The only thing I'm going to say about this

[sabotabby]

I'm against hate speech.

I'm against murdering people for making cartoons.

I'm against attacking people in retaliation for murders that they had nothing to do with.

I'm against the climate of xenophobia in France, which is, among other things, fallout from France's colonialist history.

I'm also side-eyeing the fact that there was nowhere near this level of international outcry or media coverage of the murders of 145 Pakistani children massacred and suspect it was because they weren't white Westerners.

(For context, this is a useful thing to read. Not substantially different than Nazi anti-Semitic cartoons of the 1930s. But they shouldn't have been killed over it, obviously.)

Comments

[ironed_orchid]

All of the above. Yes.

[sabotabby]

I can be opposed to many things at once, including things that are opposed to each other. Imagine!

[ironed_orchid]

I just finished reading that tumblr post with their cartoons, and I need to go vomit.

[sabotabby]

Yeah, if they and Seth fucking Rogen are the poster children for free speech, I think I'm about to take an alarming turn for the statist.

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

you dont think the french have any right to be concerned? muslims arent a problem here, i dont have to worry about it And the ones that are here are peaceful.

[sabotabby]

If they were that concerned, they probably shouldn't have occupied Algeria.

I'd be way more worried if I were a Muslim in France than if I were a secular or Christian white person. There's quite the history of brutality and persecution there. The chances of dying in a mass shooting are incredibly low.

[princealberic.livejournal.com]

I don't mean to be rude since this is sabotabby's journal, but where are you from? Your comments are bizarre.

Muslims aren't "a problem", it's a small percentage of all Muslims that are the problem. There are thousands of Muslims in France and other European countries, not only a handful. The ones that do this kind of thing are a very small percentage compared to the overall population, it's just that usually immigrant communities are "safely" relegated to suburbs where they can be ignored by everyone else. That's why they're invisible. Even if this weren't the case, it's always the more vocal and violent of any given group that get the most notoriety out of the things they do. It would be like equating all Christians to fringe minorities that are batshit and seem to think we still live in the 11th century.

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

id be more worried if there was a steadily increasing population of muslims. Which they are. and dont start that racist stuff, its a religion, not a race.

[sabotabby]

It's also a class issue. But it's mainly a race issue.

Yes, I would be worried if there was a steadily growing population of people that my society was forcing to the margins. I would rightly think that it was a powderkeg. My response would not be to encourage that marginalization and mock them for it.

[radiumhead.livejournal.com]

well its chicken or the egg, isnt it? some people would say theyre fucked up because France is pushing them, other people would say France is pushing them because theyre fucked up.

[sabotabby]

Given France's history though, France pushed first.

[angiereedgarner.livejournal.com]

I prolly need to get off the internets, but am glad I read this first.

[sabotabby]

I'm off the internet in a few minutes. Though I suspect work won't improve my mood any.

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

I find this comment very interesting on this tedious subject: http://www.juancole.com/2015/01/sharpening-contradictions-satirists.html (found it at houseboatonstyx .

The link you present I find interesting too but problematic, because someone has deliberately sought out certain old cartoons of Charlie Hebdo and presents them out of their context with an explanatory text I do not fully agree to but then, I never do or will fully to anything or anyone, including friends and lovers, I just want them to be able to have and share their form of humour and their opinions without being shot for it, I cannot agree to so very much but I want to hear everyone's voice including your own without having to fear for your life or anyone else's because you say what you say.
Obviously.
Satire has always been difficult because it was never and can never be "PC"; if it was, it wouldn't be satire; it would be Orwell Speak, North Chorean Government Speak you name it... Charlie Hebdo was and as I hope: stays, substantially different from Nazi anti-Semitic cartoons of the 1930s. In fact, the exact opposite. Don't forget how the whole craze about cartoons (that there were many before and I hope will be after) started by someone deliberately picking a few Danish cartoons out of their context and using them for their own political means (in countries where there is almost no cartoon culture or culture of satire). Satire stays an important corrective in any society where it exists, its existence is a good sign of health.

