Saturday, February 18, 2006
Russia joins crowd surrendering to Muslim cultural demands
Russia, once the tough guy of both Europe and Asia, has joined the rising tide of cowering nations intimidated by the Muslim cartoon riots, with prosecutors investigating the editor of a paper which ran the Muhammad cartoons and the government shutting down another paper which ran an original cartoon:
Russian prosecutors opened an investigation into the editor of a newspaper that reprinted caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, and another paper was ordered closed Friday after publishing a cartoon depicting Muhammad along with Jesus, Moses and Buddha.
The Prosecutor General's office said the Nash Region newspaper in the Vologda region, some 310 miles northeast of Moscow, have started a probe of Anna Smirnova on charges of using her position to incite hatred.
Smirnova's Nash Region newspaper, which published the cartoons this week, was the first such reprint by a Russian media outlet of the caricatures, which were first published in Denmark and have caused widespread outrate in the Muslim world.
This appears to have become the pattern: publishing the cartoons, or, increasingly, ANY image which does not measure up to Muslim religious standards, is "inciting hatred". Civilized nations started down this road when they began to legislate political correctness. In Russia, they're now taking the next step, and anything Muslims find offensive is going to be labeled as "abusing media freedom":
Separately, the mayor of the southern city of Volgograd said his order to close the City News was intended "to prevent incitement of enmity on religious national and social grounds, and also to stop the abuse of media freedom," according to an administration statement.
The drawing in the newspaper illustrated an article titled "Racists Can't Be in the Government" and depicted Jesus, Moses, Buddha and the Prophet Muhammad watching television. The TV screen showed two groups of people about to start a fist fight, and the drawing was accompanied by a caption that reads, "We did not teach you that."
Difficult to see how that cartoon is inflammatory, other than to the interpretation of Islam that prohibits any image of Muhammad. So now, the rest of the world is going to be required to observe Muslim religious principles or face the rage of Muslim mobs. And the reaction of Russia's "responsible" Muslim establishment is telling:
Russia's top Muslim authority, the Council of Muftis, said that the caricatures published by the Russian media had insulted Muslims.
"The Islamic culture bans all images of Prophet Muhammad, not only those which show disrespect. The Prophet mustn't be depicted in any context," the council said in a statement on its Web site.
The statement added that the council was not urging authorities to respond to publications, proceeding from the assumption that "authorities themselves must calculate and avert possible consequences of such publications."
Notice a pattern here? Do what the Muslims want or face the consequences, murder and mayhem.
Intimidation, plain and simple.
And it's working.
[also posted at BabbleFest]
Russian prosecutors opened an investigation into the editor of a newspaper that reprinted caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, and another paper was ordered closed Friday after publishing a cartoon depicting Muhammad along with Jesus, Moses and Buddha.
The Prosecutor General's office said the Nash Region newspaper in the Vologda region, some 310 miles northeast of Moscow, have started a probe of Anna Smirnova on charges of using her position to incite hatred.
Smirnova's Nash Region newspaper, which published the cartoons this week, was the first such reprint by a Russian media outlet of the caricatures, which were first published in Denmark and have caused widespread outrate in the Muslim world.
This appears to have become the pattern: publishing the cartoons, or, increasingly, ANY image which does not measure up to Muslim religious standards, is "inciting hatred". Civilized nations started down this road when they began to legislate political correctness. In Russia, they're now taking the next step, and anything Muslims find offensive is going to be labeled as "abusing media freedom":
Separately, the mayor of the southern city of Volgograd said his order to close the City News was intended "to prevent incitement of enmity on religious national and social grounds, and also to stop the abuse of media freedom," according to an administration statement.
The drawing in the newspaper illustrated an article titled "Racists Can't Be in the Government" and depicted Jesus, Moses, Buddha and the Prophet Muhammad watching television. The TV screen showed two groups of people about to start a fist fight, and the drawing was accompanied by a caption that reads, "We did not teach you that."
Difficult to see how that cartoon is inflammatory, other than to the interpretation of Islam that prohibits any image of Muhammad. So now, the rest of the world is going to be required to observe Muslim religious principles or face the rage of Muslim mobs. And the reaction of Russia's "responsible" Muslim establishment is telling:
Russia's top Muslim authority, the Council of Muftis, said that the caricatures published by the Russian media had insulted Muslims.
"The Islamic culture bans all images of Prophet Muhammad, not only those which show disrespect. The Prophet mustn't be depicted in any context," the council said in a statement on its Web site.
The statement added that the council was not urging authorities to respond to publications, proceeding from the assumption that "authorities themselves must calculate and avert possible consequences of such publications."
Notice a pattern here? Do what the Muslims want or face the consequences, murder and mayhem.
Intimidation, plain and simple.
And it's working.
[also posted at BabbleFest]
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