Charlie Hebdo’s rights and wrongs
By Anne-Marie Slaughter,
President and CEO of the New America Foundation, is the author of The Idea That Is America: Keeping Faith with Our Values in a Dangerous World.
In the wake of the terrorist attack on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris, declarations of “Je suis Charlie” have echoed worldwide. And, indeed, Charlie Hebdo should be free to publish what it likes, without fear of violence, as long as it does not directly incite violence itself. But does that mean that other news outlets and individuals should republish it?
To be sure, freedom of expression should almost never be repressed, a point that the United States Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes emphasized in a dissenting opinion in a case concerning the US Constitution’s guarantee of free speech. “[W]e should be eternally vigilant against attempts to check the expression of opinions that we loathe and believe to be fraught with death,” he wrote, “unless they so imminently threaten immediate interference with the lawful and pressing purposes of the law that an immediate check is required to save the country.”
From this perspective, I would have marched with the millions who gathered in Paris, proclaiming “Je suis Charlie.” And I fully understand the desire to purchase the subsequent issue of Charlie Hebdo, published – with bravery and determination – a week after the attack. People not just in France, but around the world, want to show their solidarity with the victims and support the fundamental principle of free speech.
But supporting Charlie Hebdo’s right to express whatever message it chooses does not necessarily imply support for its portrayals of the Prophet Mohammed or a willingness to participate in their dissemination. Support for the principle does not demand endorsement of the practice.
In the days after the attack, it became an act of solidarity to retweet the offending cartoons, rather than simply posting expressions of support. The Lebanese blogger Gino Raidy wrote, “Please, publish the cartoons again, and again, and again. Maybe with time, the murderous savages that kill for a drawing in the name of their god, will get it through their thick heads that they can never stop us, and every attempt to only fuels our cause more (sic).”
The passion in Raidy’s appeal is admirable, and the sentiment is understandable. But the view that defending free speech imposes a duty to disseminate specific content is deeply problematic. The decision to publish images or words that disrespect or defame others’ deeply held beliefs must be a personal one.
Each individual must be free to make that decision, which is why anti-blasphemy laws violate universal human rights. The fundamental principle underlying freedom of expression is that speech must be answered with more speech, never with violence, imprisonment, or censorship. Anti-blasphemy laws not only violate that principle; they can easily be abused as a tool of political power and impoverish their societies by imposing a code of rigid conformity.
But people can choose to avoid speech that others will hear as blasphemy. Though I will defend the right of individuals to make racist statements, I would not make such statements myself or listen to a speaker making them. After all, such views undermine many other important principles – namely, those needed to create and sustain an inclusive, tolerant, and peaceful society.
In the case of Charlie Hebdo, the question is whether depictions of the Prophet Muhammad are likely to foster the kinds of debate and behavior that are compatible with the coexistence of Muslims, Christians, Jews, other believers, and atheists in a society that upholds the freedom of worship and expression. All human beings are entitled to hold something – a place, an idea, an image – sacred. Desecrating a shrine, defacing a cross, or, in the US, burning a flag, is an aggressive and insulting act, one that causes real pain for believers. It may incite a conversation, but it does so from a position of profound disrespect.
Charlie Hebdo, of course, used humor precisely to challenge sacred cows. And its editors bravely and nobly stood by their convictions, even when their lives were threatened. We should uphold their right to publish. But to embrace the images they published as a statement of Enlightenment conviction weakens the values that are essential to a civilized society.
The new issue of Charlie Hebdo, which featured another image of the Prophet on its cover, sparked protest marches in Pakistan, Afghanistan, Kuwait, Lebanon, and Tunisia. Commenting on the intensity of these protests, Iyad El-Baghdadi, a self-described “Islamic libertarian,” aptly tweeted: “Unapologetic hatred is going mainstream everywhere. I worry for our world.” Mobilizing mass demonstrations around whether you “are” or “are not” Charlie Hebdo invites demagoguery from extreme factions in all societies that gain from fueling sectarian conflict.
The easiest way to compound the tragedy in Paris would be to use the deaths of Charlie Hebdo’s editor, Stéphane Charbonnier, and 11 others to fan the flames of religious hatred. Surely we can defend people’s right to express themselves without approving or endorsing their views. In the case of Charlie Hebdo, the decision not to disseminate its cartoons can be driven not by fear, but by respect.
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Copyright: Project Syndicate
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