A Paper Bird

Why I am not Charlie

Posted on 9 January 2015

There is no but about what happened at Charlie Hebdo yesterday. Some people published some cartoons, and

some other people killed them for it. Words and pictures can be beautiful or vile, pleasing or enraging, inspiring

or offensive; but they exist on a different plane from physical violence, whether you want to call that plane spirit

or imagination or culture, and to meet them with violence is an offense against the spirit and imagination and

culture that distinguish humans. Nothing mitigates this monstrosity. There will be time to analyze why the killers

did it, time to parse their backgrounds, their ideologies, their beliefs, time for sociologists and psychologists

to add to understanding. There will be explanations, and the explanations will be important, but explanations

arent the same as excuses. Words dont kill, they must not be met by killing, and they will not make the killers

culpability go away.

a paper birdUn pajaro de papel en el pecho / Dice que el tiempo de los besos

no ha llegado

Why I am not Charlie | a paper bird http://paper-bird.net/2015/01/09/why-i-am-not-charlie/

1 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

To abhor what was done to the victims, though, is not the same as to become them. This is true on the simplest

level: I cannot occupy someone elses selfhood, share someone elses death. This is also true on a moral level: I

cannot appropriate the dangers they faced or the suffering they underwent, I cannot colonize their experience,

and it is arrogant to make out that I can. It wouldnt be necessary to say this, except the flood of hashtags and

avatars and social-media posturing proclaiming #JeSuisCharlie overwhelms distinctions and elides the

point. We must all try to be Charlie, not just today but every day, the New Yorker pontificates. What the hell

does that mean? In real life, solidarity takes many forms, almost all of them hard. This kind of low-cost, risk-free,

E-Z solidarity is only possible in a social-media age, where you can strike a pose and somebody sees it on their

timeline for 15 seconds and then they move on and its forgotten except for the feeling of accomplishment it gave

you. Solidarity is hard because it isnt about imaginary identifications, its about struggling across the canyon

of not being someone else: its about recognizing, for instance, that somebody died because they were different

from you, in what they did or believed or were or wore, not because they were the same. If people who are

feeling concrete loss or abstract shock or indignation take comfort in proclaiming a oneness that seems to fill the

void, then it serves an emotional end. But these Cartesian credos on Facebook and Twitter I am Charlie,

therefore I am shouldnt be mistaken for political acts.

Erasing differences that actually exist seems to be the purpose here: and its perhaps appropriate to

the Charlie cartoons, which drew their force from a considered contempt for people with the temerity to

be different. For the last 36 hours, everybodys been quoting Voltaire. The same line is all over my several

timelines:

Among the dead at Charlie Hebdo: Deputy chief editor Bernard Maris and cartoonists Georges Wolinski,

Jean Cabut (aka Cabu), Stephane Charbonnier, who was also editor-in-chief, and Bernard Verlhac (aka

Tignous)


2 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Those 21 words circling the globe speak louder than gunfire and represent every pen being wielded by an

outstretched arm, an Australian news site says. (Never mind that Voltaire never wrote them; one of his

biographers did.) But most people who mouth them dont mean them. Instead, theyre subtly altering the

Voltairean clarion cry: the message today is, I have to agree with what you say, in order to defend it. Why else

the insistence that condemning the killings isnt enough? No: we all have to endorse the cartoons, and not just

that, but republish them ourselves. Thus Index on Censorship, a journal that used to oppose censorship but now

is in the business of telling people what they can and cannot say, called for all newspapers to reprint the

drawings: We believe that only through solidarity in showing that we truly defend all those who exercise their

right to speak freely can we defeat those who would use violence to silence free speech. But is repeating you

the same as defending you? And is it really solidarity when, instead of engaging across our differences, I just

mindlessly parrot what you say?

But no, if you dont copy the cartoons, youre colluding with the killers, youre a coward. Thus the right-wing Daily

Caller posted a list of craven media minions of jihad who oppose free speech by not doing as theyre

ordered. Punish these censors, till they say what we tell them to!

From the twitter feed of @thereaIbanksy, January 7


3 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

If you dont agree with what Charlie Hebdo said, the terrorists win.

Youre not just kowtowing to terrorists with your silence. According to Tarek Fatah, a Canadian columnist with an

evident fascist streak, silence is terrorism.

