zenkidori said:
You can't be trusted because your religion says that no depictions are allowed of Mohammed or God period, I'm not sure if it's actually a sin, but either way it's ingrained into your way of thinking, wheras the larger populous of the world would not agree and thus are free to make whatever artistic depictions they like. How can you expect anyone in your position to be object?
Islam is the largest religion in the world and fastest growing in the United States and else where. So the larger populous you speak off is false.
Next, yes Islam teaches us to not show images of prophet Mohammed (SAW), and of all the prophet before him. But what is at heart here is not just that, it was not just an image of him, it was an image depicting him in a very low forum. And the images was an attack at Muslims as an whole, showing that our leader does these nasty things, then these Muslims are the same. This is something that any man, of any religion, should be offended off. People here in the states would get mad as hell if i took an cartoon of MLK and showed him as a Drug selling, Thug who pimps girls in the streets of Harlem. What is wrong with that? Is that not the norm, at lest that?s what the music videos tell me black people are doing. But its not true.
With that said, i do protect freedom of speech, i also protect that if your going to use that right, be prepare for me to do that same. Which means i am going to speak up against it, i am going to boycott your good or whatever non violent ways its going to take to make you understand what your doing is what i don?t like.
As for the politics of it, i do see a big miss management of the Dutch government. They should have distance themselves from these cartoons and said the blame should go on the newspaper, but the PM did not and its his fault. And the Dutch companies losing money, and jobs, they should go to the newspaper and tell them how they feel about it. Now these nut jobs talking about attack the paper or government are just that nut jobs. But people must also understand that people in the middle east dont know about democracy, all they know is there own government. And with that, they know that nothing can be printed in the press without the governments ok, so to them they think the government is backing it. Its why president Bush makes a point to them to say where the US stands on Muslims in the United States, because that is what they understand.