Yick...the "Caricature Riots" in Damascus and Beirut; Inside the Mind of a Killer

[liz_marcs]

Still feelling craptastic, although I dragged my butt into work today because...yeah. I'm stupid. That and I'm just well enough to be going out of my skull from boredom.

I may post another part tonight for Facing the Heart in Darkness. Or I may just crawl directly into bed. Depends on how sucky I feel.

I do apologize for the delay, but this stomach bug sucks.

Anyway, I've been seeing some discussion about the Danish Charicature Riots, especially among the Europeans on my FList. As I've been in and out of it pretty much for the past five days, I haven't really gotten involved in the discussion nor have I been able to really think clearly about it.

I did, however, find a very good write up about what happened this past weekend.

Juan Cole, a professor of history at the University of Michigan who specializes in Middle Eastern Studies has the best, most balanced, and most level-headed take on the caricatures that riled the Muslim world that is very much worth reading.

Sample quote:

I want to underline that few places in the Muslim world have seen violence over the caricatures, so far mainly Damascus and Beirut (which are unexpected in this regard.) Protests in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, Egypt, and elsewhere have been nonviolent. This is not to play down the seriousness of what happened in Damascus and Beirut over the weekend — acts which can only inspire horror and condemnation — only to set it in context. There are 1.5 billion Muslims. A lot of Muslim countries saw no protests at all. In some places, as in Pakistan, they were anemic. The caricature protests are resonating with local politics and anti-imperialism in ways distinctive to each Muslim country. The protests therefore are probably not mostly purely about religion.

I really recommend that you read the whole thing...


ETA: A Sign of the Times...
via Atrios

Freaky-ness.

Once upon a time, you'd have to search someone's bedroom and find the diary when you had people like Jacob D. Robida, the New Bedford 18-year-old who attacked patrons in a New Bedford gay bar with a hatchet and a gun and then subsequently died in a shootout with police in Arkansas.

Now, you can always read Robida's My Space page to get a look inside the mind of a killer.

Anyone else just a little creeped out by this? Or is it just me?

Comments

[liz-marcs.livejournal.com]

*raises hand*

For the record, I think this is a case where both sides are in the wrong. And I certainly am not one to say that some countries in the Arab world has hands clean or any right to talk.

But as they say: two wrongs don't make a right.

What Juan Cole is pointing out is that it seems to him that the riots:

1) Are being hyped in the Western press. The reality is that the vast majority of Islamic countries honestly could care less about the controversy and there is absolutely nothing and no reaction, beyond maybe an overheated editorial or two, assuming the local population even cares or knows about the controversy at all.

2) In countries where there are some protests, the vast majority of those protests are anemic at best.

3) In countries where violence has occured (which, at last count, amounted to two) or in countries where the protests actually drew a crowd (Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Iran, Egypt), there were other factors that came into play that had absolutely zero to do with religion and far more to do with politics.

I happen to think he's right on all counts. I definitely think there was something a little more to the Mohammed cartoons than I've read. I also definitely think there's a hell of a lot more to the riots than just "religion" no matter how much the local authorities claim that's the motivation. Bullshit on that, I say.

As for why "other" Muslim countries don't condemn. There was a newspaper in Jordan that most certainly did.

But I think we tend to forget is that there are many Muslim countries that stay very, very far away from the Arab-Israeli pissing match. I don't believe many Muslim countries in Southeast Asia, for example, much care. Your more laidback Muslim African nations don't get too excited about the whole thing, either. Why should these nations be held responsible for Shitheads in Beirut? It's sort of like making Canada apologize everytime the United States pulls a dick move on the world stage.

[sneaker328.livejournal.com]

I understand your point, and I do agree with it. I don't think one Islamic country should have to apologize for another; but I do feel that if this is not the stance of all Muslims (which I don't believe it is), then Muslim leaders (not necessarily by country, but clerics) should be making a bigger noise about condemning the violence and making it clear that it is not approved of. I also think there is often a knee-jerk reaction from many people to brush off these extreme reactions and make excuses for it. The fact that Denmark and other European countries have asked their citizens to leave many Islamic countries for fear of their safety is insane and horrifying.

The editor of the Jordanian paper who condemned the violence has been fired and jailed.

[liz-marcs.livejournal.com]

I plead illness for not knowing what happened with the editor in Jordan.

Juan Cole (if you read what he wrote) has a selection of Muslim religious leaders who have come out and condemned the violence.

Sunni religious leaders in Beirut did attempt to stop the crowd from engaging in violence but (surprise, surprise) were drowned out by the hotheads and gunfire from government forces.

Syria's Grand Mufti (the country's chief authority on Islamic law) outright condemned the violence and said rioters hurt their own cause and the country as a result of their actions.

Not surprising Afganistan called for calm and there were protests pretty much confined to one town. In Pakistan there was a call for protests, but the local population fell into the "don't care" category. Iran has done practically zip one way or the other (again, another population that just doesn't care).

What I'm trying to say is, there have been Middle Eastern Muslim voices raised in protest and evidence that the outrage is nowhere near as overwhelming as the U.S. and European press has been playing it. That is a completely different thing than brushing it off (which I most certainly am not; what is happening is horrifying). All I'm saying is that we do need to step back, do a reality check, and not just think about what is happening, but why it's happening.

Maybe a slightly different and off-kilter way to look at it, but, as I said, I think there's a hell of a lot more at play here than an argument over a bunch of cartoons and freedom of the press.

I'm also not terribly convinced that we'd even read/hear it in the press if, say, Muslim religious leaders in say, Indonesia, came out and condemned the riots, just like we didn't hear their statement of condemnation against suicide bombers that target civilians back in December as "contrary to the teachings of Islam."

[sneaker328.livejournal.com]

That's true. I do thank you for bringing to my attention the fact that many have tried to condemn the violence. And I never meant to imply that I thought you were someone who was brushing it off- I was speaking in more general terms there.

[liz-marcs.livejournal.com]

I know this is an issue that seems to inflamed people on both sides of the debate and I know that anything Middle East will touch of firestorm no matter what, so no worries.