Je suis Charlie tragedy
 

I know I'm a bit late on this, but w/e.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-30710883

It's getting a bit out of hand, isn't it? Of course not all Muslims are bad, one of my good friends is Muslim, but Islam is fucking cancer.

I'm not even going to try and sugarcoat it. I'm too lazy to talk in-depth about this vile story so instead, here's a video that explains everything for me.

That topic title, boy you sure are one inane piece of garbage.

"I'm not racist, one of my friends is black, but those blacks are bad news!"

You realize one of the officers who was shot to death was a Muslim too right? This shit doesn't isolate itself to a group of people because they believe in their fucking spirit animal. Don't use it as an excuse to espouse racist, xenophobic nonsense. I'd rather see every socially impossible anemic shitturd who jerked off to a pony sent to reeducation centers than see 1.6 billion people grouped together and held responsible for the actions of Extremist assholes. You're so goddamn ignorant.

Oh, and here's some news articles outlining how Charles Hebdo was run by a bunch of racist, xenophobic, homophobic frenchmen who did not deserve to die and sure as hell don't deserve to be remembered as a bunch of satirical comic clowns. They were agitating fucking assholes.

Except that's completely and utterly nothing to do with what I was saying, was it? And if pointing out how disgusting and vile a religion and it's teachings are makes me a racist, I don't care. I have nothing against muslims, it's their religion I can't stand. (A religion that worships a murderous, rapey paedophile)
Don't make assumptions about me based on something that went completely over your dense head anyway.
Do some fucking research and then come back and re-read my post.

By virtue of using 'Muslims' in the topic title alone proves you're seeking to antagonize or genuinely belittle a whole group of people. You're not honestly telling me you're not talking about Big Bearded Ahmed when you talk about Muslims or Islam, are you? Because then I think you'd be lying. Claiming 'some are good, but most aren't!' makes you sound like a racist asshole. You drew the nasty little connections in your head, Nep. I just pointed it out. Why do people get so pissy when you point out they're ignorant? Because they're goddamn ignorant.

Oh, is the point of the topic to mourn Charlie Hebdo's loss of staff? Excuse me while I act like a gigantic asshole and don't. I feel really bad for the cops, though. And whoever the hostages who got blown away in the GIGN/Extremist asshole crossfire were, that fucking sucks.

It really, genuinely is. I've done the research on this big fat tragedy and found boy oh boy does the reporting like to blame Muslim clerics for keeping those rowdy ol' Extremists under control. I wouldn't have said it if your post hadn't come across as purely hateful.

What research? What could I possibly research? How not to be the king of tolerance?

"Some are good, but most aren't"
You understand that it ISN'T the minority, right? Have you read any part of the Quaran? Most Muslims follow it closer than Christians follow the Bible. This has absolutely zero to do with race, so you pulling out the "that's racist!" card falls completely flat. I knew somebody would, but I didn't think it would be you. There are legitimate arguments against what I said, and I'd be glad to argue my points against them, but seriously? You think this is to do with race?

I think it has everything to do with Islam and Muslims perceived as a lump sum IE: a race. I'm not talking about Islamic converts, and neither are you. What word should I use? Theolog-ist? Doesn't have the same sting, or accurately represent my point. It's the perception that this is an accurate representation of the majority of muslims that is really poisonous. Do your own research.
Oh, it really truly is the minority. Islamic history has quite a few takes on the subject, but the depiction of Muhammad (which is what I assume you're vaguely referring to) is really NBD amongst your average every day Muslim.
Backwater Wahibi assholes will throw a hissy fit about it though, and those are the diaspora your terrible conglomeration of Europe got dealt.I'd apologize for that but I'm not a Saudi or American businessman.
You know a good rule of thumb is 'If the majority of a billions-strong belief system/race are regarded as extremist scumbags, it's probably not the real mccoy.' You still haven't convinced me you're not ignorant to the essential ecclesiastical differences between different sects of the Muslim faith.

