Cartooning Muhammad

I spent a lot of time this morning looking for the Left’s perspective on the “war of civilizations” erupting because of those Danish cartoons. I couldn’t find a single thing. Silence. There’s lots of hyperventilating about that WaPo political cartoon I wrote about day before yesterday (examples here and here), but nothing on the Muhammad cartoons. Interesting.

The Right is sure on this issue, though, and I mean Big-Time. Check memeorandum and you’ll see what I mean. This story is today’s lead item and there are over 18 separate right-wing bloggers writing about it (not counting me, LOL).

If you haven’t seen them yet, those Muhammad cartoons are here. Auntie has a good round-up of current news on the controversy. Wikipedia has the most comprehensive background I’ve seen, including a section describing six prior incidents of violent or threatening Islamic behavior after “blasphemy” against Muhammad, or Islam in general. Perhaps the most famous incident was the fatwa issued by Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini against British author Salmon Rushdie after the publication of Rushdie’s “The Satanic Verses.” Khomeini offered three million dollars to anyone carrying out the execution of Rushdie. That fatwa still stands, as far as I know.

So. Do we have a “war of civilizations” or a tempest in a teapot? Radicals in the Islamic East are launching the usual jihadist rants and firing their AKs into the air. Some Muslims just slightly to the Left of the Jihadists are calling for boycotts of those nations whose presses have published the cartoons. Moderate Muslims, if there are such individuals, are silent, as best I can tell. And that last point is telling, in my eyes.

The ultra-right-wingers here in the West seem to prefer the war, arguing that Islam is showing its true colors of intolerance, suppression of free speech, and insistence on the observation of Shar’ia by everyone, both inside and outside Islam. Moderates are saying “wait a minute, take a deep breath and calm down.” The Left isn’t saying a damned thing.

Me, I’m conflicted.

On the one hand, why poke someone in the eye when you fully understand the reaction you’re going to get? Is your intent to incite violence, prove the point that Islam is intolerant, while at the same time making the larger point that it’s impossible for the Islamic culture and the Liberal Western (in the classic sense) culture to co-exist peacefully? Judging from the reactions we’ve seen from the Middle East so far, there’s evidence that point has been made.

On the other hand, a small part of me echoes Rodney King, i.e., “why can’t we all just get along?” I’m doing my best to try and believe the great majority of Muslims, world-wide, are willing to overlook instances of egregious bad taste, or, at the most, exercise their right to protest peacefully when these things happen. I’m having a hard time believing that, though. If we are to believe Islam is, indeed, a peaceful religion, then the West needs to hear a chorus of moderate Muslim voices counteracting extremism and the call to Jihad. The lack of restraining Islamic voices makes this “war of civilizations” all but inevitable.

I’m a “live and let live” kinda guy. It just doesn’t appear to me the majority of Muslims feel the same way. What I’m seeing is more like “my way, or the highway.” And that’s much more than a shame, it’s a recipe for disaster of global proportions. Or, if you prefer, a "war of civilizations."

Update 2/03/2006, 0925 hrs: Dr. Sanity theorizes about the Left's silence on this issue. To sum up: their core value of multiculturalism has been utterly discredited. Hard to argue that point. Read the whole thing.