News from Denmark: The Mo'toons affair

This is a direct translation of a news article on DR news...

From DR news online.
07. June. 2006

School children not allowed to borrow Mohammed book.

Several school libraries (in Denmark) are not allowing students to borrow Kåre Bluitgens much-debated book ‘The Quran and the Life of Mohammed’.
The book, which inspired Jyllands Posten to print the Mohammed Cartoons has otherwise sold well and had good reviews, including in the School Library Organisations own magazine in which the book is described as a ‘gift to any school library, both for Muslim children and to all the rest of us”.

Uncensored.

At Park School in Struer the book is not even on the shelves though.
“This is not due to the Mohammed cartoons case, or that we intend to censor the book” says the school librarian Søren Langkjær, “but it is because it is a very violent book and if read without the guidance of an adult it will give a wrong impression of Islam, and not least of the Muslims view of other religions”.

Understanding the reaction.

Jørgen Bæk Simonsen is a scholar of Islam at Copenhagen University and, to some degree, understands the school libraries caution.
“Over all, this is not an appropriate book for a child to read alone. It is a historical document and therefore its important that children receive the story of Mohammed in the correct context”
The author of the book is baffled though.
“If there is anything wrong with the book, then it is more likely due to its being so uncritical of Mohammed since I used the traditional, Muslim sources” he says. “When one considers that the libraries have no problems in lending out copies of The Bible then this seems like a misplaced consideration for Islam”.