Abusing The Freedom of Speech

29 Responses to “Abusing The Freedom of Speech”

1. Andrew Brehm on May 27th, 2006 7:57 am

   Why should people be punished for drawing cartoons of Muhammed? What does it have to do with the holocaust?

   The one has nothing to do with the other.

2. Drima on May 27th, 2006 9:47 am

   “The one has nothing to do with the other.”

   Believe me for more than a billion people it does. I personally don’t doubt that the holcaust occured. Also the cartoons had no effect whatsoever on my perceptions of the Prophet. I did find them offensive but I didn’t care much really. What would a bunch of harmless cartoons do anyways? People say a lot of bad things about Islam all the time so it’s not like this is the first time…

   BUT then again if cartoons are harmless, why are people punished for questioning the holocaust? What’s the big deal if I want to stand in the middle of the street in Germany and shout “there’s no such thing as a holocaust! It never happened!”. Why do I get punished then?? Why doesn’t the KKK get punished when they spread their hate speech in America. I know that different countries have different laws but let’s keep the focus on Europe. Why are some forms of expression illegal while others are not. What’s the basis and logic of such things being punishable or legal? Andrew this DOES have a lot to do with the other…

3. Andrew Brehm on May 27th, 2006 11:17 am

   “Believe me for more than a billion people it does.”

   But how? What does Muhammed have to do with the murder of millions? What does making fun of the one have to do with denying the truth of the other?

   “BUT then again if cartoons are harmless, why are people punished for questioning the holocaust?”

   One is satire, the other is a lie. The cartoonists did not claim that Muhammed did, in fact, wear a bomb on his head.

   And in fact, in most western countries, denying the holocaust is not a crime. Only in those countries involved it is. The reason is political: it’s illegal for the same reason as it is illegal to commit treason.

   By denying the holocaust one denies Germany’s history, and with that the legitimacy of the current German state.

   But either way there is an objective difference between misrepresenting history and satire.

4. TheRaccoon on May 27th, 2006 3:50 pm

   And moreover… in Israel, for instance, anything calling for the death of another person is illegal (that is, if you go out in Tel Aviv and scream, dunno, “Death to Arabs!”, you’ll be arrested, fined, and incarcerated). It was passed after Rabin was assassinated.

   There are certain limits to freedom of speech, just as there certain limits to freedom of action - and it stands to reason, because the pen is mightier than the sword. And can kill many more people.

   Other’n that, what Andrew said

5. Al on May 27th, 2006 4:39 pm

   Well, as far as I know, New York laws allow for some really offensive “free speech”, but if you actually threaten any individual for group with death, police take that as “intent to commit felonious assault”.

6. Drima on May 27th, 2006 8:28 pm

   The fact only in the countries involved with Germany in WW2 it’s illegal makes sense… I just think people should have some mutual respect and not insult others people’s relgions. That also includes anti-Semitic cartoons in the ME…

   Here’s an analogy:
   In some restaurants smoking is illegal and a person can be fined for it… However I can go up to another guy’s table sitting with his family enjoying a meal and I can fart in his face… It’s not illegal but it would certainly piss the hell out him… Pointless and offensive

   In a way it all does somehow come down to if Denmark’s laws and laws of other countries who reprinted the cartoons don’t or do punish a person for questioning holocaust…

   Again I’m not against the freedom of speech but I’m just still puzzled as to why some speeches are considered hate speech and are punishable while others are not…

   Andrew just as my answer “God is the souce of morality” would be difficult to use to convince others about traditional marriage, your answer will be weak when it comes to convincing Muslims about the cartoons… I’m sorry but until I see the basis of how a “negative” speech qualifies to be hate speech, I’ll still be in disagreement on this one…

7. Drima on May 27th, 2006 8:38 pm

   Come to think about it though, a point most Muslims don’t understand is that the government of Denmark cannot punish the media there… There were no laws broken. Not only that but also the Danish government cannot interfere in what the media does as it would be “obstaining” its freedom… It would be absurd to push the Danish government to punish the newspaper because no laws were broken at the time but I do think that a law should probably be implemented banning such things to avoid them from happening again and causing all thse problems…

   Don’t misunderstand though… I’m defintely not in the positition to demand such things… I’m simply sharing my thoughts and trying to explore and figure out answers…

   BTW Andrew I replied to your comment in “We Are Not Hatefull People”…

8. frenchfregoli@yahoo.com on May 28th, 2006 2:08 am

   You know drima,

   I admit that you win the argumant here.

