|
|
|
Posted: March 2
(Rome) I've done it again. Weeks have gone by without posting a new blog- which, of course, is hard get away with since my sister Barbara reads it regularly- and she has no tolerance for slackers. I could blame my not writing on being busy, which is true, since the past month has been a very productive time of working on our intranet within the Curia offices as a way of getting at the new database we have created. But I have also been closely following the controversy about the Danish cartoons and the protests they sparked in the Muslim world. The whole issue raises questions that are not easy to answer. And I must admit some hesitation even writing about them.
Five months after their initial publication, and weeks after big public protests began, the issue continues to simmer. Communication should be an interchange that leads to better understanding, mutual respect and improved relationships. Instead newspapers and television have been full of angry expressions of mistrust and condemnation. I am saddened by the violence wreaked on Western targets by angry Muslims, and by the violence last week in Nigeria where Christian mobs destroyed the homes and businesses of their Islamic neighbors. There is more than enough sinfulness in all of this to lead to much repentance during this Lenten season.
My initial reaction to the cartoons, like that of most good-willed religious people, was that Islam's sensibilities ought to be respected, just as I would expect the sensibilities of Catholics to be respected by others. The reaction last Fall to the cartoons by Islamic people in Denmark was more muted frustration than white-hot anger. Protests began after a delegation traveled to Arab lands to press for a protest campaign. The violent protests in Lebanon were launched by SMS-text messages that urged young people to recruit their friends to participate in public protests, assured that the government would not act against them. The protests themselves have now frequently transmogrified into more generic protests against the West, against the U.S. war in Iraq and Afghanistan, about pressures on Arab regimes by the West, about a perception of prejudice and mistreatment. Someone is fanning the flames, even if the fuel is abundant in a people's frustrations.
Flemming Rose, editor of the cultural pages section of the Danish paper who invited cartoonists to aim their satirical attention at Islam, claimed that he was attempting to challenge what he saw as implied threats that made any criticism of Islamic people off-limits. He invoked the memory of Soviet press control that he experienced during 13 years doing journalism in Russia before returning to transform the sleepy cultural pages of the biggest paper in Denmark into an edgy commentary that would get peoples' attention. Well he did that and more. Now he has gone into hiding, on an extended "vacation" from the paper, along with the offending cartoonist themselves who like him have been threatened with reprisals.
Half of the cartoonist he invited to submit drawings declined. He certainly did not share their prudence, but I don't know whether he did not truly understand how offensive the cartoons would be or just did not care. I don't want to dismiss him out of hand, however, because the Western journalistic tradition values criticism, even of establishment figures. Free expression of opinions that other people might not like is enshrined as a value and protected by law. Consider the criticism that several U.S. congressmen leveled at four leading American technology companies (Microsoft, Cisco, Google and Yahoo) for cooperating in China's suppression of political opinions that its government finds offensive. Zimbabwe's government is likewise criticized for shutting down all independent media and not allowing any dissenting voices to be heard.
back to previous entries