'B.C.' cartoon seen as slur of Islam (Hamas Kiss-butt/Wahhabi Lobby Alert)

WorldNetDaily.com ^ | November 22, 2003 | WorldNetDaily.com

[Jacob Kell]

The Council on American-Islamic Relations once again is demanding an apology for an alleged slur of Muslims, this time asserting a veteran cartoonist has cryptically defamed Islam.

The Washington, D.C.-based group sent out a dispatch to its e-mail list after a "B.C." cartoon last week by Johnny Hart was publicly questioned on a Washington Post Web chat page.

The cartoon shows a caveman entering an outhouse at night, and then saying, from inside, "Is it just me, or does it stink in here?"

[Pern]

So Islam has a patent on the crescent moon logo?

Some people will see what they want to see, I guess.

[buffyt]

I can't find a copy of that BC cartoon, does anyone have a link to it?

[dixiechick2000]

[dixiechick2000]

See post #4.

[T'wit]

Check the "full article" link just above -- there is at least a small version of the cartoon. Which is perfectly harmless.

[Alter Kaker]

Cartoonist should to apologize for printing cartoon that is not funny. But this is insult to Muslims? Now this is funny.

[Moose4]

They won't condemn people that kill 3000 innocents, but they'll jump down Hart's throat over a comic that's not even very funny. Idiots.

}:-)4

[pgkdan]

You're right, it is perfectly harmless. I guess the islamofascists know they're full of sh*t...makes them a little toucjy.

[Congressman Billybob]

Let's see. The twisted interpretation of this Johnny Hart work is that Muslims are cavemen whose homes smell bad. I don't see it, but in any charge of defamation, truth IS a defense.

The whole flap reminds be of a shaggy dog story. Others can put all the shag back on the dog. The punchline is, "If the foo sh*ts, wear it." Dunno why that comes to mind in the midst of this particular subject. LOL.

Congressman Billybob

Latest column, "Double Crossing at the Rio Grande," discussion thread. IF YOU WANT A FREEPER IN CONGRESS, CLICK HERE.

[DuncanWaring]

"A guilty conscience needs no accuser."

[Welsh Rabbit]

It seems the crescent moon on outhouses was an invention of cartoonists of yore: http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a2_382.html

[T'wit]

>> I guess the islamofascists know they're full of

I got a laugh earlier when someone referred to being in "Deep Shiite."

[Cicero]

Oddly enough, outhouses were actually built with crescent moon shaped holes in their doors from time immemorial. I don't know what the origin of this design is, but it didn't start with B.C.

[gitmo]

The Post interviewed a number of analysts who believed Hart's outhouse strip was an intentional defamation of Islam.

Marshall Blonsky, professor of semiotics at the New School in New York, said for one thing, people don't slam outhouse doors.

Now that is funny!

[Astronaut]

We wouldn't want to offend any of the peace-loving practitioners of the Religion of Peace, would we?

[You Gotta Be Kidding Me]

Islamofacist: "I resemble that remark!!!

[Lunatic Fringe]

THIS CARTOON IS OUTRAGEOUS! This is an OBVIOUS slam of Muslims- anyone can see that!

[88keys]

It's a very peculiar "cartoon", isn't it?! It's not what you'd call "funny", and the "slam" panel would make more sense if the door had been open in the first panel...not to mention Johnny Hart is known to often address "religious ideas" in his B.C. strip...so what to make of it?!

In my opinion, I happen to agree with the CAIR interpretation of his intent, but sadly for them, "reading between the lines" is not actionable, and Mr. Hart certainly has plausible deniability here...the ambiguity of the cartoon is the beauty of it, and the "foo" comment is exactly right on, LOL!

[Miss Marple]

Oh, for goodness sake. Look at what I pulled up on Google:

And that's just on the first PAGE when you type in "outhouse" under "Image search."

I cannot believe that someone has been in this country as long as that CAIR jerk has and does not know this is the traditional way outhouse doors were ventilated!!! Hart should sue CAIR for harassment!

[lawdude]

Let's see. Up yours raghead murderers!

[alloysteel]

Maybe we should start referring to said religion as simply "'Slam", dropping the initial letter "I".

Just a thought.

[JennysCool]

If the cartoon had been festooned with stars and stripes and the sound effect was "BUSH!", the mediots would be jumping all over themselves nominating Hart for a Pulitzer.

[88keys]

Marshall Blonsky, professor of semiotics at the New School in New York, said for one thing, people don't slam outhouse doors.

They don't have to...the doors are "self-slamming"! (aren't they all on those metal coil spring things like the old-fashioned wood screen doors?! so scrap my previous comment about the door being open in the first panel, LOL!!)

And how on earth would Prof. Blonsky know that?? Did he do a survey or something? OH, heheHE!!

Thanks for the post and the laugh! (love the bulldog too!)

[Let's Roll]

Absolute and total proof - if it were needed - that special interest groups like CAIR are paid in direct proportion to how many mountains they can make out of ant hills.

[Right_in_Virginia]

Wonderful find! Thanks for posting.

