartoons, in a short article on its back page.
Source:-
http://www.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/meast/02/07/iran.cartoon.ap/index.html
#65 Posted by arjun_m on February 7, 2006 6:57:10 am
bears repeating..
Tolerance Toward Intolerance
By Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff
It`s worth remembering that the controversy started out as a well-meaning attempt to write a children`s book about the life of the prophet Muhammad. The book was designed to promote religious tolerance. But the author encountered the consequences of religious hatred when he looked for an illustrator. He could not find one. Denmark`s artists seemed to fear for their lives. In turning down the job they mentioned the fate of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, murdered by an Islamic fundamentalist for harshly criticizing fundamentalism.
When this episode percolated to the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, the paper`s cultural editor commissioned the caricatures. He wanted to see whether cartoonists would self-censor their work for fear of violence from Muslim radicals. Still, the European media ignored this story in a small Scandinavian country. It took months, a boycott of Danish products in the Arab world and the intervention of such champions of religious freedom as the governments of Syria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Libya (all of which withdrew their ambassadors from Copenhagen) for some European papers to reconsider their stance on the cartoons. By last week it was not an obscure topic anymore but front-page news. And it wasn`t about religious sensibilities as much as about free speech. That`s when the cartoons started to show up in papers all over Europe.
Much of the U.S. reporting about the fracas made it appear as if Europeans just don`t get it -- again. They struggle with immigration. They struggle with religion. They struggle with respect for minorities. And in the end they find their cities burning, as evidenced in Paris. Bill Clinton even detected an ``anti-Islamic prejudice`` and equated it with a previous ``anti-Semitic prejudice.``
The former president has turned the argument upside down. In this jihad over humor, tolerance is disdained by people who demand it of others. The authoritarian governments that claim to speak on behalf of Europe`s supposedly oppressed Muslim minorities practice systematic repression against their own religious minorities. They have radicalized what was at first a difficult question. Now they are asking not for respect but for submission. They want non-Muslims in Europe to live by Muslim rules. Does Bill Clinton want to counsel tolerance toward intolerance?
On Friday the State Department found it appropriate to intervene. It blasted the publication of the cartoons as unacceptable incitement to religious hatred. It is a peculiar moment when the government of the United States, which likes to see itself as the home of free speech, suggests to European journalists what not to print.
The writer is Washington bureau chief of the German newsweekly Die Zeit.
Tolerance Toward Intolerance
By Thomas Kleine-Brockhoff
It`s worth remembering that the controversy started out as a well-meaning attempt to write a children`s book about the life of the prophet Muhammad. The book was designed to promote religious tolerance. But the author encountered the consequences of religious hatred when he looked for an illustrator. He could not find one. Denmark`s artists seemed to fear for their lives. In turning down the job they mentioned the fate of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh, murdered by an Islamic fundamentalist for harshly criticizing fundamentalism.
When this episode percolated to the Danish daily Jyllands-Posten, the paper`s cultural editor commissioned the caricatures. He wanted to see whether cartoonists would self-censor their work for fear of violence from Muslim radicals. Still, the European media ignored this story in a small Scandinavian country. It took months, a boycott of Danish products in the Arab world and the intervention of such champions of religious freedom as the governments of Syria, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Libya (all of which withdrew their ambassadors from Copenhagen) for some European papers to reconsider their stance on the cartoons. By last week it was not an obscure topic anymore but front-page news. And it wasn`t about religious sensibilities as much as about free speech. That`s when the cartoons started to show up in papers all over Europe.
Much of the U.S. reporting about the fracas made it appear as if Europeans just don`t get it -- again. They struggle with immigration. They struggle with religion. They struggle with respect for minorities. And in the end they find their cities burning, as evidenced in Paris. Bill Clinton even detected an ``anti-Islamic prejudice`` and equated it with a previous ``anti-Semitic prejudice.``
The former president has turned the argument upside down. In this jihad over humor, tolerance is disdained by people who demand it of others. The authoritarian governments that claim to speak on behalf of Europe`s supposedly oppressed Muslim minorities practice systematic repression against their own religious minorities. They have radicalized what was at first a difficult question. Now they are asking not for respect but for submission. They want non-Muslims in Europe to live by Muslim rules. Does Bill Clinton want to counsel tolerance toward intolerance?
On Friday the State Department found it appropriate to intervene. It blasted the publication of the cartoons as unacceptable incitement to religious hatred. It is a peculiar moment when the government of the United States, which likes to see itself as the home of free speech, suggests to European journalists what not to print.
The writer is Washington bureau chief of the German newsweekly Die Zeit.
#64 Posted by masanamuthu on February 7, 2006 4:37:22 am
This whole episode is very funny..
I`m waiting for videos next.. starrring Muhammad and Ayesha.. :-)
I`m waiting for videos next.. starrring Muhammad and Ayesha.. :-)
#63 Posted by arjun_m on February 7, 2006 4:26:39 am
For France to follow the Danish example and publish the cartoons out of spite seems also extremely foolish given that they`ve not yet cleaned up the ashes of the last Paris riots.
Let`s see..
this obviously means that France should have learnt it`s lesson from the riots..That`s like saying a rape should teach a woman to cover he head..somehow it completely absolves the behaviour of the rapist and puts the onus on the woman..as if she was somehow to blame..
#62 Posted by omar_r_quraishi on February 7, 2006 3:57:52 am
yawn
http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,,1703500,00.html?gusrc=ticker-103704
Danish paper rejected Jesus cartoons
Gwladys Fouché
Monday February 6, 2006
Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published the cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that have caused a storm of protest throughout the Islamic world, refused to run drawings lampooning Jesus Christ, it has emerged today.
The Danish daily turned down the cartoons of Christ three years ago, on the grounds that they could be offensive to readers and were not funny.
In April 2003, Danish illustrator Christoffer Zieler submitted a series of unsolicited cartoons dealing with the resurrection of Christ to Jyllands-Posten.
Zieler received an email back from the paper`s Sunday editor, Jens Kaiser, which said: ``I don`t think Jyllands-Posten`s readers will enjoy the drawings. As a matter of fact, I think that they will provoke an outcry. Therefore, I will not use them.``
The illustrator said: ``I see the cartoons as an innocent joke, of the type that my Christian grandfather would enjoy.``
``I showed them to a few pastors and they thought they were funny.``
But the Jyllands-Posten editor in question, Mr Kaiser, said that the case was ``ridiculous to bring forward now. It has nothing to do with the Muhammad cartoons.
``In the Muhammad drawings case, we asked the illustrators to do it. I did not ask for these cartoons. That`s the difference,`` he said.
