Some Good News On The Danish Front

[Annie]

Seems the problem may well be the 'schools' and the mosques:

http://www.brusselsjournal.com/node/811

More and More Moderate Muslims Speak Out in Denmark
From the desk of Hjörtur Gudmundsson on Mon, 2006-02-13 13:16

Dozens of Danish Muslims are joining the network of moderate Muslims, the Demokratiske Muslimer (Democratic Muslims). About 700 Muslims have already become DM members and 2,500 Danes have expressed their will to support the network. The initiative has caused anger among the Danish imams and their leader, Ahmad Abu Laban, who have referred to the moderates as “rats.” The imams feel that they are beginning to lose their control over part of the Muslim population.

Moderates such as Kamran Tahmasebi say they have had enough of fanatic Islamism and its intimidation of the Muslim immigrants in Denmark.

“It is an irony that I am today living in a European democratic state and have to fight the same religious fanatics that I fled from in Iran many years ago,”​

Mr Tahmasebi says. He came to Denmark as a refugee in 1989. Today he works as a social consultant and is very grateful for the life Denmark has made it possible for him to have. He says he no longer wants to keep a low profile to avoid attracting the attention of the imams. The cartoon affair was an incentive for him to stand up and warn against the Islamist imams in Denmark, whom he says are damaging the integration process with their misleading criticism of Danish values and norms.

Mr Tahmasebi is one of the people involved in the newly established network of moderate Muslims in Denmark led by Naser Khader, a member of the Danish Parliament. He says he is well aware of the risk he is taking by siding with Mr Khader, who has for a long time been living under police protection. But Mr Tahmasebi feels it is his duty to take part in this debate.

“Naser Khader has carried this responsibility for too long. I share his beliefs and now I want to stand up and say so. Apart from that, as a parent I feel a responsibility to fight, so that my children will not have to live under Islamist dogmas. They shall be able to live free in this country.”​

Mr Tahmasebi adds that he believes the imams are one of the biggest problems Denmark is facing today.

The Danish Prime Minister, Anders Fogh Rasmussen, will be meeting the leaders of the moderate Muslims today (February 13) to discuss the cartoon affair. The Danish government has suspended all dialogue and cooperation with the Danish imams on the integration process. Some of the strongest protests against the twelve Muhammad cartoons [see them here, halfway down the page] came from imams who are members of the government’s official integration think tank.

“We want the newspaper [Jyllands-Posten, which published the cartoons last September] to promise that this will never happen again, or this will never stop,”​

says imam Ahmad Akkari, the spokesman for the radical Muslim organizations in Denmark which led the protest against the cartoons. However, the deliberate lies which imams, such as Abu Laban and Akkari, used to incite worldwide hatred against Denmark have served as a wake-up call for the Danish government.

“I believe it has become obvious that the imams are not the people we should be listening to if we want integration in Denmark to work,”​

Rikke Hvilshøj, the Danish Integration Minister, has said. The BBC reports that fifteen Muslim countries, from Algeria to Pakistan, are now boycotting Danish products. So far, nearly 200 jobs have been lost in Denmark and more jobs could be endangered if the boycotts continue.

In neighbouring Norway, Vebjørn Selbekk, the editor of the Christian weekly Magazinet which first published the twelve Muhammad cartoons in his country, apologized for offending Muslims by publishing the cartoons. Mr Selbekk and his family received numerous death threats. He said he regretted publishing the cartoons because of all the strain this has put on himself and others and because the consequences were much more than he had expected. He stressed, however, that he could not apologize for using his freedom of expression by publishing the cartoons. Carsten Juste, the editor of Jyllands-Posten, made the same remark when he apologized for offending Muslims.

Last Friday the government of Sweden, another Scandinavian neighbour of Denmark, shut down the website of the newspaper SD-Kuriren because it had posted Muhammad cartoons. Richard Jomshof, the editor of the paper, which is published by the Swedish far-right party the Swedish Democrats, told the BBC: “This is illegal. They can’t do this just because we are a small magazine.” However, the Swedish Foreign Minister, Laila Freivalds, described the publication as a provocation by “a small group of extremists.” A similar view was taken earlier by the Norwegian government when it criticized Magazinet and Mr Selbekk. The question is what the Swedish government would do if the cartoons are published in one or more Swedish newspapers, as has already happened in other European countries.

