Oh, those wacky Islamists

A courageous blogger has put those accursed dozen Danish images—which apparently represent the greatest evil done to humanity in the last hundred years—on her site. Indulge your freedom of expression (that which we have left, until Bush and/or the Mullahs take it away for good) and view them:
http://face-of-muhammed.blogspot.com/

Last night on Auntie Beeb, some Muslim fundamentalist, almost perceptibly foaming at the mouth, insisted the Danish editors in question be turned over to a Sharia court where they would be (as he repeatedly said) condemned to death.

I have only one thing to say about this entire fracas, to wit:

The tender sensibilities of Islamic fundies—which I aver arise from a shaky faith in their own faith—must never be insulted or derided. They, however, may insult, deride, threaten and murder anyone they please. Especially Jews. (The Holocaust is a joke or a hoax, and Israel must be nuked off the map, but the depiction of the prophet really really hurts.) That, apparently, is the path to righteousness. We in the West must bow down in obescience to their every religious tenet, but never the reverse. I believe this is called hypocrisy—a far greater sin in my book than mocking Muhammad.
http://cartoonbox.slate.com/hottopic/?image=7&topicid=71

I'm not Muslim. I'm not Jewish. I'm not Christian. I don't give a good goddamn whose saints, prophets, popes or imams get caricatured in the press. Nor do I cede the right to not believe as any of them believe. You may not force me to bow to your god (or prophet or pope or imam).

I am insulted every day—by ugliness, ignorance, intolerance, class hatred, multinational capitalism, homophobia, anti-intellectualism, philistinism, sexism, deism and Wal-Mart. Who attends to my wounds? No one. I apply to no one, I petition no one. As Ennis del Mar says in Annie Proulx’s Brokeback Mountain: If you can’t change it you gotta stand it. I stand it. I change what I can, and I stand the rest.

Go thou, o self-righteous ones, and do likewise.