``The illustrator thought his cartoons were funny. I did not think so. It would offend some readers, not much but some.``
The decision smacks of ``double-standards``, said Ahmed Akkari, spokesman for the Danish-based European Committee for Prophet Honouring, the umbrella group that represents 27 Muslim organisations that are campaigning for a full apology from Jyllands-Posten.
``How can Jyllands-Posten distinguish the two cases? Surely they must understand,`` Mr Akkari added.
Meanwhile, the editor of a Malaysian newspaper resigned over the weekend after printing one of the Muhammad cartoons that have unleashed a storm of protest across the Islamic world.
Malaysia`s Sunday Tribune, based in the remote state of Sarawak, on Borneo island, ran one of the Danish cartoons on Saturday. It is unclear which one of the 12 drawings was reprinted.
Printed on page 12 of the paper, the cartoon illustrated an article about the lack of impact of the controversy in Malaysia, a country with a majority Muslim population.
The newspaper apologised and expressed ``profound regret over the unauthorised publication``, in a front page statement on Sunday.
``Our internal inquiry revealed that the editor on duty, who was responsible for the same publication, had done it all alone by himself without authority in compliance with the prescribed procedures as required for such news,`` the statement said.
The editor, who has not been named, regretted his mistake, apologised and tendered his resignation, according to the statement.
· To contact the MediaGuardian newsdesk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 7239 9857
http://media.guardian.co.uk/site/story/0,,1703500,00.html?gusrc=ticker-103704
Danish paper rejected Jesus cartoons
Gwladys Fouché
Monday February 6, 2006
Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published the cartoons of the prophet Muhammad that have caused a storm of protest throughout the Islamic world, refused to run drawings lampooning Jesus Christ, it has emerged today.
The Danish daily turned down the cartoons of Christ three years ago, on the grounds that they could be offensive to readers and were not funny.
In April 2003, Danish illustrator Christoffer Zieler submitted a series of unsolicited cartoons dealing with the resurrection of Christ to Jyllands-Posten.
Zieler received an email back from the paper`s Sunday editor, Jens Kaiser, which said: ``I don`t think Jyllands-Posten`s readers will enjoy the drawings. As a matter of fact, I think that they will provoke an outcry. Therefore, I will not use them.``
The illustrator said: ``I see the cartoons as an innocent joke, of the type that my Christian grandfather would enjoy.``
``I showed them to a few pastors and they thought they were funny.``
But the Jyllands-Posten editor in question, Mr Kaiser, said that the case was ``ridiculous to bring forward now. It has nothing to do with the Muhammad cartoons.
``In the Muhammad drawings case, we asked the illustrators to do it. I did not ask for these cartoons. That`s the difference,`` he said.
``The illustrator thought his cartoons were funny. I did not think so. It would offend some readers, not much but some.``
The decision smacks of ``double-standards``, said Ahmed Akkari, spokesman for the Danish-based European Committee for Prophet Honouring, the umbrella group that represents 27 Muslim organisations that are campaigning for a full apology from Jyllands-Posten.
``How can Jyllands-Posten distinguish the two cases? Surely they must understand,`` Mr Akkari added.
Meanwhile, the editor of a Malaysian newspaper resigned over the weekend after printing one of the Muhammad cartoons that have unleashed a storm of protest across the Islamic world.
Malaysia`s Sunday Tribune, based in the remote state of Sarawak, on Borneo island, ran one of the Danish cartoons on Saturday. It is unclear which one of the 12 drawings was reprinted.
Printed on page 12 of the paper, the cartoon illustrated an article about the lack of impact of the controversy in Malaysia, a country with a majority Muslim population.
The newspaper apologised and expressed ``profound regret over the unauthorised publication``, in a front page statement on Sunday.
``Our internal inquiry revealed that the editor on duty, who was responsible for the same publication, had done it all alone by himself without authority in compliance with the prescribed procedures as required for such news,`` the statement said.
The editor, who has not been named, regretted his mistake, apologised and tendered his resignation, according to the statement.
· To contact the MediaGuardian newsdesk email editor@mediaguardian.co.uk or phone 020 7239 9857
#61 Posted by Bina_Shah on February 7, 2006 1:42:00 am
Re: # 51
Arjun M - I have not rationalized the Paris riots, the targeting of Salman Rushdie, or the murder of Theo Van Gogh, neither in this article nor anywhere else on Chowk. To me this verges on the point of slander and you`d better prove your point by showing where exactly I`ve done any of that or retract your statement.
Arjun M - I have not rationalized the Paris riots, the targeting of Salman Rushdie, or the murder of Theo Van Gogh, neither in this article nor anywhere else on Chowk. To me this verges on the point of slander and you`d better prove your point by showing where exactly I`ve done any of that or retract your statement.
#60 Posted by omar_r_quraishi on February 7, 2006 1:32:54 am
arjun man this is getting boring -- you should learn one lesson of debate -- that is if such a word is in your lexicon -- you dont win a debate by questioning the personal character of your interlocutor -- you, since you say you live in the US, and since you are master of all that you cut and paste, would surely have known that over the years the First Amendment has come under increasing scrutiny and several cases have in effect impost various limitations on it -- so shri arjun jee, i wasn`t smoking anything but expected that even a moron like you would be aware of such facts -- in case you aren`t --
this is from the ACLU website -- one of the biggest advocates of unfettered freedom of speech in the US:
Q: Aren`t some kinds of communication not protected under the First Amendment, like ``fighting words?``
A: The U.S. Supreme Court did rule in 1942, in a case called Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, that intimidating speech directed at a specific individual in a face-to-face confrontation amounts to ``fighting words,`` and that the person engaging in such speech can be punished if ``by their very utterance [the words] inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.`` Say, a white student stops a black student on campus and utters a racial slur. In that one-on-one confrontation, which could easily come to blows, the offending student could be disciplined under the ``fighting words`` doctrine for racial harassment.
Over the past 50 years, however, the Court hasn`t found the ``fighting words`` doctrine applicable in any of the hate speech cases that have come before it, since the incidents involved didn`t meet the narrow criteria stated above. Ignoring that history, the folks who advocate campus speech codes try to stretch the doctrine`s application to fit words or symbols that cause discomfort, offense or emotional pain.
AND
Q: What about nonverbal symbols, like swastikas and burning crosses -- are they constitutionally protected?
