Manal and Alaa's bit bucket free speech from the bletches

Dear Alaa, dear forum readers,

There seems to be a lot of misunderstandings on both sides of the "conflict", so i'd like to contribute to a better understanding of the western culture in relation to those caricatures:

- The history of most every western european country is strongly marked by the emancipation of the people against feudalism and monarchy _and_ against the political influence of (christian) religion, which was a pillar of the feudal and royal power and oppressiveness.

- The result is a democratic system where (among other points that don't relate that much with these caricatures) freedom, equality and secularity are key principles. Freedom includes liberty of speech and expression. Thus, the people control the state, the state is not allowed to control the people or the media.

- religion is a priori not allowed to have any direct power in this democratic structure. Besides the role played by (christian) religion before democracy could prevail, this is because

a) there had been many bloody religion wars not only outside europe, but also and expecially inside (especially between catholic and protestant christians), and that was a threat to any stability and peace. And

b) every religion has its own rules which are usually mutually exclusive and incompatible, so the only viable solution to allow for a peaceful coexistence of many religions was a completely secular state where no religion has the right to enforce its rules upon the people (especially, those who believe in another religion or no religion at all). That doesn't mean that the state is anti-religious, but it does mean that religion is considered to be a private thing that everyone is allowed to follow, but no one is allowed to force upon others. thus the rules of every religion are restricted to, at most, its own believers.

- While there is in Europe, a minority who dislikes people of other countries, religion, colour or sexual orientation, discrimination is widely frowned upon. As a matter of fact, the historical wound about the nazis deporting and killing jews, people of other religions, gay people, people of certain races, handicapped people and people who spoke up against the non-democratic nazi system led most european countries to have a system that doesn't tolerate discrimination and intolerance.

- So how come the states didn't intervene against the caricatures, then? some may ask. The thing is: a) the caricatures were much less critical or insulting than those published regularly about, say, christian religious figures and symbols (and no one protests about those). b) criticism and humour about religions explicitely falls under the liberty of free speech (remember it was criticism of religion and feudalism that allowed democracies to come up in the first place). As a matter of fact, if any christian church dared to question liberty of expression for the caricatures about christian figures and symbols (which they don't), you can be assured that there would be a democratic uproar against it. Compared to that, there's a much less severe criticism against muslim demands to restrict liberty of expression. Besides, humor and criticism, including the necessity to also be able to accept jokes and criticism about oneself, are an integral part of the european cultural identity.

- Another logical misunderstanding is when radical muslims demand excuses from the danish government. Besides the fact that all the caricatures lasting on for years about christians and jews in newspapers in arab countries make that criticism sound quite ridiculous, the thing is: what exactly did that government do that would have to be excused? here's what: it did not infringe against its own democratic rules and principles in order to apply the rules of a religion instead and restrict freedom of expression. One can hardly criticize the government for that. If they had tried, the people would rightfully have impeached that government for breaking basic rules of any secular democracy.

- So what about the newspapers then? The initial newspaper might have had some latent anti-immigrant tendencies (note that even if that was the case, it wouldn't even be about religion), but the others who reprinted the caricatures certainly did not in any way. they did it because they saw it as a necessary step to prevent a restriction of the liberty of expression and of the media. Remember: the people had to fight against one religion's influence in order to have democratic liberties. They don't want to lose that to any religion.

-Again: this is nothing anti-islamic or anti-muslim. It's just that no religion has any right to restrict democratic liberties and that the newspapers wanted to clearly draw that lign and protect their democratic rights, just as they did against the christian religion.

- So what's happenning now? Now people in Europe see that their flags and embassies are burnt and their people killed by people who do this in the name of the islam. they see that it's not just a small minority following this uproar, but real masses of people. So the image in Europe of islam and muslims is definitely suffering of this.

-It seems absolutely terrifying that a stupid caricature that depicts a relationship between islam and terrorism would seem to be confirmed by the very people who act in protest against the caricature itself (ouch!) by burning and killing innocent people who just happen to have the same nationality as some newspaper. how dumb.

-The minority far right-wing parties trying to make resentments against immigrants (and thus also against muslims) are happy to find an easy "confirmation" of their claim and are slowly gaining ground because of this shit. Similarly, the integrist islamists who want a war of cultures against the western world are gaining of this whole shit.

-Those who will suffer from all this are all the moderate and peaceful muslims who will have to more clearly show that they have nothing to do with those radical extremists which are burning and killing.

- So to sum it up: There is (still) no wide anti-islamic tendency in Europe (just a small far-right minority). People in Europe just don't want their democratic and secular order to be threatened by any religion. But with every human killed in the name of islam, every burned flag or embassy, every act of terrorism in the name of islam, the currently small percentage associating islam with these terrible acts quickly increases.

- The time has come for all moderate and peace-loving muslims to speak up, take distance from the extremists doing those violent things and make clear that islam doesn't stand for violence but for peace. That voice is clearly too weak now and the only loud voice claiming to represent islam right now in Europe is the voice of those who want to force the rules of their very own religious beliefs upon all people and upon the now secular state.