   From now on i propose that we in the ‘west’ apply the same principle of free speech that exist in muslim countries.
   Oh, and of course everything else, meaning we will treat our ‘foreigners’ the same way they are treated in the gulf countries, and at the slighest ‘inconvenience’ to our beliefs we burn things and issue death treats and knife people in the streets.
   I propose complete ‘reciprocity’ in all things; after all that would be the best way to treat the muslim world as our ‘equal’ wouldn’t it?
   And for the next quake , tsunami or catastrophe in the islamic world, we will match our relief efforts to the one proposed by the muslim countries, no less and certainly no more…

9. Drima on May 28th, 2006 3:57 am

   frenchfregoli,

   your sarcastic comment is deeply appreciated. If you are a regular reader to this blog you will know where I stand regarding all the things you mentioned so don’t rush to conlcusions.

10. frenchfregoli@yahoo.com on May 28th, 2006 7:17 am

    Drima,

    My sarcasm wasn’t a personal attack.
    I appreciate your blog and your somewhat open views, but even then,from time to time, you display the same oft repeated adolescent notions of’sensivity’ and ‘humiliation’that we hear too many times from the muslim world.
    For the sake of clarity, i am myself of muslim origin(albeit non-arab, but lived in the gulf) and i am quite familiar with the mentality of ‘never criticising self’ that is destroying the muslim world.

11. frenchfregoli@yahoo.com on May 28th, 2006 7:17 am

    Drima,

    My sarcasm wasn’t a personal attack.
    I appreciate your blog and your somewhat open views, but even then,from time to time, you display the same oft repeated adolescent notions of’sensivity’ and ‘humiliation’that we hear too many times from the muslim world.
    For the sake of clarity, i am myself of muslim origin(albeit non-arab, but lived in the gulf) and i am quite familiar with the mentality of ‘never criticising self’ that is destroying the muslim world.

12. BP on May 28th, 2006 7:28 am

    Drima I disagree..I wrote about that countless times on my blog.

    1. Denmark has no holocaust rules..I can deny the holocaust as much as I want in denmark.

    2. Countries such as france and austria do have holocaust rules..but guess what, I can draw Moses naked there!

    3. countries that have holocaust rules have them because of the magnitude of what happened..france for example, treats the armenian genocide the same way..however, these laws cannot prevent me from making fun of jesus, moses, muhamed, and king tut.

    4. The only way for muslims to enjoy the “holocaust rules” that A FEW european countries have is to have a muslim holocaust in europe!

    5. I am against the holocaust rules that A FEW europe countries have.

13. Drima on May 28th, 2006 8:27 am

    Frenchfregoli,

    sorry for misunderstanding but believe me I always get bashed during discussions with people I know for being ” too self-criticising”… Those people always accuse me of being ” a self-hater” and of aligning myself with the “infidels”… You are right with the other point though and I’m very aware that I do display some of the (repeated adolescent notions of ’sensivity’ and ‘humiliation’) and I’m trying my best not to… Sometimes however I have the urge of just “going for it” so now I decided to do so on this blog to get diverse opinions that might just show me something that I’m probably missing…

    I was and still am against the boycott against Danish products, burning of embassies, stupid angry responses etc… I just wanted to understand what seems to me like some sort of double standard…

    BP, thanx to your straight forward and conclusive comment, I have finally come to a conclusion…
    
    1- Since Denmark has no holocaust rule, I cannot blame it for having a double standard…

    2- Since I can draw “Moses naked” in France and Austria (not that I would =p) I cannot blame them for having a double standard…

    3- Freedom of speech should also include me chanting “holocaust never happened” in France and Austria without getting arrested for fear it might be offensive to Jews. (please don’t take it in a racist way)

14. Andrew Brehm on May 28th, 2006 8:45 am

    “Freedom of speech should also include me chanting “holocaust never happened” in France and Austria without getting arrested for fear it might be offensive to Jews. (please don’t take it in a racist way)”

    You misunderstand. It’s not illegal because it is offensive to Jews (and Gipsies and Muslims and homosexuals and all the others who perished).

    It is illegal because it undermines the authority of the post-WW2 governments in these countries.

    The legal government of France before allied victory was Petain’s administration in Vichy. The legal government in Germany and Austria was the Nazi dictatorship.

