Edit: Damn, did not expect this to turn into today’s struggle sesh.

Here’s my both sides/both sides take. Should people be executed for drawing, publishing or showing hateful cartoons? Probably not.

What grosses me out is how Enlightened Secular France has spent centuries colonizing and brutalizing muslims and continues to oppress them with discriminatory laws while acting like the entire point of Free Speech TM is the right to degrade a profoundly marginalized minority.

As someone brought up in this thread, the whole Mohammad cartoon controversy reminds me of the perennial debate “why would a black person get violent if you call them the n-word, it’s just a word.” Context matters, when you purposely provoke an oppressed minority by shoving the thing they find most offensive in their face, you may get a violent reaction.

I don’t think this guy deserves to die at all, but Charlie Hebdo is very racist and it’s gross how people rally around it like it’s this bastion of free speech.

That said, death to A Wyatt Mann. Inshallah.

  • p_sharikov [he/him]
    2·
    4 years ago

    I get that it's supposed to be a demonstration of liberal values, but shouldn't they demonstrate free speech in a way that makes it look good? The message here seems to be, "We love liberal values because it lets us be rude to minorities."

        • SeizeTheseMeans [none/use name]
          2·
          4 years ago

          atheism or agnosticism - both are consistent with a leftist perspective. I can also see how a religious framework could lead way to agreeing with socialism or communism. There are religious texts and then there are religious institutions. Often there are readings of texts that are fundamentally at odds with many of the institutions that inhabit and lay claim to a specific territory. Think of your local church or religion you or someone you know grew up in. One can be religious and not be beholden to an institution. This is the way that opposition to religion can make sense. Do not oppose essentially any religious text that adheres to spiritual matters. Oppose institutions that seek to impose their interpretations of religious texts upon the world by force or through dubious authority.

          This is my actual and honest position on religion

    • anthm17 [he/him]
      31·
      4 years ago

      Ideally, but given the murders were done over these cartoons...

      • nohaybanda [he/him]
        4·
        4 years ago

        Shit take. If I make a tasteless joke and someone punches me in the mouth, they're (arguably) wrong to escalate into violence. But this doesn't somehow make it all right for me to be rude to all the other people who are upset with the joke but otherwise peaceful.

        • MaoTheLawn [any, any]
          10·
          4 years ago

          A tasteless joke in who's opinion? I'm sure you wouldn't be saying it's righteous if some white supremacist punched you in the face for making a joke about white people. Their white supremacist beliefs are rooted into the same thing as islam, and all religions. The common ground between them is that they're all based on absolutely nothing objective.

          • GrandAyatollaLenin [he/him,comrade/them]
            2·
            3 years ago

            "You care about this? LET ME USE IT TO WIPE MY ASS!!!" is an objectively tasteless joke.

            "Lol. Muhammad GAY!!!" is an objectively tasteless joke.

          • nohaybanda [he/him]
            2·
            4 years ago

            the wise man bowed his head solemnly and spoke: "theres actually zero difference between good & bad things. you imbecile. you fucking moron"

            You're right. I don't see offending a white supremacist the same as a white supremacist colonialist government offending the religious sensibilities of an oppressed minority. Do you?

          • qublics [they/them,she/her]
            2·
            4 years ago

            The common ground between them is that they’re all based on absolutely nothing objective.

            Honestly the main reason I have qualms about being overtly against Islam is that for many people it's not a choice at all.
            Islam like many other religions can be very unkind to its defectors.

            I'll gladly criticize specific Islamic leaders, how the religion mistreats its own people, and its reactionary doctrines.
            But resorting to mockery, not even aimed at any specific religious apologist, just no thanks.

            There are too many people stuck in the middle: derided by a racist and Islamophobic society, but unable to simply leave that religion even if they have long rejected its doctrines.