[...] And, as the cartoon controversy continues, horrifying Europeans and hopefully convincing them of the dangers of Islamists, Europe will not only be convinced of taking a more forceful position in the Middle East but may be be left with no choice. In short, After two and a half months of a new Chancellor, Germany foreign policy couldn’t be looking better. What say you? [...]

[...] Some have compared the Christian protests against the soon-to-be release film The Da Vinci Code to the Muslim protests against the Danish Cartoons earlier this year. Is this an accurate comparison and why? [...]

What is most disconcerting is that while the continent is standing up for free speach, the British are trying to ban ‘hate speach’

I have to disagree with Chirol and the Europeans. I cringed when I saw some of the cartoons. A distinction should be made between free speech and hate speech, especially ones that lead to violence. Many Muslims in Europe have experienced hate-crimes and widespread discrimination, and these cartoons will make the bad relations worse.

These caricatures remind me of how the Nazis depicted the ‘dirty and greedy Jews’ in their racist propaganda. The grossly negative portrayal increased anti-semitism.

Major newspapers have to meet a higher standard of speech than regular people. They are not supposed to publish: racist slurs, slander leading to libel, incorrect information, pornography, and some forms of hate speech.

Muslim countries already feel like they’re under siege from the West because of the War on Terror. The timing of these cartoons are really bad, when tensions are high and people’s lives are at stake.

The Wikipedia article said: “The modern, secular society is rejected by some Muslims.” Don’t blame the Muslims for this, because most religious people are supposed to reject secularism, in favor of theism. Even Christians view the secular world as sinful and Godless, and they are supposed to belong to the ‘Kingdom of God’.

I tend to agree with Mi Hwa, or at least I disagree with my learned colleague that this suggests the Muslim world can’t handle democracy and free speech. Remember the outrage in the US over piss Christ? Or when whatshername burnt a bible on Saturday Night Live in the early 1990s? This is not unique to the Muslim world. Any culture reacts violently when someone desecrates what they consider to be holy. The reaction in the Muslim world is not so foreign from our own experience.

Curzon: Of course Americans get outraged over similar incidents regarding their own sacred symbols, whether Jesus or the American Flag. However, armed American’s don’t storm EU buildings or close their embassy or recall ambassadors either. I’m not suggesting this event means the Muslim world isn’t ever capable of democracy, but considering most Muslim countries don’t have real free speech anyway, they aren’t even used to it in the first place.

Politically, they have little experience with it and thus their culture has not evolved to deal well with criticism or insults direct at their sacred objects. These suggest that the bigger war is cultural, as people like Ralph Peters has said, not political. It also raises a number of issues with Muslim immigration to Europe, but that’s another story. Remember my post on the new interpretation of the Quran? It was written by a German who published it anonymously because his publish house received thousands of death threats.

In short, being offended is fine. Protesting is fine. But violence, calling for sanctions and political repercussions are just infantile.

I wonder to what extent the educational infrastructure of Arabs—including parent-child interactions—is to blame. Is some skills, potential, talent, or intelligence not being balanced? Is there a deep deficit in Arab interpersonal intelligence which generates this stuff?

Chirol’s exactly right—Muslims may be right to offended. I find some of the cartoons tasteless. But storming compounds and calling for legislative punishment of the cartoonists is juvenile.

Mi-Hwa: “A distinction should be made between free speech and hate speech…”

And who among us is qualified to make that distinction? Who should we trust with the power to decide whether some cartoonist should be punished for offending someone’s sensibilities? If your comment offends me does that mean you should be punished because my sensibilities have been offended? If so how much jail time do you think you deserve for violating my sensibilities?

Curzon: “Any culture reacts violently when someone desecrates what they consider to be holy.”

Any culture? No. Some cultures? Yes. Some cultures more consistently than others? Most definitely.

We have worked very hard and made tremendous sacrifices in the West to reach a level of civilization where free speech is protected, regardless of who it offends. Is the West losing its nerve? It’s clear that we have taken for granted the freedoms we enjoy and have gotten to a point where too many people are unwilling to even articulate a defense of those freedoms. This particular incident should not be viewed as an isolated event but part of a larger pattern. In the future, there will be more examples of some Muslims seeking to intimidate the West into abandoning its hard-won freedoms. And there will be many within the West who will be willing to do so. The West is facing an existential crisis. We have external threats from some elements of Islam and internal threats from postmodern, nihilist leftism. Should we just resign ourselves to going out with a whimper or a bang?

“Indeed, democracy’s a fatally flawed form of government anyhow…”

All forms of government are fatally flawed. Your alternative to democratic governance is what?

