Double Standards for Cartoons

[Kulapavana 0]

Source: Guardian

Published: February 6, 2006 Author: Gwladys Fouché and agencies

Danish paper rejected Jesus cartoons

 

Gwladys Fouché and agencies

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."

 

[Guest guest]

(Better idea -- abolish blasphemy laws, expose Islam and its lies)

News24 (South Africa) ^ | 6 February 2006 | News24

 

Rome - Religious and political figures in several Muslim countries have called on European leaders to use blasphemy laws against newspapers that publish cartoons containing representations of the Prophet Muhammad.

 

In Bangladesh, minister for industry Matiur Rahman Nizami was quoted in the press as telling the European Union that if Christianity and Jesus Christ were protected by blasphemy laws, then there was no justification for those laws not being used to protect the rights of Muslims.

 

And in Lebanon Sheikh Hassan Nasrallah, the head of the radical Hezbollah movement, on Friday called on European parliaments to pass laws "prohibiting the media from attacking God and the prophets".

 

Denmark, where the Muhammad drawings were first published, has a law providing for fines and up to four months in jail for anyone who "publicly offends or insults a religion that is recognised in the country".

 

However, a court case brought against the paper that printed the Danish cartoons by 11 Muslim groups last October was thrown out, with the judges considering that the issue of freedom of expression was more important than the ban on blasphemy.

 

Norway has a public order law dating from the 1930s which in principle outlaws blasphemy on pain of up to six months in jail. However, it is never used.

 

Germany has an anti-blasphemy law dating from 1871, but it has been little used in recent decades.

 

It was, however, successfully used in 1994 to ban a musical comedy that ridiculed the Catholic doctrine of the immaculate conception by portraying crucified pigs.

 

Italy has a law against "outrage to a religion," which has recently been used against the journalist Oriana Fallaci over her outspoken statements and writings on Islam.

 

That case, which adds a charge of "incitation to inter-religious hatred", is still pending.

 

The Netherlands has a law proscribing what is called "scornful blasphemy", and providing for up three months in jail and a fine of $85.

 

The last major case brought under the law - in 1968 against a writer who wrote a poem about having sex with God - was thrown out of court.

 

Austrian law prohibits the ridiculing of a religion, on pain of up to six months in jail.

 

But no attempt was made to use it last year when a book of cartoons was published depicting the Christian prophet Jesus as a marijuana-smoking hippie.

 

Poland, an overwhelmingly Catholic country, has a legal provision against publicly offending a person's religious feelings, with up to two years in prison.

 

An artist, Dorota Nieznalska, is currently being sued under the law for a sculpture in which male genitals were shown attached to a Christian crucifix.

[Guest guest]

QUOTE:

 

An artist, Dorota Nieznalska, is currently being sued under the law for a sculpture in which male genitals were shown attached to a Christian crucifix.

 

REPLY:

 

What a sick pig - just see the kind of world we live in!

[Guest guest]

The Islamic Pandora’s Box has been opened and no amount of energy spent trying to push the true face of Islam back in will be successful. The inherent violence, intolerance, and inbred anger of Islam is now out for all to see. The world is watching and the “handful of terrorists who have high-jacked a peaceful religion” doesn’t pass the “laugh test” any longer.

 

An Islamic mob of over 500 marched through the streets of Knightsbridge, England, chanting, “Massacre those who insult Islam!” and issued warnings of further terror attacks by screaming, "Britain, you will pay, 7/7 on its way." Embassies have been burned. Nearly 50,000 Muslims took to the streets in Sudan chanting, “"We are ready to die in defense of you our beloved prophet." A Catholic priest has been killed, and churches burned. These people are not “terrorists,” but supposedly the average peace-loving Muslim. It doesn’t seem take much to turn a “peaceful” Muslim into a rampaging killer.

 

All of this chaos and destruction is over a few editorial cartoons.

 

The threats of kidnappings, riots, and boycotts are coming from Muslims all over the world. Diplomatic action against Denmark has been recommended by the Egyptian ambassador. Muslims in Norway are trying to pass laws that anything short of praise for Islam should be considered blasphemy and severely punished. The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) felt it had the right to dictate to the president of the United States concerning which terms would be acceptable when referring to Islam in the State of the Union Address.

 

Islamic hysteria is in full voice to bend the world to Islam’s will. Of course, Islam never considers as blasphemy the daily insults to Jews or Christians. Papers all over the Middle East and on the Islamic web sites display cartoons depicting Jews and Christians as pigs and monkeys and as murderous infidels butchering children with swords in the shape of a swastika. Cartoons showing the attack on America on 9/11 are very popular. Apparently, the death of 3000 people is not something Islam finds offensive.

 

Muslims lose touch with reality after being brought to a fever pitch by the imams and mullahs, especially during Friday prayers. Men often explode out of the mosque looking for someone to kill to ease their Islamic rage against an infidel world. Muslims feel Islam has been slighted and the world must pay. If these raging Muslims can’t find the guilty person to punish, any non-Muslim in their path will do.

 

What constitutes an insult to Islam? Basically, any non-Muslim is an insult to Islam. If someone does not believe that Mohammed was a prophet, that is considered an insult in Islam. Uttering any doubts that the Quran is not a perfect book written by God through Mohammed, is considered an insult to Islam. Depicting any picture of Mohammed is considered an insult to Islam. It doesn’t take much to trigger mass hysteria and Islamic mobs screaming, “Death to the world.”

 

The artists who made the editorial cartoons that have set off this hate-fest are now in hiding, fearing that they will end up as Theo Van Gogh who had his throat slit and a knife left sticking out of his chest on a public street in broad daylight. Islam will not forget. These cartoonists are now dead-men-walking and they know that carefree walks in park are now a thing of the past.

