Since I haven’t had the chance to comment on the cartoons controversy, I thought I should start by commenting about the Boston Globe opinion piece written by Jeff Jacoby in which he asserts that we are all Danes as Le Monde, the French newspaper wrote after 9/11 that “Nous sommes tous Américains (we were all Americans).” My problem with the assertion that we are all Danes is that once again it is an attempt to divide the world into two sides, the side who has the truth and morality on its side, and the one who is just wrong and should join the good side. I do not believe that the Danish flag deserves to be burn and that Danish products deserve to be boycotted by Muslims who have been offended by the cartoons published in a Danish newspaper.
Denmark
is a fine country, but it is not the world. I do believe in the freedom of the Press and even more, I believe in the freedom to provoke, to insult, and to disrespect. However, I cannot approve need that so many have to oversimplify complicate issues by making it seem as though there is one unique way to see things. We can’t be all Danes because that would mean that we are all the same, that be something other than Dane is not only wrong, but also illegitimate, and that there is just one culture and one good side.
In an article, in today’s Washington Post, Flemming Rose, the culture editor of the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten that publishes the cartoons explains why he made the decision to do so. He writes that, “The idea wasn't to provoke gratuitously -- and we certainly didn't intend to trigger violent demonstrations throughout the Muslim world. Our goal was simply to push back self-imposed limits on expression that seemed to be closing in tighter.” He attempts to place the publication of the cartons in the Danish context and although he says his newspaper has apologized for the fact that Muslims have felt insulted, he insists that he and his newspaper cannot apologize for the right to public the newspaper. He ends his article by stating that, “As a former correspondent in the Soviet Union, I am sensitive about calls for censorship on the grounds of insult. This is a popular trick of totalitarian movements: Label any critique or call for debate as an insult and punish the offenders…The lesson from the Cold War is: If you give in to totalitarian impulses once, new demands follow. The West prevailed in the Cold War because we stood by our fundamental values and did not appease totalitarian tyrants.” Mr. Rose does not get it. The central issue of this debate is freedom of expression or freedom of the press. I believe that the central issue is one of commiseration and of empathy, and more importantly of failure to communicate because of fear and of absolute beliefs. Mr. Rose is right not to apologize for the publication of the cartoons but he misses the point when he combines totalitarianism, freedom of speech, religion and everything else. He fails to understand that what is doing in his article is precisely the problem because he is saying it isn’t the cartoon, it is them stupid. He is saying the problem isn’t with me or with my newspaper; the problem is over there, with all of those people who cannot stand the fact that we are free. The belief that Mr. Rose that he is fighting a war against totalitarianism is not only problematic but a source of conflict because it shows that he lives in a bubble and that he needs not to get out of his little world and to learn more about other people’s realities. I do not think that all of those who are offended are Islamists nor are people who do not believe in freedom. I believe that a lot of people are offended precisely because Mr. Rose as his view point demonstrates has put them in the wrong side of the world and has said in fact that dialogue, communication, exchange of ideas are impossible because one side has more than God in its side, it has the truth. That is not only wrong but it dangerous. As I said, I believe in more than freedom of expression, I believe in the right to provoke, but once you do provoke, you have to be willing to listen and to view with open eyes the results of your provocation. The argument is not for self-censorship, but it is to level the playing field of the debate by asking those who are on this pedestal of rightness to get off it to listen, to stop acting like children or immature adults, and to understand that the issue is not right, freedom, about what is permissible or not. The issue is about how we communicate with each other. We do not have to agree, but we have to challenge each other to do better than to provoke just for the sake of provocation, we have to challenge each other to know more, to do more, and to try harder to understand each other to avoid violence and clashes. I fear for a world where the only means of communication is provocation and where dialogue becomes impossible because of absolutes. Mr. Rose believes religiously that he is on the right side. So are the ones who are asking for the head of his cartoonists. If those are the only two sides available then we are in trouble and the gap of nothingness will never be filled. Again the choice isn’t between appeasement or surrender. The choice is between communication, understanding, chaos, and endless confrontations. From what I understood, Mr. Rose wanted to provoke a confrontation, he succeeded, what we must now do is to open our eyes, our ears, and our minds to understand. We do not have to change who we are and our values but we have to understand that no everybody is like who are and likes our values. The goal should be to communicate, to exchange ideas, and to attempt to convince one another not through provocation or violence but through the logic and the soundness of our arguments. It is precisely because those who believe in freedom of express have the most powerful arguments that they must avoid the temptation to use solely provocation because it will only close minds to the force of their arguments. We all have to live in the same world and for that reason and because it is no longer possible to isolate ourselves and to ignore one another, we have one world means consensus and that consensus building requires the end of extremisms.