Can't sleep tonight, thoughts with my French cartooning colleagues, their families and loved ones #CharlieHebdo pic.twitter.com/LqIMRCHPgK
— David Pope (@davpope) January 7, 2015
I blame “Islam” for the murders at Charlie Hebdo precisely as much as I blame “Christianity” for the Americans who bomb family-planning clinics and kill doctors. Damaged people commit terrible crimes. Those of us who are people of faith have a responsibility, if we can’t divert their attention into less horrific channels, at least not to encourage the madness.
I don’t agree with George Packer’s post at the New Yorker. I do appreciate Ismael N. Daro’s take at Canada.com:
… “I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it,” the maxim often misattributed to Voltaire, does not say anything about adopting the views of those we disagree with in case of violence.
The well-meaning but misguided insistence that news outlets now republish the offensive cartoons also gives unwarranted credence to the attackers’ worldview, in which mere images of a long-dead man take on near-supernatural powers. Republish them or not, but we’re not fighting for the soul of humanity here.
One Canadian outlet that is purposely avoiding publishing the images is CBC News, according to an internal memo gathered by media critic Jesse Brown.
“We wouldn’t have published these images before today — not out of fear, but out of respect for the beliefs and sensibilities of the mass of Muslim believers,” David Studer, director of journalistic standards and practices, wrote to staff. “Why would the actions of a gang of violent thugs force us to change that position?”
That strikes me as… reasonable?…
RT @JeffersonObama: R.I.P. Ahmed Merabet, a French #Muslim Cop, first victim of #CharlieHebdo attack pic.twitter.com/TMQsJCCKB5
— Pnthrgrlgail (@Mama4Obama1) January 8, 2015
They want to scare us away from invading Iraq, Iran, Syria and Afghanistan. RT @ZaidJilani: Do we even know the Paris attackers' motives
— Jeb Lund (@Mobute) January 7, 2015
Media tells us the attack in Paris has been the worst terror act in Europe since 10 years. Utøya? 77 killed by an islamophobic psychopath?
— aida (@Aida_Azadi) January 7, 2015
I noticed that ISIS & Islamophobia trolls almost use the same language to attack their critics.
— Maher Arar (@ArarMaher) January 8, 2015
Today's news will assert that a crazy, White outlier attempted to bomb an NAACP office, and that Islam carried out a terror attack in Paris
— Cookie (@JamilahLemieux) January 7, 2015
Omnes Omnibus
Today’s news will almost completely ignore the NAACP bombing.
Gin & Tonic
Here’s what George Packer wrote:
What’s there to disagree with?
lamh36
@Omnes Omnibus: I’ve resigned myself to it, the suspect is still at large, and I hope he is caught and it’s just a one off thing and he doesn’t plan to try it again.
Anyhoo, just a late alert: Ana Duvernay, director of Selma is on Daily Show tonight.
Also too, Selma opens Friday…first scene…4 little girls…one extremist…horrific history
Omnes Omnibus
@Gin & Tonic: FWIW Packer’s take on it seemed quite reasonable to me. Religious fundamentalist fanatics with pre-Enlightenment worldviews aren’t helping us in our march towards a better world.
Adam
@Gin & Tonic:
Speaking for myself, I think he conflated a bunch of tragic events that don’t really have much to do with each other to try and kinda sorta start up a “clash of civilization” crap. And saying that the regular discrimination against Muslims in France have nothing to do with this, or that it’s not worth addressing.
P.S. Packer supported the Iraq War
Omnes Omnibus
@lamh36: To be quite honest (and I had a very busy day at work so I wasn’t cruising news sites), I got most of my information about the bombing from your comments. I would guess that, if the Paris shootings hadn’t happened, it would have gotten more attention.
lamh36
Love NdT on Cosmos, but a late night talk show, IDK bout that?
Neil deGrasse Tyson’s ‘Star Talk’ podcast to be adapted into late-night TV talk show
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2015/01/neil-degrasse-tysons-star-talk-podcast-to-be-adapted-into-late-night-tv-talk-show/#.VK4ENUSDAwU.twitter
Mnemosyne
@Gin & Tonic:
Here’s what’s been brewing for me all day: I can’t help but notice that most of the “First Amendment fundamentalists” and people who argue that the only defense allowable against offensive speech is more speech all happen to be people who assume that their speech will always be given a fair hearing. That’s right, white guys again.
People who know that their speech will almost certainly be discounted or ignored — women, ethnic/racial minorities, religious minorities — don’t have the same faith that more speech is the answer, because they already know that their speech will be ignored or discounted and that the free speech of the haters will be promoted above theirs.
We constantly complain that the MSM here is ignoring liberals and Democrats and not allowing them to speak, but somehow it’s impossible for us to believe that the speech of French Muslims is being ignored when they protest these cartoons are offensive to them.
And since I’m sure that, once again, what I’m saying here is going to be twisted into some kind of defense of these murders, here’s my evening macro:
The fact that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were assholes does not justify their brutal murders in any way, shape, or form.
(Sitting back and waiting for the complaints about political correctness and women/Jews/Muslims/blacks just need to get a sense of humor! to begin.)
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam:
So did a lot of people.
Dave C
@Gin & Tonic:
Yeah, I just read his column and agree with pretty much every word of it.
Mnemosyne
@lamh36:
The (sort of) good news is that the MSM may not be interested in finding the bomber, but I absolutely guarantee you that Obama’s Justice Department is not similarly uninterested.
Adam
@Omnes Omnibus:
All of whom I try to avoid taking seriously. Expect our benevolent blog host obviously.
Adam
@Mnemosyne:
100% agree.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Okay, let’s grant that the guys at Charlie Hebdo were being dicks. Now what?
Omnes Omnibus
@Adam: Including John Cole?
ETA: Posted before you made the change. Why is Cole different to you? I opposed the war, and I will always have lingering doubts about the judgment of those who supported it (Cole included). It doesn’t mean that such people can’t offer a decent analysis of something.
lamh36
@Mnemosyne: Oh, the FBI is on the case, so I’m sure DOJ is watching closely.
