Iran daily holds contest for Holocaust cartoons

Iran’s best-selling newspaper has launched a competition to find the best cartoon about the Holocaust in retaliation for the publication in many European countries of caricatures of the Prophet Mohammad.

The daily paper Hamshahri said the contest was designed to test the boundaries of free speech — the reason given by many European newspapers for publishing the cartoons of the Prophet.

“A serious question for Muslims … is this: ‘does Western free speech allow working on issues like America and Israel’s crimes or an incident like the Holocaust or is this freedom of speech only good for insulting the holy values of divine religions?'” the paper said on Tuesday.

Davoud Kazemi, who is in charge of the contest, told Reuters that each of the 12 winners would have their cartoons published and receive two gold coins (worth about $140 each) as a prize.

[Source: Reuters]

Published by

Mohamed Marwen Meddah

Mohamed Marwen Meddah is a Tunisian-Canadian, web aficionado, software engineering leader, blogger, and amateur photographer.

38 thoughts on “Iran daily holds contest for Holocaust cartoons”

  1. This is getting just way too damn out of hand.

    It was childish for the European nations to have published those stupid cartoons thinking they were making a statement about free speech by offending people with a cartoon that touches the subject of something ultra-sensitive and important to a group of people. And this Iranian publication is also just as stupid by thinking they should do the same shit back. I mean, this is the kind of crap that my 5-year-old cousin does and I have to explain to her that 2 wrongs do not make a right. To think that these are adults that are acting this way is absolutely mind-boggling.

    Nothing is resolved by hurting each other. How are the Jews who were against the publications of the prophet Mohammad supposed to react to these new cartoons about the Holocaust? This is the dumbest shit ever.

    So here’s what I think should be done.

    EVERYONE FUCKING GO HOME!

    The media has the freedom of speech on their side, but with that comes GREAT responsibility. Sure, they did a half-assed apology, but fuck it! Just don’t pull that shit again or else you’ll feel it in your wallets that we’re not buying your shit anymore. Not to mention that you will not hear the end of it from us until you’re out of business.

    Ai yah… And as for the violent protesters. GO FUCKING HOME TOO! People have died over a cartoon! As soon as buildings and cars start burning, do you think anyone’s hearing your concerns about the damn cartoon?! No! We’re thinking you’re all fucking psycho people who are out of control. And trust me, psycho people do not get much credit from the rest of us, so whatever your opinion of the cartoons, it’ll always be coming from an out of control mob. Yeah, I said it. No longer protesters. Just a goddamn mob.

    Is this not the year 2006? Be a little more civilized people! That’s going to the media, the protesters, and the people who are all attacking one another with hurtful and hateful comments. I swear, the ignorance of some people’s comments never cease to amaze me.

  2. i don’t think iran understands how it works. your only proving a point if you actually have free speech. iran does not have free speech. it is a bit farcical for iran to call this an act of free speech when their press is so censored.

    also, why go after the holocaust? did the jews publish the cartoons from denmark?

  3. It isn’t freedom of speech when u insult values and ideas. I sure that if a paper muslim do this action, all western countries start a war.

  4. There is freedom of speech in Iran sufficiently. You don’t know Iran well because Iran informations reflect in western media wrong and unreally.It apears that sehunism (Israel) leads these programs under the mask of media. I hope that people and scientists of western countries stand up against their governments and don’t allow countinue these insults and malignancies.

  5. I swear to fucking… (I’m not even gonna go there), that if I hear, “If a muslim paper wrote this, the western country would…” or “If the cartoon was of the Holocaust, the Israelis would…” one more time, I’m gonna… scream.

    If this, if that… These comments get us nowhere!!! Fucking WEH! Quit crying and fucking throwing out these stupid lines, and please say something that’s worthwhile. Let’s get somewhere people!

    There’s no defending the chaos, riots, and deaths over this. And that’s just that.

