the (in my opinion, kind of stupid and offensive) “Draw Mohammed Day”

I don’t understand, is it only smart and pleasing when Trey Parker and Matt Stone draw Mohammed?

Maybe i am stupid but i think that heavy handed government censorship of the internet is orders of magnitude more dangerous than having to tollerate random trolls.

Anyone should be free to draw whatever they want as long as they don’t then use that drawing in a threatening way that a reasonable person would consider assault. If other people don’t like it they need to grow up. This is pluralism.

And it’s not stupid either. It is satire, which is one of the most seriously useful things we’ve invented as humans. Good-natured laughter at that which is abhorrent (and not being allowed to make fun of religion is most definitely abhorrent) should be encouraged.

Could somebody get killed over it? Yes. Some already have. People got killed over the freedom rides too. Expressing one’s rights when they go against someone else’s medieval dogma is always dangerous, but it still should be encouraged whether it’s a sit-in or a cartoon.

My hats off to the brave folks who exercise their freedom of expression even with the threat of censorship, oppression and murder. We need more of the Matt Parker/Trey Stones of the world.

Are some of the individual drawings themselves awful and stupid and bigoted? Sure. Don’t look at them. Look at the funny cute ones. Or don’t look at any.

Just because you have a right to say something doesn’t mean it’s not a really stupid thing to say.

Funny how religious authorities *demand* that we not condemn the whole of religion for the ‘few’ who use it to stigmatize, abuse and kill. Yet they’re totally shameless in fully judging and sanctioning the entirety of human discourse, satire, entertainment and speech based on their lowest common denominators.

It’s probably something the Pakistani government has been burning to do for a while, so they jumped on the first half-baked excuse to do it. I bet MANY Pakistanis realize that, too.

Though i agree with you nobody has to die for a prank. This debacle is just an excuse not the reason for censhorship. Also it is an excuse for various groups on both sides to promote agendas.

It might offend the muslim religion to draw Mohammed, but then again why should that be completely off-grounds and taboo while other offensive things are socially acceptable or tolerated? this pick-and-choose policy is abhorrent. I would much rather have as many people trolling and drawing Mohammed than to give in to extremist religious views (regardless if it is Muslim or christian groups)

Just because you don’t like a drawing someone made doesn’t give you the right to threaten them with violence.

Some, do. Others really care about freedom of speech, and I do not want to live in world where I need to bow because somebody feels offended. My mere existence as a gay man is offensive to some people, should I commit suicide? Should they stop going to mosque because I think it is offensive that people still believe in superstitions from goat herders? Many Christians believe, they offend me, should I ask that they cannot speak in public anymore?

That said, the illustrators have chosen to loudly fart in public, in a way that assures their targets are people with very highly sensitive cultural concerns about bad gases, cultivated over more than a thousand years. The targets of the gas have been chosen to be the ones most sensitive to the gas.

None of this is presented as a constructive dialog, merely an imposition. When the targeted parties get, uh, wind of this plan, some decide to boycott and clear out the area to avoid cultural improprieties. Again, constructive dialog isn’t undertaken — but, there was already an impetus against undertaking dialog, by the imposing nature of the gaseous action.

Framing the whole thing as, “this is about free speech!” ignores very important and valid cultural concerns to one side, lifting the value of free speech above the value of sanctity of image.

Is one better than the other?
Most of the answers play out in the middle, but the extremes of the answers to that question play out in the responses: Public farts and quarantines.

Wake me when any of these bozos go after the real censor, which is Comedy Central. Or when Parker and Stone at least refuse to create new episodes until they can draw Mohammed. Until then, it’s just a bunch of internet monkeys flinging poo and calling it freedom.

On the other hand, the rest of your response asks if offenses should beget offenses. I don’t think they should.

They were being ironic. Irony is their thing. This “holiday” isn’t ironic, it’s just a giant FU to the Muslim world.

You should work harder on your moral relativism. It’s not working here for you… at all.

The Draw Mohammed Day wasn’t a “giant FU” to the Muslim world any more than the South Park episodes were. And that’s my point.

They both are a “giant FU” to censorship that’s enabled through violent means, threats or otherwise. And, if you bothered to look into this, you’d find far more ironic imagery in the Draw Mohammed Day pictures than found in the South Park episodes.

I am not Rosa parks, but I won’t fucking shut up because somebody does not like it, and that includes my own government.

I have seen the error of my ways, and I apologize for being stu…uh…ignorant and provocative.

I am offended by it, therefore I avoid churches and homophones, I am not asking that churches should be shut down

Why should non-Muslims be bound by the Muslim faith?

THAT’S what this is about.