JURIST Special Guest Columnist H.A. Hellyer of the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations, University of Warwick, UK, says that the worldwide controversy over the publication of caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad is symptomatic of a new type of tribalism in both East and West …

Every so often, a word that we all took for granted before as innocuous and innocent takes on a meaning totally unlike what we thought it meant before. Billions of people around the world thought the word "cartoon" was rather harmless until a few weeks ago: but as we will talk about later on, things in this modern world have a way of changing pretty drastically, pretty quickly.

The cartoons were first published some months ago, and the jury is still out on two questions:

1) Why were they published in the first place?
2) What was the impetus behind the protests, considering that for several months, there was virtually no reaction from the Muslim world?

These two questions are not meant to be "weapons of mass distraction" from the essential issues, but they are important to note. Can we separate these issues from the socio-political context of Danish Muslims, and the different policies of the Danish government to "integrate" their non-indigenous communities? Can we ignore that there are equally, if not greater, offensive images around the world regarding the Prophet Muhammad, even in Muslim countries, and yet the response has yet to come? Quite apart, it should be pointed out, from the reality that other caricatures of Muslim prophets (such as those shared by Judaism and Christianity) in pictures and plays have become common place in the world today.

Again, I bring these questions up not to reject that there are distinct details pertinent to this affair, but in the hope that the mere consideration of this affair will allow us to think more comprehensively on the matter. The real "weapon of mass distraction" in this episode has been the concerted effort by many commentatiors, willfully or otherwise, to over-simplify the topic to the point of no return.

From my own vantage point as an academic from a legal and social science background, living in Europe, but with more than a passing familiarity with the resonances in Muslim community, I could not help but think "this is nothing new". Very little has changed in the past few weeks and months; it's just another installment in the unending saga of "The Cowardly and the Ugly: Europe and Muslims". It's a re-run of episodes we've all seen before.

The script writers are really not talking about religion at all. It's deeper than that; yet again, religious imagery and symbolism has been used to cloak the real matter from our eyes. What is being espoused is symptomatic of an identity crisis, on a massive scale.

How Muslims position themselves, vis-a-vis the "West" and Europe in particular. How the "West" positions itself, vis-a-vis the Muslim world, including those parts of the Muslim world that exist within it.

None of it is about what Muslims as Muslims stand for, or what Westerners as Westerners stand for; its about what Muslims as contradistinguished from the "West" stand for, and what Westerners as contradistinguished from the Muslim world stand for.

[If this is part of the saga about Muslims and Europe, that saga is being played out on a TV channel called "Modernity: The Civilized World Strikes Back". But more on that later, maybe.]

This is not a clash of civilizations, or some sort of "East-West struggle". How could it be so? Where does the dividing line between the "East" and the "West" begin? Where does it end? How can these mythical constructs be really disparate from one another? The "West" would never have come into being without the "East"; historians have written so much on this that it does not bear going into here.

What we might declare is that this is a clash of values. And indeed, that too would follow a common pattern in history. In the Victorian Era, Muslims were demonised by Western Europeans for (get ready for it) giving women too many rights. This was, in the context of the Victorian Era, seen as a bad thing. Now, the tables have turned; Muslims are still bad, but they are bad because they give women too few rights. In both cases, a type of contradistinction is going on.

A new type of "tribalism", where we constantly create ourselves (the "Us") in contradistinction to someone else (the "Other"), just to promote our own "tribe", whatever we base it on. And the tribe does not need to be racial; it can be based on any kind of manifestation, but its still a tribe.

Our next tool in that regard? The idea of "freedom of speech". That's our next one; that's "our" value, and "they" don't share it.

The reality is, "we" are changing, "they" are in flux, and that sort of change and flux has been a part of history since the dawn of time. Unlike previous times, however, modernity really speeds it up.

The cartoons provoked a lot of rage. What a surprise; they were gratuitous, insulting, and legitimately seen as provocation. Certainly the publishers did not envisage this sort of reaction, but while the rage might not have been predictable, the type of unwarranted attack certainly was. It follows a pattern of demonisation and bigotry that has a track record in many parts (albeit not all) of the European Union. Whereas in Europe's recent past, it was acceptable to be racist, it no longer is. But it is, however, still acceptable in many quarters to be Islamophobic, and now many people have switched.