Of course, any Muslim in the West would know that being called our enemy is a direct threat; youve drawn

the go-to-GItmo card. But consider: This idiot thinks he is defending free speech. How? By telling people exactly

what they have to say, and menacing the holdouts with treason. The Ministry of Truth has a new office in Toronto.


4 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Theres a perfectly good reason not to republish the cartoons that has nothing to do with cowardice or

caution. I refuse to post them because I think theyre racist and offensive. I can support your right to publish

something, and still condemn what you publish. I can defend what you say, and still say its wrong isnt that the

point of the quote (that wasnt) from Voltaire? I can hold that governments shouldnt imprison Holocaust deniers,

but that doesnt oblige me to deny the Holocaust myself.

Its true, as Salman Rushdie says, that Nobody has the right to not be offended. You should not get to invoke

the law to censor or shut down speech just because it insults you or strikes at your pet convictions. You certainly

dont get to kill because you heard something you dont like. Yet, manhandled by these moments of mass

outrage, this truism also morphs into a different kind of claim: That nobody has the right to be offended at all.

I am offended when those already oppressed in a society are deliberately insulted. I dont want

to participate. This crime in Paris does not suspend my political or ethical judgment, or persuade me

that scatologically smearing a marginal minoritys identity and beliefs is a reasonable thing to do. Yet this means

rejecting the only authorized reaction to the atrocity. Oddly, this peer pressure seems to gear up

exclusively where Islams involved. When a racist bombed a chapter of a US civil rights organization this week,

the media didnt insist I give to the NAACP in solidarity. When a rabid Islamophobic rightist killed 77 Norwegians

in 2011, most of them at a political partys youth camp, I didnt notice many #IAmNorway hashtags, or

impassioned calls to join the Norwegian Labor Party. But Islam is there for us, it unites us against Islam. Only

cowards or traitors turn down membership in the Charlie club.The demand to join, endorse, agree is all about

crowding us into a herd where no one is permitted to cavil or condemn: an indifferent mob, where differing from

one another is Thoughtcrime, while indifference to the pain of others beyond the pale is compulsory.

Weve heard a lot about satire in the last couple of days. Weve heard that satire shouldnt cause offense

because its a weapon of the weak: Satire-writers always point out the foibles and fables of those higher up the

food chain. And weve heard that if the satire aims at everybody, those forays into racism, Islamophobia, and

anti-Semitism can be excused away. Charlie Hebdo has been a continual celebration of the freedom to make

fun of everyone and everything.it practiced a freewheeling, dyspeptic satire without clear ideological lines. Of

course, satire that attacks any and all targets is by definition not just targeting the top of the food chain. The law,

in its majestic equality, forbids the rich as well as the poor to sleep under bridges, Anatole France wrote; satire

that wounds both the powerful and the weak does so with different effect. Saying the President of the Republic is

a randy satyr is not the same as accusing nameless Muslim immigrants of bestiality. What merely annoys the

one may deepen the others systematic oppression. To defend satire because its indiscriminate is to admit that it

discriminates against the defenseless.

Kierkegaard, the greatest satirist of his century, famously recounted

his dream: I was rapt into the Seventh Heaven. There sat all the gods

assembled. They granted him one wish: Most honorable

contemporaries, I choose one thing that I may always have the

laughter on my side. Kierkegaard knew what he meant: Children used to

laugh and throw stones at him on Copenhagen streets, for his gangling

gait and monkey torso. His table-turning fantasy is the truth about satire.

Its an exercise in power. It claims superiority, it aspires to win, and

hence it always looms over the weak, in judgment. If it attacks the


5 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

powerful, thats because there is appetite underneath its asperity: it

wants what they have. As Adorno wrote: He who has laughter on his

side has no need of proof. Historically, therefore, satire has for

thousands of years, up to Voltaires age, preferred to side with the

stronger party which could be relied on: with authority. Irony, he added,

never entirely divested itself of its authoritarian inheritance, its

unrebellious malice.

Satire allies with the self-evident, the Ides reues, the armory of the

strong. It puts itself on the team of the juggernaut future against the

endangered past, the successful opinion over the superseded one.

Satire has always fed on distaste for minorities, marginal peoples, traditional or fading ways of life. Adorno

said: All satire is blind to the forces liberated by decay.