Other "incidents" so easily keep getting forgotten over the one that makes the headlines (here in France it is after all close to home though I don't live in Paris) but weren't we, as I asked the other day at theboringclub just very much upset about this http://theboringclub.livejournal.com/141433.html#comments (see my last comment) for instance? Actually, one of the accused allegedly said, he was radicalised by seeing the reports about Abu Ghreib, or so I read just yesterday.
Before that, he was as little interested in as are most of my French Muslim friends here
.
And not just one detail keeps disturbing my sense of orderliness: someone performs a killing that looks well-trained military/professionally-wise and then they forget their ID-card in the car they used for the attack? Right. When you go out for a killing; don't forget to take your papers so police can identify you? May be an actual mistake by an agitated young delinquent (as F. with whom I still live said: "imagine what goes on in their heads after having done that" ..."no, I don't want to" but even so I'd like to point this out and the nowhere heard, except hinted at by the late lawyer of one of the accused; that there has not yet been anyone found at all much less guilty in front of any court. I don't doubt that most French people feel like lynching the accused at this moment because they feel this is an attack on the very chore of their society besides callous murder of non-violent citizens and artists but I happen to be against death penalty out of principle, it is my birthright as a German person grown up an immigrant in Sweden (with being bullied called a "Nazi" etc.)

From living here in France I can only say, how the French feel "stabbed in their heart" because that little satire magazine with its 140.000 or so readers was just one tiny voice that irritated many, especially people sworn in on certain ideologies; because the cartoonists took themselves the liberty of satirising in all directions, not just one. But the French at large don't want this voice shot down; they intend to keep it (new redaction, yes), to argue about it and make no mistake: be angry about it. It's normal here. I quite like that about France, it's so much part of the culture here just as is going out on the street to protest spontaneously when something is felt wrong. It is extremely emotional here, at the moment, there is a great tension, calm but evident, in the air: it reminds me of the day after Olof Palme was shot in Stockholm, where I lived at the time. Who was not very popular in Sweden before that.

...to be continued...

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

I tried to correct and complete this sentence:

"Before that, he was as little interested in (...: militant Islamism) "as are most of my French Muslim friends here."
Who (not "they" for we all hear the difference in words chosen) were born here, grew up here, live here as the French people they are.
Most observe certain traditions like Christians who never saw a Church from the Inside do Christmas or others Hanukkah or whatever though I don't see as many Derwishes as I'd love to; some do Ramadan some not, some half or a bit or just don't drink whisky for a month; it depends.
For instance on, whether their uncles are over on a visit from the Maghreb ...bit like an English friend (whose then girlfriend's family was from India) once pointed out about their Pakistani neighbore girls who were normally wearing sexyhexy clothing and suddenly appeared all veiled in Real Life burkhas because Family Visit From Afar "...bad hair day?!" Not too popular but as he also said: "the hatred inbetween Indians and Pakistanis must not be underestimated".
A comment so quirky it passes as satire, I feel and fit to demonstrate how many French Muslims and other immigrants of other religions or none try and handle their cultural heritage a bit of humour as in self-irony helps and I love many of them for theirs. I've seen extremely few heavily veiled women here, for instance, there are all varieties; it is also forbidden to be completely veiled in public in France by law and now tell me clothing does not matter at all but that's yet another interesting topic for another boring day so back to this one...

Sorry about all the editing but strange things keep happening to my words while writing and correcting. LJ. Or Typo IT-idiot Me;)

[sabotabby]

I think I see what you're saying, and to be fair, I don't live in France. But.

A good part of my youth was spent in Anti-Racist Action, protesting and sometimes physically confronting Nazis here. It was the early 2000s, and there had been no direct physical attacks on Jews or POC by the Nazis since the 90s, when ARA beat up so many that they had to leave the downtown core. Still, there was a lot of hate speech going on, and we came out against it.

We caught a lot of shit for going after people like Zundel, who as far as I know only wrote things and said things, never actually injured or killed anyone himself. The thing is, when he wrote and said things, his younger, stronger followers tended to go out in response and beat the shit out of Pakistani cab drivers. It was disingenuous to deny a connection.

Still, the defence was always "free speech" (in fact, his organization was named for free speech, not Holocaust denial or encouraging whites to assault POC) and we were Stalinist censors for wanting to make him shut up and, at times, cooperating with the authorities to get him charged under hate speech laws.

That was around the time I realized that I was not a true anarchist, because I support hate speech laws.

Or, as I said to a colleague and fellow artist yesterday, if art can't affect society, why aren't we all just firing range instructors?

I don't really buy the satire defence. Yes, there's a fine tradition of caricaturing the Pope; that's substantially different than sexist, racist, homophobic, and transphobic attacks on marginalized populations. Punching up vs. punching down, as the case may be, and it serves an insidious tendency in French politics that is colonialism by other means. (It is a problem in North America as well with people like Dawkins, whose atheism is a thin veneer used to persecute Muslims.)

