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France: Offensive Cartoons Fine, Hijabs Not Fine.

identityissues8

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Can We Trust France's 'Freedom' When Hate Cartoons Are OK and Hijabs Are Not?

Let's call a spade a spade here, shall we? What happened at the offices of Charlie Hebdo last Wednesday was a grotesque act of savagery and murder. What happened at the same offices before the attack in the name of cartoons and satire wasn't anything short of extremely offensive and demeaning either. Demeaning not towards just Islam, but almost all religions of the world and also towards values we as humans uphold.

After the attack there was a natural outpouring of sympathy on social media for the victims of this attack and against the religion of Islam with hashtags and cries ranging from the immediate need for immigration reforms in Europe to outright #killallmuslims. Most people from Pakistan jumped on the reactionary bandwagon on either side and cried either for censorship of such speech or waxing lyrical over how "Charlie Hebdo" was the paragon of free speech and a French institution with a luminous and glorious history.

The point I am trying to make is twofold.

Firstly, there is no sane reason for killing anyone over a cartoon or a satirical piece and I am not going to interject this statement with a yet or a but either. Even if examined under Shariah law, the "state" is supposed to give due punishment for crimes and not "individuals."

However, what constitutes free speech in the world of Charlie Hebdo needs to be examined as well before we start banging the drum for the imminent war of civilizations or the "us vs. them" narrative all over the world. Charlie Hebdo was responsible for cartoons which were sexist, misogynist, demeaning and would meet the demands of any hate speech standard in our world.

The question I'm asking is: Why are we supposed to adhere to the French standard for satire, or support it? I say this because I find cartoons making fun of Islam just as demeaning as those making fun of Lord Ganesh or Buddha or Jesus Christ. We can blare the trumpets of free speech all we want but the fact of the matter is that although we do not adhere to the same systems of morality all over this world, we all do believe in a commonality of what is within the bounds of reason. Tomorrow, if someone started distributing child porn and called it his protest for free speech or his method of pushing our boundaries, at least I wouldn't stand for it. Would you? Hence I will never say #JeSuisCharlie.

Secondly, 37 people were just killed in a terrorist attack in Yemen last week to little or no coverage by the international media -- primarily because that attack does not feature in the "us vs. them" narrative. Same with the Peshawar attack on school children, although in the case of the Peshawar attack the citizens of the world did unite with us for a few days at least contrary to their media.

Nobody wants to believe that Muslims are the target of these terrorists more than any other race or religion in the world. We have the numbers to prove it, and yet we are somehow supposed to feel guilty for their attacks? Who in the West feels guilty for that grand operation in Iraq, I ask? And that too by their military -- not just a rogue terrorist group.

We as a world need to understand and question exactly how a country's barometer for "freedom" is fair when the right of a Muslim woman to wear hijab is not sacrosanct but the publishing of hate cartoons is? Where anti-Semitism is a crime but anti-Muslim is not? I think France needs to examine closely what constitutes "freedom" for them or whether their intensity for secularism both historically and now is even at pace with the existing population of more than five million of their own Muslim residents or their rights.

As for apologizing for Al Qaeda or ISIS or any other nutso group that has got it in their mind to start or attempt any other barbaric attacks -- this savage is all out of apology for others' insanity.

#againstallterrorism #withallhumanity

http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/faisal-kapadia/charlie-hebdo-ahmed_b_6456024.html

You know, for all the rattling on I've heard over the last few days about freedom and how we need to be respectful of 'unlimited' freedom of speech and freedom to offend - this is actually an excellent point.
 
Did that writer just compare the freedom to print cartoons to the freedoms of sharing child porn!

And when the entire middle east does not use a hijab as one of the methods to enslave all women then France should look at the there stance about banning the hijab.
 
I guess freedom is something that is always a thing that shift and is redefined.

in the question of religious freedom, how do you deal with the conflict of two freedoms? What has the higher right, the freedom of practising a religion? Or the freedom of individuals? For example what if the religion suppresses the right and freedoms of the individual?

This is where the satirical comments and cartoons come into it. In the argument in relation to Islam, in the 'Western Culture' where women have fought for generations to over come suppression in many forms, the right to vote, the right to wear swim suits etc etc are we then expected to just accept watching women be forced to have to cover up, be second class citizens to men. and in some cased be denied education because it falls under freedom of religion?

The basic cultural difference comes down to the fact that for the most part in the 'West' religion, politics and law are separate from religion, where as with Islam, the religion and law are one in the same. Religious leaders are the political leaders, and the religious laws based on the interpretation become the public laws.

The 'West' will not live under Islamic law, and that is where the 'us and 'them' comes into it.
 

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Off Topix is a well-established general discussion forum that originally opened to the public in 2009! We provide a laid-back atmosphere, and our members are down to earth. We have a ton of content, and fresh stuff is constantly being added. We cover all sorts of topics, so there's bound to be something inside to pique your interest. We welcome anyone and everyone to register and become a member of our awesome community.

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