Charlie Hebdo, the New Yorker now claims, followed in the tradition of

Voltaire. Voltaire stands as the god of satire; any godless Frenchman

with a bon mot is measured against him. Everyone remembers his

diatribes against the power of the Catholic Church: crasez

lInfme! But whats often conveniently omitted amid the adulation of

his wit is how Voltaire loathed a powerless religion, the outsiders of his

own era, the medieval, barbaric immigrant minority that afflicted

Europe: the Jews.

Voltaires anti-Semitism was comprehensive. In its contempt for the

putatively primitive, it anticipates much that is said about Muslims in

Europe and the US today. The Jews never were natural philosophers,

nor geometricians, nor astronomers, Voltaire declared. That would do

head Islamophobe Richard Dawkins proud:

Funny little man:

Contemporary Danish

cartoon of Kierkegaard

Funny little man: Voltaire

writing


6 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

The Jews, Voltaire wrote, are only an ignorant and barbarous people, who have long united the most sordid

avarice with the most detestable superstition and the most invincible hatred for every people by whom they are

tolerated and enriched. When some American right-wing yahoo calls Muslims goatfuckers, you might think hes

reciting old Appalachian invective. In fact, hes repeating Voltaires jokes about the Jews. You assert that your

mothers had no commerce with he-goats, nor your fathers with she-goats, Voltaire demanded of them. But

pray, gentlemen, why are you the only people upon earth whose laws have forbidden such commerce? Would

any legislator ever have thought of promulgating this extraordinary law if the offence had not been common?

Nobody wishes Voltaire had been killed for his slanders. If

some indignant Jew or Muslim (he didnt care for the

Mohammedans much either) had murdered him mid-career,

the whole world would lament the abomination. In his most

Judeophobic passages, I can take pleasure in his scalpel

phrasing though even 250 years after, some might find this

hard. Still, liking the style doesnt mean I swallow the

message. #JeSuisPasVoltaire. Most of the mans admirers

avoid or veil his anti-Semitism. They know that while his

contempt amuses when directed at the potent and impervious

Pope, it turns dark and sour when defaming a

weak and despised community. Satire can sometimes

liberate us, but it is not immune from our prejudices or

untainted by our hatreds. It shouldnt douse our critical

capacities; calling something satire doesnt exempt it from

judgment. The superiority the satirist claims over

the helpless can be both smug and sinister. Last year a former

Charlie Hebdo writer, accusing the editors of indulging racism,

warned that The conviction of being a superior

being, empowered to look down on ordinary mortals from on

high, is the surest way to sabotage your own intellectual

defenses.

Of course, Voltaire didnt realize that his Jewish victims were weak or powerless. Already, in the 18th century, he

saw them as tentacles of a financial conspiracy; his propensity for overspending and getting hopelessly in debt to

Jewish moneylenders did a great deal to shape his anti-Semitism. In the same way, Charlie Hebdo and its like

never treated Muslim immigrants as individuals, but as agents of some larger force. They werent strivers doing

the best they could in an unfriendly country, but shorthand for mass religious ignorance, or tribal terrorist

fanaticism, or obscene oil wealth. Satire subsumes the human person in an inhuman generalization. The Muslim

isnt just a Muslim, but a symbol of Islam.

You are an infamous impostor, Father,

but at least youre circumcised: Voltaire

lectures to a priest


7 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

This is where political Islamists and Islamophobes unite. They cling to agglutinative ideologies; they melt people

into a mass; they erase individuals attributes and aspirations under a totalizing vision of what identity means. A

Muslim is his religion. You can hold every Muslim responsible for what any Muslim does. (And one Danish

cartoonist makes all Danes guilty.) So all Muslims have to post #JeSuisCharlie obsessively as penance, or

apologize for what all the other billion are up to. Yesterday Aamer Rahman, an Australian comic and social critic,

tweeted:

A few hours later he had to add:

Cartoon by Sudanese artist Khalid Albaih, from Aljazeera.com


8 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

618 THOUGHTS ON WHY I AM NOT CHARLIE

Pingback: Charlie Hebdo | misanthropic anthropologist

This insistence on contagious responsibility, collective guilt, is the flip side of #JeSuisCharlie. Its #VoustesISIS;

#VoustesAlQaeda. Our solidarity, our ability to melt into a warm mindless oneness and feel were doing

something, is contingent on your involuntary solidarity, your losing who you claim to be in a menacing mass. We

cant stand together here unless we imagine you together over there in enmity. The antagonists are fake but

theyre entangled, inevitable. The language hardens. Geert Wilders, the racist right-wing leader in the

Netherlands, said the shootings mean its time to de-Islamize our country. Nigel Farage, his counterpart in the

UK, called Muslims a fifth column, holding our passports, that hate us. Juan Cole writes that the Charlie

Hebdo attack was a strategic strike, aiming at polarizing the French and European public at sharpening the

contradictions. The knives are sharpening too, on both sides.