 

An interesting twist is that a Jordanian newspaper also published the cartoons and the editor was promptly arrested. Mr. Momani stated that he wanted Muslims to stop and think about how the world is now viewing Islam. The poor man asked the leaders of Islam to be reasonable. As a Muslim himself, he should have known better. This brave editor pleaded: "What brings more prejudice against Islam, these caricatures or pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim in front of the cameras or a suicide bomber who blows himself up during a wedding ceremony in Amman?"

 

As a Muslim, Mr. Momani should have realized that in the eyes of Islam the beheaders and bombers are heroes who praise Allah with their good work. But a cartoon with Mohammed claiming paradise is running out of virgins is an unforgivable sin. Butchers of innocent hostages are held in high esteem in Islam but a leader in the new Hamas government of the Palestinians had this to say to an Italian paper about the cartoons: “The cartoonists should be punished by death.”

 

Let’s summarize. Slit a man’s throat in the name of Allah for no reason at all—good work and Allah is pleased. Draw a cartoon about Islam—this is punishable by death. That, in a nutshell, is Islam.

 

The Syrian government has claimed that all the destruction could have been avoided if the Danish government had apologized for the terrible sin against Islam. While the paper that originally publish the cartoons has done just that, the Danish government refuses to cave in to Islamic threats. Nor should they.

 

In truth, no one should cower because of Islamic threats. The Danes have done nothing to apologize for and should stand their ground as should all the countries who have published the cartoons. In fact, The Danes and every country around the world should continue to publish them to show the world’s solidarity against Islam and for freedom of speech. Sooner or later, the daily staged rage-riots will exhaust Islam and force it to realize that Islam does not give orders to the world.

 

If there is anything good to come from all of the fury Islamics have put on full display for the world, it is that passive people, especially those in Europe, have now been witness to true Islam. We have all seen the terrorist arm of Islam while the gullible continued to cling to the idea that Islam is peaceful and accepting and tolerant. It is none of those things. Islam demands acceptance while accepting nothing. Islam demands tolerance while giving none. Islam claims it only wants peace in the world while starting wars and rioting and killing at the slightest perceived insult. Horrified Islamic religious leaders will attempt to downplay the violence knowing Islam has exposed its hateful nature, but it is too late.

 

At last, true Islam has shown its face to the world, and this time the world was watching.

 

About the Writer: Barbara J. Stock is a registered nurse who enjoys writing about politics and current events. She has a website at http://www.republicanandproud.com/. Barbara J. receives e-mail at dickens502003@.

[krsna 3]

"..true Islam has shown its face to the world, and this time the world was watching."

 

Yes - Islam is the religion with grievous faults which her adherents cannot mention for fear of retribution.

 

[krsna 3]

 

What should the reaction be to the global protests over the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad?

 

At least five people have been killed in Afghanistan as demonstrations against cartoons satirising the Prophet Muhammad swept across the country.

 

UK Prime Minister Tony Blair has described the action of some protesters in London as "completely unacceptable". There have been calls for arrests after placards calling for enemies of Islam to be killed featured in Friday’s demo in London.

 

Are the protests justified? What should the response be to such protests? Should the European press have published the cartoons?

 

Published: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 15:42 GMT 15:42 UK

 

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COMMENTSNumber of Comments: 1,871

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:44 GMT 16:44 UK

 

Yes they should have been published.

 

Islamic law does not apply to newspapers published in the West and Muslims cannot expect to be able impose Islamic law on non-Muslims. Muslims need to appreciate that their religion (and therefore Mohammed) is sacred only to themselves. If they have faith then no amount of cartoons in western newspapers should matter.

 

nicky Molasses, London, United Kingdom

 

Recommended by 1306 people

 

 

 

 

Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:43 GMT 16:43 UK

 

Come on BBC - either you are going to conduct a serious debate, including showing the cartoons in question so open-minded people can give an informed opinion, or you're not.

If in order to protect Muslim sensibilities regarding the portrayal of the Prophet Mohammed you feel you have to refrain from publishing the cartoons, there is no debate. You've already decided they shouldn't be published. So why bother asking what I think?

 

easterhay, Buenos Aires

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:35 GMT 16:35 UK

 

Denmark is not an Islamic country. It has freedom of speech and press. How dare Muslims across the world burn the Danish flag and threaten death upon that nation for such an innocuous publication.

 

Peter, United Kingdom

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:40 GMT 16:40 UK

 

I am proud to see European press show solidarity with Denmark. Yes, the drawings are offensive to Muslims, just as there is material in European papers that offends Christians on a daily basis. That is what freedom of speech means. To Muslims living in Europe who are offended and demand government action: move to Saudi Arabia, you will not have such problems there. To Muslims in Arab countries who are offended: nobody is forcing European papers on you. If you don't like them, don't read them.

 

Nathan Wajsman, Amsterdam

 

Recommended by 993 people

 

 

 

 

Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:44 GMT 16:44 UK

 

No, no censorship. It is a complete over reaction from a section that appears to relish the role of being victimised and demonised. If you preach tolerance and expect it - then give it too. Depict Jesus in the same light if you want - you won't see flag burning and embassy closures here for it. We have free speech - and we'll keep it, thanks

 

Stuart, Amsterdam, Netherlands

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:19 GMT 16:19 UK

 

In Muslim countries, cartoons, newspaper articales and television shows call Jews pigs and apes. They cites things like the forgery, Protocals of the Elders of Zion, they continually publish anti-Jewish...not talking anti-Israel here but anti-Jewish media. Muslims do not have a leg to stand on here.

