
South Park creators warned over Muhammad depiction - shrikant
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/8636455.stm
======
jheriko
Should Muslims be upset about this? Probably not.

Muslims themselves have depicted Mohammed in art in the past, although usually
covering the face - nobody knows what he looked like so it is not possible to
depict his face accurately... so I have always assumed it was just a mark of
respect. e.g. <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Siyer-i_Nebi_151b.jpg>

Besides that, I think retaliating with violence is pretty unacceptable if you
truly live by the Koran - It says nowhere inside of it that such depictions
are forbidden - but it does say in plenty of places that unlawful killing (by
the law of the Koran) is forbidden and that it displeases Allah. Since
depictions of Mohammed break no law in the Koran, how can murder be justified
in retaliation? (Koran 4:29, 5:28-32 etc.)

In his own lifetime, Mohammed offered shelter and guidance to those who had
defamed him public, removed him from his home, chased and persecuted him and
his people... I wonder what he would think of all this today?

~~~
tome
Who cares whether violence is or is not permitted in the Koran? Retaliating
with violence is _completely_ unacceptable for any person who values sense.

~~~
jheriko
Muslims care - that was why I took that line of argument. Its much easier to
convince people on their own terms.

~~~
tome
I see. I hope you're right, but I fear you're wrong.

The culture of physical intimidation and oppression is just that, a culture.
Religion is used to justify it, but never stands up to scrutiny.

I don't think there's such a thing as a resonable muslim, or indeed reasonable
christian, there are just reasonable _people_ , independent of their religion.
Either someone can see that threats of murder are unacceptable or they cannot.
Rereading of their holy book is not going to change what's formed in them due
to the culture which they have been exposed to their whole lives.

~~~
euroclydon
_Rereading of their holy book is not going to change what's formed in them due
to the culture which they have been exposed to their whole lives._

I agree with you that culture is hugely important in determining what a person
considers to be justifiable killing. I don't agree that re-reading their holy
scripture can not change their attitude. People have life-changing religious
experiences all the time. One reformed murderer comes to mind who actually
went on to write a large chunk of Christian scripture.

------
tome
Perhaps the way to get these stupid and illiberal threats to stop is a massive
DDoS attack.

If a large proportion media outlets and content creators make a point of
"portraying" Mohammed then there's no way these criminals could make all of
them "probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh".

~~~
anthonyb
I can see big full page ads with some bearded guy and "C'est nes pas une
Prophet Mohammed" underneath it...

~~~
tome
That's brilliant! Perhaps this is an idea that will catch on like the atheist
bus campaign.

------
cturner
I love this game. What they do is hacking on a different format.

If I were them, I'd put an unnamed character in an episode, and have it on
television and let it go by. Then I'd refer to that character in a subsequent
episode and point out that it had been Mohammed.

Build it up as a three-part who-shot-JR-style episode series with no viable
plot conclusion except one where the depicted character is 'the prophet', in
order to strongarm the network into putting the revelation episode on TV.

------
asnyder
Absolutely outrageous. There was no depiction. They merely suggested that
Mohammed was inside the bear costume, this too is ridiculous and the point of
this aspect of the episode.

1\. It's a cartoon, there is no Mohammed. If I draw a stick figure and suggest
it's Mohammed it's unreasonable to suggest that this is a depiction of
Mohammed, it's a stick figure.

2\. It's a bear costume, just because someone says Mohammed is on the inside
no way depicts Mohammed. The only thing that suggests this is dialog, if one
mutes the audio there's no more suggestion.

3\. It's likely that in the rendering program there is in fact nothing inside
the costume, so all this fuss is over the imaginary depiction of Mohammed.

So crazy...

~~~
PG-13
They already had an actual depiction of Mohammed several seasons ago. His full
body and face were shown. He was a superhero. Nobody cared. If they depicted
Mohammed now, nobody would come after them. The networks won't allow it now.

People seem to forget that a big part of the controversy surrounding the
cartoons in Denmark wasn't just that Mohammed was portrayed, but that he was
portrayed as a terrorist and performing lewd acts.

~~~
gizmomagico
_People seem to forget that a big part of the controversy surrounding the
cartoons in Denmark wasn't just that Mohammed was portrayed, but that he was
portrayed as a terrorist and performing lewd acts._

Really?

Were these the cartoons portraying Muhammad as a terrorist and performing lewd
acts: [http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-
Posten_Muhammad_cartoo...](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jyllands-
Posten_Muhammad_cartoons_controversy) ?