A: Symbols of hate are constitutionally protected if they`re worn or displayed before a general audience in a public place -- say, in a march or at a rally in a public park. But the First Amendment doesn`t protect the use of nonverbal symbols to encroach upon, or desecrate, private property, such as burning a cross on someone`s lawn or spray-painting a swastika on the wall of a synagogue or dorm
AND (from wikipedia -- amazing that the king of cut and paste would not have seen it)
Sedition
Remarkably, the Supreme Court did not consider a single case in which it was asked to strike down a federal law on the basis of the free speech clause until the twentieth century. The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 were never ruled upon by the Supreme Court, and even the leading critics of the law, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, argued for the laws` unconstitutionality on the basis of the Tenth Amendment, not the First Amendment.
After World War I, several cases involving laws limiting speech came before the Supreme Court. The Espionage Act of 1917 imposed a maximum sentence of twenty years for anyone who caused or attempted to cause ``insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, or refusal of duty in the military or naval forces of the United States.`` Under the Act, over two thousand prosecutions were commenced. For instance, one filmmaker was sentenced to ten years imprisonment because his portrayal of British soldiers in a movie about the American Revolution impugned the good faith of an American ally, the United Kingdom. The Sedition Act of 1918 went even farther, criminalizing ``disloyal,`` ``scurrilous`` or ``abusive`` language against the government.
The Supreme Court was for the first time requested to strike down a law violating the free speech clause in 1919. The case involved Charles Schenck, who had during the war published leaflets challenging the conscription system then in effect. The Supreme Court unanimously upheld Schenck`s conviction for violating the Espionage Act when it decided Schenck v. United States. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., writing for the Court, suggested that ``the question in every case is whether the words used are in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.``
The ``clear and present danger`` test of Schenck was extended in Debs v. United States, again by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. The case involved a speech made by Eugene V. Debs, a political activist. Debs had not spoken any words that posed a ``clear and present danger`` to the conscription system, but a speech in which he denounced militarism was nonetheless found to be sufficient grounds for his conviction. Justice Holmes suggested that the speech had a ``natural tendency`` to occlude the draft.
Thus, the Supreme Court effectively shaped the First Amendment in such a manner as to permit a multitude of restrictions on speech. Further restrictions on speech were accepted by the Supreme Court when it decided Gitlow v. New York in 1925. Writing for the majority, Justice Edward Sanford suggested that states could punish words that ``by their very nature, involve danger to the public peace and to the security of the state.`` Lawmakers were given the freedom to decide which speech would constitute a danger.
Freedom of speech was influenced by anti-Communism during the Cold War. In 1940, Congress replaced the Sedition Act of 1918, which had expired in 1921. The Smith Act passed in that year made punishable the advocacy of ``the propriety of overthrowing or destroying any government in the United States by force and violence.`` The law was mainly used as a weapon against Communist leaders. The constitutionality of the Act was questioned in the case Dennis v. United States. The Court upheld the law in 1951 by a six-two vote (one Justice, Tom C. Clark, did not participate because he had previously ordered the prosecutions when he was Attorney General). Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson relied on Oliver Wendell Holmes` ``clear and present danger`` test when he wrote for the majority. Vinson suggested that the doctrine did not require the government to ``wait until the putsch is about to be executed, the plans have been laid and the signal is awaited``, thereby broadly defining the words ``clear and present danger``. Thus, even though there was no immediate danger posed by the Communist Party`s ideas, their speech was restricted by the Court.
Dennis v. United States has never been explicitly overruled by the Court, but future decisions have in practice reversed the case. In 1957, the Court changed its interpretation of the Smith Act in deciding Yates v. United States. The Supreme Court ruled that the Act was aimed at ``the advocacy of action, not ideas``. Thus, the advocacy of abstract doctrine remains protected under the First Amendment. Only speech explicitly inciting the forcible overthrow of the government remains punishable under the Smith Act.
The Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren expanded free speech protections in the 1960s, though there were exceptions. In 1968, for example, the Court upheld a law prohibiting the mutilation of draft cards in United States v. O`Brien. The Court ruled that protesters could not burn draft cards because doing so would interfere with the ``smooth and efficient functioning`` of the draft system.
In 1969, the Supreme Court ruled that free speech rights extended to students in school while deciding Tinker v. Des Moines. The case involved several students who were punished for wearing black arm-bands to protest the Vietnam War. The Supreme Court ruled that the school could not restrict symbolic speech that did not cause undue interruptions of school activities. Justice Abe Fortas wrote, ``state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students...are possessed of fundamental rights which the State must respect, just as they themselves must respect their obligations to the State.`` The decision was arguably overruled, or at least undermined, by Bethel School District v. Fraser (1986), in which the Court held a student could be punished for his speech before a public assembly.
Also in 1969, the Court decided the landmark Brandenburg v. Ohio, which overruled Whitney v. California, a 1927 case in which a woman was imprisoned for aiding the Communist Party. Brandenburg effectively swept away Dennis as well, casting the right to speak freely of violent action and revolution in broad terms: ``[Our] decisions have fashioned the principle that the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.`` Some claim that Brandenburg essentially sets forth a reworded ``clear and present danger`` test, but the accuracy of such statements is hard to judge. The Court has never heard or decided a case involving seditious speech since Brandenburg was handed down.
The divisive issue of flag burning as a form of protest came before the Supreme Court in 1989, as it decided Texas v. Johnson. The Supreme Court reversed the conviction of Gregory Johnson for burning the flag by a vote of five to four. Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. asserted that ``if there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable.`` Many in Congress vilified the decision of the Court. The House unanimously passed a resolution denouncing the Court; the Senate did the same with only three dissents. Congress passed a federal law barring flag burning, but the Supreme Court struck it down as well in United States v. Eichman (1990). Many attempts have been made to amend the Constitution to allow Congress to prohibit the desecration of the flag. Since 1995, the Flag Burning Amendment has consistently mustered sufficient votes to pass in the House of Representatives, but not in the Senate. In 2000, the Senate voted 63–37 in favor of the amendment, which fell four votes short of the requisite two-thirds majority.
[edit]
Obscenity
The federal government and the states have long been permitted to restrict obscene or pornographic speech. While obscene speech generally has no protection under the First Amendment, pornography is subject to little regulation. The exact definition of obscenity and pornography, however, has changed over time.
When it decided Rosen v. United States in 1896, the Supreme Court adopted the same obscenity standard as had been articulated in a famous British case, Regina v. Hicklin. The Hicklin standard defined material as obscene if it tended ``to deprave or corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences, and into whose hands a publication of this sort may fall``. Thus, the standards of the most sensitive members of the community were the standards for obscenity. In 1957, the Court ruled in Roth v. United States that the Hicklin test was inappropriate. Instead, the Roth test for obscenity was ``whether to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest.``
In 1964 Justice Potter Stewart famously stated that although he could not precisely define pornography, ``I know it when I see it.``
The Roth test was expanded when the Court decided Miller v. California in 1973. Under the Miller test, a work is obscene if it would be found appealing to the prurient interest by an average person applying contemporary community standards, depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive way and has no serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value. Note that ``community`` standards—not national standards—are applied as to whether the material appeals to the prurient interest; thus, material may be deemed obscene in one locality but not in another. National standards, however, are applied as to whether the material is of value. Child pornography is not subject to the Miller test, as the Supreme Court decided in 1982. The Court felt that the government`s interest in protecting children from abuse was paramount.
