The Chemistry Desk Column

We Need Comic Relief

2006-02-15T18:39:00.000-05:00

Ask almost any Westerner what's causing the Muslim riots around the world, and you'll get a typical headline news answer: Rioting Muslims are offended by cartoons. To most of us in the West, that statement sounds absurd on the surface. What gives with these touchy Muslims, raising hell in the streets over a couple cartoons? Get over it!

To which there is the equal and opposite reaction of justifying criminal behavior by saying that the cartoons instigated violence and it was irresponsible to publish such inflammatory and offensive material in the first place.

In the middle is the European and American politicians, who want both censorship and freedom of speech, trying to reach a compromise that won't outright ban religious satire but would also get rid of the comics.

Conventional wisdom suggests that I, as a blogger, will get behind one of these pre-established viewpoints and write about how the other two are wrong. So who shall I endorse, the witlessly detached, the apologists, or the politicians?

None of the Above.

I've had it. No more steriotypes. No more talking points. It's time for a honest opinion, and there is none to be found among the aformentioned three. So here's mine, along with my analysis of the debate as it rages thusfar.

Delayed Reaction

The world-wide consensus on the origins of the cartoon riots is simple, cut and dry: Comics published by a Danish newspaper incited universal outrage in the Muslim world, fueling hatred and anti-Western sentiment that led to violent protests in several countries. The mainstream media is and has beaten this simple information into the heads of everyone who is not completely severed from civilization. Ultimately, the reactions towards it funnel into two distinct categories, those who view the Muslims as the bad guys, and those who view the cartoonists as the bad guys. Both ideologies, regardless of the differences, have one thing in common: the assumption that the comics started the riots. It is in this assumption that both sides are proven irrevocably wrong.

Exhibit #1: The Space-Time Continuum. This may be the most underlooked fact in this whole debacle, and it's the one that can turn it all around. The cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad were published in September, and republished a month later in an Egyptian newspaper. So how the hell did it take nearly five months for the Muslim world to respond?

Unless someone would like to suggest that the Islamic activists of the past somehow distorted space and time such that their angry rhetoric changed our present, I'd conclude that the initial publication of the comics was not the cause of the riots.

The delay is no coincidence, it did not happen by accident. Most likely, the mass distribution of the offending comics to the greater Muslim world was, in fact, an orchestrated plot to cause chaos in the Middle East and force the West to sacrifice it's civil liberties in order to appease the violent rioters. As for who may have orchestrated the mass propaganda campaign, the answer lies with those ambiguous few who first spread the material through the Mosques and Arab satellite TV.

Now, some may argue that it was only after the Danish Prime Minister Anders Rasmussen refused to punish the newspaper for exercising it's freedom of speech that the Muslim world erupted into anger. Once again, it should be noted that the space-time continuum moves in only one direction, so you can't go back in time. Danish embassies were already under attack in the weeks before Rasmussen's defiant declaration.

Submission

If only the rest of the world were as resolute in their defense of democratic values as the Danes. Meanwhile, South Africa's courts caved into pressure from Muslim activists and prevented any of it's newspapers from reprinting any of the comics. Newspapers in Poland and Ukraine have reprinted the comics, albeit with extensive apologies. Sweden, on the other hand, is going so far as to shut down websites hosting pictures of the comics. As if state-sponsored censorship isn't enough, the European Union is planning to regulate the media in order to curb the consequences of free expression. Of course, Rome seems to believe that free expression, "...does not imply the right to offend religious beliefs." Wow, I never knew free expression was so limited before.

Oh, don't think America's off the hook, either. The Bushevik administration issued a blanket denunciation of all "anti-Muslim images." Hmm... Imagine if that was said just over four years ago after 9/11. I don't think it would have gotten such a warm reception. Remember when Osama's face was on the dartboard? Yeah, good times.