From the article: _This led to protests across the Muslim world, some of which
escalated into violence with police firing on the crowds (resulting in a total
of more than 100 deaths),[1] including setting fire to the Danish Embassies in
Syria, Lebanon and Iran, storming European buildings, and desecrating the
Danish, Dutch, Norwegian, French and German flags in Gaza City._

\- Now, how _fucking insane_ do people have to be, to have that kind of
reaction to _a fucking cartoon_ , even if it actually had been "lewd"?

------
sharpn
I think South Park may have been alluding to this sad story:

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7112929.stm>

------
lionhearted
Ah man - I'm in China, and I've gotten used to Youtube and Blogspot not
working, but the BBC is banned? This is bloody ridiculous.

Anyone got a way through it that still works? When I was here five years ago
the translate-English-to-English thing worked, but no more. I tried a good 20
or so proxies I knew as well before giving up... probably Hotspot Shield would
work, but it slows down everything and there's nothing so important I need to
do. Thoughts?

~~~
cturner
Set up ssh on a server outside china. Run sshd on port 443. You may be able to
just ssh to it. Or you can set putty up to tunnel to over HTTP, and because of
the port choice it won't be blocked, unless they've made a specific rule for
that IP. Tunnel all your operations through that link.

In time, authoritarians will start profiling internet activity to sniff out
people who do this (assuming they're not already). If you're a Chinese citizen
then you might want to think about this.

Other readers - what's a good way to set up squid or another proxy to
complement this arrangement?

------
simplegeek
I'm a Muslim and I've never read anywhere about killing someone who draws
Muhammad (Peace be upon him). But drawing Muhammad(PBUH) is definitely
considered as a disrespect. Moreover, it definitely upsets people(muslims in
this case) so why just keep doing it? On the other hand, my own study of Quran
is limited, however, I've yet to come across any study that says something
about killing someone who draws Muhamamd (PBUH). People shouldn't draw
Muhammad because it hurts Muslims. Whereas, muslims should be silent in this
case, imho. There is a story about Muhammad (PBUH) visiting Taif (city of
Saudi Arabia) and people of Taif threw stones and tortured him(PBUH)and Allah
sent a messenger asking Muhammad for the permission to crush people of Taif.
And Muhammad said something along the lines of "No, I forgive them" (this
isn't the exact story probably as I'm recalling from memory). My point is
that, if Muhammad can forgive people insulting him then why cannot, being
beloved followers, we be quite in this scenario. On the other hand, I guess
non-muslims should be tolerant of our views and shouldn't do things that makes
us sad (and same applies to us).

------
known
"Religion was born when the first con man met the first fool." --Mark Twain

------
guelo
Seems they took down all their content including their 404 page,
<http://www.revolutionmuslim.com>

You can still see the post in google's cache.

~~~
jk4930
No, they were taken down. Them and some like-minded sites. Now guess...

------
omarqureshi
One crazy bastards death threat does not represent what the entire Islamic
community believes in, remember that there are crazy people from all religious
backgrounds.

~~~
tome
Sure, there are crazy christians and crazy hindus and crazy athiests.

I don't think anyone here is jumping to the conclusion that all muslims are
horrible. I -- and others I think -- are reacting to the horrific example of
intolerance regardless of where it came from. This level of intolerance is one
thing that a liberal permissive society should indeed _not_ tolerate itself.

------
grrrr
I never understood why people actually get so angry when they take offence to
something.

Consider what happens to someone who is offended, absolutely nothing. If your
offended by something, it's not as is something really bad has actually
happened. It's not as if you've physically been hurt, or someone you know has
been hurt. The world is still exactly the same place it was before you took
offence.

Offended? So what, get over it.

------
secret
For the defenders of censorship, this recent ruling should give you a
perspective on how strongly free speech is protected in the US:
[http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iMolK4XY7...](http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/article/ALeqM5iMolK4XY7Lqi7gsN4g_W1Ija1mfQ)

------
JCThoughtscream
The fact that they're facing death threats for it is made doubly hilarious in
light of the episode's content.

------
acg
I did not see the episode but it could be satire:

<http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7119399.stm>

------
Devilboy
I'm so glad that SOMEONE is standing up for our rights - threats of violence
be damned!

------
maxklein
Different cultures is not about food that is a bit more spicy or that smells
different. There are real differences that, even though they may not be
important for you, are important for many people in the world.

We are no longer living in places with closed borders - this stuff is now
global. South Park is global entertainment, it's not American entertainment.
Respect other cultures, particularly with things that cause no hurt to anyone
else.

If you are against FGM as a cultural practise, I can understand that. It
causes harm to other people. But not showing a religous figure on television
has no effect apart from a negative one among the group. I see no harm in
respecting this.