    I, too, am a minority. So I understand how double-standards work. If a huge retail company make a tshirt with a caricature of a Chinese man making fun of him, I become furious. They would NEVER have the balls to make a stupid caricature of a black person picking cotton, but they’re fine with a slanted-eyed, buck-toothed Chinese man who washes clothes. But do we throw out that card? Do we start making tshirts making fun of African-Americans to prove our points? NO! Of course not! They didn’t do any of this to us! You need to know who’s the “enemy” and not stray from your cause. Sure, it’s freedom of speech and if I don’t like it, I just don’t have to buy it. But fuck that! It’s the principle, so what happens? Everyone gets together, come up with a strategy and become vocal, painting the retail company as the tasteless, insensitive company that they are. So what happens within a few days? They make a public apology and pull the shirts off the shelves. Sure, some resentment still resonates, but everyone’s getting along fine now. No deaths, no burned buildings or cars, everyone’s happy. This is a clear example of boycotting and protesting at its finest. So please! Try it out! It works. I understand that Islam is gonna have it hard with the western countries, but peace is truly the only way to get through to people. I’m telling you guys… People stop listening as soon as protesters become rioters.

    All I gotta say is, we need to be a little more constructive and that takes a little bit of maturity and resistance to say stupid shit like, “But had this been this way, they would’ve been like that….” Stop whining already and let’s find a solution.

  7. WoW Rex

    Thats a real interesting website.
    I assure you M A Khara will have some fancy flowerly amswer as usual that does nothing but fire up the debate.
    I am shocked by the number of attacks on that website. I guess its fair to say that it doesn’t reflect all Moslems but IT DOES say a lot about about the religion , if your mind is open to it. Unfortunately most aren’t, they see what they want to see even if you show them the light , they insist its darkness… the reason is simple they don’t know what light looks like.
    Thanks for the post Rex

    P.S. MMM you are doing a great job of being balanced, I enjoy your comments and your postings greatly.

  11. I see that the conversation has officially strayed. But I guess that tends to happen when there’s nothing one can come up with to say in an argument or debate, they’ll attack the other’s character using words with some kind of emotion behind it like “sick”. **rolls eyes** How is anyone not supposed to be offended or take that personally? Shit talking brings no understanding, only animosity.

    You see how it started out as talking about freedom of speech. That’s something we all can debate about. Talking about whether there should be limitations or not. And then it somehow led to, “Iranian government’s sick”. Wtf? Did I miss something? What does that have to do with cartoons and freedom of speech?Whatever. I’m tired of this BS.

  12. I believe that Iranian people are nice people. One of my best friends has an Iranian father and an English mother. But Iran’s legal system is beyond bizarre.

    My point is:

    The execution of a girl for killing a potential rapist is the sort of thing the Muslim world doesn’t seem to care much about. The publication of some cartoons on the other hand . . .

    You won’t see Muslims demonstrating or speaking out on behalf of this poor girl. Anybody who brings this up is labelled as someone who is trying to stir up hatred.

    How hypocritical!

    Really, what matters more? Human lives or cartoons? In the Muslim world the answer appears to be cartoons. Cartoons.

  13. Finally, speaking of outrage, it should be noted that the offending cartoons were published in an Egyptian paper months before any European country republished them. They were published during Ramadan! No Muslim outrage resulted. No one is boycotting Egypt or burning the Egyptian flag. No one is demanding an apology from Egypt. No one is threatening Egyptians with terrorist attacks. No one is calling for the executions of the staff associated with the paper. No one is protesting outside the Egyptian embassy let alone burning it down. No one is boycotting or even calling for a boycott of Egypt.

    No wonder some of the same people like Hamas who spoke out so aggressively against Europe just a few days ago on this issue are now telling people to cool it. They’ve been exposed as ridiculous.

