Just My Little Way of Sticking it to the Imam

When the hijackers flew those planes into the Twin Towers, the San Francisco/Seattle/Greenwich Village Axis of Drivel all raced to their therapists’ couches and asked, “Why do they hate us?” These Blame-America-First lefties theorized that it must be our imperialism, our greedy capitalism, our alliance with Israel, or even our failure to ratify the Kyoto Accords that invited this catastrophe.
Well now, everyone who wondered why must surely know by now why they hate us. They hate us for movies like “Brokeback Mountain.” They hate us for Brittany Spears and Snoop Dogg. And, they burn down embassies and attack businesses because western newspapers and magazines can publish irreverent cartoons. They hate us for being free.
I keep trying to square the events of the last couple of weeks with the concept of multiculturalism. How can a society house cultures with such irreconcilable differences as erupted as a consequence of Danish editorial cartoonists drawing caricatures of Mohammed? If you’ve seen the drawings, you’d be struck by how truly mild they are. Nevertheless, Muslim clerics have incited violence and Muslim governments have threatened economic boycotts. Ask yourself: How can a free and liberal society coexist with such uncompromising intolerance?
Some have tried. In Great Britain, banks have stopped giving away free piggy banks to children out of fear that the trinkets might offend Muslims. Frankly, this sort of thing strikes me as cultural cowardice.
Can we even imagine the self-censorship that would be required to keep peace? Would our creative community suffer such a muzzling? U.S. editorial cartoonists do not just content themselves with irreverence, but often descend into gratuitous cruelty. The same can be said for much of the arts community. Not long ago our cultural gatekeepers vigorously defended Andres Serrano’s artistic masterpiece, “Piss Christ,” which consisted of a crucifix submerged in a jar of urine. If a cartoon can set off an intifada, imagine what “Piss Mohammed” would have provoked.
And, there was another work of art by Chris Ofili that was featured in a city-owned art gallery in New York City called, “Holy Virgin Mary.” This pinnacle of the artist’s craft was a cartoonish representation of the mother of Christ covered with real elephant dung.
You may wonder what all this is about. It’s entirely possible you have not seen the cartoons as most of the United States media have limited themselves to descriptions, supposedly out of cultural sensitivity. Few American newspapers have printed the offending cartoons. The New York Times’ selective cultural sensitivity was displayed when it chose to reproduce Ofili’s painting in the course of a story about the Mohammed cartoons. It’s odd that the media that spent much of the last week celebrating the courage of Coretta Scott King shows so little when it’s their turn.
We’ve seen this before. In the mid-1980’s, bookstores were fearful of selling Salman Rushdie’s “Satanic Verses.” Something in that book enraged the Iranian mullahs and they pronounced a death sentence upon Rushdie and offered a huge reward to the martyr who killed him. For months, many, perhaps most, United States’ bookstores refrained from selling or displaying the book out of fear. I thought they all had a moral obligation to aggressively promote the book, considering that so many join the American Library Association’s “Banned Book Week” celebrations.
The affair seems to have revived European courage in a few isolated pockets as many European newspapers have reprinted the cartoons to demonstrate support for beleaguered Denmark. In a very un-French move, a major newspaper there ran the cartoons in support of Denmark and freedom. In a more typical French move, the editor responsible was fired and the newspaper apologized. But several other French papers published the cartoons on principle. In a rare display of backbone in a region of the world known for its spinelessness, several other newspapers in other countries printed the cartoons, even as the politicians preached appeasement.
Last week, I happened to be in the Clarkston Costco, loading up on cheap jeans and bottled water, when I happened past the dairy case. Sitting there was a large chunk of Havarti cheese. I really don’t care for Havarti, but after verifying that it was indeed imported from Denmark, I dropped it into my cart. I think of it as my little way of sticking it to the Imam.