What people don't seem to realize is that the ban on representations of religious figures was set up to steer clear of the misappropriation and possible idol worship that has lead to Virgin Mary belt buckles being sold at Lucky Brand Jeans and candles with an image of the Prophet Muhammad (pbuh) on them.

The ban goes back to an idea of not being able to capture the soul and importance of a person or living being with a visual representation. It is as much a very fundamental and deeply philosophical rule about the greatness of men, God's creations, and whether a human being can truly capture that greatness as it is about idol worship and the co-opting of religious imagery.

For Wikimedia, Sooreh Hera, and the creators of the Danish comics to ignore this rule is to ignore one of the fundamental guiding principles of a major world religion. Yes, the images displayed on the Wikipedia page are Islamic art created by Muslims who theoretically should be abiding by this ban on religious iconography but that does not somehow validate the use of those images because Muslims created them.

The petition against these images is not just the result of a usual Islamic tendency to take offense to one thing or another, nor is it just a typical Muslim over-reaction as some commenters on the Digg post have stated, rather it is a request that a cardinal belief of the religion should be respected. The petitioners are not asking that the pictures be taken down because they disagree with what the images portray or that the depictions are "bad," but because it is a basic rule in their religion. In fact, when the controversy about the Danish comics first began, the ban on depictions of religious figures played a central part in the outrage of many Muslims around the world. Whether the portrayals were positive or negative, they were still a blatant showing of disrespect towards a rule that is considered very important and sacred to Muslims throughout the world. Perhaps if the world were not currently in the grips of Islamic xenophobia, the motivations around the comics may have been seen in a different light but to many Muslims it just read almost as a belittling and undermining of their beliefs. It is this feeling of being undermined that Muslims are once again responding to with this petition.