You know, for an administration that is so dedicated to protecting our values and liberties from the evil Arab hun, we sure seem eager to acquiesce to their demands pretty quickly. I'm surprised no one's brought up the "can-of-worms" argument, because it seems pretty clear to me that if our government can limit our freedom of speech to make an exemption towards Muslims, it wouldn't be long before our freedoms are taken away from us entirely.

The cost of Submission to Islamic Law is too high for this and any Western nation. Muslims can sit there and be pissed off at a couple of satirical comics until they're blue in the face, but they have no right whatsoever to tell non-Muslims what they can and cannot say, in pictures or otherwise. Tolerance is not the issue here. This is a matter of preserving the rights we perceive as fundamental, and furthermore, one of self-respect. I don't know about Europe, but I'll be damned if America becomes blackmailed by a couple of anarchistic thugs threatening us with another 9/11.

We will not bow.

Where Free Speech Ends

2006-01-30T20:04:00.001-05:00

Earlier this evening I was riding the bus back home with my schoolmates who were with school's Alpine (Skiing and Snowboarding) winter sports program. Bus rides are usually fairly quiet with this bunch, and conversation usually consists of little more than teenage gossip and talk about how the conditions were that day.

The driver had turned on NPR for the first half of the ride, and I sat listening idly to the headlines. When news of the Senate voting on Samuel A. Alito Jr.'s nomination, the freshman girl sitting across the isle from me snapped to attention.

"Is that the guy who's against abortion?" she asked no one in particular.
"Yeah, that's the guy." I said, "We're probably looking at his nomination going through and Roe v. Wade being overturned in the short term, but after the end of Bush's term it will probably go back to..."
"YOU FUCKING ASSHOLE!!" a voice shouted from two seats up. Seth, one of the Seniors, had turned around into the isle, and angry red in his face.
"Excuse me...?" I said, with a tone of sharp reproach.
"Yeah seriously, what the fuck man!" another voice came from further up the bus.
"What are you guys all about?" I asked, "I wasn't even talking to you. I was having a conversation with her."
"Yeah RIGHT!" came the cry from several seats up.
"Oh sure," Seth replied, "It's a fucking bus. Talk about this sort of thing on you're own time, faggot."
"It's called 'freedom of speech'," I retorted.
"Suck a dick...!" he snapped back at me, "That's freedom of speech too!"
"No, it's not. That's called Censorship."
"Oh, so you can talk about your shit and we can't?"
"There's a difference between expressing your opinion and trying to silence another's."
"You're talking about sticking an egg beater up a woman's cooch and that's your fucking opinion??!"
"I don't like abortions any more than you do, I don't think it's right either." I tried to explain.
"Just shut up, fucker. Just shut the fuck up."
"Why?"
"You're fucking sick, just shut the fuck up." I could feel the tension escalate another notch, things were about to get violent. I thought to myself, if this were any other day at Prospect, I would have taken him on right then and there. But Darrow wasn't something I was willing to lose.

We rode the rest of the way in silence. I thought of a million different things to say to him, but kept it to myself under the pretense that opening my mouth again would get some teeth punched out. He had at least 50 pounds on me, but I felt I could use my weight better than his, but it would be no use in a close-quarters environment like a bus. Just a few days ago he tried to tackle me in a snowball fight, which I managed to get out of and quickly hit him with a snowball as I spun around off the ground. But my war stories are best suited for another day.

That day could not come fast enough for Daniela, the freshman girl, who stormed off through the halls once we arrived back at school. "They have no right..." she said as she passed me, "Where do they get off? It's just so..." at a loss, she continued past me.

Daniela's frustration is understandable. I remember it all too well as a freshman at Prospect Hall, in which the ignorant rich white kids felt it was their prerogative to say whatever the hell they wanted to me, and I couldn't say anything back. Looking back at those battles, those spars, I remembered what I used to conquer them: Wit, tact, eloquence and the razor tongue I inherited from my father.

