Harry’s Place

What’s the body count?

When people claim their religious sensibilities have been transgressed and react irrationally – whether violently or through recourse to the law – shows a distinct lack of real conviction in their supposed faith as far as I’m concerned.

Look at the feedback page on Pat Condell’s website, it’s shocking beyond belief.

http://www.patcondell.net/page4/page4.html

When do we get to see Terence Koh’s take on Mohammed?

A little known fact about the life of brian is that it was written and filmed featuring another faction, a group of extreme zionists whose symbol was a swastika - star of david juxtaposition on their ww2 german style helmets.

… Most of their scenes ended on the cuttingroom floor but you do see them rushing up to brian during his crucifixion and committing group suicide.

This is priceless.

At the time of the exhibition several people complained to the Baltic Centre after seeing the statue but the Centre’s response was to say that they had provided warnings about the potential offence the display might cause. In January 2008 Mrs Mapfuwa contacted the Christian Legal Centre and, with assistance from their lawyers, reported the statue to Northumbria Police, asking for an investigation. In May 2008 Northumbria Police concluded there was no case. The Christian Legal Centre is continuing to support Mrs Mapfuwa as she pursues a private prosecution. She will argue that the statue of Christ outraged public decency and that people who saw it were likely to be harassed, alarmed, or distressed.

What? So despite her being told by the Centre that she will potentially be offended, she’s gone in, and - lo and behold - been offended, she thinks she’s got a case?

What precious nonsense is this?

The Christian Legal Centre believes in freedom of expression but this statue served no other purpose than to offend Christians and to denigrate Christ.

Eh? Obviously you don’t believe in ‘freedom of expression’. One or the other, surely?

(They should also surely realise by now that if it wasn’t so easy to offend Christians pretentious idiots would stop trying to provoke them.)

Jesus’s. Or are there more than one of them?

The plural, if not following English grammar, should be penes: it’s a third declension noun. I’ve done OU Latin!

The plural, if not following English grammar, should be penes: it’s a third declension noun. I’ve done OU Latin!

Damn. That’s going in the file.

Is there really a case here? I mean a legal case? In America we have something called “standing” that I can’t seem to find in these facts.

The MoToons were commissioned as a comment on the travails of an author who had written a ‘lives of the holy’ book about Mohammed, but who couldn’t get it illustrated for fear of violent attack orchestrated by clerical fascist groups.

Did certain editions of Karen Armstrong’s book on the Islamic prophet not have a cover illusration of his making the Isra and Miraj?

“When people claim their religious sensibilities have been transgressed and react irrationally – whether violently or through recourse to the law – shows a distinct lack of real conviction in their supposed faith as far as I’m concerned.”

It is quite true, that no religious person or group has the right to react violently or resort to the law, simply due to having one’s sensibilities transgressed.

Criticism of religion is a perfectly legitimate activity in a free society.

But I think you are wrong to say that such a reaction is the result of a real lack of conviction. Firstly there are those, sadly, who as we know are willing to die for their faith, hence are very convinced, and yet would be outraged if their sensibilities are hurt.

The reason for the passionate and often irrational reaction is simply due to the worth that we believers invest in our religions. No one likes to hear bad things about matters they care for. Just ask any parent who hears of negative comments regarding their children!

So she is objecting to a depiction of Jesus with an erection. wellm since about AD 325 it has been heresy to deny the full humanity of Jesus, and thus his manhood, by… um… extension. So the clueless slut-of-satan bitch is a heretic, and she is blaspheming Christ with this little tizzy of hers.

“She has a point”

Yeah, on top of her head.

It is by no means clear that Mapfuwa even visited the exhibition in question. All we know is that she read about it in a newspaper. She appears to be taking offence by proxy.

I don’t think this interfering old busybody has anything to bleat about. She is asking for censorship, and she wants to be the censor. People like her aren’t acting to “protect” the reputation of Jesus of Nazareth. They are reacting against an exhibit because they think it makes them look stupid. It’s their own vanity coming to the fore.

But we shouldn’t have self-censorship either. If an artist wants to be “edgy” and “challenging”, but restricts himself to offending a bunch of old christian windbags, he deserves a whole shootload of scorn and mockery, and so do the Baltic Exchange. Let’s see them tangling with the “religion of peace”, and I will be impressed.

“The MoToons were commissioned as a comment on the travails of an author who had written a ‘lives of the holy’ book about Mohammed, but who couldn’t get it illustrated for fear of violent attack orchestrated by clerical fascist groups.” First I’ve heard of that. Sounds like another retrospective justification to me - i.e. made up nonsense.

