Due to popular demand, I've decided to post about the cartoon depicting Mohammad which has the Middle East in an uproar. Hopefully this can be used as a guide to more than what has unfolded in the past months, and used to help our understanding of how we deal with the Middle East in general.
For those who haven't heard, it's against Islamic law to show the face of their prophet, Mohammad, in any form. A Danish newspaper published a cartoon that shows Mohammad weilding two scimitars, standing in front of two veiled women. Muslims around the world have stated their disapproval of the message, however the most concentrated area of Muslims, the Middle East, has been the site of embassy burnings, riots, and several deaths.
I found this news problematic to talk about because of the extremely difficult nature of religious law. I am here to say that what is happening in the Middle East is not how these types of situations should be handled; and easy stance to take, I know. The tricky part of the problem lies in the idea that we as Americans take free speech to a fundamental right, one that cannot be taken away. And with this belief that speech and language is free we devalue speech. I can type Fuck, shit, cock, balls, and cunt, just to name a few; people may be offended, but as a whole no one cares. By the same case, we can show pictures of pornography, religion, and politics.
Speech is not so free in a nation governed by religious law. And the fact that it isn't free inflates the severity of the act when a delinquent message is published. This isn't as simple as saying the Muslims in the Middle East are taking this too seriously, it's a clash of two worlds which have different values. The Danish newspapers had every right to publish those pictures under Danish law. By the same token, the rioters are as justifyed by their laws to vandalize and burn the embassies.
Now you say, "even if I buy that argument, innocent people who had nothing to do with the cartoons are being hurt by the rioting." I agree, it's a shame by our standards that innocents are harmed. We place a far higher value to protecting innocence than punishment; our judicial system proved this when they admitted that they prefer to see a criminal go free than an innocent go to jail. This is not the case for Islamic law. Redemption is a much higher priority in Islamic nations, and it matters not who does the payment. I'm not judging, nor am I declaring which system is more efficient (shit their violent cime rates are half ours: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_mur_percap).
It's just a difficult subject to discuss because it's so hard to convince anyone of anything. How can I try to convince a citizen of the Western World, that punishment, no matter who actually did it, is more important than getting the actual criminal beyond a "reasonable doubt"? How do I convince a person living by the Quran, that free speech is more important than moral and religious practices? I can't and I'm not going to try.
For those who haven't heard, it's against Islamic law to show the face of their prophet, Mohammad, in any form. A Danish newspaper published a cartoon that shows Mohammad weilding two scimitars, standing in front of two veiled women. Muslims around the world have stated their disapproval of the message, however the most concentrated area of Muslims, the Middle East, has been the site of embassy burnings, riots, and several deaths.
I found this news problematic to talk about because of the extremely difficult nature of religious law. I am here to say that what is happening in the Middle East is not how these types of situations should be handled; and easy stance to take, I know. The tricky part of the problem lies in the idea that we as Americans take free speech to a fundamental right, one that cannot be taken away. And with this belief that speech and language is free we devalue speech. I can type Fuck, shit, cock, balls, and cunt, just to name a few; people may be offended, but as a whole no one cares. By the same case, we can show pictures of pornography, religion, and politics.
Speech is not so free in a nation governed by religious law. And the fact that it isn't free inflates the severity of the act when a delinquent message is published. This isn't as simple as saying the Muslims in the Middle East are taking this too seriously, it's a clash of two worlds which have different values. The Danish newspapers had every right to publish those pictures under Danish law. By the same token, the rioters are as justifyed by their laws to vandalize and burn the embassies.
Now you say, "even if I buy that argument, innocent people who had nothing to do with the cartoons are being hurt by the rioting." I agree, it's a shame by our standards that innocents are harmed. We place a far higher value to protecting innocence than punishment; our judicial system proved this when they admitted that they prefer to see a criminal go free than an innocent go to jail. This is not the case for Islamic law. Redemption is a much higher priority in Islamic nations, and it matters not who does the payment. I'm not judging, nor am I declaring which system is more efficient (shit their violent cime rates are half ours: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph-T/cri_mur_percap).
It's just a difficult subject to discuss because it's so hard to convince anyone of anything. How can I try to convince a citizen of the Western World, that punishment, no matter who actually did it, is more important than getting the actual criminal beyond a "reasonable doubt"? How do I convince a person living by the Quran, that free speech is more important than moral and religious practices? I can't and I'm not going to try.
posted by Daltonius at 4:16 PM
2 Comments:
Hey D,
I actually have something serious to say here. In your post, you mentioned,
"The Danish newspapers had every right to publish those pictures under Danish law. By the same token, the rioters are as justifyed by their laws to vandalize and burn the embassies."
I'm not so sure this is actually true. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the land that an embassy is built on technically part of the country that it represents? I know that if you're born in a foreign embassy you're actually a citizen of that country, and I'm also pretty sure that on embassy grounds you're subject to the laws of that country. In other words, when you step on to embassy grounds, you're essencially on foreign soil.
With this in mind, whatever religeous right they had to destroy things over a stupid cartoon is nill when it comes to torching an embassy.
I realize how what I wrote could be misconstrued. I didn't mean that the law of the land actually and literally allows them to torch the embassies. I wanted to merely point out that no one has been arrested or even punished for that matter, which means that in the countries which have had this escalated violence (Iran and Lebanon) redemption is weighed far more heavily than our idea of justice.
And yes, your understanding of embassy rights are correct, it is foreign soil.
To respond to your final comment, I disagree. The whole purpose of my writing is article was to show that you can't expect them to value the same things as we do when we come from completely different backgrounds. To us, property is of much greater value than it may be to them. I can't speak for them, but I'm assuming that the disrespect they felt from the cartoon is equal to what they feel the disrespect of burning an embassy is. I can't say that what they're doing is justified; all I'm saying is that they probably think it is justified or else they wouldn't be doing it.
As a white person living in the epitome of Western nations, It'd be more than difficult for me, or anyone else fitting the description (Bush) to try to convince them that they are wrong to feel how they do.
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