This said, let me reiterate that mass murder is horrific and unjustifiable. Which is, you know, part of why I believe in hate speech laws, to confront racism, misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia directly rather than pushing it to a boiling point where people resort to senseless violence.

[houseboatonstyx.livejournal.com]

I don't really buy the satire defence. Yes, there's a fine tradition of caricaturing the Pope; that's substantially different than sexist, racist, homophobic, and transphobic attacks on marginalized populations. Punching up vs. punching down

Hello. karinmollberg told me about this entry. If I'm butting in or saying anything stupid or upsetting, pls delete and forgive me. Especially since on my own site I've stuck to mild and calming, I hope. So here I come to vent something I've been holding my tongue on. I'm afraid this is US centric also. I should probably just delete it myself already.

Tl;dr. A pox on both sides. It's wrong to knowingly upset people who are sincere about their religion, as the cartoonists did. All this global thing of "Let's all make nasty cartoons to hurt those Muslims more" is very wrong. -- Otoh, if this was sincere Muslims defending their Prophet -- still they went too far. In the US, when sincere people are offended, they just burn and loot.

Not long ago there was a big flap in the US about "freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences ... it just means the US government can't arrest you, but civilians can do whatever, if they don't like what you said." I've been very tempted to find and post an XKCD comic saying that, or many anti-free speech statements from other sources.. And say, "Well, it's not a freedom of speech issue, since no government was doing it. It was clearly a consequence of the cartoonists' actions, so they have no right to complain."

In fact, there's evidence that the attackers may not have been sincere backward believers, but cynical al-Qaeda types trying to make political/military trouble. So pox on them too. But even in that case, the cartoonists were chosen because of their cartoons -- so it's still a consequence of their free drawing. /sarcasm

Okay, backed this up elsewhere, so delete away!

[sabotabby]

I don't delete comments. :)

I'm not sure it's wrong to insult sincere religious beliefs. I find it personally distasteful, but that can still fall into the boundaries of free speech. It's also very culturally nuanced. I approve much more of Catholics mocking the Pope in a Catholic country than I do of Catholics mocking Islam when they have historically and presently oppressed Muslims, and more so when the mockery is racially tinged, as this is.

"freedom of speech does not mean freedom from consequences ... it just means the US government can't arrest you, but civilians can do whatever, if they don't like what you said."

Hah, well. That's true until the "civilians can do whatever." Heckling and protesting are things I approve of, murder is not.

I have a strong sense that most of these al-Qaeda types are not sincere believers, at least the ones who do the planning. Then again, I suspect this about most religious fanatics as a result of some of the religious fanatics in my family who, when it came down to it, were very into the structure and rules bit of religion but didn't actually believe in God.

Pox, yes, definitely. I can totally hate both racists jerkwads and murdering fanatics.

[princealberic.livejournal.com]

I agree, I think there are limits to free speech and it shouldn't be used as a cover for blatantly harmful things (like how a certain site allows creepshots and revenge porn because it's "free speech", or when, like in the example you've mentioned, it's used to encourage violence and hatred). I think that a good guideline is "if this were translated into actions, what would the equivalent be?" or the old saying about how your freedom shouldn't rule out the freedom of others.

[sabotabby]

That's not a bad way to frame it, actually. I mean, I am glad I'm not in charge of defining the hard limits, because I'm biased and generally an asshole.

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

I know I should be in bed by now and I already posted this link at theboringclub directly after the murderous attack but I feel it appeals here as well and also it says very well what I tried to hint at but can't put into words yet though coming up soon so here's a shorter version: http://reason.com/blog/2015/01/07/je-suis-charlie-no-youre-not-or-else-you and now that I know Jewish friends are momentarily fairly safe I'll soon have to start worrying about Muslim friends and then it's the next group: I live in France, people here still live together no matter what their origins are and France wants to keep it that way. Where I live we eat and drink together, regularly. I can't imagine the ethnicity or religion not represented here; except I miss cannibals at the market.

