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Mohammed and the rugrats

Clare Cooney | 05.02.2006 16:09 | Analysis

Comment on the embassy burnings and the cartoons of Mohammed


Hmm. When people are rioting in the streets and burning down embassies because of cartoons, one has to say that something is rotten in the state of Denmark.
Bill Hicks once said that the problem with fundamentalism was that it breeds a ‘no irony’ mentality and I think we can see that here.
It appears that those who believe in Islam are offended because they consider it an act of blasphemy to draw Mohammed. That’s all very well for them because they believe in him - however it doesn’t apply to those of us who don’t believe does it? The catholics would consider me a heretic for views that I hold about the Pope - and they’re welcome to - I don’t care because I’m not a catholic, so they can take their doctrine and shove it. Well I’m sorry if this offends the Islamic but the same applies here. Believe what you like but don’t expect the rest of us to abide by it. The only thing that should dictate whether a cartoon is printed is whether or not it’s funny. From what I’ve heard with respect to these cartoons, many of them fail on those grounds. That would be a good reason not to publish them but not because they might offend. Frankly, the purpose of political and satirical art is to stir people up - it’s meant to illicit a response and it’s failing to do it’s job if it doesn’t. Ask Martin Rowson - he gets about 5000 e-mails a time when he takes the piss out of George Bush. I’m sure he views it as a sign that he’s doing his job. The problem with the response in the Islamic incident is that it’s out of all proportion with the events and I’m pretty sure that most sensible Muslims would agree with me on that.
I’m sorry to be the one to point it out but Islamic fundamentalists have been perpetrating suicide bombs. This doesn’t mean that those of us who possess reason think all Muslims agree with these actions of insanity and hatred. But it doesn’t mean you get to go all PC on us and bitch if we take the piss about it either. Discussing the fact that some Muslims commit atrocities is not racist or anti-religious - it's a vital step in working out why and stopping it.
Moreover, when the Muslim Council excuses itself weakly by saying it is upholding a "religious principle" by staying away from the Holocaust Memorial Day, it doesn't help matters on the religious tolerance front.
Muslims should, if anything, be joining the world in the call to make the actions of it's fundamentalist extremists not merely politically and socially unacceptable but to make those who would consider doing them feel foolish. Mockery is the only pin that terminally bursts the bubble of pompous, self-righteousness. Nobody likes to look and feel stupid - that’s why satire is such a powerful tool.
As a rational atheist, I look upon the reasonings of those with faith, with a bewilderment that would be amusing if it weren’t so bloody frightening.
See, the problem with faith is that it turns us all into children who are at the mercy and whims of a parent whom we wish to please. And our lack of subtlety in expressing that desire to be loved and accepted produces behaviour that at best is sycophantic and at worst downright frightening. Anybody who has observed an attention seeking child should be able to relate to this. If you ignore a child, odds are it will behave in a more and more reprehensible manner to try and illicit a response. The inevitable failure of God to respond to us (he can’t respond - he’s a manifestation of our own superego, nothing more) ensures that devotees become more and more desperate to get a response and the fundamentalism is what results. Obviously God isn’t showing himself because we’re not strict enough - better be more extreme. That’ll do it. But like that attention desperate child, no response from the parent could ever be enough once the pattern is set. Instead of a religiousd hatred bill, perhaps we should have fundamentalist asbos. I'd love to see Ian Paisley wearing a tag that went off everytime he said something vile. It might eventually train him, in a pavlovian manner, to stop being such a twat all the time.
You can see how it all goes wrong by watching any episode of the rugrats - it’s the absolutely perfect example in fact. The convoluted logic of the zealot is the logic of the babies who are at the mercy of a confusing world of adults, whose rules they don't quite grasp. They snatch a few titbits of information and extrapolate it to make sense of their world. And they're always wrong. Even better still, look at Angelica - a perfect metaphor for the bent cop, crooked politician or preacher, abusing midlevel authority for her own ends because she thinks it will win her points with the big folks and give her power of the stupid babies whom she despises because she thinks she is better than them. In both cases, the inability to see the true big picture and the fixation on small events which have no bearing on the real matter at hand are the stuff of every episode. They are also the stuff of religious outrage.
I mean, in a world as damaged and violent as ours, what would any reasonable deity be concerned about - the 50,000 people who die every day as a result of poverty or a cartoon that presented them in a slightly unflattering light? If the really think answer to that is the latter then you need to ask some serious questions about whether your God is worth worshipping. After all, should you follow authority blindly, irrispective of your own moral compass? Look to the example of Huckleberry Finn, who accepted that he might go to Hell because he had freed a slave but who freed him nonetheless because it felt like the right thing to do, irrespective of what God might say. That's courage.
So here's my plea to the Muslims of the world - do you know what would be worth taking to the streets over? The illegal war in Iraq that has resulted in the deaths of a 100, 000 of your brothers and sisters just because Americans can't get a handle on their consumerism. On the scale of things, these cartoons shouldn't even flicker the needle of your outrageometers.
See the problem with believing in an omnipotent god who will judge you, is the assumption that you have to behave in a certain way to please him, or else be punished. It’s like the boy scout who only does his good deed for the day if he has an audience. It creates the notion that it is the fact of being observed in doing good that matters, rather than the good deed itself. Whereas in truth, those of us who don't believe know, it’s what you do when you don’t believe anybody is watching that dictates what sort of person you really are.
Ask Chucky - I’m sure he’d agree.

