I agree, those who are saying that people are defending what the magazine published are dead wrong, what people are defending when they say “Je Suis Charlie” is the right for anyone, anywhere, to express their beliefs or whatever. I to be honest think most of what newspapers like Charlie publish are infantile and stupid, but that doesn’t mean I don’t want them to publish it, either. A lot of hurtful stuff has been published about gays, lesbians, blacks, jews and so forth, things I find vile, things that make me angry to the point that I would love to punch whoever did it in the face (figuratively, not literally), but I would also be one of the first screaming bloody murder and contributing to a legal team if someone tried to stop them from publishing it. I also earned the wrath, more than a few times, when I headed a student activities group that brought in speakers that some people didn’t like, or when I defended the right of controversial people to speak, both radical conservative and liberal, and when I didn’t agree with their stance, I let them know it:)
The hostage-takers are dead but apparently some hostages at the market have also been killed.
Not everyone sees it like you do. Many feel proclaiming that IS a direct endorsement of what Charlie Hebdo has been publishing so those who disagree for anything…including coarse taste.
Worse, some feel some of its cartoons play right into French right wing stereotypes of racial minorities while mocking terrorist victims as the Boko Haram cartoon portraying pregnant girls kidnapped by Boko Haram cry out “Don’t touch our welfare allocations” cover could reasonably be interpreted.
Those with such perspectives won’t join in the “Je Suis Charlie” while condemning the violent murders themselves because they also reject Charlie Hebdo’s content and its effects.
That’s partly because the Mormon community has been accepted into the American mainstream as shown by widespread acceptance of Mormon temples all over the US including here in NYC and the presence of prominent politicians such as Mitt Romney.
I’d doubt they’d feel as blase* about being lampooned 150+ years ago when they were being thrown out of various towns, widely condemned in the press…including in the East coast, persecuted, and even being threatened by the US Army because their religion was considered exceedingly deviant by the American mainstream of the time for certain practices and because by some accounts…they tried to impose their religion on the towns’ non-Mormon population which ended up persecuting and tossing them out. Often at gunpoint.
The Mormons back then weren’t gentle about it either as shown by the Utah War:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Utah_War
- There were accounts of Mormons breaking in and destroying printing presses of newspapers and using their affiliated militia and officials to arrest newsmen condemning or lampooning their religious practices in back then which factored in their persecution and being tossed out of those towns.
I ran by accident into the perfect example of how people should treat Islam but don’t. [url=<a href=“http://www.timesofisrael.com/norway-paper-rapped-for-anti-semitic-cartoon/%5DThis%5B/url”>http://www.timesofisrael.com/norway-paper-rapped-for-anti-semitic-cartoon/]This[/url] is a story about a cartoon published in Norway’s 3rd largest newspaper in May 2013. It shows caricatures of a Jewish man and woman with a baby soaked in blood, being held down with what appears to be a pitchfork, as a giant claw circumcises the screaming child.
Why is this perfect? There are maybe 800 Jews in Norway. There are somewhere around 175-200,000 Muslims in Norway. Muslims practice circumcision. Some traditions circumcise babies and others circumcise older children, with ages ranging up to puberty, but still always children who don’t have a say. (I can show you neat pictures of traditional circumcision costumes in Turkey!) To be clear, I’m not talking about female genital mutilation, which is more clearly a cultural or even pre-Islamic practice.
Think a Norwegian paper would print such a horrifying image of Muslims holding down a boy with a pitchfork as they chop off the end of his penis? Think of the level of outrage, of the firebombing of the newspaper office, etc. But if Norwegians don’t want circumcision, if they think it’s a barbaric practice, then they need to do this to Muslims, not to the handful of Jews who maybe on occasion may have a single circumcision.
(BTW, unrelated but a group of Muslims last year demanded part of Oslo be made Shariah or they’d attack. No insult other than not complying with Islam. I doubt the group was very large, btw.)
And that is something that the French have understood and professed for a long time. Someone quoted Voltaire in a post a few pages ago, and that statement about fighting for the right to publish (or think) texts or images that create disagreement or anger is still part of the culture in many countries. This might be a form of intelligent tolerance.
The basic issue remains that this clashes with a culture or religion entirely built on intolerance.
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I don't perceive the "Je Suis Charlie" meme as saying "I agree with everything that Charlie Hebdo ever publishes, and all of their cartoons are side-splittingly hilarious and I love every word ...
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Right…the Je Suis Charlie supporters are saying, “we respect free speech, even speech that we may not agree with.”