When we in the West talk about “democracy” we mean more than just elections and majority rule. Democratic decision-making is the best method provided it operates within a certain framework. The framework is what is important and what is the most diffilcult to export. So how do we articulate and export the framework within which democracy must operate to be successful?

I’m gunna have to say that I think the reaction to these comics is much more then they warrant. Had people in opposition to these comics reaction been, “these comics are wrong, this is not what we are about, and we take offense to them accordingly” instead of “i’ll kill you you ass-hole!” the comics would have been wrong. However since the latter reaction is what is being witnessed most, the comics are being confirmed.

The real victim as I see it, is the average muslim person that is not going out killing people, not making threats to kill people, and not storming government buildings. They are the victims of the extremist loony muslims that give all muslims a bad name, and then also victims of the west’s fear of all muslims, which sadly gets justified by the original extremist loony muslims…

I think it would be a good thing if more non-lunatic muslims stood up in protest against the loons, saying that the lunatics do not represent all muslims, and also to criticize their own lunatic brothers. Until that happens, the image of muslims will not change…

Once benificent autocracy: Singapore

One meddling and corrupt democracy: Venezuela

Ken is at least half right—it’s not that simple.

I tend to agree with Mi-Hwa’s and Curzon’s assesment here. The reaction the cartoons got in the Muslim world are very strong, but to understand why they reached such an intensity, we might have to go back a few steps. This is not about the cartoons only, if nothing else happened before it, perhaps nobody would take notice.

I can also remember the outrage by many reads when German cartoonist Jamiri published an issue in the student’s magazine Unicum last year, depicting god taking a leak…

Here’s an email from a guy in Denmark (I have to apologize in advance for my crappy translation, I’l blame it on harsh time constraints):

...now, that my small mother country’s resounded throughout the land and 12 caricatures became an international political issue, I allow myself to point at a some background information. I have the impression that this story is presented in a too simple way.

You can find good articles about the matter in the FR and SZ:

SZ, 1.2.06.: “Dänemark und seine rigide Ausländerpolitik: Der Europarat soll seine Schnauze halten
[note: just for subscribers]

FR: Karikatur der Kulturen

The reactions to the carcatures are clearly exaggerated and I don’t want to excuse it. Nevertheless, if you’re almost daily hearing stuff in the Danish media a la “Muslims are uncivilized”, Muslims are the cancer in our society”, “Foreigners have no work ethic”, “unfortunately we can’t kill criminal Muslims”, “Muslims abuse their children”, “foreign women are fair game”, etc. (irrespective of a legislation that goes with this tone), then cartoons like these are just the last straw.

Two articles for schwedophiles [note: couldn’t read those, I don’t speak swedish]:
http://aftonbladet.se/vss/ledare/story/0,2789,762470,00.html
http://aftonbladet.se/vss/ledare/story/0,2789,766151,00.html

best regards from Copenhagen,

Hey Guys,

Excellent discussion here, but I think we need to step back a bit. In the traditional interpretation of Islam, there is no schizophrenic division between the secular and the scared (to quote from Sayyid Qutb). Nothing is above Islam.

So any human construct – from laws, to the media to the government, must submit itself to Islam. Outside of Islam, there is nothing.

So any discussion on why Muslims cant handle “insults direct at their sacred objects” (Chirol) is myopic and does not recognize that for many Muslims an attack on Muhammad is not an attack on a “sacred object” but akin to an attack against God himself, his Prophet (of course), the Ummah and his creation. And that’s a pretty hefty thing to do.

And with that said, I must declare myself a species of the Western Civilization and see freedom of speech as sacrosanct.

Shakuhachi: point taken about Piss Christ. But see also 1.) the bible burning incident on Saturday Night Live, 2.) the movie showing of the Last Temptation of Christ, and the boycotts/outrage/fury that erupted over that in the US. And that was in the 1980s onwards.

We’re trying to judge undeveloped societies with the values that we have in the developed world when they have not yet experienced universal education, free and open debate, industrialization, urbanization, social liberalization, etc etc. It’s akin to asking why a third grader failed an entrance exam into business school, or demanding the President Zachary Taylor implement greater environmental protection legislation. That may sound patriarchial, but it’s not untrue.

Free speech is not the most important thing. Getting along with other cultures is just as important, if we want to create a peaceful world. Offending a billion Muslims, just because you like bad cartoons, is a dumb choice. I thought Europeans would be smarter than that. Kudos to the British newspapers for not publishing the cartoons. Shame on the other newspapers that did.