Betty Cracker
I agree with Packer’s take and don’t think it’s necessarily at odds with Daro’s perspective. Charlie Hebdo was deliberately provocative in the service of an idea: that religious fanatics should not be able to silence artists, writers and journalists with threats. I wouldn’t make that point in the same way they did, but I endorse the sentiment.
Mike J
@Mnemosyne: And the NYPD thinks they’re put upon and nobody will listen to what they have to say because everybody’s listening to the protesters. They actually, really believe that, as stupid as it sounds. OK for them to start gunning down people to get the message out?
Gin & Tonic
@Mnemosyne: As I said downstairs, I was otherwise occupied most of the day, and have read very little of the commentary or of the “news” reports.
That said, if you believe that your religion dictates the killing of people who draw cartoons, or killing anyone, for that matter, or treating people as chattel, or mutilating the children of your believers, then you are not a “person of faith”, you are a psychopath.
Mnemosyne
@Omnes Omnibus:
I don’t know, really. “More speech” doesn’t seem to be the answer, because the bigots have a bigger megaphone and are given more credibility. I was writing something snarky about the tree of liberty being watered with the blood of assholes with unlimited free speech who pissed off the wrong person, but my heart’s not in it.
Omnes Omnibus
@Betty Cracker:
Well stated. I concur.
Mnemosyne
@Mike J:
When did NYPD stop gunning people down?
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: That’s why I asked. More speech is the worst answer except for all the others.
dedc79
@Mnemosyne: Yes, those poor islamic fundamentalists can’t get their voices heard above the free speech din in france, so really, what other choice do they have than to shut everyone else up….with bullets.
jl
@Gin & Tonic: @Omnes Omnibus:
I don’t know who Packer is. He does say some reasonable things, but towards the end of his piece he says that there is a special problem with Islam, not just terrorists, but Muslims in general, who he accuses of ‘approval or favor; encouragement; moral support’ (that is the definition of countenance) of Islamic terrorism.
‘ Islam today includes a substantial minority of believers who countenance, if they don’t actually carry out, a degree of violence in the application of their convictions that is currently unique. ‘
What is a ‘substantial minority’? What constitutes ‘countenance’? What is ‘unique’ about it? What would random Muslims in the US or France or anyplace have to do or say for Packer to deem them not countenancing?
Packer is well on the way to Erick Erickson land in my opinion, perhaps more dangerous because less transparent.
So, sure, he has some reasonable things to say, but he says other things too that I don’t think are reasonable or helpful.
Mnemosyne
@Betty Cracker:
As I started pointing out down in the other thread (so there’s no need to head down there), how do you separate religious fanatics from ordinary French Muslims who are also offended by having a nude image of Mohammed on all fours with his dick and balls hanging down with a star coming out of his ass with a caption saying “A Star Is Born”?
Let’s change it up a little and say that the man in the cartoon was Obama. Should we tell the NAACP to not complain because it’s just a picture and if they don’t want to look at it, they can just turn away (as a commenter in the other thread was recommending)?
I agree with Anne Laurie here — you can say that it is horrifying and disgusting that these cartoonists were murdered without pretending that what they were publishing wasn’t really, really offensive, not just to religious fanatics, but to most Muslims. Amir Khalid is a respected commenter here. Is it A-OK for him to be offended as collateral damage since his kind of Muslim was not the stated target of the cartoon?
And, again, the macro:
BillinGlendaleCA
@Mnemosyne: I’m sure the NRA will switch it to the 2nd amendment(the DONALD already has). If only there was a good guy with a gun there…
beltane
George Packer was a supporter of the invasion of Iraq and the spread of Enlightenment values via carnage and death.Yes, religious fundamentalists are by definition the enemies of tolerance, pluralism, free speech, etc. The world would be a better place if they all exited the planet. However, aside from the fact that he failed to even acknowledge the existence of violent reactionary forces in the West, based upon values that predate and may well outlast Enlightenment ones, he is unwilling to consider that barbarism can thrive quite nicely under the veneer of a civilized society.
I read the Packer piece in its entirety. It was typically high-minded and reasonable.It was also just about as insightful as listening to the ranting of someone’s racist uncle. Alas, even if all the religious nuts were beamed off the face of the earth, the genteel and well-spoken apologists for the crimes of modern secular states would still be with us.
Omnes Omnibus
@jl: My comment was intended to say that his overall take on it as summed up in his final paragraph was reasonable. Nothing more. I ain’t signing on to every word that he said.
wasabi gasp
Sure…don’t go changing to try to please me, but also, don’t go plopping your soapbox of complacency atop the news.
Mnemosyne
@dedc79:
The Birth of a Nation should be shown in every movie theater in the United States because there have been bomb threats that shut down public screenings. Sure, it’s unwatchably racist and offensive, but any Black people who are upset by the film being shown should sit down and shut up because the principle of free speech is more important than anyone’s feelings about a piece of racist propaganda that glorifies the Ku Klux Klan.
And, the macro:
The fact that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were assholes does not justify their brutal murders in any way, shape, or form.
Bobby Thomson
Fuck Packer. He’s flirting with the same crap we could expect from Michelle Malkin or that bigot on Long Island without actually stating it explicitly.
This.
And yeah, it matters that he was a cheerleader for the invasion of Iraq, because he didn’t learn a damn thing from it. Very few people did. It’s very rare for people’s political views to change based on new information – generally being confronted with a different reality just makes them double down.
Gin & Tonic
@Mnemosyne: how do you separate religious fanatics from ordinary French Muslims who are also offended
Easy. One set murders people, the other doesn’t.
“Being offended” is one thing. Killing people is another. I was offended when Bob in Portland called me a Nazi. If I hunted him down and blew his head off, would that be justifiable? Understandable? Excusable?
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: I am sure that the line between the reasonable and unreasonable protest methods wrt offensive cartoons is drawn well short of shooting 12 people to death. How far short of that is matter of debate, but I think that this principle is fairly well accepted.
Bobby Thomson
@Mnemosyne: Except that African Americans have been able to make it commercial poison for theaters to show that movie by organizing and not by murdering people.
I really don’t understand why you felt it necessary today to go to the mattresses to defend people’s right to murder others over perceived grievances.
p.a.
