BNN provides English-language US and world news, analysis and opinion from all over the Internet. We strive for high standards, ethical behavior, and the presentation of multiple responsible points of view.
|
Get More Traffic For Your Blog! Blog Explosion brings hundreds of interested visitors to your blog - without costing you a cent. BNN News Archive Page |
Wednesday, September 27, 2006
German Opera Officials 'Blinked' "You gain strength, courage, and confidence by every experience in which you really stop to look fear in the face. You must do the thing which you think you cannot do." The German Opera house, Deutsche Oper, has canceled its scheduled performance of the opera Idomeneo because one of the closing scenes features Idomeneo, the King of Crete, carrying a bag of heads on stage and propping them up on chairs; these are the decapitated heads of Poseidon, Jesus, Buddha and the Prophet Muhammad. Idomeneo then declares, “The gods are dead!” If you knew nothing of this news story and were asked to guess which one of these "heads" caused the cancellation of the opera, I suspect that 99% of you would correctly guess 'the head of Muhammad.' Well at least we're all on the same page about something and that something is, we all feel threatened, in one way or another, by the uncivilized and unpredictable behavior of those followers of Muhammad who would, no doubt, attempt to get some type of explosive device in an opera house, simply because they were offended by the entertainment. Different people react in different ways to fear; some will cower, some will try to ignore the source of their fear in the hopes that it will go away, while others will stand up with clenched fists and say, bring it on! Its a demonstrable fact that cowering, as the German opera company is doing in this case, or ignoring the threat, as far too many of the world's citizens (including an alarming number of Americans) are doing, will do nothing but increase the threat . . . in this case, embolden the terrorists. Not to appear to be overly critical of the directors of the opera company, it must be acknowledged that they reacted as they did after receiving an ominous warning by the German police, telling them, in effect, that the police could not guarantee the safety of the opera house or its patrons if the opera were to be staged; the exact quote from the newspapers is: “disturbances could not be excluded.” A venue such as an opera house must take the safety of their patrons and staff into consideration. But imagine what a bold move it would have been . . . what a shining example for the world . . . if the opera house had taken out advertisements in the major German media outlets stating that 'the opera Idomeneo will go on as scheduled in spite of terrorist threats and in spite of the stated inability of our police force to guarantee the safety of our theater or its patrons.' On opening night security (police augmented by the military) would be so tight that it would make airport security seem lax and the theater would have a guaranteed standing-room-only crowd. That is the power of the clenched fist and the exhortation: "bring it on!" News Links: More about the story and the story behind the opera: Opera boss censors Mozart over stage beheading of Muhammad Fury as opera canceled for fear of offending Muslims Blogger News Network is advertiser-supported, and your visits to our advertisers help BNN to meet its expenses. Help keep us afloat! posted by Whymrhymer at 8:22 AM |
Subscribe to BNN and get a daily bulletin of all our news postings. Interested in writing for BNN? Want information on our news service? Contact The Editor Writing for BNN BNN Editorial Policies Previous Posts
|
1 Comments:
well that sends a clear message that Terrorism has won.
Post a Comment
Links to this post:
Create a Link
<< Home