[JesseHousman]

This statement is interesting:

Omar M. Ahmad, chairman of the board of the Council on American-Islamic relations, spoke before a packed crowd at the Flamingo Palace banquet hall on Peralta Boulevard, urging Muslims not to shirk their duty of sharing the Islamic faith with those who are "on the wrong side." Muslim institutions, schools and economic power should be strengthened in America, he said. Those who stay in America should be "open to society without melting (into it)," keeping mosques open so anyone can come and learn about Islam, he said.

"If you choose to live here (in America) ... you have a responsibility to deliver the message of Islam," he said.

Islam isn't in America to be equal to any other faith, but to become dominant, he said. The Koran, the Muslim book of scripture, should be the highest authority in America, and Islam the only accepted religion on Earth, he said.

I would say that muslims were sharing their faith with Americans when they murdered over 3,000 of us on 9-11.

[drhogan]

i think hart has the right to do what he wants with his cartoons, and the Islamists have the right to object. death threats are another thing,
i think they may be right about the cartoon, given the matching crescent moons in the sky, and the weird placement of the word "slam", as well as the earlier cartoon where hart appeared to be knocking Judaism. if you read the entire article, especially about the knocking of Judaism, it is hard not to conclude that he is knocking Islam in this one.
at first i thought the Islamists were just being paranoid, but i think they are right.

[Bubba_Leroy]

An expert in the interpretation of signs and symbols, Blonsky said he didn't get the joke, and the cartoon makes sense only in light of the religious interpretation.

Blonsky opined that when it comes to artistic criticism, it is a mistake to give much weight at all to the artist's stated intention.

All that matters, he said, is the way people interpret it. Therefore, even if Hart intended no offense, the offense is there.

So let me get this right. He is too stupid to get the joke, but he was offended and that's all that matters. Well I find this idiot offensive.

And how does one become designated as an "expert in the interpretation of signs and symbols" anyway? Can you interpret this symbol?

[StonyBurk]

first off I would like to Thank CAIR-- had it not been for
them I would have never known that Johny Harts' B.C. was
making a valid comment about ISLAM.Even with their crap
I still am not convinced I see the valididity of their point. However I do intend to copy the tune and send it
out with all my Christmas cards this year.IF it makes CAIR
angry it must be good for America.

[netmilsmom]

>>The paper also interviewed six leading cartoonists, who all admire Hart. Five of them thought the religious interpretation probably was right, including Berkeley Breathed, creator of "Bloom County" and "Opus," and Jef Mallett, creator of the nationally syndicated cartoon "Frazz."

Only Doonesbury's Garry Trudeau sided with Hart.

"We cartoonists are simple folk. We don't write on that cryptic a level," he told the Post. "Leave Johnny alone." <<

I hate to tell you but when Trudeau thinks that this was not an afront to Islam, I have to believe it was.

[hoagy62]

Now THIS is interesting....

Gary Trudeau supports Johnny Hart. Trudeau is one of the most anti-Bush cartoonists out there, and if there was ANYONE who would try to spin it in a liberal way, it'd be him...but he didn't.

And Hart is a publicly-professed Christian.

This is indeed interesting.

(BTW..I found nothing in that cartoon that was remotely anti-muslim.)

[Plutarch]

Muslims kill 3000 Americans, and this is the most complelling example of anti-Muslim defamation CAIR can find?

Geez, we must be a tolerant country.

[netmilsmom]

Welcome to FR.

I think Trudeau is saying Hart is not smart enough to be clever.

[sunryse]

>Absolute and total proof - if it were needed - that >special interest groups like CAIR are paid in direct >proportion to how many mountains they can make out of ant >hills.

Like Jessie Jackson?

[teeman8r]

apparently hart has been niggardly with his information but there are clues to his anti-muslim toon... i have not read the article but thank dixiechick2000 for posting the toon...

in frame one... the character approaching the muslim house of worship is in silouhette... a traditional symbol for the first person, or "i"...

then the hidden message "s-l-a-m" together, they make islam...

and the worshipper has apparently entered the individual mosque...

the final frame speaks for itself with the insult interpreted as "not only am i a stinking muslim, but the whole religion stinks of corruption and evil...

either that or hart was just trying to earn a paycheck with a less than creative knock on the bush administration...

but that's another analysis

[Apogee]

Having been a long time reader of BC, I would not say there is proof that Hart was implying all this. His humour is often so sublime that I fail to get it, so taking it at its face value and deciding it is simply an unfunny joke is not really out of line.
The comic that got people riled up a while back was not anti-Jewish unless one takes the position that the essential tenets of orthodox Christian teachings concerning the person of Jesus are anti-Jewish (though many of course do).
Also, "slam" "poof" and other such things frequent his comics.
Now, it is possible that he could have been inferring just what everyone is in arms about, maybe, but I wouldn't bet on it. It is equally possible that he was prophesying, after a fashion and didn't even know it.

As a person who has traipsed up and down the Appalachians for years, I find the New Yorker's (didn't say if he was upstate or NYC) expertise on the nature of outhouses sadly lacking. Moons are the decoration of choice, on outhouses and even sheds. Many of them are spring loaded, too, so of course they slam. Given this, and the fact that it is not unsimilar from a lot of his other work and humour, I incline to doubt. Of course, it could be that I have been failing to read deeply enough all along, especially as all these other guys are quick to point the finger, makes me wonder what they are saying underneath their stuff.

[tubavil]

CAIR is a terrorist front organization that should be terminated.