James Doolittle

For those of you who have been caught up in school work and haven’t had time to read some internet news, the world is going crazy over this infamous Mohamed (Muhammad, Mohamet, Muhammat, etc.) Cartoon (that I have yet to see, so if you have a link, please give it to me).  I was perusing the WorldPress.org headlines, and I came across “Danish Paper Rejected Jesus Cartoon“:

Muslims are expressing further disappointment with the Danish newspaper that published sacrilegious cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) after The Guardian of London reported that the same publication had earlier refused to run cartoons of the Prophet Jesus (peace be upon him) contending they could be offensive to readers.

The article hooked me by writing about how the same paper that published the Mohamed cartoon dismissed a Jesus cartoon on the grounds of it being offensive. Through further reading, I discovered the article’s headline to be a little bit misleading.  The editor refused publishing an article three years ago on the grounds that it would offend readers; however, the editor said that he asked for an illustrator to write a comic about Mohamed, and that the comic about Jesus was unsolicited, and that that’s the reason he didn’t publish it.
Because we’re living in a bubble in Japan–none of us students have the television or a newspaper subscription, and for the most part, we’re working constantly (or should be)–some of us might not know about the riots and deaths that are happening all over the world.  This article mentions some of the violence–crowds throwing stones at US Embassies and statements threatening those who will sully the name of the Prophet Mohamed.

For those of you who can recall your high school US History class, you’ll remember that the US only supports the first amendment so long as it does not “present a clear and present danger.”  The article quotes Bush as stating that, “With freedom comes the responsibility to be thoughtful about others.”  I guess I can’t really nail him for not knowing the constitutions and its ammendments for this particular quote, but why wouldn’t he just say that?  I mean, there was a Tom Clancy novel turned into a Harrison Ford movie with the amendment-line in it!

Oh well…  That’s what makes this world interesting, right?  Danish journalists who are too headstrong about their freedoms and the entire muslim world’s inability to accept the joke like everyone else wants it to do.