 

Matthew, Vienna, VA

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:41 GMT 16:41 UK

 

It is completely beyond me why we should let people from another continent limit our freedom of speech because they don't have any sense of humour.

 

Theo Braat, Amsterdam, The Netherlands

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:34 GMT 16:34 UK

 

Of course they should have been published. What I want to know is, why haven't the BBC or the rest of the British press reproduced the cartoons, so that we can make up our own minds?

 

Why isn't the BBC raising the banner for free speech? What is the BBC afraid of?

 

Last week the BBC ran a debate on censorship in China. It looks like we've got censorship a lot closer to home.

 

[chatmandu_uk], London, United Kingdom

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:32 GMT 16:32 UK

 

This has nothing to do with respect. If it had, then the Islamic governments of the world would respect the rights of Westerners to have secular governments and exercise their inalienable right to free speech. Once again we see the intolerance and oppressive tyranny of religion at work. Everything is open to criticism and ridicule in the West, including Islam, and of course the cartoons should have been published.

 

[pvandck], Provincia di Treviso, Italy

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:44 GMT 16:44 UK

 

I have one message for the Muslim world. Lighten up!

 

Dan Damiata

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:33 GMT 16:33 UK

 

If muslims are looking for respect and feel as though their pride has been wounded, they should still be willing to respect others. In this case the freedom of speech in western lands. I don't think they would hesitate to burn bibles, call westerners infidels, and issue fatwas to kill people for speaking their mind, not to mention disavowing the history and culture of others - at the same time their hand is out for respect. It's a system which is doomed to never play well with other systems.

 

richard S, Los Angeles

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 20:27 GMT 20:27 UK

 

While we regret having caused offense . . . well, wait a minute. Challenges to authority through satire, caricature, and political cartoon are our best non-violent release valves. The right to offend becomes a civic duty when religion & politics threaten. We need more such cartoons.

 

T.Schield Williams, New York, NY

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:29 GMT 16:29 UK

 

Yes they should! The freedoms of speech and religion enshrined in western law were, in many cases, paid for in blood.

 

Let's not forget that these are the same people that would burn your flag in your face, and not care if you were offended.

 

Juan, Queens, NY, USA

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:30 GMT 16:30 UK

 

By all means possiable. Why have they not been published on BBC? Scared? (which is why you sould post them).

 

Bill Newland, Rigby ID US

 

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Added: Wednesday, 1 February, 2006, 16:44 GMT 16:44 UK

 

Offence and bad taste are all part of being in the public arena. What I find truly insulting is when a cleric calls for attacks on me or my neighbors and isn't immediately condemened by the faithful.

 

Bruce Rerek, Brooklyn, United States

 

 

[Guest guest]

BBC NEWS ONLINE ^ | 7th February 2006 | BBC

 

A Muslim demonstrator who imitated a suicide bomber in London to protest over cartoons satirising the Prophet Muhammad is a convicted drug dealer. Omar Khayam, 22, of Bedford, was jailed in 2002 and released on licence last year after serving half of his sentence for dealing heroin and cocaine.

 

It is believed probation officers are now reviewing his case.

 

Khayam has apologised to those affected by the 7 July bombs, saying his protest was as "insensitive" as the cartoons.

 

He was given five-and-a-half years in prison in December 2002.

 

The demonstration outside London's Danish embassy on Friday and Saturday mirrored protests throughout Europe and Asia over the cartoons, which were first printed in a Danish paper.

 

Downing Street has said the behaviour of some Muslim protesters in London was "completely unacceptable".

 

Asif Nadim, from a Bedford mosque, said the Muslim community distanced itself from Khayam's actions and supported his apology.

 

Home Secretary Charles Clarke said any decisions on arrest and prosecution were "properly matters for the police and prosecution authorities".

 

He said that the reaction to the cartoons across Britain had "in general been respectful and restrained".

 

Protests have continued throughout the world, with five people being killed in Afghanistan, and a boy killed in Somalia when demonstrations turned violent.

 

Rallies have also taken place in India, Thailand, Indonesia, Iran and Gaza, following attacks on Danish embassies in Syria and Lebanon over the weekend.

 

The cartoons were first published in a Danish newspaper last year and republished in Europe last week.

[Kulapavana 0]

Source: Human Events

 

http://www.humaneventsonline.com/article.php?id=12243

 

Europe's Juvenile Idiots Start Religious War

 

by Patrick J. Buchanan

Posted Feb 07, 2006

 

That demagogues and agitators are exploiting those cartoons of Mohammed to advance a war of civilizations and expel Europeans from the Middle East seems undeniable.

 

But that does not excuse the paralyzing stupidity of that Danish paper in running those cartoons -- or the arrogant irresponsibility of European newspapers in plastering those cartoons all over their front pages.

 

The storm first broke last September, when Jyllands-Posten published 12 caricatures of Mohammed, including a lampoon of the Prophet with a terrorist bomb as a turban. In the Islamic faith, any depiction of the face of Mohammed is forbidden.

 

The Danish paper knew this. It published the cartoons to protest "the rejection of modern, secular society" by Muslims. The cartoons were thus a defiant provocation. And they succeeded.

 

The Middle East responded with a boycott of Danish foods and goods. But when, in the name of press solidarity, Le Soir and Le Monde in Paris, El Pais in Madrid and Die Welt in Berlin republished the cartoons on page one, Islam exploded. For this was an in-your-face declaration by the secularist media of the European Union that it will exercise its right to insult any God, any Prophet, any faith, whenever it so chooses.

 

"Enough lessons from these reactionary bigots," said Serge Faubert, editor of Le Soir. "Just because the Quran bans images of Mohammed doesn't mean non-Muslims have to submit to this."