We lose our ability to imagine political solutions when we stop thinking critically, when we let emotional

identifications sweep us into factitious substitutes for solidarity and action. We lose our ability to respond to

atrocity when we start seeing people not as individuals, but as symbols. Changing avatars on social media is a

pathetic distraction from changing realities in society. To combat violence you must look unflinchingly at the

concrete inequities and practices that breed it. You wont stop it with acts of self-styled courage on your computer

screen that neither risk nor alter anything. To protect expression thats endangered you have to engage with the

substance of what was said, not deny it. That means attempting dialogue with those who peacefully condemn or

disagree, not trying to shame them into silence. Nothing is quick, nothing is easy. No solidarity is secure. I

support free speech. I oppose all censors. I abhor the killings. I mourn the dead. I am not Charlie.

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anti-Semitism, cartoons, Charlie Hebdo, France, Islam, Islamism, Islamophobia, racism, satire, Scott

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9 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Amlie

on 10 January 2015 at 17:02 said:

In total disagreement with the idea that the so called unity against

Islam is the explanation for the wide support movement to Charlie

Hebdo as opposed to tragedies such as Utoya. The people in Utoya

were not journalists and its as simple as that. The media sticking with

their own

paulmarkphillips


Je suis Charlie is equivalent to I Am Spartacus. You want to kill

Charlie, you have to kill us all. Its not a difficult concept. Your

overlong blog doesnt alter that. We also need all moderate Muslims

to stand up and say Je suis Charlie, so that these extremists begin to

understand that they cannot possibly win. Having to kill several billion

people to get their way is beyond even their wildest imaginings. Je

suis Charlie is a powerful message in three words. You require nearly

3,000 words to demolish the intent. You fail. Why did you even try?

Dear oh dear.

Lee Moz


Spot on.

Jason


You really dont get it. Whine whine whine. You are

wrong and those reading your words whenever you

say them are hating you exist. They are being nice, I

dont care Lee, U Are an idiot. Thanks Have A nice

day. If you respond, I dont care I wont be reading it.


10 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Barry


More to the point. Right now, Westerners are not killing 4 or 12

Middle Easterners they are killing them by the thousands,

then tens of thousands, then hundreds of thousands In the

past two decades or so in Libya, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan and

Pakistan and threatening to do same to Iran. Of course, Mid-

dle Easterners are also killing themselves, but thats no ex-

cuse you can employ especially for such banal goals as con-

trol of oil and the protection of Israeli expansion into its neigh-

bors land. No, the truth is Westerners do the killing, Middle

Easterners do the dying.

As for Charlie Hebdo it is banal hate speech with no redeem-

ing political value. To be delicate about it its as if a small

press in the US received notoriety by repeatedly depicting

MLK taking it up the ass. Celebrate that noble use of the pen.

Janet


I get what youre saying, but I dont think that this piece misses

the point at all. It is simply offering another take on the com-

plexity of the situation. Youre right that those 3 words are very

powerful and make an important point, but sometimes the

more subtle and complex points can only be made through

more words, more dialogue and more willingness to actually

engage in thoughtful discussion. BOTH (powerful slogans and

thoughtful dialogue) have an important place in these kinds of

situations, and both can make equally important points. They

are not mutually exclusive.

neurovomit


Fuck charlie


11 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Satire is a tool to be used against the powerful not the weak.

Having said that, the likes of ISIS & al queda have done a lot more to

insult islam than that infantile rag.

If you had any sense then paying this incident more attention than the

annual US cinema shoot up might warrant a lesson in perspective.

Jean-Claude PEUGEOT


About perspective you are right, except that you dont under-

stand that you are too far from France to really know what

Charlie Hebdo is and it is certainly not an infantile rag : this is

litteraly judging a book by its cover ! Like in the case of Sal-

man Rushdies book, most of the people who condemned it

had not bothered to read it, either because it would have been

an impiety to doubt the mullahs or because they did not give a

damn about litterature.

ca procter


Unfortunately Religion in our world is the POWERFUL force.

