I think this bloke answers the question he raises: " 'They want to test our feelings,' protester Mawli Abdul Qahar Abu Israra told the BBC.
'They want to know whether Muslims are extremists or not. Death to them and to their newspapers,' he said."
The world's gone nuts.
Four killed in cartoon protests
7 comments:
My friend Matt's about to embark on an epic motorcycle trip. Here's his intended route. Hope he's not carrying any Danish newspapers.
Ha! Well from what I remember he never looked very Scandinavian. Still, I wouldn't fancy it.
The world has indeed gone nuts. When was the Rushdie Fatwa? That was bad enough, but seemed less widespread than this current absurdity. I get the sense that in the last 10 years or so, Muslim extremism has become much more prevalent across the globe.
My problem is that if the vast majority of Muslims are moderate, non-extremists - as we are constantly assured, and as I'd like to believe - where are they? They're not doing a very good job of presenting their point of view to the world's media. Whether that's because lots of people are, if not directly sympathetic, then at least tolerant of the nutters' views, or whether its because the nutters make better news stories, I don't know. But I wish a more moderate, debate-driven (and critical of the West if necessary) movement would emerge to counter the fundies.
Quite hard to grab headlines with one's moderate viewpoint I suppose. I reckon the majority are appalled by *both* the insult to the prophet and by the violence advocated by the vocal extremists.
Quite a good piece on the cartoons by John Simpson on BBC News Onlines. I never used to care for John Simpson before, but increasingly I've come to like his bland reasonableness in this era of media hysteria and ideological extremism.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/middle_east/4685886.stm
Blimey, he's a lot better in print than on the telly, when his pomposity is a bit off-putting. But you're right, this is sensible. More like this, please.
Nice to see some more sensible views being reported here now. e.g.
"Muslims of the world, be reasonable. What brings more prejudice against Islam, these caricatures or pictures of a hostage-taker slashing the throat of his victim or a suicide bomber who blows himself up during a wedding ceremony?" - Jihad Momani, editor in chief of Jordanian weekly al-Shihan. Although he was then sacked for printing 3 of the cartoons.
There's been a lot of similar views kicking about, though.
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