"O Mankind, We created you from a single pair of a male and a female and made you into nations and tribes, that you may know each other (not that you may despise each other). Verily the most honored of you in the sight of God is he who is the most righteous of you"
— Quran 49:13
“In the developed countries there is a poverty of intimacy, a poverty of spirit, of loneliness, of lack of love. There is no greater sickness in the world today than that one."
— Mother Teresa
The malicious, false depiction of Prophet, Muhammad (P), in defamatory cartoons published in Denmark’s Jylland-Posten then deliberately re-published in other European papers can only be understood as a renaissance of the Inquisition. Such defamation of the Prophet must be met with a civil lawsuit. A civil lawsuit squarely meets the legal requirement under Denmark’s and Europe’s “Defamatory Law.” The basic idea of defamation law is simple. It’s an attempt to balance the private right to protect one’s reputation with the public right to freedom of speech.
According to the American and English Encyclopedia of Law, a libel is a malicious defamation expressed either by writing or printing or by signs, pictures, effigies or the like; tending to blacken the memory of one who is dead, or to impeach the honesty, integrity, virtue or reputation.
In Denmark, defamation provisions exist in the criminal code, dividing libel into two categories; “accusations” and “offensive words or conduct”. The latter category is not subject to proof of truth. Both types of criminal defamation require malicious intent. [1]
Under the Danish Constitution, Freedom of Expression is found under section 77. It states:
"Any person shall be at liberty to publish his ideas in print, in writing, and in speech, subject to being held responsible in a court of law”.
Under the Responsibility of Media Act (Act no. 348 of June 6, 1991), the author, publisher, and editors are responsible for their actions under the law. AND:
“While carrying out their tasks mass-media should recognize the need to take the individual citizens rights to personal integrity into account and recognize the need of non-infringement without due course”.
The updated Media Liability Act of1992 includes sections on Press Ethics entitled: “The National code of Conduct:” adopted by the Danish Parliament. The rules comprise all editorial materials (text and picture) published in the written periodical press…(that) comprise persons mentioned and depicted; including deceased persons…The Code requires that the press publish factual information, especially if susceptible to personal bias or tortuous intention which may be prejudicial or insulting to others.
Additionally, the Danish Penal Code: Section 266b States:
"Any person who publicly or with the intention of dissemination to a wide circle of people makes a statement or imparts other information threatening, insulting, or degrading a group of persons on account of their race, color, or national or ethnic origin, belief" or sexual orientation shall be liable to a fine or imprisonment for a term not exceeding two years."
According to the European Monitoring Centre on Racism and Xenophobia (EUMC):
"The terms "statement or other information" should be interpreted broadly. They cover both oral and written expressions, pictures, "CARICATURES".
For thirteen centuries Europe has never fathomed Islam and has defamed the moral character of its Messenger Muhammad (pbuh)–9/11 was the cataclysmic excuse to re-launch the Inquisition against Muslims– “convert to our civilized aspiritual secularism where “sacredness” is dead or reap the political, economic, media, and military onslaught. If “God is Dead” in our society, so must your faith be killed.”
Indeed the only freedom of speech left in the west is bashing Islam otherwise it does have its limits. In Europe you can be prosecuted for questioning the extant of the Holocaust or criticizing Israel’s policy given western indoctrination that such “freedom” is Anti-Semitic.” Israel and its bloody history is now the “Holy Grail” for the civilized west, the champions of human rights.
Being civilized begins with education and manifests in rational behavior. The rampant ignorance of Islam in Europe leads to an irrational fear and thus prejudice. Descartes would turn in his grave if he knows that his motto has been transformed into “I don’t think, therefore I’m civilized.”
Prophetically the famed Danish Philosopher Soren Kierkegaard (1813-1855) described the misuse of freedom of speech as:
“People demand freedom of speech to make up for the freedom of thought which they avoid.”
Freedom of Speech is selectively determined by governments, corporate medias who decide what’s seen and heard by the masses, the military-industrial complex, and corrupt politicians beholden to special interest money. Recently, freedom of lying speech allowed the powerful few Neocons, mostly Jewish, to influence the invasion of Iraq to secure Oil and Israel’s interests. America’s occupation of MidEast oil will prevent the rise of competitive powers and manipulate the economies of Europe, India, and China As William Hearst, the American media baron, declared to his reporters prior to the Spanish-American war: “you provide the pictures, I’ll provide the war.’ The “free” media has become the dumbed down “Delphi Oracle” of knowledge, opinions, and policies for the western masses.
In western history, God is the instrument for war, colonization, slavery, genocide and the Holocaust. Pope Urban II, Hitler, Theodore Herzl, and Bush Jr. publicly proclaimed doing God’s work while privately theft and death were on their minds.
Samuel Huntington, the historian and author of “Clash of Civilizations” described western avarice for land and wealth through military adventurism as: “The West won the world not by the superiority of its ideas or values or religion but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence. Westerners often forget this fact, non-Westerners never do."
Europe is shocked at Muslim anger when it’s the Muslims who are shocked by Europe’s depleted morality, sacredness, and respect of the “other.”
Freedom of speech is the western cloak and truest weapon of destruction; for missiles kill instantly while insults have a historical life, much like the Crusades.
Whitney Moore, Jr. in describing the western demonizing of the inferior “other” said: “We create an environment where it is alright to hate, to steal, to cheat, and to lie if we dress it up with symbols of respectability, dignity and love”.
Protests against European nations whose medias defamed the Prophet must be peaceful. The lives and properties of westerners must be respected and protected. However, Muslims must use all legal, political, and diplomatic means against such nations along with a stringent boycott of all their products. European governments must condemn these offensive cartoons but Muslims must understand that unlike our autocratic governments they don’t control the “free” press, some whose agenda is light the fire between Christianity and Islam.
The greatest harm to Islam in the eyes of the world is committed by Muslim terrorism against the innocent through murder or hijacking. Resist only the aggressors; that is true Islam.
The west has invaded and occupied our lands, killed our families, robbed our resources, decimated our language and culture, humiliated our humanity and marginalized our faith, and we’ve been silent far too long; but now we draw a line in the sand at the desecration of our Holy Qur’an and the insulting of our beloved Prophet. Enough is enough. It’s time you respected our faith and humanity, withdraw from our lands, stop supporting your dictators, and deal with us as equals. Let’s pray your humanity supersedes your worldly passions and greed before it’s too late. The majority in this world want peace, it’s time we demand it forcefully from our governments, and not Neo Cons, a biased media, and bought politicians determine our destiny. Muslims are willing to die for their faith, what is the west willing to die for? God is indeed Great.
Note:
[1]. http://www.bghelsinki.org/fe/suggestions_en.html
Criminal Defamation Laws and the Right to Freedom of Expression
Joint Amicus Brief of Interights and Article 19 in Constitutional case N 16/98