Satire against religion is VERY important as religion has been

an evil force in controlling and limiting human freedom. Scien-

tific reason has made great strides against old superstition.

We must not allow the apartheid view of religion to win and

keep people subjugated and weak.

neurovomit


Nice but when a group of people who have been re-

cently subjugated to a western invasion that has re-

sulted in hundreds of thousands dead, appaling incar-

ceration (abu ghraib, guantanamo), state sanctioned

torture, rendition, daily bombardment that has lasted

decades etc It might be worth reassessing what


12 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

POWERFUL really is and what THE POWERFUL are

getting away with. Moreover this sort of deadly back-

drop is not one where 10 years of malicious pisstaking

is going to result in every one of the 1.5 bil muslims

shrugging their shoulders and saying its just words.

This is not saying that an enlightenment in is not sorely

needed. This, however, will not come from crudity and

insult. The mere presence of an ISIS and AQ is suffi-

cient to spur a new theology and this sort of thought

has already started im universities both in the west and

in some muslim countries. Eventually it may lead to a

religion that permits its followers to loosen its ties with

dogma and even leave entirely. Charlie hebdo has

added nothing to this. Whats turning people away from

islam or at least questioning it are the nuts who gunned

down the people at CH.

Lee Moz


How about fuck you.

neurovomit


How about it sweetheart?

Here I am


I am am not Charlie Hebdo I am not a killer of opinion I am not a

bomb in a school dropped from a Western drone I am not the Iraq

war I am not the pen that ordered Guantanamo I am not


13 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

incitement to hatred

Lee Moz


Charlie was commenting on the hatred found in the fundamen-

talist extremes of all religionsif you cant see that, there is

something wrong.

John Orchard


But the point is that they were also expressing funda-

mentalist hate from a secularist perspective. This is not

to justify what happened at all they did it nonviolently,

and being massacred like that is inexcusable.

vendetta


I agree with a lot of things you say but I am french and live in France

and the situation with the Muslim community (which is far to be

considered as a minority in many french cities btw) is probably too

complex and would use another year of blogging. So lets dont make

Muslims guilty of this terrorist act but lets also not reduce France to a

country of racists people and turn white french people into the bad

guys against thereligious minorities.

And about the je suis Charlie yes it can be seen as a fashion move

somehow but for numerous french it was meant as Charlies

values(freedom of expression, speech and laugh) are the values i

recognize myself and my country in and which nobody can kill. Who

would have the pretention to say I know how it feels to be killed for an

idea (or whatever you say in this article).of course you can see a part

of dramaaddiction and selfcompassionin this hashtag like in most

things noroudays. But I see it another way,the terrorists killed a

symbol of our country because humour and freedom of expression

are big part of the french identity or at least what we would like to


14 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

keep as such.and this shock showed us that we could maybe lose all

this one day and probably made us feel our roots again and what we

want to defend.

It is in this way that the comparison with September 11th was made.

Sorry for my English. I am just french

Lee Moz


They have achieved one thing these bastardsthey have

united the English and the French for the first time in about

1000 years. Im English, but me and my friends and millions of

others say Vive Le France.

Jean-Claude PEUGEOT


Well said but the problem with the american public is that they

do not know what Charlie Hebdo exactly is : some of them

even believe it is a racist paper because all what is shown to

them is a choice of the most offending front pages, even tron-

cated on purpose and nobody explains the 2nd, sometime 3rd

degree of the humour that allways needs a pause to be under-

stood. And this is a fatal flaw in a country were religious funda-

mentalists can decide the result of an election.

ca procter


Maybe if you compared Charlie Hebdo to South Park

americans would understand. South Park uses comedy

to say the most outrageous things.

neurovomit


South park gets away with it though because it is actu-


15 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Pingback: Shared from WordPress | thewarning15jtb

ally funny

Padraic Kellington


And South Park makes fun of non-critical sloppy think-

ing, without playing favourites. Example: the character

Token racist? No. Because it is a SATIRICAL com-

ment about the often one African American character

in each show, and that a backward swipe against the

idiocy of racism. A fine line Charlie Hebdo passed all

too often. But then again, I hear France finds Jerry

Lewis hysterical, lol.

Anitadiah


Reblogged this on My Short and Full of Life Life.


16 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Pingback: Charlie Hebdo | Jumping Jolens

Lisa Shaw


This is so well said.

Lee Moz


Extremists will say the same.

