Freedom of speech means video, cartoon creators get a voice

A Lebanese armored personnel carrier sits outside the official residence of the French ambassador to Lebanon during a security measures after a French magazine published vulgar caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad, in Beirut on Wednesday. (AP Photo/Bilal Hussein)

A French magazine is standing by its decision to publish cartoon images that depict the prophet Mohammed regardless of warnings that the move might incite even more unrest in the Middle East. The editorial director defends the decision, citing freedom of the press. Dave Ross points out freedom of the press requires we allow everyone, even those we don’t agree with the freedom, to publish or speak what they wish.

“Freedom of speech doesn’t really mean much when applied to nice people,” says Ross and Burbank Show host Dave Ross. “To have any meaning it’s got to be applied to the people that you can’t stand.”

Ross says the creators of the video depicting Mohammed that incited recent violence were “not nice people.” But that doesn’t mean we can keep them silent.

If you don’t give the right to everyone to speak, Ross says, “that means there’s some sort of commission who decides who the people we like are and who are the people we can’t stand. At that point, you really don’t have a free country anymore.”

The French magazine is not taking responsibility for the response, which sparked such concern that 20 French embassies are being shut down as a precaution.

“They can’t hold us responsible for the closure of the embassies, they can’t hold us responsible for the violence and the deaths,” editorial director, Stephane Charbonnier told The New York Times. “We’re not provoking anything.” Religious radicals can use “any pretext to start the fire.”

“I think that is the problem that I have with radical Islam,” says Ross. “My problem with the way [radical] Islam treats this is that the go-to penalty seems to be we’re going to kill you now. We don’t like what you did, therefore you have to die, because you think a certain thought.”

While only a radical sect of the Muslim community is responsible for the violence, Dave Ross says as he understands it, most Muslims object to images depicting Mohammed. He thinks that’s going to be a difficult position to hold in this day and age.

“If you take discomfort, and severe discomfort, from any depiction of your prophet, it’s going to be a tough life from now on, unless you turn off your computer.”

By MyNorthwest.com Staff