(...) Readers of Elenchus should have a look at Christopher Hitchens's essay on the subject on Slate, as well as the eloquent defense of the Western tradition of free expression by the irrepressible champion of secularism, Ibn Warraq in Der Spiegel, appropriately named "Democracy in a Cartoon."

(...) What our Muslim friends lack in historical sophistication they can find by recalling that no immigrant group has been spared satire and caricature--it's, alas, the price of enculturation. And it may be the price one has to pay for passport renewal in the EU or North America. Sorry. Anti-Catholic cartoons can be visited at a pro-Catholic website and the anti-Jewish cartoon propaganda at a site developed by, of all places, Calvin College (a reformed Dutch Reform college in Grand Rapids, Michigan). If you are looking for a clever article on the subject, go to Chris Orlet's piece, "The Right to Blapheme."

(...) Do we really do Muslims a favor by forgiving the trespasses we have brought into being through a century and a half of double-dealing and political hypocrisy? Do we really want one rule book for secularized Christians and Jews (the vast majority) another for noisy, repugnant, but basically harmless born-Again Christians, and a third for noisy and lethal Muslims?

The Pipes and Hoffman call attention to simlar solutions, but different problems, that in turn puts us all in a collision course to a clash of cultures, indeed civilizations - one with and one without (a civilized society acceptable to a modern world). From Pipes piece we are called to focus on whether or not we in the West are willing to accede to a double standard by which Muslims are free to insult Judaism, Christianity, Hinduism, and Buddhism, while Muhammad, Islam, and Muslims enjoy immunity from insults - which of course is unacceptable. On the other hand, in the Hoffman piece the Muslims are called upon to accept blaspheme and insult as the price of inculturation and the West, which is unacceptable to Islam, while in turn for the West to reject the "noisy and lethal" Muslims, in other words, stand up and defend the freedoms of democracy.

And there lies the problem. Muslims do not want to "inculturate," they won't the West to accept Islamic culture and law as the rule of the land, and nothing less. For the West, this is totally unacceptable. Eventually, the West will have to take a stand, and fight, or capitulate to Islam. There are no other alternatives.

As Pipes points out in his article, the deeper issue here, is not Muslim hypocrisy but Islamic supremacism. As the Danish editor who published the cartoons, Flemming Rose, explained, if Muslims insist that he, as a non-Muslim, should submit to their taboos ... they're asking for his submission. Again, this is unacceptable. We are going to have to join together and say no more encroachment on our freedoms, or begin signing up to join a local mosque.

I can't resist inserting a bit of a "post script" here. In TCS Daily today, Robert McHenry closes his piece entitled, "What Is a Picture of Muhammad, Anyway?", with this commen on "taking offense," which is apparently almost an addiction to many if not most in the Muslims community:

In cultures still struggling with the implications of the 18th century and marked chiefly by ignorance, tribalism, and religiosity, and in lieu of good government, economic opportunity, and liberty, it's the popular drug of choice.

As with Islamic supremism - the demand on the part of Muslims that non-Muslims submit to their beliefs and traditions, the apparent inability and outright refusal on the part of Muslims to inculturate, the inherent belief that the West should submit to Islamic rule, and all juxtaposed with this "drug of choice" described by McHenry - the taking offense that he describes as being characteristic of the 18th century and marked chiefly by ignorance, tribalism, and religiosity, and in lieu of good government, economic opportunity, and liberty - are all now coming together in one gigantic clash for the future of the world. Never has this been so obvious, as what we've all witnessed on the part of Muslims who have reacted like crazed animals to a few silly cartoons.