South Park creators warned over Muhammad depiction
news.bbc.co.uk
news.bbc.co.uk
Muslims themselves have depicted Mohammed in art in the past, although usually covering the face - nobody knows what he looked like so it is not possible to depict his face accurately... so I have always assumed it was just a mark of respect. e.g. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Siyer-i_Nebi_151b.jpg
Besides that, I think retaliating with violence is pretty unacceptable if you truly live by the Koran - It says nowhere inside of it that such depictions are forbidden - but it does say in plenty of places that unlawful killing (by the law of the Koran) is forbidden and that it displeases Allah. Since depictions of Mohammed break no law in the Koran, how can murder be justified in retaliation? (Koran 4:29, 5:28-32 etc.)
In his own lifetime, Mohammed offered shelter and guidance to those who had defamed him public, removed him from his home, chased and persecuted him and his people... I wonder what he would think of all this today?
The culture of physical intimidation and oppression is just that, a culture. Religion is used to justify it, but never stands up to scrutiny.
I don't think there's such a thing as a resonable muslim, or indeed reasonable christian, there are just reasonable people, independent of their religion. Either someone can see that threats of murder are unacceptable or they cannot. Rereading of their holy book is not going to change what's formed in them due to the culture which they have been exposed to their whole lives.
I agree with you that culture is hugely important in determining what a person considers to be justifiable killing. I don't agree that re-reading their holy scripture can not change their attitude. People have life-changing religious experiences all the time. One reformed murderer comes to mind who actually went on to write a large chunk of Christian scripture.
According to some hadith he also ordered the assassination of poets and artists who mocked him, after he rose to power, so its not a black and white issue of precedence, though it seems many fundamentalists interpret the assassination as the last say.
If a large proportion media outlets and content creators make a point of "portraying" Mohammed then there's no way these criminals could make all of them "probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh".
If I were them, I'd put an unnamed character in an episode, and have it on television and let it go by. Then I'd refer to that character in a subsequent episode and point out that it had been Mohammed.
Build it up as a three-part who-shot-JR-style episode series with no viable plot conclusion except one where the depicted character is 'the prophet', in order to strongarm the network into putting the revelation episode on TV.
1. It's a cartoon, there is no Mohammed. If I draw a stick figure and suggest it's Mohammed it's unreasonable to suggest that this is a depiction of Mohammed, it's a stick figure.
2. It's a bear costume, just because someone says Mohammed is on the inside no way depicts Mohammed. The only thing that suggests this is dialog, if one mutes the audio there's no more suggestion.
3. It's likely that in the rendering program there is in fact nothing inside the costume, so all this fuss is over the imaginary depiction of Mohammed.
So crazy...
The issue is crazies threatening to kill someone over a cartoon. What the cartoon depicted or did not depict is moot.
Wait. So you mean you think there's a possibility that they drew Mohammed under that 2D bear costume and that layer of pixels is the only thing preventing us from seeing the Prophet?
People seem to forget that a big part of the controversy surrounding the cartoons in Denmark wasn't just that Mohammed was portrayed, but that he was portrayed as a terrorist and performing lewd acts.
Really?
Were these the cartoons portraying Muhammad as a terrorist and performing lewd acts: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-Posten_Muhammad_cartoo... ?
From the article: This led to protests across the Muslim world, some of which escalated into violence with police firing on the crowds (resulting in a total of more than 100 deaths),[1] including setting fire to the Danish Embassies in Syria, Lebanon and Iran, storming European buildings, and desecrating the Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, French and German flags in Gaza City.
- Now, how fucking insane do people have to be, to have that kind of reaction to a fucking cartoon, even if it actually had been "lewd"?
Anyone got a way through it that still works? When I was here five years ago the translate-English-to-English thing worked, but no more. I tried a good 20 or so proxies I knew as well before giving up... probably Hotspot Shield would work, but it slows down everything and there's nothing so important I need to do. Thoughts?
In time, authoritarians will start profiling internet activity to sniff out people who do this (assuming they're not already). If you're a Chinese citizen then you might want to think about this.
Other readers - what's a good way to set up squid or another proxy to complement this arrangement?
You can still see the post in google's cache.
I don't think anyone here is jumping to the conclusion that all muslims are horrible. I -- and others I think -- are reacting to the horrific example of intolerance regardless of where it came from. This level of intolerance is one thing that a liberal permissive society should indeed not tolerate itself.
This guy looks like he just might get all worked up about South Park too.
Consider what happens to someone who is offended, absolutely nothing. If your offended by something, it's not as is something really bad has actually happened. It's not as if you've physically been hurt, or someone you know has been hurt. The world is still exactly the same place it was before you took offence.