Fanatic imams are not only a problem in Denmark. In Britain Hamid Ali, a leading imam of a mosque in West Yorkshire, hailed last summer’s bombing of the London subway as a “good” action. The imam was secretly taped when he was talking to an undercover reporter from The Sunday Times. His words contrast with the public statements of condemnation by Muslim community leaders – including Mr Ali – after the attacks, which killed 56 people. In other words, the Danish imams are not the only imams in Europe who are speaking with two tongues. Indeed, there are indications that the main culprits for the integration problems are the imams, who tend to be much more extremist than many of the ordinary Muslims.

 

[Mariner]

would be terrific if more moderate Muslims in western countries joined such organizations, as a counterbalance to the Islamists'.

I had been searching around for a way of thinking about the cartoon controversy. The following piece is the sanest and most sensible thing I've seen so far: [these are excerpts; full link below]

The New York Times
February 17, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
The Silent Treatment

By ROBERT WRIGHT

* * *

Even many Americans who condemn the cartoon's publication accept the premise that the now-famous Danish newspaper editor set out to demonstrate: in the West we don't generally let interest groups intimidate us into what he called "self-censorship."

What nonsense. Editors at mainstream American media outlets delete lots of words, sentences and images to avoid offending interest groups, especially ethnic and religious ones. It's hard to cite examples since, by definition, they don't appear. But use your imagination.

Hugh Hewitt, a conservative blogger and evangelical Christian, came up with an apt comparison to the Muhammad cartoon: "a cartoon of Christ's crown of thorns transformed into sticks of TNT after an abortion clinic bombing." As Mr. Hewitt noted, that cartoon would offend many American Christians. That's one reason you haven't seen its like in a mainstream American newspaper.

Or, apparently, in many mainstream Danish newspapers. The paper that published the Muhammad cartoon, it turns out, had earlier rejected cartoons of Christ because, as the Sunday editor explained in an e-mail to the cartoonist who submitted them, they would provoke an outcry.

Defenders of the "chasm" thesis might reply that Western editors practice self-censorship to avoid cancelled subscriptions, picket lines or advertising boycotts, not death. Indeed, what forged the chasm consensus, convincing many Americans that the "Muslim world" might as well be another planet, is the image of hair-trigger violence: a few irreverent drawings appear and embassies go up in flames.

But the more we learn about this episode, the less it looks like spontaneous combustion. The initial Muslim response to the cartoons was not violence, but small demonstrations in Denmark along with a lobbying campaign by Danish Muslims that cranked on for months without making it onto the world's radar screen.

Only after these activists were snubbed by Danish politicians and found synergy with powerful politicians in Muslim states did big demonstrations ensue. Some of the demonstrations turned violent, but much of the violence seems to have been orchestrated by state governments, terrorist groups and other cynical political actors.

Besides, who said there's no American tradition of using violence to make a point? Remember the urban riots of the 1960's, starting with the Watts riot of 1965, in which 34 people were killed? The St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Bob Gibson, in his 1968 book "From Ghetto to Glory," compared the riots to a "brushback pitch" — a pitch thrown near a batter's head to keep him from crowding the plate, a way of conveying that the pitcher needs more space.

In the wake of the rioting, blacks got more space. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People had been protesting broadcast of the "Amos 'n' Andy" show, with its cast of shiftless and conniving blacks, since the 1950's, but only in 1966 did CBS withdraw reruns from distribution. There's no way to establish a causal link, but there's little doubt that the riots of the 1960's heightened sensitivity to grievances about the portrayal of blacks in the media. (Translation: heightened self-censorship.)

* * *

BUT one key to the American formula for peaceful coexistence is to avoid such arguments — to let each group decide what it finds most offensive, so long as the implied taboo isn't too onerous. We ask only that the offended group in turn respect the verdicts of other groups about what they find most offensive. Obviously, anti-Semitic and other hateful cartoons won't be eliminated overnight. (In the age of the Internet, no form of hate speech will be eliminated, period; the argument is about what appears in mainstream outlets that are granted legitimacy by nations and peoples.)

But the American experience suggests that steadfast self-restraint can bring progress. In the 1960's, the Nation of Islam was gaining momentum as its leader, Elijah Muhammad, called whites "blue-eyed devils" who were about to be exterminated in keeping with Allah's will. The Nation of Islam has since dropped in prominence and, anyway, has dropped that doctrine from its talking points. Peace prevails in America, and one thing that keeps it is strict self-censorship.