It's not the majority who are extremists, but it's the majority who support what the extremists are doing. At this point I'm just reiterating some of the points made in the video I posted so before replying to this you should probably give that a watch so we're on the same ground.

But-that's...you're just wrong , is all. Momma and Poppa muslim aren't sitting at home cooped around the TV pumping their fists and chanting Allah Ackbar at these violent people blowing away a bunch of (presumably bald, paunchy) cartoonists.

Okay, I'll give that my point is not to paint you as a Racist. I don't think you're racist, Nepsotic. I think you're simply misinformed or ignorant in a way I can't be nice about.
Let's talk about this video I'm going to force myself to watch because I already know The Amazing Atheist is a bloated, ignorant gasbag.
What evidence that the firebomb attack was carried out by Muslims is there? I'm referring to a 2011 attack on the Offices of Charlie Hebdo [pronounced Sharly Ébdo, not once by the amazing atheist]
'I don't call him the prophet Muhammad, I call him the scumfuck Muhammad'.
Yikes.
Okay, so from 4:20 onwards he starts talking about Islam as a whole. He quotes 'some polls' and jibes some line about Reza Aslan supporting statements from Muslim countries saying 'apostates should be put to death'. Where is his proof, Nepsotic? What the fuck is he talking about?
Here's Reza Aslan, by the way.

(He starts laying down the law around 1:45, stay tuned)
Note: I'm inclined to agree with him because he's handsome and he doesn't say "Scumfuck Muhammad"
'The west needs to stop allowing itself to persist in the fantasy that what we're dealing with is a few bad apples'.
This guy is fucking gross, and I stopped watching here.
I think that the perception that 'the majority who support what the extremists are doing' is an offensive idea of equally virulent measure. I don't think Nepsotic hates people for their skin color, everyone. I just think he listens to idiotic, ignorant shits like The Amazing Atheist.

He asserts that the Qur'an is full of messages to kill non muslims. This is true, but like similar passages in every other holy book ever written, they are a completely subjective reading falling into the pale territory between The direct word of Allah or The Followers and Muhammad (The distinction between the two, in broadest terms, is a big fucking deal in the worldwide Muslic community). More importantly: There are 1.6 Billion Muslims all over the world. At which point do they start adhering to those 102 violent edicts? Never, dipshit. Because most of today's Muslims exercise a personal choice to interpret their holy book's call to arms according to their own moral preconceptions about justifiable violence. Just like the vast majority of people alive today.
I don't see such a gigantic hubbub when some pale, maladjusted nerd fires down a dozen schoolchildren in Central America (The Canadian Central America, it has a Utah), so why exactly is Islam to blame Nepsotic? Explain to me why Islam is intrinsically murderous.

You didn't do any research. You watched that video and drew some perilous conclusions to say the least. The Qur'an is a complicated book, and even more of a snoozer than The Bible. I'm still picking my way through it, but I don't get an overall murderous vibe from the the whole dealie. It's more like 'donate to charity and tell other fuckers being Islamic rules the school, and also fast once a year, it sucks but y'know, god doesn't like you eating bologna any time 365 days a year Just deal with it. Our prayers sound awesome and your neck will be warm.'

Essentially, Islam is the Guns N' Roses of the Abrahamic religions. (Judaism is probably Electric Light Orchestra and Christianity is definitely Abba these days.) There's some violence there, and a hint of blathering mayhem, but it's mostly sunsets, hot babes and an all consuming love for Holy Allah Amen.

I'm going to change the topic of this thread to not be outright offensive and without reading his posts past the first one I'm going to give Nep the benefit of the doubt and assume he was trolling because nobody, not nobody, uses the 'I know a x' defense for their bigotry anymore.

When I'm not feeling so terrible this afternoon I will read it and probably make extremely long replies.

Mac I love you.

Mac holding down the fort for the liberals, brings a tear to my eye.

Except it's not really a case of liberalism really, it's just not being a cunt.