Offended? So what, get over it.
We are no longer living in places with closed borders - this stuff is now global. South Park is global entertainment, it's not American entertainment. Respect other cultures, particularly with things that cause no hurt to anyone else.
If you are against FGM as a cultural practise, I can understand that. It causes harm to other people. But not showing a religous figure on television has no effect apart from a negative one among the group. I see no harm in respecting this.
I see great actual and potential harm, not to mention you don't know the effect before expressing/airing this to know it can be nothing but negative, such knowledge is impossible for any man to have, thats the point of the first amendment to the US constitution, and last I checked southpark was made there.
You could have made the same argument about "Life of Brian", whats the point of ridiculing jesus after all? The result of that movie has been harmful? Thats not the case at all for me, "Life of Brian" is a very important movie for me, and so is southpark.
What about all the muslims who could enjoy poking fun at Mohammed? How is it that their view is any less valid? Arguing for self-censorship legitimizes and treats muslims as a unified group, identified by voices of extremism. You delegate to them the task of identifying what is harmful and offensive, and once you've done that, it can be anything. A cartoon in an obscure danish newspaper. A 15 minute movie made in the netherlands. What children call a teddy bear in a classroom in Uganda. What southpark decides to do.
This is a capitulation that erodes freedom of speech.
Not showing the prophet on a screen is not eroding freedom of speech, because this rule has been in place longer than America has existed. And abstaining from showing it is just a sign of respect for a culture of a billion people.
Actually it absolutely is, specially when these depictions have been accompanied by campaigns of intimidation, violence and even murder.
> "because this rule has been in place longer than America has existed."
Freedom of speech has existed long before Islam, but precedence has absolutely no currency here.
> "And abstaining from showing it is just a sign of respect for a culture of a billion people."
Actually thats not the case at all, as I pointed on another post in this thread this is a tenet of Sunni, but not Shi'a muslims, several million of that billion don't see it as sin.
And if they are offended so be it - there are no guarantees you won't be offended in this world, whats unacceptable is bullying and coercion aimed at chilling and eroding freedom of speech.
There is a lot of censorship going on in the world, and a lot of real things that you cannot say without being harshly criticized and thrown out of your job or something. That's what you should be concerned about.
This particular example, is just an attack on an alternative religion, and what really hides behind this "freedom of speech" diversion is cultural intolerance and anti-muslim sentiment. The people who will argue that it should be allowed to mock another persons God will say nothing when Australia censors.
If you want to fight for freedom of speech, then fight for real freedom of speech, not for this type of cultural attacks that try to use freedom of speech as their reason.
Actually it doesn't have anything to do with them, if they are offended its because they chose to watch, I did not force them to.
And what are these people you want to protect that they can't take an offensive world. I can, if they can't thats their problem, I won't limit what I say - these campaigns of intimidation also involve mere criticism of people that bare some similarities to Mohammed (see Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses, which is actually not about Mohammed).
> "There is a lot of censorship going on in the world, and a lot of real things that you cannot say without being harshly criticized and thrown out of your job or something. That's what you should be concerned about."
We're talking about private citizens who chose to make a movie here, this isn't a corporate environment, the southpark creators are not bound by any contract that they willingly signed that states they must curb their offensiveness to particular groups.
[edit: actually they signed something with comedy central surely, but thats an internal affair for them, this has been released to the public now]
> "This particular example, is just an attack on an alternative religion"
Alternative to what? That doesn't even make sense, you were just mentioning, as if it had any weight, the fact they are 1 billion+
> "and what really hides behind this "freedom of speech" diversion is cultural intolerance and anti-muslim sentiment."
You don't know that, you're speculating, but you know what, I'll concede that a lot of it can be that. Theres also a lot of anti-catholic sentiment, a LOT of anti-atheist sentiment, etc. I believe freedom of speech covers hate speech as well.
"Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters" - Rosa Luxemburg.
> "The people who will argue that it should be allowed to mock another persons God will say nothing when Australia censors."
Actually I will stand up against stupid australian censorship and criticize it. One doesn't preclude the other.
> "If you want to fight for freedom of speech, then fight for real freedom of speech, not for this type of cultural attacks that try to use freedom of speech as their reason."
Actually I think the place that needs freedom of speech the most in the world right now is the muslim world, and we should lead by example, and yes, the example of mocking, and iconoclasm. And I know muslims out there that agree with that position.
The U.S is not an "everything goes" place where you can say what you want. The only difference is that some things are culturally inacceptible to say, and so are protected by the law, and some other things are not.
