Free Speech

xkcd's toon explaining, in 6 panels, what free speech really means resonates when it comes to Charlie Hebdo and it's right to offend everybody without having to worry about someone getting murdered for doing so, something people are beginning to understand as we move further into this already violent new year.  

People are starting to realize this, as seen in the many marches and shows of solidarity all over the West, and in the declarations by some Muslims that the right of satire should also apply to Islam. A new poll by YouGuv found that 63 percent of Americans believe that it’s more important to protect free speech than to “protect the dignity of sincerely held religious beliefs,” while only 19 percent held the reverse view.

As Salman Rushdie, who has suffered for decades from the deadly censorship of radical Islam, once said, “Nobody has the right to not be offended.” 

Any questions?

Moliere, if he was alive, would love the explanation of what this cover means
as per Luz, the artist who drew it.

I had this idea that I was stuck on: to draw my caricature of Mohammed, the one that had started all the chatter. And to do him holding a “Je Suis Charlie” sign. It made me laugh. It was my last-ditch effort. So I drew my little drawing, and I looked at his face, and it made me laugh. I saw this character who had been used in spite of himself by nut jobs who set shit on fire, by terrorists. Humorless assholes: That’s what these terrorists are. Of course everything is forgiven, my man Mohammed. We can overcome, because I managed to draw you. I showed my drawing to Richard Malka, then to Gérard Biard, and then we cried. Because we had it, a cover that looked like us, and that didn’t look like everyone else or like the symbols that have been imposed on us over the last few days. Not a cover with bullet holes, but just a cover that makes us laugh. - Luz

Moliere - More relevant then ever.