It’s akin to asking why a third grader failed an entrance exam into business school,

That’s the point. The arab world is like a third grader.

You’re absolutely right. Projecting values we’ve developed onto those who are far behind isn’t fair. It’s natural they aren’t there yet, but this can be seen as another test, in a way seeing how far certain societies and cultures are.

I think you guys are too deterministic concerning the Islamic religion. Once the Muslim world develops economically, they will accept new rule-sets, so you say. I remember Barnett accusing Mark Steyn of being a racist because he was apposed to unfettered muslim immigration. The problem is that Islam is not a race, it IS a ruleset that is believed to be the word of God for all ages.

An important point than almost everyone in the west seems to miss, is that Islam has a tradition of violent retribution against blasphemers as an obligatory religious duty that can be traced back to the direct orders of Mohammad himself.

Here is an interesting post found on an islamic website that I saw at the Jawa report:

At the time of the Messenger Muhammad (saw) there were individuals like these who dishonoured and insulted him upon whom the Islamic judgement was executed. Such people were not tolerated in the past and throughout the history of Islam were dealt with according to the Shariah. Ka’ab ibn Ashraf was assassinated by Muhammad ibn Maslamah for harming the Messenger Muhammad (saw) by his words, Abu Raafi’ was killed by Abu Ateeq as the Messenger ordered in the most evil of ways for swearing at the prophet, Khalid bin Sufyaan was killed by Abdullah bin Anees who cut off his head and brought it to the prophet for harming the Messenger Muhammad (saw) by his insults, Al-Asmaa bintu Marwaan was killed by Umayr bin Adi’ al-Khatmi, a blind man, for writing poetry against the prophet and insulting him in it, Al-Aswad al-Ansi was killed by Fairuz al-Daylami and his family for insulting the Messenger Muhammad (saw) and claiming to be a prophet himself. This is the judgement of Islam upon those who violate, dishonour and insult the Messenger Muhammad

These assasinations and many more were ordered by Mohammad and chronicled in several Hadiths. For many Muslims, accaptance of these publishers going unpunished would be the same as a christian accepting the ressurection never happened. Denmark demanding muslims accept free speach is as if the world demanded Christians deny the ressurection.

_An autocratic government that leaves individuals alone? I must confess that I have trouble wrapping my mind around the concept. “Anyone who objects to our policies will receive a very strongly worded letter, and we’ll tell your mother on you.”Â?
I don’t think autocratic govts can leave individuals alone, mainly because autocrats need someone to boss around, and those who are truly individual are very resistant to said bossing._

Do autocrats have any inherent reason to tell people what to do, as opposed to what not to do? I think not. Autocracies like China certainly meddle a lot less in their citizens’ private lives than do democracies like Iran. Autocrats and monarchs are interested in returns on their capital stock, so they won’t do anything excessively damaging (like restrict freedom to an unreasonable degree), unless, of course, they are ideological dictators.

“Be careful what you say, or else you’ll be sorry.”
Threats aren’t going to work Mi-Hwa.. Let’s think this through together (Shameless plug for my own blog post on the topic)
1. Comic artist thinks Islam = Terrorists
2. Member of Muslim community threatens terrorism to retaliate
3. Original suspicion of Islam = Terrorists is confirmed
Basically, you seem to be saying that one culture is better and takes priority over another. Muslim law reigns supreme over every other law. That can’t work. Now by arguing that freedom of speech prevails in this case, one is not arguing that it reigns supreme because just as someone has the right to print the comics, you also have the right not to look at them. Exercising freedom of speech is taking nothing away from anyone where is forcing religion on someone takes away from them.
Interestingly enough, you’re using your freedom of speech right now to bash freedom of speech. Perhaps all your comments should be erased your life should be threatened because you offend someone. Sounds silly doesn’t it.

What really irks me is that while Christians might protest (even violently, though not to the same extent) blasphemy in their own lands, at least they aren’t rioting over the fact that Christ is portrayed as a prophet (and not God) in Muslim lands. It’s not as though the CIA dropped blasphemous pamphlets on Pakistan or something.

The Danes made a joke on their own territory. Nobody cares what Muslims think about offense or free speech because it’s not their country.

Imperator, Darin, Dr Alfred and Chirol, bravo, and bravo to C.A. for publishing these pictures.

(PS Saw a fascinating but nauseating programme on Pakistani expat TV last night where they were saying that we need to limit free speech because it’s a globalized world and everybody has to respect everybody else. Ah, well, there goes national sovereignty, then! Also, interestingly, all non-Muslim guests invited were mysteriously cut off during or before their interviews.)