There is a lot of religous fervour behind these anti Islamic-culture movements, and a lot of it has little to do with free speech. A lot of it is mostly just religion.
That's what's so terrible about this - it comes across as a bigoted religous argument, and not as a defense for free speech. Look at the way people vote down anything mildly pro the other side and vote up comments that are just anti-islam. That's not about free speech, it's about intolerance for another religion.
I'm not asking for a law against showing the prophet on TV. I'm asking that this aspect of muslim culture be respected, just as words with slave origins are not used on TV.
All I want is that we all just respect each other and not mock each other.
I'm not an american citizen, my opinion is that hate laws shouldn't exist. And most certainly not any law protecting against blasphemy of any sort - glad we agree there.
> "There is a lot of religous fervour behind these anti Islamic-culture movements, and a lot of it has little to do with free speech. A lot of it is mostly just religion."
Oh I couldn't agree more, theres a lot of religious bigotry in this world. I don't see how this is relevant to the discussion, why should matt and trey self-censorship? Are you afraid they might be interpreted as being religious bigots? What if they secretly are? It just doesn't matter.
> "Islamic-culture movements"
Again, not all muslims think portraying the prophet is a sin, as far as I know (which isn't that far, I'm no religious scholar) all Shia sects don't see it as so.
> "Look at the way people vote down anything mildly pro the other side and vote up comments that are just anti-islam."
I'm upvoting anything I see as a defense of freedom of speech, and maybe I'm upvoting comments that have been upvoted by bigots, I can't help if they are on the right side (in my opinion) for the wrong reasons, I won't stop making my argument just because people with horrible intent agree with it for the wrong reasons.
> "I'm asking that this aspect of muslim culture be respected, just as words with slave origins are not used on TV."
Actually they quite frequently are. Maybe the frequent is there cause I mostly watch HBO.
> "All I want is that we all just respect each other and not mock each other."
I share that sentiment, I truly do.
But I'm not willing to compromise and capitulate my freedom of speech to respect other people's (in my opinion) nonsensical and fetishistic beliefs.
I won't do it for christians, jains, buddhists, jews, muslims. Thats equality - you earlier spoke of double standards, I strive not to have them :)
And if you really think this isn't an erosion of freedom you just aren't following this subject, there are people who are living under death threats for writing novels, and I'm not talking about the countries that have it inscribed under sharia law, I'm talking about western nations, look around the examples are plentiful - and this makes me want to do is show the prophet more, not less, not as a provocation but as a statement of freedom and civilization.
[edit: clarity/styling]
Your country respects one's life no matter whether he hurt somebody's feelings or not. It is a sane system of values, right? We're so used to these ideas that we assume all people in the world, except of some insane margin, are using the same ideas. But the problem is: they're not. Now those folks are saying publicly that they will take an criminal act by killing somebody who offended them and that act will be ok from the pov of some barbaric ideology. Does it comply with your country's general ideas?
Do you want to life in a country with American-like law or rather Shariat law, which legalizes and encourages killing a woman by her family because they didn't accept her partner?
C'mon people, read some stuff about who you're talking about. Look at what's happening in Europe for instance.
Nobody is under an obligation to pay attention to another countries culture. If I am living in the Vatican, I can make a TV show showing 12 year old girls having sex with 40 year old men - it would not be against the law of the land, but it would against American culture and would not be accepted on TV. And the people who watch this would likely be enraged enough that someone may kill one of the producers.
Different cultures should be respected in their differences, particularly where it causes nobody any harm to do so.
But that's the thin end of the wedge for lots of really insidious nasty behavior like oppressing women or other religons, flogging, FGM, MGM, honour killings, forced marriage, brainwashing, suicide bombers, stonings, stabbing people who criticise you (or stalking them and suing them into oblivion), beating up gay people.
You can't preach respect while that sort of nasty intolerant stuff is going on, and "It's our culture" doesn't hold any weight with me. Violence and oppression are violence and oppression, whether you have a religious excuse or not.
Let's take the context of Islam away and follow the analogy. Suppose me and a bunch of friends of mine were deeply offended by UML diagrams. I think it's obvious you would not grant me the right to physically retaliate against anyone who drew them. Why is it that you would in this case?
No, violence is justified only in extreme circumstances. There are no victims here and freedom of expression should be upheld. It is almost embarrassing to debate it.
I am saying that South Park should have respected the culture initially enough to not show this.
Imagine that you were deeply offended by UML diagrams. If I come into a company you are working at, and then draw a cartoon showing you hand in hand with UML diagrams, then all I am doing is offending you to no gain to myself.