I despise Islam as a religion because of its modern day interpretation, I haven't read enough of the Koran to hold any strong opinion about its historical roots. With that being said, I absolutely think the rise of Islamophobia and the hatred spouted towards Muslims is disgusting. One can make a distinction between a Muslim and their faith after all. I do not think those illustrators deserved to die of course, but jesus christ where they racist fucks.

When I wake up I'll be sure to elaborate at some point but for now I'm happy to summarise as this:

> Islam bad
> Muslims good
> Charlie Hebdo racist
> Extremism bad

Hmmm. Not that I completely understand the views of these cartoonists, what they're actually trying to say with their cartoons and its relation to and anti-Islamic culture in France but I'm getting the impression that this article is perhaps jumping at Charlie Hebdo without really trying to understand what they're about.

I mean just a quick search about the context behind that Boko Haram cartoon (link here) there's some interesting commentary about the nature of Charlie Hebdo, it's cartoonists, French culture in relation to American on such issues...

I'll repost one argument here:

There's a lot more interesting comments about the nature of Charlie Hebdo, it's type of satire, and how it's possibly being misconstrued by people like Jacob. Even if any of you still disagree I think it's worth a look anyway.

Very true, charlie is about free speach more than anything else

I truly despise Islamic extremists, day after day I hear about more killing by their hand in the media, and I can hardly call it a propaganda, as there were actual cold-blooded murders there. It's also very hard not to generalize these acts to the whole Muslim nations, as we (or at least I) hear basically nothing good about them, basically all news are bad news. And I don't know anybody from their countries or believing in mentioned religion.

Therefore, I think Nep had basically no intention of being actually racist or anything, but rather made a mistake of not correctly nailing the group he despises. He was anti-religious (in terms of hating Islam faith), yes, but thinking of him as a racist is just a wrong interpretation of his words, not looking at the context of what he said.

Finally, I think Islam (religion) is, as every other religion which promotes violence or harmfully illogical actions, bad. Yet I don't have a grudge against Islam people unless they do harm to other people. Based on what I learned about their culture, though, I think it [their culture] favors brain-wash and extremist behavior, despite what Muslim/Islamic officials say in media.

Considering most people know better than to 1) draw racist caricatures and 2) shoot people to death, I'm not sure what my Thought For The Day is supposed to be.

This entire story is basically "Idiots act like idiots, get shot by other idiots responding idiotically to their idiocy; idiots rush to defend one set of idiots and condemn the other".

Just keep a level head and don't indulge in prejudice, I guess.

I think that all religion is scary as shit, and hope that one day it all goes away. Until then, we just have to deal with the crazy, fringe extremists when they pop up, and leave the ones who are just living their lives alone. Mac is right. Making it about an entire group of people just because some of those people are psychotic not only isn't fair, it doesn't help anything.

I refuse to believe you can even put drawing racist caricatures next to killing people. That's like I went for a OWF killing spree just because you're douchey cunts, and then some guy would say that it's as your fault as mine. And, in that case, it can't be further from true, as the fault would be mine in that case.

Don't be dumb.

We both think that perpetuating racist stereotypes is bad, and generally less harmful than killing a person.

Exactly how close or distant we consider those two brands of evil to be in severity sounds like a really boring argument.

And still your previous response gives an impression that it is not. Listen, I know you think that, and I know Nepsotic is not racist, yet somehow he is getting all the bashing instead of you folks (well, technically not anymore) doing the same thing in opposite direction. I don't really understand and approve of that situation.

It appears as a boring argument, but as I look at the topic it's not really focused on what it's supposed to be focused on.

It all reminds me of a situation when I got labeled as a hater for focusing on NnT flaws, rarely saying about it's pros. I did acknowledge it had really great things in it, as I said frequently, but decided to say more about its flaws because they disturbed me deeply.

I got bashed a lot then. Mac didn't, though he's doing the same thing now. Why?

I'm not sure if Varrok's post was directed at me, or if I was a speedy shit. I do not, in any way, believe that their cartoons warranted their death. I'm not interested in what that magazine did to get this response. The response is the problem.