Clare Cooney
- e-mail: clare.cooney@gmail.com
- Homepage: http://rantinf.blogspot.com/

Comments

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Racial bullying is a two stage process

05.02.2006 19:23

The psychology of racial bullying, as seen during the time of Black slaves, then of the 'liberated' black population of the US, then of the jews of Europe, and now of the muslims, is well understood. Those that invite 'complex' discussions of the 'issues' are ALWAYS on the side of the bully program.

The purpose of racially bullying during the three earlier times listed above is now accepted without question. No-one cares to engage in complex discussions, because the purpose of such bullying is crystal clear today.

Black slaves, black 'liberated' slaves, and jews were to be treated as less than fully human. They were to have significantly less rights in a society where others were expected to value their own rights. In other words, a two tier system was to be created, where the various mechanisms of society would allow for the very different treatment of humans according to their racial status. The purpose of racial bullying was to give the strongest impression that this state of affairs was both right and proper, with the 'inferior' group deserving their treatment.

To take black slaves, if they chose to be passive, they defined themselves as domesticated animals. If they chose to be aggressive, they defined themselves as wild savages, deserving of no consideration. Defined, that is, in the words of the scumbags responsible for using propaganda to maintain slavery.

Today, when we look back on the imagery of Nazi anti-jew propaganda, we see only one-hundredth of the picture. Missing was the fact that people like 'Clare Cooney' were essential to the whole horrific process, by bringing a pseudo-intellectual analytical process that sought to justify the propaganda images by damning the response of the jews, no matter what that response was. Most Germans would NEVER have agreed that the anti-jew images represented their own opinions. However, they WOULD strongly agree with the commentators in the Nazi controlled German press that cleverly damned the jews for however they chose to act in the face of the provocation.

JUST LIKE NORMAL BULLYING. The bully says something about his victim, but more importantly is prepared to mock the victim publically no matter how the victim responds. The second part is the true process of bullying, not the first part.

From the audience, the bully gets two kinds of response. The evil response- ie., those that are interested in what the bully and his victim say and do. The good response- ie., those that identify that they are seeing an act of bullying, and desire to end it.

Blair is bullying the muslims with OPERATION 'THE ETERNAL MUSLIM' so that he may more easily murder them in vast numbers. Are you prepared to demand that Blair and his people are stopped, or are you going to have a nice cosy natter about 'freedom of speech', 'religious tolerance', 'thin-skinned ethnics', 'extremists', and all the other stuff the people of Nazi Germany did when confronted with Hitler's program of anti-jew propaganda. Hitler WANTED the chat, and so does Blair. Hitler DID NOT want his people to say STOP BULLYING THE JEWS NOW!!!

If you witness a bully, and do not act to stop him, you are by definition on his side, and partner in his actions. Blair is engaged in nothing that is clever, sneaky, or unknown. His program is transparent when connected to his stated goals. The only lie is that which he hopes people will willingly tell to themselves.

twilight


Let's Ask Clare !

05.02.2006 19:50

Clare, where did you find the button labelled 'Publish Your Opinion' ? If you've got comments it looks neater if you add them to an existing news story. The only news worthy thing about your post is that Twilight finally published a comment that I can't find any fault in.

Danny


Points of View

05.02.2006 22:32

This week the BBC unwittingly showed us the inconsistency within political correctness and multiculturalism, the twin comic towers of contemporary Britain. Our freedom loving white van hero stepped outside of his usual routine only to be threatened with arrest by the banner apologists. The irony wasn't missed by the British public. So the complaints flooded in and the police scurried about. "Do we pacify the marchers or the irate viewers? The law? We'll just have to make that up as we go along."

