It says a lot that there’s only one religion that I’m scared to criticize.

12 people were killed for publishing a cartoon of Muhammad.

A teacher was beheaded for showing a drawing of Muhammad.

Cartoonist drew Muhammad, leading to Danish embassies being attacked and riots broke out and people died. Later, people broke into his house to try to kill him.

Cartoonist had to live under police protection because of threats.

Creators of South Park were threatened for including Muhammad in an episode of the show.

These were just a few from the FIRST PAGE of a search engine, AND outside of Muslim majority countries.

This is before even considering every other ‘provocation’, leading to incidences like:

Salman Rushdie being stabbed on stage

A teacher forced into hiding for showing a picture of mahammad

I’m all for satire, but I also think this was kind of bullying in that they did something that was offensive specifically to a particular marginalized minority group.

So it’s not something that should be illegal or warrant a shooting, but I’m not exactly surprised. Just as if they published a story like “Fuck this one guy’s mother” showing a drawing of some random guy’s mother being fucked.* That guy doesn’t then have a right to shoot them and should go straight to prison if he does - but I wouldn’t be surprised and I don’t think we all need to identify with the paper or anything because they were being total pricks.

*And I know the response will be along the lines of “You can’t compare that drawing with a mere drawing of mohammed”. But that betrays a failure to take another perspective. Who’s to say that in a society even more liberal than our own, “fuck your mother” might be seen as not particularly insulting? After all, take away expectations of women being pure and you basically have “fuck your dad” which really doesn’t seem too insulting, it’s like sure if that’s what you’re into weirdo, but let me check with my dad first.

A week ago I was in line to check out and there was a young woman in a hijab. When she turned to help me I saw her entire face and hands (all I could see really) had acid burns all over.

The paradox of tolerance will never be something I struggle with once The Fall happens. Regardless for whichever religion seeks to lynch me.

Honestly? That I would rather have Meta (and a bunch of Western countries, while we’re at it) lift restrictions on that front first before they go against LGBT people.

I’m not on board with the idea that edgy or offensive humor is valuable in itself, but I absolutely abhor the scenario where offended conservative and traditionalist views are treated in their own terms while marginalized groups are considered needy or nagging if they ask for the same treatment.

Also not on board with comedians assuming that noting their ignorance or bigotry is the same as not having a sense of humor, incidentally. Everybody sucks, is my point.

The shooting wasn’t merely about the freedom of satire. Not really. Let’s complicate the story.

The Kouachi brothers were Algerian and you can’t ignore the history of French colonialism in Algeria as the antecedent to this attack. This isn’t just about secularism and blasphemy, that’s only the surface. It’s about racism and colonialism and imperialism. Don’t think of this only as religious fanatics angry because infidels insulted the Prophet Mohammad, think of this as an oppressed racial group lashing out at a racist society and it being channeled through Islam. There’s a deeper tension here than just the religious surface.

Now, as for my opinion?

Racist satire should be illegal and that racists should be put into reeducation camps to be rehabilitated.

Also! Adventurism is bad and people should get organized into a Party, not do vigilante attacks on racists.

Satire should be staunchly defended. Some people may find it offensive and they can go fuck themselves.

Satirical publications are often the last free press able to publish in authoritarian governments and have often played a critical role in communication to weaken oppressive regimes.

We can all occasionally suffer jokes in bad taste in exchange for freedom of the press.

It was depressing that every newspaper in the developed world didn’t print the cartoon :(

Prohibiting satire of religion is a form of blasphemy law, and blasphemy laws shouldn’t exist.

In the words of Sam Harris: “People were murdered over cartoons. End of moral analysis.”

Everything is and should be allowed in comedy. Religion is no exception.

I think Charlie Hebdo comics are often in bad taste and more shock value than critic, but that’s no legitimate reason to massacre people.

More than the attack on Charlie Hebdo itself, which I can “understand” in the twisted sense of a religious fanatic, it was the overall ruthlessness of the attackers that shocked me. I remember vividly seeing a video of one of the attackers walking up to a wounded police officer and executing him at point-blank range.

Doesn’t make sense to me that religious people get violent because of something you say or draw.

If it would be wrong god will punish people who do it. If god doesn’t it is not wrong. And if god doesn’t but religious people do, that is them acting against god and thinking they know better then god. That is blasphemy and will make their god hate them.

We pull back too much because Islamic nutjobs will get violent because you dared draw a picture that resembled their stupid prophet. By doing that, we are giving them what they want and telling other religious groups that if they get violent enough, we’ll stop to appease them too.

You can mock Jesus, Moses, Krishna and any other religious figure because their followers, at worse, are going to verbally protest, if they do anything at all. But draw fucking Muhammad and people will tell you to knock it off because we don’t want to upset the assholes who will riot and kill people because they can’t handle someone having a differing opinion. Society bends over backwards to not offend Islam out of fear.

In response, we should have doubled down. Make more cartoons, get more vulgar with it…go all in, not stopped to appease them. Some people did for a while immediately after the attack, but not enough and not long enough, imo.

I think most people would agree with the following: even if you feel the cartoon was in poor taste or was “punching down,” the shooting was a terrorist act that just served to reinforce the worst stereotypes about Muslims and—ironically—the offending cartoon itself.

Opinions can vary about the cartoon, but that’s the point of defending satire and free speech; what’s completely indefensible is violence that clearly isn’t in the service of self-defense. People who quibble about the definition of self-defense and even skirt the idea that the terrorists in this incident had a right to do what they did, in my opinion, are likely either sophomoric contrarians or bad faith actors intentionally trying to muddy the waters, akin to some far-right militia members on conservative subreddits.

As in everything in life, your right to swing your fist ends where my nose begins.

If you don’t like the satire of Charlie Hebdo, your right is to not read it. If you don’t like a comedian who makes pedo jokes, your right is to not buy their tickets. If you don’t like a TV show that shows drug use, your right is to not watch it.

That’s it. That’s the end of your personal rights on that issue. You do NOT have the right to tell other people what they personally view, watch, read, etc…

If enough people share your view, that publication/comedian/show will either change or go out of business naturally because of lack of subscribers. That’s how it works.

I personally find Charlie Hebdo to be racist twits. But that doesn’t give me any right to kill them. I have the right to just ignore them.