Nick Scott Greene


Reblogged this on The TinHead Emporium.

Tatoosh


Ha ha nice long explanation why you have no balls! Or ovaries

either! I may detest Charlie Hebos work. But your gutless approach is

beyond pathetic. It is whining intellectual rationalizing at the its best

or worst.

TheAnon


There is indeed no but in such conditions and I believe that your

entry on the matter, just like as the many other twitter posts arent

really well placed as the Charlie Hebdo cartoons had never been part

of your cultural background.


17 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Pingback: Dubout and Hebdo | Mehreen Kasana

The cartoon look, indeed, very shocking to people who saw those. But

you werent in the French political context when they were published.

Therefore, claiming I am not Charlie havent got any sense. Except,

maybe, a need to get more visits by using trending keywords perhaps.

Most of the Muslims from France choose not to speak on the matter

because they werent reading the magazine themself and I think it is a

respectable choice.

I firmly believe that you should do the same because you obviously

can understand the word satirical

TheAnon


I would definitly give credit if you were having a french cultural

background, but it isnt the case.

nullhogarth


I am not Charlie I just write provocative headlines as clickbait. Thats

it, isnt it?

Padraic Kellington


Je suis Frederic Boisseau

Ahmed Merabet

Franck Brinsolaro

Stephane Charbonnier

Jean Cabut

Georges Wolinski

Bernard Verlhac

Philippe Honore


18 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Bernard Maris

Elsa Cayat

Mustapha Ourrad

Michel Renaud,

Mais

Je ne suis pas Charlie.

If that is unacceptable with those who cannot distinguish one issue

from another, too bad. Barbarism includes a wide range of behaviour,

and justification.

Pandu Padmanegara


thats why, theres a powerful thing in the my country called: society

norm. Where everyones respect each other & implement social

inclusion. In freedom of speech, theres still a respect factor, so theres

no way hate,racism,prejudice can grow.

Intan K. Lukman


Reblogged this on Mischief Madness and commented:

Were facing, what my dear friend Tofan called, a social Bias that

polars wether youre an inhumane barbarian who by the way opposes

anyone not under your voice, or youre with the rest of the good guys

of the universe where free speech is loudly spoken so lets create

hate and anger upon a certain community which is totally acceptable

by our standard.

So yeah, sorry for the lost, violence is never the answer let alone

murder, but #JeSuisCharlie NOT.

Free speech, yes. Hate speech, no.

Mona


19 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25


We want the permission to republish this article. please contact.

scottlong1980


Hi Mona, I sent you an email. I am happy to have the article

republished. Just please include credit and a link to the blog.

My email (if mine doesnt arrive for some reason) is scott-

[email protected]. Thanks!

cc


Thank you for this thoughtful and respectful post. You have put into

words many of the thoughts and feelings that I had during the past

few days. I hope that discourse does not become even harsher on

deviant opinions. Terrorism is one aspect that endangers free

expression of speech, not only in its obvious effect, but because of the

reaction of mainstream society to it. I hope we can find a way to

dialogue.

Andrea


So, in the same vein, when do white Americans get to stop

apologizing for slavery? When do Christians get to stop apologizing

for the crusades? Why is something that happened yesterday not

relevant to an entire group, yet something that happened hundreds of

years ago still relevant? There doesnt get to be a double standard

AnnaF



20 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

How would you call, Deleting a comment because it is against my

opinion? Damn and I made a good point on that. So actually what is

going on (and on and on and on) is that we keep and take in mind

only opinions that are similar to ours, the rest do not have place here,

right? So remind me what is this (if not a paradox) we are

commending on a blog where the main theme is about the current

facts that took place in France and where the freedom of speech was

violated, abused and murdered. and what do we do here again.?

scottlong1980


I am not sure what that means, but I havent deleted any com-

ments.

Poonam


Thank you for writing a very thoughtful and thought provoking essay.

#hashtagsarejustonlyhashtags

viewfromadyke


Thank you for this thoughtful essaysadly, in this age of tweets and

texts, many people do not seem very interested in reasoned,

exploratory discussion. Everything is not simple enough to express in

a few characters, a slogan, or a hateful epithet.