 

Faubert, however, is not a Danish soldier in the Shi'ite sector of Iraq. Innocents will pay the price of his heroism.

 

The U.S. State Department seemed to empathize with Muslim rage, stating that "inciting religious or ethnic hatred in this manner is unacceptable." But, within hours, State had retreated to neutral ground: "While we share the offense that Muslims have taken at these images, we at the same time vigorously defend the right of individuals to express points of view."

 

As of today the Danish consulate in Beirut has been burned, Danish embassies have been stormed, and Danes are fleeing the Middle East. Europeans are getting out of the West Bank, Gaza and Beirut, where mobs are attacking embassies and Christian churches.

 

Islamic countries have recalled ambassadors from Copenhagen. People have been injured and property destroyed in mob assaults as far away as Indonesia. Relations between the West and the Islamic world have been dealt another rupturing blow.

 

And for what? What was the purpose of this juvenile idiocy by the Europress? Is this what freedom of the press is all about -- the freedom to insult the faith of a billion people and start a religious war?

 

Can Europeans be that ignorant of the power of the press to inflame when Bismarck's editing of just a few words in the Ems telegram ignited the Franco-Prussian war? Did Europeans learn nothing from the Salman Rushdie episode? Or the firestorm that gripped the Islamic world when Christian ministers in the United States called Mohammed a "terrorist"?

 

European governments are wringing their hands over the rage and violence unleashed, but they seem paralyzed. What is the matter? Why cannot they denounce press irresponsibility while defending press freedom? Even friends of the West like Hamid Karzai in Afghanistan, President Hosni Mubarak in Egypt and Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey have denounced these cartoons as insults to Islamic values and deeply damaging to Western interests.

 

British Foreign Minister Jack Straw deplored republication of the cartoons as "insensitive ... disrespectful ... wrong." But German Interior Minister Wolfgang Shauble haughtily dissented, "Here, in Europe, governments have nothing to say about which publisher publishes what."

 

What hypocrisy. When it comes to what Germans are most sensitive about, Hitler and the Holocaust, they are ruthless censors. British historian David Irving has spent three months in a Viennese prison awaiting trial on Feb. 20 for speeches he made 15 years ago in Austria. Skeptics and deniers of the Holocaust are prosecuted, fined and imprisoned in Europe with the enthusiastic endorsement of the European press.

 

Nor are we all that different. Sen. Trent Lott was ousted as majority leader for a birthday-party compliment to 100-year-old Strom Thurmond. Atlanta Braves pitcher John Rocker was almost lynched for saying he considers New York a social pigsty. There were demands that Rocker undergo psychiatric counseling.

 

We have "speech codes" in colleges and "hate crimes" laws to protect minorities from abusive remarks. But newspapers that hail these codes throw a blanket of "artistic freedom" over scatological art that degrades religious symbols -- from putting a figure of Christ in a jar of urine to a "painting" of the Virgin Mary surrounded by female genitalia and elephant dung that hung in a Brooklyn museum.

 

What has happened in Europe is that the secular press, which loves to mock the beliefs and symbols of religious faith, has now insulted a deadly serious religion that answers insults with action.

[Kulapavana 0]

It does not matter whether you or I think that these protests are not justified, as millions of people think otherwise. That is a FACT. When you allow millions of immigrants into your country - there are real consequences. Who is to blame for such consequences? People who let them into their own country.

 

Remember LA riots after King's beating? Were they justified? Riots happen when there is a deep sense of injustice in the minority population. Do you think it would be smart to publish cartoons offensive to blacks in LA? Do you think a paper has a RIGHT to publish such cartoons?

 

You folks have been duped, and became the tool of the propaganda machine...

[krsna 3]

 

 

BY ALI SINA

 

EDITORIAL, Feb 7 (VNN) — "Allah was not just satisfied with killing the unbelievers. He enjoyed torturing them before killing them..." Taste ye the Penalty of Burning!" 22:19-22

 

I Learned the truth from the Quran.

 

I left the religion in the backburner for several years. Not that my views about religion had changed or I didn't consider myself religious any more. I just had so much to do that expending time on religion had become scarce. I simply lived the way I thought I was supposed to live according to my understanding of how a good Muslim should be. Meanwhile I learned more about democracy, human rights and other values like equality of rights between men and women and I liked what I learned.

 

Did I pray? Whenever I could, but not fanatically. After all I was living and working in a Western country and did not like to look too different. One good day I decided that it is time that I should deepen my knowledge of Islam and read the Quran from cover to cover. I found an Arabic copy of the Quran with an English translation. Before that I had read the Quran but only bits and pieces of it. This time I started to read all of it. I read a verse in Arabic then I read its English translation moving back to Arabic and did not go to the next verse unless I was satisfied that I had understood it in Arabic completely. It didn't take me long before I came upon verses that I found hard to accept. One of the verses that I found puzzling was this one.

 

"Allah forgiveth not that partners should be set up with Him; but He forgiveth anything else, to whom He pleaseth; to set up partners with Allah is to devise a sin Most heinous indeed." 4:48

 

I found it hard to accept that Gandhi will be burned in hell forever because he was a polytheist with no hope of redemption while a Muslim murderer can hope to receive Allah's forgiveness. This raised a disturbing question. Why Allah is so desperate to be known as the only God? If there is no other god but him what is the fuss? Against whom is he competing? Why should he even care whether anyone knows him and praises him or not. I learned about the size of this universe. That the light, which travels at a speed of 300 thousand kilometers per second takes 20 billion years to reach us from the galaxies that are at the edges of the universe.