If some Christian fundy had gone postal at the PissChrist exhibit would we be calling Serrano an asshole and saying he has a right to exhibit but should not, to spare the tender sensibilities of the loons?
beltane
Early indications are that the ringleader of this attack was radicalized not by cartoons, but by the all too real images that emerged from Abu Ghraib. Perhaps the trait most needed for living in our society is not tolerance, but the ability to shut one’s eyes.
Mnemosyne
@Gin & Tonic:
Well, gosh, that was easy. So all we have to do is keep publishing cartoons that are more and more offensive. Anyone who reacts violently is a Bad Muslim, and anyone who keeps their mouth shut is a Good Muslim. Problem solved!
And yet somehow it doesn’t solve the problem of upsetting Good Muslims while you smoke out the Bad Muslims by offending all Muslims. I guess we just have to hope that Good Muslims will know we don’t mean them when we talk about how horrible Islam and Muslims are.
The macro:
The fact that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were assholes does not justify their brutal murders in any way, shape, or form.
Dave C
Remind me again why it’s racist to make fun of a religious prophet who has been dead for over a thousand years? Keeping in mind, of course, that this prophet is primarily being mocked in protest against assassination threats toward those who mock him?
jl
@Omnes Omnibus: OK, I was making a list of every bad thing every kind of person has done recently that I require of all BJ commenters to ‘not countenance’ to my satisfaction, otherwise they would constitute something unique in today’s world.
Some lawyers have done bad things lately…
Maybe Packer means well. Probably I should apologize to him for saying he was on the road to Ericksonism. On second thought, that was a pretty mean thing to say.
kc
@Mnemosyne:
Jesus Christ.
beltane
@p.a.: We here would not be saying it but I am personally acquainted with many Christians and others who would.
Gin & Tonic
@Mnemosyne: Maybe you should stop digging.
jl
@Gin & Tonic:
” Easy. One set murders people, the other doesn’t.”
I do agree with that sentiment.
Marc
@Gin & Tonic:
How about the part where he says this killing is the product of a major world religion, but the killings in Oslo (Anders Breivik, influenced by US Islamophobes like Pam Geller) and in Newtown (Adam Lanza, libertarian gun nut obsessed with Anders Breivik) are just part of “some general wave of nihilistic violence”?
Their killers are always representative. Ours are just lone wolves and crazy people. Right?
Bobby Thomson
@Mnemosyne:
Always the straw. If the NAACP machine gunned the people who drew it, I think most people would be both horrified at the crime and outraged that the NAACP had undermined all of its good works with such a stupid act.
I know you are capable of expression other than murder. Why do you assume others aren’t?
kc
@Mnemosyne:
*bangs head on keyboard*
Omnes Omnibus
@beltane:
So let’s just ignore the problem of religious fundamentalists? Or maybe we could work in that one and then hit the next?
Mnemosyne
@Bobby Thomson:
No, African Americans were able to make it commercial poison by literally dying to make the point that they should have the same rights as white Americans. If you think that French Muslims need their own Martin Luther King to win themselves the right to not be publicly taunted with racist cartoons, you’re probably right. Are you volunteering for the duty?
My macro. Let me show it to you:
The fact that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were assholes does not justify their brutal murders in any way, shape, or form.
“Comprehensible anger” =/= “the right to murder others”
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Please state the proposition that you are offering. Let’s avoid late night misinterpretations.
lamh36
@Mnemosyne: nothing to do with the subject at hand, but apparently, Birth of a Nation is livetreaming on Netflix, and has been for a while. And apparently it has a 3 out 5 rating from viewers.
Take that anyway you will…
J
@Mnemosyne: So Frederick Douglas, Mahatma Gandhi, Susan B Anthony, Margaret Sanger, Martin Luther King, Rosa Luxembourg ….one could go on…. shouldn’t have bothered because what they said was going to be dismissed by lots of people?
jl
@Marc: I agree. Packer indicated he has a double standard, that happens to be convenient for him. By his logic, he can stay silent on bad things people from ‘his’ civilization do and avoid being accused of countenancing, unlike a ‘substantial minority’ of a group that seems inherently suspect in his eyes.
Mnemosyne
@Bobby Thomson:
Why do you assume that other tactics were not tried and they went straight to murder?
I’m assuming that if this were 1965, you would be one of the people complaining about the Watts riots — after all, they should have been capable of expressing themselves without violence and arson.
And, since you still seem to not get my point:
The fact that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were assholes does not justify their brutal murders in any way, shape, or form.
Bobby Thomson
@Mnemosyne: You can repeat that mantra, but your own words show you don’t believe it.
That’s just one example. You have stated over and over again that the failure to react violently is silence, even coerced silence. And that’s just a crock of shit.
Omnes Omnibus
@Marc: I read Packer’s column as a general comment against violent fundamentalism.
Mnemosyne
Jaysus, I feel like I’m back on 9/12/01 again, trying to explain to my asshole relatives that just because a specific group of Muslims attacked us, it doesn’t mean that all Muslims are murderous assholes or that Islam is a dangerous religion that should be repressed.
Betty Cracker
@Mnemosyne: I’m not pretending that what they published wasn’t really, really offensive. I’m sorry it hurts people’s feelings, and it’s not the sort of thing I’d draw. But we shouldn’t forget why the cartoonists drew those particular images; it was because religious fanatics have been terrorizing and murdering artists, writers and journalists for decades in an attempt to silence them. It was a reaction to that, not an unprovoked attack on a marginalized minority group.
Mandalay
@beltane:
Exactly right, which is why we probably won’t be hearing much this week from Hillary Clinton about how the murders in Paris demonstrate that we must preserve the right to free speech at all costs.
Because if she speaks out for that noble goal, she might be reminded by unkind souls about her own views ten years ago: “I support federal legislation that would outlaw flag desecration”.
She was hardly the only “genteel and well-spoken apologist” to completely blow it on Iraq, but I find her carefully measured views on flag burning to be far more disturbing.
kc
@Mnemosyne:
He didn’t say that or anything remotely like that.
Why do you do this? Why?
Suzanne
@Omnes Omnibus: Well, the answer to this problem, as it is to all problems, is for people to simply choose, without any threatening, persuasion, or coercion, to simply choose to not be offensive assholes.
