All Intensive Purposes

I hereby exercise my First Amendment right to agree with Hugh Hewitt:

Some of the commentary on the cartoons in the farther reaches of the internet has that quality to it --of a desire to throw off the subterfuge and get on with the "clash of civilizations." . . . .

Defending the right to publish offensive material . . . mean and shouldn't mean having to defend the content published. And it certainly doesn't mean having to reproduce the material. . . .

Some are arguing that the cartoon with Mohammed wearing a bomb isn't offensive, a very different argument from the "cartoons are offensive, but the West defends the right to be offensive." Would a cartoon of Christ's crown of thorns transformed into sticks of TNT after an abortion clinic bombing be offensive? Of course it would be . . . . At least begin with the obvious: Some of the cartoons were offensive.

. . . [M]ost of the commentary on the cartoons seems to me to be off point. I have yet to see any commentator --in the U.S. at least-- who is demanding the Danish government apologize or that press freedom be restricted in any way. I haven't seen any commentator argue that threats aginst the papers that published the cartoons are other than evil, or that the burning of embassies or other manifestations of jihadist rage are anything but condemnable.

But the central issue is largely unaddressed: Does the press in the West owe the war effort against the jihadists nothing, or even anything at all? The jihadists are hungry for information and for propaganda. If the West's media is eager to supply either or both, there isn't much anyone can do to stop that supply -- nor should there be -- except via careful reminders to responsible journalists that there's a war on, and everything that is printed is part of that war.

Some of my e-mail is full of the predictable "We are already at war with Islam" nonsense. We aren't, and we should do everything in our power to prevent such a catastrophe. From Soxblog:

I believe that the vast majority of people, regardless of what faith they are born into, will opt for peace and prosperity over war and hardship if they have such a choice available to them. The argument that Muslims are inherently different from all other peoples in this regard is fatuous in the extreme. Examples of hundreds of millions of Muslims who have chosen a lifestyle that doesn't feature violent Jihad is easily attainable.

None of this makes their dangerous co-religionists any more cuddly or less threatening. The menace posed by the Jihadist mentality is undeniable. Calling it out and identifying it is a necessary precursor to fighting it.

But demonizing a billion people because of the faith they were born into is not.

Many commentators want to define the debate as an either/or choice between the cartoonists and the jihadists. That's not the debate at all, and suggests an inability to grasp the real complexity here. It is not only consistent but compelling to both demand that the jihadists who threaten the press or who burn embassies be defeated and to also conclude that the cartoon fiasco was an unnecessary and expensive diversion from the central confrontation with the jihadists.

Publishing material that will offend Moslims just for the sake of 'showing them that we won't be intimidated' is playing into the hands of the radical Islamists who are stirring the pot and benefiting from this uprest. There's a battle in the Islamic world between radicals and moderates. If we're going to start enlisting the press, we might as well do a little thinking about whom we're trying to help. Though I still think that turning the other cheek is the better way to show that we can't be intimidated.

Or, as Fontana Labs says:

You might not believe this, but my high-level, super-secret contacts in the Muslim world have intimated that there's actually a trace element of dissent in the Umma about this: apparently some Muslims are not actually in favor of rioting over cartoons. It's very hard to spot, because in other ways Muslims are completely homogenous-- but there might be one or two we could spare from either internment or deportation.