Contest: Make Your Own Holocaust Comic, Win Gold Coins

Mr Blair also said Mr Ahmadinejad "should come and see the evidence of the Holocaust himself in the countries of Europe", to which Iran responded by saying it was willing to send a team of "independent investigators".

I'm sure Mohammed is proud of his followers making jest of Hitler's final solution,

and people question Israel's foreign policy?

I really don't see it as that

i see it as "you want free expression, here is ours..."

I don't find it a good thing, but the logic that got them to that position is fairly sound

Here's the thing...

Holocaust == REALITY of genocide; some victims are still living today.
Mohammed== ______________

Is the logic still sound? Hardly a fair comparison for free speech, especially when we're talking about Denmark.

I really don't see it as that

i see it as "you want free expression, here is ours..."

I don't find it a good thing, but the logic that got them to that position is fairly sound

"how does that medicine taste?"

(for the record, I don't think the Muslim cartoons or Holocaust cartoons should be censored, nor do I think either party should be offended by someone elses thinking)



ok, heres the deal. i have been living in Canada for a several years, but my family is from 1313 Mockingbird lane, Anytown USA, 12345

I want to go back home to Anytown. So I move back, and forcibly (and violently) evict the current residents and move back to my old home, where I used to live (OK, maybe I didn't live there, my grandparents did, but they told me I could have it as my own one day)

so now that I have violently evicted the current residents and retaliate against the families of those who try to evict me, the rest of my neighbors aren't too happy with me, in fact they hate me and plot revenge for my takeover of the land

so I start blowing up my nieghbors houses as well, because, after all, my grandparents told me I could have this land one day, even though we no longer have the deed, and the neighbors don't want me here, so we will kill them

See how Israels foreign policy works?

/derail

/not derailed

Hmmm Kay, now since were speaking hypothetically, lets say everything you said is true and you believe you have every moral and legal right to be in your house in Anytown. In fact, pretty much everybody agrees with your legal right to live there.

Lets say in 1967, 3 of your neighbors decide to kill you and all of your family. You figure this out and kill some of them first and take some of there land. Another one of your neighbors decides to make atomic weapons. It's their public policy that you will be removed from the map. You send some guys over to France 1981 to stop that. In the mean time you give back the land that you took from the guys that tried and still are trying to kill you. They continue with their policy of trying to destroy you and you family anyway. The entire time you implement strict security measure to prevent this.

Oh yea, Since when has free speech meant anything in Iran except now to stir up shit?

Isn't religion grand? The hate flows both ways and if you think either side is 100% right then your wrong. If I was a Palestinian I would be pissed and if I were Israeli I would probably be even more hard ass.

It's all about perspective something your story is obviously missing.

Props for PC'ness though, should earn brownie points on this board.

Here's the thing...

Holocaust == REALITY of genocide; some victims are still living today.
Mohammed== ______________

Is the logic still sound? Hardly a fair comparison for free speech, especially when we're talking about Denmark.

I think you are missing something, I think it is more like this:

holocaust depicted as good == deeply offensive
Muhammed depicted as a terrorist == deeply offensive

I believe in full freedom of expression (period).
.

What I mean is, human thinking has always be prejudeced.

I believe in full freedom of expression (period). The dilemma is that we do not have it. For example we are not allowed to use our freedom of expression for hate speech or inciting a riot. Simply put they see these depictions as hate speech.

The reason depicting Muhammed is offensive for certain Muslims is that it is akin to promoting the worship of a false idol; they worship Allah, not Muhammed and some are very strict about this. On the other hand, most of all Muslims see the depiction of Muhammed as a terrorist as offensive.

Mr. Eunuch,

You are the one trying to give lesson on middle east politics.

in poor taste yes, and as much as I dislike and disagree with much of the actions of Israel, seems sad that Jews are being dumped on by Muslims again (even tho they had nothing to do with it)

I put the exact same lesson in your face and all of a sudden it's off topic.