Mapfuwa… it sounds like a Zimbabwean name. Our illustrious President His Excellency Robert Gabriel Mugabe sets a good example of African, Catholic, North Korean-Stalinist homophobia so are we to take it that Madame Mapfuwa is a ZANU acolyte?
I’m intrigued.

But for the record I think it’s quite pathetic of the artist to court publicity this way. Say what you will, it was just the fact that Mohammed (allahu snackbar) was (gasp) PICTURED, that sparked those riots. No gallery in Eurabia would dare exhibit a statue of Mohammed with a big woody.

That’s nice, dubi, start speculating about her race. Why? So that you can pigeon hole in your tiny mind all people of that race. Make a racist generalisation in other words.

“The MoToons were commissioned as a comment on the travails of an author who had written a ‘lives of the holy’ book about Mohammed, but who couldn’t get it illustrated for fear of violent attack orchestrated by clerical fascist groups.” First I’ve heard of that. Sounds like another retrospective justification to me - i.e. made up nonsense.

well, all this shows is how bloody ignorant you are. that’s exactly why the cartoons were published. people were too cowed by the vicious ideology that is “militant” islam to illustrate a book about big Mo’. i don’t believe it was meant to be an offensive book, and should you care to read some of the background at zombie’s Mo’toons archive, you’ll find that historically there was not a restriction on portraying the “Prophet”. it’s a modern invention, like the falsehood that the Temple Mount is the “third holiest site in Islam” and Mohammed ascended to Heaven from there on a creature with the body of a horse, face of a woman, and tail of a peacock.

First I’ve heard of that. Sounds like another retrospective justification to me - i.e. made up nonsense.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kåre_Bluitgen

TheIrie -

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kåre_Bluitgen

It’s not nonsense, I’m afraid.

TheIrie-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_Jyllands-Posten_Muhammad_cartoons_controversy

Not made-up, or nonsense, I’m afraid.

Test

First I’ve heard of that.

Doesn’t mean it ain’t true. In fact, there is a strong chance that a lot of things you ain’t heard of are true.

Sounds like another retrospective justification to me - i.e. made up nonsense.

Yes, rabbles roused round the rglobe on the more than partial basis of fabricated and doctored photographs to call for violent reprisals in response for benign images of any providence were - being conducted by exotic non-Westerners - naturally to be defended.

I agree with you about inferring motives from her name.

shut up twat, it was just an observation. i don’t give a shit about her race, i was talking about her nationality. or are you just defending a bigoted homophobe because she’s black? we have plenty of small minded white racist homophobe bigots from Zimbabwe too. although had this been the case i wouldn’t be able to ascertain this from an article because they tend to have british imperialist names like “ireson” or “smith”. you see a “racist” behind everything. mccarthyite knob.

Try here Irie

Not nonsense, I’m afraid.

Or here

There is no equivalence between what this women has done and the behavior of outraged Islamists who’ve murdered innocents over a cartoon

And as for these “transgressive” artists, they’re all cowards.

Jesus with an erection?

Jesus it’s pathetic, just pathetic.

In light of the religious threat we’re all facing, think of how cowardly and counterproductive this work of ‘art’ is.

And of how shallow and superficial the artists principles are.

I think Koh should be prosecuted for gaining notoriety by deception.

Jesus with a stiffy? I say, how positively daring.

and yes, for the record, I do think it is relevant whether she is a ZANU acolyte, because there are a lot of them living in the West. we have a campaign to enforce sanctions on ZANU brats studying in prestigious foreign universities on the Zimbabwean’s dime. or would it be “racist” to punish these parasites for the thievery and murder by which they have reduced the country to penury so as to provide a 1st class education for their children?
anyway, sorry, i’m derailing the thread. could be she’s just a good christian woman who’s offended by this and not a ZANU homophobe. in which case i would sympathise with her.

here’s the link for the campaign: http://www.zimfinalpush.blogspot.com/

When do we get to see Terence Koh’s take on Mohammed?

Well, that’s just the probleme, isn’t it?

As long as ‘transgrssive’ art and ‘iconic’ transgressive artists restrict themselves to mocking religions that don’t issue death fatwas, we can all go on believing are fundamental rights are safeguarded.

Islam raggin’ on ya? Muslims islamising you school-space and workplace and insisting on forcing you to respect their ’sacred’?

Just do another pisschrist.

tee-hee.

And as for Pat condell ( mention above)?

He’s spent a great deal of his adult life delegitimising and ridiculing, for profit, the sanctity of Christianity, and in doing so has foolishly midwived the arrival, the establishment and the legitimisation of a new form of sacred, a sacred that screams to Mecca and that won’t be mocked.

