Watching
world leaders join hands and march along with 3.7 million French citizens as a
response to state terrorism was a heartwarming image. However, there is another
issue which has percolated to the surface in light of the madness in Paris
which must be addressed, if the deaths of the magazine victims are to be
honored. This issue has nothing to do
with terrorism, how to stop it or refusing to live in fear. It is a fundamental principle of free speech
that: in a pluralistic democratic society
none of us, including our beliefs, has
the right to not be offended.
This means that when the world
adopts the slogan: JE SUIS CHARLIE (I am
Charlie), it is recognizing the right of a group of magazine writers and
cartoonists to satirize any individual or any group of people for any reason,
no matter how politically incorrect the message may be. The message is that the right of others to
offend us is the mirror image of the right of our individual political and
religious views to be legitimate and not be subject to state censure. We cannot have one without the other.
The
employees of the French magazine were assassinated for poking fun at Islam and
its leaders. It was in fact an equal
opportunity offender, taking bold shots at all religions and ethnic groups. Many commentators believe that if this
magazine tried to open a branch office on an American college campus, it would
be shut down for being too offensive and divisive.
If
anything is to be learned from this horrible episode, it may be that while our
political, economic and mainstream media institutions need on some level to be
politically correct, the satirical media does not. It is ok and even healthy in a democracy to
offend. While America tends to err in favor of political correctness and to
place burdens on free speech, I think we have gotten better at laughing at
ourselves in recent years. Using humor
to criticize the Pope for being too conservative, African Americans for their urban
culture, wealthy blue bloods at the Duquesne Club for caring only about money,
or Jews for supporting Israel on all matters, is not racist commentary. It is social commentary designed to make us
think through the issues and to realize our view is not the only one. The truth is that if you are being lampooned
by a standup comic, the weekly newspaper the Onion, the animated show South
Park or the political cartoon in the daily newspaper, you have arrived in
the mainstream of American culture. Get
over it and join the debate.
What
makes this issue difficult to resolve is that extreme and racist speech is also protected by our First Amendment
and the French Declaration of the Rights
of Man. In the rural areas of
France, racism, anti Semitism and Islamophobia are gaining strength along with right wing fringe political
parties. These groups spew racist
rhetoric and are every bit as dangerous to the French Republic as fundamental
Islamists. This collective insanity
among homogeneous populations, to racially attack rather than to criticize, is
also present, to a lesser degree, in rural America. Interestingly, these more isolated citizens
have almost no knowledge of or contact with the minorities they believe are
dangerous and may cause a threat to their way of life.
Diversity
is the catalyst for constructive free speech.
In diverse communities where different cultures, backgrounds and
religions meet and define the local culture, free speech tends to be productive
and non threatening. There is a balance
between criticism on the one hand and acceptance of diverse views, on the
other.
The fact that Muslim immigrants in Paris have
never assimilated into the overall population and remain “ghetto bound” may
help explain the horrendous acts of last week.
The fact that Muslim immigrants to the United States, while far fewer,
are better educated and assimilate by the second generation, may explain our
good fortune in minimizing such events.
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