Today’s Jesus and Mo cartoon, called “relics”, appears both on Patreon and the J&M website. And on Patreon is this explanation:
Today’s comic comes in the wake of British MP Naz Shah trying to piggyback a blasphemy law on to proposed legislation regarding statues.
Here’s Shah’s tweet with a four-minute excerpt of her speech in Parliament. There is no end of the Muslim drive to prevent every criticism of their religion and its founder.
Today the Government proposed a bill to protect the emotional harm connected with the damaging of statues.
If people can understand the emotional connections to statues, then they can understand the connection Muslims have with the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ #NotJustACartoon. pic.twitter.com/WIKbQNkGhG
— Naz Shah MP 💙 (@NazShahBfd) July 5, 2021
And a bit of her kvetching in the House of Commons about “hurt feelings” when the Prophet (peace be upon him) is insulted. This is an excerpt from the AA (Anadolu Agency) report:
“As a Muslim, for me and millions of Muslims across this country and the quarter of the world’s population that is Muslim too, with each day and each breath, there is not a single thing in the world that we commemorate and honor more than our beloved Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him),” she said.
Shah drew comparisons between the British people’s attachment to figures such as Winston Churchill and Oliver Cromwell and Muslims’ love and endearment for their prophet.
Just as this new law aims to protect historical figures of the UK, the same protection should be extended to figures and individuals that hold importance for other communities, the lawmaker stressed.
“When bigots and racist defame, slander or abuse our Prophet (peace be upon him), just like some people do to the likes of Churchill, the emotional harm caused upon our hearts is unbearable. Because for 2 billion Muslims, he is the leader we commemorate in our hearts, honor in our lives and forms the basis of our identity and our very existence,” Shah asserted.
The thing is, it’s not illegal to mock or make fun of Winston Churchill or Oliver Cromwell.
But I digress; here’s the Divine Duo:
All the repetitive, desperate “peace be upon him” stuff always reminds me of Hamlet’s mother: “The lady doth protest too much methinks.”
It is no different to “the Reverend so and so…” used for Christian (and other religions’) clerics. It reminds me of the reference to an evil soul in Spanish as “el reverendo hijo de puta”. Did I say soul…!?
Nice
I can’t recall ever seeing a statue of Mohammed.
Having said that, this new law seems like bullshit to me. vandalising statues is already criminal damage and I can’t think of anything particularly emotionally harming about defacing any statue that you are likely to find in the UK.
Indeed. As a comment piece in The Grauniad said when the bill was announced
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2021/mar/15/tories-statues-safety-women-police-crime-sentencing-and-courts-bill-government
It’s all about shutting down any form of public protest against government. I simply don’t have the words to properly elucidate my feelings towards Boris and his despicable chums. Even approximating my thoughts in English would likely get me banned from the entire internet forever.
I feel similarly towards Johnson that many decent Americans felt towards Trump. I truly believe that Boris is just as bad as the orange fella, but he is doing things stealthily, bit by bit. Changes go largely unnoticed behind his posh voice and ruffled hair, but they’re creeping into our lives, curtailing our freedom. Him, Patel, Gove, Raab and the rest of the Tory govt are imposing nationalist, authoritarian populism on the UK. It sickens and frightens me.
I could weep when I look back to the 2012 olympics – as a country we were happy, open, welcoming and full of optimism. The UK was at the centre of the EU, we could live and work anywhere in the EU and would be treated as citizens of the EU state we settled in. Now, we are threatening to throw out people with families that have lived here for 15 years, just because they didn’t get the right paperwork. The hostility is appalling.
The Tories and their poisonous, scheming govt have done more damage in a few years than I would have thought possible. Racism, xenophobia and hate crimes are up, and a large portion of the public have turned their back on our European friends, and now look only inward. They bask in smug, patriotic glory, proud of our struggles in WW2 when they weren’t even bloody born.