And in case you’re wondering, the New testament says quite explicitly that the devil won’t be mocked.

Fair enough - that was how the editor justified himself.

In other words, Andrew, Kåre Bluitgen - whose slant on Mo’, I admit I don’t know (as, no doubt, do you) - you accept was in fear of his physical safety for seeking illustrations of Mo’.

I don’t need to see this statue to know that it is utter artless [I I may give the word a literal sense] trash. I don’t care about the religious fall out, but I would love to be able to construct a case to prosecute the cretin for purveying it as art, and more so the cretins who assist the ‘artist’ with publicly funded venues, and the critics who talk it up. It’s possible that they may not be guilty of artistic cretinism, but simply be scammers, like the tailors of the king’s new clothes.

TheIrie

It wasn’t a post hoc justification. Bluitgen’s difficulty in finding an artist predated the publication of the cartoons.

The issue gave rise to a wide ranging debate in the newspapers, which culminated in the publication of the MoToons.

There’s an account of it here:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/news/2006/feb/04/cartoonprotests.uknews

Is there any explanation as to why these iconic figures are portrayed with erections?

Can anybody suggest a reason?

I’m stumped.

Fair enough on that point, David. I still agree with it. And I wonder if the same paper would publish the Holocaust cartoons, in the name of free speech and pushing back boundaries. I doubt it.

I meant I still disagree with it…

Should Ms Mapfuwa not muse on the fact that I would not be aware of the Jesus with a penis if it was not for her activity.

Surely she is offending people by waving Jesus’s penis in our faces.

So to speak.

It would have been more challenging if they had given Jesus a vagina.

That would have challenged boundaries and allowed us to question the normative values of gender and the power relationships that spring from them.

Or other such bullshit.

It would be more interesting if the statue was in a church. For instance if a christian sect chose to depict jesus in this way.

I want to get a copy of this statue to stick in my front garden at Christmas. It’ll be a nice complement to the turgid nativity scene my neighbours put out each year.

“TheIrie”, what’s the connection between Holocaust denial cartoons, and the MoToons? The Iranian regime and you both conflate the two. Of course, the Iranians promote Holocaust denial, so what’s your reason for the conflation?

There are many depictions of the Holocaust, in many media.

Are you promoting Holocaust denial, like the Iranians? Or do you think that upsetting peoples’ religious sensitivities is equivalent to the antisemitic denial of the murder of six million Jews, in recent history? Or is this just a knee-jerk reaction to have a pop at Jews the moment your Islamophobia alarm rings.

I’m sure there’s an innocent explanation that doesn’t paint you as an antisemite.

Jesus is one thing, but messing with The Mouse is another. The artist had better look out for the Disney heavies.

And, judging from the photo in that article, Jesus has an impressive piece of equipment but it’s clearly only half-way there. Is Mr Koh making a comment on Anglicanism?

I think we know that “TheIrie” is drawing an equivalence between Holocaust denial, specifically, and the MoToons. I know that time and time again he’s shown himself to be an ignoramus, and it’s quite stunning that, having lingered at HP for the last few years, he’s completely ignorant of the origins of the MoToons affair. However, I’ve always been doubtful about the regular accusations that he is an antisemite, but his MoToons/Holocaust equivalence is making me reconsider that. But I’ll wait to see what the explanation is.

There is no equivalence between what this women has done and the behavior of outraged Islamists who’ve murdered innocents over a cartoon

And as for these “transgressive” artists, they’re all cowards.

What are you talking about?

Jesus it’s pathetic, just pathetic.

Agreed, Jesus deserves better than the ugly, misshapen phallus Koh stuck on that statue.

Oops somehow my agreement with “There is no equivalence between what this women has done and the behavior of outraged Islamists who’ve murdered innocents over a cartoon” is missing from the above comment.

I have picture of myself in the mirror with an erection.

I don’t need to see this statue to know that it is utter artless [I I may give the word a literal sense] trash. I don’t care about the religious fall out, but I would love to be able to construct a case to prosecute the cretin for purveying it as art, and more so the cretins who assist the ‘artist’ with publicly funded venues, and the critics who talk it up. It’s possible that they may not be guilty of artistic cretinism, but simply be scammers, like the tailors of the king’s new clothes.

Freakin’ A.

And I see that Hirst is having trouble shifting his portfolio. Seems the market for his puerile contrivances is drying up at last.

Credit crunch Brownie.

Same goes for organic food sales.

There is no recession. Just a unique convergence of disparate economic challenges.

Ha ha.

You forgot to add, “which we are uniquely able to cope with due to our strong fiscal policies and economic track record under Gordon Brown”.

