Politics

Cartoon Wars

by Nikita Patel

Tuesday March 7, 2006

What began as a Danish phenomenon has escalated into a global outcry. With concerted efforts from the Western press and religious Muslim groups, what the Economist has called the "Cartoon Wars" is being transformed into a clash of civilizations.

The printing of twelve cartoons negatively depicting the Prophet Mohamed on September 30, 2005 in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten was precipitated by questions of self-censorship. The editor of this Danish paper particularly chose to challenge what he saw as the intimidation of fundamentalist Islam. Ironically, a few months before the printing of the controversial cartoons, a series of cartoons satirizing Jesus were rejected on the grounds that they would cause an "outcry."

Yet many remain surprised by the Muslim reaction, which ranged from peaceful street protests, consumer boycotts, closure of embassies, vandalism and rioting. Many have died either in rampages, from altercations between police and demonstrators, or communal rioting.

The backlash came on a global scale many months after the original printing. It was a delegation of Muslim leaders from Denmark who visited the Middle East that raised awareness of the cartoon to the international Muslim community. The delegation of Danish Muslim leaders and other religious organizations played a large part in the internationalization of the Muslim backlash, leading many to believe that the cartoons and the subsequent reprintings weren’t the only provocations that incited mass protest.

The public apology given by the Jyllands-Posten and the Prime Minister of Denmark a day after the January 30 raiding of the EU building in Gaza prompted other Western newspapers to reprint the images in a show of solidarity, because members of the Western press wanted a more affirmative defense of free speech than their governments were giving.

Restrictions on free speech prohibiting libel and obscenity are staples of all Western governments. Britain has an anti-blasphemy law which protects only Christianity, and several countries in Europe outlaw the denial of the Holocaust. A scholar in Austria has been jailed for denying the existence of gas chambers in Auschwitz.

While many Muslims criticize Western countries for their double standards and Islamophobia, in places like Gaza the newspapers regularly print grossly offensive images of Jews. In terms of hypocrisy, the dominant ruling classes both in the Western and Islamic worlds have much in common, it is minority communities that struggle for a voice in the international debate.

In light of the cartoon crisis, issues of immigration and minority communities have resurfaced. Many people in developed countries feel threatened by the "invasion" of minority culture and religion. They are fearful of those unwilling to assimilate.

The culture editor of Jyllands-Posten, who directed the creation of the original cartoons, asks, "How much should the host society compromise to accommodate immigrant populations, and how much should immigrants integrate into the society they are making home?"

His disregard for the power dynamics that exist and the histories that accompany the movement of peoples lead him and many other speculators to polarize the issue into a clash of cultures.

The media fixates on rioting mobs, and in the process pits the West as the champion of freedom against the intolerant violent Muslim world, and in the fertile climate of the "war on terrorism" people accept this image.

What further limits should be put on free speech to protect the cultural and religious sensitivities of minority communities? How will free speech be distinguished from hate speech? These questions, not to mention larger underlying structural problems of disproportionate power hierarchies and racism, are being ignored.

The simplicity of images that are both reactionary and binary are preferred, and entire histories of people and present double standards applied to minority communities wholly disregarded.