The shortsighted Charlie Hebdo

We’ve all heard this narrative over and over again: Two shooters (accompanied by one driver/lookout) killed 12 members of the Charlie Hebdo editorial staff on Jan. 7. Within the week, millions of French citizens flooded the streets of Paris and other large cities. These crowds embraced the slogan “I am Charlie,” declaring themselves to be staunch supporters of freedom on speech.

However, this is the same Charlie Hebdo which had a previous incarnation as a magazine called Hara-Kiri:

QUOTE:

SOURCE:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Hebdo

Charlie Hebdo first appeared in 1970 as a successor to the Hara-Kiri magazine, which was banned for mocking the death of former French President Charles de Gaulle.[10]

:UNQUOTE.

How many among those millions of demonstrators found it acceptable to condemn Muslims killing 12 journalists, while finding it unacceptable for (virtually) that same magazine to mock the death of Charles DeGaulle? Both the killing and the mocking are instances of freedom of speech being exercised, right?

Looks like freedom of speech got sacrificed on the altar of Charles DeGaulle, a secular god of the Frankish people.

Charlie Hebdo’s staff had prior warning of Muslim sensitivities concerning the creation of images of their Prophet. That is, there was a firebombing of this magazine’s offices in 2011 for that same crime. As far as freedom of speech is concerned, hate speech and fighting words aren’t protected. At least in the United States of America, they’re not. Even common sense tells you, you cannot crawl into a bull fighting arena day after day and wave a red flag in front of the bull, and then complain when he finally charges at you.

Charlie Hebdo had always been a low-circulation magazine, not even among the top 25 in sales among French magazines. Now it can claim the largest-ever single print run in French history – having cranked out 7 million copies of its first post-massacre edition. And eager souvenir seekers the world over are snapping up all available copies.

If I was at a newsstand in Paris, looking at the front cover of this issue with a thought of purchasing same, I would have turned away empty-handed upon seeing the front page. That shows a cartoon image of the Prophet with a sad face and a single tear streaming down his face. He’s holding a sign that says, “I am Charlie,” and he’s below the headline that reads “All is forgiven.”

It seems Charlie Hebdo’s editors couldn’t resist waving that red flag in front of the bull one more time. It’s like they’re saying, “No one can tell us what to do.” Never mind that riots erupted throughout the Islamic world causing the deaths of several people. Never mind that Muslims would react badly to an infidel magazine putting words in the mouth of their Prophet, while showing him declaring himself to be Charlie Hebdo. Never mind the claim that “All is forgiven.”

I don’t think Charlie Hebdo could have succeeded more magnificently in insulting Muslims than it did by means of this cover – not even if they consciously tried doing so.

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Steven Searle, just another member of the

Samgha of the Lotus and

Former candidate for President of the USA (in 2008 & 2012)

Contact me at bpa_cinc@yahoo.com

The Smell of Bacon: An NYPD story

Introduction

Today, I offer you a short story I wrote recently, followed by my comments. But first, I offer some background for this story.


Background

My short story was inspired by the photo which the following link will connect you to. Which in turn was inspired by the ambush killing of two NYC police officers as they sat in their squad car in December, 2014:

http://www.usnews.com/dims4/USNEWS/a4bedca/2147483647/resize/652x%3E/quality/85/?url=%2Fcmsmedia%2Ff5%2Fa3%2Fd9088cf94263973dd602dfcea634%2F150108-police-editorial.jpg

The two officers in question were Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos, whose recent funerals were attended by thousands of police officers, many from police departments across the nation.


The story: The Smell of Bacon*


DATE:       Jan. 3, 2016
Location:   NYC
Event:        A funeral for a recently-slain NYC police officer

I remember reading about the huge turnout of police officers who attended two funerals about a year ago - for slain officers Wenjian Liu and Rafael Ramos. So when yet another officer was ambushed in that same city last week, I decided to join the mourners as they assembled in the street outside of the funeral home. I was never very comfortable among cops, so I decided to hang back at a distance and not immerse myself in the crowd.

I also remember how uncomfortable I felt when I saw photos of all those uniformed mourners packed so closely together. As fate would have it, my fears proved well-founded based on what happened when the crowd was at its peak. Two single-engine planes packed with explosives, flying low and coming from opposite directions, did a kamikaze on that crowd. Not long after, mortar rounds descended wreaking their predictable havoc.