Misguided British exceptionalism is back with a vengeance and Johnson continues to encourage its revival. He’s actually leading the charge – not content with dragging us out of the EU, he’s trying to break international law because it’s politically expedient for him to do so. Perfidious Albion never went away, but we are now as snide and untrustworthy as we ever were.
They have ripped the decency, kindness and joy out of our lovely country with nastiness and bile. And it’s all a result of them playing a political Game of Thrones with our future – BJ and others hoping to slither up that greasy pole to be PM.
This latest nonsense is just the latest in a long line of cold, uncaring and nonsensical legislation, drafted and passed by cold, uncaring ministers. Its only purpose is to control – rape is just one of those things to them, it happens to others. Statues are different – they like statues, and more importantly, statues are often damaged during protests. That’s why this has been passed, their latest move in the effort relieve us of democratic rights.
Yes, and in in the general theme of liberalism’s drive towards a less punitive-focused, more rehabilitative-focused criminal justice system, 10 years’ jail time for vandalizing a statue seems extremely excessive. How about: no jail time, pay for it, and do weekend public service (…maybe cleaning up other vandalism?) for umpteen weeks, depending on the offense. Ten years’ jail time for statue vandalism might as well be the “how to” book for turning a minor hooligan into a hardened criminal.
Both sides in the culture wars are illiberal and slightly nuts. Unfortunately that seems to include much of the political “elite” in so many countries now.
Jeez, last I looked there was no shortage of Brits willing to take the piss out of Sir Winston. And as for criticizing Cromwell — oh, hell, just ask the Irish.
It’s people like you what cause unrest by actually *thinking* about the words. The words are for feeling about, not thinking about.
There exists a famous bust of Beethoven. The emotional connection to Beethoven, his music, and the bust needs no explanation.
However, I personally understand that the bust is a piece of art – that is all it is – a person hewed this bust from raw material out of the earth. It is not Beethoven, nor his music. Anyone is free to be an a$$hole and drill the eyes out, slice the hair off, or toss it in the ocean, and Beethoven and his music remain unchanged.
I do not understand why this sort of thing needs such Deep Thought.
^^^ what I mean by Deep Thought : of course discussion is important. This statue thing however seems to be a red herring – a case where what it is does not match the concern… or something…
I find myself asking “so what?” to the statue stuff in the news.
Wasn’t Beethoven an ableist? Trying to pass as able to hear while being deaf in a hearing person’s world.
(/sarcasm)
I think there are some good aspects to the idea. But the law should only apply to statues of soccer players. Now Zlatan can move the statue to Manchester.
Also, there should be prison sentences for sculptors who sculpt sculptures that look nothing like the soccer players that the sculptures are supposed to be sculptures of.
I’ll send the JCB around (EN_US : “backhoe”, I think) if you tell me where Sir Henry Moore is buried.
Actually, since I have to rent by the week or not at all, send me a “little list” of Sculptors of Offence and their graves and I’ll deliver them to a prison of your choice. With fuel receipts.
How can you tell if a statue of a soccer player was really vandalized or if the statue is just embellishing?
That’s true, especially when the damn thing topples over and rolls around surrounded by angry players vying for the referee’s attention.
with each day and each breath, there is not a single thing in the world that we commemorate and honor more than our beloved Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him),” she said.
Anytime I read something like this I wonder how one could live a life so dull and tedious as this.
And then imagine the various descriptions of Heaven – an eternity of that crap.
I honestly believe that it’s time ridicule of Muslims and Islam is made mainstream and any counter violent reactions must be punished. With the left silencing any criticism of this horrible religion as “racist” must be met a counter response that punishes them for their hypocrisy. Tolerating intolerance should be in no ones interest and our rational and time wasting discussions don’t lessen the problem of global Islamic extremism. This is the time we say enough is enough to the left and those useless bunch who they’re trying to protect.
Well, calling Muslims a “useless bunch” is way, way too derogatory for me. I’d rather ridicule Islam than its adherents who, after all, were largely brainwashed into belief. It’s much kinder (and more efficacious) to criticize the bad beliefs than the people who hold them.