    Current French, German, and Austrian government’s authority is based on the assumption that the allies’ occupation was justified because of the crimes of the Nazis. (The United Nations were first founded by the five victorious powers to handle that responsibility.)

    By denying the holocaust you do not offend Jews as much as you directly challenge the government.

    And that must be illegal according to the definition of what a government is in these countries.

    That doesn’t mean that free speech might not be worth more than the stability of government, or that government will now, after several decades be stable enough, but the point is that it is not the same. If Muslims don’t understand or accept that, I can only propose that they think about making fun of Muhammed in a country where government is based on his words. THAT would be comparable to denying the holocaust in Germany in the legal sense.

15. TheRaccoon on May 28th, 2006 10:04 am

    BTW, about Holocaust and offense to Jews - there are tons of Holocaust jokes in Israel. Which might be in poor taste (even though some of them are really good), but perfectly legal. They’re also perfectly legal in Germany, I think, but the Germans are more likely to take offense at these than Jews
    There’s also the question of preservation of life - after the Europeans have been slaughtering Jews by the millions for a couple of thousand years, they wisened up and decided that maybe it’s a bad idea. And that maybe it’s time they changed their attitude entirely and stopped torturing and killing people altogether - and especially Jews.

    The Holocaust happens to be the single largest massacre of Jews in Europe over a short period of time; as such, it’s remiding the Europeans that maybe wholesale massacres of Jews are not really a good idea any longer. Denying the Holocaust is denying this reminded - and denying this reminder is stepping back into the good ole days of socially accepted anti-Semitism.

    I hope that it’s apparent how this is different from ridiculing religion - and especially from ridiculing the violence in a religion.

    Personally, I am all for ridicule of systems - it’s part of my religion
    All hail Eris Discordia!

    Peace out.

    The Discordian Raccoon.

16. halalhippie on May 28th, 2006 4:51 pm

    Gotta agree w/bp here:

    Holocaust denial/revisionism is NOT illegal in Denmark!
    Depicting religious figures is NOT illegal in Denmark!

    NO BLOODY DOUBLE STANDARDS

    Please tell that to EVERY Muslim you know, so we can get that one aside and start talking.

    Truly sorry to lose my temper (deep breath…better now
    That said, I’m still ashamed over the cartoons. Depicting the Prophet (pbuh) was ok… the taboo against it doesn’t apply to “infidels”…but mocking Him…not very polite.

    In the best possible future, Western media will not make mocking cartoons of the Prophet: not because there is a law against it (perish the thought), not because Muslims worldwide will issue death treaths, but simply because it’s hurtful to some people’s feelings.

    Good, you’re safe in Indonesia.

17. halalhippie on May 28th, 2006 5:07 pm

    oh, and another thing: the “bomb-in-turban” cartoon that was by far the worst…
    When I first saw it I chuckled. I said to myself “yeah, how stupid are we Danes. Thinking terrorism”

    some westerners got their crash-course of Islam on 9.11 They see news about suicide bombings.
    So they think Prophet Muhammed -> Islam -> Terrorism

    Now, is that stupid, or what ?
    Does it deserve to be ridiculed, or what ?

    There ya go: the bomb-in-turban cartoon. The joke is upon us/the West/Danish ignorants. It was published in a Danish newspaper,in Danish language, directed at a Danish audience (inlcuding Muslims)

    That’s how I saw it…is it a lame excuse, or what ?

    Keep sane, brother

18. keda on May 29th, 2006 12:07 am

    dirma its my first time here. i sauntered over from leiloutas.

    i don’t want to really disagree with you my first time here. but i do. i concur almost 100% with many of your commenters and i’ll leave it at that as its all been said really.

    however, from what i have seen of you so far despite having very different views, you are open minded, polite and open to debate. you can also admit any mistakes you happen to make if you are convinced you have done so. this as well as my interest in hearing moderate islamic voices makes me interested to read more. your commenters are also fabulous so i believe i’ll be lurking here again.

    thank you.

19. Qatar Cat on May 29th, 2006 7:11 am

    Oh my oh my oh my. Speaking of double standards? How about we compare the freedoms Muslims have in the West, with the freedoms Westerners have in the Muslim countries? In other words, lets compare apples with apples.
    Two scenarios:
    1. You can stand in the middle of ANY European country and shout “Europe is cancer, Islam is the answer” (or Your president is a pussy, etc). You draw a cartoon of Jesus (Moses, Buddha, Mickey Mouse, etc) and display it on a poster.
    2. I stand in the middle of ANY Muslim country and shout “Islam is cancer, Western way of life is the answer” … (I don’t think I will have time to draw anything, though.)

