12/26/2006

a time of peace and love

Christmas is a time of peace, love, giving and sharing. Though the weather was bad across the world, nothing like the tsunami of 2004. There were some cheers and gloomy dark clouds. But a tsunami of a different kind is brewing. Below is a short article which I copied from littlespeck.com which says anything but the above. And if violence befallen on the owners of the article, I think they deserve it. Iran's president Punked by Danish group 'Sympathetic' ad published in Tehran press insults Ahmadinejad with hidden message. WorldNetDaily.com Dec 24, 2006 Less than a year after Danish cartoonists ignited protests across the Muslim world with their depictions of Muhammad, another group from that country has risked offending Iran's president by calling him a "swine" in a hidden message included an advertisement that got past censors and editors at the Tehran Times. Surrend, a Danish art group that targets world leaders, successfully submitted an advertisement to the newspaper that, at first glance, expressed support for President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. The half-page ad, submitted under the name of "Danes for World Peace," features a picture of Ahmadinejad and a series of statements sympathetic to his regime: Support his fight against Bush, We are also tired of Bush, Iran has the right to produce nuclear energy, No US aggression against any country, and Evil US military stay home. Surrend's members told the editors they wanted to express their solidarity with Iran and make amends for the publication of cartoons of Muhammad published in their own country, reported the German daily, Der Spiegel. But what the advertising editors at Tehran Times missed was that the first letter of each phrase formed an acrostic that, top to bottom, spelled "S-W-I-N-E." On it's website, Surrend describes itself as a "street-art group" that was started in the winter of 2006 "during the funeral of Serbian war criminal Slobodan Milosevic." "The idea behind Surrend is to make fun of the world's powerful men," the group proclaims, through the use of "stickers, ads and posters with ironic texts as its expression medium." Despite listing only two members – Jan Egesborg and Pia Bertelsen – Surrend plans projects that will require "20 different travels," having already targeted authoritarian leaders with their pranks in Serbia, Belarus, Turkey, Poland, Sri Lanka, Faroe Islands and, now, Iran.

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