That was well over a week ago. Death toll was in the hundreds - mostly uniforms. I had watched from a place spared by the attackers. It was awful - seeing all those scorched corpses and body parts. And watching a large number of officers trying to help the wounded. I also saw a fair number who ran away, thinking only of themselves - fearful of another possible assault. Something else as terrifying in its own way was wafting through the air - the unmistakable scent of fried bacon. Must be my imagination, I thought.

It didn't take long for the various police unions to start howling. Citing the precedent of the city's response to the Liu & Ramos killings, demands were issued. All of the dead NYPD officers:

• should have streets named after them;

• should be posthumously promoted to the highest, legally-permissible pay grade so their next-of-kin could be entitled to greater benefits.

Of course, the departments of the dead who weren't members of NYPD felt a ripple-effect of pressure for similar treatment.

I wonder if similar funerals in the future will be as well and vulnerably attended. But I don't have much time to wonder these days.  Ever since I hacked NSA's computers years ago, I knew I was on their shit list as a possibly dangerous non-conformist (they don't even call them "terrorists" anymore - how far we've come). So I went underground, which so far has proved good for me. But I feel sorry for the poor and minorities without influence or a place to hide. I heard that cops all over the nation unleashed their wrath, killing dozens and strong-arming untold thousands more. And grand juries routinely refused to indict any cops, even in cases where it was undeniable - undeniable except to such as the compliant and cowed members of these grand juries.

I cry and pray for the dead and those who felt they had to kill them - sometimes at the cost of their own lives.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

My comments

I posted this on Yahoo:


QUOTE:

B'OR is the kind of guy who would call the murdered police officers "heroes." Even though they were really two guys in the wrong place at the wrong time - who weren't in the midst of doing anything heroic. The H-word is hugely overworked. As for cops in general? I don't know about NYC, but in Chicago [my home town] they comprise the biggest street gang in town.

Anecdote:  When I was in my [late] 20's, I was jumped by a couple of thugs and ended up with a bloody face. They fled, then I saw a squad car waiting for a green light at a nearby intersection. I ran up and knocked on the window. Cop turned his head, saw what a wreck I was, then took a bite out of his donut and drove off when the light turned green. No, I don't have a lot of love for cops. As for you cop supporters, heaven help you if a cop thinks you're guilty of something.

:UNQUOTE.

• Someone posted a one-word reply to the above-quote: "fibber." Uh, huh. This poster undoubtedly doesn't live in Chicago. If he did, then he would know what most Chicagoans know - my experience was not an isolated one. On occasion, I encounter such posters on line who like to accuse folks like me as being "libruls." (sigh): I don't care if anyone disagrees with me, but I don't care for one-word respondents bent on showing off their stupidity.

• Hundreds of cops had turned their backs on their mayor since they felt he, in effect, encouraged anti-police demonstrators who had protested the recent death of Eric Garner at the hands of a police-officer using a choke-hold to subdue him. [NOTE: None of the other four officers, who had Eric pinned to the ground and heard him say "I can't breathe," bothered to try to break the choke-hold, or tell that cop to ease up. You will never hear of any such behavior.] Also, the number of arrests and parking tickets saw a precipitous drop over the last two weeks. Looks like these cops are being insubordinate. In the first case, if (for example) President Obama were to suffer such an episode (say) during a speech he were to offer to West Point graduates, they would be severely punished. But, no, cops get a pass, as they all-too-often do.

• Members of the NYPD are called New York's Finest. "Finest" what, I must ask? Are we to believe that even the worst-behaved of their corp are to be held in higher esteem than (say) a highly-effective medical doctor or school teacher?

• Then there's that TV show "Blue Bloods," which is a term used to indicate a person of noble birth. Excuse me? That smacks of hubris - for which there is karmic retribution (sooner or later).

• In cases where a cop is accused of killing a citizen, it's too much to hope a grand jury will ever indict.  Such jurymen are too easily cowed by a prosecutor who presents evidence - but perhaps not all of it nor with any conviction to indict. Instead, a special prosecutor (a neutral party from another state or from the federal DOJ) should handle such cases.

• The feds should randomly set up sting operations focused on local departments to see if cops are breaking the law.

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Steven Searle, just another member of the

Virtual Samgha of The Lotus Sutra and

a former candidate for US President (in 2008 and 2012)

Contact me at bpa_cinc@yahoo.com

Footnote: 

Bacon* - This is based on the habit of some to refer to police officers as pigs.

