So.....this may seem random but please bare with me.
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Below is an image that I, as a typical white british mongrel, find offensive. But why? Its retarded thats why. Wolfy's page sent it to me automatically it seems.
I know why they're doing it, expressing views on free speech, which I'm all for. But when i found the images uploaded, I raged.:argh:

This little tiff, depictions of Mohammed, highlights the real failing in cross cultural interaction. Ignorance is the crux of the matter. On both sides, the west and the m. east.

Do you think 99% of our so called "knowledge" of middle eastern culture comes JUST from the media? (Which i think we can all agree, is rather biased), or shall we give
ourselves more credit and assume we have more accurate sources?

So answer me this guys.
Who amongst us finds that picture of Mohammed amusing?
Who amongst us has read bits of the Quran?
Who amongst us has family out in the Middle East, past or present.
Who amongst us has interest or respect for the culture/religion?

It all comes down to this image right now really. It insults the core of a culture. Its like slagging off :tfti:Jesus:tfti: 600 years ago in Christian Europe.
It's the hardline wackos that threaten the west for "testing their faith", and we in turn rage back feeling our beloved freedom of opinion being challenged.

But seriously, this is just immature, slag off extremist Iranian clerics, but leave Mohammed alone. He was actually an awesome guy. Why do i say this?
Well ive read a few varied and unbiased stories of him since i was young. I didnt watch Fox News, ya see.

Discuss. Dont fight now, kids.

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

Looks like a jpg to me.

*high five*

Well, I sent out the page quite manually...

I agree that there's a fair bit of stupid content on the page, however, I also believe that the avoidance of using Mohammed is getting (or has gotten) pretty ridiculous. Muslims can and are very welcome to protest the use of Mohammed (and I still think that the famous Danish art was in poor taste), but I think it's ridiculous that South Park is having to lead the social commentary on this issue (and, even then, Comedy Central puts limits on it) - in the same way that a person can and should be allowed to burn an American, British, German, or otherwise flag in protest, can Mohammed at least be used in a way that is not denigrating? I mean, for Christ's sake (pun intended?), Comedy Central resorted to bleeping out the guy's name.

I won't deny that there are plenty of "NOBAMA IS A HALFBREED MUSLIN" redneck white trash hicks that are just getting in on a chance to legitimately hate on brown people on that page, but the message, I think, is something that should be supported: threatening people with death (and, in some instances, carrying through on that threat) for drawing a picture is not acceptable, and sticking your head in the sand is not going to resolve that situation. By all means, protest and write letters decrying it as an offensive act if you deem it so, but wishing death upon someone for using a black CENSOR bar to represent someone you consider holy is just wrong.

yeah, that's pretty ignorant and awful. I'm also all about free speech, but that doesn't mean you have to be completely and totally disrespectful when going about it.

Upon reading Wolfy's post above: I see some of your points, and you're right, avoiding it to the point of making everyone else uncomfortable is unnecessary, too. I just think people should be able to strike a balance between freedom and respect.

lol cute baby.

I found some of the cartoons mildly amusing :downs:

Agreed. It's unfortunate to have an association with people who are bit more crude, but, by the same token, I also don't stop supporting government transparency simply because Tea Partiers do, too.

I dunno, maybe I'm just a complete dick-wad.

But when people act all "omg you must respect me!!1one!1" the only thing it makes me want to do is to try to offend them.

You know what? I don't practice your damn religion. If I want to make a TV show that shows your religous figure, DON'T WATCH THE SHOW. DON'T ***** ABOUT IT.

If you do, you'll just get dickwads like me drawing little cry baby pictures.

Muslims' reasons for being offended at this are beyond stupid, though. The reason they don't create pictures of the Prophet is so they aren't tempted into thinking of him in an idolatrous manor. It's a tradition that had no basis in the Qur'an. Many Shi'a Muslims don't even adhere to this and actually do create artwork featuring Mohammad.

The idea that non-Muslims should refrain from using images of Mohammad is internally inconsistent. Why should a tradition that helps devout Muslims worship properly be at all relevant to people who have no Islamic faith? This is not a case of being offended because we are actively disrespecting Mohammad, this is an example of being offended that we don't follow Muslim worship traditions as if we were Muslims. The tradition doesn't even make sense when applied to a non-believer; why would we be tempted to idolize something that we don't believe in? And who cares about idolatry if we are not believer's in the first place? Isn't that pretty much the same thing?

The only reason that this is offensive is because the Muslims who are offended at this choose to be offended by it; it's not a response that is consistent with the teachings that they hold to. It's as stupid as a Christian being offended at someone drinking alcohol.

That being said I don't give a ****, and certainly am not going to participate in their stupid little game designed to fan the fires of their own self-righteous indignation.

Dude, Christians can drink alcohol...

They got ****faced all the time in the bible.

Exactly my point. However there are many Baptists who for what ever reason believe that the Bible says that any drinking is wrong and become offended when people do it. This is in spite of the face that Jesus drank wine on many occasions. It's stupid. That's what I'm drawing the analogy to.