Who is everybody? Well the UN according to the link you gave.

In March, for the first time ever, Kofi Annan, the UN's secretary-general, called Israel's occupation illegal, but it is no accident that he has not repeated this claim.

Now read my first post again. It's in response to a contest in Iran about Nazi killing Jews. I didn't say anything about "Free Pass" for Israel.

But a comment of Israel politics is certainly on topic of the discussion.

I guess you have a problem with it since you disagree, well I can respect that it's your thread right? You make the rules for your thread right?

I really feel you put this out as flame bait. If you really think the contest has anything to do with free expression then you probably need to take meds.

I'm done responding now. Good Day

It is off topic for those that read the title, my 1st post, and the link included.

If you wish to speak about Israel "foreign policy" please, feel free to open your own thread.

It is just kind of hard to take you seriously when you are straying so far from topic. I have ADD and even I can focus enough to follow a conversation....

So who's oversimplified? Me thinks it's you.

Here is my (biased, overly simplified, "cute" view on what is happening, please read it, but if anyone dares to respond to it, it's off topic!

Doesn't fly.

respond on topic get a reply on topic

what is the title of this thread, Einstein?

(please include how it relates to Israeli foreign policy to support your, um, position)

now good night, ill be gone for awhile, talk amongst yourselves

IMuhammed depicted as a terrorist == deeply offensive

Democracy's Double Standard

by HOSSEIN DERAKHSHAN
Published: January 28, 2006

Tel Aviv

THE day before Iran's ninth presidential elections last June, President Bush sent a discouraging message to potential voters. Iran's electoral process "ignores the basic requirements of democracy," Mr. Bush declared, and these elections would be "sadly consistent" with the country's "oppressive record." For Iranians, there was no mistaking the American president's point: he was tacitly sanctioning the call that some Iranian exiles and activists had issued for an election boycott, based on exactly this logic.

An American administration that had called on other Middle Eastern populaces to vote in flawed elections greeted the Iranian electoral process with nothing but open disdain. It is worth revisiting this odd judgment call at a time when Hamas's victory in the Palestinian elections has raised even more questions about Washington's confused strategy of democracy promotion.

In Iran last June, the call for a boycott resonated with frustrated and apathetic voters. Many, if not most, moderates and reform advocates stayed home from the polls. And we all know what followed: the philosophy-loving moderate, Mohammad Khatami, was replaced as president by a radical militant, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad — a former military commander who presides over one of the most extreme governments post-revolutionary Iran has yet had.

That's right: with what appeared to be the endorsement of President Bush and dozens of American-backed satellite television channels that broadcast in Farsi, the disillusioned young people of Iran effectively took one of the world's most closely watched nuclear programs out of the hands of a reformer and placed it into the hands of a hard-line reactionary.

Can anyone now doubt that Iranian elections, however flawed, really do matter? When Mr. Khatami came to power, his declared goals were to establish the rule of law, demand equal rights for all citizens and reconcile Iran with the world. He may not have succeeded in all of those endeavors, but Mr. Ahmadinejad has entered government with manifestly opposite priorities.

The new president's allies in Parliament recently concluded that nearly 80 percent of the books published under President Khatami violated revolutionary values and should be placed under restrictions. Films that promote feminism, secularism and liberalism are to be banned. And while President Khatami built his international reputation on his call for a "dialogue among civilizations," President Ahmadinejad has reached out to racists and anti-Semites instead.

It's true that Iranian elections are not quite democratic, because the unelected Guardian Council reserves the right to bar candidates. But the real problem here is that boycotting semi-democratic elections ultimately will not make such a system more democratic.

The rise of Mr. Ahmadinejad, and the threat he poses to the stability of a volatile region, demonstrates that promoting apathy in a semi-democratic system can only strengthen the radical anti-democracy forces. And it raises a question as to whether that is what hawks in Washington actually wanted.

