Wikipedia refuses to censor medieval images

“Wikipedia, the free online encyclopaedia, is refusing to remove medieval artistic depictions of the Prophet Muhammad, despite being flooded with complaints from Muslims demanding the images be deleted.
“More than 180,000 worldwide have joined an online protest claiming the images, shown on European-language pages and taken from Persian and Ottoman miniatures dating from the 14th, 15th and 16th centuries, are offensive to Islam, which prohibits any representation of Muhammad. But the defiant editors of the encyclopaedia insist they will not bow to pressure and say anyone objecting to the controversial images can simply adjust their computers so they do not have to look at them.”
Full article in The Observer
Wikipedia’s Muhammad page
Wikipedia’s Depictions of Muhammad page

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barry
Barry Kavanagh writes fiction, and has made music, formerly with Dacianos.

Contact him here.

5 comments

  1. I have a picture of MY ASS that looks just like Mohammed! I have another picture of MY ASS that looks suspiciously like Jesus. You can all kiss MY ASS!

  2. Yes, the religious-minded are always very concerned with what everybody else is doing. It is as if they need the support of fellow believers, because their own faith is inadequate, and they are weak without an in-group. Certain members of the Islamic community might ask themselves where in history Wikipedia might have found these images of Mohammed, and then realize that people have been depicting Mohammed for centuries. Let people get trapped in the ‘image of God’ as much as they want to. If they choose not to make the image “transparent to transcendence” then that’s their problem; it’s their loss. Worry about your own spiritual development, and let ‘God’ deal with the rest of us. The Process will continue as always, no matter how we attempt to describe or picture it.

  3. Terrific post Gabriel Spaulding. Very well said, had I the ability to put my thoughts in such articulate words I would have done so but you removed the need.

  4. Wow. Thumbs up for Wikipedia! I think that several world goverments could learn a thing or two about how to deal with all those muslim “hurt feelings”.

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