“I want millions” cartoon dubbed a “hate crime”

This cartoon, published in April by the Chronicle Herald in Canada, has been reported to police as a “hate crime” by the director of the Centre for Islamic Development (CID).

It depicts Cheryfa MacAulay Jamal, whose husband Qayyum Abdul Jamal was held for 17 months on suspicion of terrorism. On his release without charge, she stated in an interview that she wanted millions in government compensation.

The cartoon by Bruce Mackinnon was printed on April 18, and immediately drew the ire of Zia Khan of the CID. He claimed that it went beyond the boundaries of free speech.

It doesn’t.

Dan Leger, the Herald’s director of news content:

The whole purpose of that cartoon was to comment on the outrageous demands of this individual for compensation long before any hearing into her case had ever been held […]

[MacKinnon] depicted her exactly the way she looks and used her own words, and that’s the genius of cartooning that you’re able to do that

Khan sees things differently.

This is a horrendous thing in this day and age where you are feeding the seeds of hatred toward a whole community of 1.8 billion people.

You would not put a native American Indian with feathers and say I need money in order to cull white people’s heads. You wouldn’t do that. This would be libellous.

(Hat tips to The Freethinker and the Comics Reporter)


2 Responses to ““I want millions” cartoon dubbed a “hate crime””

  1. marc draco says:

    Brilliant! Thank “god” for free speech.

  2. intheknow says:

    I am Muslim and I found it funny. Oh oh guess I am in trouble with the radicals.

    But I ask people this – please divorce the uneducated Muslims who follow a twisted view of Islam from your average Muslim who is trying to raise their kids with values, pay their bills and hate their jobs. These people do not understand, nor have they studied the Quran. They are bitter and listen to somebody else and think they are so bright. In reality they make life harder for us who get painted with the same paint brush. And for the record no place in the Quran does it say to cover their face. They a – either need to cover it or b – like to run around feeling superior like they are Super Muslims.

    The person in the cartoon goes and deletes anything in Wiki she doesn’t like written about her. She cries for free speak yet lowers the bar for herself.

    And the best part of this all. The tax dollar goes to supporting them while they sit on welfare, get free lawyers etc.

    She does not speak for Islam, problem is nobody can get a word in edgewise with her around.