What it really means to support the Danish cartoons
By Beena Ahmad

I don’t get offended easily. I have always thought of witty irreverence as pretty cool. I laugh during South Park. I think Salman Rushdie is hilarious, usually. I appreciate Dave Chappelle’s shocking brand of humor that cracks racial issues right along their fault lines. I am an agnostic so there isn’t much that is sacrilegious to me. I firmly believe that humor can unshackle a society from its taboos. That said, I have been thinking a lot about the Danish cartoons of the Muslim prophet Muhammad. I have been surprised to find that I am not on the “free speech” side of the issue. I find the cartoons offensive on many different levels. I don’t think any responsible newspaper would have printed the cartoons in the first place, and I definitely do not think that the cartoons ought to be reprinted to show support for Denmark or a supposed campaign for free speech. I have reason to believe this debate is a bit of a sham. For those of you who may have been asked to make this choice, as Muslims, “progressive” or “moderate” Muslims, former Muslims, those with some knowledge of Islam, or conscientious thinkers at large, let me explain what I mean. You may not realize the power of your “progressive” words to the debate.

The Danish newspaper at the source of all this controversy, Jyllands-Posten, printed the 12 offending cartoons all together in an issue back in September. The newspaper intended to make the point that the nation’s media feared offending Islam. The newspaper continues to hide behind a higher moral ground, claiming that all it ever wanted to do was promote freedom of expression. Bull. Not one of the depictions of the prophet Muhammad was flattering, innocuous or even funny. In place of wit or cultural understanding, the cartoons employed pernicious stereotypes about the Islamic world. The prophet is either shown as a fool, a pimp surrounded by veiled women, a dagger-wielding thief or a terrorist. For example, the infamous cartoon featuring the prophet Muhammad with a fuse growing out of his turban, I’m trying to get the subtle, jabbing political or social criticism. Er, Muhammad was a terrorist? Islam was handed down through a terrorist? That’s why there’s no peace in the Middle East? That explains why people who look like my grandfather have a propensity for bringing explosives aboard airplanes. Brilliant. Er, that is racist.

Someone recently said to me, “But you have to understand the Danish. They poke fun at everything.” Maybe I was missing something. Maybe I lost my sense of humor somewhere along the way in my twenties. I came across the comment that Muslims need to learn to laugh at themselves a little more. That could be so. I know of a few good Muslim comedians who can handle that. But, the issue here isn’t about Muslims laughing at themselves. It’s about others laughing at Muslims in ways that aren’t funny. I’m reminded of Dave Chappelle’s interview with Oprah, where he explains how he was disturbed to see the message in his humor translate into something else, something ugly for some of his non-black followers. He said of a sketch that he did about black face, “There was good-spirited intention behind it,” Chappelle said. “So then when I’m on the set [who] was white laughed in such a way – I know the difference of people laughing at me – and it was the first time I had ever gotten a laugh that I was uncomfortable with. Not just uncomfortable, but like, should I fire this person?” I can guess how some of Chappelle’s jokes could be misused to confirm the bigotry and stereotypes some people would like to go on believing about black people in America. I can see how some people might miss that the real butt of his jokes is racialized America that still hasn’t sorted out its subconscious stereotypes and foolishness. I don’t think this awareness will hurt Chappelle’s comedy. I think it will force him to work harder to get his message across.

I am uncomfortable with the discourse around these Danish cartoons. I’m troubled by the movement to condemn the Islamic world and to rally behind Jyllands-Posten, which committed the offense in the first place. This sends a troubling message to me about the underlying suspicion that some European countries have for followers of Islam and their intolerance for religious expression in general. The forced secularism of these countries has too often been generously credited as tolerance. Take for example, France’s ban on headscarves and other religious items in schools. The French government could not seem to grasp the spiritual significance of such coverings for people belonging to these faiths. The flurry with which many European presses chose to reprint the Jyllands-Posten cartoons revealed that same disrespect and lack of understanding.