Kenneth, autocrat don’t necessarily care about returns on their capital stock: theys””?and, in fact, all governments””?care about net revenue, i.e. profit (be that measured in money or less tangible benefits), and there’s extensive Public Choice literature to back this up. Enlightened autocrats and states might take that from capital stock or pomp and pageantry, but the greater number of petty tyrants, I’m sure, are just as happy to pilfer and consume all the capital they can.

Hardly. Your assertion is not merely baseless: it is contrary to established historical fact. Marginal tax rates in Europe during the monarchical era and the early phase of the industrial revolution (prior to 1850) were far, far lower than they are nowadays. So, too, were marginal tax rates in autocratic Asian states. The “literature” of which you speak on public choice is nonexistent- elementary public choice theory shows why democracy, with its distribution of costs and benefits, systematically fails. You have also posited no reason why a democrat should not be worse- indeed, far worse, since they do not own or are saddled with their capital stock for life- their planning horizons are limited by their (usually short) terms as presidents, and the high degree of uncertainty in being reelected. A democrat has every incentive to plunder his country dry, for what he does not consume now he will probably never consume.

profit (be that measured in money or less tangible benefits)

Ever heard of “future income”? Did you know that, it, too, can be measured in money? No way! Corporations and individuals (people and organizations who actually own their capital) do it all the time, and so do monarchs and autocrats. A monarch will not make tax rates excessively high, as too much present consumption will severely limit future income- even a sixteen year old like myself understands this.

In sum, your worldview, insofar as it supports capitalism, is arbitrary and internally inconsistent- capitalism, and private ownership more broadly, presupposes that individuals will be interested in long-term as well as short-term benefit. You have not posited a single reason that monarchs or autocrats should be any different that does not amount to what logicians call “special pleading”.

I note you have said absolutely nothing about modern African regimes (Zaire, DR Congo, CA Empire, or basket-case du jour, aux choix), banana republics, or (since you brought up Asia) Myanmar and China under Mao, or are those not examples of autocracy?

I see you, too, have ignored examples of failed democracies like Brazil, Venuzuela, Argentina, India, Ceylon, Rwanda, Iraq, modern day Iran, Russia, Niger, Nigeria, Colombia, Haiti, Cambodia, Tanzania, Sierra Leone, Liberia, Ethiopia, and Eritrea, or are these not democracies? There’s a difference between ideological and pragmatic democracies; the Soviet Union was an example of the former, Singapore of the latter. I am, of course, in favour of the latter. For every autocratic basketcase there are about half a dozen democratic ones. The fact that autocracies are grossly overrepresented in examples of third world countries that modernized within a single generation (or came close to doing so) is certainly cause for reflection, no?

As for a “democrat”Â? plundering his polity dry””?who is now contradicted by historical fact? American presidents and legislators certainly benefit from office and their policies are certainly deleterious but can we say that the United States are a desolate wasteland riven by war and famine? Canada? Britain (effectively a republic)? Even France is muddling along fairly well by comparison to some autocracies. And speaking of future income (not quite the same thing I think as net present value), I think you underestimate the opportunities available to “democrats”Â?: lobbying is certainly lucrative, as are memoirs, charity engagements and so forth.

Of course, the US, with its first-past-the-post system and a largely monolithic political establishment that has mitigated the ill-effects of democracy. France and Europe founder along because, among other things, they lack this limitation. However, there are internal constraints that at least slow the expansion of government. In this regard, part of this article should be food for thought:

But evidence is not on Professor Sachs’ side. African corruption has been getting worse, not better, over the last few years. Each year, Transparency International publishes its Corruption Perception Index (CPI). The CPI defines corruption as “abuse of public office for private gain.” It is measured on a scale from 0 to 10. The higher the number, the lower the corruption. In 2000, the average African CPI was 3.24. By 2004, the African CPI fell to 2.87.

With the African CPI score on the decline, how can Mr. Sachs claim to have “seen exactly the opposite”? Perhaps he confuses the growth of African democracy with the reduction of corruption. Indeed, Africa today has more democracy than ever before. Between 1960 and 2004, Africa had 198 leaders. Only one, the prime minister of Mauritius, was voted out of office between 1960 and 1989. Things changed thereafter. Between 1990 and 2004, 23 African heads of state were voted out of office.

The spread of democracy enables more Africans to vote corrupt governments out of office, and that surely is a step in the right direction. Unfortunately, elected officials’ behavior in power has not appreciably changed. Many Africans continue to see participation in the government as a means of becoming wealthy, and weak institutions allow them to succeed.

See what I mean?

