That this House notes with concern the sketch on the NBC Jay Leno Show where the most sacred Sikh shrine, the Golden Temple, was disrespected by Jay Leno when it was referred to as GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney’s summer home; expresses concern and regret that this depiction of the Golden Temple as a home of the rich shows a complete misunderstanding of the Sikh faith and is derogatory to Sikhs across the world; believes that these comments are not acceptable to all those who believe in respect for all religions; calls on Jay Leno and NBC to apologise to all Sikhs for this disrespectful depiction of the Golden Temple; and further calls on the Government to make representations to the US government that while recognising principles of freedom of speech there should be more understanding and respect shown to the Sikh faith.
Louise Mensch MP has a lot on her plate today. Not only will she be at the heart of one of the biggest news stories of the day — the interrogation of James Murdoch by the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee — she’s also had to find the time to get very, very offended by a comedian, even calling for him to be sacked.
The comedian in question is Brian Limond, known as Limmy (@DaftLimmy) on Twitter.
Limmy first found fame on the web with YouTube videos and podcasts, before getting a series on BBC Scotland (allegedly, the show was never transferred to UK-wide transmission as it was seen as too “parochial”. Anyone who’s ever sat through a Radio 4 comedy slot, seemingly created with only Home Counties Oxbridge graduates in mind, will know how absurd this is).
I should admit I’m a bit of a fan. As well as his brilliant sketches, Limmy is very funny on Twitter, veering between sincerity and absurdity, engaging with fans, creating running themes (such as his excellent bedtime stories) and sometimes plain trolling.
As I went to bed last night, Limmy had changed his avatar to a portrait of Stalin and was boasting of his hatred for Tories.
When I looked at Twitter this morning, Limmy was back to normal, but Louise Mensch was outraged. Limmy had apparently put up an avatar of former Tory PM Margaret Thatcher, with red lines across her throat and eyes and the words “DIE NOW” scrawled across the picture.
Mensch was shocked, apparently.
She didn’t appear to know who Limmy was, or how he operated, but she was still appalled by him, and tweeted that he should sacked (though she didn’t seem to know who he worked for).
She also (and this is where Index comes in) tweeted that Limmy’s joke had “nothing to do with free speech”.
This is wrong. Offensive jokes have absolutely everything to do with free speech. Things that some people may dislike are at the very core of any discussion of free speech. Otherwise free speech is entirely meaningless.
Mensch does have some previous on this type of thing, having supported the idea that social networks could be shut down during times of civil unrest.
So we have perhaps forming here the Menschevik* view: “Free speech is fine as long as nothing that I find disagreeable ever happens.”
I do not ask that Louise Mensch be a free speech zealot (that, literally, is my job). But I would hope that a UK parliamentarian would have a slightly better understanding of liberty.
Limmy, meanwhile, seems to have deleted the Thatcher tweets, though one senses that this his apology is just part of a game he’s quite enjoying.
*Apologies to any surviving Menshiviks. Louise Mensch is clearly more of a Bolshevik when it comes to people who disagree with her, but sometime one must go where the wordplay takes you.
The Charlie Hebdo bombing exposes a gulf in understanding between the secular French establishments and Muslim immigrants, says Myriam Francois-Cerrah
The firebombing of Charlie Hebdo offices following its decision to run an edition featuring the prophet Mohammed as “guest editor”, is a sad reflection of France’s uneasy relationship to Islam and religion more generally.Sadly, there are some who do not believe that Charlie Hebdo should have the right to publish a satirical issue, in which it presents Prophet Mohamed as the inspiration of the Arab revolutions and subsequent rise of islamist parties in the region (regardless of the accuracy of this link!). They are no doubt in a minority, just as those who committed this crime will no doubt be revealed to be a fringe group or renegade individuals.
But there is no denying the fact many Muslims are offended by the decision to run an issue entitled “Charia Hebdo”, with reference to “100 lashings if you don’t die of laughter” (chuckle) and a “halal aperitif” (ha!) and perhaps more pertinently, to run images of Prophet Mohammed.
Charlie Hebdo is renowned for being a highly satirical outlet which pushes the limits of public discourse on any given issue through its provocative illustrations and irreverent style. It has in its time, been accused of being anti-Semitic, anti-Catholic and now Islamophobic to boot and would no doubt parade these accusations as badges of honour.
However the recent issue comes at a complex time in France’s political life. The far right has made large advances, gaining 15 per cent of the vote in recent regional elections and they have maintained the “immigration question” near the top of the political agenda, drawing parallels between Muslims praying in the street and the Nazi occupation. Meanwhile, recent stats suggest that amongst the descendants of immigrants, 70 per cent, compared with 35 per cent amongst recent immigrants, consider that the French government does not respect them, including amongst those possessing university degrees and thus in theory, more “integrated” into the social fabric.
French Arabs face unemployment at a rate of 14 per cent compared with 9.2 per cent amongst people of French origin — even after adjusting for educational qualifications and are poorly represented at every level. Charlie Hebdo’s decision to poke fun at Islam, although completely inline with its treatment of other issues, comes at a time of intense polemics over the place of Islam within France, as debates over “laicite” galvanise the political spectrum.
