French Journalists Murdered by Islamic Terrorists

There are definitely some non-Enlightenment opinions on the subject, but I'm not down with them, and neither is French or US law.

 

"i'm offended"

so what.

 

Right to be an ******* to a group of individuals who find a war mongering traveling merchant pedophile infallible.

Satire and harsh criticism is sometimes deserved regardless of how many individuals find the criticized individual infallible. It's their problem they find this "prophet" above reproach, Not ours. We have every right to make fun of a man who deserved every bit of it.

 

Feroz-- what you don't realize, or admit, is being extremely naive is that peace and harmony are not exclusive to islam. they can be taught by anyone. you are probably more detached from the core of your religion than the extremists. while there is nothing wrong with using common sense to live a life of morals and integrity, as most of us here do... please look into the life and actual words of Muhammed. You'll find he's much less prophet, much more genocidal zealot. be strong, learn to think for yourself, and you will break the chains of the spell that has been cast on you from birth. we all want peace and harmony, but sometimes you have to get out of your comfort zone to get it.

 

Oh, if you want to play that game, the God of the Old Testament was a very vengeful, angry God- and praised Joshua for murdering a bunch of people. I was forced to go to Catholic school for 8 years, and it didn't make sense to me then, and it still doesn't. I was the student who always got in trouble b/c I questioned things about the Bible. Go figure.

 

But Jesus wasn't, if the historical accounts are correct. He sounds more like a friendly peacenik and hippie. The bible, just like the Quran was written up by a bunch of storytellers. So what. I care about what is happening today, and Islamists murder lots of people in the name of Islam. I don't see this currently being done nearly to that extent in the name of the bible, but if it was, you bet I would be up in arms against it, too.

 

Any religion, especially one that claims to be the final and complete solution should rightly be subject to critique/criticism

 

Additionally, secular influence has brought about better treatment of women, homosexuals, the abolishment of slavery, the pope lifted the rediculous and ghastly ban on condoms to fight aids, in non-Muslim majority nations.

 

So it looks like the Islamist terrorists in this incident have been killed. No doubt that there will be more incidents like this happening soon, unfortunately.

 

That's what I would say. There is no right to not be offended. None. There is a freedom of speech which can include saying things that will offend someone.

So yes, that is accurate. But being offended doesn't make it okay to kill anyone no matter what some people believe their religion says.

 

I'm not so sure if it's that black and white today. Just as an example, FCC has some rules against indecent exposure. And I believe part of the reasoning for these rules is nudity and certain words is "offensive" with current community standard. So, we already live under rules that limit free speech based on "offensive" nature of it (and of course offensive here is subjective).

 

fair enough.

I will say that while acts may be deemed to be offensive and restricted, ideas generally aren't. And it seems like it's the ideas that terrorists are using as excuses to carry out their deeds.

 

Actually in the U.S., freedom of speech doesn't protect all forms of speech. Speech that incites violence or is part of a criminal act, for example, is not protected. Other speech such as commercial speech, obscene speech, or defamatory speech only receive partial protection (i.e. protection under certain conditions)

 

Two very sad reactions to the events that have transpired:

Algerian Islamists: 'Strike Jews' in celebration of Paris attack
Dozens attend Algiers rally celebrating deadly Jewish grocery store siege in which at least four were killed.

Islamists in Algeria shouted anti-Semitic slogans at a rally celebrating the slaying of 12 people in Paris.

Several dozen men participated in the rally that took place Wednesday outside a mosque in the Belouizidad district of Algiers, the news site tamurt.info reported Thursday.

They shouted “strike France and the Jews,” “Allah is the greatest” and “Charlie is dead.” French authorities suspect the Jan. 7 attack on the offices of the Charlie Hebdo weekly was carried out by Islamists who targeted the publication for its satirical cartoons lampooning Islam.

Elsewhere in Algiers, Islamists celebrated the deadly attack with a dance party on the street near the Djamaa Lihoud mosque, tamurt.info reported.

In France, Jewish groups called on their members to attend a vigil in Paris on Jan. 11 in memory of the people killed in the attack.

“All French citizens must stand united with Charlie Hebdo,” the Union of Jewish Students of France, or UEJF, wrote in its statement about the rally.

CRIF, the umbrella group of French Jewish communities, also called on its members to attend.

