[Flipside]

I heard that being called a dickhead stops being insulting once you've been called a dickhead ten times. But that's not how humans work, now is it?

I heard being able to depict one of the most influential religious and historical figures of all time is the same thing as calling people dickheads.

Seriously, that's a completely **** comparison of behavior, reflecting absolutely none of what makes this discussion tick. You're better than that.

Hey stop using this post template you've picked up where it's [argument] [derisive personal attack] tia

This.

Oh so this.

[NGTM-1R]

@The E: Which ignores the point that, again, it's not really about childishness or whether or not this is insulting, but about the degree of response and the nature of what's being said.

If we were saying "Brigham Young is a jackass" then yes, that would be a case of someone being outright insulting. But we're not calling the Prophet a jackass. (Well, not most of us.) And also, Mormons wouldn't threaten to kill people over Brigham Young being called a jackass.

We are drawing pictures of someone who is a major religious, and more importantly a major historical, figure. You are proposing something equivalent to a ban on depictions of George Washington, or Lenin, or Kaiser Wilhem II, because simply depicting such a person is considered insulting. Now I don't think much of Willie either, probably a lot less than I think of the Prophet since the Prophet actually accomplished some admirable things, but that doesn't mean I'm automatically going to make any depiction of him demeaning. Nevertheless we should ban all depictions of him.

This is not a matter of being childishly insulted; it's an issue of attempting to assert control. The threats and actual instances of violence only make that more clear. The idea that the outrage is over insults when even the most flattering portrayal would draw the same sort of condemnations as the least flattering is extremely hard to sustain.

[General Battuta]

There's an interesting discussion to be had about this topic - a complex one on which my thoughts haven't settled - but this thread is not getting that job done.

sit back with muay thais

i think you mean mai tai

[NGTM-1R]

but this thread is not getting that job done.

Considering your habit of chastising threads in this manner, I have to ask if you feel it's A: actually going to accomplish something, and B: is somehow more effective than actually participating in an effort to steer the thread back on track whatever you regard "on track" to mean.

(Yes I'm veering wildly offtopic but then this habit has always bugged me.)

[General Battuta]

Yeah, I think it can accomplish something. We recently had a really good thread on a controversial topic, and it did require a fair bit of posting about posting. I agree that backseat moderating can be super annoying, but HLP's conversational dynamics are (by this point in our august history) so ossified and the moderators so ineffectual compared to other forums that I don't think the occasional kick will hurt.

I do think there's a very interesting core point here, one which cuts across feminism, civil rights, and every other sector of cultural policy. To what extent are the traditions of one group valuable when they constrain the freedoms of another? Would we be more responsive to demands to avoid depicting Mohammed if they weren't accompanied by insane violence and rioting? Would these demands be more worthy of consideration if they were presented via peaceful demonstration, mass sit-ins, letter writing, whatever?

There's a tricky entanglement here between the problematic methods used to defend the no-depiction cause, and the question of the fundamental worth of that cause. The prohibition against depicting Mohammed is arbitrary unless you subscribe to a subset of Muslim beliefs. How much do we value arbitrary prohibitions? Should they ever receive any consideration at all? Should that consideration be practical (depicting Mohammed could get people killed) or principled (we should consider the beliefs of others, even those we don't understand, and limit certain freedoms out of respect for them)?

I'm not totally sure where I stand.

e: it's really hard to have good effective debate anywhere, let alone on a modding forum, but I think the most valuable thing is to shoot for a conversational rather than antagonistic approach. Spending time restating the other side's points and exploring their implications like you're gently jerking each other off in a bathhouse lightly glazed in sweat but it's not gay no gay **** here is a lot more valuable than angry morally outraged rebuttals

[StarSlayer]

Well the fact that the typical response is fanatical calls for retribution and violence doesn't garner much in the way of sympathy, typically it strokes most folks' "**** you" button.  Acting in a progressive fashion would certainly get them a much better response in the West.  Take Israel/Palestine for example, the Palestinian position would be much more legitimate and would have made much greater gains for their people if they had been practicing civil disobedience all these years rather then blowing up shopping marts and shooting rockets.

[General Battuta]

Agreed. I think I see two obstacles to that kind of response. The first is cultural - there's just no institution of peaceful disobedience in place (correct me if I'm wrong). The second is strategic, and one I'm even less certain about: would that kind of peaceful protest be effective, whether in Palestine or in this case?

There's also a pretty significant difference between Palestine and here. I'd say the Palestinians definitely have an issue to stand on even when their methods are questionable, but I'm not convinced 'don't depict Mohammed, even in other cultures' is a petition that should ever be entertained.

[Ghostavo]

The prohibition against depicting Mohammed is arbitrary unless you subscribe to a subset of Muslim beliefs. How much do we value arbitrary prohibitions? Should they ever receive any consideration at all? Should that consideration be practical (depicting Mohammed could get people killed) or principled (we should consider the beliefs of others, even those we don't understand, and limit certain freedoms out of respect for them)?

To me, considering such prohibitions seems to be a kind of slippery slope. But hey, I'm a SWM, what do I know?



"I feel outraged when people depict pirates with a wooden leg! It makes me feel inadequate and pressures me into amputating my leg to meet expectations!"

"Arrr!"

RABLE RABLE RABLE...

[StarSlayer]

Agreed. I think I see two obstacles to that kind of response. The first is cultural - there's just no institution of peaceful disobedience in place (correct me if I'm wrong). The second is strategic, and one I'm even less certain about: would that kind of peaceful protest be effective, whether in Palestine or in this case?

