Discourse Chronicle

Some two decades ago, relations between Europe and the Islamic world were convulsed by the controversy surrounding the publication of the book The Satanic Verses. It is depressing that cartoons first printed in a Danish newspaper last autumn appear to have had much the same effect now. It should not, alas, be surprising. The cultural chasm has, if anything, grown in the past 20 years. Many in Europe today think nothing of mocking the most revered aspects of Christianity — often in a crass, tasteless manner — while the abject corruption and failure of secular regimes in the Middle East have helped to inspire a revival of Islam, including a most extremist strain.

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On balance, we have chosen not to publish the cartoons but to provide weblinks to those who wish to see them. The crucial theme here is choice. The truth is that drawing the line in instances such as these is not a black-and-white question. It cannot be valid for followers of a religion to state that because they consider images of the Prophet idolatry, the same applies to anyone else in all circumstances. Then again, linking the Prophet to suicide bombings supposedly undertaken in his honour was incendiary. The Times would, for example, have reservations about printing a cartoon of Christ in a Nazi uniform sketched because sympathisers of Hitler had conducted awful crimes in the name of Christianity.

category: Comics, Politics, Popular Culture, Rhetoric and Poetics