Michelle Malkin’s “First They Came” Video
I really haven’t wanted to comment on the Danish-Muslim cartoon controversy, because the points are totally obvious to anyone who loves freedom (Update — I just learned this afternoon that “progressives” are now calling the word “Freedom” the “F-bomb.” So I guess this 1960s anthem has about 18 “F-bombs” in it.).
Fortunately, Michelle Malkin has done a two-minute video that makes the points better than any post could.
You can view the video or download it at her site. Go there first.
In case the traffic at Michelle’s site goes bonkers, which could very well happen, I have copied the vid (WMV format) so you can view or download it HERE.
(Update: Thanks to Michelle for the mirror link to this post).
And here’s my token contribution to freedom of expression (HT Courageous Conservatism):
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UPDATE: My dream Presidential ticket: Malkin for President, Anchoress as VP, with Atlas Shrugs as Secretary of State.
Atlas points out, thanks to e-mailer Tom (not me), that three of the cartoons used to incite the Muslim outrage were never published anywhere. Two media items relating to the extra cartoons are here and here (HT Mark in Mexico). Also (added Feb. 5), The Counterterrorism Blog exposes a double-talking Danish imam, and the UK Telegraph’s Charles Moore wonders how so many Danish flags can be at the ready for burning.
UPDATE 2: Right Wing Nut House has a great post on the difference between what the State Department really said, how the WORMs (Worn-Out Reactionary Media, known to most as The Mainstream Media) are (mis)reporting it, and the tactics used to create the misreportage.
UPDATE 3, Feb. 5: Mark Steyn, of course, totally gets it:
Jyllands-Posten (the Danish newspapers that printed the cartoons) wasn’t being offensive for the sake of it. They had a serious point ….. The cartoons accompanied a piece about the dangers of “self-censorship” — i.e., a climate in which there’s no explicit law forbidding you from addressing the more, er, lively aspects of Islam but nonetheless everyone feels it’s better not to.
That’s the question the Danish newspaper was testing: the weakness of free societies in the face of intimidation by militant Islam.
One day, years from now, as archaeologists sift through the ruins of an ancient civilization for clues to its downfall, they’ll marvel at how easy it all was. You don’t need to fly jets into skyscrapers and kill thousands of people. As a matter of fact, that’s a bad strategy, because even the wimpiest state will feel obliged to respond. But if you frame the issue in terms of multicultural “sensitivity,” the wimp state will bend over backward to give you everything you want — including, eventually, the keys to those skyscrapers. Thus, Jack Straw, the British foreign secretary, hailed the “sensitivity” of Fleet Street in not reprinting the offending cartoons.
No doubt he’s similarly impressed by the “sensitivity” of Anne Owers, Her Majesty’s Chief Inspector of Prisons, for prohibiting the flying of the English national flag in English prisons on the grounds that it shows the cross of St. George, which was used by the Crusaders and thus is offensive to Muslims. And no doubt he’s impressed by the “sensitivity” of Burger King, which withdrew its ice cream cones from its British menus because Rashad Akhtar of High Wycombe complained that the creamy swirl shown on the lid looked like the word “Allah” in Arabic script. I don’t know which sura in the Koran says don’t forget, folks, it’s not just physical representations of God or the Prophet but also chocolate ice cream squiggly representations of the name, but ixnay on both just to be “sensitive.”
And doubtless the British foreign secretary also appreciates the “sensitivity” of the owner of France-Soir, who fired his editor for republishing the Danish cartoons. And the “sensitivity” of the Dutch film director Albert Ter Heerdt, who canceled the sequel to his hit multicultural comedy ”Shouf Shouf Habibi!” on the grounds that “I don’t want a knife in my chest” — which is what happened to the last Dutch film director to make a movie about Islam: Theo van Gogh, on whose ”right to dissent” all those Hollywood blowhards are strangely silent. Perhaps they’re just being “sensitive,” too.
And perhaps the British foreign secretary also admires the “sensitivity” of those Dutch public figures who once spoke out against the intimidatory aspects of Islam and have now opted for diplomatic silence and life under 24-hour armed guard. And maybe he even admires the “sensitivity” of the increasing numbers of Dutch people who dislike the pervasive fear and tension in certain parts of the Netherlands and so have emigrated to Canada and New Zealand.
Very few societies are genuinely multicultural. Most are bicultural: On the one hand, there are folks who are black, white, gay, straight, pre-op transsexual, Catholic, Protestant, Buddhist, worshippers of global-warming doom-mongers, and they rub along as best they can. And on the other hand are folks who do not accept the give-and-take, the rough-and-tumble of a “diverse” “tolerant” society, and, when one gently raises the matter of their intolerance, they threaten to kill you, which makes the question somewhat moot.