Looking back at the oppression I dealt with at Prospect, and the coordinated response of the Druids, I held my head up high at what could be described as, by and large, victory. I feel bad for those I left behind, knowing that for them the battles still continue, but at least not in the way I had been "Swiftboated," if you will, freshman year. I have been longing to get back into that familiar arena of schoolhouse politics, if for no other reason to aid my friends back at St. John's. Now I have that chance again.

Daniela may have come away from that experience feeling abused and downtrodden, but I came away from it awakened. My adversary has returned to me, in my face, to silence me. Only this time, they don't know who their up against. At the risk of sounding arrogant, I'd like to think I've got some pretty heavy shit under my belt.

This is what happens when Free Speech ends. Dissent is the shadow of oppression and censorship, and follows the two just as closely. It doesn't matter what the issue is, or how taboo it is, no one has the right to tell anyone else to shut the fuck up on a bus because of their political views. Anywhere. Ever. And if anyone tries, they shall be fought. The world is full of people like me, I'd like to believe, people like Daniela. People who are sick of being pushed around, and are going to start pushing back.

It is my hope that, with my guidance, Daniela starts to push back as well, fiercely and effectively. And in her wake she may yet train another, who will train another, until finally the legacy of the Druids of Prospect Hall spreads across the country.

Our President has often stated that Freedom is infectious. For once, I'll take him on point.

We're back up

2006-01-30T19:59:00.000-05:00

My apologies for the downtime. Next time I go idle for weeks/months at a time, send me an email with the subject header "GET OFF YOUR ASS AND BLOG YOU LAZY BUM" if your email client supports that many characters, in which case you can condense it to just the first 6 words. To apologize, I hope to write another 2 entries tonight, one on Free Speech and one on the Alito nomination.

Penance

2005-11-12T14:20:00.000-05:00

I remember that one morning years ago… I was sitting in math class when the director of the school, Mr. Mullin, came through the door and told us we needed to go to the library. My whole 8th grade class, except for those in honors, were there at the time so it wasn’t hard for us to get up and go, the lecture was getting boring anyway. I could tell though, and so could the rest of the class, that something was off. He said nothing else.

The “library” was a fairly small room, and wasn’t used as it’s name intended. Books lined the walls, but no one ever read them. We gathered around a small television on one of those TV racks that every school in the country has, mostly to watch Pixar and Disney films in Spanish on days the teacher was absent. I thought it was a movie, something even seemed eerily familiar about it, but it was unmistakable afterwards.

Smoke rose from the lone World Trade Center building, and somewhere off camera below the transparent Channel 9 news banner was the smoldering remains of the other one. We watched in stunned silence as the limp figures of people, distant yet distinct, willingly leaped to their deaths below. Looking around the room shortly thereafter, I wondered who I’d hold hands with if we had to jump like that.

My experience with extreme emotions prior to then, specifically pain and anger, was that they always came separate from each other, and were part of different emotional spectrums. At that moment, I was experiencing utter pain. Then the beleaguered newscaster coming over the air: “…we have just received word that the Pentagon has been struck as well…”

My blood boiled.

Never before had I felt anger and pain coexist; they had always overcome and cancelled each other out. Now they coexist. The confusion preceding it didn’t last long, once I reached the conclusion that Someone had done this. Someone rammed those planes into the towers on purpose. And I wanted Someone dead.

Parents were notified and all the kids got out of school. My mom picked me up in the driveway of that small and dreadful private school, she saw it all happen live too. We watched the news, trying to take it all in. Questions raced through my mind… who was responsible? How did it all happen? Where are the bastards now, and when are we going to get them?

One question I did not, would not, and even today, will not ask is: Why?

As I saw it, that was a question to be asked by those who did it. All that mattered was that my country, and myself, was at war with some rouge militant group called Al Qaeda, and that our army was going to kick their asses. Nothing else mattered; not fear, not remorse, not anything.

