Charlie Hebdo: Gun attack on French magazine kills 12

Discussion in 'Off Topic Area' started by slipthejab, Jan 7, 2015.

  1. philosoraptor

    philosoraptor carnivore in a top hat Supporter

    I think there's a major distinction to be made between the philosophical ideas of freedom of speech/press and the actual implementation of those ideals. I think that framing this solely as a free speech/censorship issues flattens the complexities of this case. It makes it easy to take a self righteous stand, but I don't believe that's the best way to end terrorism or the best way to fix the world. Yes, freedom of speech is an issue here. But I think that the causes of terrorism, the media's focus on certain violations of freedom of speech over others and the larger Western agenda in the Middle East are also at play and worthy of discussion.
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2015
  2. Bronze Statue

    Bronze Statue Valued Member

    Deleted.
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2015
  3. philosoraptor

    philosoraptor carnivore in a top hat Supporter

    I think this is actually about much more than just trying to forcibly impose compliance with religious prohibitions. I don't think that the people who organize this kind of thing are stupid. I'm pretty sure that they realize that making these kinds of attacks actually exacerbates the situation and many more Mohammed cartoons are made in response to the attack. It's happened before.

    Rather, I think that within fundamentalist Islam there are sections that know that assimilation is a threat to them. Kouachi, one of the dude's in the attack, was a pothead! I think that attacks like these, symbolic attacks on the Western way of life, really, really assist them in maintaining cultural power. You look at the effects it has and well, it seems like it's done more to ensure that the populations are maintained as separate than it has shut down cartoon population.

    http://www.vox.com/2015/1/10/7524731/french-muslims-attacks-charlie-hebdo

    I liked this article very much also.

    http://www.huffingtonpost.ca/julian-vigo/jesuischarlie-racism_b_6435038.html
     
    Last edited: Jan 14, 2015
  4. Mangosteen

    Mangosteen Hold strong not

    Watching a show called "White Angry and Proud".

    At first I thought "I can't understand extremism in anyway"

    But it really is a clash of cultures. So tribal. People are so tribal.
     
  5. CanuckMA

    CanuckMA Valued Member

    It's one sided, not factual, and stupid. But not Anti-Semitic.

    The whole point is that cartoonist can draw offensive cartoons of Jesus, Moses, etc. People will complain. People may even demonstrate in front of the newspaper's offices. But Jews and Xtians just don't go and blow things up or kill people over it.
     
    Last edited by a moderator: Jan 15, 2015
  6. FunnyBadger

    FunnyBadger I love food :)

    To me religious extremism is very comparable to football violence.

    Look at the old firms, they all supported their own team but at the end of the day it was still football. Most fans just wanted to turn up watch a game and enjoy a couple of pints but some looneys ruined that for the rest and as a result the police got involved. A few incidents of insensitive or heavy handed policing created more hooligans and that attracted more police attention

    It's the same thing but instead of a teams it's a religions and instead of police it's the state/culture in general and most people still just want to get on quietly but can't because of the actions of a stupid minority.

    As zaad said its just tribalism, it's an excuse for a few nutters to trick and cajole impressionable people into terrorism because those at the top of the terrorist networks think the world should burn. Islam isn't the cause of extremism its a weak excuse for it.
     
  7. Johnno

    Johnno Valued Member

    I think that the point about tribalism is a good one.

    My theory is that we retain an instinctive survival instinct from 'caveman days' that makes us tend to distrust those who we perceive as being outside our own 'group'. This group can take many forms, because it's really a matter of perception rather than of actual reality.

    To take the football crowd as an example, chances are that we'd have more in common with many of the away fans than with most of the muppets in our own end, but in the heat of the moment we feel a tremendous bond and affinity with EVERYONE in our end when we are all standing up and singing together. We thrive on that group feeling, and for ninety minutes we are happy to ridicule the other 'tribe' in the away end because they are 'foreign' to us. Deep down we know it makes no sense, but for ninety minutes we play that game, and it satisfies some primeval part of us.

    It isn't hard to see how that same very basic instinct can be harnessed by right-wing politicians, religious zealots and cult leaders. It just needs people to switch off their critical faculties (or to be lacking them in the first place) and to blindly follow the herd.

    I suspect that it also has a powerful subconscious appeal to the socially inadequate loner, the misfit who desperately wants to belong. You can imagine the young Adolf Hitler developing warped fantasies about a might German 'tribe' when he was a friendless drop-out in Vienna. I wouldn't be at all surprised if many of these so-called 'jihadi' terrorists have a socially dysfunctional background too - although I'm not suggesting that it would be universally true of al of them. Just one contributory factor in many cases.
     
  8. dormindo

    dormindo Active Member Supporter

    Canuck, you've certainly been around long enough to know MAP's TOS regarding profanity--even in discussion of heavy topics, it is meant to be a family friendly site, so please refrain from this in future.

    Carry on, all.
     
  9. Smitfire

    Smitfire Cactus Schlong

    I think the worrying "elephant in the room" is what the reality of muslim feeling on this subject really is?
    There's obviously a spectrum of feeling right?
    For example on one end you've got muslims that are OK with satirical cartoons of mohammed and islam being questioned or even ridiculed and who realise that's what will happen in a relatively free society where not everyone shares the same reverence for the same objects/ideas/icons. They are confident in their faith and don't wish to impose it on others. I think they are, with the best will in the world, probably small in number?
    Along from that are muslims that are not OK with images of mohammed but accept them, again, as part and parcel of living in a wider non-islamic society. This would be more liberal or moderate muslims. Offended but accepting of that offence.
    Next you have muslims that find such images unacceptable and would wish them banned.
    Then muslims that think such images should be banned AND the people that produced them punished in some way.
    Then muslims that think such cartoons should be banned AND the people that produced them violently punished although they wouldn't be violent themselves or would be violent if enough other muslims were also violent. Or maybe they are happy that someone was violent over this even if it wasn't them.
    And then finally muslims that think such cartoons should be banned, the people that produced them violently punished and are willing to enact that punishment themselves. Like the first group these are obviously small in number too. This is obviously the group the terrorists come from.

