And so Al-Qaida turns against Sweden

[JemyM]

I remember when Usama Bin Laden in his video said: "Contrary to what [President George W.] Bush says and claims -- that we hate freedom --let him tell us then, "Why did we not attack Sweden?""

The Iraqi branch of the terror network Al-Qaida have today threatened Sweden due to the published cartoons of Muhammad as a dog.

The swedish cartoonist who drew Muhammad as a dog is now on Al-Qaida's hitlist. The price on his head is 100.000 dollars. The publisher of the news magazine that published his paintings also got on the list, the price on his head is 50.000 dollars. Furthermore, five swedish companies Ericsson, Volvo, Ikea, Scania and Electrolux, have received threats today on an audiotape.

Swedish muslims openly condemn the threats and in a letter asks Al Qaida to take back their threats and respect the peace of Ramadan.

[Squeek]

Intelligent fools will easily be able justify those threats and reconcile this obvious contradiction. It won't actually make sense, but it hasn't actually made sense up to this point either. And it never will.

George W. Bush isn't the sharpest knife in the drawer. But he was right when he claimed Al Quieda hates freedom.

[Dez]

Most of the islamistic world is still living the middle ages, not that recent war in irak or western presence in general has done any good to the matter. Besides why is it always the west who has to honour their stupid proffet. As far as I've read from the papers, one doesn't exactly have a freedom to be christian or atheist in those countries, or not that they even respect any other faith than their own, so why should we respect their religion? Because they hold the knife on our throath?

I'm so bored to people who race with their religion and use it to drive their own agendas. When will it end? and btw If those ignorant apes are to go heaven or paradise, I will GLADLY choose the alternative.

[Ubereil]

Most of the islamistic world is still living the middle ages, not that recent war in irak or western presence in general has done any good to the matter. Besides why is it always the west who has to honour their stupid proffet. As far as I've read from the papers, one doesn't exactly have a freedom to be christian or atheist in those countries, or not that they even respect any other faith than their own, so why should we respect their religion? Because they hold the knife on our throath?

No, we should respect them because we're "better" than them. That they want to treat us disrespectfully doesn't justify for us to do the same. After all, WE are the ones who are supposed to be civilized ;).

I'd allso like to point out that Al-Qaida isn't the majority of the Muslim comunity. And that these pepole are extremist first, and muslims second. And while I'm at it I'd allso like to point out that generalization is dangerous (and if you need an example, I just have to say WW2. IMO pepoles feelings towards muslims are dangerously close to pepoles feeling towards jews in the 30's).

Übereil

[Zaleukos]

Update that to 100 threatened Swedish companies.

As a Swede I had forgotten that he granted us immunity in the past:p We are in a better position than Denmark was during the Muhammed cartoon ruckus, with arguably much less friction between natives and inhabitants of foreign descent, and most importantly a lot more responsible local muslim organisations who all have condemned this crap (their danish counterparts instead went on a middle east tour to fuel protests).

There has been quite a number of threats against the artist in question and the editor of the Nerikes Allehanda newspaper though, but not on a scale that is widely different from what high profile politicians normally would get from native right/left/whatever wing extremists. In all it seems like the thing will fade away into obscurity...

[Corwin]

No-0ne will ever attack Sweden while they still have ABBA living there!! :)

[Zaleukos]

I'd be very worried if they are our only guardian angels.

They split about 25 years ago, and I think at least two of them live in the UK nowadays:)

[Corwin]

Well, if it's a choice between them and Volvo,!!!!!!!!!!! :)

[Ubereil]

OK, I'm nervous...

Übereil

[JemyM]

Björn Ulveaus of ABBA is today one of the spokespersons for the swedish humanist organisation that recently organised a seminar for ex-muslims together with Lars Vilks.
The Swedish humanists have previously taken sides with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Salman Rushdie and Tasleema Nasreen, three famous and death-threatened apostates of Islam.
Something tells me ABBA Björn is not the best defense we have against radical muslims. Or maybe he is. :)

[zakhal]

This is an outrage! Only finns should be allowed to hate swedes. Now we have to add al-qaida to the list too.

