This Year's Valentines Go To....
Denmark, for reminding us all that the most threatening thing in the world is freedom of speech.
That tiny country is really taking it in the shorts, not only with rent-a-mobs going batshiat crazy in all of the usual Islamic "centers of learning and explosives", but also from their partners in the European Union who aren't backing them up like they should.
Our State Department isn't backing them up either. Big shocker there.
And, of course, our media conglomerations are showing that they have no damn spine. I'm disgusted with them, frankly. The Fisrt Amendment? That only applies when they are sure their targets are going to act civilized (CIA, evangelicals and Catholics annoyed by "Piss Christ"), not the ones who might hurt them (crazed guys in turbans calling for beheading of infidels). In the second case, they do the journalistic equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome.
Apparently taking a page from the old Pravda stylebook, they feel that telling us the cartoons are offensive is enough. We aren't mature enough to look at them and make up our own damn minds if they are or not. After all, they have degrees in journalism and are much smarter than we are.
(Side note: I remember when I went to Arizona State. It seemed like the ugly communications school students went into journalism. The ugly ones with decent voices sometimes chose radio. The cute ones went into television. But none of them were towering intellects. I know. I started out as a communication major, but found myself wanting classes with actual intellectual vigor and not discussions of mind-melding a la Spock or dusty old theories of Marshall McLuhan. Heaven help me, I was engaged to another communications major at one time....but my tastes improved with wisdom, age....and exposure to the real world outside of school.)
Since I still have to get better at HTML, here's the offending cartoons. I trust you to make up your own minds about them.
Another Valentine goes to Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
For those of you not familiar with her, she is a Somali refugee turned Dutch legislator who has been an outspoken critic of Islamic extremism. She collaborated with the filmmaker Theo van Gogh on a movie called "Submission". The movie offended some Moroccans in Holland, and Mr van Gogh paid for this "offense" with his life. Ms Ali was forced to go into hiding after similar threats were made against her.
To her credit, she has shown that she will not be silenced even in the face of personal danger. This editorial by Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a prime example.
A third Valentine goes to a blogger by the alias of "Big Pharoah". If some of his co-religionists got their panties in a bunch over those cartoons, they sure aren't going to like what he wrote here.
They are my heroes on this Valentine's Day.
I'm going to go get a tin of Danish butter cookies and salute them all.
That tiny country is really taking it in the shorts, not only with rent-a-mobs going batshiat crazy in all of the usual Islamic "centers of learning and explosives", but also from their partners in the European Union who aren't backing them up like they should.
Our State Department isn't backing them up either. Big shocker there.
And, of course, our media conglomerations are showing that they have no damn spine. I'm disgusted with them, frankly. The Fisrt Amendment? That only applies when they are sure their targets are going to act civilized (CIA, evangelicals and Catholics annoyed by "Piss Christ"), not the ones who might hurt them (crazed guys in turbans calling for beheading of infidels). In the second case, they do the journalistic equivalent of Stockholm Syndrome.
Apparently taking a page from the old Pravda stylebook, they feel that telling us the cartoons are offensive is enough. We aren't mature enough to look at them and make up our own damn minds if they are or not. After all, they have degrees in journalism and are much smarter than we are.
(Side note: I remember when I went to Arizona State. It seemed like the ugly communications school students went into journalism. The ugly ones with decent voices sometimes chose radio. The cute ones went into television. But none of them were towering intellects. I know. I started out as a communication major, but found myself wanting classes with actual intellectual vigor and not discussions of mind-melding a la Spock or dusty old theories of Marshall McLuhan. Heaven help me, I was engaged to another communications major at one time....but my tastes improved with wisdom, age....and exposure to the real world outside of school.)
Since I still have to get better at HTML, here's the offending cartoons. I trust you to make up your own minds about them.
Another Valentine goes to Ayaan Hirsi Ali.
For those of you not familiar with her, she is a Somali refugee turned Dutch legislator who has been an outspoken critic of Islamic extremism. She collaborated with the filmmaker Theo van Gogh on a movie called "Submission". The movie offended some Moroccans in Holland, and Mr van Gogh paid for this "offense" with his life. Ms Ali was forced to go into hiding after similar threats were made against her.
To her credit, she has shown that she will not be silenced even in the face of personal danger. This editorial by Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a prime example.
A third Valentine goes to a blogger by the alias of "Big Pharoah". If some of his co-religionists got their panties in a bunch over those cartoons, they sure aren't going to like what he wrote here.
They are my heroes on this Valentine's Day.
I'm going to go get a tin of Danish butter cookies and salute them all.
posted by KoryO @ 9:40 AM
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