    For further information:

    http://freedomforegyptians.blogspot.com/
    http://egyptiansandmonkey.blogspot.com/
    http://bigpharaoh.blogspot.com/

  14. Human lives or cartoons ? In the muslim world the answer is human exactly, dear rex. Why you think muslims are people of other planet ? Unfortunately you ( and most people of western countries ) don’t know religion Islam and muslims people well.In fact muslims couldn’t defind it ( to western counries ) well. You just see bad things not good, although there isn’t any bad thing in religion islam. If you see some bad things, they relate people performance, not riligion islam. There is many legals in the wesrwen countries that we can ask about them rightfulness. Why when a paper do wrong action, the western papers countinue its action and republish ? wrong action is wrong, now anyone want to do it.
    I am happy about these discussion when i see others think open and don’t accept things whitout reason. I hope that all people ( whit any riligion ) live friendly together whitout any hatred.

  15. In Denmark, the culture editor of Jyllands-Posten, Flemming Rose, who commissioned the cartoons last year has been sent on indefinite leave, after saying he would also be open to reprinting cartoons about the Holocaust, Britain’s Guardian newspaper reported.

  17. Connie,

    Until we see all European news papers publishing those holocaust mocking cartoons. Your comment

  20. Mary, I apppreciate your comments, I do.

    It is just that in the West we do see people who claim to be devout Muslims, who quote the Quran as justification for their actions and who engage in terrorism based off what they think are proper Islamic teachings. Christians have many differences of opinion amongst themselves also but we don’t see Christians engaging in the sort of actions we see Muslims engage in routinely.

    Sorry, I know that most Muslims aren’t like that.
    But do they have to be. Why is the entire Islamic world, taken as a whole, so much more extreme than the Christian/secular world of the West?

    Another question about Iran. Do you think we will see the cartoons they want to publish reprinted in papers throughout the Arab and Muslim world?

  21. Tango, freedom of speech in the West only protects people from being persecuted by governments. It is not a guarantee of employment when you say something that your employers don’t like at work or publish something in a paper you don’t own.

    Your comments remind me again that the Muslim world, by and large, doesn’t understand the concept of freedom of speech very well.

  23. Tango, I can think of a million things that you could say or do at work to get yourself fired!
    Insulting your boss would be the most obvious one!

    Like I said, the purpose of “freedom of speech” is to guarantee that the government cannot interfere with what people say. It doesn’t guarantee you employment in the private sector if you say something your employer doesn’t like and it doesn’t guarantee you the right to publish anything you want in a newspaper or magazine that you do not own. Rose, from the Jylland-Posten, has been put on leave by his employer, he hasn’t been sent to prison by the Danish government for what he said.

    I think the Iranian cartoons should be published by the Jylland-Posten anyway. I think any papers out there that want to publish them should. I think they will mostly make the Iranians look like fools.

    The Iranians are attacking Jews which is an irony considering that the various chief rabbis of Denmark, Britain, France, etc. all denounced the Mohammad cartoons as insulting and inflammatory to Muslims. Furthermore, the only ‘Western-style’ nation ever to prosecute somebody for insulting Mohammad is to the best of my knowledge, ironically, Israel:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tatiana_Soskin

    But what about the question I asked earlier? Do you think the Arab media (or the media of the greater Muslim world) will publish the Holocaust cartoons? If they do, then should the West hold the entire Arab world be held accountable the same way all of Europe is being held accountable by the Muslim world?

    Up until now, the Arab world has argued that the cartoons it publishes with Jewish caricatures are not against Jews just against Zionism. I would question this, given the fact that some Muslim commentators have drawn comparisons between Jews and pigs and monkeys as well as asserting that Jews drink the blood of non-Jews and other such ridiculous accusations. In any event, if they reprint these cartoons, especially without any real context or serious analysis, they won’t be able to make that argument any longer.

  24. Rex,

    Nice try, Avoiding questions by asking questions!

    The guy was sent home because his employers would not allow publishing holocaust cartoons and this is exactly why Iran made this contest.

    Last time I checked the Holocaust is not a religion.