[Lucky Day]

The question I'd like to know is this cartoonist and the newspapers that published these going out of their way to do this? They know they will get this kind of reaction from dingbats who think they have. It makes like its a conscientious effort to show one for the principals of freedom of speech.

However, from what I understand from Sweden and all the grandstanding about human rights and Amnesty Int'l you can't actually criticize the government there. There's plenty to gripe about with the taxes on taxes issues.

Heck, Markus Naslund had to turn around and leave the country during the NHL Lockout season so his previous year's income he was already taxed for in Canada wouldn't be taxed there. After that fiasco Markus doesn't appear to ever want to go back.

I'm not defending the threats, or even attacking the principal in going out of their way to cause the obvious reaction. I'm commenting on the institutional double standard, official or otherwise.

Plus, I hate Ace of Base.

[Prime Junta]

However, from what I understand from Sweden and all the grandstanding about human rights and Amnesty Int'l you can't actually criticize the government there. There's plenty to gripe about with the taxes on taxes issues.

Um... what do Swedish tax laws have to do with freedom of political speech? I don't think the guy you mention could have been double-taxed because he criticized the government; it's more likely he was just a victim of a glitch in the tax laws (or tax laws that were bad to start with).

[Ubereil]

I live in Sweden, and I can assure you that you can critizise our goverment as much as you want. In fact, prio to the last election we had had 12 years of ruling from the Social Democrats. During this time the opposision non-Socialist parties where whineing constantly about how the Social Democrats was destroying Sweden's economy. Now that the non-Spcoalist parties is in charge, the Social Democrats is whineing about how the non-Socialists are undermining Sweden's wellfare...

And in Marcus case, you don't have to worry, the wealth tax has been abolished now (and it has been finansed by highering the member fee for the union...). Besides, I don't really feel sorry for him. After all, he's turned ritch because he's good at playing ice hockey...

Übereil

[JemyM]

The question I'd like to know is this cartoonist and the newspapers that published these going out of their way to do this? They know they will get this kind of reaction from dingbats who think they have. It makes like its a conscientious effort to show one for the principals of freedom of speech.

A country that is threatened into silence do not have free speech.
The liberals within Europe have done a great effort to portrait muslims like a peaceful religion and an oppressed people. The cartoonist/newspaper wanted to show just who it really was that they were trying to protect. It was pretty much releasing the steam that had boiled for quite awhile, building up a rising but yet silent threat from within. It's a much needed debate.

However, from what I understand from Sweden and all the grandstanding about human rights and Amnesty Int'l you can't actually criticize the government there. There's plenty to gripe about with the taxes on taxes issues.

People are very free to vocally attack politicians, and they do. Politicians are torn to pieces from left to right. However, Swedes do not see money as Americans do so to the majority it's actually not a big topic that we pay almost 50% in tax. The big issues in Sweden is unemployment/wellfare/immigration and the environment. The Social Democrats, who are the main party behind the humongous taxes, lost their seat thanks to the unemployment issue and a leader who was seen as megalomanic, not the taxes. By current polls, the Social Democrats will probably get their seats back next election. The sitting party have 3 more years to make them change their minds however.

[Pladio]

The liberals within Europe have done a great effort to portrait muslims like a peaceful religion and an oppressed people. The cartoonist/newspaper wanted to show just who it really was that they were trying to protect.

Just want to say something about this.
It's something I believe and except if you can show me facts it isn't like this or a real good argument then I don't think you'll be able to change my mind.