Law being a blunt instrument, I’ll always choose to protect free speech and expression, even hate speech, because I’d rather have that than a society that infringes on that right even a little bit. However, that certainly means that we must be even more vociferous in opposing racism and bullshit.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Are you trying to be intentionally offensive?
dedc79
@Mnemosyne: Point us to the comment here that you think is saying something remotely akin to what your asshole relatives were saying.
Omnes Omnibus
@Suzanne: I concur. It is the reason that I don’t use any of the anti-troll filters around here. And happy birthday.
Bobby Thomson
@Mnemosyne:
You mean the people who booed and heckled Martin Luther King? Yeah, I probably would have been critical of them. Certainly with the benefit of hindsight, I am.
jl
@Omnes Omnibus:
” intentionally offensive? ”
Hey? What am I Omnes, chopped liver?
Actually I think there is kernel of Mnemosyne thought that is worth discussing. I have to go now, but this topic probably will return over the next few days, and maybe I will have worked it out in my mind by then.
Mnemosyne
@Bobby Thomson:
No, I have stated over and over again that France has a social problem with repression and discrimination against Muslims. I have stated over and over again that these cartoons are a reflection of a society that has no problem dehumanizing Muslims, and that anyone who sees them simply as “free speech” is ripping them out of context and ignoring that French Muslims are treated badly all the time.
If you think these murders happened because a few cartoons were published and that there’s no wider social context that also contains discrimination, anti-Muslim riots, mosque burnings, and the desecration of Muslim cemeteries, you’re a fool.
Betty Cracker
@Mnemosyne: Then you’re tripping. No one here is saying anything remotely similar to what your asshole relatives were saying on 9/12/01. You, on the other hand, keep repeatedly calling murder victims who are barely cold “assholes.”
? Martin
@Mnemosyne: I don’t agree that they were assholes. Sure, in the US they would be, but the US is unusual in western nations for our insistence on politeness toward religiously intolerant people. Hell, we even elect them to congress in reasonable numbers rather than shout them down for the hateful lunatics they are. Charlie Hebdo existing in France and not the US is more our failing than theirs.
Mnemosyne
And mosque occupations, too:
But, obviously, these murders are about fundamentalists hating freedom of speech and nothing more.
beltane
@Omnes Omnibus: Religious, or rather ideological, fundamentalism is a problem that cannot be ignored. However, our preferred, enlightened methods of dealing with it thus far such as bombing and anal feedings do not seem to be having the desired effect. Again, the ringleader seems to have been motivated by issues other than the cartoons themselves.
A good place to promote tolerance of such cartoons in the Muslim community might be a “delete button” campaign to teach people to tune out that which they find offensive. I occasionally receive hateful, wingnut screeds from relatives. If I look at them I tend to become consumed by rage. The answer is not to accept the value of these screeds, but to ignore them completely.
cbear
@Bobby Thomson:
You were expecting coherence or perhaps some sort of nuanced view?
Ah, mon ami, that was your first mistake.
dedc79
@beltane:
Yet he murdered cartoonists.
By the way, what’s your source?
Omnes Omnibus
@beltane:
The suggestion that I supported anything like that is a bit offensive. Just saying.
srv
@Betty Cracker:
Maybe assuming facts not in evidence. Is it really beyond the imagination that some cartoonists could be Islamophobes and care more about the social impact of their comics than free speech?
I have no context on “those particular images” or the general product of Charlie Hebdo, so someone can fill me in on how tasteful and socially generous to Islam their product was. But having seen images from years back, it’s quite clear there is a lot of socially/politically motivated content in Europe.
Mnemosyne
@Betty Cracker:
Given the multiple and ongoing physical attacks on that marginalized minority group (see my links above), I don’t think it’s as easy as you think to specify that the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were only attacking religious fanatic Muslims and not all Muslims when they attacked Islam.
Mnemosyne
@kc:
Have you lost the ability to detect sarcasm?
beltane
@Omnes Omnibus: That was directed towards liberal interventionalsts like George Packer, not you. I should have made myself clearer.
@dedc79: I have been using The Guardian as my source. In 2008 the attacker was convicted on charges of sending young men to fight the Americans in Iraq. He told the judge that he was motivated by the images he saw from Abu Ghraib.
Mnemosyne
@Bobby Thomson:
No, I mean the white flighters who picked up and ran to the suburbs because black people weren’t sufficiently grateful for the crumbs they’d been thrown.
? Martin
@Mnemosyne: One of the accused was convicted of terrorism that he claimed was motivated by Abu Ghraib.
I agree that France has a poor record on the treatment of Muslims in their country, but that does not stem from Charlie Hebdo. They’re no more responsible than the various targets identified on the War on Christians here in the US. Few religions tolerate being mocked but mocking them is not criminal, and if Charlie Hebdo does appear to be singling out Islam it’s only because nobody else has the stones to do it. Salman Rushdie did not incite discrimination of Muslims either, even though few other writers were brave enough to write what Rushdie did. These people are associated with criticism of Islam only because the various fatwas have been effective in isolating a few voices. Don’t buy into their campaign.
Omnes Omnibus
@beltane: FWIW I actually still identify as a liberal interventionist. I just think that Packer and his ilk got it wrong. Iraq was a stupid and bad choice. Afghanistan could possibly have been done right, but not by the Bushies.
Mnemosyne
@Betty Cracker:
<a href="Gin & Tonic“>This one by G&T kind of set me off:
kc
@Mnemosyne:
No. I recognized the dripping sarcasm. It’ was just grotesquely misplaced. He responded reasonably to a weird question, and then you responded sarcastically in a way that suggested he’d said something he didn’t say.
Dave C
@Mnemosyne: Which part of it, exactly, do you disagree with?
Mnemosyne
@? Martin:
I disagree with you there — there have been many examples in Europe of cartoonists specifically targeting and mocking Islam, with the Danish cartoons being the most famous and deadly example so far, with an estimated 200 people killed in riots. It seems like Charlie Hebdo was unique because these murders have brought the magazine to our attention in the US, but anti-Muslim and anti-Mohammed cartoons are pretty common in Europe.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Why did that comment “set you off?”
beltane
@Mnemosyne: The thing is, psychopaths are disproportionately drawn to fundamentalism. Even devout people who are not fanatics will tend to shrug things off rather than react violently. Unfortunately, a certain percentage of the population is borderline nuts.