~~~
xenthral
> "But not showing a religous figure on television has no effect apart from a
> negative one among the group. I see no harm in respecting this."

I see great actual and potential harm, not to mention you don't know the
effect before expressing/airing this to know it can be nothing but negative,
such knowledge is impossible for any man to have, thats the point of the first
amendment to the US constitution, and last I checked southpark was made there.

You could have made the same argument about "Life of Brian", whats the point
of ridiculing jesus after all? The result of that movie has been harmful?
Thats not the case at all for me, "Life of Brian" is a very important movie
for me, and so is southpark.

What about all the muslims who could enjoy poking fun at Mohammed? How is it
that their view is any less valid? Arguing for self-censorship legitimizes and
treats muslims as a unified group, identified by voices of extremism. You
delegate to them the task of identifying what is harmful and offensive, and
once you've done that, it can be anything. A cartoon in an obscure danish
newspaper. A 15 minute movie made in the netherlands. What children call a
teddy bear in a classroom in Uganda. What southpark decides to do.

This is a capitulation that erodes freedom of speech.

~~~
maxklein
Is abstaining from calling a person a "nigger" eroding freedom of speech? No,
it's simply a sign that you recognize that it will cause another person
distress.

Not showing the prophet on a screen is not eroding freedom of speech, because
this rule has been in place longer than America has existed. And abstaining
from showing it is just a sign of respect for a culture of a billion people.

~~~
xenthral
> "Not showing the prophet on a screen is not eroding freedom of speech"

Actually it absolutely is, specially when these depictions have been
accompanied by campaigns of intimidation, violence and even murder.

> "because this rule has been in place longer than America has existed."

Freedom of speech has existed long before Islam, but precedence has absolutely
no currency here.

> "And abstaining from showing it is just a sign of respect for a culture of a
> billion people."

Actually thats not the case at all, as I pointed on another post in this
thread this is a tenet of Sunni, but not Shi'a muslims, several million of
that billion don't see it as sin.

And if they are offended so be it - there are no guarantees you won't be
offended in this world, whats unacceptable is bullying and coercion aimed at
chilling and eroding freedom of speech.

~~~
maxklein
But surely you understand that making fun of somebody else god is not eroding
freedom of speech. Rather, you're just provoking someone else for no reason.

There is a lot of censorship going on in the world, and a lot of real things
that you cannot say without being harshly criticized and thrown out of your
job or something. That's what you should be concerned about.

This particular example, is just an attack on an alternative religion, and
what really hides behind this "freedom of speech" diversion is cultural
intolerance and anti-muslim sentiment. The people who will argue that it
should be allowed to mock another persons God will say nothing when Australia
censors.

If you want to fight for freedom of speech, then fight for real freedom of
speech, not for this type of cultural attacks that try to use freedom of
speech as their reason.

~~~
xenthral
> "Rather, you're just provoking someone else for no reason."

Actually it doesn't have anything to do with them, if they are offended its
because they chose to watch, I did not force them to.

And what are these people you want to protect that they can't take an
offensive world. I can, if they can't thats their problem, I won't limit what
I say - these campaigns of intimidation also involve mere criticism of people
that bare some similarities to Mohammed (see Salman Rushdie's Satanic Verses,
which is actually not about Mohammed).

> "There is a lot of censorship going on in the world, and a lot of real
> things that you cannot say without being harshly criticized and thrown out
> of your job or something. That's what you should be concerned about."

We're talking about private citizens who chose to make a movie here, this
isn't a corporate environment, the southpark creators are not bound by any
contract that they willingly signed that states they must curb their
offensiveness to particular groups.

[edit: actually they signed something with comedy central surely, but thats an
internal affair for them, this has been released to the public now]

> "This particular example, is just an attack on an alternative religion"

Alternative to what? That doesn't even make sense, you were just mentioning,
as if it had any weight, the fact they are 1 billion+

> "and what really hides behind this "freedom of speech" diversion is cultural
> intolerance and anti-muslim sentiment."

You don't know that, you're speculating, but you know what, I'll concede that
a lot of it can be that. Theres also a lot of anti-catholic sentiment, a LOT
of anti-atheist sentiment, etc. I believe freedom of speech covers hate speech
as well.

"Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters" - Rosa Luxemburg.

> "The people who will argue that it should be allowed to mock another persons
> God will say nothing when Australia censors."

Actually I will stand up against stupid australian censorship and criticize
it. One doesn't preclude the other.

