On April 14th, the infamously controversial and insanely entertaining animated show, South Park, aired their 200th episode in which the Prophet Muhammad is heard speaking from a U-Haul trailer and later comes out dressed in a bear costume. I have not seen this episode as it is not available to watch online as the episodes usually are. I am betting it was funny. Comedy Central, in responding to threats from a humorless group called Revolution Muslim, took the episode down and in the continuing storyline of this week's episode both the visual depiction (in a bear suit, nonetheless) and his name were blacked and bleeped out. A member of this group said that it was an insult to the Prophet and warned the creators, Matt Stone and Trey Parker, that they might end up like the filmmaker Theo van Gogh. Van Gogh, a Dutch filmmaker, was stabbed killed in 2004 by an Islamic militant for making a movie critical of abuse of women in some Islamic societies. Ridiculous. These incidents and threats are horrific and in no way represent the actions of people with 1) brains and 2) hearts. 1) If any religion has so affected one's mental faculties in such a way that they can justify murder (or for that matter, fleecing anyone else's rights), then maybe it isn't the best way to get to one's own personal heaven. 2) Anyone with a scrap of emotion (i.e. a heart, see "Tin Man") knows that they shouldn't kill other people who presumably have emotions and hearts. Heartless and brainless people aren't supposed to be the clergy, they are supposed to replace us in the work force and are fueled by old people's medicine (i.e. they are robots, see
Saturday Night Live Season 21, Episode 6). Anyway, here is a link to the story:
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/23/arts/television/23park.html. And if you'd rather, the British version of things:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/apr/22/south-park-muhammad-episode-censored.
The Stranger is Seattle's local weekly. They often have cool/funny/relevant covers. This week the cover is all three.
If you can't see it, up in the corner it says "It's Wrong To Draw Muhammad! Don't Connect The Dots!" This is obviously a plea to connect the dots, vis-a-vis reverse psychology. So I did.
Truthfully, it looks more like a Santa to me. If no one was ever supposed to draw the Prophet Muhammad, then how would anyone know what he looked like? Mentioning that it "is" Muhammad inside that bear costume means that it is a valid depiction worth killing for? This religion stuff can be exhausting to understand sometimes, I think, because each person has a bit of their sacred book to back up any action they take. Next thing you know someone is going to religiously justify killing a doctor. I am glad that day has not yet come to pass.
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Addendum to post now considering a comment made concerning post -
There is apparently, in a certain old text, a description of what our old friend the Prophet looks like. The Shia do not forbid his depiction I have been told. The Sunni then must make up the radical perspective of "No Connecting The Dots or Pay With Death!" I think I may have found, based on the descriptions, a painting of Muhammad, or at least a likeness. Let's see:
Thanks to the beautiful artist, Anne Petty, for her rendition of this fellow, also known more casually as simply "Lucas."
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Further addendum:
The connected dots figure, after a long look, is actually the Burger King. It has a BK on the crown that is on its head. Hmmm... even better.
The second largest group of Muslims, the Shia, do NOT forbid depictions of the prophet. If you want to draw him, here is a description from the Kitab al-Tabaqat al-Kabir, a very old text.
ReplyDelete"The Apostle of Allah, may Allah bless him, is neither too short nor too tall. His hair are neither curly nor straight, but a mixture of the two. He is a man of black hair and large skull. His complexion has a tinge of redness. His shoulder bones are broad and his palms and feet are fleshy. He has long al-masrubah which means hair growing from neck to navel. He is of long eye-lashes, close eye-brows, smooth and shining fore-head and long space between two shoulders. When he walks he walks inclining as if coming down from a height. I never saw a man like him before him or after him."
Sound like anyone you know? (see: Anne's paintings)
Hmmm... I can think of one man that fits this description possibly. But I can't paste the painting into this comment. This man actually enjoys being depicted, for a little booze and snacks that is.
ReplyDeleteYeah. People are crazy. All I know is that killing people, or threatening to kill people, is not anywhere near what I have gathered from Islam. The people are a different story. I don't think we should go around drawing the prophet Muhammed (pbuh) to the point that we say, "this is what he looked like... definitely." or in the way that some Christians have westernized the image of Jesus. There are definitely ancient depictions of him, which makes me wonder if this taboo is a new thing. But I do know for certain in Islam we are not supposed to even attempt to create an image of God. I have not read anything in the Qur'an about the prophet Muhammed in this sense. There may be a hadith about it, but these are documented by humans.
ReplyDeleteAnyways... what I'm trying to get at is I get frustrated with the major taboo amongst muslims of drawing the prophet Muhammed, but they don't seem to care about the drawing of the other prophets. Just because Muhammed is the final messenger is Islam, doesn't mean he is more significant or should be treated different than the others. Also, I feel by saying you shouldn't create the image of God AND Muhammed... that is placing Muhammed on a similar level to God. Which it's a big "no no" in Islam to place anyone or anything near God.
So... Sorry for the novel. I hope I made sense. A couple of my muslim friends saw the episode and said it was indeed funny and that they didn't understand all the hype. Without seeing it, I already know that you can't be offended by South Park because that's the core of the show's existence. They make fun of everyone and everything. I also feel like people freaking out about it is just going to make people draw him more, so they're just screwing themselves over.
Glad to hear your thoughts Ashley. I was curious as to how you felt about all of this. Thanks for sharing!
ReplyDeleteThanks a lot for your thoughts, dear Muslim friend. No matter where or for what reason or under whatever flag, people are going to find reasons to be shit-brained and vengeful psychotics. It just so happens that God has been an easy shield for this psychosis. And, yes, it made sense. And, yes, I bet the episode was funny and only predictably controversial. That is freedom. Minus the great big black box and the bleeps.
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