South Park Takes on MoToon

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A_Wanderer

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Great episode of South Park tackles the Mohammed Cartoon controversy, raises some good point about freedom of speech in the face of retrograde ideas
Cartman and Kyle are at war over the popular cartoon, “Family Guy.” Kyle loves “Family Guy” and hates Cartman. The two boys embark upon a mad chase across the country and the fate of “Family Guy” lies with the first boy to reach Hollywood.
link

:up:
 
i think it was hilarious last week. can't wait for part 2. it's great how they expose Family Guy's shitty humor. it's like the time....oh wait.....
 
I especially liked the defending free speech versus believing in free speech (with limits)

Muhammed_Persian_Icon.jpg


:shh:
 
Hmm, Trey Parker and Matt Stone were a bit sneaky in the way they incorporated this social issue into their episode. They didn't take into acocunt the context in which Mohummad was used in the media recently (cartoons). They seemed to only focus on the fact that Islams are angry because there is simply a mention of Mohummad. But the malicious context of the cartoons was ignored to make it more black and white.
 
I don't think the guy who actually drew the cartoon was completely innocent and shouldn't be treated as some sort of hero. The intent of the cartoon was malicious. I'm not saying he should have been censored. As an artist, I can't hack censorship. But also as an artist he should have considered the consequence of his work. I've done stuff I didn't think was appropriate for public viewing and I've decided not to show it. A picture of Mohammed with a bomb on his head bothers me. There's something unfair about it.
 
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Nothing at all unfair about it, Muslims kill umbelievers, unbelievers get to mock their so-called prophet.
 
It's not fair in the sense that not all Muslims are terrorists, and this cartoon perpetrated a Western stereotype. It's like the Crusades, something we Catholics are not particularly proud of. If all Muslims were terrorists, I wouldn't be getting ready to go to a Muslim country.
 
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I am not allowed to go to Saudi Arabia. Why should one respect a religion that is opposed to ones ideological existence?
 
The guy should have drawn a picture of Muhammed ibn Abd al-Wahhab with a bomb on his head, not Mohammed. Wahhab was the Sunni' nutcase who made the concept of jihad holy war, and is responsible for all the crud going on in Saudi Arabia today. I'm not allowed to go there either.
 
The Caliphate had expanded by both cultural and military conquest well before the 18th Century, jihad as holy war existed before then.
 
A_Wanderer said:
The Caliphate had expanded by both cultural and military conquest well before the 18th Century, jihad as holy war existed before then.

Yes. But this religious tradition also gave us Celaleddin Rumi, the great Turkish mystic and poet known by Muslims as the Mevlana, the founder of the Whirling Dervishes. I'm going to visit his tomb in Turkey. He's been called the Shakespeare of Islam. He was followed not only by Muslims but by Christians, Jews, and Zoroastrians because his message was universal love. He said "If you count the courtyards of all the buildings on which the sun shines there are hundreds of houses, but if you remove the walls all these pieces of light are one and the same". He never shed a drop of blood in his life. It was just about the last thing he wanted to do. The concept of jihad as holy war has been called "folk Islam".
 
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But one does not wipe out the other, humanist philosophers in Christian states do not undo the barbarism inflicted by religious zealotry, even though they were each a product of the underlying principles.
 
nbcrusader said:


Are you basing this conclusion on a statement of the artist or on the response to the cartoon?

The guy didn't talk to the press. But the picture was pretty damn hostile, and hostility and malice are first cousins.
 
A_Wanderer said:
But one does not wipe out the other, humanist philosophers in Christian states do not undo the barbarism inflicted by religious zealotry, even though they were each a product of the underlying principles.

Fair enough. We can't do anything about the Wahhabists or the Deobandis, the spiritual ancestors of the Taliban. The cartoon annoys me nonetheless. I don't have to like it.
 
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It's too late to edit my post, but I still don't consider the cartoon fair. It's unfair to every peaceful Muslim on the planet.
 
verte76 said:
It's unfair to every peaceful Muslim on the planet.

First I want to say that I think the continued publication of the cartoons was nothing more than agitation and we all could have done with some cultural sensitivity.

But I'm not really sure how it's unfair to every Muslim? If the implication is that Mohammed is a terrorist - so? Some people believe that, wrongly or rightly.

