—–

Maybe a better name for Jon Stewart’s rally would’ve been “Multicultural-Sensitivity Suicide Rally.” Or maybe Colbert wasn’t kidding about keeping the fear alive. According to Nick Cohen at Standpoint, Salman Rushdie, the author forced into hiding for years because of the Cat Stevens (Yusaf Islam) approved fatwa on his head, is just as confused as everyone else:

“I’ve always liked Stewart and Colbert but what on earth was Cat Yusuf Stevens Islam doing on that stage? If he’s a “good Muslim” like Kareem Abdul-Jabbar then I’m the Great Pumpkin. Happy Halloween.”

Stevens-Islam has been trying to backtrack from his comments for some time now, claiming they were some kind of joke. Does he look like he’s putting everyone on in that video? Rushdie isn’t buying the joke excuse either:

However much Cat Stevens/Yusuf Islam may wish to rewrite his past, he was neither misunderstood nor misquoted over his views on the Khomeini fatwa against The Satanic Verses (Seven, April 29). In an article in The New York Times on May 22, 1989, Craig R Whitney reported Stevens/Islam saying on a British television programme “that rather than go to a demonstration to burn an effigy of the author Salman Rushdie, ‘I would have hoped that it’d be the real thing’.”

(more…)

Art is a tricky subject. Everyone’s a critic and some react a little more strongly than others. Just ask Molly Norris. Art critics in the Muslim world have put her on a hit list for some of her work.

Ms. Norris is a cartoonist who stood up for freedom of speech…for awhile. After the animated show “South Park” bowed to pressure and threats and removed a piece from a show showing the Prophet Muhammad in a bear suit, Ms. Norris started a movement called “Everybody Draw Muhammad Day.” The idea took off and groups both left and right got behind the idea of standing up for freedom of expression.

Radical Yemeni-American cleric Anwar al-Awlaki

Some liberal cowards like Atlanta Journal Constitution “political cartoonist” Mike Luckovich didn’t join in because they were already aware of the way Islamic critics give a bad review. As were the folks at one of my favorite shows “The Simpsons.” After the “South Park” incident they had Bart do his punishment on the chalk board by writing, “South Park – We’d stand beside you if we weren’t so scared.”

I’m not sure of Molly Norris’ political leanings but after her crusade for freedom took off, she backed away. She apologized to Muslims for offending them. She was honest as to why she was backing away when she drew a cartoon with herself saying, “I said that I wanted to counter fear and then I got afraid.” (more…)

Well after its phenomenal success of eight Oscars, four Golden Globes, seven BAFTA’s, and $350 million at the boxoffice, “Slumdog Millionaire” has managed to stay alive. As much an amazing longshot victor as its hero, an urchin from the Mumbai slums cum tea server at a phone call center who wins a fortune in an Indian version of “Who Wants to Be a Millionaire?,” “Slumdog” has kept making news in ways deeply rooted in its own depiction of the world.

Recently the film’s British director Danny Boyle, serving as jury president of the 12th Shanghai Film Festival, confided during a panel discussion that on “Slumdog” he had shed the patronizing, “imperialist” mentality, relying heavily on a local Indian crew. Boyle also observed that while it was “regrettable” that Beijing imposed censorship restrictions on its filmmakers, he’d nonetheless love to work in China, as it would be a “challenge learning Mandarin.” Boyle neglected to mention that on “Slumdog” he’d skipped the challenge of learning Hindi, necessitating an Indian co-director, and also skipped the patronizing practice of paying Western wages, and the low pay for local child actors would fuel most of the subsequent controversies. (more…)

Sorry that I can’t cry over Roger Friedman’s firing as a columnist from FOXNews.com.

It’s not just that he ignored the age-old advice–don’t blank where you live/eat/work.  And it’s not just that as an entertainment industry writer, he was an uber-liberal who rarely wrote anything of interest and mostly gushed over the vapid celebs he covered.

It’s that left-wing politics dominated his absurd praise of left-wing propaganda on the silver screen and his apologism for extremist Muslims in showbiz. (more…)

Valentine’s Day was the 20th anniversary of the death fatwa issued against The Satanic Verses novelist Salman Rushdie by Iran’s Ayatollah Khomeini, whose stern expression glowered down from many a wall-sized banner throughout his country, and whose declaration, “There is no fun in Islam,” is a masterpiece of comical understatement.

In another notable understatement (considering that the Islamist foothold in England is so great that it gave rise to the expression “Londonistan”), BBC arts correspondent Lawrence Pollard said recently that the Rushdie controversy galvanized “a stronger sense of Muslim identity in Britain.”  Nothing like having a blasphemer to behead to bring some people together, I guess.  “Until that time there had been assumed support for the broad principle of free speech,” Pollard adds.  “The Rushdie affair introduced the question of how far free expression should be limited to avoid offending religious feelings in a multicultural society.”

No, it introduced the question of how far expression should be limited to avoid the hysterical, worldwide, lethal mob violence of Muslims, since no one in the media, especially the BBC, gives a second thought to offending the religious feelings of Buddhists, Jews, Hindus, animists, Satanists and especially Christians, because none of those groups will kill you for it.  Indeed, taking pop culture potshots at Christianity is such a common pastime for the Western media that Christians can barely even muster the energy for an angry e-mail or two. (more…)