I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Tommy De Seno ·
Sep 16, 2010 at 5:16am
The creator of the boorish, rude and intellectually void "Everyone Draw Muhammad Day" is going into hiding because even worse people than her, Islamo-fascists, want to kill her.
If Molly Norris was fighting a good fight I'd be behind her 100%. But she wasn't. So I'm not. She's a needless blasphemer. I loath blasphemy.
I'm not indifferent to the fatwa death promise. I abhor it completely and would have no problem killing those who issued it in defense of Molly were they to try to kill her.
But be clear that I would be defending free speech and not Molly. Molly is part of the world's problems, not the solution.
She doesn't deserve to die. She needs to learn to have a conversation with words that persuade, not insult.
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May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
She doesn't deserve to die? That real big of you, Voltaire.
Edited on Sep 16, 2010 at 5:23amRe: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
I said I'd kill (and by extension die) for her right to say it. That's the rest of Voltaire's quote.
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Mesquito, if you're wondering about that "Edited" part, I corrected a typo--you missed an "s" in doesn't.
(I'm explaining this to keep us all from becoming paranoid.)
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
She made (arguably) a silly mistake and now has had her life completely ruined by monsters as a result. If that isn't a victim, I don't know what is.
The fact that she should better use "words that persuade, not insult" is evidence that she's a human being. Big deal.
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Thanks, Ms Berlinski. Can you follow me around to other blogs?
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Blasphemy is something that belongs in the days of the Inquisition, not in the present day of separation of Church/Mosque and State. Freedom of speech means freedom to offend, no one in a democracy has a right to not be offended. That is why it is not in the constitution of most western democracies.
Blasphemy accusations put you on the side of the political correctness brigade, not on the side of freedom
I care little for your opinion that Molly Norris was not fighting a good fight. She was exercising her freedom of speech and if that by definition is not in of itself good then please tell me what is. Killing people for a book, a cartoon, or a joke is truly blasphemous,
I am not sure that any conversation can be had with fanatics that urge Death to America, Death to the blasphemer, using pure reason or insults. Freedom of speech is not ended with a single act, but with small accommodations , a cut here, a cut there , till there is no freedom left.
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
I'd say if she so afraid she had to basically go into hiding, someone is threatening her or she's clinically paranoid. I very much doubt the latter.
Someone should be facing charges.
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
David, with you until you argue that all expressions of the right to free speech are by definition good. I don't think people should be forbidden from buying Mein Kampf. I don't much want to see it in the local bookstores, though, and don't think it's a fine thing when it's a bestseller. (No mere abstraction here in Turkey, where it is indeed a bestseller.)
This is not a comment on Molly. But we should be clear on this point--having a right does not mean it is always good by definition to exercise it.
Edited on Sep 16, 2010 at 5:39amMay '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
A silly girl (anybody under the age of 40 looks like a girl or boy to this old f@rt) impulsively does something stupid (and if the most stupid thing any of my kids ever do is make a rash "blasphemous" post on the Internet, I'll gladly take it), and has to go into hiding for fear of her life.
Sorry Tommy, you get to go down the road to dhimmitude without me on this one. We're rapidly approaching the point where we all will have to join in and draw a cartoon of the prophet in solidarity to the Islamocrazies, they can't fatwa us all any more than they already have.
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
It's not the people that "can't be persuaded" that bothered me about Molly's "Draw Muhammad Day." I support the 2 wars we wage to try to wipe them out.
She went after the ones that can be persuaded.
She even insulted the ones who already are persuaded.
If you are here to argue her right to say what she wants, don't waste your typing. I'm 100% convinced of that.
I can defend her right to speech and condemn her words. I do. That right there would be my right to free speech, and the substance of it carries more moral authority than blasphemy.
I prefer words that persuade by beauty, sublime imagery and thought. No one has ever been persuaded by first being insulted.
My enemy, the Islamo-fascists, are blasphemers themselves. Why would I lower myself to their level and defend Molly's blasphemy?
She's not nearly as bad as they are, but she's not good, either.
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
We do already. We listen to your phone conversations, too.
Please do call me Claire. Or if you prefer, "the Enforcer."
Jul '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Tommy De Seno: It's not the people that "can't be persuaded" that bothered me about Molly's "Draw Muhammad Day." I support the 2 wars we wage to try to wipe them out.
She went after the ones that can be persuaded.
She even insulted the ones who already are persuaded.
I prefer words that persuade by beauty, sublime imagery and thought. No one has ever been persuaded by first being insulted.
My enemy, the Islamo-fascists, are blasphemers themselves. Why would I lower myself to their level and defend Molly's blasphemy?
