Islamic imperialism's varied strategies

Mark Steyn writes,

Speaking of Islamic imperialism's varied strategies, ten years ago this September an obscure Jutland newspaper published the Danish Mohammed cartoons, and opened up a new front in the clash of civilizations: free speech and jokes. The inarticulate goon imams threatened to rain down death hither and yon, and then began actually doing so. Given that the media are incessantly congratulating themselves on their courage, I carelessly assumed they would welcome the opportunity to show some, and would reprint those cartoons as part of a legitimate news story. In fact, only my magazine in Canada, Ezra Levant's Western Standard, and a satirical weekly in France, Charlie Hebdo, dared to show readers what all the fuss was about. Ezra was prosecuted by the disgusting Alberta "Human Rights" Commission and lost a six-figure sum. The Charlie Hebdo guys lost their lives.

On the fifth anniversary, I had the honor to appear in Copenhagen with a handful of friends from Scandinavia, the Netherlands and elsewhere at a conference to consider the question of Islam and comedy. There were six of us on stage that day: our host Lars Hedegaard, the Swedish artist Lars Vilks, the pseudonymous Dutch cartoonist Nekschot, the comedians Shabana Rehman and Farshad Kholghi, and me. Nekschot, for security reasons, was obliged to appear disguised in a burqa, and has since been forced to abandon his identity and the cartooning life entirely; Lars Hedegaard dodged a shot at point blank range by a man at his front door who subsequently fled to Turkey, where they're refusing to extradite. Lars Vilks was the target of the jihadist attack on a free-speech event in Copenhagen this Valentine's Day in which a Danish film-maker and a synagogue security guard were killed, and so he too has been obliged to retire from public life. Shabana Rehman has had her family restaurant firebombed. So, of the six of us, that's an impressive 67 per cent hit rate for Islam.

But I'm still here and I love my beleaguered Scandinavian friends, and so I will be in Copenhagen for the tenth anniversary of the Danish cartoons. I will miss those who can't be there, either because they're dead or have had their public lives erased, but I will salute those who will be, including the editor who commissioned and published those pictures, Flemming Rose. It's important to keep the flame of free speech burning in Europe, and in Denmark in particular. Because all you can do as the weasels and cowards of the fin de civilisation west trade away freedom of expression incrementally day by day is to stand up and use yours as loudly as you can. Copenhagen's a nifty 20-minute high-speed train ride across the Øresund Bridge from Sweden and a short flight from Paris and London, so, if you're minded to swing by, I'd love to see you there. It's the afternoon of September 26th.