    And now imagine likely outcomes of these two scenarios.

    And THEN talk about double standards.

    OK?
    

20. Drima on May 29th, 2006 9:41 am

    Qatar Cat,

    I won’t ever lie to you. I defintely have to give you every single point you make for the simple reason that I agree with you 1000000%

    People sorry for the short absence… I just got done with my exams Yaaaay! Busy packing up my stuff and emptying my dorm room… Will be back to reply this stuff later plus need some time to digest all the comments here… thank you all for contributing… Cya in about a day…

    BTW a Sudanese man married a goat… LOL… That’s just retarded ain’t it!! hehehe

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/4748292.stm

21. TheRaccoon on May 29th, 2006 10:48 am

    The goat story - BRILLIAN! Thanks
    LOL!

22. Andrew Brehm on May 29th, 2006 11:21 am

    “They said I should not take him to the police, but rather let him pay a dowry for my goat because he used it as his wife,”

    I think the elders were absolutely right.

    The goat’s original owner can arguably no longer use the goat (or I would understand it if he refused to own it after that). Had they taken the “groom” to the police, he would have been punished, and what’s the point of that?

    That way the groom escapes severe punishment and the goat’s original owner get compensation for the loss of his goat.

    Very wise men these elders, even if it sounds funny at first.

23. halalhippie on May 29th, 2006 1:21 pm

    Sorry for my rude replies….I was tired….u don’t really deserve it. Respect to de Drima.

24. Drima on May 29th, 2006 8:52 pm

    Hey Halalhippie you don’t have to apologize at all bro… Come on man serisouly… I wasn’t offended at all whatsoever so don’t worry about it… We’re all brothers and sisters no matter how much our views differ, remember?
    

    Sorry people just got done packing with almost everything and now gonna pack my PC… another 10 hours and I’ll be back… Sorry to keep you all waiting…

25. Qatar Cat on May 30th, 2006 6:15 am

    If we are all brothers and sisters, then who do we marry? Goats!

    :p

26. Drima on May 30th, 2006 11:50 am

    “Very wise men these elders, even if it sounds funny at first.”

    Damn Andrew, I have to admit… RESPECT bro… I was too busy laughing to actually bother to sit and analyse the goat story like you did… You are absolutely right… Those men were wise…

    And now back to the discussion of abusing the freedom of speech and double standards… I have read and re-read all the comments and then digested everything all over again… Allow me to rephrase the points…
    

    1- SAME… Since Denmark has no holocaust rule, I cannot blame it for having a double standard…

    2- SAME… Since I can draw “Moses naked” in France and Austria (not that I would =p) I cannot blame them for having a double standard…

    3- I misunderstood the reasons behind why denying the holocaust is illegal in some European countries. After Andrew Brehm explained it, I now realize the real reasons behind those laws.
    

    As such thanks to the comments you all made and contributed in, I’m a little wiser now… Therefore I withdraw my comment… There is no double standard AT ALL in the freedom of speech and how it’s applied in the west… Infact thanks to this discussion I now understand why seemingly “hatefull” speech is allowed… However I still think that a little bit of “manners” should be practiced… The cartoons did a lot of damage and I hope that next time anger will be channeled productively and not destructively… Nevertheless though, let me say it again… There are NO double standards… I now know this… Thank you all for being supportive readers, active commenters and for aiding me in my quest for answers and understanding… I appreciate it

27. Qatar Cat on May 30th, 2006 12:53 pm

    Oh well… It’s not all so black and white.

    Actually, I’ve had to tell people here in Qatar many times that when talking about double standards in this context they shouldn’t look at WHAT Western world allows but at WHO is allowed. You will find that the rights of Muslims in the Western world are largely equal to that of the Westerners. There is no double standard in allowing hate speech - a Muslim and a Westerner denying Holocaust will be equally prosecuted. Just as the right of drawing cartoons and shouting slogans is equally granted to both groups. If people are equally allowed to do one thing, and equally not allowed to do another, that is not a double standard. If one person is allowed, and another one is not - THAT is a double standard.

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