Open Letter: On Blasphemy, Islamophobia, and the True Enemies of Free Expression (3 page)

The term “Islamophobia” could never have achieved such wild popularity without the—mostly idiotic—complicity of the media. Why were they so eager to co-opt Islamophobia? First out of laziness, then for the novelty of it, and lastly out of commercial interest. Their contribution to popularizing the term “Islamophobia” has never been motivated by the least impulse to combat racism. On the contrary.

To put it simply, any scandal containing the word “Islam” in its headline sells copy. Ever since the attacks of September 11, 2001, the media have placed a fascinating and frightening character at center stage: the Islamist terrorist. Any terrorist can scare the hell out of us, but if you make him Islamist to boot, we all shit ourselves. Fear sells well. Scary Islam sells well. And scary Islam has become the only Islam there is in the eyes of the public at large.

Because the Islam that the media shovel down consumers’ throats is by necessity radical and bearded. When the mainstream media present a report on Islam it is very often a caricature, yet it provokes little open protest from the pressure groups that track Islamophobia. So long as they’re invited to put in their two cents on the rise of Islamophobia, everybody’s happy.

On the other hand, when a cartoon of so-called radical Islam is presented as a genuine and deliberate caricature, the Islamophobia-busters lose their cool. If you want to thrive in the media ecosystem, it’s far safer to take on a little newspaper like
Charlie Hebdo
than to attack major television channels and newsmagazines.

Nowadays, when a journalist asks a Muslim to comment on “the rise of Islamophobia,” what he’s really asking for is commentary on something the media themselves have created. In other words, the reporter helps to amplify the problem and then claims to be surprised that the problem exists and endures. The Muslim leader whom the prime-time anchor has called on to express his opinion of this notorious “rise of Islamophobia” should spit in his eye. He is face-to-face with the guy whose very job is to peddle fear of Islam.

Charlie Hebdo
published cartoons of Muhammad long before the scandal of the
Danish cartoons.
⁴
Note that, before the so-called Muhammad cartoons affair, the artists of
Charlie Hebdo
were known as and considered themselves to be journalistic illustrators. Ever since, they have generally been described as cartoonists.

Without denying the utility of cartoons in reporting current events, satiric caricature is but one element of drawing. There’s no shame in it at all, but this one detail highlights the extent to which the cartoons of Muhammad have colored the general public’s view of the work done by the artists of
Charlie Hebdo
ever since.

As I said, the Muslim prophet had been depicted in
Charlie Hebdo
long before the aforementioned scandal. No pressure group or reporter had expressed dismay of any kind over these drawings. A few individuals had conveyed their disapproval by letter, nothing more. No demonstrations, no death threats, no attacks. It was only after the denunciation and exploitation of the Danish cartoons by a group of Muslim extremists that caricaturing the prophet of the faithful suddenly became the trigger of media and Islamic hysteria. Media first, Islamic later. In 2006, when
Charlie Hebdo
reaffirmed an artist’s right to caricature religious terrorism by republishing the Danish cartoons of Muhammad, the media turned their cameras on our satirical paper.
Charlie Hebdo
became yet another potential target for the wrath of God’s wingnuts. The publication of the cartoons generated a tsunami of publicity, not because they were especially shocking, but because they could only be shocking, given how they were exploited to provoke outrage abroad.

The cartoon showing Muhammad wearing a turban in the form of a bomb is the best known among them. While not everyone interpreted it in the same way, it was at least open to interpretation by all, since it did not include text. Its detractors decided to read it as an insult to all Muslims.

To give the prophet of the faithful a bomb for a hat was to suggest that all his followers were terrorists. Another interpretation was possible, but it did not interest the media as much since it was not inflammatory, and therefore didn’t sell copy. Showing Muhammad in a bomb-hat could have been a way of condemning the exploitation of religion by terrorists. The cartoon was saying, “This is what terrorists have done to Islam. This is how the terrorists who claim to follow the prophet see him.”