Mnemosyne
@Dave C:
The implication that Islam is a religion that requires people to murder others or mutilate their children. I guess I was supposed to intuit that, the same way that French Muslims who are not authoritarian fundamentalists were supposed to intuit that the Charlie Hebdo cartoons weren’t about them, they were about other Muslims.
Dave C
@Mnemosyne: How many of those 200 hundred were killed by cartoonists? How many were killed by religious extremists?
srv
@Mnemosyne: I just presumed G&T was talking about Christians there.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Where are you going with this? Again, if one concedes that people were being dicks, then what? You say it doesn’t justify them being killed. Do you have a point other than saying that they were dicks?
beltane
Here is my source for the Cherif Kouachi/Abu Ghraib connection: http://www.nbcnews.com/storyline/paris-magazine-attack/confusion-french-hunt-magazine-attack-suspects-n281761
Mnemosyne
Fuck it, I’m done. If you all want to sit here with George Packer and insist that events inside France have nothing to do with these murders and it’s all about free speech and non-violent Muslims just have to grin and bear it or be tarred with the same brush as these murderers, have at it. I’m done.
ETA: Satire.
? Martin
@Mnemosyne: They’re satirists. They attack EVERYONE. It’s what they do.
Dave C
@Mnemosyne: I’m not exactly sure how you managed to intuit those implications from G&T’s comments. I certainly did not.
notorious JRT
@jl:
I think you state my “issue” with Packer’s piece. That and his own diagnosis that it has nothing in it that points the way to any real insight.
slag
@lamh36: StarTalk is totally teevee-worthy. For a while now, I’d been surprised that it’s not at least a YouTube show. I hope the show will be Interwebbed.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Jesus fuck. What makes you think that G&T’s comment was about Islam? I saw it as being about any religion that causes one to be an asshole.
sparrow
@Mnemosyne: Not every worldview deserves fucking respect, least of all one so obviously barbaric.
beltane
@notorious JRT: Tom Friedman’s cab driver is dependably more insightful than George Packer.
Omnes Omnibus
@Mnemosyne: Golly, you are a misinterpretive asshole, aren’t you?
? Martin
@Mnemosyne:
They’re really not if you compare them to satirical attacks on other religions. They’re just more noteworthy because of the threats.
sparrow
@Mnemosyne: Actually, that pretty much does sound like problem solved. If your response to cartoons, no matter what they depict, is to FUCKING MURDER PEOPLE than yes, I want you out of my society, forever. Call me crazy…
srv
@Mnemosyne: You clearly do not know your Freedom Fighters from Freedom Fries, M.
It’s all for the lulz – oopsie there, I mean lols.
You’re either with us, or against us.
LWA (Liberal With Attitude)
The more interesting and productive question should be- What are we going to do?
Are we simply going to pound out ever more outrageous and provocative statements, just to prove the Free Speech point?
If so, then I may just change my screen name to NiggerSkullfuckingVirginMary. Y’know, just to show everybody what free speech is all about.
Is our goal to force the 1 billion Muslims around the world to accept free speech?
If so, is this the best way to go about it?
Has anyone here actually spoken to a Muslim, or had a dialogue with them? What if we invited them to hear their voices for a change, and listened to what they had to say?
kc
@Mnemosyne:
Its too bad youre done ’cause I’d love to know who on here said “non-violent Muslims just have to grin and bear it or be tarred with the same brush as these murderers.”
Betty Cracker
@srv and @Mnemosyne: The cartoonists explained their motives in multiple media interviews after their office was firebombed a few years back. Don’t take my word for it — Google it for yourselves. I guess they could have been lying about their free speech absolutism, and perhaps they founded the mag in the 70s and expended barrels of ink lampooning politicians and religious bigwigs of all stripes for decades as cover for their true mission of denigrating a marginalized immigrant group. But I think it’s more likely that they were what they said they were.
@Mnemosyne: You’re going BiP on us here — assuming the worst motives and attributing rancid shit to people who said nothing of the sort.
sparrow
@kc: Mnemosyne is clearly the One Noble Defender standing up for a group that (strangely) no one is attacking… you know, the billion or so muslims that did not actually murder people yesterday. He/she is impressively delusional.
Anne Laurie
@Dave C:
Along with “mocking this prophet”, Charlie Hebdo cartoons could be flat-out racist / sexist — caricaturing a Black female French politician as a monkey, or one with a caption “Boku Harum sex slaves demand their welfare checks”. Keep in mind that in France (in much of Europe), Muslim and immigrant and “lesser” race are all conflated into one toxic image of Those People; as though every “Negro” in America was assumed to be a migrant from a darker-skinned, all-Muslim Mexico.
Dave C
@Anne Laurie: Assuming your descriptions are accurate, I would not condone those cartoons, nor have a seen them. Can you provide the links?
Edit: I should add that I’m going to bed and will not likely be replying for several hours.
beltane
Rather than ponder ways of eliminating all politically/religiously motivated violence from the face of the earth, I am more interested in learning 1) What group or groups the two brother belonged to; and 2) How was a convicted terrorist able to obtain firearms in France. This fellow seems to have longstanding grievances against the West and perhaps Charlie Hebdo had the misfortune to be a symbol whatever it was that he hated. In any case, this crime does not appear to be a spontaneous act but a carefully premeditated one.
I’ve read that 2014 was a particularly bloody year for journalists in many parts of the world, so it may be the case that freedom of speech and liberal values as a whole are under threat from more than just religious fanatics.
eemom
@kc:
Oh, she’s not done, not by a long shot. Gonna keep digging in with her “not surprised” insistence, based on 0 evidence, and knowing jack shit about who these killers were, where they came from, who enabled them, etc. — that they did what they did today BECAUSE of how Muslims are treated in France. While continuing to reiterate her mantra that she doesn’t condone the killings. Just like in the last gazillion comment thread where she assured y’all she was DONE.
Cuz that’s what smug ass obsessive know-nothings do.
Mandalay
The irony of these comments from President Obama will probably slip under the radar….
