Islamic Fig Leaves and Duct Tape

Modern art connoisseurs

Giulio Meotti, cultural editor for Il Foglio, and an Italian journalist and author, chronicles the steady, cringing submission of Western culture to Islamic demands and imperatives in an article on Gatestone, ‘Covering Up Our Culture to 'Avoid Giving Offense' on June 16^th.

Meotti wrote:

….In the name of fighting "Islamophobia", the British establishment now appears to be submitting to creeping sharia: and purging and censoring speech on its own.

Recently, some major conservative intellectuals have been sacked in the UK.

One is the peerless philosopher Roger Scruton, who was fired from a governmental committee for saying that the word "Islamophobia" has been invented by the Muslim Brotherhood "to stop discussion of a major issue".

Then it was the turn of the great Canadian psychologist Jordan Peterson, whose visiting fellowship at Cambridge University was rescinded for posing with a man wearing an "I'm a proud Islamophobe" T-shirt. Professor Peterson later said that the word "Islamophobia" has been "partly constructed by people engaging in Islamic extremism, to ensure that Islam isn't criticized as a structure".

The instances of Scruton and Peterson only confirm the real meaning of "Islamophobia"; a word invented to silence any criticism of Islam by anyone, or as Salman Rushdie commented, a word "created to help the blind remain blind". Where is the long-overdue push-back?

… We all have been covering up our supposedly "blasphemous" culture with burqas to avoid offending people who do not seem to mind offending us.

I would have retitled Meotti’s column, “Erasing Our Culture to ‘Avoid Giving Offense.’” Not all “offensive” works of art (or critiques) are ‘covered up’ with sheets. They are simply removed from sight or display.

And, to contradict Jordan Peterson, there is no such thing as “Islamic Extremism.” There is just Islam, which emulates the practice of the likes of Google, FaceBook, and other tech giants to remove “offensive” posts or sites from public view (and without much of a definition of what they consider “offensive." Islam, root, trunk, and branch, is a totalitarian ideology, on a par with Nazism, if not worse. Arguably worse, Hitler slaughtered six million Jews, not counting millions of other groups. Islam has slaughtered tens of millions over its entire fourteen-century history.  Aside from Fallaci’s narration of June 14, Robert Spencer’s The History of Jihad From Mohammad to ISIS ought to satisfy your appetite for gory annals. “Extremism” is practiced by the killers, the jihadists; “silent majority,” non-“extreme” Islam is what is practiced by non-violent rank-and-file Muslims.

Meotti continued:

At the Saatchi Gallery in London, two works, again featuring nudes, this time overlaid with Arabic script, prompted complaints from Muslim visitors, who requested that the paintings be removed from the Rainbow Scenes exhibition. In the end, the paintings were covered with sheets. "The Saatchi is behaving like Saudi Arabia, hiding from public view artworks that blaspheme against Islam", commented Brendan O'Neill on Spiked. One expert described the paintings as "The Satanic Verses all over again". The reference was to the book by Salman Rushdie, a British citizen, published in 1988. Iran's "Supreme Leader" Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 condemned Rushdie to death for writing the book. The bounty on Rushdie's head was increased to $4 million in 2016 when a group of Iranians added $600,000 to the "reward" -- with no protest from Britain.

The Guardian, a left-wing British newspaper, reported:

A leading contemporary art gallery covered up works featuring an Islamic declaration of faith after complaints from Muslim visitors who said the artworks were blasphemous.

The Saatchi Gallery in west London hosted an exhibition of new material by the artist SKU featuring a variety of works. However, it decided to cover up two paintings that incorporated the text of the shahada, one of the five pillars of Islam, in Arabic script juxtaposed with images of nude women in the style of the US flag.

The gallery, founded by the advertising magnate Charles Saatchi, rejected calls from some visitors to remove the paintings, arguing it was up to visitors to come to their own conclusions on the meaning of the art. However, in response to the complaints, SKU suggested as a compromise the works should remain on the gallery wall but be covered up with sheets.

“It seemed a respectful solution that enables a debate about freedom of expression versus the perceived right not to be offended,” he said in a statement to the Sunday Times.

If Mr. Saatchi understood an inkling of Islam, he would know that most Muslims, having been raised in an anti-reason, anti-thought social environment, are not able to reach their own conclusions; such independence is forbidden by the Koran under pain of being branded an apostate or earning a fatwa’s death sentence.

Mr. Saatchi’s willingness to compromise with Islam is a measure of weak-spined, “respectful” eagerness to oblige Islam, and to surrender the West to Islam’s Sharia demands. 

I would have retitled Meotti’s column, “Erasing Our Culture to ‘Avoid Giving Offense.’” Not all “offensive” works of art (or critiques) are ‘covered up’ with sheets. They are simply removed from sight or display.

And, to contradict Jordan Peterson, there is no such thing as “Islamic Extremism.” There is just Islam, which emulates the practice of the likes of Google, FaceBook, and other tech giants to remove “offensive” posts or sites from public view (and without much of a definition of what they consider “offensive." Islam, root, trunk, and branch, is a totalitarian ideology, on a par with Nazism, if not worse. Arguably worse, Hitler slaughtered six million Jews, not counting millions of other groups. Islam has slaughtered tens of millions over its entire fourteen-century history.  Aside from Fallaci’s narration of June 14, Robert Spencer’s The History of Jihad From Mohammad to ISIS ought to satisfy your appetite for gory annals. “Extremism” is practiced by the killers, the jihadists; “silent majority,” non-“extreme” Islam is what is practiced by non-violent rank-and-file Muslims.

Meotti continued:

At the Saatchi Gallery in London, two works, again featuring nudes, this time overlaid with Arabic script, prompted complaints from Muslim visitors, who requested that the paintings be removed from the Rainbow Scenes exhibition. In the end, the paintings were covered with sheets. "The Saatchi is behaving like Saudi Arabia, hiding from public view artworks that blaspheme against Islam", commented Brendan O'Neill on Spiked. One expert described the paintings as "The Satanic Verses all over again". The reference was to the book by Salman Rushdie, a British citizen, published in 1988. Iran's "Supreme Leader" Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini in 1989 condemned Rushdie to death for writing the book. The bounty on Rushdie's head was increased to $4 million in 2016 when a group of Iranians added $600,000 to the "reward" -- with no protest from Britain.

The Guardian, a left-wing British newspaper, reported:

A leading contemporary art gallery covered up works featuring an Islamic declaration of faith after complaints from Muslim visitors who said the artworks were blasphemous.

The Saatchi Gallery in west London hosted an exhibition of new material by the artist SKU featuring a variety of works. However, it decided to cover up two paintings that incorporated the text of the shahada, one of the five pillars of Islam, in Arabic script juxtaposed with images of nude women in the style of the US flag.

The gallery, founded by the advertising magnate Charles Saatchi, rejected calls from some visitors to remove the paintings, arguing it was up to visitors to come to their own conclusions on the meaning of the art. However, in response to the complaints, SKU suggested as a compromise the works should remain on the gallery wall but be covered up with sheets.

“It seemed a respectful solution that enables a debate about freedom of expression versus the perceived right not to be offended,” he said in a statement to the Sunday Times.

If Mr. Saatchi understood an inkling of Islam, he would know that most Muslims, having been raised in an anti-reason, anti-thought social environment, are not able to reach their own conclusions; such independence is forbidden by the Koran under pain of being branded an apostate or earning a fatwa’s death sentence.

Mr. Saatchi’s willingness to compromise with Islam is a measure of weak-spined, “respectful” eagerness to oblige Islam, and to surrender the West to Islam’s Sharia demands.