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2020-09-06 b
FREEDOM OF SPEECH IN A TIME OF INTOLERANCE - I

People must have the right to mock Muhammad

Charlie Hebdo is right to republish the cartoons that caused such barbarism in 2015.

Charlie Hebdo is at it again. Once again the famously fuck-you French magazine has published caricatures of the Prophet Muhammad. And not any old caricatures. It has published the ones that made it a target for radical Islamist fury and mass murder in January 2015, when two al-Qaeda-inspired gunmen stormed into its offices and massacred 10 of its cartoonists and writers for the ‘crime’ of blasphemy, for the ‘sin’ of mocking the Prophet. Have Charlie Hebdo’s new editors gone mad? What are they thinking republishing the Muhammad-mocking cartoons that led to that act of deranged slaughter just five years ago?

They’re thinking, it seems, about freedom, and in particular freedom of speech, and about the importance of upholding this central value of civilised societies even in the face of threats from violent religious extremists. Charlie Hebdo is right to republish the cartoons. It has, predictably, received a lot of flak. The radical Islamist corners of the World Wide Web will be full of rage and splutter. Leaders in Muslim-majority countries will hotly denounce the heretical French satirists. Indeed, Pakistan has already condemned Charlie Hebdo. Its foreign ministry declared on Twitter that this ‘deliberate act to offend the sentiments of billions of Muslims cannot be justified as an exercise in press freedom or freedom of expression. Such actions undermine the global aspirations for peaceful coexistence.’

Actually, the republication of the cartoons can absolutely be justified in terms of freedom of expression. This is unquestionably a free-speech issue. The right to doubt, question and even mock all gods, prophets, ideologies and fads is essential to a free society. (read more)

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