Irreverent Caricatures
Recently the Muslim world has become outraged by a set of cartoons appearing in European (particularly Dutch) newspapers. Creating an image of Muhammad (pbuh) is forbidden in Islam, and it doesn’t help that the cartoons are insulting depictions of him espousing terrorist rhetoric. These cartoons have led to numerous demonstrations, and threats from the Islamic world to cease the reproduction of such material.
I consider myself fairly sympathetic to the plight of minority groups – particularly if they are from Islamic or Arab backgrounds considering personal interests.. but I admit that this time I think protecting free, even irreverent, speech is more important than mending hurt feelings.
A part of Western culture is satire. Its aim is to criticize anything and everything – nothing is too sacred. For goodness sake – there is an entire genre of “dead baby” jokes floating around.
Seeing the way “outsiders” view your beliefs can be incredibly positive. I think movies like Dogma and Saved! are irreverently hilarious… and they show a side of Christianity I can often overlook because I’m in it.
All religions and religious leaders are poked fun of.. c’mon – Jesus battles Satan on freakin’ South Park.
My point is simply this: there are no exceptions or exclusions for religions in a world of free speech. Christians, Jews, Buddhists, etc. have come to laugh at themselves – and now it’s time for Muslims to learn a bit about that too.
16 Responses to “Thursday February 2, 2006”
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February 15th, 2006 at 9:35 pm
i’ve been out of the blog loop for a bit…what gets me about this whole thing is that they are reacting to (partially) the Prophet being depicted as a terrorist, by committing acts of terror. do any muslims see the irony in that?
February 6th, 2006 at 6:09 pm
this actually made headline news due to the violence that has erupted over it. seriously people.
February 3rd, 2006 at 10:10 pm
so would this mean youre open to seeing the last temptation of Christ? or Brokeback mountain? or any other controversial film that may depict something you have an idea about, differently?
February 3rd, 2006 at 6:23 pm
nice to see you in person last night…
February 3rd, 2006 at 4:14 pm
I agree that we should all learn to laugh at ourselves a bit. I don’t think the Muslim world (at least the ones depicted protesting, etc) are ready for that however. They’ve never had to. I was thinking about how I would try and explain to someone that, while you love and respect the deity your worship, one can still appreciate things that do seem ridiculous to the outside world..In America, seeing Christianity made fun of is so commonplace, and we even do it in our own little Christian circles. So different…
February 3rd, 2006 at 3:38 pm
good stuff. and regulargoy’s comments too. Makes me wonder – is satire a world-wide communication technique? How about through the ages? Hmmm. That would make a very interesting cultural study.
February 3rd, 2006 at 12:37 pm
Awesome picture of Jesus! Heck yeah!
February 3rd, 2006 at 2:42 am
Good perspective. Satire is good because it makes us take a look at ourselves from outside our normal perspective.
I liked “Saved” because it pretty much hit the nail on the head for me (although I didn’t care for the ultimate message in the end, but that’s a whole other comment). The sad realization I came to watching “Saved” was that there is a little bit of Hilary Faye in all of us.
February 2nd, 2006 at 4:34 pm
That is one thing that I still like about South Park, though I’m not nearly as fanatical about it as I was back in the day, is that it hits on angles of issues that are not expressed by the “powers that be” or whatever. Those angles still exist and they do make some very good points. Even outside of South Park, I’m okay with hearing another opinion of something I believe, as long as there’s a basic understanding. One reason I don’t care for George Carlin’s newer stuff (ie-religious attacks) is that he sounds like a complete, if I may use the word, dumbass in the process. The idea of separating murders, crazy people, drug addicts, and rapists into four states and fencing them off, I still find funny. Heck, I feel slightly tempted to support it if it came up, though realistically I don’t think I could.
So basically, if you’re going to kid about something I know or believe in, know what you’re talking about. You can’t write a realistic paper about the life of Spuds MacKensie unless you know and have a general idea of who and what Spuds MacKensie is and what Spuds stood for.
And if you don’t know who Spuds MacKensie is, look it up and you’ll get my point of this rant!
February 2nd, 2006 at 3:59 pm
well said.
February 2nd, 2006 at 11:23 am
BTW, I like your new header, I hope to see you tonight!
February 2nd, 2006 at 11:23 am
OK, I’ll bite on the obvious question: have you seen/will you see Albert Brooks’ Looking for Comedy in the Muslim World? The premise is that Brooks is a comedian whom the State Department assigns to a new anti-terror initiative: marketing pro-American comedy in Islamic nations.
Satire is sacred to me. Satire illustrates the absurdity of things which are absurd. (i.e. What Would Jesus Bomb?) That said: I can understand Muslims being upset about representations of the Prophet–that’s a fairly sacred prohibition in Islam, and satirists might do well to be sensitive to it. Satire only sticks if people get over what offends them and see your underlying ethical purpose.
February 2nd, 2006 at 11:22 am
I guess I hadn’t thought about this to much, thanks for bringing it to my attention. My general feeling is that most people take themselves to seriously and it’s a problem if we can’t joke about ourselves, our foibles and the quirks of the organizations we are connected with…
February 2nd, 2006 at 10:07 am
You know, to be honest, I am fairly suprised to see you show up on this side fo the argument. Have you checked out Robert Spencer’s Dhimmi Watch and Jihad Watch websites?
February 2nd, 2006 at 3:05 am
Yup.
You know, i tried to watch Dogma, because I liked the concept, but it just kept grossing me out. I ended up turning it off. Saved was pretty good. I wasn’t offended by it, but I thought it was a little er…cartoonish…maybe? Only a little though, and only a few certain parts. I think my favorite part was the girl playing the keyboard with one hand and raising the other hand. We laughed and laughed about that. One of my all-time favorite movies is The Apostle. I know this is a little different than what you are talking about in this post cuz it’s not exactly satire, but I love how it portrayed a minister in his sad humanity, but still with some rough dignity. To me it was a great illustration of how God uses flawed people to do his work.
But southpark…the episode where Cartman forms a Christian rock band…Rocks. King of the Hill does a good job with the subject too, but with less sarcasm.
February 2nd, 2006 at 2:40 am
Very good insight. Also, I think part of what goes on in much of the Islamic world is that corrupt and self-seeking leaders try to bring much attention to Western offenses of Islam to divert their people’s attention away from how crappy a job these leaders do at caring for their country. For instance, instead of people protesting against the way money is misused for personal gain by their government leaders, they are riled up to protest defamation to Islam by those evil Westerners. What do you think?