The paucity of cultural dissidents within Islam inspires pessimism. Following 9/11, the beheadings of journalists, and the cartoon riots, the West patiently listened for the Islamic voices of common sense to speak up. But all we heard were the crickets chirping. Where is the Saudi Arabian Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn? Where is the Iranian Vaclav Havel? Where is the Sudanese Harry Wu? Andrew Sullivan believes such a figure may have arrived in Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a playwrite and member of the Dutch parliament. Sullivan remarks that the Somali-born Ali's speech in Berlin last week "will one day be a critical historical document of our time." Time will tell. But Ali's Right To Offend is definite must-reading for the present.

Sullivan: "Free speech is at its most legitimate when it is offending people. That's how societies change."

It seems to me that Sullivan and co. do not have a proper hold on this issue. Freedom is not good for its own sake, and censorship is not bad for its own sake.

Freedom, it seems to me, is good as a means to and condition of goodness. True freedom is the freedom to be good. And therefore, freedom that leads to evil should be restricted.

Censorship (a restriction of freedom) in the service of goodness, is itself a good (e.g., restrictions on pornography).

Concerning the Cartoon Riots, the issue is not censorship, but destruction and violence.

I hope Hirsi Ali is watching his step, for more than a few Muslims who ran afoul of radical Imams have had fatwas issued for their heads. Murders in his nation suggest he is in danger there as well as in Somalia.

Ayaan Hirsi Ali is a she, not a he, but the general point stands.

I know what you mean . . . but I don't think nations like Iran and Sudan being ruled by Islamic parties is usefully ana-logous to communism as your reference to political dissidents of former communist regimes indicates.

Take Iran, for example, there are plenty of different political parties within their system covering a spectrum of positions that vie for control of their Parliament and Presidency. The Ayatollah right now is actually relatively moderate and is working hard to restrain Ahmedenijad (sp? that is a try from memory) and Ahmed himself is mostly saying ridiculous things to pander to his base that put him in power. Sure it is a theocracy, but that isn't enough to make an ana-logy to communism. I know communism is often likened to a religion but it certainly wasn't one shared by the masses that lived under it.

My post meshes with your comment. Individuals rebelled against their governments, culture, and (ir)religion under Communism. They don't do this under Islam. This shows one difference between Islam and Communism. The failure of Islam to bring a formerly non-Islamic nation into the Islamic fold for several hundred years also shows the failure of equating Islam with Communism, which swallowed up two of the most populous nations on Earth, as well as nations on four continents. But that totalitarianism existed behind the Iron Curtain, and rules several of the high-profile Islamic states, is certainly one ground for comparison--the ground I use for comparison in the post.

Dan, new here, and great site. I believe for us not to band together and publish these cartoons only empowers the extremists because now they know they can use fear to their own means. It's actually quite shocking. We would have been far better off to publish these cartoons. These extremists have no real power, they are mainly from primitive agricultural societies and like in prison, look to prey on the weakness.

Was ww3 started over a cartoon?? I hope not, but there is going to come a point where we are going to have to be just as brutal. They take away our freedom of press, what next?? How many millions of innocents have to die in the hands of these cowards before we do something??? Isn't there a fatwas issued for all our heads??