Agora

I would like to direct you all to this excellent piece by Poul Højlund of Pia Causa (Just Cause in Latin):

 

Op Blog: The strategy of our war

By Poul Højlund, March 6, 2003:

Bloggers worldwide have engaged in this battle with an overwhelming eager and with great results so far.

We dug out the information that lifted the debate from the virtuous indignation on bad taste cartoons to the perspective of a shrewdly planned Jihad against Western freedom, first and foremost Free Speech.

But are we preaching among the converts? Are we gaining ground, or will we end up as the intolerant minority of Free Speech extremists, as several mainstreamers already baptized us?

The battle against Islamization has only just begun, and our opening position is not the best.

We have lost ground through several decades as the West allowed The Islamic Brotherhood to march on. We loose everyday when UN accepts the violation of Human Rights committed by the Muslim countries, and when the OIC can sign their own Islamic Human Rights without the slightest protest from UN.

We loose when Free Speech is balanced against religious freedom, - even without anyone stating the obvious: that religious freedom also include the right not to have any religion at all, or the right to choose a religion on your own behalf.

We loose whenever Free Speech cannot be mentioned without the little ‘but…’. We loose when we fail to meet our Muslim neighbours world wide with the same demands as we meet our selves. We loose when we mistake Muslims for Islamists, the oppressed for their oppressors.

We loose when we accept the hypocrisy of protesting against depicting Muhammad while the same protesters silence on the massive violations of Human Rights in the name of the same prophet.

It’s so easy to loose this battle, and it will be the last battle lost. There is no turning back to freedom once Islam is installed world wide.

How to win this battle?

First we must face the fact that we already are far behind.

[…]

Read the rest here.

Also read his Lessons Learned piece - very interesting. Quote:

Cartoon War: Lessons Learned

By Poul Højlund, March 2, 2006:

Time to sum up a few lessons learned from the cartoon war.
First: Free Speech has no added ‘but …’.
Second: Not everything thing is what it pretends to be.
Third: Establishment sails under the flag of their own convenience.
Fourth: Terror pays off.
Fifth: We must separate the terms ‘Muslim’ and ‘Islamic’.
Sixth: No right of freedom stands without the strong support of you and me.
Seventh: UN does not function.
Eighth: As the press failed, the blogg’ers succeeded.
Ninth: The war aint over till Muslims have been freed from their Islamic oppressors.
Tenth: Only free speech will enable us to move forward.

He elaborates on each of the lessons here. I have just quoted his list.

Note to my American readers: In Europe, blue is the colour of the Right and Red the colour of the Left. I don’t know why you got it so terribly mixed up at some point, but just so you know: Blue is Right, Red is Wrong. In the same vein, liberal in Europe is usually used in the meaning of "classic liberal", meaning Equality before the Law, Free Trade, Spreading Democracy, etc.

The cartoon imbroglio seems to have made some impact on our fellow Northerners in the marxist-leninist people’s monarchy of Sweden and the social-democratic hill fort of Norway. According to Politiken, a survey by Sentio reports that the blue areas of Scandinavia are growing daily. In Denmark, the first bastion of social democratism to fall to the powers of good, Right wing parties DPP, The Conservativ and The Liberal Party stand to get 53.7% of all votes. In Sweden, the Alliance for Change stands to reap 55.5% of all votes - impressive for a country that is usually rules by turtle-necked social democratic dolts. Norway still hangs in the balance though. The Conservative parties of that country stand to gain slightly over last election, and would squeak into power with 50.1% of all votes if elections were held today.

Quote about the Danish People’s Party (DK) and the Progress Party (NO):

"The Forces of the Right in Denmark and Norway are riding with the wind in their backs. Our poll shows the Muhammed affair has mobilised many voters who didn’t vote in the last elections, but who would cast protest votes for the two parties today." [says Arve Østgård of Sentio to Altinget.dk]

So far 10 have been charged with threatening Jyllands-Posten and 150 threats have been reported so far. From dr.dk:

10 Charged with Threats against Jyllands-Posten

10 persons have been charged with making threats against Jylland-Posten or employees thereof, since the newspaper published a series of cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammed September 30 last year.

So say Inspector Bjarne Lauridsen of the Århus Police Department.

[…]

"The grand total is about 150 threats against the newspaper," says Bjarne Lauridsen

[…]

The Manifesto I covered in this post can now be supported online at this site. Don’t wait. Sign today. It’s target audience is the White House and the United Nations. I now ask all those bloggers who reposted this Manifesto to spread the news and sign the manifesto.

This is especially important since some Moslem countries are apparently trying to get a convention to ban slander about religious figures.

A couple of quotes from those who have already signed:

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