Religious groups are blasting President Obama for not condemning an anti-Christian art display set to appear in New York City and one Republican lawmaker said he is “fed up with the administration’s double standard and religious hypocrisy.
“Piss Christ,” once branded as a “deplorable, despicable display of vulgarity,” will be displayed at the Edward Tyler Nahem Gallery in Manhattan on Thursday. The artwork features a “photograph of the crucifix submerged in the artist’s urine.”
The artwork debuted in 1989 and was funded through prize money provided by the National Endowment for the Arts.
[Sarcasm alert.] You proles and rubes just don't understand art; that's what the problem is.
That and Christians tend not to come to art galleries with rocket-propelled grenades or with the intention to behead. Clearly, that's how you gain religious respect from a government.
I foresee interesting ecumenical conversations in the near future with these excitable folks:
"Prime Minister Raja Pervaiz Ashraf on Friday said the blasphemy against the Holy Prophet (PBUH) was unacceptable under any circumstances and demanded the world community to declare sacrilege a global crime."
and
“It is not good enough to say it’s free speech, it should be allowed. I think if this does provoke action against American citizens or Americans anywhere else in the world, then maybe we do need to rethink how much freedom is OK."
However, if they have a good pension fund, I may be willing to "swim the Sinai". I could be Mullah Bob. Any religion that can gain that much attention and support from a religion-free democracy may be on to something, although I imagine members of the US Foreign Service might feel differently.
Still more:
"What other entertainments have senior U.S. officials reviewed lately? Last year Hillary Clinton went to see the Broadway musical "Book of Mormon." "We reject all efforts to denigrate the religious beliefs of others"? The Book of Mormon's big showstopper is "Hasa Diga Eebowai," which apparently translates as "F*** You, God." The U.S. Secretary of State stood and cheered.
Why does Secretary Clinton regard "F*** You, God" as a fun toe-tapper for all the family but "F***, You Allah" as "disgusting and reprehensible"? The obvious answer is that, if you sing the latter, you'll find a far more motivated crowd waiting for you at the stage door. So the "Leader of the Free World" and "the most powerful man in the world" (to revive two cobwebbed phrases nobody seems to apply anymore to the president of the United States) is telling the planet that the way to ensure your beliefs command his "respect" is to be willing to burn and bomb and kill. You Mormons need to get with the program.
Meanwhile, this past week has seen the publication of two controversial magazines in France: One, called Closer, showed Prince William's lovely bride, the Duchess of Cambridge, without her bikini top on. The other, the satirical publication Charlie Hebdo, showed some bloke who died in the seventh century without his bikini top on. In response, a kosher grocery store was firebombed, injuring four people. Which group was responsible? Yes, frenzied Anglicans defending the honor of the wife of the future Supreme Governor of the Church of England rampaged through Jewish grocery stores, yelling, "Behead the enemies of the House of Windsor!" The embassy-burning mobs well understand the fraudulence of Obama and Clinton's professions of generalized "respect" for "all faiths." As a headline in the Karachi Express-Tribune puts it:
"Ultimatum To U.S.: Criminalize Blasphemy Or Lose Consulate."