There's also a pretty significant difference between Palestine and here. I'd say the Palestinians definitely have an issue to stand on even when their methods are questionable, but I'm not convinced 'don't depict Mohammed, even in other cultures' is a petition that should ever be entertained.

I think in both cases it would stimulate much better results then what they currently receive.  Our response to depicting the Prophet if they had voiced there discontent in a peaceful manner would be much less knee jerk.  As for Israel I think it would pretty much negate the IDF's big tan kill power.  Running over a bunch of peaceful protesters with a Merkava won't make good copy with the rest of the world.

[Spoon]

Well the fact that the typical response is fanatical calls for retribution and violence doesn't garner much in the way of sympathy, typically it strokes most folks' "**** you" button.  Acting in a progressive fashion would certainly get them a much better response in the West.  Take Israel/Palestine for example, the Palestinian position would be much more legitimate and would have made much greater gains for their people if they had been practicing civil disobedience all these years rather then blowing up shopping marts and shooting rockets.

Agreed.

However, I must ask: How is all that protesting working out for say, Tibet? 

[StarSlayer]

Well the fact that the typical response is fanatical calls for retribution and violence doesn't garner much in the way of sympathy, typically it strokes most folks' "**** you" button.  Acting in a progressive fashion would certainly get them a much better response in the West.  Take Israel/Palestine for example, the Palestinian position would be much more legitimate and would have made much greater gains for their people if they had been practicing civil disobedience all these years rather then blowing up shopping marts and shooting rockets.

Agreed.

However, I must ask: How is all that protesting working out for say, Tibet? 

The rest of the world isn't financed by Israel? 

[LordPomposity]

Well the fact that the typical response is fanatical calls for retribution and violence doesn't garner much in the way of sympathy, typically it strokes most folks' "**** you" button.  Acting in a progressive fashion would certainly get them a much better response in the West.  Take Israel/Palestine for example, the Palestinian position would be much more legitimate and would have made much greater gains for their people if they had been practicing civil disobedience all these years rather then blowing up shopping marts and shooting rockets.

Agreed.

However, I must ask: How is all that protesting working out for say, Tibet? 

About as well as all that blowing stuff up is working for Palestine.

[NGTM-1R]

There are degrees to which nonviolent protest works. Israel is a modern country with a free press and no real tradition of longterm censorship. It might, however, have a racial divide that can be exploited...but only to a point. In the end the religion/racial thing will still work against them.

The classic success of nonviolence is India and it's instructive to consider who they succeeded against, and what they did when someone else threatened to take over. You can use nonviolence against the British because they regard themselves as moral people and there are lengths to which they are not prepared to go. Most of the Indian independence movement was more than happy to support the Brits during World War 2, however, because they perceived correctly that Imperial Japan would not be swayed by such tactics.

So it is with Israel; the explicitly Jewish state can justify the use of any and all means so long as you continue to threaten their existence, but in being explicitly Jewish they carry with them certain morals about not slaughtering the innocent and soforth.

China has manifest destiny issues with Tibet, a long tradition of censorship, racial divides that they will gleefully exploit, and long struggle with the concept of morality in government being a good thing.

[karajorma]

However, I must ask: How is all that protesting working out for say, Tibet? 

You mean the rather violent riots where they beat up immigrants and set buildings on fire?

[AtomicClucker]

I think it shouldn't be without any surprise that I support Battuta's take on the point of this thread. Depictions of Muhammed and freedom of expression are one thing, but I'm calling out Draw Mohamed Day on the entire methodology behind it. My biased opinion is that it falls into another pointless troll-a-thon, rather forming a concrete protest of a more concrete issue, like the problem of literal wage slaves used in the Persian Gulf countries.

Think of it as "I cast magic missile and attack the darkness!"

Attempting to attack such a large and amorphous blob doesn't really net any positive gains except Lulz and Derps.

[Aardwolf]

But I like Lulz and Derps 

[stinkyFeet]

I think it's pretty juvenile to try and prevent people from making fun of you. It's something you learn when you grow up. Personally, I think most children figure it out when they find out that it mostly eggs people on. Looking at Arabs as culturally underdeveloped, wouldn't this be the best way for them to learn it? It's the same way everybody else has learned it.

I think the question will be whether or not the reasonable arabs see it as hateful or merely a reaction to a bunch of radicals. How will the trolling be presented to them? Personally, I found most of the pictures to be amusing.

[Scotty]

Go into a bar of any kind and call everyone inside a mother ****ing faggot.  Odds are significantly better than even that they'll prevent you from doing it very quickly and very violently.  Does that make the reaction that of radical funadmentalists?  **** no, it makes you a flaming idiot.

There are any one of a thousand other things you could better be spending your time on to "help Arabs learn that they're culturally underdeveloped".

[666maslo666]

Trolling is just harassment filtered through the internet. Trolling someone, as you so rightly said, is a dickish thing to do, so why not follow Wheatons' Law and not do it when you know that the vast majority of people you are trolling is moderate and thus will only be radicalized by said trolling?

I heard that being called a dickhead stops being insulting once you've been called a dickhead ten times. But that's not how humans work, now is it?

It is not harassment when 1) it happens through the Internet (because you can usually block the harasser) 2) if you attack an idea instead of a person. (otherwise  a political cartoon insulting democrats is a harassment, there is no difference between religion and politics, both are ideologies)

And yes, desensitisation does work. If you are called a dickhead once, you may react violently. If you are called a dickhead ten times, then you probably wont bother anymore.

[Sandwich]

Go into a bar of any kind and call everyone inside a mother ****ing faggot.

Returning to the root of this entire issue, drawing a political cartoon is hardly equivalent of cursing someone to their face.