Meida credit to Jerica Fagan.

Recently, a British teacher was sentenced to 15 days in Sudan jail followed up by immediate deportation from Sudan. What was her crime? She allowed her class of seven year olds to name the class teddy bear ‘Mohammad.’ Gillian Gibbons, the woman charged with this insult to the Islamic faith, was a teacher at a British run school in Khartoum, and considering what protestors were fighting for, she was lucky.

Muslim protestors gathered last Friday, many armed with blunt objects and swords, to call for Mrs. Gibbons’s death. Most of these faithful Muslims were angered that she was let off the hook with merely 15 days and a deportation after being threatened with 40 lashes and six months imprisonment. They considered the act of her allowing her class to name the stuffed animal an extreme insult against their Islamic prophet and founder of Islam, Mohammad.

As many of you can assume, this poor woman doesn’t really deserve any of the heinous punishments that many have thrust upon her. To us, she’s done nothing wrong that can’t be fixed with much more than a little talk and slap on the wrist. However, therein lays our issue: we want to impose our culture onto others. As I must admit I began to write this editorial with the belief that I would write about how completely absurd the faithful Muslims are for wanting such a terrible punishment for such a minute offense. Do not get me wrong though, I still believe that it is a major overreaction on their part and that they should learn not to take every slight notion as an insult to their religion, not to mention resorting to violence and aggression when confronting every single one of these issues as well. However, that is not my concern right now. What I am concerned with is that the majority of the Western world has almost no idea for what goes and what does not, with respect to the world’s religions.

There have been many cases where Western ignorance has insulted many other religions that do not have as many followers as our major religions do here. The image of the Hindu goddess, Lord Ganesha, has been thrust upon such things as designer shoes and toilet seats. These products were withdrawn of course, after a huge uproar from the Hindu community, but the issue remains; we have little to no respect towards other religious icons and have no idea what goes and what doesn’t when dealing with such issues.

Gillian Gibbons did not deserve any of the terrible punishments she was threatened with. The Islamic faith does not deserve to be insulted by ignorant outsiders. Neither should be something that should be merely overlooked. The general western populace needs a crash course on respect with regard to the world’s religions. The Muslims need to learn how to handle something as trivial as the name of a class of seven year olds’ teddy bear, and that it does not incite a punishment as sever as lashings, nor death.