5 Feet of Fury

“In a democracy, we do not recognize the right not to be insulted”

Deliberate provocations, from the Boston Tea Party to lunch counter sit-ins to an artist signing his name to a urinal, are, for better or worse, a hallmark of Western civilization.

These provocations can be inspired, counterproductive or pedestrian, but they play a pivotal part in the ongoing development of Western culture.

Which would explain why Muslim spokesmen and their historically illiterate infidel dupes sense (rightly) that any such provocations must be condemned, pronto. Western culture must not be allowed to flourish (and part of said flourishing requires the provocative testing of limits, and the debates they inspire); if Islam is to take over, deliberate provocations must be condemned.

“It is Muslims who need to be told, or need to be shown, that this lost-dog sign, while hardly a brilliant sally of wit, is neither prosecutable as a crime nor, in the civil law, actionable. And that the hysteria that they are showing is designed of course to force everyone to go after anyone who dares to display an attitude other than one of respect, or even reverence. It is designed, that is, to force non-Muslims in a non-Muslim land to behave as circumspectly, or deferentially, toward Islam in all of its aspects, as possible. Yet when such deference and such circumspection is not demanded of us, we do not demand it of ourselves, in regard to any non-Muslim faith.

“The transparent attempt to manipulate non-Muslims is aided and abetted by the moral-preeners who choose never to quite come to grips with the collectivism and the aggressive nature of Islam.

(…)

“The dog poster was clearly an attempt to flout the wishes of those Muslims who, not only in sweet Auburn but around the world, think that they have every right to stop all criticism of Islam, to shut it down, by playing the poor victim and waiting for the rabbi-katzirs to come running at one end, and by death threats, and then by murdering, the theo-van-goghs at the other end.”