Two years after much of the American press shamefully kowtowed to murderous mobs intent on censoring allegedly offensive caricatures of the Prophet Mohammed, a leading publishing house has handed militant Islam and its supporters another victory.
Random House had been set to publish “The Jewel of Medina,” a novel by Seattle-based journalist Sherry Jones about Aisha, the child bride of Islam’s prophet.
Unfortunately, the publishers last spring sent galley proofs to Denise Spellman, a professor of Islamic history at the University of Texas-Austin and author of a scholarly book on Aisha in hopes of getting a nice blurb for the dust jacket.
Professor Spellman, to put it mildly, tossed a fit.
She contacted the owners of two Islamic-oriented blog sites to “warn” them that the novel “made fun of Muslims and their history.” They, in turn, alerted their readers and called for a campaign to get the book withdrawn.
Spellman also called Random House and “warned” that publication could set off a wave of widespread violence, calling the book “more dangerous” than the Danish cartoons or Salman Rushdie’s “The Satanic Verses” – a book that led to a death warrant against its author.
To emphasize how poisonous the book supposedly was, Spellman also had her lawyers threaten to sue if her name was in any way associated with it.
So what did Random House do? You guessed it – the publishers caved.
Within 24 hours, it notified Jones that it was postponing publication “indefinitely,” citing “fear of a possible terrorist threat from extremist Muslims” – though it had received no such threat, apart from Spellman’s “warning.”
Eventually, Random House simply cut the book loose, negotiating a termination agreement with the justifiably stunned author. (Rushdie, himself a Random House author, called the decision “disappointing.”)
On its Web site, Random House touts its publication of a guide for youths called “The First Amendment First Aid Kit,” warning that “today the fundamental right to read what we want is facing more challenges than ever.” The publisher also proudly proclaims that it “is committed to those who stand against censorship.”
Random House should re-examine its supposed commitment to oppose book banning – and its editors should start by taking a close look in the mirror.