MCC opposes boycott of Danish food products
Just as all Muslims should not have to suffer for the crimes of Bin Laden, all Danes should not have to pay for a Danish newspaper's hate mongering

TORONTO - The Muslim Canadian Congress is asking Muslim consumers and businesses in Canada not to boycott Danish products as a way of venting their justifiable anger at the Danish newspaper that printed hate filled offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad (May peace be upon him). The MCC understands the hurt of the community, but feels the boycott of Danish food products by some Muslim owned stores is just another example of our community getting provoked into irrational action and validating the stereotypes that exist about us.

Muslim Canadians must express their outrage not only at the cartoonist, but also the extremists in the Middle East and London, England, who carried posters claiming, "The solution is the slaughter of those who harmed Islam and the Prophet."

The Muslim Canadian Congress strongly believes that as reprehensible as the cartoons were, the issuing of death threats and asking for the killing of journalists and cartoonists, must be condemned with vigour, as it is contrary, not only to the letter and spirit of Islam, but also offensive to the civic society we have chosen as our home.

The MCC feels Danish cheese manufacturers should not be punished or held responsible for the publication of the extremely hostile cartoons of Prophet Mohammed in a Danish newspaper. Innocent Danes should not be punished for the crimes they have not committed.

Collective punishment and group guilt has affected Muslims adversely only recently. For the last four years the MCC and other Muslim organisations have demanded that the Muslim community not be judged negatively and considered guilty by association, because of the actions of Osama Bin Laden. For the last few years Muslims have campaigned against racial profiling and guilt by association. How can we then turn around and act contrary to what we demand for ourselves?

As Muslims, are we not the same people who said, don't blame all Muslims for the actions of one Muslim--Osama Bin Laden? Have we forgotten the argument we used to defend ourselves from collective punishment? The why apply this unfair judgement against innocent Danes, many of them Muslim.

If our Muslim community wishes to boycott Danish products as an act of protest, the question is, why stop at Denmark? Why not start with American products? After all, it is the United States that occupies two Muslim countries, not Denmark. Where will this boycott stop? Will we stop buying French, German, Italian, Spanish and Norwegian products as well? After all, newspapers in these countries too have printed the cartoons.

Many Muslim governments, led by dictators and kings, have fanned this selected sense of outrage against Danish food products. Their campaign reeks of hypocrisy and false bravado. After all, it is easy to give up on Danish cheese, but who will hand over their Microsoft products, their iMacs or their Mercedes cars. Not Hosni Mubarik, and definitely not King Abdullah or President Assad of Syria.

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