Charlie Hebdo: How soon we forget

The Algerian War of Independence lasted from 1954 to 1962. That was so long ago that most Americans don’t know much about it or that there ever was such a conflict. However, the two brothers (Saïd Kouachi and Chérif Kouachi), who killed 12 people in the attack on the Charlie Hebdo (satirical magazine) headquarters, remembered.

[I pause here to offer my prayers to these brothers, who were doing what they thought was right. They, in their early 30's, were too young to die.]

This source (Wikipedia) summarizes that war quite nicely and includes the following quote:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Algerian_War

QUOTE:

Historians, like Alistair Horne and Raymond Aron, state that the actual number of Algerian Muslim war dead was far greater than the original FLN and official French estimates… Horne estimated Algerian casualties during the span of eight years to be around 700,000. Uncounted thousands of Muslim civilians lost their lives in French Army ratissages, bombing raids, or vigilante reprisals. The war uprooted more than 2 million Algerians, who were forced to relocate in French camps or to flee into the Algerian hinterland, where many thousands died of starvation, disease, and exposure.

:UNQUOTE.

I don’t know about you, but I would be inclined to nurture a grudge against the French nation that was responsible for this genocide. It’s true that France has contributed greatly to the world’s culture. But these deaths and that war were definitely a black mark on their reputation.

I mean, France itself had been liberated from German occupation about 10 years prior to Algeria’s attempt to gain its independence. You would think the French would have been more sympathetic with the yearning for freedom felt by the Algerians.

“Freedom,” specifically the right to freedom of expression, is highly prized by the French and has been rallied around at recent demonstrations as something the French will rabidly defend against alien elements. I don’t know if French law bans the act of (falsely) yelling “Fire!” in a crowded theater or permits physical assaults against those guilty of using “fighting words.” But, setting that aside for a moment, those same demonstrators don’t think much of the right of Muslims in France to maintain their Islamic identity. A good example was the ban in 2011 against women wearing a burqa in public – a ban which was upheld in 2014 by the European Court of Human Rights.

Hey, no problem right? This only affects French Muslims, not real human beings.

As for tolerance, if someone among those demonstrators had hoisted a sign saying “Vive la Algeria,” the self-righteous (tolerant) crowd would have probably torn him to pieces. I guess the limits of tolerance depend on whose ox is being gored.

Concerning blasphemy against the Prophet

By now, and for some time, it’s clear that Muslims disapprove of “slandering the Prophet” or even lampooning him. Knowing this, I would suggest that writers and cartoonists stop doing so, keeping the “fighting words” doctrine in mind.

If anyone wants to question the tenets of the Islamic faith, that can be done respectfully by means of interfaith (or inter non-faith) dialogue. Even a fanatic can be approached if we take the time and trouble to find the right words to use. To reduce the level of fanaticism, I suggest that the French – and the Americans – simply stop waging war against Islamic countries. All that war-making will end up doing is creating more people who will nurture a decades’ long grudge – people like these two brothers. People who will strike back decades after the end of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

All I can hope for, is that the victims of such reprisals don’t knee-jerkingly ask, “Why me?” But they will ask, simply because they will have lost any clear memory of what we did to the attackers and why.

Of course, the Western powers won’t cease and desist their wars, simply because they wish to prevent the rise of a unified Caliphate. That’s what these wars are all about – the prevention of the rise of a new power center, especially one strong enough to resist Western exploitation of its resources.

In short? The rich and powerful don’t like competition, which is what a Caliphate would offer.

As for blasphemy, I sincerely hope that the Prophet (and his followers) would have a thick enough skin to ignore any slights. I can’t see killing someone for being disrespectful. Within the world of Buddhism, slandering the Buddha to his face (for example) for a million years would invite karmic retribution. But from what I’ve read, the Buddha would silently and calmly endure insults and pray for the enlightenment of the offender. And, as importantly, any of the Buddha’s followers who witnessed such blasphemy would not have attacked the offender.

Maybe that’s because they don’t have an ox that’s being gored, but because they know the offender has deep-seated issues that need to be overcome – and that takes time.

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Steven Searle, just another member of the

Virtual Samgha of The Lotus Sutra and

a former candidate for US President (in 2008 and 2012)

Contact me at bpa_cinc@yahoo.com