Why the irony? Because earlier this week NYT reporter James Reisen made it pretty that he is prepared to go to prison for refusing to kowtow to the Justice Department:
This is what Risen said about the government’s behavior:
Freedom of speech for French cartoonists is one thing. But freedom of speech for an NYT reporter exposing our government behaving badly is another matter entirely for our Administration.
beltane
@Anne Laurie: This angle may be downplayed for obvious reasons, at least by the American media.
SatanicPanic
I don’t think it’s fair to point to some terrorists and go “clearly Muslims are upset about their treatment and this was just the last straw.” Who appointed these 3 men to speak for all French Muslims? That’s kind of bullshit.
Mandalay
There is widespread unambiguous condemnation from the Arab world on the attack:
beltane
@SatanicPanic: They were three men with their own motives for doing this. One of the men is on the record explaining his motive for committing a previous crime. That’s all we know now. It’s up to the French criminal justice system to learn the rest.
eemom
@Anne Laurie:
From your link:
Yep, this was all about French Muslims pushed to the breaking point because women aren’t allowed to wear burquas in that country, fer sure.
SatanicPanic
@beltane: Yup. If we want the pulse of French Muslims, I think we should take LWA up there’s advice and just ask them. Until then it seems kind of premature to assume that even a majority is angry about a cartoon.
trollhattan
ZOMG, mittens are wanted to treat koalas with burnt paws.
Also, too. http://www.abc.net.au/news/image/6007256-16×9-460×259.jpg
You may now return to the discussion of murderous assholes.
Mandalay
The odious Bill Donohue is goin’ rogue and blaming the victims:
Of course he is only pretending to align himself with Muslims because Charlie Hebdo had also gone after Catholicism:
AnderJ
Not having read the whole discussion, I think a lot of people can agree that:
– just because you have the right to be a dick does not mean you should.
– regardless of whether a person is a dick, murdering someone is reprehensible
– murdering someone involing a deity is probably not a compliment to said deity.
I have not seen many of the cartoons by Charlie Hebdo, but there was one that summed this all up quite nicely; the prophet was saying: it’s hard being the deity of auch extremists idiots.
NotMax
Fail to grasp the point of posting a raft of tweets.
Peale
@eemom: yep. It’s not like I’m callous about these things, but … If it turns out these guys got good grades in school and came from nice middle class families, can we stop talking as if they are acting on their marginalization like they’re Senegalese workers in locked down in french public housing squalor?
NotMax
@Omnes Omnibus
Personally have seen, heard or read plenty about the attempted firebombing, including about the man hunt.
But it is the nature of the beast that a story such as that will be subsumed by the “if it bleeds, it leads” commandment of the mass media.
EconWatcher
Some comments seem to draw an implict equivalence between mocking someone’s religion and mocking his race. I think this equivalence in completely misguided. Unlike race, religion is a choice, a chosen belief. People are entitled to exercise their religion freely and should not suffer discrimination in housing, employment, etc. because of it. But they have neither the legal right nor the reasonable expectation that others should respect their religion.
Instead, others have the absolute right to disresrespect their religion, and express it any way they damn well please in the public forum. I’d call someone an a-hole if he singled out only Islam for derision, because that suggests his problem isn’t with the irrationality of religion but bigotry toward a particular group of people, possibly because of their hue. But the Charlie people apparently dished it out to all religions. That doesn’t make them a-holes. That makes them advocates for the Enlightenment.
I have great respect for Amir Khalid and I’ve often thought he’d make a great front-pager, but I really wish he’d reconsider that comment about the people at the paper sharing responsiblity. It’s chilling.
mai naem mobile
I can’t believe people here appear to be trying to justify this murder. Seriously? You can say you aren’t justifying but it sure seems like they’re justifying. There is zero justification for this. Zero. I don’t care how much French muslims are discriminated against. The Romas have been treated like crap for hundreds of years. Never heard of extremist Romas killing freaking cartoonists. Look up the root of the term “gyp” as in you’re trying to gyp me. Juan Coles got a good take on it. Most French Muslims are secular.and this is trying to get the regular French to be anti-Muslim to get the secular French Muslims to become more wingnut Muslims.
Anyhow, the real solution to this is for the secular world to become energy independent and tell all the mideast countries, including Israel, to go pound sand. This all goes back to our need for oil.
EconWatcher
@EconWatcher:
I think Mandalay’s quote from Bill Donohue proves my point.
Jewish Steel
Arizona Highways was already taken, you see…
EconWatcher
@Mandalay:
Thanks, Mandalay.
Amir, I say this with respect, but when you find yourself in the company of Bill Donohue, you really might want to think long and hard.
Mike J
@Jewish Steel: I only read Inspire for Marilyn vos Savant and Marmaduke.
eemom
@mai naem mobile:
Oh dear, haven’t you heard? As long as you keep reiterating the macro “killing is a bad thing” at the end of every comment, it means you totally are NOT trying to justify this murder.
Mike J
That sad apprehension that even the most horrific terrorist acts are basically no more than a form of trolling. – William Gibson
Jewish Steel
@Mike J: I lol’d.
They should talk to the JW’s. Got your Watchtower and (yikes) AWAKE! Now that’s some crazypants religious magazine branding.
Keith G
@LWA (Liberal With Attitude): It is really too bad that the common obsession of the internet (getting involved in peripheral argumentation) has buried your important comment. It is rational, it is insightful, and would be nice if this blog could some how put it into action.
Calouste
@beltane:
Illegally. It’s not like you can buy Kalashnikovs legally in Western Europe, they are not as stupid as America in that regard. But former Yugoslavia had loads of them that became surplus after things calmed down there.
Calouste
@LWA (Liberal With Attitude): I haven’t spoken personally to a Muslim about this, but I could quote Ahmed Aboutaleb, the Muslim mayor of Rotterdam, who called the attack “an indescribable form of barbarianism” and said that sympathizers of the attack in the Netherlands “should pack their suitcase and leave”.
Keith G
Now, for my second comment which I am making separately because it is heading off in a slightly different direction than my previous one. At its center is a riff on a comment I have made earlier today combined with something that LWA mentioned up thread.