I believe that not all Muslims, Jews, Christians, Buddhists, Atheists, Nationalists are terrorists.
I believe just a small portion of every population is terrorist and a slightly larger group support terrorists in every single race/ethnicity/religion/nationality...
You're saying the cartoonist is showing the true face of the muslims and I think you are completely wrong. Yes, there might be more Muslim terrorists than other religions, but that's because of two major reasons. The Muslims are about 1.0-1.5 billion on earth.
Let's say there are 1%(example) terrorists among them , that means there are 10 million terrorists... Yes, it might be a large number, but that's still only 1% of the population. Same thing with Jews ? 13-15 million Jews, take 1%, that's only 130000 Jewish terroists. Do you understand what I mean ?
Not all Muslims are terrorists or bad, it just seems as if they're worse than other groups because they with much more.
the second important reason would be that western terrorism has been hidden from the media and such... It has been called differently and less attention has been spent to it. Western terrorism would consist of Weapon Dealers, Drug Dealers, Organized crime... Yes it's different, doesn't meant it doesn't terrorize people. Drug dealing enslaves thousands of people in the fields. Weapon dealers sell to all the warlords in Africa ... Organized groups of crimes such as the Traids, Yakuza, Red Mafiya, Italian/Sicilian Mafia, Bloods, Crips... Many, many crimes are being comitted, but people only look at what's happening with the Muslims. There still are the Czechen rebels, Tamil Tigers, still some South American rebels, Myanmar rebels................. and the list of groups comitting crimes goes on and on and even keeps growing.

[Prime Junta]

A country that is threatened into silence do not have free speech.
The liberals within Europe have done a great effort to portrait muslims like a peaceful religion and an oppressed people. The cartoonist/newspaper wanted to show just who it really was that they were trying to protect. It was pretty much releasing the steam that had boiled for quite awhile, building up a rising but yet silent threat from within. It's a much needed debate.

Yeah, right.

Publishing a cartoon of the Prophet as a dog, and subsequently getting a death threat from Al Qaeda, only proves two things: (1) Al Qaeda has members who are violent fanatics, and (2) you're either colossally stupid, colossally out of touch with reality, or have a colossal craving for martyrdom.

[Squeek]

A country that is threatened into silence do not have free speech.
The liberals within Europe have done a great effort to portrait muslims like a peaceful religion and an oppressed people. The cartoonist/newspaper wanted to show just who it really was that they were trying to protect. It was pretty much releasing the steam that had boiled for quite awhile, building up a rising but yet silent threat from within. It's a much needed debate.You're absolutely right, JemyM. That's the way to resolve these problems. There are millions of muslims practicing Islam in the US, and every major political party here considers theirs a peaceful and beautiful religion.

So why isn't progress being made?

That conversation won't happen while innocent people on both sides feel threatened by criminals and killers. They masquerade as muslims, intellectuals and teachers, and their poison has reached parts of the mainstream. They're convinced they're right to the point that it's futile to engage them. Real progress won't be made until their influence is limited.

[Pladio]

You're absolutely right, JemyM. That's the way to resolve these problems. There are millions of muslims practicing Islam in the US, and every major political party here considers theirs a peaceful and beautiful religion.

So, you're saying: "If you're a Muslim, you're a killer!" ?

[Squeek]

So, you're saying: "If you're a Muslim, you're a killer!" ?No, of course not. I'm referring to Muslims, and I'm also referring to terrorists.

[JemyM]

Just want to say something about this.
It's something I believe and except if you can show me facts it isn't like this or a real good argument then I don't think you'll be able to change my mind.

You do not need to be a terrorist to be against democracy and freedom of speech.

550 swedish muslims in the small city of Uppsala demonstrated against freedom of print, a part of the swedish constitution.
As another reaction, Organization of the Islamic Conference, representing 57 muslim countries, condemned the cartoons and demanded an apology.
The Egyptian ambassador urged for Sweden to change their constitution, alter their school system so that students and journalists respect Islam and finally they wanted the swedish government to open a department that specifically focus on fighting "Islamophobia".

Several of my classmates are immigrants from muslim countries and all of them are not exactly friendly to Islam. I am currently reading the Quran myself. I would not say that I consider radical extremist muslims worse as neighbors than the extremist christians, but if they are, I know what drives them. Quaran is a brainwashing tool. Already book 2 consists of 250 passages why thoose who do not follow the Quaran are fools/lost/sheep/blinded etc. The main difference between the two religions is that there's currently no real christian teocracy.

