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What would you do if faced with a radical Islamic group’s death threats? If you’re South Park, you’d go ahead and air an episode featuring Muhammad, but censor it to pieces by bleeping out any time a character says the words “Prophet Muhammad.” Plus, the prophet character himself would be covered by a black box labeled “censored.” That’s exactly what happened last night.
The threats stemmed from last week’s 200th episode of the animated comedy, in which Muhammad appeared but was disguised in a bear costume. RevolutionMuslim.com issued a warning aimed at the show’s producers, Trey Parker and Matt Stone, for insulting their prophet. The website, which has since been taken down, indicated that Parker and Stone might face the same fate at Dutch filmmaker Theo Van Gogh, who was murdered by Muslim extremists following his depiction of the prophet.
Parker and Stone have since issued the following statement regarding the censored episode: “In the 14 years we’ve been doing South Park we have never done a show that we couldn’t stand behind. We delivered our version of the show to Comedy Central and they made a determination to alter the episode. It wasn’t some meta-joke on our part. Comedy Central added the bleeps. In fact, Kyle’s customary final speech was about intimidation and fear. It didn’t mention Muhammad at all but it got bleeped too. We’ll be back next week with a whole new show about something completely different and we’ll see what happens to it.”
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I don't even know what to say. Very sad story.
There are nice Muslims, and there are angry Muslims. This message is for the angry ones who are prone to violence, and think Allah's/God's command against murder somehow doesn't apply to them (yeah, so murder people out of vengeance, but just don't eat that ham sandwich - because that would be an abomination):
I don't think the handful of angry violent types among the Muslims are well informed. Most importantly, they don't seem to understand how religion works, so let me explain...
You think your religion forbids you from drawing Muhammad. (By the way, it doesn't. You will note that there are prevalent images of Muhammad in several Muslim countries, and you can buy paintings of Muhammad which are presently being sold openly on the streets of Tehran - the images of Muhammad thing is really just a pretty new "craze". An effort to create something new to be angry about, so you can continue to seethe and be angry at everyone but yourselves)
But if you *want* to think up some crazy rules (like "you can't draw Muhammad") and add them willy-nilly to your religion, you need to take a hard look at that very same rule one ... more ... time:
Your religion forbids *YOU* from drawing Muhammad.
Your religion forbids *YOU* from drawing Muhammad.
My religion does NOT forbid *ME* from drawing Muhammad. In fact, I am eating a ham sandwich while I type this. What are you going to do about it, big shot?
Your religion forbids *YOU* from drawing Muhammad.
Let's look at this another way. Let's examine what *MY* religion compels from *ME*:
My religion says that I must recognize and espouse that the Pope is God's prophet here on Earth, and the divinely chosen leader of the One True Faith that is Catholicism.
If you want to stop non-Muslims from drawing Muhammad ... then of course you *WILL* recognize that the Pope is God's prophet here on Earth, and that he is the divinely chosen leader of the One True Faith that is Catholicism.
You angry Muslims are probably saying to yourselves "Bulls*it! That's not *MY* religion! I don't have to do any such thing!"
And that, my angry Muslim friends, is exactly what the 1 billion or so of us non-Muslims are saying. Go ahead an oppress yourself with your strict rules, but recognize that they are not mine. Lest you want the rest of us to sweep through the Middle East and impose our Catholicism upon you all. We've done it before (to a large extent). So just don't tempt us to come in and finish the job.
Go figure out better farming and housing solutions in your region. Can't you find a productive use of your brief time here on Earth? You're not Buddhists, so this is your one and only chance at life. Make the most of it. Quit blaming the west for every little problem in your life. We never blame you for things. To be honest, until you started blowing things up, we barely knew you existed. Maybe you could do us a favor and ignore us as well.