  25. dear rex,
    talking about these problems take more times. I want to say one thing ( to you ) : the solution of these problems is only speaking, not mocking, outrageing, starting war and … with other religions and nations. We should’t allow some goverments or groups stir up among nations and religions and ignore nations certain right under the mask of media and international assosiations such as atomic energy agency.
    good luck

  26. Before we go condemning the Jyllands-Post for supposedly stifling Flemming Rose, their Cultural Editor, you might want to read these articles, which are sadly the best I can find in explaining the terms of his vacation leave.

    http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/11/international/europe/11denmark.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
    http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/1410194.cms

    The mischaracterization of this cartoon issue on all sides is staggering. I’m American, living in Denmark, with a Jewish-Scandinavian background, and to see ridiculousness like this is distressing. What’s interesting (though to be expected) is that most of Denmark is much more reasonable and understanding in this issue than all the foreign pundits, clerics, etc, lined up on all sides around them.

    Let’s start with this leave of absence. From the first link, it’s apparent that Rose welcomes his leave, as it is fair to say he has indeed been under extreme pressure. The second link also tells you that he did agree with the Editor-in-Cheif’s decision NOT to run the Holocaust cartoons. Yes, the statement came through the paper, but if you have any knowledge of Danish society at all, you would know that Danes are very stubborn on matters of ethics and principle, and that even if a paper did, inconceivably, try to cover up an internal scandal with a misleading public statement, the editor in question would never idly submit to being misquoted.

    Knowing the way things work here, it’s easy to see what probably happened: he made a rash decision which he thought would help defend his paper’s reputation, his co-editors had the wisdom to recognize that it is unnecessary to print further offensive cartoons just to engage the Iranian press in a misguided tit-for-tat dare, he realized his judgement mistake, and agreed (at his editor’s suggestion) that he take a break to clear his mind and ease his nerves and his health.

    There is no scandal here (with respect to Rose’s leave). Rose’s employment is not seriously in question. His bosses have been rallying to his defense, as has the clear majority of the Danish public and the government. They are defending him because they know that, within the context of their society, he did nothing wrong. There is indeed a debate to be had regarding the degree to which even private interests have a right to stifle free speech, but that debate is irrelevant to the case at hand. Please take a few minutes to digest this info, before finding yet another issue to be indignant or angry about.

  27. Tango, you need to do your homework on the Holocaust. The Holocaust deniers have been exposed as liars a zillion times. They their arguments have no substance. Rather than simply take this websites word for it, I recommend you get other opinions on the subject.

    Here is a general article on Holocaust denial:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holocaust_denial

    Here are some refutations of common Holocaust denier’s claims. It should be obvious by these common sense refutations that Holocaust ‘revisionists’ routinely distort the truth:

    http://www.nizkor.org/features/qar/qar00.html

    I strongly recommend you examine all sides before you endorse something as absurd as Holocaust denial.

    As far as freedom of speech goes, I answered your question as best I understood it. If you don’t feel I answered your question then please rephrase it.

  30. Secondly, this fuss about the Holocaust cartoons and the Iranian paper.

    I should first frame my post by saying that my father’s cousin married a man whose father was an Auschwitz survivor. That connection sounds distant, but considering we shared Passovers and some Thanksgivings with the survivor’s son (and family) on a regular basis, and my father attended his funeral 6 years ago, you should recognize that he was close enough to be very real to me and my family. He had the ‘numbers’ tattooed on his body, and he had an entire family that perished in the death camps; his surviving family was his second family, from after the war. Everyone in my family knew his history, but it was rarely spoken of; it was still a tender subject for the man 50 years later. It is sad that Mr. Gisko is no longer with us, because it is people like him who provide the most real evidence for the Holocaust and its horrible legacy, though the skeletons and burial sites, stolen property, torture facilities, Nazi documentation, etc, are all quite good evidence in their own right; I can testify to this, having walked on the grounds of both Auschwitz and Birkenau. That the Holocaust existed is a fact, and it is either extremely misguided or extremely ignorant of people like Holohoax to use tenuous statistical manipulations and unbelievable sources to create doubt where none should exist.

