“The Book of Mormon,” a long-running Broadway smash in left-wing New York City, is the intellectual equivalent to Pam Geller’s Draw Muhammad Cartoon Contest. Both use art and satire to poke a finger in the eye of a particular religion. The only difference between the two is that the mainstream media loves to mock Mormons even as they vigorously defend Islam. And there is of course the little matter of Islamic savages threatening to behead cartoonists.

There is just no getting around the fact, though, that unless you are appeasing terrorists or carving out special protections for a certain religion, Muhammad cartoons and “The Book of Mormon” are the exact same approach towards two different religions.

Wednesday, and to no one’s surprise, The New York Times exposed themselves as both bigots and terrorism-appeasers.

Here’s the Wednesday Times’ editorial condemning the Muhammad Cartoon Contest:

Those two men were would-be murderers. But their thwarted attack, or the murderous rampage of the Charlie Hebdo killers, or even the greater threat posed by the barbaric killers of the Islamic State or Al Qaeda, cannot justify blatantly Islamophobic provocations like the Garland event. These can serve only to exacerbate tensions and to give extremists more fuel.

Some of those who draw cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad may earnestly believe that they are striking a blow for freedom of expression, though it is hard to see how that goal is advanced by inflicting deliberate anguish on millions of devout Muslims who have nothing to do with terrorism.

On that same day, here’s the very same New York Times selling tickets to the “Book of Mormon.”

In other words, The New York Times is making advertising money off of satirizing Mormons.

Here’s the very same New York Times raving over “The Book of Mormon.”

Oh, and here’s a New York Times review of Kevin Smith’s 1999 Catholic-bashing film “Dogma”:

Nothing could be more irrelevant to Kevin Smith’s audacious ”Dogma” than ticking off a list of its cheerful outrages against hidebound Roman Catholicism. Yes, Mr. Smith enjoys shock value, but this time he makes it mercilessly funny and places it in the context of an obviously devout, enlightened parable.

Given this filmmaker’s special vernacular, a wild hybrid of comic books, off-the-wall rhetoric and unexpected intellectual heft, his ability to bushwhack audiences with serious thought has never seemed more worthwhile. With ”Dogma” Mr. Smith makes a big, gutsy leap into questions of faith and religion. He miraculously emerges with his humor intact and his wings unsinged.

The true bigots are those who defend one religion and promote and profit from the mockery of another.

At least among those in the elite American media, the  terrorists have won this victory. If violence works once, the violent are encouraged to use it again.

Defiance is not provocation, appeasement is.

In defense of your rights, if you don’t believe offending a culture by provoking the savages within that culture is a righteous act, you would have hated Martin Luther King.

 

Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC