[InclinedPlane]

When applied to any other religion in the world, especially Christianity, it's legitimate criticism. But somehow Islam gets special dispensation (perhaps because Islamic reactionaries have a tendency towards violence, and cowards have a tendency towards caving in to threats of violence).

"Piss Christ" (look it up) has been lauded as a legitimate work of art. And cartoons that are much more intentionally harmful toward Christianity or Judaism are printed on editorial pages every day in the western world.

The Mohammad cartoons were very mild in comparison to the standards of criticism in the western world. If we cannot support criticism of Islam because we lack the balls to set Muslims straight when they throw violent tantrums then we do not have freedom of speech anymore. And it's only a matter of time before Muslims make greater and greater use of this new power they've discovered. And too it's only a matter of time before every group realizes that threats of violence are an effective means of exercising influence over others.