Abu Hamza, the radical Muslim demagogue in London, has recently been convicted of inciting to hatred. Nick Griffin, the leader of the far-right British National Party, on trial in a separate case, has not been convicted, although he called Islam a "wicked and evil religion". If he had called Muslims a wicked and evil race, he would have been convicted. He's smarter than that.

But that's by the by. The reality is, none of this was about some mythical value of "freedom of speech": in every European country, there are laws limiting certain types of freedom of expression. In every European country, there are civic limits imposed by society (in other non-legal measures) that limit freedom of expression, depending on the cultural history of that place. We may disagree with some parts of the taboo, but the undeniable fact is: we do have taboos. And in the 21st century, the European Union, a Europe that has always been changing and continues to change, will change what it considers to be taboo again, taking into account its new citizenry, as well it should.

In terms of this particular case, it may be that the publisher did not break any Danish law. He did not. But he broke higher civic conduct; to act responsibly and not needlessly offend people's sensitivities. This was never about "freedom of speech"; it was about what we, as a people, define as "sacred".

There may be no law about showing mutilated soldiers on TV; but British television networks knew that to screen such events in Iraq would be incredibly insensitive, not least of all to the families of those involved. They declined to break that civic trust.

In this specific episode, the hypocrisy is most evident when one co
nsiders that in the past, the same publisher rejected publishing cartoons about Christ on the basis that it would cause uproar, and rejected recently publishing cartoons demeaning the Holocaust for the same reason.

So where are we now?

We have a Muslim world that is enraged. These cartoons were, as mentioned above, not just pictures, but insults. Pictures of the prophet alone are taboo in the Muslim mind; for most, it is seen as one step closer to idolatry, and the Muslims are nothing if not monotheistic. Professor Yahya Michot from Oxford points out that it is the absence of the depiction of the sacred that is most important to the Muslim, whilst it is presence of the depiction of the sacred that is most important to other communities.

Nevertheless, it is hard to reconcile the reaction with their stated purpose. "Hands off our Prophet! We will uphold his honor!" I certainly have no standing as some sort of religious authority, whether in Islam or otherwise. Yet, it struck me that as the rioters attacked embassies, the Prophet honored ambassadors. Whilst the rioters were enraged, the Prophet typically responded to attacks with kindness and forbearance, whether he was in a position of outward weakness (such as the Meccan period) or in a position of political authority (such as the conquest of Mecca).

This is the man who, it must be said, had garbage thrown at him in Mecca regularly by one particular lady. Nevertheless, his response was to call on her when she ceased to throw rubbish at him, out of concern for her health.

This is the man who made supplication for the people of Ta'if, when they had turned their children on him to stone him.

This is the man whose uncle was assassinated and mutilated in a horrific way by one individual in Mecca: but an individual whom he pardoned when he conquered that city in one bloodless victory.

That was the law of the Prophet, and that was the way he upheld his own honor; how have the rioters upheld the law he brought, let alone his honor?

This is what I mean when I insist that these responses have more to do with tribalism than faith. Faith-based responses are not without example; the Birmingham based remembrance of the life of the Prophet went without any violence whatsoever. The celebrations of the Prophet's life in Zanzibar in East Africa; the massive demonstration in London on the 18th of February; the imminent commemoration of the birth of the Prophet in different parts of Scandinavia; all of these bringing to bear on the Muslims the nature of the Prophetic character. Perhaps not one but two steps ahead of the game was the declaration in connection with one of the marches of a campaign for "Global Civility": bringing a sense of decorum back to discourse. Whatever took us so long?

In this modern world where identity and tribalism are extreme under other names, these sorts of approaches that defy the illogic of such tomfoolery need to be considered very carefully. The beginning of any type of tribalism, and hence, the beginning of the end, is when someone believes "I am better than him".

That kind of wicked and mischievous logic is not going to be rejected by everyone, but it has to be transcended by more people if we have a hope in this world. The perennial truths of Western civilization and the truth of the Prophetic message demand no less.

Dr. H.A. Hellyer is an Associate Fellow at the Centre for Research in Ethnic Relations, University of Warwick, UK. After completing degrees in Law and International Political Economy, he completed a doctoral study of the European Union and its Muslim populations that related to law, political philosophy and Muslim jurisprudence. A research consultant and social policy analyst, Dr. Hellyer is presently engaged in research on contemporary Muslim communities. His first book Muslims and Multiculturalism: The European 'Other' is due to be published in 2006.
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