The next day, all of Frederick City gathered out in the park by the band shell, holding candles for the lost. I remember behind right where I sat that night, in the branches of a tree long since cut down, was my former Scout Master, bearing the Stars and Stripes alongside the rest of the troop. I had long since severed from the Boy Scouts, and I had a passionate hatred for the man. But that night, I didn’t see him as the bastard who let the older scouts beat me up on Wednesdays, but as a fellow American. We never talked to each other, but from the glances we exchanged, the feeling was mutual.

I felt like part of a greater whole that night, and for a while afterwards. We were all Americans, and despite all our differences, we still had that in common. We were all going to fight the Terrorists together, and if all of us worked together, we would win.

In the weeks that passed, I felt… well… it’s strange. I felt good, on the inside. Naturally, the rest of me was afraid, but an underlying consciousness loved the fact that we were going to war, that we were going to fight evil, and most especially, we were going to win. This I must confess, and it pains me to do so. People had died, people were fighting, and more were dying, and on the inside (it so disgusts me now!) I loved it. The simple feeling, of knowing that there was nothing else to the world than the good and the bad, was wonderful in the way that only bliss can be. Everything was so simple, and even, exciting.

It’s disgusting, isn’t it? But we were all there, we all felt that way, however short of a time it lasted (if it has not worn off at all). We were all angry, and we were all scared; even the most stoical leftist anti-war protestors can admit to that. But most importantly, we were united.

Then came the Great Media Terror. For months on end we were bombarded by sickeningly descriptive ways, or in absence of that, ambiguously unspecific ways that the Enemy was going to try to kill us next. Again, even the best amongst us were captured by the forces of fear during that time, if not for a little while. It was then that I started asking questions. “How do they quantify the terror on the National Terror Alert Chart?” “How did the FBI figure out the terrorists would use pen guns and RC planes to attack us?” and, “Just what the hell am I supposed to do during Orange Alert, anyway?” After a while, it began to wear on me so much I just stopped believing them.

That was the turning point in what brought me back from the brink to where I am today in my thoughts and beliefs. I opposed the war from the start, and will continue to do so until it ends. Whatever simple ideology I held of a black and white world is long gone, and I pray it shall never return. To those who have joined our side in the fight against tyranny, I hope you can forgive me, and to please accept this blog as my penance.

What is the Chemistry Desk?

2005-09-25T21:56:00.000-04:00

What this is:

-A liberal blog.
-A news editorial blog.
-Replacement for the hard-to-find (for spelling reasons) Chemestry Desk Column.

What this is not:

-Fair and Balanced.
-Compassionate or caring.
-A blog I want my mom to see.

The Chemestry Desk started about a year ago, when I atteneded St. John's at Prospect Hall, a Catholic school in central Maryland. I took Chemistry in a fume-filled concrete floor lab room, which was hardly a positive learning enviroment. The class often got off-track, and gererally there was nothing any of us could do about it. So one day, I started writing in pencil on the desk I sat at, completing my political editorials before the end of class. The next day I would come in and erase it with Windex, and started all over again. Over time, I went from vandalism to blogging, and created the purposefully misspelled "Chemestry Desk Column," named as such because I somehow got away with spelling chemistry that way for over half the year without anyone noticeing. Now that I'm back into blogging, I've created the correctly spelled version, which is easier to direct people to verbally than "...go to www.chemestrydesk.blogspot.com, only the 'i' in chemistry is an 'e'..." The Daily Kos can get away with that sort of thing, but I can't.

Reveille

2005-09-25T21:27:00.000-04:00

I'm going to make this short and sweet:

Uncle Sam needs a few good bloggers to step up and give him a good kick in the ass once in a while, and while I may not satisfy the criteria for "good," my nearly half-year of editorial silence will come to a close with the establishment of this blog. It is physically impossible for me to not think about, consider, or feel bad for those in New Orleans and all along the Gulf Coast, and I need release... even if it means I have to shout into the internet where no one is listening.

Welcome back to the Chemistry Desk Column.