Thread by @luminatus1

#FreedomOfSpeech
#Hebdo

Some freedom of speech
"causes the death of Charlie's 12" & "arms the killers"

https://twitter.com/luminatus1/status/1325723514167496705

reprint Danish cartoons 2006

French President Jacques Chirac condemned "overt provocations" which could inflame passions. "

2007
The court followed the state attorney's reasoning that two of the three cartoons were not an attack on Islam, but on Muslim terrorists,

Cartoons were not an attack on Islam, but on Muslims terrorists

François Fillon, the prime minister, and Claude Guéant, the interior minister, voiced support for Charlie Hebdo,[32] as did feminist writer Ayaan Hirsi Ali, who criticised calls for self-censorship.[38]

there is a principle of freedom of expression, which should not be undermined. In the present context, given this absurd video that has been aired, strong emotions have been awakened in many Muslim countries. Is it really sensible or intelligent to pour oil on the fire?"[4

On 7 January 2015, two Islamist gunmen[52] forced their way into the Paris headquarters of Charlie Hebdo and opened fire, killing
12 people

President François Hollande described it as a "terrorist attack of the most extreme barbarity".[61] The two gunmen were identified as Saïd Kouachi and Chérif Kouachi, French Muslim brothers of Algerian descent.[62][6

The day after the attack, the remaining staff of Charlie Hebdo announced that publication would continue, 

huge demand in France, the print run would be raised from three to five million copies

The French government granted nearly €1 million to support the magazine

Je suis Charlie, French for "I am Charlie", was adopted by supporters of Charlie Hebdo. 

embraced the expression as a rallying cry for freedom of expression and freedom of the press.[7

Violent demonstrations

while peaceful demonstrations were held in Khartoum, Sudan, Russia, Mali, Senegal, and Mauritania.[86]

million people attended a demonstration in Grozny, the capital city of the Chechen Republic, protesting against the depictions of Muhammad in Charlie Hebdo

"Violence is not the method".

embroiled in controversy...easy to misrepresent purpose of provocative work

In February 2015 Charlie Hebdo was accused of attacking freedom of press when its lawyer Richard Malka tried to prevent the publication of the magazine Charpie Hebdo, a pastiche of Charlie Hebdo

disparaging people with disabilities

Riss parodied anti-immigrant attitudes by featuring a cartoon with a caricature of Jesus walking on water next to a drowning Muslim boy

widely seen as gallows humour in France, but prompted another wave of controversy abroad

caricature of the dead body of Syrian Kurdish refugee child Alan Kurdi next to a McDonald's sign with the caption, "So
close to the goal."

including a caption questioning whether the boy would have grown up to be an "ass groper in Germany".[101][

Charlie Hebdo published cartoons which were perceived in Russia as mocking the victims of the tragedy.[10

The Vatican and Jewish groups said they were offended, the Associated Press censored images of the cover

The cover upset the Belgian public and it particularly upset Stromae's family, because his father was murdered in the Rwandan genocide.[

caused 294 deaths, the French magazine published a cartoon in which the earthquake victims are depicted as pasta dishes, under the title "Séisme à l'italienne

Russia accused Charlie Hebdo of 'mocking' the Black Sea plane crash after publishing 'inhuman' cartoons about the disaster. In one reference to the crash, which claimed 92 lives,

This came as tensions between Erdoğan and French president Emmanuel Macron rise over Macron's anti-Islamic comments,

The tensions were, in turn, caused by the beheading of schoolteacher Samuel Paty in France after he showed caricatures of the prophet Muhammad, which were published by Charlie Hebdo, to his students as part of a lesson on free speech.

(Chechan 18yr old refugee murderer)

On the other hand, Macron promised to defend the right to freedom of expression and freedom of publication.

(his "Islam is in crisis" on 2/10/20 before Paty's murder & the stance above was behind boycott from Muslim countries)

an unaccompanied minor refugee in France in 2018. He confessed to his actions and said he had acted in vengeance for the Muhammad caricature republications.

the enemies of the republic will not win" and pleged to escalate the fight against terrorism.[

Emmanuel Macron faced backlash when he defended the caricatures. Many Muslims called for French products to be boycotted

In March 2007 a Paris court acquitted Val, finding that it was fundamentalists, rather than Muslims, who were being ridiculed in the cartoons.

Hebdo ridiculing terrorists will make them put their arms down

but academics are responsible for arming terrorists 🤔

Sinè

This led to complaints of antisemitism. The magazine's editor, Philippe Val, ordered Siné to write a letter of apology or face termination. The cartoonist said he would rather "cut his own balls off," and was promptly fired.

Italy
filed a lawsuit against Charlie Hebdo for "aggravated defamation",

Turkey

Granting the prize to Charlie Hebdo sparked vast controversy among writers[149] and 175 prominent authors boycotted the event due to "cultural intolerance" of the magazine.[150]

the satirical weekly represented the “cultural arrogance of the French nation”.

stepped beyond PEN's traditional role of protecting freedom of expression against government oppression.

"A hideous crime was committed, but was it a freedom-of-speech issue for PEN America to be self-righteous about?" he told the newspaper.

its moral obligation to a large and disempowered segment of their population."

withdrawing out of discomfort with what she called the magazine's "cultural intolerance" and promotion of "a kind of forced secular view."

"In recent years the magazine has gone specifically for racist and Islamophobic provocations," Nigerian-American novelist Cole wrote in a New Yorker article shortly after the attacks in January.

Salman Rushdie 's colourful language

"Charlie Hebdo's intent was to "ostracise or insult Muslims, but rather to reject forcefully the efforts of a small minority of radical extremists to place broad categories of speech off limits."

If this was my child, how would I advise?
Is this a subject for Civics Education?

But it is possible to defend the right to obscene and racist speech without promoting or sponsoring the content of that speech. It is possible to approve of sacrilege without endorsing racism. 

newyorker.com/culture/cultur…

Teju Cole :

The Charlie Hebdo cartoonists were not mere gadflies, not simple martyrs to the right to offend: they were ideologues. Just because one condemns their brutal murders doesn’t mean one must condone their ideology

Rather than posit that the Paris attacks are the moment of crisis in free speech—as so many commentators have done—it is necessary to understand that free speech & other expressions of liberté are already in crisis in Western societies;

There are harsh consequences for those who interrogate this monopoly. The only person in prison for the C.I.A.’s abominable torture regime is John Kiriakou, the whistle-blower. Edward Snowden

#JulianAssange

But the suggestion that violence by self-proclaimed Jihadists is the only threat to liberty in Western societies ignores other, often more immediate and intimate, dangers.

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