 

How many galaxies are there? How many stars are there in these galaxies? How many planets are there in this universe? The thought of that was mind-boggling. If Allah is the creator of this vast universe why he is so concerned about being known as the only god by a bunch of apes living in a small planet down the Milky Way?

 

Now that I had lived in the West, had many western friends who were kind to me, who liked me, who had opened their hearts and their homes to me and accepted me as their friend, it was really hard to accept that Allah wanted me not to take them as friends.

 

Let not the believers Take for friends or helpers Unbelievers rather than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah 3:28, Isn't Allah the creator of the unbelievers too? Isn't he the god of everybody? Why he should be so unkind to the unbelievers? Wasn't it better if the Muslims befriended the unbelievers and taught them the Islam with good example? By keeping ourselves aloof and distant from the unbelievers, the gap of misunderstandings will never be bridged. How in the world the unbelievers will learn about Islam if we do not associate with them? These were the questions I kept asking myself. The answer to these questions came in a very disconcerting verse. Allah's order was to, "slay them wherever ye catch them". (Q.2:191)

 

I thought of my own friends, remembered their kindness and their love for me and wondered how in the world a true god would ask anyone to kill another human being just because he does not believe. That seemed to be absurd, yet this concept was so much repeated in the Quran that obviously there was no doubt in it. In the verse 8:65, Allah tells his prophet:

 

"O Prophet! rouse the Believers to the fight. If there are twenty amongst you, patient and persevering, they will vanquish two hundred: if a hundred, they will vanquish a thousand of the Unbelievers."

 

Why should Allah send a messenger to make war? I wondered. Shouldn't God teach us to love each other and be tolerant towards each other's beliefs? And if really Allah is so concerned about making people believe in him to the extent that he would kill them if they disbelieve, why he would not kill them himself? Why he asks us to do his dirty work? Are we supposed to be Allah's hit men? Although I knew of Jihad and never questioned it before, I found it hard to accept that God would recourse to such violent measures to impose himself on people. What was more shocking was the cruelty of Allah in dealing with the unbelievers. I will instill terror into the hearts of the unbelievers: smite ye above their necks and smite all their fingertips off them 8:12.

 

It seemed that Allah was not just satisfied with killing the unbelievers. He enjoyed torturing them before killing them. Smiting people's heads from above their necks and chopping their fingertips were very cruel acts. Would really God give such orders? And yet the worst is what he promised to do with the unbelievers in the other world:

 

These two antagonists dispute with each other about their Lord: But those who deny (their Lord),- for them will be cut out a garment of Fire: over their heads will be poured out boiling water. With it will be scalded what is within their bodies, as well as (their) skins. In addition there will be maces of iron (to punish) them. Every time they wish to get away therefrom, from anguish, they will be forced back therein, and (it will be said), "Taste ye the Penalty of Burning!" 22:19-22

 

How could the creator of this universe be so petty? These verses of the Quran shocked me. I was shocked to learn how Allah ordered killing people, how he would torture them eternally in such a horrible ways for no reason but disbelief. I was shocked to learn that Quran tells Muslims to kill the disbelievers wherever they find them (Q.2:191), to murder them and treat them harshly (Q.9:123), fight with them, (Q.8:65) humiliate them and impose on them a penalty tax if they are Christians or Jews, (Q.9:29) and slay them if they are Pagans (Q.9:5). I was shocked when I learned that Quran takes away the freedom of belief from all humanity and tells clearly that no other religion except Islam is accepted (Q.3:85). That Allah would relegate those who disbelieve in the Quran to Hell (Q.5:11) and calls them najis (filthy, untouchable, impure) (Q.9:28). I was shocked to learn that Allah orders the Muslims to fight the unbelievers until no other religion is left other than Islam (Q.2! :193), or that he says that the non-believers will go to hell and will drink boiling water (Q.14:17), and asks the Muslims to slay or crucify or cut the hands and the feet of the unbelievers, that they be expelled from the land with disgrace. And as if this were not enough, that "they shall have a great punishment in world hereafter" (Q.5:34).

 

I was shocked when I reads words such as "As for the disbelievers, for them garments of fire shall be cut and there shall be poured over their heads boiling water whereby whatever is in their bowls and skin shall be dissolved and they will be punished with hooked iron rods" (Q.22:9). How sadistic! But that was not all. The Quran also prohibits Muslims to befriend their own fathers or brothers if they are not believers (Q.9:23), (Q.3:28) and that actually Muhammad encouraged his followers to kill their own family in the battles of Badr and Uhud and asks the Muslims to "strive against the unbelievers with great endeavor (Q.25:52), and be stern with them because they belong to hell (Q.66:9). How can any sinsible person remain unmoved when he of she finds the Quran saying: "strike off the heads of the disbelievers" then after making a "wide slaughter among them, carefully tie up the remaining captives" (Q.47:4).

 

The book of Allah says that women are inferior to men and their husbands have the right to beat them (Q.4:34), and that women will go to hell if they are disobedient to their husbands (Q.66:10). It says that men have an advantage over the women (Q.2:228). It not only denies women equal right to their inheritance (Q.4:11-12), it also regards them as imbeciles and decrees that their testimony alone is not admissible in the court (Q.2:282). This means that a woman who is raped cannot accuse her rapist unless she can produce a male witness, which of course is a joke. Rapist don't rape in the presence of witnesses. But the most shocking verse was where Allah allows Muslims to rape the women captured in wars even if they are married before being captured, (Q.4:24) (Q.4:3). I was shocked to learn that the holy prophet raped the prettiest women that he captured in his raids in the same day that he killed their husbands and loved ones.