As a Christian, if somebody suggests that Jesus was a lunatic and didn't rise from the dead, I don't feel that's unfair to me. Say whatever you want, it doesn't affect my beliefs at all. Much of the Muslim response to the cartoons was completely over the top.
 
A_Wanderer said:
AKA the "if you can't hack the criticism then you truly deserve it" line of thinking

:up:

Can you say "I screwed up?" and "Where's my white flag?" Hell, I'm not normally this touchy if someone says "Fuck the Pope". I've been having a terrible time with Yahoo over my site and haven't been in a great mood. In fact, they've got me on hold right now. I wish I were a little more Internet savvy and could just move my damn site. I say "Fuck Yahoo!" I really don't like them at all. Geocities was great before Yahoo got hold of it. I'm really pissed off at Yahoo. To hell with the cartoon. I doubt if many Turks, especially, particularly minded the cartoon. Hell, alot of them keep wine cellars and don't mind criticizing certain aspects of Islam themselves. Many books very critical of the Wahhabists and other Islamic nutcases have been published in Istanbul. One of those writers even has a web site with his whole book on it. I don't have the URL handy, but I read it while I was researching Wahhabism.
 
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South Park makes fun of Jesus all the time. I laugh, I shrug it off, I move on....

It does not affect my beliefs.
 
anitram said:
As a Christian, if somebody suggests that Jesus was a lunatic and didn't rise from the dead, I don't feel that's unfair to me. Say whatever you want, it doesn't affect my beliefs at all. Much of the Muslim response to the cartoons was completely over the top.

I actually agree with you. I screwed up, and plead stress from my 24-hour hassle with Yahoo.
 
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Dreadsox said:
South Park makes fun of Jesus all the time. I laugh, I shrug it off, I move on....

It does not affect my beliefs.


It's different.

When they make fun of Jesus and things like that it's just thoughts that they make up.

When they made fun of Muhhammad they based themselves on the prejudice that all muslims are terrorists which in itself is based on recent terrorist events from a couple of muslims. That isn't fair and that is stereotyping. That's why it was off-color.

Sometimes I wonder if you're all just playing devil's advocate because you seem to willingly ignore the facts.
 
BrownEyedBoy said:

Sometimes I wonder if you're all just playing devil's advocate because you seem to willingly ignore the facts.

Fact is its a cartoon....and there are plenty of heinous cartoons and stereotypes put out there by arabs about Jews and Christians too. My panties are not in a bunch about it.

I will go back to ignoring the facts now, bathe in my ignorance, and continue to post my thoughts because clearly, that is what people with different opinions do.
 
BrownEyedBoy said:

It's different.

When they make fun of Jesus and things like that it's just thoughts that they make up.

When they made fun of Muhhammad they based themselves on the prejudice that all muslims are terrorists which in itself is based on recent terrorist events from a couple of muslims. That isn't fair and that is stereotyping. That's why it was off-color.

Sometimes I wonder if you're all just playing devil's advocate because you seem to willingly ignore the facts.
Well I feel stereotyped as being part of a monolithic evil of unbelief. So I might as well take that "negative" stereotype by the horns and embrace the evils of mocking the so-called prophets and enjoying those sins that don't violate the don't hurt people. It's a cartoon, just like the other MoToons - mocking religion is one of the greatest examples of free speech, it guarantees that the right to unbelief exists and I will practice that to my death, hopefully not a death caused by a believer who's faith is so weak it can't be threatened.

Generally the great thing about believers is how stupid they are, it works with quite a few Christians and there are plenty of Muslims on this UK forum that are good for a laugh. Stereotyped by their own words :lol:

You can also get people smart enough to rationalise the irrational, they are generally better because they won't be able to knock other beliefs without opening theirs up to attack, I have no problem if somebody wants to blast me for not having faith - it isn't something that one should be ashamed of and is much easier to defend than invisible friends.
 
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I felt as though the main theme of the show had more to do with Comedy Central not showing re-runs of the "Trapped in the Closet" episode with Tom Cruise and Scientology. Didn't Cruise threaten Paramount he wouldn't promote Mission Impossible: 3 if they aired the episode again?

The end of the episode said: "Will the cartoon be allowed to appear uncensored? Will Family Guy be destroyed??? Will television executives fight for free speech? Or will Comedy Central puss out? Tune in to see Part 2 of Family Guy, next week, on South Park!"
 
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