MiamiHerald.com | 02/08/2006 | Clash of cultures and values

MiamiHerald.com 02/08/2006 Clash of cultures and values: "
Published on Wed, Feb. 08, 2006

DANISH CARTOONS
Clash of cultures and values
BY FRIDA GHITIS

If you listen carefully, you can almost hear the sounds of arguing editors in newsrooms all over the world. To print or not to print, that is the question. What shall news organizations do about the explosion of irreconcilable differences over European cartoon images of the Prophet Mohammed?

News organizations face a choice: Print the cartoons and knowingly offend Muslims, who have told us in not uncertain terms the cartoons constitute blasphemy; or refrain from printing or broadcasting them and, thus, give in to what is an effort to muzzle freedom of the press. The dilemma affects every newsroom because the story has grown so large that it cries out for detailed reporting. When a news organization decides not to show the cartoons, it deliberately chooses to tell an incomplete story.

It is no accident that the raging controversy has not exploded with the same bitterness in America. To understand the actions of both sides, and the fury of the debate, one must remember that Europe today stands at a cultural turning point. A massive wave of Muslim immigration is changing the society. Many Europeans feel their values are under siege. Some think liberal European countries have gone so far in accommodating the values of Muslim immigrants, that they are sacrificing their own secular freedoms, including the freedom to declare nothing is sacred.

Initially, the dilemma only affected Danish editors, who first printed the series of a dozen Mohammed cartoons last September. The controversy simmered on a low flame until a few weeks ago, when the editor of a tiny Norwegian paper decided to reprint the drawings, along with an interview with two local cartoonists who said they felt drawing Mohammed would endanger their lives.

The pictures show the revered Muslim prophet in largely unflattering ways. In one his turban is a bomb with a sparkling fuse, in another he declares paradise is running out of virgins -- an allusion to the claim that Muslim suicide bombers (martyrs in some eyes) are entitled to 72 virgins in heaven. Muslims erupted in a fury. Any depiction of the prophet, they explained, is blasphemous and it brings them pain. When the Danish editor apologized, editors across Europe reprinted the cartoons in country after country. Journalists brandished the images as proud shields in what they view as a dangerous assault against freedom of expression, freedom of thought, and freedom of the press.

The new battle in the clash of civilization was joined. Arab countries -- where viciously anti-Semitic cartoons are daily fare -- recalled ambassadors from European posts. Mobs burned Danish embassies in several countries, police shot protesters in Kabul, and Palestinians threatened to kidnap citizens of the offending countries.

To Muslims, the printing and broadcast of the cartoons looks like a provocation, a transparent effort to hurt and to stereotype. To mainstream Europeans, however, this is a battle over which culture will have to adapt as East and West blend in a shrinking world. While it is true that discrimination against Muslims is on the rise, these cartoons were not part of a systematic effort to degrade and vilify Muslims. And the reprints have clearly been intended as a statement about press freedom, not as racist incitement. That should be the standard by which free societies judge whether offensive material can be permitted.

Editors routinely choose to leave material out. The choice is a cultural one. Profanity is replaced by bleeps, and disturbing images are left out. For Europe, however, the images of Mohammed represent one of today's most pressing questions. Whose culture will determine what is acceptable? The answer to that question will go a long way in determining the values of a fast changing Europe and an ever-shrinking world.

Frida Ghitis writes about world affairs. She is the author of A Changing World in the Age of Live Television.