    Now, after that introduction:
    “It isn’t freedom of speech when u insult values and ideas.” – mm
    “Last time I checked the Holocaust is not a religion. … I advise you to read carefully what [Holohoax] has to say in his site before making a big deal out of Holocaust itself let alone cartoons about it.” – Tango

    mm says that freedom of speech doesn’t include ‘insult[ing]’ values and ideas. What mm fails to grasp is that it is PRECISELY about CHALLENGING values and ideas, and that distinguishing between a challenge and an insult is all up to the beholder, because they’re functionally the same thing … the difference lies in the intentions behind the speech. The trouble is that people tend to misinterpret a challenge as an insult more often than vice-versa, and that some people are more sensitive to feeling insulted than others. In any case, the appropriate response to either a challenge or an insult is the same; shrug off any perceived slights and address it directly and confidently with the facts you have at hand. Eventually, if your counterpart is at all reasonable, you’ll earn yourself respect and create a new understanding between all involved. That is the premise on which the European notion of free speech rests, as well as portions of most peaceful religions (turn the other cheek, love thy neighbor, etc), and it has proven wildly successful in bringing unprecedented peace and prosperity to the European continent in the last 60 years.

    Facts, if they can be proven, are beyond dispute. Conclusions, however, are in the realm of debate and hence subject to challenges. Values and ideas are by their nature unproveable and always open to challenges. Religions are basically just collections of values and ethical concepts that are often expressed through a series of tales (both historical and fictional) and allegories. It is for this reason that religious concepts fall smack-dab in the middle of the realm of free speech, and religious expressions and invocations as well. The trouble is that religions represent such strongly held beliefs that it is stressful on the individual of faith to challenge them too directly; therefore, it is generally wise to be careful when addressing religious ideas and to expect religious change to occur slowly. This does not mean that religion is exempt from challenge.

    In the case of the cartoons, there were a few ideas being challenged. First, there was the idea that non-Muslims are bound by modern interpretations of Sharia law to avoid depicting Muhammad. Next, there was the idea that Muslim militants have the right or the ability to use intimidation to stifle speech they do not like. Lastly, there was the idea that Muhammad, a man who supposedly represents peace and tolerance, could be invoked to defend the actions of violent Muslim militants and repressive fundamentalists. It is a stretch in the eyes of a neutral observer, particularly one living in Denmark with direct knowledge of the Danish people, to say that the cartoons were meant to insult the actual prophet or to bundle all Muslims across the world with a small number of radicals. People who would interpret the actions of the Jyllands-Post as such are imposing their own insecurities on the cartoons.

    As far as the Holocaust, it is a big deal. It is also accepted fact. The western world will not stifle or attempt to fight any cartoons that express their own opinions about the meaning of the Holocaust or its significance, though many would find irreverent cartoons to be tasteless; they do, however, have a problem with people using lies and other forms of deception to dispute its very existence. The point of free expression is to arrive at stronger understandings and greater truths by the market of ideas; that is entirely undone when deception and manufactured doubt begin to remove established truths from the public sphere. In the case of the Holocaust, there may be serious debate over whether 5 million or 6 million people were killed, when the “Final Solution” was first conceived, how it developed, who implemented it, and what did the public know about it, among other details. Serious discussion of these issues should be encouraged, and as far as I know it is. What is not up for debate is certain fundamentals such as, a. that it happened, and b. that it constituted genocide and horrible cruelty. Allowing ill-founded doubt to spread over these well-substantiated facts risks undermining the significance of the event and losing the lessons that it has to teach us. Thus, there are laws in Germany and Austria that protect the memory of the Holocaust, and that are wrongly said to represent European hypocrisy with respect to free speech, with the arrest of David Irving used as an example. While it may be debateable whether such laws are necessary, it reveals a lack of understanding of the philosophy of free speech to say that it protects wilfull deception in the manner of Irving and his cohort.