Yet, personal possession of obscene material in the home may not be prohibited by law. In writing for the Court in the case of Stanley v. Georgia, Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote, ``if the First Amendment means anything, it means that a State has no business telling a man sitting in his own house what books he may read or what films he may watch.`` It is not, however, unconstitutional for the government to prevent the mailing or sale of obscene items, though they may be viewed only in private. Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition (2002) further upholds these rights by invalidating the 1996 Child Pornography Prevention Act, holding that ``banning the depiction of pornographic images of children, including computer-generated images, was overly broad and unconstitutional under the First Amendment``. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote: ``First Amendment freedoms are most in danger when the government seeks to control thought or to justify its laws for that impermissible end. The right to think is the beginning of freedom, and speech must be protected from the government because speech is the beginning of thought.``
U.S. courts have upheld certain regulation of pornographic speech. U.S. courts have found that regulation and banning pornography as a way of protecting children meets the strict scrutiny test. A zoning regulation which restricts where pornography can be viewed is valid if the purpose for the statute is based on secondary effects, the zoning is not related to the suppression of the pornographic content and the statute makes other ways of viewing the content.
[edit]
Libel, slander, and private action
The American prohibition on defamatory speech or publications—slander and libel—traces its origins to English law. The nature of defamation law was vitally changed by the Supreme Court in 1964, while deciding New York Times Co. v. Sullivan. The New York Times had published an advertisement indicating that officials in Montgomery, Alabama had acted violently in suppressing the protests of African-Americans during the Civil Rights Movement. The Montgomery Police Commissioner, L. B. Sullivan, sued the Times for libel on the grounds that the advertisement damaged his reputation. The Supreme Court unanimously overruled the $500,000 judgment against the Times. Justice William J. Brennan suggested that public officials may sue for libel only if the publisher published the statements in question with ``actual malice``, a difficult standard to meet.
The actual malice standard applies to both public officials and public figures, including celebrities. Though the details vary from state to state, private individuals normally need only to prove negligence on the part of the defendant.
As the Supreme Court ruled in Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. (1974), opinions cannot be considered defamatory. It is thus permissible to suggest, for instance, that a lawyer is a bad one, but not permissible to declare that the lawyer is ignorant of the law: the former constitutes a statement of values, but the latter is a statement alleging a fact.
More recently, in Milkovich v. Lorain Journal Co. 497 U.S. 1 (1990), the Supreme Court backed off from the protection from ``opinion`` announced in Gertz. The court in Milkovich specifically held that there is no wholesale exemption to defamation law for statements labeled ``opinion,`` but instead that a statement must be provably false (falsifiable) before it can be the subject of a libel suit.
In 1988, Hustler Magazine v. Falwell extended the ``actual malice`` standard to intentional infliction of emotional distress in a ruling which protected a parodic caricature. In the ruling, ``actual malice`` was described as ``knowledge that the statement was false or with reckless disregard as to whether or not it was true.``
Ordinarily, the First Amendment only applies to prohibit direct government censorship. The protection from libel suits recognizes that the power of the state is needed to enforce a libel judgment between private persons. The Supreme Court`s scrutiny of defamation suits is thus sometimes considered part of a broader trend in U.S. jurisprudence away from the strict state action requirement, and into the application of First Amendment principles when private actors invoke state power.
Likewise, the Noerr-Pennington doctrine is a rule of law that often prohibits the application of antitrust law to statements made by competitors before public bodies: a monopolist may freely go before the city council and urge the denial of its competitor`s building permit without being subject to Sherman Act liability. This principle is being applied to litigation outside the antitrust context, including state tort suits for intentional interference with business relations and ``SLAPP Suits``.
Similarly, some states have adopted, under their protections for free speech, the Pruneyard doctrine, which prohibits private property owners whose property is equivalent to a traditional public forum (often shopping malls and grocery stores) from enforcing their private property rights to exclude political speakers and petition-gatherers. This doctrine has been rejected as a matter of federal constitutional law, but is meeting growing acceptance as a matter of state law.
[edit]
Political speech
The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 and related laws restricted the monetary contributions that may be made to political campaigns and expenditure by candidates. The Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of the Act in Buckley v. Valeo, decided in 1976. The Court affirmed some parts of the Act and rejected others. The Court concluded that limits on campaign contributions ``serve[d] the basic governmental interest in safeguarding the integrity of the electoral process without directly impinging upon the rights of individual citizens and candidates to engage in political debate and discussion.`` At the same time, the Court overturned the expenditure limits, which it found imposed ``substantial restraints on the quantity of political speech.``
Further rules on campaign finance were scrutinized by the Court when it determined McConnell v. Federal Election Commission in 2003. The case centered on the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, a law that introduced several new restrictions on campaign financing. The Supreme Court upheld provisions which barred the raising of soft money by national parties and the use of soft money by private organizations to finance certain election-related advertisements. At the same time, the Court struck down the ``choice of expenditure`` rule, which required that parties could either make coordinated expenditures for all its candidates, or permit candidates to spend independently, but not both, further stating that a ``provision place[d] an unconstitutional burden on the parties` right to make unlimited independent expenditures.`` The Supreme Court also ruled that the provision preventing minors from making political contributions was unconstitutional, relying on the precedent on the Tinker case. For additional details, see campaign finance reform.
The ``free speech zone`` at the 2004 Democratic National ConventionFree speech zones are areas set aside in public places for political activists to exercise their right of free speech. Free speech zones are set up by the Secret Service who scout locations where the president is to pass through or speak at. Officials target those who carry anti-Bush signs (and sometimes pro-Bush signs) and escort them to the free speech zones prior to and during the event. Reporters are often barred by local officials from displaying protesters on camera or speaking to them within the zone. Protesters who refuse to go to the free speech zone are often arrested and charged with trespassing, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. In 2003, a seldom-used federal law was brought up that says that ``entering a restricted area around the President of the United States`` is a crime.
[edit]
Involuntary commitment
A small minority has questioned whether involuntary commitment laws, when the diagnosis of mental illness leading, in whole or in part, to the commitment, was made to some degree on the basis of the speech or writings of the committed individual, violates the right of freedom of speech of such individuals.