In this country, the campaign has also been couched as one for “free speech.” But it’s interesting to see who the main players are and what their fury is about. First of all, it doesn’t seem to me that this “debate” is about freedom of speech at all. Most of the Danish Muslim community conducted itself respectfully. It was pretty well understood that freedom of speech was going to prevail. The Danish Muslim clerics did not ask the government to take any specific punitive actions. A group of Muslim ambassadors sought a dialogue with the Danish leadership, which was denied. By this time, the news had made its way through the Muslim world. A successful boycott of Danish goods was waged and the issue demanded attention again. Then, newspapers in Europe started reprinting the cartoons. Guess what? There was public protest because the cartoons were extremely offensive an irresponsible. Guess what? Our cherished freedom of speech permits us to protest irresponsibility committed by the press. Some death threats may have been made by individuals. I am not condoning such acts. When emotions run high, there are people who seem to find it easier to use the language of violence than the language of reason and understanding. Let me just remind you that there were death threats, bomb threats, and actual violence against Muslims and mosques in this country after 9-11. It would be ignorant to start thinking, as the cartoon of turban bomb Muhammad suggests, that Muslims have some special “propensity” to violence.

Unfortunately, the Muslim clerics also took the offensive cartoons to volatile places such as Palestine where such tensions run extremely high and where it isn’t that hard to figure out why there might be anti-Western sentiments. And shit exploded. It would be silly to think that the violence in places like Palestine was just about twelve Danish cartoons. I do not condone the violence that ensued, nor do I condone the clerics’ propaganda campaign. It was irresponsible activism and an enormous setback to building understanding for the offense that Muslims felt. Most of all, I think it was inexcusable that publications in the Muslim world retaliated with anti-Semitic cartoons. However, that does not excuse us from continuing to propagate the idea that Islam and terrorism equate somehow or to dress up our biases in the other clothing.

The campaign for the “freedom of speech” took on the position that those who chose not to reprint the cartoons and those who condemned the cartoons, such as Bill Clinton, who called them, “appalling” and “totally outrageous,” were merely pansies caving into pressure from the “Muslim world.” Those who have consistently published hostile views towards Islam, largely conservative voices that make even the right-wing cringe, the likes of Michelle Malkin, Deroy Murdock and Christopher Hitchens, quickly turned this issue into a “You’re with us or against us debate.” That is, if you don’t reprint the cartoons, you don’t support free speech enough, a cherished American value. If you reprint the cartoons, you stand for free speech and read between the lines: Kudos to you for taking a stand against that faith of troublemakers who always seem to be at odds with the Western world. Hitchens goes so far as to make an emotional cry that we support Denmark, this ally, “a small democracy, which resisted Hitler bravely and protected its Jews as itself.” What? Allies? When did this become a war with nations? Last I checked, Pakistan was also an ally. That thought might be displeasing to Hitchens and he ought to figure out why. I am not joining this camp of thinkers. These are the voices that challenged moderate Muslims to choose between free speech and Islam. I know their agenda. They go running any time they hear the words “cultural relativism” or “tolerance.”

Unfortunately, a few “progressive” Muslim voices fell for the trap. Irshad Manji, the author of “The Trouble with Islam,” helped spread the idea that the offense was largely fabricated by the Danish Muslim clerics. In an interview with CNN, Manji referred to a large collection of 15th century Persian portraits of the prophet that are housed in a library in Edinburgh to endorse the idea that depictions of the prophet Muhammad are not expressly forbidden. The reporter interviewing Manji lapped her words up greedily. Even in the transcript version of the interview, it is so clear that this is the answer CNN eagerly wanted to hear. Manji is a thinker with whom I suspect I share much in common, but on this occasion I think she unwittingly acted like a tool. Whatever the prevailing opinion of Muhammadian art was in the 15th century, Manji herself admits that “it’s become a norm” and a “tradition” that representations of the prophet are considered prohibited by the majority of Muslims at this time. She ignored the idea that moderate Muslims who are not spiritually offended, may have other good reasons to protest the printing and reprinting of the cartoons. The twelve cartoons show how incapable Europe is of seeing what’s wrong with pushing the stereotype that Islam is a religion of terrorists. Instead, Manji confirmed for CNN what the network couldn’t say on its own: There go those Muslims, overreacting again.

