What do you ladies think about the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attack? (self.blackladies)
blackladies
22 ups - 0 downs = 22 votes
Obviously, it was a horrible and indefensible massacre. And while it's always great when people around the world can support each other in times of grief, I just can't get behind "Je suis Charlie Hebdo." While I can mourn every senselessly taken death at the publication, I have to rather emphatically say "Je ne suis pas Charlie Hebdo."
For example, here's one of their covers: http://imgur.com/qPhHwR0,qqGnW0N,gzgtnmn#0
It depicts the Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by Boko Haram now pregnant and shouting, "Keep your hands off our benefits!" This sort of horrifying racism is really par for the course for CH. Though I want to stress that the massacre is a horrible thing, Charlie Hebdo is a publication I don't feel I can support in any way. I believe in freedom of speech, but I can't support a paper that regularly mocked Muslims, oppressed minorities in a virulently racist country who viciously colonized their home lands. Europe has hate speech laws that would be unconstitutional in the US. Holocaust denial can get you jail time over there. And yet we don't see Europe as a hotbed of oppressive fascism. I guess I see free speech as a way of protecting us from government abuses, not an excuse to victimize the powerless. I felt similarly about The Interview-- guess absolutely free speech is not high on my list of social justice concerns. How do you ladies feel?
39 comments submitted at 00:11:46 on Jan 10, 2015 by ObsidianBlackbirdMcN
I think they're crying over him because whiteness is allergic to accountability. Hedbo was a NASTY piece of work who intentionally baited Islamist extremists into doing what they did because it was something the horrifically racist and xenophobic French right wing could wank over. He also depicted a Black politician as a monkey, made homophobic illustrations and more.
I dont care who judges me for this but Hedbo is as much responsible in death for those other 11 people who were murdered as the gunmen. And its because of him and the sick, twisted mentality of right wing whiteness in general that those people are dead and a lot of Muslims in France are in grave danger right now. And they're crying over him. Psh
Whiteness also only protects free speech so long as its shitting on people they consider themselves above. Its all free speech until we start talking. Because France just banned Pro-Palestenian demonstrations as well.
Free speech my ass.
Fuck Charlie Hedbo. That aint my goddamn name. There's a lot you can get me to feel for a fellow scribbler, but not in this case.
I've seen a lot of things like this posted, but a lot of the covers people are referring to are satire.
The one you mentioned was a satirical criticism of a right-wing french nationalist party called Front National. The flame to the left of the picture is their logo. Their slogan of sorts was was 'Rassemblement bleu Marine' meaning 'navy blue gathering' a play on words with the navy blue color of their party and the name of their leader Marine Le Pen.
The text above the drawing says 'Rassemblement Bleu Raciste' meaning 'Blue racist gathering' and a racist depiction of French Minister of Justice, Christiane Taubira, who was called a monkey by Marine Le Pen, leader of Front National.
Most of the staff team at Charlie Hebdo were involved in far-left activism, several members making anti-racism cartoons, and making cartoons criticising the far-right (notice the small advert in the upper right for an issue called 'Feminism, future of Humanity').
That said I don't agree with some of their criticisms of Islam, but it has been completely blown out of proportion in my opinion.
I don't think their criticism of Islam has been blown out of proportion. The stereotypical drawings of Muslims alone seem like the direct parallel to what Sambo was to black people.
I meant just the criticism of Charlie Hebdo in general, but again I disagree with their recent criticisms of Islam.
With the stereotypical drawings of Muslims, I think you may be referring to drawings by a guy called 'Riss', who draws most people (including non-muslims) with long/crooked noses, although it's hard to say without specific examples.
Uh, yeah, not only do I not buy this but I operate on an "Intent is not magical" paradigm.
Like, intentions aside they were gross as hell and did a whole lot of baiting.
I'm not sure what you mean when you say you don't buy it. I agree that 'intent is not magical' but to me it's fairly obvious that the covers were anti-racist when you know the context.
> covers were anti-racist
Yes depicting the Boko Harem girls depicted as pregnant and screaming angry welfare queens and the French politician as a monkey is very anti racist.
Intent. Is not. Magical.
I agree that intent is not magical but honestly I think when there is both a language and culture barrier I do think it holds a bit more weight. The fact is Charlie Hebdo is parodying French society and French situations. Not American society and American situations. You are applying American stereotypes and situations to a French magazine. In America, racism is not as directly spoken, our racists claim they are not racist and use tons of codewords. Therefore if you were to depict a black person as a monkey, YOU would be the racist no matter what. However in France and honestly most of Europe people publically call black people monkeys all the time. Therefore depicting such a thing is not a form of edgy fedora shock humor like it would be in America but actually a response to something that is being said and depicted by right wingers in public all the time.
Black people in Europe are offended to be called monkeys. When footballers get bananas thrown at them, they're offended about it. Racism is more acceptable in Europe, sure, but that doesn't make it less racist.
Edit: There never was clearer evidence of brigading than a post saying "Calling black people animals isn't racist in France" being upvoted in a sub called r/blackladies.
> You are applying American stereotypes
Mnoo, Like, I see your point but I'm applying racism as well, fucking racism. Depicting Black people as monkeys is racist. Period. Even as satire. It's not okay.
I see what you're saying about Hebdo aside from that but, no, this aint an american thing. This is an anti black thing. It crosses the pond.
Again, the cover was satire.
The cover is mixing two unrelated elements which made the news at about the same time:
In France, as in probably every country who has welfare allocations, some people criticize this system because some people might try to game it (e.g., "welfare queens" idea). The idea of the picture is that French family allocations are already so bad that even Boko Haram does a better job providing allocations to pregnant people, and is parodying racists' ideas of ethnic minorities.
I think satire is a hard thing for people to understand. As with all types of comedy, some people will get it, some people just don't.
Hey, fellow scribbler! I think as a writer I'm also feeling like I should feel more strongly about freedom of speech, but I agree with you that it's so selectively applied. I'll try to think of it like that-- I care about equality of free speech. Not just free speech that allows them to shit on us.
Also I don't want to be pedantic, but I thought I'd point it out in case you take your very well reasoned argument outside of this sub-- you know how the neckbeards of reddit love to pounce on a tiny error and use it as an excuse to ignore someone's totally valid points. Charlie Hebdo isn't an actual person, as far as I know, "hebdo" means "weekly" in French.
I prolly anthro'd him a bit too much but I am a touch tipsy over here lol
edit: "Him", it. The magazine. Fack
I've been surrounded by JeSuisCharlieHedbo people this week but the only message I got from that was "I am a shitty person." There is nothing satirical about bullying an already marginalised group in your society and claiming to be 'equal opportunity offenders', when equal opportunities don't exist in your society. If they gave as much attention to drones blowing up weddings in the Middle East I would have related more to loonies killing a bunch of useless journalists. Fuck them.
> There is nothing satirical about bullying an already marginalised group in your society and claiming to be 'equal opportunity offenders', when equal opportunities don't exist in your society.
THIS is everything. Great satire targets the powerful, making fun of the oppressed is just bullying.