It was because the media had decided that the reissue of the Muhammad cartoons could only unleash the fury of Muslims that it unleashed the ire of a few Muslim organizations. For some, their anger was just for show. Once they found themselves hemmed in by microphones and cameras, with reporters demanding their views on the blasphemous nature of the cartoons, the spokespersons of these pressure groups had no choice but to react. They had to prove to the most riled-up believers that they were true defenders of the faith.

The most radical Muslims compensate for their low numbers with intense, militant activism. Everyone falls for it, Muslim organizations and journalists alike. Because they have the biggest mouths, they become Islam—the real Islam. The truth is that there are few Muslims who observe all their religious obligations. And among those, the majority are not involved in religious groups, moderate or otherwise. That’s totally understandable. They don’t need someone telling them how they ought to believe.

Islam may very well be the second most practiced religion in France, but that doesn’t mean that all immigrants or children of immigrants from predominantly Muslim countries are Muslims themselves. I recall that in 2010, according to a report issued by the National Institute of Demographic Studies and the National Institute of Statistics and Economic Studies, 2.1 million persons in France called themselves Muslims, while 11.5 million called themselves Catholics and 125,000 called themselves Jews. These figures have never been cited by minority activists, who continue to claim—depending on their mood, which way the wind blows, or their own interests—that there are six, eight, ten, or even thirteen million Muslims in France!

Thankfully, faith is not transmitted genetically, as minority pressure groups and the far right would like to have us believe. But if your parents are Muslims, or assumed to be so on the basis of their origins, you will be considered a Muslim by the pressure groups and the reactionaries. Reporters, who need to inflate the “alarming” figures, are only too happy for a few minority-group leaders in search of notoriety and power to serve up those numbers on a platter.

Ever since the Muhammad cartoons affair and the notorious trial that followed,
Charlie Hebdo
has been under almost continuous media surveillance. Only dare to publish a cover representing the prophet or even someone who might be mistaken for him, and they’re off! The drawing in question is described as “yet another provocation from
Charlie Hebdo.
” And when the TV says it’s a provocation, there’s always some group of morons out there ready to consider themselves provoked. If the press calls it a scandal, someone out there will be scandalized.

Who are these Islamophobes? They’re the ones who claim that Muslims are stupid enough to get bent out of shape over some ridiculous drawing. A drawing that was widely viewable only because it was broadcast on every channel. Islamophobia is a market not only for those who make a profession of condemning it, but also for the press that promotes it.

Reporters are not the only ones who see Muslims where they ought to see citizens. Too many politicians also sell the Republic short by cozying up to so-called believers instead of to citizens. Special-interest advocacy, which everyone condemns in speech, is encouraged in deed.

To cite just one example—an egregious one, given that it stars a socialist President of the Republic—on February 18, 2014, François Hollande visited the Grand Mosque of Paris to inaugurate a memorial honoring Muslim soldiers who died for France from 1914 to 1918. We can understand the President drooling over the idea of a Muslim electorate, since the socialists are convinced that such a thing exists—that is, that most Muslims cast their votes not on the basis of candidates’ political ideas, but based on the amount of affection these candidates lavish on Muslims. This concept assumes that Muslims, as prisoners of their Muslim identities, can think only in their capacity as Muslims. You’d have to take Muslims for nitwits to believe such a thing. Or for overcooked spaghetti. The socialists think that if you plunge your fork into a bowl of Muslims and twist, you’ll pull out the entire bowlful. They’re one solid mass. Yet again, Muslims are considered first as Muslims before being considered as citizens. Yet that, somehow, is not Islamophobia.

It’s perfectly natural for Muslim leaders to pay homage to Muslims killed in the First World War. But it’s absurd for a President of the Republic to pay homage to Muslims “who died for France.” These natives—the colonized and enslaved who, for the most part, were rounded up and enlisted by force—did not die for France in their capacity as Muslims. They died in their capacity as low-cost cannon fodder. And if they did die for France, it wasn’t by choice. They died because of France; they died defending a country that had stolen their own. Hollande honored them as heroes, but they were, above all, victims. Before them, German bullets; behind them, French bayonets.

