Ryan Byrd’s Ramblings

I picked up a few pieces of artwork during my trip to the Ivory Coast last summer. Here below, I finally post a few pictures:

Cory Doctorow of the Electronic Frontier Foundation authored a op-ed piece for the latest edition of Make Magazine (which magazine, is, by the way, probably the coolest magazine ever, but I divagate…).

His article argues that it is unconscionable for museum officials to prohibit the photographing of national treasures (such as Michelangelo’s David) all in an effort to make a few bucks selling official prints. Copyright law, he states, does not apply to works that are hundreds of years old. Says Cory, “The point of a museum is to spread culture, not restrict it in order to run a penny-ante picture-postcard racket.” His sentiments struck a chord with me; I completely agree with him.

If you’ve been to many museums lately, you’re entirely familiar with the anti-camera stance. Over the Christmas holiday break, I visited a number of museums in the Museum District of Houston, Texas. At one art museum, they featured ancient African art and artifacts. There too, pictures were prohibited. Not heeding the countless signs, I whipped out my Sony Cyber-shot digital camera and began shooting. A security guard approached me.

“I hope you’re not going to take pictures in here,” she said.
“Why would I do such a thing,” I replied.

She left, I reluctantly put away my camera and instead took out my handy Treo 650 cell phone/PDA and pretended to be engaged in vigorous PDA work, all along, taking still and video shots of the art. Here are a few of the results of my passive insurrection:

If you keep abreast of current local events, you were no doubt aware of Paul Rusesabagina’s recent whirlwind tour throughout Utah. In one week alone, he was featured at Utah State University, Utah Valley State College and University of Utah. I was present at the latter venue.

Paul Rusesabagina is the hero portrayed in the film Hotel Rwanda. In that film (and in real life), Paul helped save more than 1,200 refugees by sheltering them in the Hotel des Mille Collines, a large hotel in Kigali, the capital city of Rwanda. The year was 1994 and situation in Rwanda had reached the boiling point; Militant members of the Hutu tribe began committing genocide by the senseless slaughter of those from the Tutsi tribe. (As a historical framework, during French occupation, the Tutsi’s were largely placed in positions of leadership and as a consequence, when the French left, the Hutu profited from the power vacuum to seize control and enact revenge upon their old enemies.) A band of Tutsi rebels formed to resist the Hutu oppression, throwing the country into civil war.

During that perilous time, Paul, a Hutu himself, bribed the Hutu Interahamwe militia with money and beer to keep them from killing the refugees in the hotel. As the conflict raged on, food and water became scarce in the Hotel. As a last resort, the refugees began to use water from the Hotel swimming pool to survive. The civil war eventually ended. The 1,000,000 deaths were largely ignored by the rest of the world. Rwanda, like its neighbor Zaire, continues to struggle to this day.

The four star hotel continues to operate. It has 112 rooms, a bar/cafe, three conference rooms, a restaurant, and the now-famous swimming pool.

As I understand it, it is forbidden in Islam to make depictions (positive or negative) of the Prophet Mohammed (probably deriving from the second of the Ten Commandments forbidding graven images). An author in Denmark was therefore having difficulty locating a cartoonist who felt comfortable drawing the religious icon for an upcoming book. An appeal for help was broadcast and, soon enough, a dozen cartoonists offered their skills by sending in representative drawings. Many of those drawings turned out to be (as cartoons sometime are) less-than-flattering. A Danish newspaper decided to print those submissions last in September. Months later, political and religious Muslim leaders used the publication of those drawings to enrage their followers. What followed were militant, violent demonstrations beginning in Denmark and spreading virally throughout Europe (particularly as other European newspapers printed the cartoons in support of free speech).

Questions I’ve been thinking about: what denotes free speech and when does freedom of expression transition from merely offensive to becoming a hate crime? What are appropriate responses to attacks on fundamental religious philosophies? When it is ok to ignore the rule of law and act according to conscience (or according to how a religious vade mecum dictates?) Why do Muslims at large seem lately to react differently (read: more violently) to external stimuli? What about the Muslim (or middle-eastern?) culture makes it easier to incite crowds to mob destructiveness and disorder?

ideas? comments?

Below are the cartoons published in Denmark’s Jyllands-Posten. Click each image to enlarge.