Yes, they are because the issue wasn't properly handled. Saying that someone is just asking for attention for something is asking for it because they'll blowup and the issue will go everywhere. Either squish it, move it or dissolve it. Trying to put something under a rug with cliche never works. You'll be seeing it there and in fire.

Yeah, right. And they don't think twice about making insulting, derogatory, and blasphemous remarks about Christianity... The fact is Islam's representation of Jesus is blasphemous to Christians, and it's twisting of the entire history of Israel from Genesis onwards is blasphemy of the highest order. They put fatwas on themselves for insulting the two religions that their religion is nothing but a cheap copy of.

Muslims are no better than Christians and their claims that their religion is superior only serve to prove that the only thing they have over Christianity is arrogance. As a Christian I do not push my religion on others, not many Muslims can say that. Their attitude of join or die tells the whole story of the draconian nature of their religion. Christianity is a voluntary affair, while Islam is largely a threat that puts people into a religion under false pretense. I have to wonder how many "devout Muslims" go to Mosque more out of fear for their lives than out of devotion to Allah.

I strongly disagree with your opinion on the issue. To the point where I question your professionalism! Frankly speaking I don't know where you come up with the ignorance to call freedom of speech our " hyper-liberalism ways ". At the end of your third paragraph you state "as opposed to hiring a handful of cartoonists who were basically instructed what to draw (which, by the way, could also be considered a restriction on the freedom of speech) ". So willingly accepting a job, where you are hired to do a task you get paid for, can be called a restriction of freedom of speech? Also there was only one actual cartoonist that received countless death threats. How you find that less disgusting that publishing cartoons in a newspaper(as you mention in the first paragraph) is just beyond me. The nonsense just keeps on going when you try to parallel it with certain things; Not being able to cause a rukus at the time of an international meeting is a problem now? If I remember correctly, the participants of the G8 all got voted into the government by the people. They represent the people of the netion that chose them. Those meetings are agreed upon by all participants and are there to solve problems pragmatically. If you have real problems with the discussions, yes you should go back to your congressman and try to get someone preferable elected. Either way that scenario is not really comparable to the one at hang. Robert, I am surprised and disappointed.

Because ,the west is full of garbage,and we tolerate low life humans degradeing out teachings and ridule our religion,in the west,,Our morons in the west expect The Muslim religion and its people to do the same.These people and retards should educate themselves,distorting its Prophet's teachings is a human failure.Conclusion our idiots in the west like they idiots who distorted they teachings should get educated.,no excuse in the 21st century for being morons.and dont confuse or assimilate teachings and intepretation as the same.

Heaven! This " us and them" "holier than thou" syndrome resonates not only through rather inappropriate response from Muslims but in comments here too; boy these commentators here too are not immune from insular ways of human mind!..it is not about a particular faith, it is about perversions of thought in what ever mind they originate.. Muslim. Christian, Jew, Hindu! Hate breeds hate...prejudice prevents clarity..dispositions eclipse the truth! Robert, while i disagreed with some of the points u raised i, nonetheless, commend your efforts to capture the essence of the issue! you could have though commented upon the unwarranted and disproportionate response from certain quarters of Muslim camp over this issue; that would have made it more balanced!

I had assumed that the original publication of the cartoons was a publicity stunt that exceeded all of its authors expectations. If the freedom of speech argument concerned just the written press it would be hard to care. News papers are the playthings of the wealthy and/or corporations. They are neither free nor neutral. It is internet censorship that is of real concern. And there is no practical possibility of this in the West. Consequently any individual that wants publicity only has to post cartoons labeled the Prophet ' Mohammad' and they will succeed in raising a storm of publicity for whatever cause they care to. Hence irrespective of all debates two things are predictable. (1) There will be an endless flow of these cartoons, videos etc posted on the net (2) They will become increasingly offensive. And may well become pornographic.

Why, i dare to ask, are we not sharing their passion for misinterpretation? Alll they Muslim are asking is to leave that prophet image alone... is that really that hard to do? don't we have enough issues, with more alarming necessity, to be discussed? or we do love/leave the media powers push and pull our sentiments anyway they want? We have to rise abode those issues and go for the root of it, treat it as we see a child teasing a friend at school... Educate them, don't slap them or ignore them!

The majority of the "comments" on this article are so much off the base that they made me sick. I am a Christian and I don't believe insulting any other religion is part of our freedom of speech. If it comes to exclusivity, the most exclusive religions are Judaism and Christianity, and in that order. Yet you never see ridiculing the basic tenets of these religions (of which there are many) in any Moslem press The examples of the curtailment of free speech brought up in the article have completely escaped the comentators. Anybody who believes in the freedom of the press or the freedom of speech in the current Western world of ours is utterly removed from reality. What we see in the case of deliberate and calculated attacks on Islam are certain forces in the West whose job it is to inflame the fires of hatred between Christians and Moslems in order to carry out their agenda of setting the Western world against the Eastern world. Well, let me tell you pious commentators, that the world is not so stupid as to miss the conspiratorial scheme behind all this promotion of selective freedom.

You have to realize that nothing is sacred to these people who tromp on other peoples' values in the name of free speech. To them anything is fair game. If anyone was to call your mother a whore, your sister a slut and your father a bastard to your face I guess that would be ok in the name of free speech, but how would you feel about it? Well to muslims, we value our Prophet Muhammed(PBUH) greater than our parents because he brought the word of God to mankind. What could be more sacred to us? A muslim could not be a muslim if he didn't believe in Jesus and Moses (Peace Be Upon Them) and the teachings that they brought before Islam. They are mentioned in the Qu'ran. Even in free speech, you cannot yell out fire in a crowded room.