People who "stand up for freedom of speech" with pointlessly offensive expression are idiots. Yes, you juvenile morons, you can say whatever you want and you're protected by the law. Congratulations. You want to celebrate freedom of speech, try contributing something useful.

I think its rather humorous actually. I view it as more satire then anything. Just like those old comics from the 1700-1900's with caricatures presidents and political figures. People are too easily offended these days, and because of that there will always be as Squirrel King put it "dickwads" to even the score.

In my honest opinion, everyone needs to stop using kid gloves with the Muslim faith. Its absolutely ridiculous.

Satire of what?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satire

Really?

I'm offended that "Ruthven" is in totally unnecessary quotation marks.



Yes.

ummm...

...


What do you take the image to be satire of, and how does that make the image more ok? (Because, um, anybody who knows how to read political cartoons knows that this is mocking the behavior of a few Muslims... so that can't be what your comment is referring to...?)

Exactly my point. I don't get what is so complicated here.

Mohammad cartoons = mockery of the ongoing situation concerning censorship and threatening of American television networks.

I thought it was obvious.

yeah, man. if living under police protection for 20 years was good enough for salman rushdie, it's good enough for anyone who works for comedy central.

Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody's face but their own

- Jonathan Swift, history's greatest satirist

Hmm, I don't know. My problem with this whole thing is the purely hypocritical reactions from all kinds of people. I'm talking about a group of the dutch equivalent of 'chavs' talking about how 'the Muslims' need to refrain from wearing head-scarfs without any supporting arguments. At the same time, when you tell them to stop wearing those frickin' tracksuits and caps, you'll get called all kinds of names, if not beaten up. Seriously, not wearing head-scarfs can be supported by quite a lot of good arguments, don't just yell something because you think it makes you a rebel and cool.

I think this depiction of Muhammad falls under that category, just annoying a group of people for the sake of annoying people. You're not just annoying the radical Muslims who actually threaten people, you're also annoying a large group of Muslims who dedicate a large part of their life to their religion. I know religion is arguable, but I believe these people get a lot of satisfaction in life because of their beliefs and lifestyle.

On the other hand, when Muhammad is depicted in a comic in a 'proper' way (actual satire, not just annoying people), I think Muslims in general shouldn't be overreacting, it's just a depiction. I mean, when Americans are satirically being viewed as a fat burger-eating intelligence-lacking race of humans there are not any flag-burnings or protests (i.e. There are no 'radical Americans', if these even exist), because everybody knows it's just a satirical view of the stereotype American. I also think we shouldn't stop 'provoking' the Muslims. Again: Not provoking for the sake of provoking. But provoking to show that we still have our freedom of speech. I really think that when we stop making fun of religion, we have lost a large and important part of our freedom of speech, self-criticism, critical for a well functioning democracy.

Admittedly I'm not sure about this, and please correct me if I'm wrong, but as I understood there was another principal reason that they didn't want the Prophet drawn, in that they didn't think that any material representation of the Prophet could ever do him justice. To me, that's a fair reason for them not to create such an image inside their own faith - and you could forgive them for smugly rejecting any non-Muslim attempt to capture the likeness.

I think that's the main problem for everyone, the seeming reluctance to come to the party in terms of debating the worth(lessness) of Parker's/Stone's satire. If you slag someone off, you're more inclined to respect the guy who makes a withering comeback, as opposed to the guy who rips his shirt off and asks you to come outside to fight.

Or maybe you all have it backwards.

They don't hate depictions of Mohammad, they hate us. They don't rage because they are cartoons of Mohammad; they rage because we drew them.

By them, I assume you're meaning this splinter Islam group implying death threats toward Stone and Parker?

So you finally cottoned on?

Dash if only you had added a Kilt to that picture, it would have worked :p

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

You're english.

I guess I can sum up my feelings on the topic with: Who gives a ****?

1/2 scottish 1/2 english and my username is my family's scottish clan.
So *rasp*, you arent the only scot here, bubba :p

if(getThingFlags(source) & 0x8){
  do her}
elseif(getThingFlags(source) & 0x4){
  do other babe}
else{
  do a dude}

LOL, any Muslim who is offended by this needs to get over themselves. I've spoken to Muslims who believe in a God, but think Mohammed didn't exist or did exist and wasn't anyone special.

I had a gecko I named Swift, after Jonathan Swift. I also had another gecko named Gordon, and one Conrad.

Ah yes, "Ruthven". The race of Massassian allegedly half-Scottish.

We have dismissed that claim.

:awesome::awesome:

I am a descendant of Robert the Bruce, that being my Mothers maiden Name is Murdock(Scottish Name). So Im just bragging here, but Im very proud to be of Scottish nationality.

You mean a "skirt"?

Yeah but the other guys names are Oxyonagon and Cooked Haggis.

Not according to the Wikipedia article which is pretty detailed, and probably at least co-authored by a few Muslims.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Depictions_of_Muhammad

This is about the same level of idiocy as the group that is basically praying for the death of President Obama. Facebook needs to up their standards for policing this kind of stuff.