The First Amendment implications of involuntary psychiatric drugging have also been questioned. Though the District Court in Mills v. Rogers 457 U.S. 291 (1982) found that ``whatever powers the Constitution has granted our government, involuntary mind control is not one of them,`` this finding was not of precedential value, and the Supreme Court ruling was essentially inconclusive.
[edit]
Freedom of the Press
Main article: Freedom of the press
Freedom of the press, like freedom of speech, is subject to restrictions on bases such as defamation law. Restrictions, however, have been struck down if they are aimed at the political message or content of newspapers.
In Branzburg v. Hayes (1972), the Court placed limits on the ability of the Press to refuse a subpoena from a Grand Jury based on claims of Freedom of the Press. The issue decided in the case was whether a reporter could refuse to ``appear and testify before state and Federal grand juries`` basing the refusal on the contention that such appearance and testimony ``abridges the freedom of speech and press guaranteed by the First Amendment.`` The 5-4 decision was that such a protection was not provided by the First Amendment.
[edit]
Taxation of the press
State governments retain the right to tax newspapers, just as they may tax other commercial products. Generally, however, taxes that focus exclusively on newspapers have been found unconstitutional. In Grosjean v. American Press Co. (1936), the Court invalidated a state tax on newspaper advertising revenues. Similarly, some taxes that give preferential treatment to the press have been struck down. In 1987, for instance, the Court invalidated an Arkansas law exempting ``religious, professional, trade and sports journals`` from taxation since the law amounted to the regulation of newspaper content.
In Leathers v. Medlock (1991), the Supreme Court found that states may treat different types of the media differently, such as by taxing cable television, but not newspapers. The Court found that ``differential taxation of speakers, even members of the press, does not implicate the First Amendment unless the tax is directed at, or presents the danger of suppressing, particular ideas.``
this is from the ACLU website -- one of the biggest advocates of unfettered freedom of speech in the US:
Q: Aren`t some kinds of communication not protected under the First Amendment, like ``fighting words?``
A: The U.S. Supreme Court did rule in 1942, in a case called Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire, that intimidating speech directed at a specific individual in a face-to-face confrontation amounts to ``fighting words,`` and that the person engaging in such speech can be punished if ``by their very utterance [the words] inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace.`` Say, a white student stops a black student on campus and utters a racial slur. In that one-on-one confrontation, which could easily come to blows, the offending student could be disciplined under the ``fighting words`` doctrine for racial harassment.
Over the past 50 years, however, the Court hasn`t found the ``fighting words`` doctrine applicable in any of the hate speech cases that have come before it, since the incidents involved didn`t meet the narrow criteria stated above. Ignoring that history, the folks who advocate campus speech codes try to stretch the doctrine`s application to fit words or symbols that cause discomfort, offense or emotional pain.
AND
Q: What about nonverbal symbols, like swastikas and burning crosses -- are they constitutionally protected?
A: Symbols of hate are constitutionally protected if they`re worn or displayed before a general audience in a public place -- say, in a march or at a rally in a public park. But the First Amendment doesn`t protect the use of nonverbal symbols to encroach upon, or desecrate, private property, such as burning a cross on someone`s lawn or spray-painting a swastika on the wall of a synagogue or dorm
AND (from wikipedia -- amazing that the king of cut and paste would not have seen it)
Sedition
Remarkably, the Supreme Court did not consider a single case in which it was asked to strike down a federal law on the basis of the free speech clause until the twentieth century. The Alien and Sedition Acts of 1798 were never ruled upon by the Supreme Court, and even the leading critics of the law, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison, argued for the laws` unconstitutionality on the basis of the Tenth Amendment, not the First Amendment.
After World War I, several cases involving laws limiting speech came before the Supreme Court. The Espionage Act of 1917 imposed a maximum sentence of twenty years for anyone who caused or attempted to cause ``insubordination, disloyalty, mutiny, or refusal of duty in the military or naval forces of the United States.`` Under the Act, over two thousand prosecutions were commenced. For instance, one filmmaker was sentenced to ten years imprisonment because his portrayal of British soldiers in a movie about the American Revolution impugned the good faith of an American ally, the United Kingdom. The Sedition Act of 1918 went even farther, criminalizing ``disloyal,`` ``scurrilous`` or ``abusive`` language against the government.
The Supreme Court was for the first time requested to strike down a law violating the free speech clause in 1919. The case involved Charles Schenck, who had during the war published leaflets challenging the conscription system then in effect. The Supreme Court unanimously upheld Schenck`s conviction for violating the Espionage Act when it decided Schenck v. United States. Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr., writing for the Court, suggested that ``the question in every case is whether the words used are in such circumstances and are of such a nature as to create a clear and present danger that they will bring about the substantive evils that Congress has a right to prevent.``
The ``clear and present danger`` test of Schenck was extended in Debs v. United States, again by Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes. The case involved a speech made by Eugene V. Debs, a political activist. Debs had not spoken any words that posed a ``clear and present danger`` to the conscription system, but a speech in which he denounced militarism was nonetheless found to be sufficient grounds for his conviction. Justice Holmes suggested that the speech had a ``natural tendency`` to occlude the draft.
Thus, the Supreme Court effectively shaped the First Amendment in such a manner as to permit a multitude of restrictions on speech. Further restrictions on speech were accepted by the Supreme Court when it decided Gitlow v. New York in 1925. Writing for the majority, Justice Edward Sanford suggested that states could punish words that ``by their very nature, involve danger to the public peace and to the security of the state.`` Lawmakers were given the freedom to decide which speech would constitute a danger.
Freedom of speech was influenced by anti-Communism during the Cold War. In 1940, Congress replaced the Sedition Act of 1918, which had expired in 1921. The Smith Act passed in that year made punishable the advocacy of ``the propriety of overthrowing or destroying any government in the United States by force and violence.`` The law was mainly used as a weapon against Communist leaders. The constitutionality of the Act was questioned in the case Dennis v. United States. The Court upheld the law in 1951 by a six-two vote (one Justice, Tom C. Clark, did not participate because he had previously ordered the prosecutions when he was Attorney General). Chief Justice Fred M. Vinson relied on Oliver Wendell Holmes` ``clear and present danger`` test when he wrote for the majority. Vinson suggested that the doctrine did not require the government to ``wait until the putsch is about to be executed, the plans have been laid and the signal is awaited``, thereby broadly defining the words ``clear and present danger``. Thus, even though there was no immediate danger posed by the Communist Party`s ideas, their speech was restricted by the Court.