The thing is Churchill – like him or lump him and in spite of his many faults – did all non-Nazis an immeasurably valuable service in 1940. His courage, leadership, oratory and belief, along with his carefully cultivated friendship with FDR, saved the world from an even worse mess in 1940 & 41. Britain would have capitulated to Hitler without him, there’s very little doubt about that.
Where would we be now if he hadn’t stood up to the threat? I’m a UK citizen, and I detest and reject the whole idea of patriotism as a damaging addiction. However, I see Churchill (and FDR to a large extent) as saviours of western civilisation. The UK cabinet was prepared to sue for peace with the Nazis, God knows how it would have turned out if he wasn’t around.
The man wasn’t perfect; he was an imperialist, he was often racist, he contributed to huge problems in India – the famine etc. But where would we have been without him? What would have befallen us all in 1940 & 41? To my mind he deserves all the credit we can give him. The world would have collapsed head first into full blown tyranny without him.
As for Naz Shah – she can simply do one, get lost. Her tweet is outrageous.
Don’t know about UK speech laws, but the American reply to this is pretty obvious: “Oh don’t worry, offensive speech about Mohamed will get exactly the same legal punishment as offensive speech about Churchill and Cromwell.” 🙂
Yes, but in the USA that would be “no punishment at all”, at least from the state. In the UK, I can’t guarantee that saying offensive things about Mohammed will necessarily keep you out of prison, in the future, even if they are true.
Which is the point. 🙂
It’s win-win! Folks like Ms. Shah get the parity they claim they want, and liberals get the freedom they want.
The only way such a solution could possibly fail is if Ms. Shah is being insincere about wanting equal treatment. 🙂
Perhaps the most hurt feelings I get is when artworks are defaced. Michelangelo’s Pietà was hammered, the Mona Lisa was doused with acid, the Night Watch was slashed, as was Velázquez’s Rokeby Venus. These objects represent some of the highest achievements of mankind and have a kind of cultural sacredness. I doubt the punishment for these crimes was anything like 10 years. As has been pointed out, the artists and art are free to be ridiculed, just not physically damaged.
I’m not sure if the “4th plinth” in Trafalgar Square is still accepting artworks-of-the-month, but I for one would put a few squidlets towards putting a concrete statue of the cartoon of Mo, the body double of Mohammed up there.
Might be best to make it of moderately reinforced concrete though.
Or maybe of barbed wire (with welds & rebar) – it’ll glow nice and scary when you light a good fire under it.
Trafalgar Square, as a concept of commemorating a major massacre, in itself is a challenging concept.
I wonder what anti-climbing measures they’ve put on it these days. Used to be that protestors had to form an orderly queue to get their chance to summit it and unfurl their banner. Haven’t seen that for years.
I think it was graded about VS 5c, but with good, frequent protection from the bolt holes for the lightening conductor. Bit of a straw clencher for the overhang, but nothing drastic.
It may not be illegal to mock Churchill or Cromwell, but this bill makes it *extra*-illegal to damage a statue of either, when compared to damaging any other public property. It is hypocritical.
Imagine all the hurt feelings amongst the Russianx community when British commentators blame the beloved Родина for little things like novichok poisonings in Salisbury, and defame, slander, and abuse our Intelligence services and our Dear Leader, Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin.
If the trilogy is anything to go by, Mr Putin is a sweet pussycat compared to Mr Mohammed.
I’m outraged at Naz Shah’s tweet. Her seat is only 30 mins drive from where I live and I’m appalled by her trying to establish a false equivalence between damaging real statues and drawing an imaginary image. She probably won’t read it, but I tweeted her this:
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NO! This is outrageous from a UK MP. Damaging real statues IS NOT equivalent to drawing cartoons. You infer support for control of our rights to free expression – it’s egregious & un-British, harking back to medieval times. Blasphemy laws belong in the dark ages, along with your views.
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Shah’s feelings hurt by mocking Mohammed? Foei tog, who would not feel pity and compassion for her?