How do you understand the original teachings of Islam?

Dear Liberal Pundit:

You and I both hate George W. Bush. Remember that childish statement he made after 9/11? ——"You are either on our side or you are on the side of the terrorists." But now, another horrific terrorist attack has occurred, and you all seem to be repeating "Dubya" (Bush Jr.'s nickname, derived from Based on the Texas pronunciation of the letter W - Observer Network Note) slogan: If we don't agree with free speech... then we are against it. If we're not Charlie...then we're freedom-hating fanatics.

I am writing this letter with one simple purpose: to ask you to stop this behavior. Do you think you are challenging terrorists? On the contrary, your efforts to divide and demonize dissidents show that you are playing into the bloody hands of terrorists. Us versus them. The progressive, liberal West versus the backward and barbaric Muslims. You continue to emphasize that the massacre in Paris on January 7th was an attack on freedom of expression. Conservative former French President Nicolas Sarkozy agreed, calling the incident a "declaration of war on civilization." Also holding the same view was the left-wing liberal and popular British TV host Jon Snow. He crudely called the massacre a "clash of civilizations" on Twitter and emphasized the "European attitude towards speech." free faith".

Everyone should be familiar with the slogan on the wall: I am Charlie.

The outpouring of condolences following the Paris terrorist attacks was filled with hypocrisy and exaggeration. Indeed, this attack was a heinous crime; an inhuman massacre of innocent civilians. But is it really an "attempt to murder" free speech (ITV presenter Mark Austin) and "blasphemous" our idea of ??"freedom of thought" (Stephen Fry)? It is a crime - but not a war. It was committed by a group of disaffected young people. In fact, the trigger was not the vilified prophets in European comics in 2006 or 2011, but the images of torture of war criminals by the US military during the 2004 Iraq War.

Please think more broadly. No one favors unlimited free speech. We are all aware of the existence of boundaries: for the sake of the rule of law and social order, we cannot cross the boundaries; because of style and etiquette, we should not cross the boundaries. We only disagree on one point: where exactly those lines should be drawn.

Give me an example. Did your publication publish cartoons mocking the Holocaust? No? So have you ever published a cartoon about the victims of the 9/11 incident jumping off the Twin Towers? I didn't think so (and I'm relieved about that). Let’s look at the “thought experiment” proposed by Oxford University philosopher Brian Kruger. Imagine, he wrote, if a man "wearing the 'I am Sharif' badge" - one of the killers of Charlie Hebdo staff - had joined the Paris Concord on January 11 Among the crowds at the “Solidarity Rally” in the square; imagine that man holding a poster with caricatures of the journalists who were shot… “How will the crowd react?… They will see this man as A hero for free speech? Aren't they seriously offended? "Do you doubt Krueger's reasoning? He said the man "would be lucky if he made it out alive."

I want to make this clear: Shooting a reporter or a cartoonist is not worth defending. What I don’t agree with is your high-sounding point of view: you have the right to offend others, but refuse to bear the corresponding responsibilities; I can’t even believe that “the right to offend others” can be interpreted by itself as “the obligation to offend others.”

Does your shouting "I am Charlie" mean that you agree with Charlie Hebdo's move to paint French black Justice Minister Christine Taubira as a monkey? Does that mean you appreciate those crude caricatures of round-nosed Arabs in Charlie Hebdo that would make Edward Said hate him?

The use of outrageous caricatures to mock racism is questionable.

Former Charlie Hebdo reporter Olivier Chiran claimed in 2013 that “Islamophobia gradually swept over” the magazine after the 9/11 attacks, and that this sentiment spurred them to attack those “on the fringes of social power.” of vulnerable religious members.”

For the above reasons, I cannot "be" and do not want to "be" Charlie - if we must take a stand, then we should be Ahmed, the Muslim policeman who was accused of defending "Charlie Hebdo" personnel Killed for the right to evacuate. As the novelist Teru Cole said: "We may be able to defend the freedom to say bad things, but that doesn't mean we have to promote and encourage the actual content of those words."

And you Why remain silent about this glaring double standard? Don’t you know that Charlie Hebdo fired veteran French cartoonist Maurice Siné in 2008 because he was accused of making some anti-Semitic remarks? Don't you know that Jyllands-Posten refuses to publish cartoons that vilify Christ because it would "cause an outcry" and generously declares that "under no circumstances... will it publish cartoons about the Holocaust"? And it was the same Danish newspaper that published a cartoon mocking the Prophet in 2005?

I guess people think that Muslims are inherently thicker-skinned than their Christian and Jewish brothers. The context that produced these comics also needs to be taken into consideration. You ask us to laugh at a caricature of the Prophet while ignoring the vilification of Islam across the continent (have you been to Germany recently?) and the widespread abuses that Muslims face in their education, careers and public life. Discrimination (especially in France). You ask Muslims to denounce a few radicals who threaten free speech, while turning a blind eye to the more radical rhetoric of our political leaders.

Are you indifferent to what Barack Obama did? ——He asked the Yemeni government to detain journalist Abura Haider Shaya (Shaya opposed the U.S. drone strikes and was later convicted of "terrorism" by a private court), but still claimed that he was a supporter of free speech. Self-proclaimed. Aren’t you disgusted by Benjamin Netanyahu’s behavior? ——As the Prime Minister of a country responsible for the murder of seven journalists in Gaza in 2014, he participated in a "solidarity rally" in Paris on the Place de la Concorde to mourn the murdered journalists of "Charlie Hebdo". With Bibi (Netanyahu’s nickname - Observer Notes) were Angela Merkel (in Germany, denying the Holocaust is punishable by up to five years in prison), and David Cameron (who wants to ban non-violent "extremists" committed to "overthrowing democratic institutions" from television).

You also have your own readers, could you please tell them this? A 2011 YouGov poll found that 80% of people supported prosecuting those who burn handmade poppies (the poppy is Britain's symbol of commemoration of fallen soldiers).

Apparently, Muslims are not alone in feeling offended.

Yours faithfully, Mahdi