Taking a stand

Non-violent Islamist groups like the Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) do try to distance themselves from the behaviors of radical Islamists. They, however, do not respond logically by actively voicing the need for necessary reforms against blasphemy laws and theocracy of the Islamic state. Their director, Ibrahim Hooper instead told FoxNews.com that “it may be a setup to smear Islam.” True to form, Islamists will always contrive deflective bizarre conspiracy theories reflecting their pathological denial when case after case of violent Islamists should point Muslims instead toward the need for deep seeded reform.

Private corporations like Comedy Central, Sony Entertainment, and various book publishers will probably try to tell us that their decisions are not guided by real censorship but rather based in concerns of physical safety, liability, and some concerns of profit losses in the face of boycotts. These distinctions and excuses matter little.

At AIFD we believe companies producing the work of artists should stand behind their products. These companies are entering into a shared free market mission of art production with writers and videographers. If they censor their artists when things get hot due to the physical and existential threats of militants, they have shirked one of their deepest ethical responsibilities to our nation in which they operate—the preservation of a climate of genuine free speech and thought.

There is no mandate in the Islam I know and practice for anyone to force respect of Islam or the Prophet Mohammed and likewise to punish offensive art. In fact the Islam I learned taught me that the Prophet Mohammed was subjected to profoundly offensive criticism and ridicule during his life. He met this criticism with dialogue or avoidance with an admonishment to Muslims to either ignore it or respond positively, peacefully, and intellectually. This is the true example of the Prophet of Islam. Words and art, even when offensive, were never to be met with anything but mutual respect.

We desperately need a national conversation on the inherent duties of media and corporations in the war of ideas. We need to have a united front against these insidious threats, which radical Islamists impose upon artists and upon all of us. America cannot survive without the freedom of speech. Freedom of speech cannot survive in an environment that panders to political correctness.

As a devout Muslim dedicated to defeating Islamists, I am pleading with the artistic and intellectual community to stop their pathological timidity against Islamism. The last stronghold of human equality and principles of freedom is our First Amendment and the inviolable nature of free speech. Our culturally collective slide down the slippery slope of Islamist blasphemy laws is sending us hurling toward a society bizarrely no different from Sudan, which will remain a global obstacle to the very reforms we need within Muslim communities. My family escaped Syria and the Middle East because America represented the supposed beacon of freedom around the world to protect those voices, which the thugs of the Middle East would not protect. Yet a small group of thugs behind a computer right here in America can invoke the same fear we thought we left behind in the lands of autocracy and theocracy.

While the excuses are different, the end result of censorship on South Park’s 200th episode is the same as what the government of Sudan did to that schoolteacher.

Media companies need to understand that the root cause of Islamist terrorism is the desire of Islamists to stifle critique and put into place the shar’iah of political Islam like blasphemy laws around the world. The profound uptick in homegrown terror plots in 2009 shows that we are losing the war of ideas on the home front and globally.

Programs like South Park cannot have special standards for Islam versus that which they have for the program’s treatment of Christianity, Scientology, or any faith tradition. Islamists will capitalize on this double standard and it will nurture their sense of supremacy, which feeds the narrative that fuels terrorism.

There is a reason free nations have adopted the effective principle that “we do not negotiate with terrorists.”

As a devout Muslim I will be the first to acknowledge that we have a great deal of work to do in reinterpreting Islamic scripture in a manner that marginalizes radical theocratic interpretations into ideological oblivion. We need to better lift up modern, pluralistic interpretations of Islamic scripture which are in fact not in conflict with western principles of universal freedom and societies that are based in one law that does not favor one religion above others.

The only way to force real reform within the Muslim consciousness is to show a united front in the defense of artists and their freedom of expression. Once radical Islamists find themselves beating their head against a wall, they will eventually wither and disappear. Corporations distributing the work of provocative artists need to take the artists as a whole package. Once the companies begin to pick and choose the populations they feel comfortable offending and those they do not, they become gateway drugs for the advancement of radical Islamists.

Comedy Central took a small “wannabe terror cell,” Revolution Muslim, and made them into an effective global leader of political Islam and its imposition of blasphemy laws. Every other corporation that caves into physical threats by radical Islamists does the same.

Brave anti-Islamist Muslim dissidents around the world should be collectively offended by the actions of Comedy Central and every other individual, corporation, and government which bows to the intimidation of Islamists domestically and abroad. Believe it or not, shirking away from the defense of free speech in America profoundly affects many deeply devout Muslims dedicated to defeating the ideas of theocracy. There are Muslims across the globe fighting an internal civil war against extremists and Muslim theocrats that manifests at many levels over the role of clerics in government and law. Ultimately they become the first victims of the blunt instrument of theocratic shari’ah law because of the avoidance behavior right here in supposedly the freest nation on earth.

M. Zuhdi Jasser is the President of the American Islamic Forum for Democracy based in Phoenix, Arizona. He is a former U.S. Navy Lieutenant Commander. He can be reached at zuhdi@aifdemocracy.org