    And the truth of the matter is we have no idea how the muslim population breaks down into those demographics (and some of those demographics are inherently in opposition to modern democracy). And those demographics would vary form country to country (with a tendency to be on the more extreme end of those views if the country if muslim controlled) no doubt.

    So I think for some non-muslims the worrying thing is "where do the muslims I see around me fall on the 'punish people for insulting islam/mohammed' sprectrum?"
     
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2015
  10. 47MartialMan

    47MartialMan Valued Member

    And trivial :)

    But in some point of human history when it came to religion, people of all faiths did kill in their name of
     
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2015
  11. philosoraptor

    philosoraptor carnivore in a top hat Supporter

    They actually do! But when a Christian blows up an abortion clinic, shoots policemen or kills seventy children he's called a crazy person. The Kouachis became affiliated with terrorism in 2005, when the war in Iraq was in full swing and two Algerian teenagers were killed in France - something that elicited Ferguson style riots. It's not like they heard Charlie Hebdo was publishing offensive cartoons and thought "Now is our time!" I think with these sorts of attacks there's a tendency to remove them from history, and I think that's a tendency to be avoided.

    Note: I do not want to imply that these attacks were justified by history, but that there is a cycle of violence between the Western and Middle Eastern countries that is at once both predictable and defusable.
     
    Last edited: Jan 15, 2015
  12. Mangosteen

    Mangosteen Hold strong not

    I dunno man, how do christian, hindu, sikh and jewish folk in the UK feel about people dying horribly in anarchic gunfire? the same as many muslims in the UK im guessing.

    i know you're just speculating on people's attitudes but i dont assume that non-brown or even non-muslim people fall on the "racist butts" end of the spectrum of human decency so i hope that people on the other side don't make similar assumptions.

    In fact it's ignorance on the most part. when community or religious leaders speak out and condemn such attacks or even incidents like rochdale (the pakistani community there spoke up about that and condemned those involved), they are seemingly never heard by "non-muslims".

    the reason i say brown is because how many in this country see muslims around them:
    for non-muslim brits i guess they think "look at them brown people, they must be muslim. i wonder how they feel about cartoons"
    for non-muslim french "look at these dark-skinned people (algerians and african muslims), they must be muslim. i wonder how they feel about cartoons"

    its running on those blearly lines of tribalism known as racism. when someone sees muslims around them, they rarely see muslims, they see people they assume to be muslims.

    it's why when i grow a beard for "Movember" people at work comment that they thought it was for my religion.
    it's why people at uni would yell "terrorist" while throwing eggs at me from their windows.
    it's why people yell "taliban" at my sikh grandfather
    it's why country nuts decide to punch up my brother and yell "go home muslim" when he walks into the only club in his uni town during freshers.
    and people wonder why immigrant communities become so insular.
     
  13. Smitfire

    Smitfire Cactus Schlong

    Well I'm guessing too. Back when Rushdie was condemned to die for writing a book there was a fair biut of muslim support for that (in the form of agreement even if individuals wouldn't be violent to Rushdie themselves) AND some non-muslim support too (in various forms).
    So I think it's fair to say that it's not a cut and dry issue whereby all muslims condem the action or all support it. It's a spectrum.
    I dunno where you're getting the idea I see everyone non-white as muslim?
    I'm specifically talking about muslims (which is why i kept mentioning them).

    Quite honestly there seems to be a fair bit of muslim comment on this issue that takes the form of "We condemn the violence but....". And then after the but there some caveats, victim blaming in some ways, condemnation of the cartoons too, etc, etc. So that kind of muddies the waters to some degree.
     
  14. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    No one ever expects every Christian to condemn violence when a Christian commits violence, but whenever a muslim does all we hear is "Muslims aren't condemning the violence loudly enough". It's crap and its a double standard fueled by not so thinly veiled racism.

    It is 100% possible to find the cartoons offensive (and they were offensive and 100% deliberately so) and be outraged at the violence.
     
  15. Mangosteen

    Mangosteen Hold strong not

    and my comparison was saying that there is probably a spectrum among other religions too
    heck the pope is on the end of the spectrum i dont really like:
    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/charlie-hebdo-pope-francis-says-those-who-ridicule-others-religions-should-expect-a-punch-9980192.html

    as i said at the beginning of the post, i don't think you see everyone non white as muslim. im talking about people in general. but we only explicitly see muslims around us when they wear traditional Islamic attire.
    the rest of the time we just assume that people are of a certain faith because of their skin colour.
     
  16. Smitfire

    Smitfire Cactus Schlong

    I was gonna mention the pope's comments myself.
    That's a classic example of a 'but' statement 'I support free speech...BUT...not when it criticises religion'.
     
  17. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    Just because you have the right to do something doesn't mean you should do it.

    And free speech doesn't protect you from criticism. You have the right to say whatever you like, and I have the right to point out that those views would embarrass a developmentally stunted wombat in the latter stages of dementia.
     
  18. philosoraptor

    philosoraptor carnivore in a top hat Supporter

  19. Hannibal

    Hannibal Cry HAVOC and let slip the Dogs of War!!! Supporter

    And of course that extends to criticism of religious beliefs too
     
  20. holyheadjch

    holyheadjch Valued Member

    Sure. But again, just because you can doesn't mean you should.
     

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