And not just by media outlets. Most Americans tread lightly in discussing ethnicity and religion, and we do it so habitually that it's nearly unconscious. Some might call this dishonest, and maybe it is, but it also holds moral truth: until you've walked in the shoes of other people, you can't really grasp their frustrations and resentments, and you can't really know what would and wouldn't offend you if you were part of their crowd.

The Danish editor's confusion was to conflate censorship and self-censorship. Not only are they not the same thing — the latter is what allows us to live in a spectacularly diverse society without the former; to keep censorship out of the legal realm, we practice it in the moral realm. Sometimes it feels uncomfortable, but worse things are imaginable.

Robert Wright, the author of "The Moral Animal," is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/17/opinion/17Wright.html?_r=1&th=&oref=slogin&emc=th&pagewanted=print

 

[Annie]

If the NYTimes and other MSM hadn't published those types of cartoons out of 'taste' regarding Christ, Christians, Jews, and others. But they have and continue to do so. Actually I imagine they will continue to do so until forced to submit...

 

[musicman]

The New York Times
February 17, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
The Silent Treatment

By ROBERT WRIGHT

* * *
"...Hugh Hewitt, a conservative blogger and evangelical Christian, came up with an apt comparison to the Muhammad cartoon: "a cartoon of Christ's crown of thorns transformed into sticks of TNT after an abortion clinic bombing." As Mr. Hewitt noted, that cartoon would offend many American Christians. That's one reason you haven't seen its like in a mainstream American newspaper."

Another reason might be that this is not SOP for Christians. It enjoys neither the tacit approval nor the overt encouragement of the Christian heirarchy - if any such thing can be said to exist. Can Islam make the same claim? In a word, no.

"Or, apparently, in many mainstream Danish newspapers. The paper that published the Muhammad cartoon, it turns out, had earlier rejected cartoons of Christ because, as the Sunday editor explained in an e-mail to the cartoonist who submitted them, they would provoke an outcry."

Just once, I'd like to see the NYT publish the WHOLE TRUTH of matters like these. Cherry-picking the parts of a story that support your agenda, and leaving out the parts that don't, is as bad as lying.

The Danish editor's principal reason for not publishing the cartoons was that they were - in his opinion - NOT FUNNY. That's part of his job.

NYT motto: Never let the truth get in the way of a good story.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

would be terrific if more moderate Muslims in western countries joined such organizations, as a counterbalance to the Islamists'.

I had been searching around for a way of thinking about the cartoon controversy. The following piece is the sanest and most sensible thing I've seen so far: [these are excerpts; full link below]

The New York Times
February 17, 2006
Op-Ed Contributor
The Silent Treatment

By ROBERT WRIGHT

* * *

Even many Americans who condemn the cartoon's publication accept the premise that the now-famous Danish newspaper editor set out to demonstrate: in the West we don't generally let interest groups intimidate us into what he called "self-censorship."

What nonsense. Editors at mainstream American media outlets delete lots of words, sentences and images to avoid offending interest groups, especially ethnic and religious ones. It's hard to cite examples since, by definition, they don't appear. But use your imagination.

Hugh Hewitt, a conservative blogger and evangelical Christian, came up with an apt comparison to the Muhammad cartoon: "a cartoon of Christ's crown of thorns transformed into sticks of TNT after an abortion clinic bombing." As Mr. Hewitt noted, that cartoon would offend many American Christians. That's one reason you haven't seen its like in a mainstream American newspaper.

Or, apparently, in many mainstream Danish newspapers. The paper that published the Muhammad cartoon, it turns out, had earlier rejected cartoons of Christ because, as the Sunday editor explained in an e-mail to the cartoonist who submitted them, they would provoke an outcry.

Defenders of the "chasm" thesis might reply that Western editors practice self-censorship to avoid cancelled subscriptions, picket lines or advertising boycotts, not death. Indeed, what forged the chasm consensus, convincing many Americans that the "Muslim world" might as well be another planet, is the image of hair-trigger violence: a few irreverent drawings appear and embassies go up in flames.

But the more we learn about this episode, the less it looks like spontaneous combustion. The initial Muslim response to the cartoons was not violence, but small demonstrations in Denmark along with a lobbying campaign by Danish Muslims that cranked on for months without making it onto the world's radar screen.

Only after these activists were snubbed by Danish politicians and found synergy with powerful politicians in Muslim states did big demonstrations ensue. Some of the demonstrations turned violent, but much of the violence seems to have been orchestrated by state governments, terrorist groups and other cynical political actors.

