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Get a Sense of Humour

Entry 279, on 2006-02-05 at 09:41:22 (Rating 4, News)

Violence by Muslims against the countries they see as insulting their religion through the famous cartoons of the prophet Mohammed is growing. First they were burning flags, now they're burning embassies! Its a bit of an over-reaction to something which I see as fairly innocuous. The cartoons, which are easily available on the Internet if you don't see them in newspapers, really aren't particularly insulting in my opinion.

Of course, my opinion doesn't count, because I'm an atheist and don't take any aspect of religion particularly seriously. I've said it many times before, and I'll say it again: religion is OK, as long as you don't take it seriously. Clearly these pyromaniac protesters have let things get a little bit out of perspective.

On many occasions I have defended the Islamic world, and pointed out that Christianity is also guilty of many over-zealous acts. But this tends to be more in the past. Maybe its just because Christianity is older, and has evolved into a more sensible old age. Of course there are plenty of crazy fundamentalist Christians around as well - but as far as I know, they haven't burnt down any buildings to make their point recently.

And there is another political and cultural aspect to this as well. Its an "us against them", thing. The Islamic world sees the western world as an oppressor and enemy. Any attack on Islamic religious beliefs, no matter how trivial, is bound to increase tension because of this simmering background of mistrust.

So do I think the cartoons were a bad thing? Well I didn't find them very amusing. But I support the right of cartoonists and other artists to use humour and satire to make a point. Anyone who can't accept this really needs to get a sense of humour!

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