Hanh Tran


This writer missed the point of I am Charlie message and gave


21 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

wrong person the credit for the quote

Leigh M. Johnson (@DrLeighMJohnson)


Kudos to you here:

Hastagging Solidarity

Erik Baard


Voltaire never said those words, an account has hime writing a similar

sentiment to a Catholic cleric. As for the rest, Je suis Charlie has

nothing to do with the publications contents before the murders

(which I dont admire). Its a stand for free expression, recognizing

that tomorrow another hate group could target another publication to

address another grievance. We are all potential targets if we dont

stand together now.

Janet


I said this in an earlier reply to someone who made a similar

point, but it bears repeating here as well: I dont think that this

piece misses the point at all. It is simply offering another take

on the complexity of the situation. Youre right that those 3

words are very powerful and make an important point, but

sometimes the more subtle and complex points can only be

made through more detailed discussion, more comprehensive

dialogue and more willingness to actually engage in thoughtful

discussion. BOTH (powerful slogans and thoughtful dialogue)

have an important place in these kinds of situations, and both

can make equally important points. They are not mutually ex-

clusive.

davidly


22 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25


Very thoughtful reply, Janet. Ill admit up front that my

sympathies lie with the ideas expressed in this post, ie.

from the angle that one should be aware of all the im-

plications of this particular hashtag but in particular,

the fact that I just cannot be down with je suis Charlie

irrespective of their m.o. because inherent in the move-

ment is the continual ignoring of a broader problem un-

til it blows back home.

The problem, as I see it, is that the dialogue is prohibi-

tive if not impossible. I mean, there is no small contin-

gent who believe upon hearing that one or more of

the killers in this particular incident trained in Yemen

that the US will need to step up drone attacks in Ye-

men. And even the folks who dont necessarily come to

that conclusion, amongst them plenty of je suis Char-

liers who have since changed their avatars to the next

family photo, will certainly not be hash tagging

#IamAnInnocentYemeniDroneVictim

And when you look at how clustered-up this dialogue is

taking place on this forum and elsewhere, the amount

of misunderstanding and missing the point while telling

someone else they are doing the same, and on and on

and the fact that you will not see the points of this ar-

ticle or you or I make here on any Sunday talk shows,

well its exhausting.

gibson911


Reblogged this on gibson911 and commented:

its official and somehow relative to us.


23 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

waitingforyourcall


Well written. Good one.

Christian Vigh


Satire is not an invention of Voltaire, although he was good at it, but

this is definitely not an invention borrowed by the potentially

discourteous Charlie Hebdos people ; look a little bit backward into

roman and greek litterature And please, dont forget people like

Diderot ; and you could also include Balzac, Flaubert, Maupassant,

although this will require reading much more pages for extracting their

satiristic contents.

Satire is part of french culture. And Charlie Hebdo (formerly Hara-Kiri,

amongst others) was formed by people who where figures in the

exercise of making us laugh, think, doubt, think and laugh again.

None of them ever killed anyone. And nobody ever obliged you to

read their writings and drawings.

Oh, a short parenthesis : curiously, everybody talks about their

drawings, but Ive not heard so far anybody talking about their

writings

May I encourage you to read Pierre Desproges, or have a look at

Coluche or Jean-Marie Bigard shows (amongst others) ? just to have

a taste of french humour.

Je suis Charlie doesnt mean youre a jerk if you are not Charlie,

although social behaviours tend to confirm what you said (there is

some kind of shame in not being Charlie, and it requires some kind

of courage in one telling he is not Charlie).

I think that the initial goal of Je suis Charlie was to say several things

(I apologize to the author if I misunderstood his original intents) ; and I

think it was spontaneous :

You tried to kill freedom of speech

You killed people

You killed innocents

You attacked my convictions, thinkings or whatever way youd like to

call it (oh, doesnt this seem familiar ?)

And since thre is this big messy internet thing out there, I will react

with other people


24 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

This can be seen as self-styled courage as you mentioned, and I

agree with that, for more than 90% of cases, but not 100%.

And it turns out to be that this collective reaction now looks like a solid

wall, like a weapon that betrayed their terrorist authors.

Humorists didnt laugh about people of Islam obedience ; they were

pointing out well, everybody calls it integrism, but I cannot help from

calling it fascism. This is another notion you may have not caught

from Europe.

And now, today, in France, there is a very very big challenge : there

are hundred of thousands of muslims whose religion has been stolen

by terrorists to justify their act. And Im afraid there are hundred of

thousands of french people that think that all muslims are terrorists.