 

This is why anytime a Muslim army subdues another nation, they call them kafir and rape their women. Pakistani soldiers raped up to 250,000 Bangali women in 1971 and massacred 3,000,000 unarmed civilians when their religious leader decreed that Bangladeshis are un-Islamic. This is why the prison guards in Islamic regime of Iran rape the women and then kill them after calling them apostates and the enemies of Allah.

 

After reading the Quran I was overtaken by a great depression. It was hard to accept all that. At first I started denying and searched for exoteric meanings to these cruel verses of the Quran. But it wasn't possible. The proof was overwhelming. There was no misunderstanding! Quran was inhumane. Of course it contained a lot of scientific heresies and absurdities. But that was not what hit me most. It was the violence of this book that really jolted me and shook the foundation of my belief.

 

http://www.faithfreedom.org/Articles/sina/frombelief.htm

[Guest guest]

Western wimps missing chance to teach important lesson

 

This could have been an occasion for instruction and tutelage, for assisting the followers of the religion of peace out of the 8th century and into the relative light of the 12th or 13th, en route on some distant day to the 21st.

 

 

http://www.JewishWorldReview.com | The prophet Muhammad, who lived in the 8th century, never met Boss Tweed, who presided over New York in the 19th. But if the prophet runs into Mr. Tweed at the mall in a modest suburb somewhere in the afterlife, they can compare afflictions.

 

 

Mr. Tweed suffered boils and warts at the hand of the great newspaper cartoonist, Thomas Nast. "Stop them damn pictures," the old Tammany tiger told his hit men. "I don't care what the papers write about me. My constituents can't read. But they can see the pictures."

 

 

If we are to believe the millions of Muslims who are racing into the streets from Damascus to Jakarta looking for Jews to torment, Christian churches to torch and European embassies to plunder, the prophet who invented Islam is suffering a similar migraine this morning, the gift of a Dane reckless with pen and ink. The prophet's constituents can't read, either. They're not even supposed to look at the pictures. The imams fomenting hysteria are apparently afraid they might peek.

 

 

Hollywood couldn't contrive this latest Islamic comic opera, which has been tough on government property but has afforded the bored Muslim masses an opportunity to entertain themselves, and a lot of pols and government bureaucrats the stage for a remarkable performance of pandering, hot-dogging and grandstanding.

 

 

Several European heads of state have done what Europeans do best, the full grovel, and yesterday Kofi Annan, the secretary-general of the United Nations, did his usual shuck and jive on the high road. "I understand and share their anguish," he said of the plunderers and looters in the capitals of Arabia. "But it cannot justify violence, least of all attacks on innocent people. I appeal to Muslims to accept the apology that has been offered and to act as I am sure Almighty G-d, who is compassionate and merciful, would wish them to do. That is, to act with calm and dignity, to forgive the wrong they have suffered and to seek peace rather than conflict."

 

 

But Muslims have suffered no wrong; Muslims have inflicted the wrong. It's reassuring to learn that the theologian-general of the U.N. is on such intimate terms with G-d, and endorses the almighty mind. Expecting "calm and dignity" in the Muslim street is expecting a lot, and only a man of Mr. Annan's deep faith in the whatever would attempt such a stretch.

 

 

Representatives of nearly every European country, and sad to say the United States, hurried out to the nearest camera with apology and penitence, where apology is not called for and penitence is not appropriate. The bureaucrats, like the State Department officer who called the cartoons "unacceptable," are addicted to the grovel, too. What does "unacceptable" mean in the mouth of a government officer? Is an arrest imminent?

 

 

This could have been an occasion for instruction and tutelage, for assisting the followers of the religion of peace out of the 8th century and into the relative light of the 12th or 13th, en route on some distant day to the 21st. Scott McClellan, the spokesman for President Bush, attempted a lecture yesterday but delivered the wrong rebuke. "We support and respect the freedom of the press," he said, "but there are also important responsibilities that come with that freedom."

 

 

This is wrong, and dangerously wrong. The guarantees of free expression (such as the First Amendment in our own country) include no "if," no "also," no "but." The guarantees do not ordain a "responsible" press, but a free press. This is what the Muslims, who often show no respect for the beliefs of others, must learn even if they learn it the hard way. Followers of the prophet are entitled to believe that a caricature of the man they revere is wrong. If they believe that, they should neither draw such a caricature nor look upon one drawn by someone else. They have no right to impose that belief on anyone else, Hindu, Christian or Hottentot. This is what Kofi Annan and the bowed heads of Europe and spokesmen for the State Department and the White House, and George W. Bush for all that, should be telling the Muslims. And not forget to duck.

[Guest guest]

[Kulapavana 0]

"Kula has been duped and is a wimp"

 

LOL! especially coming from somebody so heroic they have no guts to even sign their own post...

 

when people call me names, it is a chance for me to practice humility. Yes, I have been duped by a blue boy called Shyaam... and yes, I'm a wimp for even taking part in such partisan discussions.

 

are not Muslims children of God too? Just like Christians and Jews? is not Allah a name of God? do Vaishnavas need to act on primitive levels of partisan materialistic religion? try to be more objective and first analyze your own faults before you point your fingers at someone else.

[Kulapavana 0]

"But Muslims have suffered no wrong"

 

suuuuuuure... Americans killed 250,000 in Iraq just recently... the article is typical partisan propaganda garbage.

[Guest guest]

The Hypocrisy of the Cartoon Campaign

By Sharon Lapkin

It took the Muslim world three months to bring Denmark to its knees. Robert Spencer had sadly declared, “We’re all dhimmis now.” To Muslims all over the world, Denmark had been rightfully shamed. But many Westerners were saddened that the Danes had succumbed to threats and bullying and, more importantly, that none of us had cherished our freedom of speech enough to fight for it.