Now what? Is there a way to organize a discussion about what is happening in some quarters of the world of Islam? Is there a way to identify and categorize and understand these behaviors that are so worrisome (and so physically dangerous) to so many?
Problems caused by those behaviors are at the root to a lot of the disruption facing many communities in the world today. Is there a way to focus on the energy source of these behaviours without casting too wide of a net and involving people who need not be part of such a discussion?
This is important and urgent stuff yet I am unconvinced that many folks can even discuss this without falling into their normal and comfortable patterns of thinking and speaking.
Keith G
Comment #3: Fucking insomnia. I’m in the central time zone and I should not be awake right now.
p.a.
@Keith G: maybe it’s late and I’m cranky, but organize a discussion? There were death threats over a dog petting get together in Malaysia. Indonesia is trying to decide what word for ‘god’ non-Muslims get to use. I suppose that can be considered an advance from burning churches. Pakistan, Iraq, Syria anyone? (Yes, I know we sure as hell stir those pots). When it comes to Muslim killing Muslim, they make the bloody Northern Irish look like pikers. The tender mercies of the Saudi penal code. How are the B’hai doing in Iran? Keeping their heads down I hope. Copts in Egypt? South Sudan? Nigeria? Turkish secularism is under attack. Let’s see, that’s a swath of intolerance from the Pacific to the Atlantic. I appreciate the bravery and decency of Muslims who speak out against this, and I’m sure they are in the majority. But this is a hell of a lot more than a few bad apples.
Keith G
@p.a.: And those behaviors need to be part of a discussion. At this point in time, a culture of extreme intolerance and violence hasgrown within Islam. Can we find a way to discuss how much of these current problems are owned by the greater Islamic culture?
Some? All? None?
How we answer that question has implications about how we address these issues of violence and extremism.
raven
@Keith G: Discussion with who, fucking Mika?
wilfred
Maybe some historical perspective could be part of the discussion:
That’s Sartre (In “Critique of Dialectical Reason”), writing about the French conquest and exploitation of Algeria, which later included the slaughter of thousands of Arab Muslims in the Algerian War of Independence. He continues:
Did anybody ever ask what was wrong with France?
raven
@wilfred: In “A Bright Shining Lie” Sheehan writes about a French Army compound in Cambodia where La Marseillaise is being played at retreat. The Algerian and Cambodian troops face the flag and salute while the French officers play tennis! In the film Days of Glory about Algerian troops fighting for France in WW2 have their pensions revoked when Algeria gains independence.
Another Holocene Human
@Mnemosyne:
I have seen the Hebdo covers. I don’t know, maybe you don’t speak French? They were absolutely going against extremists specifically.
Charlie Hebdo made themselves a target when they republished the vile, racist Danish cartoons back when it was a big “principle of the thing” cause celebre during the height of the Bush/Blair mad years. They were attacked in 2011 but nobody was killed, IIRC.
Not that this justifies anything, but the Danish cartoons were inflammatory and racist, real Hustler kind of material, especially in a European context where Muslim males, especially North Africans, face a lot of discrimination in society and open expressions of racism.
By contrast I’ve yet to see a Hebdo cartoon that came from them that wasn’t pretty much ‘in the lines’ for what might get published in the US on an editorial page. (And as we all know, US ed page cartoonists sometimes hit racist tripwires and get their paper in hot water too.)
Our homegrown racist extremists have killed for a lot less than blasphemous cartoon reprints. They kill children. Cuz they’re butthurt about something they read in a KKK flier, Ron Paul newsletter, heard on hate radio, downloaded on a conspiracy website, or were lied to about on the 24/7 hate cable channel we all know and loathe.
Keith G
@raven: Well, since confronting these behaviors will require the action of international states (at both the individual and collective level) there should be discussions at the appropriate level of political decision making. As with other issues, policy conversations can be strongly influenced by vigorous debate on the part of religious leaders, secular academics, and others outside of government.
My hope is that some how we can get close to a rational way of considering these issues, but that is just a hope.
Another Holocene Human
@p.a.: I think you ought to read Juan Cole’s piece on the Charlie Hebdo attack. Really cuts through the issue and puts it in context.
http://www.juancole.com/2015/01/sharpening-contradictions-satirists.html
raven
@Keith G: Well those are great sentiments, hope it happens.
raven
@Another Holocene Human: There are reports of mosque and kebob shop bombings.
Another Holocene Human
The question is whether Paris can pull together like Boston did after facing the trauma of Inspire Magazine inspired stochastic terror or whether they shit their pants and pull a Bush.
A lot is riding on how they respond.
Another Holocene Human
@raven: Damn.
Anyway, what’s up with these racist fuckers? Who doesn’t love a kebab?
wilfred
Juan Cole is correct, I think. But the French treatment of Arab/Black Muslim people has a long history that makes Ferguson look like Periclean Athens:
That’s France, only you never hear about it. I wonder if Charlie Hebdo ever made fun of the police, the ultimate source of power and authority?
Elizabelle
Paris and all of France observing a minute of silence now. Raining. Notre Dame’s bells tolling. Now the Paris crowd is applauding spontaneously.
BBCA World News rocks. They’re silent to listen to the applause.
Elizabelle
@Mnemosyne: Most interesting.
Coco drew the Muhammed with star in his ass cartoon. She was at the Charlie Hebdo offices yesterday, but not killed.
Keith G
@raven: So do I.
If not, it seems that the likely alternative will be for this president and future ones to just find more people to kill and more things to blow up.
It is possible that that is just the world we’re going to have to live in.
raven
@Keith G: If the thunder don’t get ya the lighting will.
Another Holocene Human
To be fair, OTOH, the Tsarnaev bros chose a less politically complicated target. Public events are of course a favored target for terrorists. But even before they knew who had did it there was credible speculation that the perpetrator had an animus towards sport and sporting events, a suspicion that later seemed to be confirmed when the details of Tamerlan’s failed boxing career became public. Add to that credible evidence of a previous murder (that bumbling Waltham cops failed to implicate him in) in which he had sprinkled pot on the victims post mortem, revenge for supplying his little bro with weed, and the crime takes on a very personal character, one that seems to be on the wrong side of sanity. So it was easy to turn this into an almost normal criminal proceeding (if you ignore the federal prosecutors and the FBI agents who killed a witness/suspect). Dzokhar’s place in American consciousness shares more these days with Ted Bundy than Timothy McVeigh!