    Let me make this very clear, it is totally fine to satirize Jews, to condemn actions by Israel, to challenge Jewish values, even to satirize the Holocaust, however tastelessly. However, it is wrong to deceive the public into believing one of the greatest social catastrophes and human tragedies of our time was fabricated by the very people it victimized. Apparently, many in the muslim world and elsewhere are too busy letting themselves be offended to think this one through and understand why it is so.

    Mr. Gisko was not the sort of a man to take offense easily. He had seen the worst that mankind could offer, and came away as a survivor with a deeper perspective on people and the world. What he would want today is a global environment free of the repressions that led to his imprisonment. The muslim world, which sees itself (with some reason) as the modern oppressed people of the world, is ironically attacking one of the nations that stands most strongly for such freedoms.

  32. Tango, what you need to consider is that there many religions in this world. A free society cannot give preferences to ANY particular religion.

    Read up on the following religions, Scientology and Satanism, and then tell me that you shouldn’t ever criticize any religion:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientology
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_of_Satan

    People believe in many absurd ideas. Encapsulating those ideas in a religion doesn’t make them any less absurd.

    I fully understand that you were offended by the cartoons. That is fine. I hope you’ll consider that the Western world has many religions, including many small minority religions and sects that immigrants have brought from all over the world as well as ones that have been started in more recent times: Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Jainism, Sikhism, Parsiism, Taoism, Scientology, Satanism, Shintoism, Wiccanism and neo-Paganism, Rastafarianism, the Druze faith, Yezidis, Native American religions, and countless of others. There are, of course, also people who are athiests and agnostics and people who simply don’t think or care about religion.

    If we were to be fair (which in a Western society, respecting religious freedom, we must) and allow all these faiths an equal say in prohibiting certain things from being said, we would be able to say practically nothing at all. Freedom of speech would be nonexistent. Furthermore, not only would freedom of speech be nonexistent, but freedom of religion would have to be impinged upon also. The Church of Satan would argue, for instance, that it is within its religious rights to criticize Christianity and other monotheistic faiths in ways that the followers of these faiths would find offensive. So would athiests and Wiccans for example.

    Christianity, for one, is as diverse as it is today because new groups and movements within that religion were able to criticize other branches of the Christian religion – even though, at times, some of these groups and movements were labelled heretical or blasphemous at the time.

    There is simply no way you can maintain a society that has freedom of speech and freedom of religion
    and have blasphemy laws. Freedom and censorship on grounds of religion are at a fundamental level incompatible.

    In any event, I must leave this blog for good. 🙁
    I’ve had an interesting time.

    I hope you’ll consider some of the things I have written more carefully, Tango. Don’t be so defensive, OK? And I’m sorry if I’ve offended you but I wish you would open your mind a little bit!

    To Tango and everybody else, I’ve had a good time and wish you the best. Have a nice day.

  33. “NOT A SINGLE ANNOUNCEMENT WILL REACH THE PUBLIC WITHOUT OUR CONTROL. Even now this is already being attained by us inasmuch as all news items are received by a few agencies, in whose offices they are focused from all parts of the world. These agencies will then be already entirely ours and will give publicity only to what we dictate to them”

    “In the front rank will stand organs of an official character. They will always stand guard over our interests, and therefore their influence will be comparatively insignificant”

    “THESE ATTACKS UPON US WILL ALSO SERVE ANOTHER PURPOSE, NAMELY, THAT OUR SUBJECTS WILL BE CONVINCED TO THE EXISTENCE OF FULL FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND SO GIVE OUR AGENTS AN OCCASION TO AFFIRM THAT ALL ORGANS WHICH OPPOSE US ARE EMPTY BABBLERS”

    “In the hands of the States of to-day there is a great force that creates the movement of thought in the people, and that is the Press. The part played by the Press is to keep pointing our requirements supposed to be indispensable, to give voice to the complaints of the people, to express and to create discontent. It is in the Press that the triumph of FREEDOM OF SPEECH finds its incarnation. But the GOYIM States have not known how to make use of this force; and it has fallen into our hands. Through the Press we have gained the power to influence while remaining ourselves in the shade; thanks to the Press we have got the GOLD in our hands, notwithstanding that we have had to gather it out of the oceans of blood and tears. But it has paid us, though we have sacrificed many of our people. Each victim on our side is worth in the sight of God a thousand GOYIM”

