Cartoons about Muhammad in Europe

Some cartoons were published in a Danish newspaper in late September of 2005 depicting the prophet Muhammad in unflattering and offensive ways.

This article from the BBC explains the meaning of the 12 cartoons.

The cartoons led to major protests across the Muslim world.

(here is an intriguing map of where Muslims are in the world)

The New York Times has a nice timeline tracing the cartoon protests.

The cartoons currently in the news raise the issue:

How free should freedom of speech be?

There are some limits to free speech in the United States -- but speech here is far freer than in almost any other nation.

The main categories of speech not protected in the U.S. are

Defamation | Causing panic | Fighting words | Incitement to crime | Sedition | Obscenity
For a discussion of each, click here.


For some additional context, see this speech from a first amendment website.



Here is another account of the cartoon scandal, from Wikipedia.