Was this an universal viewpoint in the West? As a non-Muslim teen in India I saw it as mocking Islam (I get that others' mileage varies).
"Legitimate" mockery would have exposed the absurdity of terrorist groups recruiting petty criminals and elevating them to a noble "jihadi" status because, well, nobody else had as little to lose.
But that wouldn't get any media coverage, nor would it get props for "upholding free speech", in a country that outlaws Holocaust denial.
I don't deny that there was a lot of hypocrisy and fair weather friends surrounding CH after they were targeted, but the point about the Holocaust laws misses the mark. It's not illegal in France to make crass jokes about the Holocaust, as CH makes them in droves. In fact, they make crass jokes about almost anything related to France in some way and their first love always was the opposition to the traditional gaullist catholic establishment. You can be as crass as you want and won't get in trouble for it as long as you don't incite violence directly.
The problem highlighted by CH is that there currently is only one ideology that gives artists, filmmakers, cartoonists, etc. pause in the West when drawing up jokes or material, and that is Islam. There are few other topics in the West where there is a chance that criticism or commentary on your part will cause you great personal adversity or harm. In fact, I can't think of any off the top of my head but I'd be happy to hear some examples.
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/its-not-fr...
>On Thursday, the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) upheld her 2011 conviction for “disparagement of religious precepts,” a crime in Austria. The facts of what E.S. did are not in dispute. She held “seminars” in which she presented her view that Muhammad was indeed a child molester. Dominant Islamic traditions hold that Muhammad’s third wife, Aisha, was 6 at the time of their marriage and 9 at its consummation. Muhammad was in his early 50s. The Austrian woman repeated these claims, and the Austrian court ruled that she had to pay 480 euros or spend 60 days in the slammer. The ECHR ruled that Austria had not violated her rights.
Muhammad fucked a 9 year old according to the Quran, which makes him a child molester under any kind of reasonable understanding--pointing that out means you get fined. Now, granted, Europe does not have freedom of speech, but this shows the way the things are moving.
What an absurd statement.
Although, having lived in the West for the better part of a decade, I don't see what progress we have made as society that you are so confident that right to blasphemy is no big deal. I am not saying we live in medieval England, but speech with zero consequence is not a thing yet.
Furthermore, what progress have non-Western societies made to be confident in the right to determine what is blasphemous, and then to murder so-called blasphemers?
Probably can say the same about blasphemy.
Yes, it kind of was.
But should people be able to 'mock' a religion?
Should they face death threats becauase they 'mocked' something?
This is the whole point.
I have a slight inclination towards a specific religion and I can assure you it's 'mocked all day' and I don't care, as long as it's not done in a vile way. And even when it is, I'm not calling for suppression.
It also includes forbidding idolatry. Images and sculptures and works of art should not be prayed to or venerated.
So the rule that you cannot depict Mohammed, God, or any other prophets is not to prevent disrespect. It's to prevent worship of images.
They have a right to publish those cartoons. I view them the same way as I'd view an anti-Semite who published cartoons with stereotypical, negative portrayals of Jews, while advocating for kicking Jews out of Europe. I'd hold my nose and believe in their right to free speech, but I wouldn't lionize them.
Among those four, two use comedy as the medium. Three of them has been banned in various countries. The only exception is the south park episode and I suspect the only reason is because scientology is not the majority religion in any country or state.
This is not whataboutism. I'm not saying it's ok because it happens elsewhere. I'm just arguing against the portrayal of it as a uniquely Muslim problem. I think we would be able to find some icon or symbol in every culture which some subset of people consider murder a valid reaction to disrespect of that symbol.
Your example is wholly imaginary, where Muslims murdering people for mocking or criticizing their religion has many many examples in modern and old times.
Theo van Gogh got his head cut off. Ayaan Hirsi Ali lives in hiding with armed guards. So do Robert Spencer and Salman Rushdie. Charlie Hebdo staffers slaughtered. Draw Mohammed contests in Texas attacked by armed terrorists. And on and on.
And this stuff isn't happening in rural Pakistan. It happens in places with very few Muslims. They travel to Connor these crimes. In your analogy it would be like a hillbilly southerner traveling to Morocco to mutilate someone who insulted George Washington. It would be like that happening consistently over and over for decades.
There's no comparison. Islam is unique in this.
There are non-Muslim states that will execute people for disrespectful depictions, so I can't see how this is a uniquely Muslim problem.