Dennis v. United States has never been explicitly overruled by the Court, but future decisions have in practice reversed the case. In 1957, the Court changed its interpretation of the Smith Act in deciding Yates v. United States. The Supreme Court ruled that the Act was aimed at ``the advocacy of action, not ideas``. Thus, the advocacy of abstract doctrine remains protected under the First Amendment. Only speech explicitly inciting the forcible overthrow of the government remains punishable under the Smith Act.
The Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren expanded free speech protections in the 1960s, though there were exceptions. In 1968, for example, the Court upheld a law prohibiting the mutilation of draft cards in United States v. O`Brien. The Court ruled that protesters could not burn draft cards because doing so would interfere with the ``smooth and efficient functioning`` of the draft system.
In 1969, the Supreme Court ruled that free speech rights extended to students in school while deciding Tinker v. Des Moines. The case involved several students who were punished for wearing black arm-bands to protest the Vietnam War. The Supreme Court ruled that the school could not restrict symbolic speech that did not cause undue interruptions of school activities. Justice Abe Fortas wrote, ``state-operated schools may not be enclaves of totalitarianism. School officials do not possess absolute authority over their students. Students...are possessed of fundamental rights which the State must respect, just as they themselves must respect their obligations to the State.`` The decision was arguably overruled, or at least undermined, by Bethel School District v. Fraser (1986), in which the Court held a student could be punished for his speech before a public assembly.
Also in 1969, the Court decided the landmark Brandenburg v. Ohio, which overruled Whitney v. California, a 1927 case in which a woman was imprisoned for aiding the Communist Party. Brandenburg effectively swept away Dennis as well, casting the right to speak freely of violent action and revolution in broad terms: ``[Our] decisions have fashioned the principle that the constitutional guarantees of free speech and free press do not permit a State to forbid or proscribe advocacy of the use of force or of law violation except where such advocacy is directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action and is likely to incite or produce such action.`` Some claim that Brandenburg essentially sets forth a reworded ``clear and present danger`` test, but the accuracy of such statements is hard to judge. The Court has never heard or decided a case involving seditious speech since Brandenburg was handed down.
The divisive issue of flag burning as a form of protest came before the Supreme Court in 1989, as it decided Texas v. Johnson. The Supreme Court reversed the conviction of Gregory Johnson for burning the flag by a vote of five to four. Justice William J. Brennan, Jr. asserted that ``if there is a bedrock principle underlying the First Amendment, it is that government may not prohibit the expression of an idea simply because society finds the idea offensive or disagreeable.`` Many in Congress vilified the decision of the Court. The House unanimously passed a resolution denouncing the Court; the Senate did the same with only three dissents. Congress passed a federal law barring flag burning, but the Supreme Court struck it down as well in United States v. Eichman (1990). Many attempts have been made to amend the Constitution to allow Congress to prohibit the desecration of the flag. Since 1995, the Flag Burning Amendment has consistently mustered sufficient votes to pass in the House of Representatives, but not in the Senate. In 2000, the Senate voted 63–37 in favor of the amendment, which fell four votes short of the requisite two-thirds majority.
[edit]
Obscenity
The federal government and the states have long been permitted to restrict obscene or pornographic speech. While obscene speech generally has no protection under the First Amendment, pornography is subject to little regulation. The exact definition of obscenity and pornography, however, has changed over time.
When it decided Rosen v. United States in 1896, the Supreme Court adopted the same obscenity standard as had been articulated in a famous British case, Regina v. Hicklin. The Hicklin standard defined material as obscene if it tended ``to deprave or corrupt those whose minds are open to such immoral influences, and into whose hands a publication of this sort may fall``. Thus, the standards of the most sensitive members of the community were the standards for obscenity. In 1957, the Court ruled in Roth v. United States that the Hicklin test was inappropriate. Instead, the Roth test for obscenity was ``whether to the average person, applying contemporary community standards, the dominant theme of the material, taken as a whole, appeals to the prurient interest.``
In 1964 Justice Potter Stewart famously stated that although he could not precisely define pornography, ``I know it when I see it.``
The Roth test was expanded when the Court decided Miller v. California in 1973. Under the Miller test, a work is obscene if it would be found appealing to the prurient interest by an average person applying contemporary community standards, depicts sexual conduct in a patently offensive way and has no serious literary, artistic, political or scientific value. Note that ``community`` standards—not national standards—are applied as to whether the material appeals to the prurient interest; thus, material may be deemed obscene in one locality but not in another. National standards, however, are applied as to whether the material is of value. Child pornography is not subject to the Miller test, as the Supreme Court decided in 1982. The Court felt that the government`s interest in protecting children from abuse was paramount.
Yet, personal possession of obscene material in the home may not be prohibited by law. In writing for the Court in the case of Stanley v. Georgia, Justice Thurgood Marshall wrote, ``if the First Amendment means anything, it means that a State has no business telling a man sitting in his own house what books he may read or what films he may watch.`` It is not, however, unconstitutional for the government to prevent the mailing or sale of obscene items, though they may be viewed only in private. Ashcroft v. Free Speech Coalition (2002) further upholds these rights by invalidating the 1996 Child Pornography Prevention Act, holding that ``banning the depiction of pornographic images of children, including computer-generated images, was overly broad and unconstitutional under the First Amendment``. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy wrote: ``First Amendment freedoms are most in danger when the government seeks to control thought or to justify its laws for that impermissible end. The right to think is the beginning of freedom, and speech must be protected from the government because speech is the beginning of thought.``
U.S. courts have upheld certain regulation of pornographic speech. U.S. courts have found that regulation and banning pornography as a way of protecting children meets the strict scrutiny test. A zoning regulation which restricts where pornography can be viewed is valid if the purpose for the statute is based on secondary effects, the zoning is not related to the suppression of the pornographic content and the statute makes other ways of viewing the content.
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Libel, slander, and private action
The American prohibition on defamatory speech or publications—slander and libel—traces its origins to English law. The nature of defamation law was vitally changed by the Supreme Court in 1964, while deciding New York Times Co. v. Sullivan. The New York Times had published an advertisement indicating that officials in Montgomery, Alabama had acted violently in suppressing the protests of African-Americans during the Civil Rights Movement. The Montgomery Police Commissioner, L. B. Sullivan, sued the Times for libel on the grounds that the advertisement damaged his reputation. The Supreme Court unanimously overruled the $500,000 judgment against the Times. Justice William J. Brennan suggested that public officials may sue for libel only if the publisher published the statements in question with ``actual malice``, a difficult standard to meet.
The actual malice standard applies to both public officials and public figures, including celebrities. Though the details vary from state to state, private individuals normally need only to prove negligence on the part of the defendant.
