Cartoon fiasco. Normally, I wouldn't comment on this whole cartoon fiasco, but I read a great article in the Dallas Morning News today that brought (to me, at least) some perspective. In it, they linked to a page at the Anti-Defamation League that documents the portrayal of Jews in the Arab media. It's pretty nasty stuff, and demonstrates a little bit of hypocrisy on the part of those who have so violently demonstrated against the Danish cartoons.

Coming from a person who's neither Muslim nor Jewish, these cartoons are ever bit as offensive as the Danish ones. To be sure, both are very hurtful. Demonizing an entire race of humanity is no better than demonizing an entire religion. But where are the protests or letter-writing campaigns over the clearly anti-Semitic cartoons in the Arab media?

It is always easier to see the injustices that outsiders inflict upon you, rather than to see the flaws that come from within. There has been a trend throughout many Muslim countries to shift the blame from their governments to the actions of unnamed Zionists and conspirators. This is disappointing because much of the blame for the inequity and diminished world status of Muslim countries lies in the bad governance of their current and previous elected officials ruling parties.

Unfortunately, the approach by the Jyllands-Posten is the wrong one. Rather than engaging Muslims as humans, with their own hopes, desires and fears, the Danish paper taunted them. This took a lot of pressure off the Arab and Muslim governments, as they were able to point out these cartoons to the local people as a way to deflect criticism and diminish the growing appeal of democracy.

Everybody's doing everything wrong and pissing everyone else off, while the real problem continues... sheesh. To quote a line from Cool Hand Luke:

Hopefully, this whole row will catalyze some introspection in both Europe and the Muslim world.

UPDATE: A Qatari University lecturer says this whole thing is yet another Zionist conspiracy... the world needs some quick liberalization in that region. Faster, please. [via Solomania]

UPDATE: The Economist sums up my feelings perfectly. I love The Economist.

LAST UPDATE: Egyptian journalist and visiting lecturer Hani Shukrallah recently gave a talk here at Berkeley. His perspective is as interesting as it is timely, and available to read here. Excerpt:

Middle Eastern countries need more ability to debate, he said [...] The real promise of democracy may not be its potential to elect secular alternatives to those holding the power, formally or informally — as the recent victories by Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood illustrate — but "to recreate political space in the Arab world" that forces ideologists to demonstrate the validity and utility of their beliefs.

Read the whole thing.