[Ubereil]

And you don't have to be an anti-democrat to be a muslim. And being against the cartoons doesn't mean you're against democracy (which in itself has nothing to do with freedom of speech...), or freedom of speech. In fact, a lot of the muslims who argued against the cartoons claimed they weren't against freedom of speech, quite the contrary. They were against how it had been used in this specific case. They found the cartoons highly offensive, and they didn't feel that freedom of speech should be used for offending pepole.

Übereil

[Prime Junta]

Freedom of speech includes the right to offend, the right to be offended, and the right to protest about it.

I agree that in a perfect world disagreements would never be solved by violence, and therefore no-one would have to fear for their safety due to anything they said.

But the world isn't perfect. If you go out of your way to insult someone's religion -- Muslim, Christian, Hindu, whatever -- there will be consequences.

It's also really dumb, IMO. But I think we've already had this discussion, and you know that I don't sympathize with your militant anti-religionism any more than I sympathize with militant Islam.

[Squeek]

So threatening people with murder is just a consequence of the world not being perfect? And failing to understand how that works is really dumb?

I honestly don't get it. Sometimes your sympathies are about as easy to understand as your conclusions, Prime Junta. If putting a price on someone's head isn't going too far, then where do you draw the line?

It isn't nice to antagonize people about their religion. But terrorism is criminal, plain and simple.

[Corwin]

What bothers me, is that I see 'offensive' anti-Christian cartoons and no-one says anything about it, but something similar done regarding Islam and we have death threats. I'm not really upset by either cartoon, it's not worth the hassle, but I would like to see some consistency in response!!

[Pladio]

You do not need to be a terrorist to be against democracy and freedom of speech.

550 swedish muslims in the small city of Uppsala demonstrated against freedom of print, a part of the swedish constitution.
As another reaction, Organization of the Islamic Conference, representing 57 muslim countries, condemned the cartoons and demanded an apology.
The Egyptian ambassador urged for Sweden to change their constitution, alter their school system so that students and journalists respect Islam and finally they wanted the swedish government to open a department that specifically focus on fighting "Islamophobia".

Several of my classmates are immigrants from muslim countries and all of them are not exactly friendly to Islam. I am currently reading the Quran myself. I would not say that I consider radical extremist muslims worse as neighbors than the extremist christians, but if they are, I know what drives them. Quaran is a brainwashing tool. Already book 2 consists of 250 passages why thoose who do not follow the Quaran are fools/lost/sheep/blinded etc. The main difference between the two religions is that there's currently no real christian teocracy.

Even then it doesn't mean that all muslims are against freedom of speech and that is how some people portray them. Some portray all muslims as terrorists. I've even talked to people in England who said that if they see someone wearing the long dresses muslim men sometimes tend to wear and they also carry a backpack and they go to the metro (tube in London), that they feel threatened by it. Also that they see some other people move away from that muslim guy.
Every other person with a backpack is normal except for the muslim one.
Yes, a lot of people protested against it and I understand that it isn't normal to call for a ban on freedom of speech, but then they have the right to express their opinions freely too.

If you feel offended by something, you have the right to respond to it and even ask for an apology. Asking for a change of constitution or other laws is a bit too much though.

@ Corwin : I think that's because most Christians do believe in (close to) full freedom of speech and so let it go very easily without protest.

[Ubereil]

I believe it's also a cultural thing. One of the arguments the muslims had was that in their culture (we have to respect other pepole's culture IMO, at least to a point) you don't depict dead pepole out of repect for them. And you certanly don't offend dead pepole, since they can't here to defend themselves. And consider the fact that muslims think the Prophet is holy, it's not weird that they're offended by a PICTURE of him, and not only a picture, but a highly offensive picture of him. We don't have that kind of culture here in the west (pepole portray Jesus all the time, especially Christians), and therefore we have a hard time understand that argument (at least I have, and I doubt I am the own). But (I believe) the reason they're so highly offended by it is a cultural thing more than anything else (and maybe the fact that this particular picture isn't the least funny, it's just bluntly offensive).