 

But then a small revolution began breaking out in America and all over Europe. Political journalist Michelle Malkin courageously defended freedom of speech on her website. Next, France’s daily newspaper France Soir took a stand against Islamic intimidation (although the editor was later dismissed). Then Germany’s Die Welt and Der Spiegel, were joined by Italy’s La Stampa and the Catalan-based, El Periódico. And in a brave move, Dutch politician Geert Wilders reproduced the whole scandalous incident on his website. Vive La Revolution!

 

 

 

When the Danish newspaper, Iyllands-Posten published twelve cartoons last October depicting the prophet Mohammad, it received so many threats it had to hire security guards to protect its staff. The Pakistani Jamaaat-e-Islami party offered a large reward to anyone who killed any of the cartoonists. And a number of the cartoonists – terrified for their lives – went into hiding.

 

 

 

Muslims lobbied the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, Louise Arbour, who warned, “I find alarming any behaviours that disregard the beliefs of others. This kind of thing is unacceptable.” Then she announced an investigation into racism and Islamophobia.

 

 

 

Muslim Ambassadors from eleven countries demanded a meeting with the Danish Prime Minister, and thousands of Muslim protestors took to Denmark’s cobbled streets. In the Kashmir Valley, shops and businesses closed for a day to protest the cartoons. And Al-Azhar, the highest authority in the Sunni Islamic world, declared he intended to protest the drawing of Mohamed to the UN and human rights organizations around the world.

 

 

 

In January, the imam at the Islamic Center in Brussels denounced the cartoons. “Where are the human rights organizations? Why are they silent?” he demanded. And the Muslim World League called on UN Secretary Kofi Annan to implement international laws against insolence of religions.

 

 

 

In Saudi Arabia, Muslims threatened to boycott Danish Company, Aria Foods, and one supermarket was reportedly removing Danish produce from its shelves. Masked gunmen in Gaza stormed into the EU office and demanded that Denmark and Norway apologize for publishing the cartoons; they then banned citizens from both counties until an apology was made. The Danish Red Cross were forced to evacuate their employees after concrete threats were made against them. And the following day, thousands of Palestinians protested and burned Danish flags as they chanted, “War on Denmark, Death to Denmark.”

 

 

 

In Iraq, a roadside bomb was said to target a joint Danish-Iraqi patrol and Libya announced it was closing its embassy in Denmark. The Emirate’s Minister of Justice stated that publishing the cartoons had been “blasphemous, disgusting and irresponsible.” And 17 foreign ministers from the Arabian League called for the editors responsible for publishing the cartoons to be “punished.”

 

 

 

On January 30, the Egyptian government refused to discuss a matter of $72.5 million loaned to it by Denmark. And Bill Clinton decided that freedom of speech was not worth defending. When the former President was in Qatari explaining to reporters how “appalling” and “outrageous” the cartoons were, the journalists at Iyllands-Posten were evacuating their offices due to a bomb threat by the devastated Islamic victims Clinton was defending.

 

 

 

As the Islamic world intimidates and threatens the West with violence and economic boycotting, it is important to examine the Islamic response in its entirety and put this event into historical context. When Danish Muslim leaders recently toured the Islamic world with a 43-page report protesting the twelve cartoons published by Iyllands-Posten, they inserted an extra three into the Report for good measure. The Brussells Journal reported that the extra cartoons depicted Mohamed as a pedophile and a pigsnout, with a third, portraying a praying Muslim being raped by a dog.

 

 

 

Akhmad Akkari, spokesperson for the Muslim organizations involved in the tour, told The Brussels Journal that the three extra cartoons had been added to “give an insight in how hateful the atmosphere in Denmark is towards Muslims.” The 21 Danish Muslim organizations protesting the publication of pictures of their prophet, Mohamed, considered it appropriate to distort the truth in order to shame those, who it had perceived, had dishonored Islam.

 

 

 

But – even granted this concession – Mohamed has been visually represented throughout the centuries in hundreds of different mediums. The popular blog Little Green Footballs has published dozens of illustrations of Mohamed that have never generated an outraged Muslim or claims of blasphemy.

 

 

 

From book illustrations, including French book jackets to medieval paintings and Dante’s Inferno and Iranian icons, there has never been a murmur of protest from the Islamic world. In contemporary Christian drawings and animated television parodies Mohamed has been portrayed visually – again and again – without a word of complaint from any Muslim organization or spokesperson.

 

 

 

When France Soir published the Mohamed cartoons, it claimed it was doing so in provocation and stated, “We will never apologize for being free to speak and think.” However, the owner of the newspaper moved quickly to dismiss the Editor and apologize to the Muslim community.

 

 

 

German newspapers, Die Welt reprinted six of the cartoons and Der Spiegel examined the status of free speech in Europe while the BBC reported on the paper’s editorial, which stated, ”The protests from Muslims would be taken more seriously if they were less hypocritical.”

 

 

 

Dutch Politician, Geert Wilder is already the recipient of death threats for his criticism of radical Islam. Fellow Dutch MP, Sudanese Muslim activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali supported the Danish newspaper for publishing the cartoons and said, “It’s necessary to taunt Muslims on their relationship with Mohammed.”

 

 

 

Freedom of speech is a jewel in the crown of democracy. If the Western world is afraid to speak, write or to draw, it may as well succumb to the oppression and fear that characterizes the Islamic world. Tolerating the intolerable enables the aggressive culture to dominate and it nurtures its agenda of inequity.

