http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/4673908.stm
Hmmm.
I don't where I stand on this. 'Freedom of speech' is a misleading statement, because it doesn't actually exist. There are lots of things you can be prosecuted for saying and if you *know* that by saying something in print or in person you are going to incite a violent reaction then you are, in fact, abusing the ideal of 'freedom of speech'. An ideal that doesn't exist. I see a catch-22 developing...
However- if no-one ever said things to challenge potentially oppressive ideals and structures, then none of the major changes would have taken place over the last 150 years. If Rosa Parks had not said 'No', the course of American and European history may have been very different, for example. Ghandi!
Sitting back and letting something repressive take root was Europes mistake in the 1930's.
*I am not comparing Islam to the Naziism. I am just trying to build a psychological context for modern Europe when it comes to strict belief structures, and to the perception of fundamentalist groups of all faiths by the secular world*
So... this Danish newspaper publishes cartoons that it *knows* will incite debate and possibly violence. Let's not beat around the bush with this, it was meant to cause offence. I heard an interview with a French journalist last night who was one of those who reprinted the pictures. He was quite explicit in his assertion that it was BECAUSE it was a 'forbidden' representation in another culture that they printed it. Now, France is rebelling against religious imagery in most forms at the moment, so this attitude- while it worries me- does not surprise me.
However- do threats of violence against the EU, armed gunmen raiding EU offices, and violent protests do anything but reinforce a stereotype held in Europe?
Personally I think fundamentalists in any religion are dangerous, poisonous and should be subjected to criticism, examination and questioning, always questioning 'but why?'.
I can't help but feel a definite smugness and underlying racism in the actions taken by the Danish and French press, however