Turkish Cartoonist to Be Put On Trial For 'Renouncing God'

hyscience.com

Atheists and agnostics in America take note. Thank God (or whoever people of your belief or lack thereof usually thank for blessings) that you don't live in Turkey. Renounce or say something against God and you'll be prosecuted.

As the the Daily News in Istanbul reports:

[...] The Istanbul chief public prosecutor's office charged cartoonist Bahadir Baruter with "insulting the religious values adopted by a part of the population" and requested his imprisonment for up to one year.

Baruter's caricature depicted an imam and believers praying in a mosque. One of the characters is talking to God on his cellphone and asking to be pardoned from the last part of the prayer because he has errands to run.

Within the wall decorations of the mosque, Baruter hid the words, "There is no Allah, religion is a lie."

The cartoon was published in the weekly "Penguen" humor magazine.No real surprise, Islamists have never been known for their tolerance or sense of humor. And so much for "secular" Turkey being secular and an ally of the West. As Daniel Pipes noted yesterday, Turkey is anything but secular (and secular Turks tend to be even more anti-Western than Turkey's Islamic party), and Turkey may be, along with Iran, the most dangerous state of the region.