Obviously, I do not advocate you should retaliate. But I should never have done this in the first place - out of respect for you.
You are making the "Peyote-Popping Native" argument: http://lesswrong.com/lw/24o/eight_short_studies_on_excuses/
If you respect this, it will be an example for more to come. How about prohibiting alcohol production? Since it is forbidden by Islam and its consumption does not have much positive effect on the society.
The prophet comes from Islam. Without Islam, there would be no prophet. If you are going to use this figure, then I believe you should abide by the rules of the movement that created it, otherwise don't use it.
This is an old law that harms nobody. There is no slippery slope here.
"O ye who believe! When the call is proclaimed to prayer on Friday, hasten earnestly to the Remembrance of Allah, and leave off business." (Koran 62:9)
A half an hour prayer on Fridays practiced by a small group of people would harm nobody, right? I live in Turkey and I can attest that local authorities in Turkey are happy to give their employees that freedom. Besides, what is the odds that an entire brigade of firefighters turns out to be devote Muslims? http://bit.ly/bbQWcB [Google translation of a Turkish news page].
Once you start stretching the laws to hand out privileges to a group of people, more privileges and more groups with different requests will follow.
Actually I hate lots of things in my culture. I'm not sure what you're trying to get at with the question to be honest.
(btw I came back to delete my original comment, because I thought it didn't contribute that much to the discussion and was verging on a flame. From my experience HN commenters seem more able than others to keep it civilised. But I was too late :))
Everybody has their own weird things that are annoying to other people. But when you're going to criticize others, first look at yourself, and see your own flaws. If you cannot see your own flaws, then do you really think it is because you do not have any?
Statements like this do not demonstrate respect for the beliefs of other people - therefore those who subscribe to them do not engender respect.
Are some Muslims really so insecure that they think other peoples' ideas can shake their faith? Isn't that the point of having faith in something, that you believe in it regardless of what anyone else says or does?
Before this gets any hotter - just wanted to say that physical depictions of holy figures in Islam is prohibited [wiki: Aniconism, Idolatry, Islamic Art, ...]. I personally don't watch any episode/movie/play with Jesus, Muhammad, Noah, Moses (PBUT) drawn or acted (I don't feel comfortable - Silly Me).
Religion is the only boundary that some have left. It encapsulates things as simple and beautiful as ethics and manners. What's wrong with a little of these?
freedom-of-expression (which should be held dearly) is not freedom to attack other's values.
I don't like Southpark (but I'll be waiting Futurama) :)
What offends non-religious people is the expectation that we should censor our statements and cartoons on the threat of murder.
So much for "manners".
I mean really. It's a bear suit. The whole point of this South Park portrayal is to show - as if it needed to be shown again - just how absurd is this lust among certain religious believers for any opportunity to be offended. Is there any point at which you're able to be a little reflective and think "yeah ok, I guess we're being a touch precious here"?
Actually, it is.
I have read the Qur'an, all of it. Page after page it tells me that people like myself deserve to be tortured for zillions of years. I find it pretty offensive and hateful. But I don't call for it to be banned.
I have seen debates on T.V where respected Muslim scholars agree on and defend this interpretation - its the duty of a Muslim (Mu'min) to kill or convert an unbeliever (Kaafir).
I don't understand why this argument(of banning the Qu'ran) is not made whenever this topic comes up.
Hold on there, don't go speaking for all of Islam, in Sunni Islam, yes, its considered a sin by all major schools of thought, but thats not really the case in the shia tradition. Until not that long ago you could buy posters of Mohammed in Tehran (saw it done in a british documentary... Mo looked like he went heavy on the make up).
> "freedom-of-expression (which should be held dearly) is not freedom to attack other's values."
Freedom of speech/expression isn't merely the right of saying what _you_ want, it is also the right for others to hear/see it, so when asking for people not to express their views because some can be offended, you have actually attacked my values, because maybe (and in this case, definitely) I'm very interested. So I do hope you'll condemn a campaign of whispered threats of horrible violence for people who just want to express themselves, rather than condemning southpark (which granted you didn't, just said you didn't like them).
Freedom of expression is absolutely freedom to attack others' values. It's the freedom to criticise them openly without fear of physical violence. It's the freedom to lampoon them in public, and make them the subject of satire and riducule.
I can understand you might not like that when it affects you, but I suggest to all muslims -- or indeed to anyone who feels their values are being attacked, religious or otherwise -- that the correct response is to publicly debate why you feel this way, and why you think your feelings should be protected. Threats of murder are unacceptable.
"Verily the most grievously tormented people amongst the denizens of Hell on the Day of Resurrection would be the painters of pictures."