I can’t help thinking the statue of Jesus with a hard-on would garner more votes in an election than Brown.

Gregg wrote: “…It’ll be a nice complement to the turgid nativity scene…”

Turbidity contrasted with turgidity - quite an artistic concept.

But the truth is, this sculpture was created with one and only one purpose in mind - to insult and mock Christian believers.

But the truth is, this sculpture was created with one and only one purpose in mind - to insult and mock Christian believers.

I don’t think that’s neccessarily true at all. The point is clearly about subverting popular icons rather than about religion per se, which is why it is meaningless to ask when he is going to create a similar image of Mohammed.
As to its qualities as a work of art, I think it’s ok - I certainly have no particular objection to it. I don’t think that that, or the quality of the other works which David mentioned is particularly relevent though - bad art is equally deserving of protection from censorship as good art.

When I first saw this post I thought you’d been visiting my blog:

http://unitalian.blogspot.com/2008/06/jesus-with-penis-and-unitarian-soul.html

There’s apparently another one in Barcelona, according to a comment.

So roll up for more willy’s of the Messiah (not erect though, sadly).

Is there any explanation as to why these iconic figures are portrayed with erections?

I’m stumped.

Drawing cocks - or “dobbers” - on existing pictures is bona fide British folk art.

The case of Jesus with a stiffy is amusingly absurd; I presume Emily Mapfuwa and the Christian Legal Centre have not got a leg to stand on here - certainly the police have already dismissed the first case.

Mind you, any court proceedings may be quite amusing as Mapfuwa and pals try to explain in great detail how Jesus’ cock “harassed, alarmed, or distressed” the public. Pure Monty Python.

I suppose, in a way, she might have a stronger argument if Jesus had been placed on a traffic island, but in that case the old chap would more likely be a source of amusement than anything else.

I think the display of erect penises is a sign of health, strength and leadership in some cultures - far from negative at all. Didn’t Anita Roddick, during negotiations in the Amazon, once come across a tribesman proudly displaying his stiffy? Something like that.

So in that case its really rather a compliment to old Jesus.

“Jesus with a stiffy”

In South Africa, “a stiffy” is a 3.5″ computer disk. You know, the smaller ones with the hard case, as opposed to “a floppy” - the 5.25″ big thin ones that bend. It leads to all sorts of confusion when South African IT people working in London ask their clients if they have a stiffy.

“Drawing cocks - or “dobbers” - on existing pictures is bona fide British folk art.”

Yes it is, but at some point, an idea has been done so many times before that it ceases to be a ‘daring breaking of taboos’ or ‘iconoclasm’ or ‘challenging the presumptions which underpin the privileging of the ’sacred”, and just is a little bit ‘old hat’.

But the truth is, this sculpture was created with one and only one purpose in mind - to insult and mock Christian believers.
Nothing wrong with that, because the Christian story is definitely worthy of mockery - it’s really trite beyond words; I twigged that at age 11. One thing I have come tounderstand in the last few years - most Christians, even those ostensibly quite devout, don’t really believe the nonsense story themselves.

I think though in relation to this Jesus hard-on business, the first comment by mequito is the best!

But who knows? We haven’t seen them “in the flesh” have we? Perhaps it’s a comment on the infantilisation - the “cuteness” - of icons in the modern world? Perhaps it’s a comment on the fact that icons are overwhelmingly male? Perhaps it to “complete” these kitsch anthromorphisations of ruthless organisations (Disney, DreamWorks, the Church) by making it explicit that if they were real they would need bodily functions? Perhaps a combination of the above; perhaps something else altogether? I’m not being post-modern when I say that there’s a degree of freedom to interpret them as you see fit. e.g.:

I don’t need to see this statue to know that it is utter artless [I I may give the word a literal sense] trash. I don’t care about the religious fall out, but I would love to be able to construct a case to prosecute the cretin for purveying it as art, and more so the cretins who assist the ‘artist’ with publicly funded venues, and the critics who talk it up. It’s possible that they may not be guilty of artistic cretinism, but simply be scammers, like the tailors of the king’s new clothes.

Or, Colin, they may just be having a laugh. I think what REALLY riles people like Coliin here is not the antiquated 80s view that this is publicly-funded commie corruption of our kids, but that in a post-Sarah-Lucas world this stuff might actually sell, and sell for loads and loads of money. People find this stuff amusing.

Yes it is, but at some point, an idea has been done so many times before that it ceases to be a ‘daring breaking of taboos’ or ‘iconoclasm’ or ‘challenging the presumptions which underpin the privileging of the ’sacred”, and just is a little bit ‘old hat’.