The big challenge is definitely not in deciding whether I am Charlie or

not ; the big challenge is that french people could think that people

of Islam obedience are terrorists. We have seen acts of violence (but

hopefully no victims) against mosques. And that terrorists also act

against the jewish community. And this apparently is not finished,

should we trust the medias

The big challenge is in solving what makes people behave as

terrorists. These are governements issues for political aspects, and

people issues for racism and historical aspects. Everybody has to

learn and accept the difference and, personally, I do not have any

problem with differences. But what a tough problem.

But let me go back to my original goal : I grew up with Wolinski and

Cabu. I liked the acid view of Wolinski, and I liked the kind

impertinence of Cabu, who also animated emissions for children and

teenagers in the 80s and 90s. Got the picture ?

Another social difference is that we do not have in France the culture

of weapons, as this is the case in the US. The attacks we followed on

the news in the preceding days are really rare. For example, the last

case of a potential murderer I can remember so far was in the 90s

(terrorist attacks excepted). So that was shocking. Hence again the

Je suis Charlie.

I am an atheist. No religious aspects other than stated from a

sociologic point of view will speak to me. I do understand religious

beliefs, but I cannot feel them. I feel however than so many people of

different religions are now feeling uncomfortable. Hence again the Je

suis Charlie ?

May I cite one of your sentences ?

We lose our ability to imagine political solutions when we stop

thinking critically

What about when politics stopped to think critically ? wasnt it the start


25 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

of terrorism, when the US and (probably) western europe learned

eastern europe and asian people to fight against russia ? japan ?

other ?

Isnt Je suis Charlie a result of a carefully prepared, un-critically

thought, political behavior ?

And what is the main concern of people who claim Je suis Charlie ?

Isnt it to say : Im really fed up with your crap ?

Ill let you guess whether they point at the governments or at the

terrorists.

But I have an idea on the answer

Let me cite a short quote from the french humorist Pierre Desproges :

Children believe in Santa Claus ; adults not : they vote.

Christian.

callen


You seem to lump the muslims together as the weak. This is

nonsense. Royal Muslim Princes are some of the richest most

powerful and privileged people in the world. Elite in some muslim

societies be they princes or clergy make and uphold laws that give

1000 lashes of the whip and 10 years in prison for someone speaking

out! And the lawyer for this person was also imprisoned. Woman must

cover themselves, not allowed to drive! This fascist extremist religious

control over society breeds extremist acts. The powerful practice it on

their own people.

If you are not charlie think about this. They came for the anarchist

cartoonists and I said nothing, they came for the jews and I said

nothing, they came for the LGBT people and then I said nothing.

Je Suis Charlie means to stand up against fascist extremism practiced

by powerful people.


26 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

Janet


Hes not talking about the powerful Muslim leaders. Hes talk-

ing about the immigrants in France many of whom fled those

oppressive leaders as well and find themselves caught be-

tween two cultures, just trying to live their lives and practice

their religion moderately, without being persecuted by either

extremists or bigots. That quote you use about how they

came for etc. etc. works both ways. Too much fear and ha-

tred can create fascism on either side of the equation. And this

must be acknowledged or we will just continue to perpetuate

the same hypocracy over and over again.

blockedletters


Reblogged this on blockedletters and commented:

Sorry to compare this tragedy to a B-rate movie, but this reminds me

of The Interview buzz about how terrorists (North Korea and Kim

Jong-Un) win if we dont watch the movie.

higgsbosoff


Comment deleted apparently, so yeah not going to push my ideas

further if you dont even want to take them in consideration (but thats

a pretty low bar to set ones tolerance). But consider this: discussing

the appropriateness of Charlie Hebdos satire in relationship to this

attack kind of comes off as spending two lines decrying a rapist and

then writing an entire article commenting how however the victim

really wore rather skimpy clothing. People doesnt solidarize with

Charlie because they think alike, but just because they think theyve

been victim of a gross injustice, and thats it and of course there are

hypocrites and people who just do it for herd effect on social networks

like there always are, in fact I didnt do it on my FB profile nor did I


27 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

repost any of CHs drawings for the same reasons. I just think its

personal, and its right to call it out if someone specifically accuses

you of being some kind of traitor for NOT doing it, but it doesnt

make sense as a rant on its own. Obviously most people dont share

CHs ideas, they were a far-left French newspaper (and mind you,

European continental countries have a bar for far which is much

higher than in the US)! But thats besides the point.


28 of 28 1/12/2015 12:25

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