Many Muslims appear to feel under siege in a political climate which continues to view Islam as an impediment to full adhesion to French national identity and where religious practise is associated with a social malaise. Indeed, a recent report by the French academic Gilles Kepel has reignited debate over the role Islam plays in the perpetuation of disenfranchisement in the suburbs, where Muslims are over-represented.
Some in France have sought to blame Islam for the high levels of unemployment, underachievement, violence and marginalisation in France’s ghettoised suburbs, while others have protested the Islamification of the discourse on the suburbs, decrying the use of confused and loaded terminology to overlook substantial economic and social problems in these areas. In France, with or without the caricatures, Islam is a sore topic with many recent polemics related to Islamic practises, whether the face veil debate, street prayers or the building of new mosques.
French Muslims are regularly told — even by the President — that you either “love France or you leave her”, reinforcing their status as outsiders, and a right-wing discourse which promotes ridiculous predictions of a Muslim take over of Europe through high birth rates and proselytising, is gaining ground. Christopher Caldwell, a contributor to the Financial Times recently published an inflammatory book Reflections on the Revolution In Europe: Immigration, Islam, and the West which has gained widespread media coverage, including on mainstream French TV, with its thesis that Europe is doomed in the face of a Islamic cultural invasion. In this context, marked by fear of Islam’s alleged resurgence, intractability and incompatibility with “French culture”, as well as the inability of many French Muslims to present an alternative perspective on an equal platform, are the seeds of profound social malaise.
Satire of religion has a long history in France and Christians are not exempt from what some groups have deemed insensitive and injurious portrayals of sacred persons or ideas. Since its launch on 20 October, Christian groups have regularly interrupted the Paris based theatrical production of “On the concept of the face of the son of God” (Sur le concept du visage du fils de Dieu) for its perceived blasphemy and “Christianophobia”.
The play features an elderly man defecating on stage and his son coming to clean his back side, using the portrait of Jesus. The excrement collected is then used at the end of the play by children as missiles to be thrown at the portrait of Christ, whilst at the end of the production, a black veil of excrement glides down the portrait of Jesus. In April this year, an art exhibit entitled Piss Christ, featuring a crucifix immersed in a glass containing blood and urine was vandalised by Christians outraged by the piece. Some religious groups have accused the arts and the media to resorting to crass provocations to raise the profile of otherwise mediocre artistic endeavours which might not have garnered public attention without the controversy.
Charlie Hebdo’s current confrontation with Islamic polemics is not its first. In 2008, it won a legal case against accusations of incitement to racial hatred when it chose to reprint the Danish cartoons, launched by the French Muslim Council (CFCM) and the Grand Mosque of Paris. Interviewed on recent events, Mohammed Moussaoui, president of the CFCM has both condemned the attack on Charlie Hebdo and the printing of the irreverent images.
Describing the decision to print images known to be offensive to Muslims as “hurtful” and questioning the association of the caricatures of Prophet Mohamed with events in Tunisia or Libya, he defended the right of those who opposed the decision to protest as well as the freedom of the press to print the said images and explained that in a plural society, people’s relationship to the sacred will necessarily vary.
The attack on the press outlet, Charlie Hebdo is symptomatic of the broader unease French society is facing in light of a growing visible Muslim minority. While successive generations of “French” origin are getting more secular in their outlook, with around 60 per cent of youths saying in 2008 that they had no religious belief, the pattern among the children of immigrants from north Africa, Sahel and Turkey is the opposite, as religion gains in importance, particularly among the young.
How France negotiates an inclusive public sphere in which the views of all its citizens, including those who abide by a religious tradition, are reflected remains a stark challenge. It is telling that Charlie Hebdo chose Mohammed as “guest editor”, rather than a contemporary figure who could express an accurate reflection of French Muslim opinion on current affairs — instead, it chose the route of ease, ascribing archaic and reactionary ideas to a sacred figure, his ideas rigidified and frozen in a literalist caricature, which although undoubtedly humorous in parts, is completely out of sync with how most Muslims understand Islam’s relationship to the modern context. This issue might be its best-selling; the real question though ought to be, is it its best?
Myram Francois-Cerrah is a writer, journalist and budding academic
There’s been a hell of a lot of discussion this week about Ricky Gervais and his use of the word “mong” on Twitter (mong being a shortened version of “mongoloid”, an archaic term for Down’s Syndrome).
I wont explain the whole thing, James Ward does it all here.
Gervais’s defence of his use of the word is that meanings change. Of course, this is true. But this is something that happens over time. Gervais can’t really force it. You can’t simply decide, by yourself, that a word that many people find offensive is not offensive and then get defensive when people point out you’ve been offensive. Which is what Gervais has done, variously blaming people who are jealous of his success (what, in the old days, we used to call “playa haters”) and the “humourless PC brigade” (I’ve always maintained that invoking the PC brigade is on a level with saying “I’m entitled to an opinion” as a tacit admission that one has lost the argument).
A problem with Gervais’s use of the word is he clearly does believe it is transgressive, and therefore funny. So his defence — that the usage doesn’t have transgressive aspects, as the meaning has changed, doesn’t add up.
And worst of all, it’s just not funny. Gervais has confused offensive (rarely in itself funny) with transgressive (a vital element of pretty much all humour).
None of this is to say that Gervais cannot use whatever the hell words he likes.
Here, as a lesson in transgressive, is Joan Rivers making Anne Frank jokes (fast forward to three minutes):