Besides, who said there's no American tradition of using violence to make a point? Remember the urban riots of the 1960's, starting with the Watts riot of 1965, in which 34 people were killed? The St. Louis Cardinals pitcher Bob Gibson, in his 1968 book "From Ghetto to Glory," compared the riots to a "brushback pitch" — a pitch thrown near a batter's head to keep him from crowding the plate, a way of conveying that the pitcher needs more space.

In the wake of the rioting, blacks got more space. The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People had been protesting broadcast of the "Amos 'n' Andy" show, with its cast of shiftless and conniving blacks, since the 1950's, but only in 1966 did CBS withdraw reruns from distribution. There's no way to establish a causal link, but there's little doubt that the riots of the 1960's heightened sensitivity to grievances about the portrayal of blacks in the media. (Translation: heightened self-censorship.)

* * *

BUT one key to the American formula for peaceful coexistence is to avoid such arguments — to let each group decide what it finds most offensive, so long as the implied taboo isn't too onerous. We ask only that the offended group in turn respect the verdicts of other groups about what they find most offensive. Obviously, anti-Semitic and other hateful cartoons won't be eliminated overnight. (In the age of the Internet, no form of hate speech will be eliminated, period; the argument is about what appears in mainstream outlets that are granted legitimacy by nations and peoples.)

But the American experience suggests that steadfast self-restraint can bring progress. In the 1960's, the Nation of Islam was gaining momentum as its leader, Elijah Muhammad, called whites "blue-eyed devils" who were about to be exterminated in keeping with Allah's will. The Nation of Islam has since dropped in prominence and, anyway, has dropped that doctrine from its talking points. Peace prevails in America, and one thing that keeps it is strict self-censorship.

And not just by media outlets. Most Americans tread lightly in discussing ethnicity and religion, and we do it so habitually that it's nearly unconscious. Some might call this dishonest, and maybe it is, but it also holds moral truth: until you've walked in the shoes of other people, you can't really grasp their frustrations and resentments, and you can't really know what would and wouldn't offend you if you were part of their crowd.

The Danish editor's confusion was to conflate censorship and self-censorship. Not only are they not the same thing — the latter is what allows us to live in a spectacularly diverse society without the former; to keep censorship out of the legal realm, we practice it in the moral realm. Sometimes it feels uncomfortable, but worse things are imaginable.

Robert Wright, the author of "The Moral Animal," is a senior fellow at the New America Foundation.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/17/opinion/17Wright.html?_r=1&th=&oref=slogin&emc=th&pagewanted=print

THis is all crap.l

 

[Mariner]

at least interesting crap : )

I was reading a about privacy book this weekend by a colleague ("Private Matters," Janna Malamud Smith), where she notes that terrorism is in fact well known in America: the KKK's terrorist intimidation of black people, which served the interests of many whites who preferred black people "stay in their place." So, that's another counterexample to the "Christians never do that kind of thing" argument. Have you seen the pictures of people partying at lynch scenes?

I work with a black man whose uncle was hunted down by the KKK for allegedly disrespecting a white person. They pinned him down in his bedroom and drove a stake through his eye socket.

Mariner.

 

[musicman]

at least interesting crap : )

I was reading a about privacy book this weekend by a colleague ("Private Matters," Janna Malamud Smith), where she notes that terrorism is in fact well known in America: the KKK's terrorist intimidation of black people, which served the interests of many whites who preferred black people "stay in their place." So, that's another counterexample to the "Christians never do that kind of thing" argument.

EXCUSE ME? " 'Christians never do that kind of thing' argument"? I hope you're not talking about me, Mariner. I'd hate to think that all that NYT horseshit you've been reading and posting has led you to adopt their craven, word-twisting, double-tongued tactics. Just so we can be VERY CLEAR on this, here - again - is what I posted:

"Another reason might be that this is not SOP for Christians. It enjoys neither the tacit approval nor the overt encouragement of the Christian heirarchy - if any such thing can be said to exist. Can Islam make the same claim? In a word, no."

You're comparing the long-ago actions of people who may have professed Christianity - but behaved barbarically - to Islamic fanatics. It won't work. I can assure you that Robert Byrd found no promise in the Christian Bible of 72 virgins in the hereafter, if he were martyred in the segregationist cause. U.S. foreign policy has never been, "bow before Jesus or I'll kill you". Can Islam make the same claim? Again, I say - no.