I responded to MM. OANST, You were a speedy piece of shit. I have nothing against you except you being too speedy shit. On the other hand, I take some long time making a serious post sometimes.

No one is advocating violence, I'm simply making a statement on the fringe issue that Charlie Hebdo published a lot of what I think is truly hateful content and people should be aware of that before they start turning these guys into Martyrs.
The point is that hate speech in the name of freedom of expression is bad, violence as a response is much, much worse and the propagation of hateful ideas in general (including those taught by portions of the Islamic faith) is at the root of all this horror. That's what I'm saying. I am not saying what happened was warranted or just. I'm just saying that injustice can fall on the heads of bigots and it's up to everyone to prevent it both the bigotry and the violence.

I didn't get bashed because I put things in an entertaining and hopefully informative way.

I'm trying to read a bit about Charlie Hebdo, their views, and what the French particularly think of them and their satire. I'm getting the impression that calling them all "a bunch of racist, xenophobic, homophobic frenchmen" seems to be a surface level generalisation. They were certainly agitators. Anyone who depicts a picture of Muhammed is trying to give the middle finger to extremism, and perhaps (inadvertently or not) will be offending a lot of normal, law abiding, practicing Muslims, too.

But, even if I'm wrong, I think it's important to have a conversation on this type of satire. Particularly if one person thinks it's incredibly racist, homophobic, and xenophobic and another thinks it isn't - and not as a result of their own inane racism.

Also, Varrok, was I the one who called you a dirty Oddworld hater? It doesn't sound like me but who knows?

@Mac, We live in a free country*, and everybody has a right to be a douche or a hater. People have a right to be offended at that too, call that person an idiot, or ignore the things they say, but nobody has the right to be violent about it or physically or mentally abuse them or whatever (That said, I don't consider any form of satire as a real mental abuse, I meant, like, mental torture and stuff. It's just a gosh-darn comic strip, isn't it?). The murderers definitely crossed that line, big time.

Frankly, I think that's one of the reasons, but not everybody has that ability (of course I have it, as I'm obviously cool and liked by everybody kind of guy), or just decide to come totally serious. Nep's posts were clearly emotional, and he meant no harm. We shouldn't belittle his point just because he's saying it in a not-totally-mature way

*applies only to OWF users who live in a free country.

I think you're one of the few who gave me an impression that they think that.

I'll note right here that upon further research, the Homophobia label is ungrounded and incorrect. I'll fix my posts indicating such, but it was the impression I got from several of their cartoons.

I just can't look at it as good satire. I think I'm pretty intelligent when it comes to being satirical, its the one form of Comedy I've really stuck with and educated myself about, and Mohammed with his dick and balls hanging out with his butthole in the shape of a star and 'A star is born' captioned is a really inexplicably offensive image to me. And on its own its funny because of the ridiculousness of it--it's just that the everyday operations of Charlie Hebdo seemed to foster that image as an appropriate method of addressing and satirizing Muslims.
Not all, but definitely enough to get it published, of the staff at Charlie Hebdo must have harbored some pretty Xenophobic views that seem very extreme and inappropriate, in my opinion.

Here's an example of how the crew old white dudes at Charlie Hebdo let some anti semitism slip through the cracks a few years back.
Two things are important to note here:
A) They fired this guy, only after he refused to publish a retraction.
B) He had a history of making hateful statements about Judaism long before this. (From a 1982 Interview)
" 'Yes, I am anti-Semitic and I am not scared to admit it... I want all Jews to live in fear, unless they are pro-Palestinian. Let them die.' "

Charlie Hebdo seemed to act as a hugbox for confused men to espouse views like this. I don't think it was good satire, I think it was a lot of hate getting a free pass.

I'm inclined to state I don't believe it's just a comic strip, there's a little bit too much venom behind the images they published, a little bit too much politicizing an offensive depiction of Islam. You're free to disagree with me obviously, I just feel like much of what Charlie Hebdo published was seeking an audience of Nationalistic, or perhaps Xenophobic, people. What troubles me is that it wasn't exactly a niche rag, it reflects an attitude of what could be called Islamophobia in certain parts of the world.