Unfortunately this latest act of stochastic terrorism at least at present seems to be a much uglier bit of trolling guaranteed to complicate any attempts by the community to link arms and sing kumbaya, as Boston did after the marathon bombing and as Norwegians did after Breivik’s horrific crimes.
Another Holocene Human
There’s a lifer in the Texas pen who helped the infamous “Candyman” procure his victims. Makes me think of Dzokhar a bit. The prison interviews should be interesting. Wonder if he’s bitter about the whole thing. Or if he’s really just a callous dickhole.
raven
@Another Holocene Human: You sure write some confusing shit this early in the day.
Another Holocene Human
@wilfred: Really? I know fuck all about Periclean Athens. But we have no high horse to get on here. That shit sounds like Joe Arpaio country. Sure, in AZ it’s all extralegal, but like that ever stopped that asshat.
And all through the Iraq war federal prosecutors along with Northeast police departments were totally legally harassing immigrants including college professors, accusing them of funneling money to terror groups and other bogus charges.
Another Holocene Human
@raven: I guess you had to be there.
raven
@Another Holocene Human: It’s early and I’m a dolt.
Elizabelle
I find it ironic and sad that many here are using the Charlie Hebdo murders to assail Mnemosyne and Amir Khalid for politely expressing their opinions.
You may or may not share their views, but I’m picking up some purity ponying among some of our illustrious commenters.
Hive mind again.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
I can’t remember what I was watching last night, but they ran a bunch of cartoons responding to the shooting. They were brilliant and tragic at the same time.
Marc
@Omnes Omnibus: Then you read it… let’s say “charitably.” It was a general comment against violent Islamic fundamentalism, with other, Western forms of violent fundamentalism explicitly ruled out as “nihilistic violence.” With Oslo explicitly mentioned as an example!
But Breivik was not a nihilist. He was a far right-wing Islamophobe. That last part in particular is inconvenient to Packer, so it gets redefined and ignored.
There have been some very eloquent, very moving, very moral, and very fair condemnations of the Charlie Hebdo killings. This was not one of them.
Omnes Omnibus
@Elizabelle: With all due respect to the two commenters that you mention, I find the implication that the people killed at Charlie Hebdo bear some responsibility for their own murders to be too close for my comfort to the suggestion that rape victims brought it on themselves by wearing short skirts/being drunk/etc. The killers chose to kill, not to protest, not to boycott, not to argue. They chose to kill to silence speech with which they disagreed.
@Marc: A fair point (or points).
Bobby Thomson
This is a pretty unobjectionable statement. If you think your religion requires you to bomb the Olympics or murder abortion doctors, you are not a person of faith, you are a psychopath. This doesn’t mean that the average person professing adherence to the faith is a psychopath. It means exactly the opposite – that psychopaths shouldn’t be allowed to slander an entire faith group by claiming the religion requires or justifies their actions. The block quoted statement doesn’t “imply” that all – or indeed, any – Muslims are brutes who murder children. It implies that brutes who murder children are brutes who murder children, and we don’t care what their fucking “reasons” are – there’s no defense for murdering children.
These murders had about 2% to do with the perpetrators being Muslim and about 98% to do with them being assholes. That’s why I get upset when people try to excuse murders committed by a dozen punk ass bitches on the basis of societal repression, because it plays right into the hands of the assholes who did this.
Bobby Thomson
@Elizabelle:
Hi, Alanis.
No one has gone ad hominem. No one has launched a DOS attack preventing them from responding. We haven’t shot them in their offices. We have responded to their ideas with debate, because that’s what people who aren’t psychopaths do when they disagree with ideas.
chopper
@eemom:
Also too, I’m still waiting for a rational, cogent answer as to how it was ‘understandable’ that these choads would murder 12 people because cartoons.
Enhanced Voting Techniques
@Mnemosyne: (Sitting back and waiting for the complaints about political correctness and women/Jews/Muslims/blacks just need to get a sense of humor! to begin.)
No, more like your an utter idiot. Shooting someone isn’t going to open the minds of their family and friends.
Elizabelle
@debbie: They have been excellent.
I found some of the cartoons on Vox; here’s the link.
A cartoon seen on BBCAmerica’s World news this morning was the most chilling. I’ve not yet found it.
It’s an ISIS terrorist beheading a pencil, I believe.
Elizabelle
@Bobby Thomson:
I hear you, Bobby. But I felt some commenters were to some extent picking and haranguing.
And that is free speech. And what it’s wonderful to see here.
Although it can, in sufficient quantity, reduce or discourage others’ free speech as well.
ETA: and the thread might seem different, skimmed in one fell swoop later, than when the discussion is in progress.
PS: I wish I could sing! You do not ever want to hear me try.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
Those are the ones I saw, and now I remember it was on some news show last night from BBC on my local PBS station.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
Here are some more:
http://edition.cnn.com/2015/01/08/europe/charlie-hebdo-cartoons/
and
https://www.google.com/search?q=charlie+hebdo+cartoon&biw=1258&bih=635&tbm=isch&tbo=u&source=univ&sa=X&ei=XJOuVLvbMoSwyQST24K4CQ&ved=0CC0QsAQ&dpr=1
Wish I could find the one that really struck me.
Elizabelle
@debbie: Which one really struck you?
debbie
@Elizabelle:
Some will consider the analogy “overwrought” and “overdone,” but it was an AK-47 on the left and a photo of a colored pencil on the right, facing each other down. The pencil’s broken and the lead is in crumbles. A balloon coming from the AK-47 says, “He drew first.”
It may be trite by now, and it have affected me more than others because I do a lot of drawiing with colored pencils. But then, the cartoon with Charlie Brown holding his head in despair also affected me. I may just be a big baby.
Elizabelle
@debbie: Have seen that one. Will look for it for you. It was memorable.
debbie
@Elizabelle:
I wish someone would republish the 911 cartoon of the Statue of Liberty weeping. That one still applies and is timeless.
I hate the world today.