London protests
Joygantic has pictures from the protests in London concerning the Danish cartoons. This one is my favorite, though this comes a close second. For a country like Denmark that prides itself on its civility, framing this as a violation of manners is exactly the right response. I'll wait to hear his full report, but based on the pictures, I draw some comfort from the lack of burning flags, people throwing rocks at police, or other visible signs of violent protest.
posted by L&D at
5:32 PM
1 Comments:
There were actually two demonstrations here in London. The first was extremely ugly. There was one person dressed as a suicide bomber and many others carrying signs threatening to repeat the 7 July Tube bombings. The police have since found and arrested several of these people: the young man dressed as a suicide bomber has apologised. But as here was out of prison on parole...he has since been returned to jail (non-terrorist related).
I was in Covent Garden on the day of the second protest. I was playing tour guide to friends from Paris, I must have just missed Joygantic!
Back to the protest, this time it was much more reasonable, the photos that Joygantic posted are from this second day. The organisers stated that they were protesting not only the cartoons, but the violence and terrorist propaganda being distributed during the first protest. For that I applaud them, and good on them for protesting against the publication of the "blasphemy". I certainly agree that there was plenty of room for compromise, and an apology after Jyllands-Posten doesn't seem like much to have asked for.
Having said that...I walk about the East End and I regularly see young girls dressed in full burkha. I don't know from what age this is done, but it frequently starts during their childhood from what I see of teepees of under 1m being lead past me onto the bus. I feel that anyone forcing their daughter to walk around in a teepee with virtually no light from the end of their childhood and subsequently the rest of their life should they remain part of the community, is breaking an awful lot of laws here in England, and being terribly uncivil. I don't really see the room for compromise on everything with certain groups immigrating to Europe, or with odd religious cults that spring up here, either. There are Muslims in Europe that demand that Islam have a role similar to the Catholic Church, or the state religion Church of England here. I wholehearted agree with them. But there are many Muslims in Britain calling for the death of the cartoonist from J-P. These are groups who seek to impose a minority religion's views, and at times horrors, upon us by threats. I have no desire for Europe to go back to the Dark Ages, or to shift to modern Saudi law for that matter. What happened to the attitude after 9/11 when the "Allied Coalition" was going to save Afghan women that have been terrorised by the Taliban for decades? The positive side of bringing democracy the majority of a nation that was terrorised under a dictatorship?
Whatever the riot fodder provided by these cartoons and its fall-out are really worth has long been depassed. It seems pretty clear that the US and Europe are losing the cultural war against a small group of Islamic minority extremists. Great...
Okay, back to thinking about lab...
hmmm, no, there I have to worry about bird flu...perhaps hillwalking, yes, innocent enough as a topic!
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cij, at 11:11 AM
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