Absolutely, David. But why would it have to be taboo breaking? As I say, maybe it’s just a continuation of an artistic tradition, or maybe it’s even just someone having fun. Willies are fundamentally funny, after all.

Erections are all about power though aren’t they. Bologna used to boast hundreds of towers erected (fnar) in the middle ages by competing families. My friend Matthew Stradling’s Marissa http://www.dontpaniconline.com/var/uploads/mag/images/illustration_121302567
is all about female empowerment (but be careful if you are at work!)

So this could be about a powerful rather than a disempowered (crucified) Christ.

I think the display of erect penises is a sign of health, strength and leadership in some cultures - far from negative at all.

You will certainly find statues of Buddha with impressive erections.

If Jesus’s penis offends thee, Mapfuwa, cut it off.

Oops, that might be worse.

“I have picture of myself in the mirror with an erection.”

Oh thanks! That made me splutter porridge on my laptop. And that’s NOT a metaphor.

Tim - “I think we know that “TheIrie” is drawing an equivalence between Holocaust denial, specifically, and the MoToons” - I’m drawing an equivalence between the right to publish cartoons of either. And since the Danish paper was interested in breaking taboos, either could be equally justified, if this was purely a matter of principle. There is no way around that. If you demand the right to offend others, but scream to the high heavens when someone else offends you, you are a straightforward hypocrite.

was an ok-ish poem which was important because it highlighted the arguably homoerotic nature of the Jesus story

Oh, ok, well that is very important. Terribly, terribly important.

I’m drawing an equivalence between the right to publish cartoons of either. And since the Danish paper was interested in breaking taboos, either could be equally justified, if this was purely a matter of principle.

If a Danish newspaper, in the face of death threats from Jewish extremists, insisted on publishing cartoons satirising the Holocaust, I would insist upon their right to publish.

I would imagine that this position would be consistently held by HPers - I know that David T, for instance, has argued that David Irving should be defended.

Strange that you think there would be any hypocrisy on this matter.

Drawing cocks - or “dobbers” - on existing pictures is bona fide British folk art.

Is it? I know it’s the kind of thing 13-year-old schoolboys have been doing for, oh, probably ever since there were schoolboys, if that’s what you mean.

But who knows? We haven’t seen them “in the flesh” have we? Perhaps it’s a comment on the infantilisation - the “cuteness” - of icons in the modern world? Perhaps it’s a comment on the fact that icons are overwhelmingly male? Perhaps it to “complete” these kitsch anthromorphisations of ruthless organisations (Disney, DreamWorks, the Church) by making it explicit that if they were real they would need bodily functions? Perhaps a combination of the above; perhaps something else altogether? I’m not being post-modern when I say that there’s a degree of freedom to interpret them as you see fit

My two rules of thumb are:

1 - if it needs interpreting, then it probably isn’t art. It won’t always apply, but it does more often than not.

2 - if I could have done it, then it probably isn’t art, because I’m crap at art.

There are exceptions to one or both rules, but they are rare.

There are usually two stock responses to the above. To the first:

“Who get’s to decide what is art?”

The answer is that I do, you do, we all do. But it is no more arrogant of me to claim that sticking an erect cock on Mickey Mouse is not art, then it is for anyone else to insist that that it is. If I don’t get to define the term for others, then I demand reciprocation.

To the second:

“Ah, you may be able to do it, but you didn’t think to do it.”

If Hirst shits in a box and gives it to the Tate, you can bet your life it will be interpreted as a commentary on something or other. If I do it, it will just be a turd in a box. It wouldn’t matter if I got there first.

I have picture of myself in the mirror with an erection.

That would never have happened in Piers Morgan’s day.

If you demand the right to offend others, but scream to the high heavens when someone else offends you, you are a straightforward hypocrite.

Way to miss the point, Irie. Mark T has already dealt with this, but just to add, I don’t have a problem with people expressing their dislike and even anger at anything being published anywhere, including Muslims and non-Muslims complaining about the publication of the Mo Toons. The issue was not the complaining, but rather the threats to murder the artisits and newspaper editors both before and after publication, not to mention the deaths in riots in some countries and the attacks on embassies, etc..

Capiche?

I suppose the Cerne Giant is a British folk art precursor of this swollen jesus. Maybe people weren’t so hung up about tadgers in the old days.

“TheIrie”: “If you demand the right to offend others, but scream to the high heavens when someone else offends you, you are a straightforward hypocrite.”

As it happens, my issue with Holocaust denial is not that it’s offensive, but that it’s false. But you digress…

I simply want to know why you chose Holocaust denial, in particular, to draw equivalence. There are so many examples of taboos that you could have chosen: paedophilia, rape, pornography