As the Supreme Court ruled in Gertz v. Robert Welch, Inc. (1974), opinions cannot be considered defamatory. It is thus permissible to suggest, for instance, that a lawyer is a bad one, but not permissible to declare that the lawyer is ignorant of the law: the former constitutes a statement of values, but the latter is a statement alleging a fact.
More recently, in Milkovich v. Lorain Journal Co. 497 U.S. 1 (1990), the Supreme Court backed off from the protection from ``opinion`` announced in Gertz. The court in Milkovich specifically held that there is no wholesale exemption to defamation law for statements labeled ``opinion,`` but instead that a statement must be provably false (falsifiable) before it can be the subject of a libel suit.
In 1988, Hustler Magazine v. Falwell extended the ``actual malice`` standard to intentional infliction of emotional distress in a ruling which protected a parodic caricature. In the ruling, ``actual malice`` was described as ``knowledge that the statement was false or with reckless disregard as to whether or not it was true.``
Ordinarily, the First Amendment only applies to prohibit direct government censorship. The protection from libel suits recognizes that the power of the state is needed to enforce a libel judgment between private persons. The Supreme Court`s scrutiny of defamation suits is thus sometimes considered part of a broader trend in U.S. jurisprudence away from the strict state action requirement, and into the application of First Amendment principles when private actors invoke state power.
Likewise, the Noerr-Pennington doctrine is a rule of law that often prohibits the application of antitrust law to statements made by competitors before public bodies: a monopolist may freely go before the city council and urge the denial of its competitor`s building permit without being subject to Sherman Act liability. This principle is being applied to litigation outside the antitrust context, including state tort suits for intentional interference with business relations and ``SLAPP Suits``.
Similarly, some states have adopted, under their protections for free speech, the Pruneyard doctrine, which prohibits private property owners whose property is equivalent to a traditional public forum (often shopping malls and grocery stores) from enforcing their private property rights to exclude political speakers and petition-gatherers. This doctrine has been rejected as a matter of federal constitutional law, but is meeting growing acceptance as a matter of state law.
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Political speech
The Federal Election Campaign Act of 1971 and related laws restricted the monetary contributions that may be made to political campaigns and expenditure by candidates. The Supreme Court considered the constitutionality of the Act in Buckley v. Valeo, decided in 1976. The Court affirmed some parts of the Act and rejected others. The Court concluded that limits on campaign contributions ``serve[d] the basic governmental interest in safeguarding the integrity of the electoral process without directly impinging upon the rights of individual citizens and candidates to engage in political debate and discussion.`` At the same time, the Court overturned the expenditure limits, which it found imposed ``substantial restraints on the quantity of political speech.``
Further rules on campaign finance were scrutinized by the Court when it determined McConnell v. Federal Election Commission in 2003. The case centered on the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act of 2002, a law that introduced several new restrictions on campaign financing. The Supreme Court upheld provisions which barred the raising of soft money by national parties and the use of soft money by private organizations to finance certain election-related advertisements. At the same time, the Court struck down the ``choice of expenditure`` rule, which required that parties could either make coordinated expenditures for all its candidates, or permit candidates to spend independently, but not both, further stating that a ``provision place[d] an unconstitutional burden on the parties` right to make unlimited independent expenditures.`` The Supreme Court also ruled that the provision preventing minors from making political contributions was unconstitutional, relying on the precedent on the Tinker case. For additional details, see campaign finance reform.
The ``free speech zone`` at the 2004 Democratic National ConventionFree speech zones are areas set aside in public places for political activists to exercise their right of free speech. Free speech zones are set up by the Secret Service who scout locations where the president is to pass through or speak at. Officials target those who carry anti-Bush signs (and sometimes pro-Bush signs) and escort them to the free speech zones prior to and during the event. Reporters are often barred by local officials from displaying protesters on camera or speaking to them within the zone. Protesters who refuse to go to the free speech zone are often arrested and charged with trespassing, disorderly conduct and resisting arrest. In 2003, a seldom-used federal law was brought up that says that ``entering a restricted area around the President of the United States`` is a crime.
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Involuntary commitment
A small minority has questioned whether involuntary commitment laws, when the diagnosis of mental illness leading, in whole or in part, to the commitment, was made to some degree on the basis of the speech or writings of the committed individual, violates the right of freedom of speech of such individuals.
The First Amendment implications of involuntary psychiatric drugging have also been questioned. Though the District Court in Mills v. Rogers 457 U.S. 291 (1982) found that ``whatever powers the Constitution has granted our government, involuntary mind control is not one of them,`` this finding was not of precedential value, and the Supreme Court ruling was essentially inconclusive.
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Freedom of the Press
Main article: Freedom of the press
Freedom of the press, like freedom of speech, is subject to restrictions on bases such as defamation law. Restrictions, however, have been struck down if they are aimed at the political message or content of newspapers.
In Branzburg v. Hayes (1972), the Court placed limits on the ability of the Press to refuse a subpoena from a Grand Jury based on claims of Freedom of the Press. The issue decided in the case was whether a reporter could refuse to ``appear and testify before state and Federal grand juries`` basing the refusal on the contention that such appearance and testimony ``abridges the freedom of speech and press guaranteed by the First Amendment.`` The 5-4 decision was that such a protection was not provided by the First Amendment.
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Taxation of the press
State governments retain the right to tax newspapers, just as they may tax other commercial products. Generally, however, taxes that focus exclusively on newspapers have been found unconstitutional. In Grosjean v. American Press Co. (1936), the Court invalidated a state tax on newspaper advertising revenues. Similarly, some taxes that give preferential treatment to the press have been struck down. In 1987, for instance, the Court invalidated an Arkansas law exempting ``religious, professional, trade and sports journals`` from taxation since the law amounted to the regulation of newspaper content.
