That’s ‘I am Charlie!’ in French, if readers have been under a rock the last twenty-four hours.
Earlier today in Paris, three masked gunmen brandishing AK-47s and shouting “Allahu Akbar” stormed the offices of the satirical* newspaper Charlie Hebdo. They murdered twelve people – the editor, cartoonists, journalists, and police officers – before fleeing in two stolen automobiles.
Police have identified the terrorists as Said Kouachi and Cherif Kouachi, both in their 30s, and 18-year-old Hamyd Mourad. There is a nationwide manhunt across France. In mourning, French citizens have held candlelight vigils and defiantly brandished pens as symbols of their solidarity with the newspaper and the law enforcement groups who lost comrades today.
The protest has spread worldwide.
Previously, Charlie Hebdo endured firebombs and multiple death threats against its journalists and cartoonists, for satirical cartoon portrayals of the Prophet Muhammad and current Islamic figures.
I had to think about this for a few hours. Satire is an old and honored art form; as with dance and music, I don’t quite trust any culture that penalizes it.
My answer is aimed at all religiously-motivated terrorists, no matter the faith:
Don’t push us, the sane and secular citizens of the world, too far.
Or you may see what else our pens, science, brains, and determination can achieve, when we stop being tolerant of you. You might end up longing for the silly cartoons.
*On other forums, it’s been noted that Charlie Hebdo’s satirical style can often be crude, raunchy, and intentionally offensive. So what? So were Lenny Bruce and George Carlin, in their day. The point of shock humor is not to respect the target’s sensitivity, but to sledgehammer through its defenses to expose any underlying hypocrisy and corruption. In the newspaper’s half-century of operation, Hebdo cartoonists have pretty much gleefully skewered every religion, creed, culture, and policy. With generally good reason.
The cartoonists wouldn’t bother mocking militant Islamists, if there wasn’t something nasty already under that rock.