Übereil

[Prime Junta]

So threatening people with murder is just a consequence of the world not being perfect? And failing to understand how that works is really dumb?

Not a consequence. A feature.

Suppose you walk into a Hell's Angels clubhouse and yell "Bikers are fags!" and subsequently get beaten to death with a tire iron. Courageous or dumb? I say dumb.

Al Qaeda are much like the Hell's Angels, only more ideological. Going out of your way to insult them is dumb.

I honestly don't get it. Sometimes your sympathies are about as easy to understand as your conclusions, Prime Junta. If putting a price on someone's head isn't going too far, then where do you draw the line?

Of course it's going too far.

It isn't nice to antagonize people about their religion. But terrorism is criminal, plain and simple.

I agree entirely.

Squeek, just a question -- you quite frequently respond to my postings, and when I try to engage you, you withdraw into a corner to sulk, sometimes with a nice little insult thrown in. Do you, or do you not, want to talk with me? If you want to talk, I'm always ready, but your passive-aggressive stance makes it... un-fun, and unlikely to get anywhere fast.

[Squeek]

Squeek, just a question -- you quite frequently respond to my postings, and when I try to engage you, you withdraw into a corner to sulk, sometimes with a nice little insult thrown in. Do you, or do you not, want to talk with me? If you want to talk, I'm always ready, but your passive-aggressive stance makes it... un-fun, and unlikely to get anywhere fast.Here's the deal, PJ. IMO, there's not much point engaging you beyond taking opportunities to make clear distinctions. Even then, you dispute those too (like you just did). There's usually no need, anyway. You tend to be clear even when you're wrong, and that's enough.

I'd like to show you the same respect I show everyone else, Prime Junta. It's not easy. I'm not going to explain why, either. IMO, the reasons are fairly obvious. Call it passive-agressive or sulking or anything else you want. I don't agree, naturally, but that's fair enough.

[Prime Junta]

Here's the deal, PJ. IMO, there's not much point engaging you beyond taking opportunities to make clear distinctions. Even then, you dispute those too (like you just did). There's usually no need, anyway. You tend to be clear even when you're wrong, and that's enough.

I'd like to show you the same respect I show everyone else, Prime Junta. It's not easy. I'm not going to explain why, either. IMO, the reasons are fairly obvious. Call it passive-agressive or sulking or anything else you want. I don't agree, naturally, but that's fair enough.

Thanks for clearing that up. I won't be bothering you in the future by trying to draw you out, then.

[JemyM]

Even then it doesn't mean that all muslims are against freedom of speech and that is how some people portray them. Some portray all muslims as terrorists. I've even talked to people in England who said that if they see someone wearing the long dresses muslim men sometimes tend to wear and they also carry a backpack and they go to the metro (tube in London), that they feel threatened by it. Also that they see some other people move away from that muslim guy.
Every other person with a backpack is normal except for the muslim one.
Yes, a lot of people protested against it and I understand that it isn't normal to call for a ban on freedom of speech, but then they have the right to express their opinions freely too.

"Terrorists" is a rather American expression. I doubt many here would call muslims terrorists, to us they are just muslims. But there is a line between announcing that you belong to the religion and being a hardcore believer in the holy scripture. Moderates that just call themselves "muslims" are not neccessary bad, but the fundies are creepy.

If you feel offended by something, you have the right to respond to it and even ask for an apology. Asking for a change of constitution or other laws is a bit too much though.

That's pretty much what can be said on the subject. The controversy were way out of line and should by healthy circumstances not have been that great, and that was exactly what the cartoonist wanted to show.

[Squeek]

"Terrorists" is a rather American expression. I doubt many here would call muslims terrorists, to us they are just muslims.Maybe I should have been more clear. There are millions of muslims in America. They refer to terrorists as terrorists too. I've never met or even heard of anyone who thinks the terms "muslim" and "terrorist" are synonymous.