In Leathers v. Medlock (1991), the Supreme Court found that states may treat different types of the media differently, such as by taxing cable television, but not newspapers. The Court found that ``differential taxation of speakers, even members of the press, does not implicate the First Amendment unless the tax is directed at, or presents the danger of suppressing, particular ideas.``
#59 Posted by omar_r_quraishi on February 7, 2006 12:55:45 am
raw dust -- i wonder which world you`re living in -- i donty know about prophets but even the British royal family has protection in the press -- there is no such thing as complete freedom of speech anywhere and any moron who thinks so is well ... a moron -- even in the UK, recently the govt issued a `gag order` prohibiting newspapers from publishing a memo which detailed a private conversation between bush and blair and had it been published it would have embarrassed the US president -- so raw moron, you`re saying that moses and muhammad arent given the same protection, or shouldnt be given the same protection, as given to messrs bush and blair?
and another thing raw moron -- by your own logic, then those who published the cartoons against Muhammad, it could be argued, are racists against Muslims
rf786 -- just because something is taken as a given does not mean it needn`t be mentioned, esp when doing so brings in a clear case of application of double standards -- also, my point wasn`t to say that everything is hunky dory in muslim communities in europe but rather that in this particular instance the double standards are a bit too blatant to ignore
and another thing raw moron -- by your own logic, then those who published the cartoons against Muhammad, it could be argued, are racists against Muslims
rf786 -- just because something is taken as a given does not mean it needn`t be mentioned, esp when doing so brings in a clear case of application of double standards -- also, my point wasn`t to say that everything is hunky dory in muslim communities in europe but rather that in this particular instance the double standards are a bit too blatant to ignore
#58 Posted by rf786 on February 7, 2006 12:05:25 am
Re: # 56
Dear Zeena Princess Warrior,
Anger does not solve any problems, torching of emabssies makes things even worse by confirming the stereotypical image of Muslims that they are violent, unforgiving, uncouthe, barbaric (issueing videos of beheadings), and lack any sense of civility which is the pre-requisite for a civilzed dialogue. How can we claim that we are treated badly when we behave badly? Protests are fine, peaceful, civilized protests the sort demonstrated by millions of Europeans protesting against the Iraq war. Give me one example where Muslim populations have ever bothered to demonstrate against their Governments for people they have nothing to do with and very well know will slit their throats if they wandered into their land. How many Muslim demonstrations did you see against the Dharfur genocide committed by Sudanese Muslims? By the way it was Muslims massacring Muslims simply because the dominant entity spoke Arabic while the other weaker party did not.
Saddam gassed the Kurds, Iranians yet the Muslim world chose to stay silent cause it was kosher to kill children of a lesser god. Saudi`s continue to desecrate and destroy Islamic history, yet not a squeak from the Muslims world, God forbid the Saudis were to get offended. Pak army killed hundreds of thousand in East Pakistan, then Baluchistan, Karachi and now Baluchistan again. Indonesian dictator`s under the patronage of CIA massacred millions in the name of war against communism, has any muslim ever confronted these Govts? When those loony bins Taliban destroyed the Baimyan Statutes of Buddha, did the Muslim world even flinch?
Fact is Dear Princess Warrior, we Muslims enjoy western values yet live in a world of self-righteousness that makes everything western offensive. In English its called hypocrisy and in Arabic `Munafiqat`.
If the Danish cartoons offend you, then please take a look in the mirror and ask yourself the question ``what has the current muslim world done for this world?``. Given suicide bombings, beheadings, violent protests, religious intolerance, bigotry, ethnic discrimination, petrodollar self indulgence, genocides, crimes against women, child camel jockeys etc etc etc.
Its about time Muslims woke up and smelt the coffee (Kahwa), for time is running out...
Dear Zeena Princess Warrior,
Anger does not solve any problems, torching of emabssies makes things even worse by confirming the stereotypical image of Muslims that they are violent, unforgiving, uncouthe, barbaric (issueing videos of beheadings), and lack any sense of civility which is the pre-requisite for a civilzed dialogue. How can we claim that we are treated badly when we behave badly? Protests are fine, peaceful, civilized protests the sort demonstrated by millions of Europeans protesting against the Iraq war. Give me one example where Muslim populations have ever bothered to demonstrate against their Governments for people they have nothing to do with and very well know will slit their throats if they wandered into their land. How many Muslim demonstrations did you see against the Dharfur genocide committed by Sudanese Muslims? By the way it was Muslims massacring Muslims simply because the dominant entity spoke Arabic while the other weaker party did not.
Saddam gassed the Kurds, Iranians yet the Muslim world chose to stay silent cause it was kosher to kill children of a lesser god. Saudi`s continue to desecrate and destroy Islamic history, yet not a squeak from the Muslims world, God forbid the Saudis were to get offended. Pak army killed hundreds of thousand in East Pakistan, then Baluchistan, Karachi and now Baluchistan again. Indonesian dictator`s under the patronage of CIA massacred millions in the name of war against communism, has any muslim ever confronted these Govts? When those loony bins Taliban destroyed the Baimyan Statutes of Buddha, did the Muslim world even flinch?
Fact is Dear Princess Warrior, we Muslims enjoy western values yet live in a world of self-righteousness that makes everything western offensive. In English its called hypocrisy and in Arabic `Munafiqat`.
If the Danish cartoons offend you, then please take a look in the mirror and ask yourself the question ``what has the current muslim world done for this world?``. Given suicide bombings, beheadings, violent protests, religious intolerance, bigotry, ethnic discrimination, petrodollar self indulgence, genocides, crimes against women, child camel jockeys etc etc etc.
Its about time Muslims woke up and smelt the coffee (Kahwa), for time is running out...
#57 Posted by rf786 on February 6, 2006 11:35:17 pm
Re: # 49
Dear Quick Draw Mcdraw,
Had you bothered to read my post w/o your anti-Pakitan bllinders you would have noticed that particular statement which you refer to was directed towards Muslim States protesting publication of those offensive cartoons yet fail to say anything about the continued carnage in Iraq. The same analogy can be applied to Pakistani crimes committed against its own people in East Pakistan, or for that matter Indian massacre of Kashmiris,Moros, Senhalese, Bengalese, Sikhs and the list goes on and and and on, like the Energizer Bunny. Maybe we Pakistanis should carry a badge saying ``Dear Arjun, we apologise for the East Pakistan massacre`` that will not satiate your anti-Pak apetitie either. I find your continuous carping and judging Pakistanis on the East Pakistan massacre without even knowing the other persons thoughts and sentiments on that particular episode downright prejuidiced and maliciously centered. Chill dude, your not the only one with a sense of morality.
Dear Quick Draw Mcdraw,
Had you bothered to read my post w/o your anti-Pakitan bllinders you would have noticed that particular statement which you refer to was directed towards Muslim States protesting publication of those offensive cartoons yet fail to say anything about the continued carnage in Iraq. The same analogy can be applied to Pakistani crimes committed against its own people in East Pakistan, or for that matter Indian massacre of Kashmiris,Moros, Senhalese, Bengalese, Sikhs and the list goes on and and and on, like the Energizer Bunny. Maybe we Pakistanis should carry a badge saying ``Dear Arjun, we apologise for the East Pakistan massacre`` that will not satiate your anti-Pak apetitie either. I find your continuous carping and judging Pakistanis on the East Pakistan massacre without even knowing the other persons thoughts and sentiments on that particular episode downright prejuidiced and maliciously centered. Chill dude, your not the only one with a sense of morality.
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