Mr Donnelly, as a well-known advocate of higher standards in education, could you please spell "cultural imperialist"?

You also failed to mention such important concepts as "the white man's burden" and the "Yellow Peril".

But you well and truly lost your way when you stooped to use that nebulous, meaningless and populist term "un-Australian".

D-

Please try harder.

Stickman67,

Your post reads as, Argumentum ad Hominem. Perhaps, this was unintended. If you have case you should be more articulate your view.

Shorbe,

I will need to search for the Redding paper - if I still have it? His basic idea was based on Rome AND Roman Catholicism having enduring effects into History. Herein, England and her colonies have been more successful than say Spain and her colonies. Redding is a specialist in Sinic Economics, it will have been an aside remark. His measure of one thousand years could have included the Eastern Empire, which existed centuries after the fall of the Western Roman Empire (476).

Regarding the Vikings, some have suggested that they were not primarily familial, because the warriors were off fighting, while the women stayed at home. This having carry-over effects.

Agree. Very complex, indeed.

Boaz,

Any comment on my earlier post?

Obojo You show a weak understanding of Islam.

The pope is complying with the West because the Catholic Church is losing the West. We have become educated. We are demanding things: women to become priests, contraception, homosexuality, reading fiction about Da Vinci and demanding answers that the Church cannot adequately answer.

Why would he pass up an opportunity to jump onto the bandwagon and condemn a religion and its followers?

Afterall Pope-what's-his-face did it during the Holocaust only his actions were less excusable. He said nothing and did nothing and was ultimately held responsible in the end.

The pope is encouraged to go with the flow. If everyone says no to invading Iraq who is he to say otherwise? A pretty dodgy example to prove a point.

How do we know the reaction from the Muslim world? From what the media reports. Ha. Remember when Fox News recycled footage of the Palestinians celebrating to show the reaction to 9/11?? Forgive me for being sceptical but until I see legitimate proof that the entire Islamic world is up in arms then I'll respond.

I have studied Women in Islam and can challenge your narrow minded view any day.

Women in Islam ARE spiritually equal to men.
Women in Christinaity ARE NOT spiritually equal.

Women in Islamic societies are facing cultural difficulties. But they are not as unequal as the West will have you believe.

"Mohammed took women as wives" he is so evil. OOHHH because no one does that these days. They don't take wives they just sleep around impregnating many women and then paying for child care. You're so naive it's not funny.

I don't care for the religious sensitivity that some Muslims and Christians may have at seeing their prophets/Gods defamed. I am protesting at the politcal significance of the cartoon.

And as others have said - I do not call for censorship of the cartoon I call for adequate critique of the cartoon.

Finally terrorism is a political movement. It is not linked to Islam and the reasons are purely political.

Shorbe,

No-one has said anything about legislation or official censorship but you.

Condemning newspapers for printing inciteful material is not absolving people of responsibility for their actions. However, you seem to want to absolve newspapers for responsibility for what they print.

The point is that if people believe what newspapers or political leaders say i.e. that a problem exists, then they are more likely to sanction whatever measures are put forward to deal with the problem which they are being told exists. A case in point is the Iraq war.

No-one is suggesting that the foundations of Islam should not be criticized (quite frankly all religions should be debunked), but it should be done in a rational and reasoned manner. If the real intention is to genuinely criticize, then using inflammatory material is not the way to do it, it only makes matters worse.

Further, criticizing Islam in and of itself will not address the causes of terrorism. Fundamentalist Islamic terrorism is a symptom and outcome of more complex underlying social, economic and political problems facing the world. But you don’t see newspapers dealing seriously with those issues, and in fact newspapers actively divert people from the real issues.

It is naïve to think that newspapers are innocently engaging in freedom of speech, or that they make innocent mistakes. Newspaper owners, and their editors, are acutely aware of the political lay of the land and tailor their newspapers in order to protect and promote their own interests. I can’t remember who said it, but I heard it once said that the difference between Soviet propaganda and Western propaganda is that at least Soviet people knew they were being fed propaganda. Western people think they are being told the “truth”.

Quite frankly, it seems to me to be incumbent upon people who believe in democratic rights to condemn and denounce the use of a daily newspaper to incite prejudice and give justification for the dismantling and trammeling of the democratic rights of all of us, Muslim or otherwise, Danish or Australian. Anything else would be absolving oneself of one’s responsibilities.

hi flu,

who cares what pope says. Pope is a coward and a hypocrite. But, on readiny your post, i can see that you are worse than pope.

" We are demanding things: women to become priests, contraception, homosexuality, reading fiction about Da Vinci and demanding answers that the Church cannot adequately answer. "

Try the same in islam flu and see the reaction. your head lies separated from your body.

" How do we know the reaction from the Muslim world? From what the media reports."

This statement has blown me up! Try al-jazeera for allah's sake.

"I have studied Women in Islam and can challenge your narrow minded view any day.

Women in Islam ARE spiritually equal to men. "

I can't stop laughing at this statement.

"Mohammed took women as wives" he is so evil. OOHHH because no one does that these days. They don't take wives they just sleep around impregnating many women and then paying for child care "

No, he didn't just took 14 wives but he did paedophilia & slavery. Do you mean all the non-muslim australian guys sleep around..?

A thousand pardons, Oliver.

I was merely indulging in the lowest form of wit. Sadly, however, I've neither the time nor the inclination for stewing over minutiae. Straight for the cheap shot for me!

Perhaps if people are offended by argumentum ad hominem, they should subscribe to the time-honoured practice of illegitimi non carborundum.

And them as want to go out in public using terms like "un-Australian" should be prepared for flak, in my humble opinion.

;-)