A


Insanity on all sides

05.02.2006 23:55

I fail to see why we can't condemn (though not ban) both the cartoons which seem to be crude, politicised smears portraying all muslims as terrorists AND the hypocrites who use freedom of speech to encourage violence against those who exercise that very same right in a way they don't personally like.

Andrew


Nice Guy Andy

06.02.2006 00:10

Okay, that is a rational post. How about you keep on making that point to the hate-mongers here for a few hours so I can grab some much needed sleep ?

Danny


NYT - "Oil Graft Fuels the Insurgency, Iraq and U.S. Say"

06.02.2006 04:21

 http://fairuse.100webcustomers.com/news2/nytimes13.htm
"Oil Graft Fuels the Insurgency, Iraq and U.S. Say"

Go Twilight, run with this, run like the wind...
mention the privatisation at least once though...

Danny


Another point of view

06.02.2006 10:08

They're just opinions. no matter how you slice it, whether it's Jesus, Muhammad or anyone else being subject to someone else's interpretation, violence is NOT justified or comprehendible. I think American web site Annoy.com makes some very valid points. Don't click on the link if you you'll be offended by a strong image related to the controversy.

annoy.com/covers/doc.html?DocumentID=100773

Who's Your Shepherd
By Clinton Fein
Annoy.com

The global furor over the publication of cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad as violent seems as inappropriate as the tepid condemnation over Pat Robertson’s call to assassinate Hugo Chavéz.

Calling for the beheading of an artist for creating a caricature depicting a religion as violent is about as hypocritical as assaulting or killing a woman for appearing in a degrading beauty contest. Or like amputating Ann Coulter’s legs for her immodest vagina flashing on Fox News. Or castrating and sodomizing men who rape.

As fanatical, intolerant Muslim preachers continue to incite violence over the depictions of violence, and as Israeli Jews deliberately incite riots by building unauthorized new structures in settlements, America’s religious righteous -- armed with justifications from their churches, mosques and synagogues -- are mincing into gay bars with machetes and guns and opening fire. Others are frantically preparing to picket Coretta Scott King’s funeral because she supported gay rights. The Pope, lost in the haze of his Nazi Youth is too busy purging the symptoms of his dysfunctional, homocentric Church -- in between satin dress fittings and Prada shopping sprees -- blissfully oblivious to the blatantly obvious causes. The one certain thing all of these Torah-touting, Koran-clutching, Bible-thumping, Scripture-screeching religious zealots seem to share, is an unbridled lust for violence.

While all the world’s major religions -- Judaism, Christianity, Catholicism, and Hinduism – shoulder responsibility for fueling extremist factions spewing hatred, violence and intolerance, Muslims do need to drop the victimization act and realize that just as they condemn and judge others with impunity, so too must they learn to cope with being subject to criticism.

Until people stop, in Allah's name, stoning woman to death, killing homosexuals, cutting the hands off children stealing food to survive, flying passenger planes into skyscrapers, car-bombing innocent people, forcing their religious convictions onto others, and other such atrocities, and until Muslims loudly and clearly reject and condemn the violence perpetrated by those who have hijacked and perverted their religion, the likelihood of cartoonists depicting Muhammad as a gentle, olive-branch carrying dove is not particularly high.

Mike


My God! A Khalif Omar and a St.Paul already.

06.02.2006 18:18

Danny, You have jumped the gun just a little. It would be wise to await my demise before making up my words.

Are you prepared to spread the Remedy with fire and sword? Time is running short, and God is seriously hampered by the scientists who keep on obstructing every cure evolved to heal the ills of the planet.

Ibola on the Metro, Subway and Underground in rush hour would probably be enough to save Life on Earth from extinction and undo the Satanist plot of the Archbisops, Ayatollahs and Popes.

Ilyan


May every conception be immaculate

07.02.2006 16:19

>It would be wise to await my demise before making up my words.
Ah, but Your appeal to the apostates to renounce their procreation has been brutally surpressed (well, hidden at least). The true words of the Prophet Ilyan, who would save us from overpopulation via the five-fingered prayer, Hidden from the eyes of sinners, with no sign whether that was because we used the word 'wank' or just because we were talking wank. Dear and Holy Prophet, are you the Messiah or is there One to cum after you ?

Danny