Now, you mention “basic public choice theroy.”Â? We cannot get more basic in Public Choice theory than Calculus of Consent, in which the “ideal”Â? state (my term) is that at which the sum of transactional and external costs of legislation are minimized. One-man rule certainly minimizes transaction costs of legislating, but raises expected external costs as the monarch can both makes mistakes and act against the interests of his subjects.

Here you are simply bandying about terms which you plainly don’t understand. A monarch does not create “external costs” on his country by definition: it’s his capital stock. If you hold that a monarch creates “externalities” for his country, then you must also maintain the same for the owner of a company that (occasionally) makes bad decisions. However, the cost is not truly “externalized” since the monarch’s future income is compromised- the monarch bears the burden of his mistakes, just as a company owner bears the burden of his. This is one of the reasons why monarchy is superior to democracy.

Unanimity of the body politic, on the contrary, causes transaction costs to balloon but eliminates expected external costs (no one would knowingly vote against his own interests, though mistakes are possible). The total costs attain a minimum at the optimal decision rule.

This is another unsupported assertion dressed up in jargon. “External costs” are not minimized in a democracy as legislators do not own the capital stock of the country and can therefore cater to interest groups in a socially inefficient way, albeit one where the marginal private cost is effectively zero and the marginal private benefit very high. So, too, can the executive, and this is why lobbyists have modern-day democratic governments by the balls. You have not addressed my original planning horizon/time preference head on, and the general vagueness of your reply leaves me wondering if you actually considered my planning horizon/time-preference argument.

In the absence of uncertainty, monarchy certainly might be preferable””?one need not support a whole legislature’s salary””?but I doubt it. You have not posited a reason to think that a monarch would not favor himself and his own relations””?his own genes””?over those of people he does not know and who might well be hostile to him and his dynasty.

I have- present mistakes compromise future income. If the monarch is concerned with his progeny, and not merely himself, then this merely strengthens my argument, as it means monarchs have a very low rate of time preference indeed. and a monarch that is concerned about the success of his offspring will think far, far ahead. You have not given me a reason why a democrat should not focus entirely on his own short-term gain, rather than the long-term interests of the nation. Shifting the burden of proof is so much fun.

What’s worse, is that you have completely neglected the possibility of an economic-illiterate or downright psychopath attaining the monarchy. I take most of my cues in this area from Locke, who reminds us that the reigns of good princes have always been most detrimental to the liberties of the people. (The rest of the quote is illuminating, but I’ll simply refer you to it””?which you did not do for your statistics I might add.

Consider the following analogy: a company owner may not know very much, indeed, anything at all, about the manufacturing and marketing processes behind the selling of his product. Does this mean he will screw everything up? Hardly. It means that he will use his resources to hire people who do know. The same applies to monarchs- they have every incentive to appoint the best and the brightest to positions of authority. The possibility of having a “bad” monarch is just that- a mere possibility, whereas democracy practically guarantees a bad leader.

Ultimately, I think you’re attributing more beneficence, impartiality, intelligence, or foresight to monarchs””?mere human beings””?than I think is warranted. You certainly seem to attribute more longevity to the average monarch than is warranted (not every one is an Elizabeth, Kublai Khan, Augustus) than is warranted, though that is speculation. If these attributions are not “special pleading,”Â? may I be struck down where I sit.

I’m not- the whole premise of a monarchy is to get the incentives in order so that even the most self-interested of them won’t screw things up or fail to do anything good to the degree that even the most well-meaning presidents do. At this point, you’re creating straw men: I NEVER stated that monarchs live longer- I merely said that, as they do not have to worry about elections, and are saddled with their capital for life, they will have a much broader planning horizon than a president with the same lifespan. Your argument applies to democracy as well as monarchy: how do we know that an elected leader won’t be as ignorant as the people that voted him in? How do we know that a democrat won’t implement policies that are unsound but popular, as Juan Peron did in Argentina? The likehilood of this happening is greatly increased in a democracy, for reasons outlined further below.

This strikes me as similar to leftists’ desires to to substitute government command (in this case a monarch) for market processes (elections and legislatures) in the hopes of more enlightened and less selfish production.

You strike me as possessing the communistic desire to replace privately owned government with collectively owned government. I will also addressed this invalid market comparison: democratic politicians do not produce goods, they produce bads. Competition in the production of bads is not good; it is worse than bad, as it simply leads to ever more artful forms of swindle, theft, lying, money laundering, demagoguery, and fraud generally. Finally, for the last time, the whole premise of monarchy is self-interest- maximizing both one’s present value AND future income. Say what you will about monarchy, but incentives make a difference, even in government.