 

 

 

Recently, a young Muslim immigrant in the UK was granted a subsidy from the Ministry for Culture to publish a poster advertising his play. He chose to depict a bare-breasted Virgin Mary holding a howling baby and a bowl of blood. And he announced, “I think one should be able to laugh at anything, even at anti-Semitism.”

 

 

 

When the Muslim World League lobbied the UN over a drawing of Mohamed with a burning fuse in his turban while simultaneously demanding respect for the Muslim religion, it appears it was ignoring its own hypocrisy.

[gHari 0]

 

I remember when the Taliban destroyed a huge religious monument carved into the face of a stone wall. I have read of uncountable Indian holy places destroyed by Muslim invaders.

 

No sane man can have any compassion for such animals. They won't have images of the prophet, but they soon will be killing other Muslims by the millions - self-destruction of Islam in the name of Allah. It may well be time to end the madness, from God's point of view.

 

Sorry, I cannot accept their indignation over a cartoon - a cartoon that cruxifies them, not Mohammad. The sooner the world abandons these psychotics, the better. Get out of the desert, America, and let these dogs tear each other apart.

 

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

To Vaishnavaisum. Like we are meant to do.

 

What you said Prabhupada never said. Basically it is your own speculations. I am seeing many devotees being against Muslims, but Prabhupada never actually taught this. Neither did Gauranga Mahaprabhu ever kill any muslims. In fact they were converted to Vaishnavaisum.

[Guest guest]

Copies of Koran in Pakistan found lying in drain

 

Hindustan Times ^ | Lahore, February 8, 2006|14:27 IST | HT.com/ Press Trust of India

 

 

At least 3,000 protesters enraged by the alleged desecration of the Koran clashed with police and torched two cinemas in Pakistan's second largest city Lahore, police said on Wednesday.

 

The city, was tense after the mob rampaged through a poor neighbourhood overnight and also smashed up dozens of vehicles, local police officer Mohammad Abbas said.

 

The trouble erupted late on Tuesday when copies of the Muslim holy book were found lying in a drain in the Bhatta chowk area on the fringes of the sprawling city.

 

"The news of the desecration of the Koran spread quickly in the neighbourhood and within no time some three to four thousand people took to the streets shouting slogans against the desecration," Abbas said.

 

He said the crowd armed with bamboo sticks turned violent, setting fire to two cinema houses and attacking public and private properties.

 

"Police used a mild baton charge to restore order, but the situation is very tense," he said.

 

Abbas said police have registered a case against unknown people under the country's blasphemy laws.

 

The violent protest came amid ongoing outrage in Pakistan and other Muslim countries over the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad in European newspapers.

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

 

 

When we meet a muslims whos the highest class of Vaishnava, and offend him. So for Ghari whos senior devotee to say those things is bewildering to me. After all these years, to have hate for others is not

purebhakti.

[Kulapavana 0]

"No sane man can have any compassion for such animals. They won't have images of the prophet, but they soon will be killing other Muslims by the millions - self-destruction of Islam in the name of Allah. It may well be time to end the madness, from God's point of view."

---

 

compassion is a deep thing. something you perhaps do not quite understand.

 

certainly Muslims often act as barbarians. the same can be said about a lot of other people. were you outraged when US forces obliterated Fallujah in a barbarian way, killing thousands of innocent people?

 

and pretending to know God's point of view on a particular issue is quite preposterous. reminds me of some Muslims who kill others because they think God would like it...

 

the cartoons are just a spark that ignited stored up anger at the West for the many injustices it perpetrated at the Muslim world.

 

[Guest guest]

 

"...the cartoons are just a spark that ignited stored up anger at the West for the many injustices it perpetrated at the Muslim world..."

 

Indeed!

 

[gHari 0]

It seems a little dull-witted to conclude that I was presuming to know God's point of view. Now perhaps English is not your first language, yet still you should drink a tall glass of humility before even thinking of criticizing a vaishnava.

 

I usually let your arrogance slide, accomodating your youth, but now I see that was hardly fair to you.

[gHari 0]

What did Srila Prabhupada say about Al Qaeda, about jihad, about Muslim moguls? While placing me below you, you have simply placed me farther away, very far away.

[Kulapavana 0]

yes, I am neither humble, nor young (and thus deserving special treatment from you), yet your partiality on this issue is quite peculiar for one who calls himself a Vaishnava.

 

still, the arguments stand, as you are merely hitting the messenger.

[Pankaja_Dasa 1]

Why should I speculate about what Prabhupada said?

 

Always devotees say what did Prabhupada say about it, Prabhupada gave the Bhagavatam! and Gita! Take a look in their..

 

Sorry I am far away, anyway. I didn't mean any offence.

 

 

Ps. I live in a predominent Muslims town [very famous in Uk! for the wrong reasons /images/graemlins/tongue.gif]. While I was in school years ago [12 years ago] their were riots in India when those Muslims broke Lord Rama temple. And I was probably the only indian besides about 3, and in class [and whole school] they were writing on the Blackboard Kill all Indians.' Me and my indian friend were right there, he was like laughing [his clever fellow]. I was fuming inside. Thinking here I am ****kos [sorry needs to be said how I was feeling]. Then the teacher came back to the class and as if in a sureal devopolment. She called us out. And we went to the hall-way with all the people from the class. They looked so scared I thought they has . in thier pants. Anyway they said sorry to us. What really hurt was most of them I knew for YEARS in class. And that they had no compassion. But when the Headmaster [who I must say handled the sitaution with amazing speed]. Told them he would have to SHUT down the school in case somebody started a riot or something. No clue what he told them. After that the people that did it were nice to me. But inside I hated thier guts, anyway my real 'friends' in the school [mosly muslims anyway] were ok.