She's not nearly as bad as they are, but she's not good, either. · Sep 16 at 5:43am
I don't think the point of her exercise was to persuade. There's this art form, perhaps you're familiar, called satire. In satire, vices, follies, abuses, and shortcomings are held up to ridicule, ideally with the intent of shaming individuals, and society itself, into improvement.
This art form, specifically Juvenalian satire has found a home throughout history. I think Molly Norris was extending the work of Daniel Defoe. So some persuasion starts with an insult.
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Considering it blasphemy to depict Muhammad is a bit sketchy, but Molly Norris absolutely made a point when she drew some silly cartoons in support of fellow artists and freedom of speech. She's now living in fear despite apologizing almost immediately, and we're having a conversation about a free American citizen being "part of the world's problems."
If we allow "blasphemy" to be defined by lunatics and consider attempts to oppose them "intellectually void," wait until you see what's blasphemy this time next year.
Edited on Sep 16, 2010 at 6:27amSep '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
It's true: Her Everybody Draw "project" was boorish and rude. However, it may not have been intellectually void; if the project had any intellectual content, it may have been, "I will prove that we have the right to draw whatever we want." Apparently and unfortunately, she has proven the opposite.
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Michael Tee: Your make a fair point. Satire can involve insult which can lead to embarrassment that can lead to changed behavior. Certainly a form of persuasion.
But satire to can go too far, and blasphemy is certainly that far.
My focus is not on Molly's insult of Islamo-fascists. I support killing them, so I'd by quite hypocritical to be bothered by insulting them.
My problem with Molly is that her cartoons make no attempt to save from insult the American Muslim who hates the Islamofascists as much as I do.
Like Cpl. Kahn, the young Muslim man who lived near me, whose mother leans on his grave in the photo. He died so the rest of us can have this row on Ricochet.
For Molly Norris' demeaning of that young man's belief, I won't join her. I condemn her (not to death, but to wear the label of the religious intolerant, just as the Islamo-fascists wear that label).
That does not make me Dhimmi as one commenter suggested. It makes me American - an American who loves religion and religious freedom.
I'll take 1 Cpl. Kahn in America to 1,000 Molly Norris'.
May '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Jason Hart Considering it blasphemy to depict Muhammad is a bit sketchy, but Molly Norris absolutely made a point when she drew some silly cartoons in support of fellow artists and freedom of speech. She's now living in fear despite apologizing almost immediately, and we're having a conversation about a free American citizen being "part of the world's problems."
If we allow "blasphemy" to defined by lunatics and consider attempts to oppose them "intellectually void," wait until you see what's blasphemy this time next year. · Sep 16 at 6:02am
Bullseye. Norris was being neither rude nor boorish. She was, quite mildly, standing up for the right of free expression in perhaps the least offensive way possible. Let us review what Norris drew, shall we? Here you go.
Which one of those is the cause of the world's problems, Mr. De Seno? The coffee cup? The little puppy dog purse? Which of those images, not a single one of which actually depicted Mohammed in any way, has drawn your righteous ire?
Not only can we not draw pictures of Mohammed lest we be murdered, but we can't not draw pictures of Mohammed either.
Aug '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Turkey has bestsellers? Turkey has sellers? I never saw a bookstore anywhere in that country. But back on topic, sort of, I'd like to muse on the practical aspects of a death threat. I've never had one. How does it work? If someone wanted to bump me off - say, for peeling open that brew on the train from Adana to Mersin - how would he do it? Run me over while I was bicycling? Sure. But first he'd have to case my route. Stake out my only published address, which is a P.O. box I visit one or two pre-dawns a week, then follow me around. I'd notice him. The more so since he already told me he was going to do all this! By which time I'd've told everyone I know. Might even have posted it on my website! I'd skip the FBI, though. They don't sound too helpful. I know I'm sounding terribly flip. But you gotta fight these yahoos, and that requires some icy contemplation.
Jun '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Tommy De Seno
Thanks,Tommy -- that picture truly is worth a thousand words.
Unless you safeguard the idiotic exercises of free speech (and the idiots), you will never be able to distinguish those who are silent out of a proper respect for the sensibilities of others from those who are intimidated. Stated another way, if Molly had a Secret Service detail instead of forced into hiding, I could assume that others speak freely as they choose.
Aug '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
As my illustration that drawing Muhammad need not be blasphemous, even for Muslims, please check out this beautiful historic miniature painting - Persian or perhaps Mogul - that shows the Ascension of Mohammad. All of him is drawn - and beautifully, too - except his face:
http://thriceholy.net/JPGs/ascension_of_muhammad.jpg
Edited on Sep 16, 2010 at 10:46pmAug '10
Re: I'll Defend Speech, But Not Molly Norris
Thanks, commenters, for restoring my sanity -- when I read Tommy's post, I thought I had somehow found myself at the Huffington Post or something. :-)
Phew!
Edited on Sep 16, 2010 at 6:54am