Monday, February 13, 2006

The Stranger posts Mohammed Cartoons

... what’s happening here is that a gang of bullies—led by a country, Saudi Arabia, where Bibles are forbidden, Christians tortured, Jews routinely labeled “apes and pigs” in the state-controlled media, and apostasy from Islam punished by death—is trying to compel a tiny democracy to live by its own theocratic rules. To succumb to pressure from this gang would simply be to invite further pressure, and lead to further concessions—not just by Denmark but by all of democratic Europe. And when they’ve tamed Europe, they’ll come after America.

After all, the list of Western phenomena that offend the sensibilities of many Muslims is a long one—ranging from religious liberty, sexual equality, and the right of gay people not to have a wall dropped on them, to music, alcohol, dogs, and pork. After a few Danish cartoons, what’s next? - The Stranger - News - Feature - All the Rage:

It is important to thoroughly consider who it is that are re-publishing and distributing these cartoons.

Some folks like to point, with a look-at-them-right-wingers-go glee, those folks posting the Mohammed cartoons.

Yet, certainly Seattle's The Stranger is nowhere close to being labeled a right wing paper and they have evidently posted several of the cartoons on their website and perhaps published them too (to be confirmed).

And what about the clerics that distributed the cartoons in the Muslim world? What makes them different from Levant, publisher of the Western Standard? Shouldn't they be scolded just as much as newspaper publishers for distributing the materials in question?

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