One day the British foreign secretary will wake up and discover that, in practice, there’s very little difference between living under Exquisitely Refined Multicultural Sensitivity and Sharia. As a famously sensitive Dane once put it, “To be or not to be, that is the question.”
What really started the Muslim anti-cartoon rampage
As reported many places over the past few days, most recently here, there is a lot more to this Muhammed cartoon row than meets the eye. When Danish Imams who originally protested the cartoons could not drum up enough of the appropriate outrage and v…
Trackback by Mark in Mexico — February 4, 2006 @ 4:19 pm
The reason behind the timing of the Islamic outrage is obvious.
Bin Laden and Zawahirri both calling for escalation I believe may be a part of it as well.
Big picture, Iran last big push forthe finish line to make a N-bomb. Raise the noise level and intimidate the west so that an assembled weapon can be completed and delivered to terror cells.
Could their penchent of consiperacy plots be wearing off on me, or is the pattern just coming together for me. Lets just hope that I’ve been drinking to much of the coolaid from the liberal sites I’ve been reading for laughs.
Comment by Bill Cismar — February 4, 2006 @ 5:47 pm
Michelle Malkin totally ROCKS!!! From another woman of Philippine heritage, and proud to be an American Conservative, You just can’t get any clearer than that video!
I love Michelle’s work and am looking forward to seeing more of it. Thank God for blogs like Michelle’s and these to keep us in the loop.
Jeannie
http://www.ijeannie.com
Comment by Jeannie — February 4, 2006 @ 6:38 pm
#2, it’s a stretch, but not an inconceivable one, given that the outrage was drummed up, as noted by Atlas and the UK press.
Comment by TBlumer — February 4, 2006 @ 8:12 pm
Go to http://www.petitionspot.com/petitions/freespeech1 to sign a petition in support of Denmark.
Comment by Holger — February 5, 2006 @ 11:08 am
#5, Done.
Comment by TBlumer — February 5, 2006 @ 12:06 pm
Ahem, Not that I told you so, just I thought so too.
Bill’s Link
Comment by Bill Cismar — February 6, 2006 @ 1:39 pm
#7, I had to create a link for your URL so it wouldn’t mess up the page.
You deserve the self-pat for coming up with the tie-ins early Friday afternoon.
#2’s theory isn’t tied to the EU’s immediate decisions on Iran, but either way, the orchestration that has become so obvious is deeply troubling, as is the lack of media curiosity about the time lag and the orchestration.
Comment by TBlumer — February 6, 2006 @ 1:46 pm
Well that was a stupid little clip.
First of all Pim Fortuyn’s murder had nothing to do with islam. “They” didn’t kill him, Volkert van der Graaf (a lone Dutch extreme environmentalist with no ties to islam or muslims whatsoever), murdered him to “procect the weaker in the society”. With that he meant the disabled, people who are on welfare, muslims, asylum seekers and such.
But wait, he mentioned muslims, let’s blame the murder on them! Those images of his bloody corpse sure worked in that clip!
Secondly I don’t like the way it’s trying to scare us of “them”, without actually telling us who “they” are. I get the impression that by “they” she means all muslims, and that just pissed me off.
Comment by RJ — February 9, 2006 @ 6:52 am
#9, from BBC, 11/23/02:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2506253.stm
Mr Fortuyn’s brother, Marten, told the Dutch news agency ANP he was not surprised by the confession but felt irritated by Mr van der Graaf’s presentation of himself as “the saviour of the nation”.
The fact is that he did what radical Muslims do when someone says something they don’t like — he killed. No, Muslims didn’t do it. The headline didn’t say a Muslim did.
“They” are anyone with a radical thought process (yes, mostly radical Muslims, hopefully not more than a minority) that concludes that a person offends their sensibilities must be killed for the slightest “offense” — like drawing a bleeping cartoon. “They” are the people who carried out the attacks and murders identified in the vid. The more we allow “them” to carry out their bloody deeds and poison the well of civil society, the more of “them” there will be, as it becomes more clear that the tactic works to intimidate and silence opposition.
To believe that the majority of Muslims really oppose what is happening in the name of their religion, we have to believe that, with rare exception, they (the moderates) have already been intimidated into silence. I do, but they do the world no favors by remaining intimidated.
Comment by TBlumer — February 9, 2006 @ 10:47 am