The two gunmen, caught on video outside the magazine’s offices, are the subject of a massive manhunt.

Following the killing, two cofounders of the Free Gaza Movement suggested the attack was carried out by the Israeli Mossad spy agency to malign Muslims.
Greta Berlin wrote on Facebook: “Mossad just hit the Paris offices of Charlie Hebdo in a clumsy false flag designed to damage the accord between Palestine and France,” the website honestreporting.com reported.

Another cofounder of the movement, Mary Hughes-Thompson, wrote on Twitter: “#Hebdo killings indefensible. Can’t help thinking #JSIL Mossad false flag though.”

CRIF and other Jewish organizations have criticized Charlie Hebdo in the past for publishing material deemed offensive to Muslims and Jews, including a front-page cartoon in 2012 that showed a haredi Orthodox Jew and a Muslim saying, “No mocking.”

In 2009, a French court acquitted a Charlie Hebdo cartoonist of incitement to hatred charges over a cartoon that suggested that the French former president Nicolas Sarkozy was converting to Judaism for financial reasons.

Citing the Sarkozy case, Wikileaks on Thursday said on its Twitter account that “the Jewish pro-censorship lobby legitimized attacks on Charlie Hebdo for ‘offensive’ speech.”

http://www.haaretz.com/news/world/1.636273

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Catholic League President Attacks Murdered Cartoonists: Charlie Hebdo ‘Perverts Freedom’

While journalists and free speech advocates across the country rally in support of free press following the murder of twelve French journalists at Charlie Hebdo this week, the leader of a U.S. Catholic group is blaming the satirical newspaper’s staff for “the kind of intolerance that provoked this violent reaction.”
In a blog post Wednesday and then a follow-up post Thursday, Catholic League President Bill Donohue said the cartoonists’ “obscene portrayal of religious figures” represents an “abuse of freedom” — missing the fact that the First Amendment to the Constitution in the U.S and a similar law in France both guarantee freedom of speech and of the press.
“Freedom of speech is not an end—it is a means to an end,” Donohue wrote on the Catholic League website. “For Americans, the end is nicely spelled out in the Preamble to the U.S. Constitution… No fair-minded reading of the Preamble suggests that it was written to facilitate the right to intentionally and persistently insult people of faith with scatological commentary.”
Donohue also specifically singles out the paper’s publisher Stephane Charbonnier, who was killed by the two shooters on Wednesday. “It is too bad that he didn’t understand the role he played in his tragic death,” Donohue said.
Dalil Boubakeur, head of the French Council of the Muslim faith, has called the attack a barbaric act against freedom of the press and French President Francois Hollande said on Twitter after the shootings that “No barbaric act will ever extinguish the freedom of the press.”
French law enforcement officials have identified and are searching for two suspects in connection with the mass shooting in which multiple masked gunmen entered the office and opened fire on the staff before escaping. The shooters reportedly yelled “Allahu Akhbar” (“God is greatest”) during the assault and “We have avenged the prophet” as they left the office.
Charlie Hebdo is know for frequently satirizing religious and political figures. The magazine’s latest cover, posted on Twitter right before the attack, took aim at Islam by depicting Abu Bakr Al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic militant group Islamic State (ISIS). The staff have been the target of violence and death threats in the past for publishing cartoons depicting the Prophet Muhammad, which is prohibited in Islam.

http://thinkprogress.org/world/2015/01/08/3609637/donohue-charlie-hebdo/

 

One thing that hasn't been pointed out enough yet is the role of the police officer of Muslim origin (I don't know if he was a practicing Muslim) who was brutally murdered on the street, Ahmed Merabet. He was a hero, standing up for what is right, and got killed in the line of duty.

Important to recognize that while I criticize the ideology of political Islam, I have nothing but admiration for Muslims like Ahmed Merabet.

Je suis Charlie.
Je suis Ahmed.

 

Two of those French terrorists were found guilty and convicted for terrorist activities, serving only three years. That just blows my mind. I've lived in Europe (France/Spain) and have traveled well through out and one thing that surprises me is the rather lenient sentences given to criminals. At least comparatively to the US. The Boston bombers friend is getting that much if not more and he just lied for his hommie.

 

When it comes to prison . . . .we are anything but lenient
Which is why we have the highest prison population in the world
We busy putting drug smokers in jail forever . . ..

Rocket River