Authorities cover up nude Roman statues to not offend Iranian president

Completely OT but somehow relevant in my mind: this kind of submission getting up symbolizes how HN is now becoming mainstream - there is nothing even marginally "hacker" about this post - unless they were using some cool new optic fiber to make the statues "invisible".

It's an interesting philosophical question, but the only reason this is being reported is because the Iranian President is Muslim. People who believe in Islam should not be subject to extra scrutiny, nor should respect, tolerance and friendship directed toward Muslim people be questioned as some sort of capitulation.

If we want a good outcome, we need more tolerance and less divisiveness and paranoia. We know very well from history that the latter results in very bad things - death, oppression, war, etc. - and what good comes from them?

IIRC, George W. Bush's Attorney General John Ashcroft had a nude statue in the Justice Department covered because he didn't like nudes.

It seems unclear where the order to do this might have come from, and with the feeling in much of Europe at the moment it will be seen as cultural capitulation by many.

It's somewhat scary and the consequences are hard to forsee, but the combination of recent atrocities and the refugee crisis does seem to be reawakening various forms of European nationalism as people (rightly or wrongly) perceive their culture to be under attack.

This won't help.

What's this doing on HN by the way?

When in Rome..... oh wait, I guess not.

These statues are artful history of our human heritage...

I understand the effortful making nice with foreign diplomats, but come on, the Iranian president has likely seen actual people nude before without exploding into an atomic nova of violated regressive doctrine.

Statues covered up: In my mind it depends where it comes from. - If the visiting Iranian delegation requests it I would say it's a little ignorant and petty for a visiting foreign representative to request something like that. You have to know Italy has naked statues in it. There's no way you can't know that. Asking your host entity to cover them up because you don't like them (or like them too much?) strikes me as extremely arrogant and haughty. - If it comes from the Italian Government, I'd say it's somewhat disingenuous. If they're so much a problem, they shouldn't be there in the first place, and if they aren't, it's just showing the Government is ashamed of it's own culture which is kind of weird. - If it's just the museum going "Hey this guy is visiting, his culture doesn't really dig this kind of thing, why don't we be polite and cover it up" I think that's perfectly acceptable and frankly very polite of them to do.

As to his aides asking him not to be photographed next to the statue: Who cares? It's his image, let him maintain it how he sees fit.