It’s a bit unsettling to me how eager the proponents of freedom of speech are to knock Islam. Through this CNN interview, Manji revealed what I regard as the real danger in speaking out against Islam in this day and age. I’m not afraid of upsetting Muslims as much as I am afraid that my words might be stockpiled as ammunition against my own people. I have an Islamic last name and therefore I can be misrepresented as an authority speaking against Islam. I am nobody’s fool. I will not sign on to this supposed free speech campaign because I don’t see how the First Amendment is at stake in this country or how the freedom of speech is being curtailed in Denmark. No one is stopping Malkin and Murdock from their lunatic ravings. Nor do I believe that Malkin and Murdock are the torchbearers of our rights to free speech. Malkin is outraged anytime the Bush administration meets with a member of the Muslim community. She considers this acquiescing to the enemy. She is on a warpath against Islam (count the number of columns she has written). Malkin also states, “Self-censorship is a conservative value,” in a column on why she can’t stand South Park, even though it purportedly has conservative leanings, because of its liberal use of profanity. It is more important to Malkin that the language be clean of profanity than the journalism or message be responsible.

I am encouraged that most of the mainstream American press did not fall into the trap by reprinting the cartoons in solidarity with Jyllands-Posten (and Malkin, Hitchens and Murdock), as many members of the European media did. It seems inconceivable to these ultra-Americans that the media was exercising good editorial judgment by not reprinting the cartoons rather than expressing fear for retaliation from Muslims. They chose to focus on the news and not become part of the news or turn into vehicles for hate speech. Anyone who wanted to see the cartoons could find them on the Internet. Their availability is what made them newsworthy.

I admit that free speech is not freely available yet in many Muslim countries. I wish it were. However, I can’t imagine that either Malkin or Murdock is that concerned about the plight of Muslims worldwide. Leave it to the people of these countries to demand their rights for themselves. The process needs to evolve naturally. We can’t force others into submission by backing them into a corner using the worst examples of free speech. It would be like trying to convince women to be liberated from headscarves by waving pictures from Playboy in their faces. These are not the tools for reform.

I did a lot of soul-searching for this piece. What is the point of being offended? Is it the product of hypersensitivity? Should Muslims just get over it? Should I just get over it? This debate has continued to come up among friends and colleagues and I’ve grown increasingly aware of my place in it. I have come to realize that I don’t want to confirm the stereotypes that are at the heart of this debate for others, namely that Muslims are innately programmed to self-destruct in Allah’s name, like robots, nor are all Muslim societies in need of the Western world’s liberation armies. Nor should we buy into the idea that Islam is an enemy to the Western world. I will not unwittingly support these stereotypes or the agendas of those who would like to see the Muslim world toppled in the way of Communism. The importance of being offended is picking up on the pathogenic stereotypes and prejudices that still persist below America’s idyllic shores of diversity, democracy and freedom.

I want to return to Dave Chappelle because I respect his search for trying to balance irreverence, his genius in comedy, and social responsibility, his conscience. In an interview with CBS in 2004, he said, “I look at it like that word, “n-,” used to be a word of oppression. But that when I say it, it feels more like an act of freedom. For me to say it unapologetically on television.” When the correspondent asked Chappelle, how would he react if a white comedian used the “N” word? “I’d be furious,” replied Chappelle. “That word, if you could sum up the story of America in a word that might be the word I’d pick. It has connotations in it that society has never dealt with.”

Yes, I decide. I have the right to be offended by the racist connotations in those cartoons. And I’m furious that hatred and bigotry against Islam are being justified under the banner of a campaign for free speech.

Images Courtesy Corbis