Cartoon Controversy

Have Mohammed Cartoon Reactions Gone Too Far?
By Marisol Vargas

As I read some stories on the newspapers about the reactions the Mohammed cartoons have caused, I tried to think for a while of what I would have done, and what my attitude toward these cartoons would have been if my religion was Muslim. As hard as I thought and wondered, I still could not conceive taking it as far as to where many of these people have taken it.

There are protests all over the world, including some in Latin American countries such as Venezuela and Colombia. There are Egyptian demonstrators calling for boycotts of European countries and hundreds of innocent Palestinian children burning Danish flags, when at their age the only thing they should know about rather than violence is having fun and playing with one another.

Last week about 700 Muslim protesters gathered together on a main avenue of Venezuela to march against these pictures. They tore down flags, and reacted with violence when police tried to calm them down. In northwestern Pakistan, a Christian school was attacked by demonstrators breaking the windows with stones. People are crying for apologies from the ones responsible for these cartoons, which have obviously have caused the fury of the Muslim community.

People are dying, nations and governments are fighting. Organizations are getting together masterminding new attacks on people who they think are responsible for this insult to their Religion and ideals. David da Silva, the editor of Gloria, a Christian magazine in Indonesia that published the cartoons, is fired and questioned by police. The French Embassy in Tehran was attacked last week, and the end does not seem to be near.

There are over 200 million Muslims in the world. There were 12 Mohammed cartoons, enough to infuriate the hundred thousands Muslims all over the world. I cannot help to wonder if these cartoons are really the ones responsible for all this anger, or if it is hatred that is forcing all these people to react with such violence.

The Muslim organizations seem to be hurting, adding that their most sacred figure has been insulted. Still, no matter how insulted and hurt these group may feel, there is no excuse for the amount of lives being taken and wounded since the protests have been taking place. The idea that 12 cartoons depicting a consecrated figure to thousands of people could result in countries fighting with one another over the anger these caused is very scary.

While many people try to excuse this act of ignorance, there is no reason why any demonstration of disagreement should be display with violence or harming innocents.