Hundreds of thousands protest Charlie Hebdo cartoons in Chechnya. Yahoo/Reuters

Protesters for the  "Love for the Prophet Muhammad" event in Grozny Chechnya. Yahoo/Reuters

Hundreds of thousands of protesters marched in Grozny, Chechnya in opposition of the satirical Charlie Hebdo cartoons that depicted Muhammad. Yahoo/Reuters. Chechen leader, Ramzan Kadyrov, lead the march with anti-western and pro-Islam rhetoric. Kadyrov said that the protesters were willing to die to stop people from making fun of Muhammad. Russia broadcast the rally on state television, perhaps suggestion they are using the Chechen protests as a way to remove criticism for banning a similar gathering in Moscow. Russia claims that 60% of Chechnya's population, 800,000 people attended the rally, with Reuters reporting at least several hundred thousand people in attendance. 

My Comment:

Part of me wishes I was their with a huge sign showing the Charlie Hebdo cartoons. It would probably be the last thing I would ever do but it would probably be worth it. It is amazing how backwards their priorities are. With all the horrible things happening in the world, the thing that gets 800,000 Chechens upset enough to protest are a bunch of stupid cartoons. Not their Islamic insurgency that kills civilians. Not the Russian government that cracks down on their religion. Not any of the other millions of problems Chechnya, and indeed the world, has that could be helped if these people did something productive with their time. Nope, all this anger and drama over a stupid drawing of a religious figure that wasn't even offensive (for the most recent drawing at least).

In the United States, the country I am proud to call myself a citizen of, nobody is off limits for satire and criticism. Everyone, from the lowliest unemployed person, to the president, to God himself are on the table. Freedom of speech is our most cherished freedom and the rantings and threats of a very angry and unstable minority of Muslims will do nothing to end them.That freedom survived our own religious extremists on the right and, more recently, our social justice obsessed weirdos on the left. All of them will fail. Because we are willing to fight for our right to offend. The rest of the world should keep that in mind... 

As for the broader implications of this, it is disturbing to me that these protests are spreading so far. I seriously doubt many of these people have even seen the cartoons that they are protesting against. Someone is putting propaganda out there. And nobody is explaining to these people that we have the right to be offensive if we so choose and there is very little they can do about it. Also, nobody is telling these people what the benefits of our system are. Sure some people might get their feelings hurt once in awhile, but we can check power and mock bad behavior by the use of satire. When someone here calls the president incompetent, there aren't any police raids sent. That kind of freedom is unheard of in the Middle East and other Muslim areas like Chechnya, so it isn't surprising that they don't see the value in this kind of speech. Someone should really teach them though...

EDIT: Updated with a video