There have been protests in the Muslim world during the past week over the anti-Islamic film that depicts the Prophet in a derogatory way. Likewise, there were protests last year when a Danish publication ran some cartoons in their magazine, which ignited Muslim riots everywhere. The western media should get with the program and realize that Muslims don't like their beliefs mocked. Westerners wouldn't understand the jokes anyway because most don't know dick about the Islamic religion.
Muslims could also take the high road and ignore western media, particularly sensationalist magazines that are just out to make a buck, and prove to
westerners that Islam really is a peaceful religion. Anybody who has lived in the Muslim world knows that Muslims take their religion very seriously. The unfortunate thing about the violent protests that are sure to result from Charlie Hebdo publishing cartoons of the Prophet, is that they will further portray Muslims as violent fanatics. This is unfortunate because after having lived in Jordan, Morocco and now Oman and traveled through other countries in the Muslim world, I have known these people to be generous, respectful and family-oriented. Perhaps more so than their western counterpart.Yes, there are fanatics in any religion, just like there are Christian fanatics and Jewish fanatics and I have met a few of them, too.
Although the French government has criticized the cartoons, they are still sending riot police to guard the offices of this provocative magazine. They should be fed to the wolves. Let them suffer the results of their stupidity and hire their own private security to stop their windows from being broken. Why is the French government paying to protect them? The Rector of the Great Mosque of Paris Dalil Boubakeur said: “I think that what they’ve done here is beyond comprehension. It breaches normal reasoning, and is a breach of responsibility.”
This latest provocation does not make any sense whatsoever and has nothing to do with freedom of speech, but instead is an attention-seeking gimmick to sell more copy, and with tensions as high as they are over the film, totally irresponsible. The editor of the magazine, Stephane Charbonnier, is quoted as saying 'we do caricatures of everyone every week, but when we do it with the Prophet, it’s called a provocation.' He said that the images would 'shock those who will want to be shocked.' It seems an auspicious time to run these cartoons for his magazine, yet what's more unbelievable is that they have run out of western politicians to ridicule.
By the way Stephane, the Prophet is not 'everyone.'
