Danish Muhammad cartoonist Kurt Westergaard defiant in face of threats and alleged murder plots
It’s so good to read of the courage of this man, who’s cartoons came to represent the struggle to maintain freedom of speech in the West, even in the face of the fact that Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet Mohammad.
It’s just a shame that Yale press were so cowardly:-
Why Did Yale Censor the Danish Cartoons?
We all have to suffer offence in this world and there will never be such a thing as a world free from offence, no matter how hard they try to legislate for ‘hate crimes’, it simply doesn’t work. We all have to be grown up about it, secure in our own identity and beliefs and get on with life frankly.
The Associated Press by Jan M. Olsen
COPENHAGEN, Denmark – A few pen strokes thrust Kurt Westergaard into the midst of an international crisis, exposing him to death threats and an alleged assassination plot.
Terror charges brought against two Chicago men this week show the 74-year-old Dane remains a potential target for extremists, four years after he drew a caricature of the Prophet Muhammad wearing a bomb-shaped turban.
“I am an old man so I am not so afraid anymore,” Westergaard said Tuesday in an interview with Jyllands-Posten, the Danish newspaper that first published his drawing in September 2005 along with 11 other cartoons of Muhammad.
The drawings triggered an uproar a few months later when Danish and other Western embassies in several Muslim countries were torched by angry protesters who felt the cartoons had profoundly insulted Islam.
Islamic law generally opposes any depiction of the prophet, even favourable, for fear it could lead to idolatry.
Westergaard has said it took him 45 minutes to make the drawing, considered by many Muslims to be the most offensive of the 12 cartoons. He has rejected calls to apologize to Muslims, saying poking fun at religious symbols is protected by Denmark’s freedom of speech.
The drawing was meant to illustrate that extremists draw “spiritual ammunition from Islam,” but not criticize the religion as a whole, he told broadcaster DR in February 2008 after Danish police uncovered an alleged plot to kill him.
“I realize that when issues of religion are involved emotions run high, and all religions have their symbols, which possess great importance,” he said. “But when you live in a secularized society, it’s clear that religion can’t demand some sort of special status. … “I have a problem with the fact that we have people from another culture who don’t accept that we use religious elements in a drawing.”
The cartoon uproar forced Westergaard underground, living under the protection of Denmark’s intelligence agency, PET.
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