Today I'm Danish

One of my favorite webcomic writers Chris Wright has put together this piece on the situation which gives a nice little comparison, nothing at all Canberra related, but thought I’d throw it up anyways because I like Ubersoft so much and Chris’ ideas

Did anyone see that Queen of Denmarks comments on the issue? She said, in short:

BRING IT BITCHS!!

Why are they provoking us?

They, being the violent element in these events, aren’t. They are showing off to god.

Although I didn’t intend to comment on this issue here, I think the incident has perpetuated enough to actually have a long term effect on Canberrans now.

Whilst the effect of this will not be immediately felt in Canberra, the threads of what is going to occur in the future are already starting to unfold.

The question is, when will the anti-christian messages be published for the Christians to get all het up about ?

Will the Christians burn down embassies, go on riots, etcetera, or will the archbishop of whereverville just quietly denounce the incident on his way to the opening of a new shooting gallery ?

The behaviour of those of Muslim faith during this event has been appalling, and I hope that the film footage be used to prosecute individuals in the same way Cronulla beach footage has been utilised.

All these events begs the question – are they asking for another crusade ? Do they want the western world’s retribution ? Why are they provoking us ?

(Yes they are provoking us, those cartoon images are pathetic, I’ve seen heaps better ones on the Al-Jazeera website).

We will respond eventually, but it won’t be sword on sword like the crusades, it’ll be 5.56mm on 5.56mm. Last time I checked though, pointing your gun in the air and letting off the full 30 round clip only makes you look like an idiot, us westerners like the term, “when your target appears, watch and shoot, watch and shoot”.

Well i would defend any publication’s right to publish what they choose to.

I’d also say I thought the crikey approach was particularly cowardly.

But that’s just my opinion.

There was an interesting counterarguement in Crikey yesterday (original text run in the the New Zealand Herald:

“As soon as an issue is framed as a test of press freedom, the temptation is to publish for no better reason than to assert that freedom. And in some circumstances, where the threat is real, that might be reason enough to publish. But in this country, and most others where newspapers have strutted a hairy chest on this issue, Muslims are a small minority of the population and we are free to offend their religious sensitivities if we want to.

The only question to consider is, why would we want to?”

From Christopher Hitchen’s piece in Slate.

Islam makes very large claims for itself. In its art, there is a prejudice against representing the human form at all. The prohibition on picturing the prophet—who was only another male mammal—is apparently absolute. So is the prohibition on pork or alcohol or, in some Muslim societies, music or dancing. Very well then, let a good Muslim abstain rigorously from all these. But if he claims the right to make me abstain as well, he offers the clearest possible warning and proof of an aggressive intent. This current uneasy coexistence is only an interlude, he seems to say. For the moment, all I can do is claim to possess absolute truth and demand absolute immunity from criticism. But in the future, you will do what I say and you will do it on pain of death.

Q: “In the spirit of understanding, what would RA players do if they were in a position of power in the current Danish Government?”

A: Freedom of expression is not for sale. Its a core value of fairdinkum democratic societies. That’s how you can tell we don’t live in one – all the makor Australian press have demonstrated a distinct absence of back-bone.

I think it was Rowan Atkinson who said something like – to ridicule a man because of his race, well that’s simply illogical. To ridicule god – well thats just common sense…

In light of the various sackings of Danish diplomatic missions around the middle east (and Africa?) it may have been unwise for the Danish Gov’t to tell them to get stuffed… Although the people responsible for the burning, bombing and sacking are now just perpetuating lunatic stereotype. Not only do some of these freaks have no sense of humour, they seem to be spoiling for a fight.

In the spirit of understanding, what would RA players do if they were in a position of power in the current Danish Government?

Tenuous link to Canberra, but I’ll lend some thoughts anyway;

1) Bahahaha, the ‘Stop, we’ve run out of virgins” one is gold.
2) The Gov’t of a nation should not censure a document that was not published by them or one of their agencies. Kudo’s Denmark for sticking to your guns.
3) Why are there so many freaks w/o a sense of humour? This is not singularly applicable to the fringe Muslim’s, but many other freaks as well.
4) Yeah, the bomb/turban thing was probably a bit rough (and not very clever or funny), but it’s no worse than the Catholics have been saying (and depicting) about Moh’d for years and years. See DoppelFrog’s link for a larf.
5) Why do we have to import Danish sperm? Just tell me it’s not for Danishes… in fact I don’t really want to know.