I work with a black man whose uncle was hunted down by the KKK for allegedly disrespecting a white person. They pinned him down in his bedroom and drove a stake through his eye socket.

Mariner.

Your co-worker's ancestors were sold into slavery by members of their own race. A favorite sport of Native Americans was to cut open a white man's stomach, nail his large intestine to a tree, and force him to walk around and around the tree until he collapsed, dead. Each of us here could tell his own tale of ancestral woe. Man is a barbaric, tyrannical monster by his nature. Jesus teaches us to try to rise above our essential, animalistic selves. I don't know who's teaching what to Muslims, but the Bible says, "By their deeds shall you know them". I've got to tell you - I'm not impressed.

 

[Mariner]

you, Musicman. I was referring to all the posts and threads here with the theme, "Look, they (Muslims) are so barbaric and we (Americans) are so above that."

As for your argument about slavery, you seriously want to blame all slavery on the fact that some African tribes played into the market for slaves? And you want to equate the small number of atrocities committed by American Indians as they were overrun with the large number committed by the Europeans doing the overrunning? And the KKK's killing of my co-worker's uncle was his ancestors' fault, not the KKK's fault?

Mariner.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

you, Musicman. I was referring to all the posts and threads here with the theme, "Look, they (Muslims) are so barbaric and we (Americans) are so above that."

As for your argument about slavery, you seriously want to blame all slavery on the fact that some African tribes played into the market for slaves? And you want to equate the small number of atrocities committed by American Indians as they were overrun with the large number committed by the Europeans doing the overrunning? And the KKK's killing of my co-worker's uncle was his ancestors' fault, not the KKK's fault?

Mariner.

You must admit, Mariner, that right now the Muslim world is in a relatively barbaric phase, relative to the rest of the world. To equate us you must go back several hundred years to the crusade and start finger pointing. They're stuck. The world has progressed. They're barbaric; the rest of the world is more advanced.

 

[musicman]

As for your argument about slavery, you seriously want to blame all slavery on the fact that some African tribes played into the market for slaves?

Wouldn't have been much of a market with no supply, would it?

And you want to equate the small number of atrocities committed by American Indians as they were overrun with the large number committed by the Europeans doing the overrunning? And the KKK's killing of my co-worker's uncle was his ancestors' fault, not the KKK's fault?

Mariner - for your own good, you're going to have to step away from the NYT for a few days. You've lost the ability to read, comprehend, and discuss a simple statement without reflexively twisting it to mean something else. AGAIN, here is what I actually said:

"Each of us here could tell his own tale of ancestral woe. Man is a barbaric, tyrannical monster by his nature. Jesus teaches us to try to rise above our essential, animalistic selves. I don't know who's teaching what to the Muslims, but I've got to tell you - I'm not impressed".

I honestly don't know how you get, "Caucasians are the scourge of the universe" out of that. As I said - it must be an NYT thing.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

You've correctly identified the theme, Mariner. You get points for that. Now prove it's false.

 

[trobinett]

Kathianne posts:

Moderates such as Kamran Tahmasebi say they have had enough of fanatic Islamism and its intimidation of the Muslim immigrants in Denmark.
“It is an irony that I am today living in a European democratic state and have to fight the same religious fanatics that I fled from in Iran many years ago,”

I just knew, that at some point the Muslim community would start to speak out, or would forever be under the control of the fanatic Islamism.

Good article.

 

[fabb1963]

You must admit, Mariner, that right now the Muslim world is in a relatively barbaric phase, relative to the rest of the world. To equate us you must go back several hundred years to the crusade and start finger pointing. They're stuck. The world has progressed. They're barbaric; the rest of the world is more advanced.

So, I guess we should eliminate them for not keeping up with the times. I guess, from a business point of view, it would be cheaper to eliminate them than educate them.

 

[musicman]

So, I guess we should eliminate them for not keeping up with the times. I guess, from a business point of view, it would be cheaper to eliminate them than educate them.

We ARE educating them. "Don't fuck with the U.S." is good, solid information.

 

[rtwngAvngr]

So, I guess we should eliminate them for not keeping up with the times. I guess, from a business point of view, it would be cheaper to eliminate them than educate them.

Dude, we need to stop them from killing us.

 

[trobinett]

We ARE educating them. "Don't fuck with the U.S." is good, solid information.