Mia Doornaert: "Europe going wobbly"

A reader sent me the following editorial column by Mia Doornaert from Belgian weekly De Standaard (in Dutch, paid subscribers only). Here is my translation:

Bravo, Charlie-Hebdo. The cartoon on its cover this week says it all. A distraught Muhammad covers his eyes and says: c'est dur d'être aimé par des cons [French for "it's hard on me to be loved by arseholes"]. The witty cartoon is actually rather flattering for Islam. It shows that foaming-at-the-mouth fanatics that torch European embassies are not the most representative elements of said religion.

We hear these "angry muslims" protest day after day against "Danish cartoons". Yeah, right. Jyllands Posten is no doubt one of the most read newspapers in the Muslim world. That the cartoons already appeared last September 25 does not matter. Good for the demonstrators that only after months of deliberation they burst out in spontaneous rage.

And of course this rage is our fault. The lands where demonstrations are being held are sooooo much better at the "dialogue between cultures". And if they leave an occasional "beauty flaw", well, the Middle East has oil and thus one might look the other way sometimes.

THe Europeans started getting wobbly as soon as demonstrators threw the first stones. EU-Commissioner Franco Frattini set the tone for, by now, pretty much all EU-leaders. Of course he's in favor of freedom of press. But the press has to be cautious. Cartoons that run afoul of religious taboos "do no service to the dialogue between cultures". We never hear this concern about "needless provocation" concerning mockery and blasphemy against Jesus, the Pope, or his Church. Or about hurtful sexist "humor".

The message is clear. Whoever does not strike back is fair game for mockery. Whoever retorts violently gets a pass. The capitulation of the spirits is already far-reaching. Progressives warn against islamophobia: "like antisemitism is shocking to us, cartoons about the Prophet are shocking to Muslims".

This comparison is obscene. Antisemitism is racism. Jews were murdered off for what they were, not what they believed. Objecting against the presence of people bceause they belong to the wrong "race" is racism. Debating their convictions is democracy. Islam is just as little a "race" as Xianity. Whoever wants to live in a free society has to put up with [Dutch idiom meaning: "the rough-and-tumble of debate"]. Or should we now expunge all passages from Voltaire that poke fun at Mahomet [sic] and only keep his mockery of Xianity?

Wake up, Mr. Frattini. What we see now is precisely a "dialogue between cultures". It is the confrontation between a culture grounded in the principles of the Enlightenment and one that abominates them.

Pretending that the latter is "the Islam", now that is insulting to Muslims. Europe should support the many moderates in Muslim world, rather than pandering to the extremists. The totalitarian version of Islam does not seek a dialogue [with us], but [our] capitulation

In this regard Great Britain seems already past the "point of no return" [English expression in original]. Recently, entertainers had to mobilize to prevent the extension of anti-racism laws to religions. Last summer, the London Tate Gallery dropped a piece by John Latham from an exhibition: sort-of a thick plate of glass in which texts from the Bible, the Gospels, and the Koran were embedded. The latter was enough for this self-censorship. There just had been bloody attacks in London, so you never knew. It also speaks volumes that no British newspaper published the Danish cartoons. Only those who do not know the [British] tabloids could ascribe this to good taste and tolerance.

"In the land of Voltaire and Zola, certain principles shall not be compromised" said the editor-in-chief of Charlie-Hebdo, this week. One might have hoped this would have been the position of the European Union.

But the EU leaves the PM of a member state standing alone in the breach, and this is shocking. For not PM Rasmussen is refusing the "dialogue between cultures". Danish imams did. They want to enjoy the benefits of freedom of expression but cannot accept that a democratic government does not rein in its press. And thus they started inciting the Muslim world against the land that granted them hospitality.

Our PM, who is such a staunch defender of the separation between church and state when it concern the "papists", has not even sent a message of support to his Danish colleague.

Europe goes on being mired in appeasement [English word in original]. It should have learned by now that a totalitarian monster cannot be placated. The more you feed it, the bolder it becomes.

Comments

[Richard M]

While much of what you say is true and I entirely support freedom of speech, your disdain for the EU is more than a little disingenuous. There have been messages of support within Europe, only you choose not to quote them.

The United States press hasn’t printed the cartoons either, and the US political establishment is at least as silent as its European counterparts. Indeed the Bush administration has also called for sensitivity and avoiding offence. As regards the cartoons themselves, you have to admit they are in pretty poor taste, as most material of this nature is.

[urine detox]

y Mia Doornaert from Belgian weekly De Standaard (in Dutch, paid subscribers only). Here is my translation:

Bravo, Charlie-Hebdo. The cartoon on its cover this week says it all. A distraught Muhammad covers his eyes and says: c'est dur d'être aimé par des cons [French for "it's