In yet another round of Islam v. Free Speech, Islam slams hit satirical comedy show, South Park, with lamented cries criticizing the show's producers Trey Parker and Matt Stone for daring to depict the Prophet Muhammad. However, not completely insolent, Trey and Stone didn't violate the Islamic fundamentals such as not depicting Muhammad in any way, including speech. Instead, they disguised him in a bear suit. Clever.

South Park is a long running cleverly written show aired on the Comedy Channel Central, which has a witty tongue-in-cheek approach to covering pop culture, leading figures, and news events. It uses the fictional town of South Park and its characters to drive home points that appeal to common sense and logic, and which fly far above and beyond the grasp of political correctness, including the current emphasis on not offending Muslims - a trending attitude that treads on increasingly thin ice.

The mention of Muhammad as a South Park feature has infuriated Muslim groups, including uber-lame "RevolutionMuslim.com" (see smarter counter part RevolutionIslam ). In their online rant and rave, RevolutionMuslim argues that the Prophet Muhammad has been mocked - from there they digress into a discussion on the Iraq War and imperialism, bringing up ancient history and Quranic scriptures. The online proclamation denouncing the show and defending the group's position also demonstrates the groups total inability to let a show be a show; rather, and as usual, groups such these bring out as many tangent aspects as possible showing far too serious an attitude over such a simple little depiction.

Perhaps the problem here isn't that Muhammad was "insulted" or that Muslims were offended; the problem here is that Muslims don't have a sense of humour when it comes to their faith. Afterall, South Park is an equal opportunity comics, having depicted Moses, Jesus, and Buddha without any fuss from any other religious group.

So the fact that a Muslim group is protesting the show demonstrates the severe limitations in freedom of speech; but the fact that South Park producers complied with the protest by altering the show's ending, highlights the very real damaging effects that such outbursts and threats against free speech have on our society. So it's Islam 1, Free Speech O.

Other than that, I say well done South Park. It's satirical comedy shows such as this that help break barriers by cracking smiles on otherwise grim faces.