Three male terrorists, one female…explosions in other parts of Paris. Not one of these folks was a lone wolf. This was coordinated and it was murder, plain and simple.
Cobrat-
“Not everyone sees it like you do. Many feel proclaiming that IS a direct endorsement of what Charlie Hebdo has been publishing so those who disagree for anything…including coarse taste.”
That is their problem, they are welcome to their feelings, but it also means like those who broad brush stereotype muslims, or for that matter, broad bush those who criticize Islam, means they fail basic contextual analysis. I don’t know whose these many are, but simply because they perceive this to be an endorsement of what the paper published is their problem, it is no different than the Christian fundies who believe the earth is 6000 years old and evolution shouldn’t be taught because it challenges their beliefs. I don’t care if the ‘many’ represents 80% of the population, the fact that they believe that, rather than bothered to think it through, is about them, and it doesn’t make it a valid criticism.
“Worse, some feel some of its cartoons play right into French right wing stereotypes of racial minorities while mocking terrorist victims as the Boko Haram cartoon portraying pregnant girls kidnapped by Boko Haram cry out “Don’t touch our welfare allocations” cover could reasonably be interpreted.”
Again, that is on them. As abhorrent as cartoons like that are, the real problem is the French right wing stereotype, not the cartoon (and was the cartoon actually supporting that notion, that black women get pregnant to get on welfare, or is it ridiculing the notion that anyone actually believes that…that cartoon is probably ridiculing that anyone could believe anything that stupid).
The problem with yourself and others who argue that something is offensive and shouldn’t be published, who argue that free speech shouldn’t cover this, or whatnot, is that it forgets that they won’t always be the ones writing the rules. People out to save people’s sensibilities and whatnot often end up on the wrong end of it. Back in the 80’s, there was this movement in the US to write laws that banned pornography, a movement that combined an odd couple of groups, the religious right and feminist groups, arguing that it harmed women, I think Indianapolis was the first place that tried to pass it, and there were attempts to introduce it in congress. The courts here later on threw it out, saying it violated free speech, that the supposed harm of it was not proven, and that it was so broad that it could be used to suppress erotic art, erotic literature and so forth if someone decided they were porn. Canada however ended up passing a law like that, that forbade materials like that being sent in the mail, it forbade the purchase of erotic movies through the mail, and through stores and such…and there was outrage, because not only were the usual suspects banned, but suddenly lesbian erotica, erotic romance novels, certain kinds of sex toys and the like, were also suppressed, and many of those who had pushed for it being passed suddenly figured out that maybe, just maybe, they wouldn’t be the ones deciding what was good and bad.
The reason we cannot censor speech based on offensiveness, on pushing unpopular ideas, is that ideas that are unpopular at one point one day might become mainstream, a book featuring a lesbian couple might have been controversial in the 1920’s (when in fact several books featuring same sex relationships or interracial relationships were suppressed by the US Postal system as being unfit to be shipped in the mail), today is blase…
I fully support the idea that people should think about what they do, and realize that what they write or print or whatever might cause unintended consequences, and I am not a big fan of offending people simply to offend or be out there, and i would hope people would think about what they are doing, but on the other hand, I also refuse to suggest that someone else should deny them the right to express whatever…and if the consequences are violence, then that is on those who choose violence, and if people get so upset about something that is printed that they cannot protest, but rather want it censored, same thing, it is on them.
@musicprnt - excellent post.
Yes, this was murder. Just as the attacks on the Jewish Museum in Brussels was. Fwiw, if the cartoons published by Charlie Hebdo offered an “excuse” to justify the “reactions” the murders in Brussels by a similar type of attacker did not have any. See: http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/jun/01/french-suspect-brussels-jewish-museum-attack-syria
It does appear to be part of a two-pronged attack. First, send a message to innocents that they should indeed fear the reach of radicals and refrain to oppose them. Secondly, hope for a strong reaction against Muslims which can be turned into catalyzing the disengaged Muslims in supporting the more radicals. In the case of Brussels, there was hope to create a reaction from Israel and perhaps reprisals.
The worst part is that they have plenty of incentives to repeat what has worked so far and has increased in the past months. From a distance, the organizers must look at how poorly we are equipped against egregious terrorism with glee and satisfaction.
Just an aside, Voltaire had to flee multiple times because of official reaction to his writings.
^^
Yes, and although I expect Cobrat to enlighten us promptly with a complete treatise on France In those days, I’d like to add that Voltaire wrote when there were strict censorship laws. His satire contribute to the diminishing impacts of intolerance and religious dogma. Interestingly, that remains on today’s agenda, albeit it is no longer the French institutions that are the targets.
