“The touchiness of Muslims about assaults on the Prophet Muhammad is in part rooted in centuries of Western colonialism and neo-colonialism during which their religion was routinely denounced as barbaric by the people ruling and lording it over them.” — this is not just history but also v relevant today. qurans have been burned by u.s. soldiers and flushed down toilets by u.s. interrogators in the present war on terror. also, it would be interesting to flip this story. what if muslim americans went around town burning the bible publicly and calling jesus names? what if palestinians made a film about moses in which he was having some non-kosher sex? how would evangelical christians react to that? or jewish settlers? after all they r part of the “civilized” free-speech-loving west. of course, i’m not advocating the making of hateful films. i’m proposing a theoretical argument where we switch the religions of the people involved and imagine how things would roll. not so smoothly i predict. more here.