Among the 100,000 native colonial casualties of the Great War who are purported to have been Muslims, it would be astonishing to find even one who fought to defend the values of Islam. Can anyone imagine Muslim poilus engaging in jihad on France’s behalf? Socialist comrades, don’t mistake yesterday’s colonials for today’s imbeciles. Let the Republic raise a monument to the colonial peoples it led to slaughter rather than dream up Muslim fighters who died for France! How could Hollande not see the grotesque irony of the situation? Having kowtowed to the memory of Muslim soldiers, why not in the future kowtow to the memory of atheist soldiers, homosexual soldiers, vegetarian soldiers, albino soldiers, freemason soldiers, Orthodox Christian soldiers, Sephardic Jewish soldiers, pacifist soldiers, soldiers who played the ponies, soldiers who believed that the Sun revolves around the Earth…?

France is a salami that the Socialist Party has the annoying tendency of slicing up into special-interest groups. And it does so not out of respect for these purported groups, but out of political interest. Too many cultural associations assign the official “Muslim” label to immigrants who ask nothing more than to be treated as citizens—either because they are not Muslims, or because they can practice their faith without the support of dubiously representative associations.

It is astounding to see Hollande suck up to the shopkeepers of faith. Needless to say, not a single journalist or activist in the struggle against Islamophobia criticized the President’s gesture. Ultimately, what all of them really want is for Muslims to be seen exclusively as Muslims.

The Socialist Party has been promising to give foreigners the right to vote for over thirty years. François Hollande made it a campaign promise. Once elected, the President declared several times that he was in favor of it. But he waited until December 15, 2014, on the occasion of the inauguration of the Museum of the History of Immigration, and only
after
the Senate had swung back to the right, to deplore the fact that the opposition was against such a reform. Allowing non-EU foreigners to vote in
local elections
⁵
requires a constitutional amendment that must be approved by three-fifths of the Parliament. Did François Hollande launch a national debate on the issue? No. He feels it is less politically risky to pay homage to “Muslims” who died for France than to grant a legitimate right to immigrants who participate in the daily life of the country.

But if the artists of
Charlie Hebdo
understand that their cartoons may be exploited by the media, the hucksters of Islamophobia, the Muslim extreme right, or the nationalist extreme right, why do they insist on caricaturing Muhammad and depicting the “sacred” symbols of Islam?

Quite simply because
Charlie Hebdo’
s cartoons do not target Muslims as a whole. But what happens when, following overexposure in the media, Muslims as a whole gain access to the drawings? The artists of
Charlie Hebdo
believe that not all Muslims are intolerant of a cheeky sense of humor. What twisted theory makes humor less compatible with Islam than with any other religion? Asserting that Islam is not compatible with humor is as absurd as claiming that Islam is not compatible with democracy or secular governance.

If we suggest that it is okay to make fun of everything except certain aspects of Islam because Muslims are much more sensitive than the rest of the population, isn’t that discrimination? Shouldn’t we treat the second-largest religion of the world, the purported second religion in France, exactly as we treat the first? It’s time to put an end to the revolting paternalism of the white, middle-class, “leftist” intellectual trying to coexist with these “poor, subliterate wretches.” “
I’m
educated; obviously I get that
Charlie Hebdo
is a humor newspaper because, first, I’m very intelligent, and second, it’s my culture. But you—well, you haven’t quite mastered nuanced thinking yet, so I’ll express my solidarity by fulminating against Islamophobic cartoons and pretending not to understand them. I will lower myself to your level to show you that I like you. And if I need to convert to Islam to get even closer to you, I’ll do it!” These pathetic demagogues just have a ravenous need for recognition and a formidable domination fantasy to fulfill.