16 Jan, 2015
Hypocrisy Abounds: Free Speech as Cover for Islamophobia – Sonali Kolhatkar – Truthdig
A magazine that most people outside France had never heard of before Jan. 7 now has legions of followers and fans around the world. The dominant narrative that has emerged from the horrific massacre of 10 staffers of Charlie Hebdo (plus police officers and hostages) is that the very foundation of freedom itself was attacked last week in Paris, and that the best way to fight Islamic fundamentalism is to uphold the ethos of Charlie Hebdo’s irreverence and satire. After all, in seeing their own values embodied in Charlie Hebdo, holders of “Je Suis Charlie” signs seem to be positioning themselves on the “right” side of freedom and democracy.
It is tempting to join in and poke fun at religion as an expression of freedom and free speech. I am an atheist. I don’t think highly of any religious views, myths or traditions. But the response to the Charlie Hebdo massacre has revealed an overwhelming set of double standards. Scratching even a tiny bit of the surface of one hypocritical notion after another leads to uncomfortable and undeniable conclusions: that it is OK to insult one and only one religion and its 1.6 billion adherents, and that we must uphold at all costs the freedom of anti-Muslim speech alone.
Read the rest: Sonali Kolhatkar: Hypocrisy Abounds: Free Speech as Cover for Islamophobia – Sonali Kolhatkar – Truthdig.
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