The Back Burner: CARTOONISH RACISM
The Truth of The Matter
Most protests against the offensive cartoons were peaceful. So why the cries for freedom of speech? flickr user sgrah
TL Staff / Andrew Garib, Turn Left Link Every publication in the democratic western world—including Turn Left—abhors the violence, destruction and death wreaked across the Muslim world in response to Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoon controversy. But that’s only half the story.
The publications who published the racist filth (incendiary cartoons depicting Islam’s Prophet Muhammad as a hateful terrorist) and their mainstream apologists have done little to acknowledge the European Right’s growing antagonism towards immigrants from its former Muslim imperial possessions. Conservative racists have effectively hidden their agenda of painting Muslims as uncivilized savages unable to assimilate into a mostly White and Christian Europe behind the universal ideal of freedom of speech. But cartoon protests across Europe and North America have been largely peaceful, while unsurprisingly, violent protests have occurred in nations where respect for freedom of speech—among other democratic values—is rather underdeveloped. In the North Atlantic, the issue isn’t free speech at all. It’s a free-for-all of racist, anti-Islamic invective.
Everyone agrees that free speech must be protected and that less developed nations must learn to respect the rights of journalists, artists, and politicians to speak their minds. But free speech is not an excuse to belittle and insult the people of an entire religion. Shame on the race-baiting publications who print cartoons meant to divide and deride. But shame equally on mainstream publications across the democratic world echo the chant of free speech, playing into the hands of euroracists while ignoring the central story: intolerance and ignorance right at home.
No laws or behavior against free speech should ever be condoned. TL Staffers and like-minded principled progressives commit themselves to the true calling of journalism: The truth, and nothing but the truth. Unfortunately, the real story of the Danish cartoons isn’t one of free speech. Persistent and malignant racism in our western democratic societies is one truth that TL will not ignore. 
Published 06.03.03 02:00:00 -0500 GMT
Posted by Andrew Garib on 06.03.04 
Also On This Topic:
From The Editor’s Desk The Hard Truth About Fact-Checking The Back Burner: On Our Watch
Created: 05.12.04 