Just saw this in News.com.au:

IRAN’S largest selling newspaper announced today it was holding a contest on cartoons of the Holocaust in response to the publishing in European papers of caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed.

“It will be an international cartoon contest about the Holocaust,” said Farid Mortazavi, the graphics editor for Hamshahri newspaper - which is published by Teheran’s conservative municipality.He said the plan was to turn the tables on the assertion that newspapers can print offensive material in the name of freedom of expression.

“The Western papers printed these sacrilegious cartoons on the pretext of freedom of expression, so let’s see if they mean what they say and also print these Holocaust cartoons,” he said.

Where in the world has Mr. Mortazavi been for the past five or six decades?  Oh yeah, living in Iran under a repressive regime that would put him to death, or at least cut off his hands, should he deign to critique his own government or question Islam in any way.

Granted, the kooks seems to run all major institutions in Iran, but we have plenty of kooks here in the western world too.  We’ve had to tolerate offensive anti-Jew, anti-Christian media all our lives.  What will Mr. Mortazavi publish that has not been published before?

Mr. Mortazavi doesn’t even seem to understand that his silly contest will likely do nothing more than make Muslims in general look even worse than they already do after days of burning embassies, threatenting a “European 9/11,” etc.  But I’m sure he’ll go ahead anyway with his childish “contest” and ultimately publish a number of Holocaust cartoons.  Here is what you WON’T see happen when the cartoons go to press:

• Crowds of rioting Jews and Christians burning Iranian embassies.
• Demands for the murder of those who dared to create such offensive material.
• Jewish and Christian religious leaders inciting their followers to commit violent acts… of ANY kind.

You might see the cartoons reprinted so that the western press can highlight the extreme level of ignorance on display by the “Arab Media.”*  You might also see some religious and governmental leaders express their distaste.  You might even see a yawn or two from people like me who have had to tolerate such idiocy all their lives.
As Mr. Mortazavi stated in the article, this ridiculous contest is nothing more than a reaction to the one which took place in the Netherlands a few weeks ago.  I’ve said in a previous post that, yes, it was an ignorant thing to do…  Welcome to the free world!
And the western press is freer by far than the Arab Media*. Don’t believe me? Then read this:

Two Jordanian newspaper editors who published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad have been arrested.

Jihad Momani and Hisham Khalidi are accused of insulting religion under Jordan’s press and publications law.

Mr Momani was fired from the weekly Shihan after reproducing the cartoons - originally printed in Denmark - which have caused a global storm of protest.

This story is a perfect reflection of the double-standard imposed upon the world by many in the Muslim community.  They expect the world to know AND to be perfectly sensitive to their own religious mores, yet HAVE NO CLUE — or care for that matter — to learn even the least little bit about anyone else’s.

It reminds me of the time that that Taliban used AK 47’s to shoot up precious, irreplaceable Buddhist art that had been meticulously carved into the side of a mountain.   They destroyed it forever in a fit of religious extremism.
Which is why, when I hear of contests like this one, organized as a sort of tantrum-like response to the offensive behaviour of another, but one which is far worse than what precipitated their anger, it tells me that the people who work for this Iranian newspaper are child-like in their naivete.

My apologies for the run-on sentence.
—————————————–
* - This is an example of the “Arab Media” which al-Jazeera recently declared could soon rival western media in it’s dominance.