Intruder at cartoonist's home

BBC News - Danish police shoot intruder at cartoonist's home

Danish police have shot and wounded a man at the home of Kurt Westergaard, whose cartoon depicting the Prophet Muhammad sparked an international row.

Mr Westergaard scrambled into a panic room at his home in Aarhus after a man wielding an axe and a knife broke in.

One of 12 cartoons published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands Posten, it depicted the Prophet Muhammad with a bomb in his turban.

In 2006 the paper apologised for the cartoons, but other European media reprinted them.

Danish embassies were then attacked by Muslims around the world and dozens killed in riots.

Mr Westergaard went in to hiding amid threats to his life, but emerged last year saying he wanted to live as normal a life as possible.

His house has been heavily fortified and is under close police protection.

 

I'd like to read up on what this guys thought process was when he drew up the cartoons. Local tensions are one thing, but in the days of Twitter, email, etc where you can communicate with a large audience in seconds, did he really expect his political "stand" would remain isolated?

While he definitely shouldn't have done things that would offend people in such a way, is it really enough to try and kill him over? I think not but then again I'm viewing it as a outsider of sorts since I'm not Muslim, from Denmark, etc.

 

Danish police should have shot the guy in the head I think ..absoluty not done what this pile of crap was trying to do there .A simple cartoon certainly doesnt justify a murder attempt ..pure dark ages terrorism .

 

ive contacted a few family friends as it where...hate kissing gold...and da vinci will be sleeping with the fishes by midnight..

 

It was more of an overreaction by the Muslim community...they seem to jump at the slightest opportunity to commit violence. How many cartoons are there of Catholics or Christian religious symbols? Yet, you don't see people rioting in the streets or calling for the head of the Cartoonist over those.

 

Certainly not trying to exuse a mad going Muslims actions, but:

We have to accept the fact, that most Muslim radicals and "true believers" are somewhat 300-400 years back in time.

And a cartoon like issue against Jesus 400 years ago in Europe, would have resulted in a burning stake party.

Since we all inhabit this planet however at the same time, unthoughtfull or thoughtless actions will cause thoughtless counterreactions.

Regards
Kruska

 

So, now there is a criteria for free speech.

Negative speech can be directed toward some but not others????? We can disagree with Christians in any manner because we don't have to fear them but don't disagree (or at least let them know it) with Muslims because they might blow us up. Doesn't anyone else see a problem here???

 

tfer13

The problem here seen is termed a "culture gap"

And I am sure that even in liberal Denmark they have laws to handle that particular Muslims behavior or doings.

Regards
Kruska

 

Good point, I guess it's a kind of "phase" of sorts. Religion aside, anything remotely Communist in the United States 50 years ago could have gotten you into similar situations.

Edit: tfer13, "extremism" exists in all religions, you will always have people that take things too far, the Army of God comes to mind. Not all movements have to be violent either, I remember a few months back a Atheism group rented out a few bus/train ads here supporting their movements. Christian groups weren't very pleased with it so they demanded they be removed and I think they were, they also put up their own ads that said "God Does Exist".

There was also another controversy here about a Hindu Temple who donated money to the local Zoo, in commemoration the Zoo put up a statue of one of the Hindu god Ganesh as part of a exhibition, the same groups demanded it be removed because of its religious association. In my own religion we've had our own fair share of terrorism since the 80s as well. I'm not saying this to demonize or put anyone or a group down, just pointing out extremism isn't associated with a single religion, group of people, etc nor does it necessarily have to be violent.

 

I myself (non-Muslim BTW), found the cartoon putting the bomb in the Prophet Muhammad's turban to be in poor taste to say the least. I wasn't that offended, but can see how a follower of the Muslim faith might be.

But this fellow's reaction did less good for the Muslim community than the cartoon did. This seems (to me) to verify the cartoon, not discredit same. I live in Montana, and only know three Muslims personally, and they are saddened by the "taint" seemingly placed on them by the extremist few. It seems to me similar to judging all Christians by the extreme fundamentalist groups, or cults like Jim Jones. Or judging all Buddists by the "Moonies", or something.

 

Here in Holland we already had a lunatic who slaughtered a writer called Theo van Gogh for something very similar .. The assasin took the risk that serious riots would have broken out after his barbarous deed in many parts in the country wich easily could have hurt many totally innocent muslims... lucky for him people are wisened by WW2 and wont flame up that easily around here but it really makes you wonder if that was the deeper meaning of his deed ....

 

Is this justification? I guess I don't see how bringing up that another religion doesn't like something has anything to do with this event. No comparison with Christians not liking signs and Muslims blowing up airplanes or killing authors etc....

I do agree there extremists everywhere. But there hasn't been religion associated violence to this scale since the holocaust. Sadly, I don't think it going away anytime soon.

 

I don't think anyone is trying to justify anything.

The KKK was a pretty big deal albeit they weren't into religion per say but more so race. Go back in history, the Vatican alone is a great source for corruption, assassinations, etc during the medieval ages. I believe their was a bomb plot in either France or Britain that was motivated by religion in the 1600s?

In Europe, is religion not one of the original reasons for the whole IRA struggle? Planes and such are being used by terrorists now simply because they are available, 200 years ago terrorists would have used another popular area to plan their attacks.

Islam is a huge religion, in the grand scheme of things those that actually use terrorism are a small fraction. There are also people within the religion who might hate the US, Britain, Israel, etc but not enough to use terror.