“Are cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad as a terrorist the moral equivalent of using the n-word when speaking to an African-American?
Ihsan Bagby, a University of Kentucky professor of Arabic and Islamic studies, says a deep racism is behind the cartoons that have sparked riots and deaths throughout the Muslim world.
“This is simply another manifestation of racism that they have decided to cloak in freedom of speech,” he said.
Bagby was one of three featured speakers yesterday as more than 150 people filled a meeting room at UK’s W.T. Young Library to discuss the cartoons. Violent protests of the cartoons have resulted in at least 45 deaths, the latest 15 just the day before the event.”
Hold up! Wait a minute!!
Apparently Bagby has not been in this country long enough!
For starters:
#1- Black folk don’t blow things up or kill folk if someone call us the n-word.
#2- Our own songs contain the n-word. I didn’t know that there was an acceptable way to defame the name of Mohammed.
#3- Those cartoons are no more related to racism than Don Knotts to Murder Inc.
Later in the article, Bagby is quoted saying…
“They are not at all funny, and they are deeply, deeply offensive,” Bagby said.
That’s because Muslims think that the image of Muhammad should never be shown, he said.
Then why in the world did they not raise all this hell way back when?
The Islamic Prayer rugs play an important role in prayer and involve many factors. The first actual prayer rug was made around the fourteenth century, but it is said that the prophet, Muhammad, was depicted in many painting sitting on a prayer rug at an earlier date (Calatchi 39). (Source)
And this…
Portraying prophet from Persian art to South Park
By Anthony Browne and Ruth Gledhill
DESPITE the outcry, the Danish cartoons of Muhammad are just the latest in a long line of depictions of the Muslim prophet, both in the West and in Islamic countries. From Ottoman religious icons to market stalls in Iran, from the US Supreme Court building to the South Park cartoon, Muhammad has been frequently portrayed in flattering and unflattering lights. (more…)
Bagby also said this:
“He compared the climate that allowed the cartoons to be published to the climate that existed in America when it was considered acceptable to use slurs against blacks, Jews, and Italian and Irish immigrants. And to the growing feeling toward Hispanics today.”
Watch Comedy Central for at least a day and you will see that they cover all the bases.
Yeah, racism is wrong, but there is something afoot in this case–Bagby and others that share his opinion know full well that Americans for the most part have been kept out of the fray in this situation (other than what we see in the media). Because of this, the American opinion (which does hold a lot of weight in international affairs) has been pretty neutral. Bagby knows that the only way he can sway that opinion his way is by making it into a racial issue. Despite Comedy Central and other similar outlets where racial stereotypes are “acceptable” , religious tolerance is not as high on the totem pole in this country as racial sensitivity—and folks like Bagby know this!
My guess? This will not be the last time we hear this issue being framed as a racial debate.
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