"Je suis Charlie": The Artistic Value of Charlie Hebdo

Source 1: NSFW. Captions read "Mohammed: A star is born!" "The film which shook the Muslim World". Mohammed's speech bubble reads"And my ass? You like my ass?"

Before we start, let's get one thing out of the way. France is not the final bastion of free speech: Charlie Hebdo's predecessor was shut down due to a joke about Charles de Gaulle's death (that kind of thing would be legal today, in case you were wondering, though I don't know if the French would be as quick to play that card).

Source 2: Text reads "Tragic dance in Colombey. One Dead."

Source 1 was published in the wake of the now-infamous Innocence of Muslims film, and portrayed Mohammed as a gay porn star. Not only is this provocative for the sake of being provocative, there's no inclusive interpretation of this cartoon; it's homophobic, racist and only adds fuel to the fire. If you want to claim they're equal opportunist offenders, it's hard to see in light of Source 1 and it's context. Surely there's comedy when there comes to Christian fundamentalists?

No, the Charlie Hebdo cartoonists should not have been killed for Source 1, nor anyone else for any other form of free speech, but we should not be setting out to offend with #JeSuisCharlie. It's an insult not just to the tiny amount of fundamentalist Muslims in the world, but to the few billion non-fundamentalist Muslims in the world.

Source 3: Caption reads "Marvingt-Three has three dads." God's speech bubble reads "The Father", Jesus' "The Son" and the Holy Spirit's "The Holy Spirit".

Source 4: Caption says "Bishop's pedophilia". The Pope is saying "Go into cinema, like Polanski"

To choose a less politically charged topic right now: Source 3 is not good satire. Its sole source of humour relies on "lol gayyyyyyyy" (Charlie Hebdo seemed to have a thing over humiliation via gay sex-much like Alan Moore). It restates the joke with the Trinity's speech bubbles (just in case we didn't know who they are). Maybe it would be hilarious if I knew who Marvingt is (it's a surname of some sort, I think?). Source 4 is decent satire. It has a punchline (of some sort), It's decently topical.

We may be Charlie, provocative at heart (though most are undoubtedly more cowardly when tested), but we should not be. We should aim to be respectful of other people, and broaden views through art, not market bigotry through it.

tldr; would you rather die for Salman Rushdie's The Satanic Verses or Source 1?

Related

I am not Charlie, I am Ahmed the dead cop. Charlie ridiculed my faith and culture and I died defending his right to do so. #JesuisAhmed
— Dyab Abou Jahjah (@Aboujahjah) January 8, 2015

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