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Let me bounce off of some words by Stanley Kurtz posted today:

The Madrid and London terror bombings, the failed plot against America-bound British airliners, the murder of Theo van Gogh, a series of violent anti-Semitic incidents in France, the Paris riots, and the Muhammad cartoon affair have all served to wake up at least some Europeans to the problem of unassimilated Muslim immigrants and their children. Unfortunately, many Europeans remain asleep.

And I would argue, American artists as well. I point again to Thom Morgan's excellent article in the inaugural issue of POLYSEMY, entitled "After Theo Van Gogh's Murder". Thom says quite a bit, and does so masterfully, and it alone makes the $3 price for the issue's Digital Edition worth it in my book.

In considering Thom's piece further, it occurred to me that, for artists more interested in anti-Bush political stances, or anti-Western power stances (all of which I agree with Paglia makes for a bitter and naive artistry), Van Gogh's murder presents a special problem. You either have to come to terms with the fact that this so-called Western power (or "hegemony"), oft-critiqued by contemporary artists as well as Humanities professors, presents in and of itself the opportunity for the free speech, free expression, and what many are usefully calling "the right to offend", and that those who seek to prevent it are, thus, misguided in a fundamental way, which requires some likely drastic remedy. Or you have to somehow find an argument that, while acknowledging the "wrong" of the brutal murder of Van Gogh, and the wrong of something like this possibly happening in America, nonetheless still maintains the conclusion that the very source of this murder (extremist Islam) is to be expected given Western dominance, behavior, and history in the region. The latter of which either leaves you defending the murder (what few if any do), excusing the murder (what many Dutch Muslims do), or (and this is what is happening in America, and Hollywood), you completely ignore the murder. Cue the radio silence in this country about this murder, which I've long viewed as a watershed moment for this planet, vis a vis the artistic community.

So with the Van Gogh situation (further complicated by the role of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who is vital to understanding this issue, as well as the locale for all this — Holland, the home of liberal culture), you either have to question your priorities and moral wares deeply, seemingly intractably, and allow for possibly long periods of ambiguity and indecision before, perhaps, you see the light on this (and see how and when humanitarian concerns are secondary to common national interests, which protects the right to offend) or you have to ignore the whole thing. Which is precisely what people do with Zen koans, such as "What is the sound of one hand clapping?" You either pretend it isn't there, and go on about your life ignorant of its learning potential, or you actively contemplate the confusion, and find a new resonance. And my intention with encouraging Thom to write his piece, and pride at what he cooked up, was the sincere hope that more working artists would end their habit of the former and do much more of the latter.