I don't think Nep's at fault here, I just wanted an excuse to post my big fat opinions and he gave me one. I should also note I value being entertaining more than coming across as reasonable (if that wasn't obvious, get some eyeballs).
The worst thing I can say about Nepsotic in this situation is that he's misinformed, and that's kind of a good thing because it gave us an opportunity to show him why thinking that way can be to his detriment, I guess. If you feel like I was calling you out personally Nep, I apologize. My target was the gross generalizations made about Muslims done by people worldwide.

Well, didn't mean to. It would be ridiculous to call someone on OWF an Oddworld hater unless they were so bitterly disillusioned with all games, past and present, and wouldn't stop talking about how terrible the series is and how everyone sucks for liking it.

I've disagreed with you a bunch but it's just because I argue too much in general. Apologies. But stop being such a hater, seriously.

I did hear of the Charlie Hebdo guy who was fired from this interesting cartoon.



I mean from what little I've read about them I don't think whether their satire is good or not is terribly important. Certainly some of their images are very crude. That Muhammed one in particular, although very crude, I don't think can be described as racist. The newspaper certainly seem like a very anti-religion newspaper and perhaps there's a fine line between criticising religion and criticising religious people that gets blurry and, perhaps, tasteless.

Although, looking into the context of a that Boko Haram cartoon it seemed like pretty good satire. And the image of extremists beheading Muhammed himself was quite good too. Maybe it's the fact that caricatures, by their nature, exaggerate. That, when addressing Islamic extremism or the negative aspects of Islam the look of most of their leaders (turban and beard) becomes the go to image. But you'd see the same image addressing any other kind of group, really. It seems more like they're espousing the philosophy of "everyone's up for ridicule or no one is" that Trey Parker and Matt Stone often espouse in relation to South Park controversies.

Anyway, I'm not too informed or familiar with the paper to really make my own opinion. But I'm gravitating towards discussions trying to explain Charlie Hebdo in the wake of racist accusations.

EDIT: not sure how to resize images.
MOD EDIT: I did it for you.

I'm really on the same page.
The most specific terminology I could use for what bothers me about Charlie Hebdo is Anti-Islamic. I'm drawing my own conclusions by calling them racist, and perhaps that doesn't belong in this discussion, so I'll excuse myself from criticizing the mag any more or accusing them of being various 'ists'.
I'm going to repost part of something I just posted on STM's wall:
"If we could have this conversation without lumping Islam into the same category as Extremism and holding Liberal (more accurately: moderate) Muslim Clerics responsible for the actions of what I don't think qualify as their constituents or followers, this could purely be about the tragedy of a dozen people being gunned down in cold blood. But it was too quickly used as an excuse to condemn Islam across social media, and that's terrible."
Now, obviously no one has posted outright Anti-Muslim hatespeech on OWF. actually I might have at some point. Not sure, just putting the possibility out there.
And really the closest thing to was The Amazing Atheist's Amazing Ignorance, but there's a common thread I've seen (not exclusive to) but primarily from Western posters on various media making assumptions about Islam and Muslims as a whole that are simply incorrect, but worse are being corroborated by popular media.

I think honestly, this was always going to be an issue that went above mere murder. The moment we knew they were Muslims, the game changed.

We think the Paris terrorists were offended by Charlie Hebdo's satire. What if we're wrong?

Takeaway from the article: the solution isn’t to fiercely defend and produce more anti-Muslim/anti-Islam media.

If the Telegraph thinks that there is a difference between terrorism and Muslims, then where does that leave everyone else?

I'm not sure exactly what to make of this information, but as the world looks on in horror at the Charlie Hebdo killings, Boko Haram has just slaughtered up to 2,000 people in a few villages in Nigeria. They brought in trucks with motorcycles on them so that they could chase anyone who fled the village, and easily gun them down. For some reason, this is nowhere near as big of news as Charlie Hebdo. Maybe because we expect it to happen in Nigeria? I don't know.