> "If you want to fight for freedom of speech, then fight for real freedom of
> speech, not for this type of cultural attacks that try to use freedom of
> speech as their reason."

Actually I think the place that needs freedom of speech the most in the world
right now is the muslim world, and we should lead by example, and yes, the
example of mocking, and iconoclasm. And I know muslims out there that agree
with that position.

~~~
maxklein
What about "hate speech"? This is forbidden by the laws of the U.S.

The U.S is not an "everything goes" place where you can say what you want. The
only difference is that some things are culturally inacceptible to say, and so
are protected by the law, and some other things are not.

There is a lot of religous fervour behind these anti Islamic-culture
movements, and a lot of it has little to do with free speech. A lot of it is
mostly just religion.

That's what's so terrible about this - it comes across as a bigoted religous
argument, and not as a defense for free speech. Look at the way people vote
down anything mildly pro the other side and vote up comments that are just
anti-islam. That's not about free speech, it's about intolerance for another
religion.

I'm not asking for a law against showing the prophet on TV. I'm asking that
this aspect of muslim culture be respected, just as words with slave origins
are not used on TV.

All I want is that we all just respect each other and not mock each other.

~~~
xenthral
> "What about "hate speech"? This is forbidden by the laws of the U.S."

I'm not an american citizen, my opinion is that hate laws shouldn't exist. And
most certainly not any law protecting against blasphemy of any sort - glad we
agree there.

> "There is a lot of religous fervour behind these anti Islamic-culture
> movements, and a lot of it has little to do with free speech. A lot of it is
> mostly just religion."

Oh I couldn't agree more, theres a lot of religious bigotry in this world. I
don't see how this is relevant to the discussion, why should matt and trey
self-censorship? Are you afraid they might be interpreted as being religious
bigots? What if they secretly are? It just doesn't matter.

> "Islamic-culture movements"

Again, not all muslims think portraying the prophet is a sin, as far as I know
(which isn't that far, I'm no religious scholar) all Shia sects don't see it
as so.

> "Look at the way people vote down anything mildly pro the other side and
> vote up comments that are just anti-islam."

I'm upvoting anything I see as a defense of freedom of speech, and maybe I'm
upvoting comments that have been upvoted by bigots, I can't help if they are
on the right side (in my opinion) for the wrong reasons, I won't stop making
my argument just because people with horrible intent agree with it for the
wrong reasons.

> "I'm asking that this aspect of muslim culture be respected, just as words
> with slave origins are not used on TV."

Actually they quite frequently are. Maybe the frequent is there cause I mostly
watch HBO.

> "All I want is that we all just respect each other and not mock each other."

I share that sentiment, I truly do.

But I'm not willing to compromise and capitulate my freedom of speech to
respect other people's (in my opinion) nonsensical and fetishistic beliefs.

I won't do it for christians, jains, buddhists, jews, muslims. Thats equality
- you earlier spoke of double standards, I strive not to have them :)

And if you really think this isn't an erosion of freedom you just aren't
following this subject, there are people who are living under death threats
for writing novels, and I'm not talking about the countries that have it
inscribed under sharia law, I'm talking about western nations, look around the
examples are plentiful - and this makes me want to do is show the prophet
more, not less, not as a provocation but as a statement of freedom and
civilization.

[edit: clarity/styling]

------
tamersalama
Muslim Here - I don't know the full story (a bit late).

Before this gets any hotter - just wanted to say that physical depictions of
holy figures in Islam is prohibited [wiki: Aniconism, Idolatry, Islamic Art,
...]. I personally don't watch any episode/movie/play with Jesus, Muhammad,
Noah, Moses (PBUT) drawn or acted (I don't feel comfortable - Silly Me).

Religion is the only boundary that some have left. It encapsulates things as
simple and beautiful as ethics and manners. What's wrong with a little of
these?

freedom-of-expression (which should be held dearly) is not freedom to attack
other's values.

I don't like Southpark (but I'll be waiting Futurama) :)

~~~
gort
"freedom-of-expression (which should be held dearly) is not freedom to attack
other's values."

Actually, it is.

I have read the Qur'an, all of it. Page after page it tells me that people
like myself deserve to be tortured for zillions of years. I find it pretty
offensive and hateful. But I don't call for it to be banned.

~~~
ivenkys
This is absolutely spot-on.

I have seen debates on T.V where respected Muslim scholars agree on and defend
this interpretation - its the duty of a Muslim (Mu'min) to kill or convert an
unbeliever (Kaafir).

I don't understand why this argument(of banning the Qu'ran) is not made
whenever this topic comes up.