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

...:

There is a Mandela effect too of demanding the cartoonists be buried in the Panthéon and many other side-effects and further collateral damage to be expected unfortunately (I'll come back to this in a long post, probably but am not ready yet) such as Le Pen not wanting to solidarise herself with her country on this subject on Sunday because she "was not invited" in her opinionwhich is wrong; there has been a call to everyone (thus even non-French people) who feels supportive of the principles of the French society to demonstrate this on Sunday.
I am probably going, with a green felt pen as symbol of my right to use purple prose when and how I want but M. Cro Magnon (F. with whom I still live together) is not going "with all those hypocrites" who never read or liked Charlie Hebdo before and I of course respect his opinion and choice. Like Cabu I don't like demonstrations generally so I will, as always with groups, large or small, rather stay on the outskirts (I hate crowds for fear of being carried off in directions I don't want to go and also for fear of being trampled dead or taken for someone I am not) but I will go anyway for several reasons; one of the main ones being satire, which is my territory and self-chosen "Homeland".
I don't feel at home with nationalism anywhere though I do feel at home here in France where I live for Beckett-similar ("rather at war in France than in peace elsewhere") and other reasons but not for the money; I never took a centime from this state though a tiny bit for the beautiful sometimes furry guys (openly sexist of me but Swedes are so beige though it's probably not their fault) many of whom are Ausländer or kids of foreigners just like myself as we all stay, at least somewhere. Let's not forget how we are just guests on this planet for a short visit, whatever we otherwise imagine ourselves as.

This got a bit longeish but I felt a need to state the to me obvious, more to come at my own sites. It is getting quite a bit of a rant, I'm afraid. Ah well, we all get down to it, sometime...

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

So at this moment several persons are taken hostage, the young policewoman who was French from Martinique is dead by this morning and now I just want the killing to stop I'll try to write more later.

[sabotabby]

I'm just waking up. Again, it's horrific. Not arguing with that at all.

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

Hope to hear you later, here they are evacuating a lycée in Paris too close to the Cacher Market where the hostages are kept and I'm still waiting to hear one of my LJ-friends is safe in Paris as I hope; then I go get the kids from school and feel like staying home, one of the hostages is a child. I can't argue much today also I will always insist on what I said above; the fact that I may not agree is no reason to stop talking to or liking whoever.

[sabotabby]

News here is saying that the hostages are freed. Hope that's true!

[karinmollberg.livejournal.com]

I saw the violent end of it live on TV with the kids. Going home was a trip in an atmosphere of fear. Sirens and police everywhere, an extreme tenseness inbetween people, I suggested walking insteand of taking the tram as we did but the boy was tired though the girl said "yes" we'll do that if you want and I explained, I didn't feel good about being with them Inside a closed vehicle because of what was just happening. When I left to go by foot to their school both hostage situations were still ongoing and completely unclear, there were warning signs instead of time to wait til tram comes of "please contact security immediately if you notice orphan bags". I realised yesterday that lately when suddenly some ten heavily armed and bulletproof-vested police with dogs came into the tram they were probably not looking for drugs as I had assumed (I told the kids to stay calm then) but for bombs. This is a sleepy town normally but we are one of the bigger towns after Paris and yesterday when it got fairly clear this was not a singular thing by some crazy person, we definitely felt the change here. I must give the French police this; they're damned effective, at least from what I saw here the last three days. Is it over now, I wonder?? Hope so.
Will come up with post on satire and more on my own site and it dépends how personally I write but probably a public post, this time, too. During this I've appreciated hearing the opinions of everyone here, whether we agree or not. To me, that's what democracy is all about.

[matrixmann]

In a world where only a few agencies hand out the information that is shown all round the globe that has joined the Western cultural circle, it is just not only a Family Guy joke that the world cries when a little white girl dies and when a girl with a Spanish-sounding name dies they ask "What's the news?"...

[sabotabby]

It's true, of course.

I think for me it's that I know a lot more Pakistani children (well, children of Pakistani descent) than I know racist French cartoonists, so the tragedy of the former seems much more visceral and immediate than the latter.

[matrixmann]

That may change some things, if you have a personal connection in that issue...

Well, the shameless on that thing is: If someone attacks Western system, Western values or just humans in the Western hemisphere, where safety and going to work every day should be the adventure everyone should go after, then it's worth a loud cry, but if it happens far away in another cultural circle, who may not even want to adapt to Western standards, then it's not worth a note. Or simply "colleteral damage". Sometimes they even call it "fight for democracy", if it's their troups or the local troups that they made friends with.
...Not saying that this is a logical comparison, but in many ways, people also didn't ask for help from the Western hemisphere or they even declared to not adapt to it, and what is it what they get, they get hunted down and shot for it.