Contrast the "don't vote" message that President Bush sent to Iranians to the one delivered to Iraqis through a major media campaign and other costly means: "Your destiny is in your own hands. Disappoint the anti-democracy radicals and go out and vote."

If the United States is serious about promoting democratic change in Iran, it needs to try the same approach that brought Iraqis to the polls despite mortal danger. Mr. Bush and his supporters should encourage the people of Iran to participate in the next election. And they should urge Iranians to vote for someone who will make their country more open and democratic, rather than more threatening, as Iran under President Ahmadinejad has become.

Hossein Derakhshan writes the Farsi-English blog "Editor: Myself."

Iran has found an interesting way to test the free speech defense of Denmark and the others who use that defense

in poor taste yes, and as much as I dislike and disagree with much of the actions of Israel, seems sad that Jews are being dumped on by Muslims again (even tho they had nothing to do with it)

Still, an interesting "retaliation" that puts tolerance and freedom of speech to the test... nonviolently

http://www.news.com.au/story/0,10117,18066746-1702,00.html?from=rss

More fake outrage from the Islamists.

These cartoons came out in SEPTEMBER. Months and MONTHS ago people.

Where was the outrage back _then_?

Suddenly, Saudi Arabia screws up the Hadj (again), and in order to take the heat off themselves, they dig up these old cartoons, start passing out Danish flags from MYSTERIOUSLY CONVENIENT STOCKPILES that popped up overnight, and go to town.

Color me unimpressed.

But hey, Iran wants to continue to make itself look childish and churlish, go ahead. This idea of theirs sure beats the hell out of their usual responses to these issues: beheading innocent civilians and blowing things up/burning things down.

No fan of Bush, but lets call a spade a spade here; the "fundamentalist nutjobs" in the Muslim world are not the minority I once was lead to believe...this and the Hamas vote seems to have made that point abundantly clear.

The controversy over the publication of cartoons of the Prophet Mohammed is expanding, as more Muslims join the boycott and protests against Denmark and various European newspapersdecide to publish the cartoons, mostly out of solidarity with Jyllands Posten and to make a strong political stand. One issue that puzzles many Danes is the timing of this outburst. The cartoons were published in September: Why have the protests erupted from Muslims worldwide only now? The person who knows the answer to this question is Ahmed Abdel Rahman Abu Laban, a man that the Washington Post has recently profiled as “one of Denmark's most prominent imams.”

Last November, Abu Laban, a 60-year-old Palestinian who had served as translator and assistant to top Gamaa Islamiya leader Talaal Fouad Qassimy during the mid-1990s and has been connected by Danish intelligence to other Islamists operating in the country, put together a delegation that traveled to the Middle East to discuss the issue of the cartoons with senior officials and prominent Islamic scholars. The delegation met with Arab League Secretary Amr Moussa, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Sheikh Mohammad Sayyed Tantawi, and Sunni Islam’s most influential scholar, Yusuf al Qaradawi. "We want to internationalize this issue so that the Danish government will realize that the cartoons were insulting, not only to Muslims in Denmark, but also to Muslims worldwide," said Abu Laban.

On its face, it would appear as if nothing were wrong. However, the Danish Muslim delegation showed much more than the 12 cartoons published by Jyllands Posten. In the booklet it presented during its tour of the Middle East, the delegation included other cartoons of Mohammed that were highly offensive, including one where the Prophet has a pig face. But these additional pictures were NOT published by the newspaper, but were completely fabricated by the delegation and inserted in the booklet (which has been obtained and made available to me by Danish newspaper Ekstra Bladet). The delegation has claimed that the differentiation was made to their interlocutors, even though the claim has not been independently verified. In any case, the action was a deliberate malicious and irresponsible deed carried out by a notorious Islamist who in another situation had said that “mockery against Mohamed deserves death penalty.” And in a quintessential exercise in taqiya, Abu Laban has praised the boycott of Danish goods on al Jazeera, while condemning it on Danish TV.