    THE PROTOCOLS OF THE LEARNED ELDERS OF ZION

    http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/przion1.htm

  36. OK, you guys are going off the deep end now. I honestly have no idea what you (Tango) hope to accomplish by linking us to the Elders of Zion and their fictitious protocols. Do you honestly believe in these conspiracy theories??? How about the Knights Templar, the Merovingians, the Stonemasons, the Illuminati, or even ALIEN OVERLORDS?? I betcha I could produce a few mission statements from those groups too … on the internet, at least; I’d just have to look for links from DaVinci Code fansites. So please put down the pipe and jump back into reality … I’m Jewish and I’ve been to Israel, and I can tell you there’s no chance Zionists could agree long enough on any one issue to come close to managing a secret world-dominating society. Aside from that, the whole concept is just idiotic, and it’d be a waste of time and text to go into all the reasons why.

    The notion that Flemming Rose is a jewish extremist is equally ridiculous. For all I know, he’s got some jewish ancestry, but I’m guessing he doesn’t because I haven’t seen any evidence that he does. As far as the Israel cartoons, you (American) and Mr. David Duke both miss the fact that the Jyllands-Post simply declined to REprint cartoons they had ALREADY PRINTED. I’ll say that again. THEY ALREADY PRINTED THE ANTI-ISRAEL CARTOONS. There is no point in reprinting the cartoons because the paper does not need to prove its willingness to print criticism of all peoples and creeds; it has shown through its history that it’s willing to satire whatever is important on a given day. The Muhammad cartoons were not printed because Jyllands-Posten just compulsively likes insulting Muslims … it was to take a stand against documented instances of physical intimidation against those who comment on Islam, and to see how far the resulting self-censorship in Danish society had gone. If the KKK asked them to reprint the Muhammad cartoons, they would not, on the same grounds that they refuse to reprint the Israel cartoons (and the additional grounds that Islamic protestors might destroy more lives and property).

    You guys need to take a break and spend a summer in Scandinavia. It’ll calm your hate and restore your sanity.

  38. “NOT A SINGLE ANNOUNCEMENT WILL REACH THE PUBLIC WITHOUT OUR CONTROL. Even now this is already being attained by us inasmuch as all news items are received by a few agencies, in whose offices they are focused from all parts of the world. These agencies will then be already entirely ours and will give publicity only to what we dictate to them”

    “In the front rank will stand organs of an official character. They will always stand guard over our interests, and therefore their influence will be comparatively insignificant”

    “THESE ATTACKS UPON US WILL ALSO SERVE ANOTHER PURPOSE, NAMELY, THAT OUR SUBJECTS WILL BE CONVINCED TO THE EXISTENCE OF FULL FREEDOM OF SPEECH AND SO GIVE OUR AGENTS AN OCCASION TO AFFIRM THAT ALL ORGANS WHICH OPPOSE US ARE EMPTY BABBLERS”

    “In the hands of the States of to-day there is a great force that creates the movement of thought in the people, and that is the Press. The part played by the Press is to keep pointing our requirements supposed to be indispensable, to give voice to the complaints of the people, to express and to create discontent. It is in the Press that the triumph of FREEDOM OF SPEECH finds its incarnation. But the GOYIM States have not known how to make use of this force; and it has fallen into our hands. Through the Press we have gained the power to influence while remaining ourselves in the shade; thanks to the Press we have got the GOLD in our hands, notwithstanding that we have had to gather it out of the oceans of blood and tears. But it has paid us, though we have sacrificed many of our people. Each victim on our side is worth in the sight of God a thousand GOYIM”

    THE PROTOCOLS OF THE LEARNED ELDERS OF ZION

    http://www.biblebelievers.org.au/przion1.htm

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