Fwiw, his play, Le fanatisme, ou Mahomet le Prophete, should be mandatory reading in all high schools along the work of Swift.
Interesting you say that considering many posters and the “Je Suis Charlie” bandwagon are actually forgetting that by making it about free speech when in actuality, the murderers weren’t affiliated with the French government or any recognizable government whatsoever.
Instead, they’re essentially acting on behalf of a terrorist organization which is essentially on the ropes due to both anti-terrorist actions against them and internal factional squabbling.
Incidentally, the latter is one reason why ISIS/ISIL came about and essentially sidelined Al-Qaeda and its leadership.
And you have painted me with a broad brush when that’s actually not my position.
My postings the free speech aspect has to do with the fact this thread is dominated by folks who are superimposing the absolutist American interpretation of free speech that’s not only inapplicable, but one France and Germany and many other European societies would reject due to their experience with what happens when public hate speech and mass media spreading sensationalistic bigoted news stories against perceived “outsiders” of their society of the time.
Especially considering, the Weimar Republic before the Third Reich did guarantee near absolute free speech except censorship in film for pornographic content in their constitution. However, this didn’t result in the “unfettered speech on both sides”.
That line of argument is also overly simplistic because it also assumes all sides have reasonably equal access to speech platforms on the basis of finances(i.e. to pay for costs of running mass media/PR/propaganda machines) and a stable ordered society where rule of law was effective.
A tall assumption especially considering the weakness of the Weimar Republic at its very birth due to economic factors and political chaos after WWI and after a brief golden period, more chaos when the Great Depression hit Germany and other European nations.
All this played a key role which encouraged the political and private mass media and radical political activists…especially those on the right* to run overly sensationalistic bigotry filled articles and make highly inflammatory hate speech which ended up polarizing German society, destroying any semblance of a civil marketplace of ideas, and inflamed a critical mass already hankering for easy scapegoats from perceived “outsiders” to the point of mass violence.
I’m actually for free speech in the more absolutist sense. However, I am also mindful and understanding of why due to historical events up till the end of WWII, many European countries…especially Germany and France would disagree.
To some extent, the dominance of posters viewing this issue through the American perspective of Free Speech reminds me of an admonition a foreign language Prof a friend had for a study-abroad trip made to some of his classmates who viewed everything from an American-centric perspective:
“You won’t learn much about different cultures and societies if you insist on only viewing it and having everything conform to your own cultural assumptions and sensibilities rather than also viewing them on their own cultural terms & contexts.”
- They had more support and financial backing from aristocrats and large industrialists fed up with what they perceived as a government which wasn't sufficiently deferential and working more enthusiastically in their own interests and from a nationalistic perspective not resisting harsh Allied Armistice terms and enforcement enough and allowing the lower classes "too much freedom".
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Abortion doctors have been murdered in this country by religious fanatics and clinics have also been bombed by those same fanatics. The violence were quite successful, too, in sending their message; in many parts of the country there are no doctors any more willing to perform abortions and in many states no clinics left anymore, either.
Some of our religious fanatics are no better than than Islamic religious fanatics. Also, there are many who also actively try to test the line between church and state.
Ok, Cobrat, I will play.
For starters, can you give example of where posters go wrong by citing their ID and explaining what X is wrong and that your Y is correct?
Further, how do YOU differentiate the view on free speech protection between the French version and the AngloSaxon one? For instance, how would YOU explain how people in Paris might have a different appetite for the cartoons from Denmark or Paris?
You claim to be an expert of French culture and are, obviously, raised in the Big Apple. I think it would be cinch to “explain” to us, the common mortals, how we should interpret … your posts. And I mean your posts with words you write without links to nebulous elements that are … beyond our common knowledge.
Emily, it is not a contest about which religious fanatics are better or worse. Right now, though I think the answer is pretty obvious.
Xiggi,
Just scroll up to the first part of #132…
Try again, Cobrat! I did not see anything that addresses my questions to you. And if I did miss it, please honor me in restating your answer is easy to follow terms.
Again, where did some posters go wrong and why?
Those are very valid points. And, perhaps, we could look at the changes in the fatalities associated with abortion clinics and see how they subsided in this century – in the 2000s that is. Bombing and arson that did not result in fatalities have not disappeared. Perhaps, actions from the government played a role, or perhaps the reaction by common people in the US contributed to the lowering of the criminal actions. Or the opponents discovered that the economic and legislative attacks are far more successful than the isolated destruction.