France Shoot-Out

[Hax]

That just sickens me...there is no congruention between the subject spoken to in the first: the curse of God be uponyou (pl.) oh worshipper (sg.) of the Cross. The word for worshipper, ‘abd, should be in the plural: ‘abîd. Freedom of expression should be extended to people that make this kind of mistake in God's holy language.

But I digress. What is absolutely horrifying to see is the lengths to which people go to -- despite everything that has happened -- to still blame Charlie Hebdo for all this. It's the intellectual equivalent of saying "well when you wear skirts of that length, don't be surprised that you ended up raped". It's victim-blaming and it's horrific. To spin it into a pseudo-intellectual debate concerning the limitations of freedom of speech is pretty much just insulting. Personally, I'm getting tired of the people that try to take some kind of moral "high road" when it comes to these events, because we're not on the same wavelength.

To put it in different terms: we have all decided that in our respective societies (Dutch, French, English, German...etc) there should be the possibility for all people to express -- more-or-less without fear of repercussions -- our opinions freely. However, there is a serious problem when it comes to the reciprocity of this point of view: you feel that violent Islamists have the right to express their opinion. Violent Islamists feel that they have the right to express their opinion. So up unto that point everything's great. Express an opinion that is critical of this group of Islamists though, and you're risking your life.

Seeing the degree to which people on these forums go to slam Charlie Hebdo or French Republicanism is frankly just sickening. I can only speak for myself, but I have a huge respect to the history of satire in France, and the argument that the cartoons harm "the socio-economically marginalised group of French Muslims" is so incredibly daft that it just feels like trolling at one point -- especially when I see articles written by British journalists: maybe some of them are still feeling bad about the 100 year war. More seriously: I have no idea what feeds this kind of poorly-disguised anti-French sentiment.

To all those that say that radical Islamism -- yes, radical Islamism; not radical Islam -- is not a threat to Western society is fooling themselves. It's an incredibly naive thought that will only do harm. Does that mean that we should pre-emptively tone down criticis of a particular religion? That's insane. I have actually been positively surprised by the general response by and to the Muslim communities in Europe after the shooting, and I think it would be the same kind of insane to suddenly have this knee-jerk reaction to everything that has anything to do with their religion. If I were a Muslim, I'd be more insulted by the fact that everyone thinks that I'd literally explode at the very first perceived slight towards Muhammad. But maybe, that's why I'm not a Muslim.

I think that a lot of what's happening today with relation to violent Islamism has to do with the fact that it's a wounded animal, and although I'm not a hunter, I understand that they are the most dangerous -- but it can't go on much longer. So kill it with laughter, and vive la liberté​.