Comedian Shappi Khorsandi, the host of this year’s Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression Awards, understands the effects of censorship first hand.
Her father, Iranian writer and comic Hadi Khorsandi, was forced to flee to Britain in 1979 with his family, including a young Shappi, following the Iranian revolution and his criticism of the new regime. Even in the UK, Khorsandi continued to receive death threats.
“During the 1979 revolution against the Shah, there were crowds calling for my father’s execution because of his satirical writings. The only way to stay in Iran was to toe the party line. He chose exile, a profound experience for a writer,” Khorsandi says.
Khorsandi speaks movingly of the effects of exile on writers, saying: “They have to leave their home country to be able to express themselves freely in their native language. Censorship was a huge thing in my family.”
Once in Britain, Hadi Khorsandi continued writing and also published a satirical newspaper: “Because of this there was a plot to assassinate him in 1984,” says his daughter.
Many of those shortlisted for this year’s freedom of expression awards have experienced similar attempts to silence them. Lirio Abbate, an Italian journalist who faces constant threat of attack because of his investigations into the mafia, has 24-hour police protection. Others, like Angolan journalist Rafael Marques de Morais, Moroccan rapper El Haqed, or Ecuadorian cartoonist Bonil, are repeatedly threatened with jail for challenging powerful government and business interests.
Index on Censorship magazine featured Hadi Khorsandi’s work in two of its 1986 issues, describing his humour as “aimed at the follies and absurdities of the present Iranian regime and giving the reader a vivid picture of life in a country where ideology and zeal have been allowed to reign unchecked.” The October issue in which Hadi Khorsandi’s work features also includes an essay by Nobel Prize-winning author Gabriel Garcia Marquez.
“I’ve known about Index on Censorship for years – there were always Index logos in our house because of my father’s work,” says Khorsandi. “It’s quite an honour to have been asked to host the awards, one I accept on my father’s behalf.”
The 15th Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression Awards were held on March 18 at the Barbican, London.
What is the solution to the Muslim Problem? Britain has tried multiculturalism; the French, a stricter enforcement of secularism. Neither has been an unequivocal success.
I’m afraid I don’t have the answer. I have only doubts and questions, whereas the terrorists have certainties and guns.
The only thing I can say with a fair amount of confidence is that the right not to be offended is a ridiculous thing. For there is no way to measure a subjective, emotional state other than to ask “Does this offend you?” in the same way you would ask “Are you tired?”, “Are you hungry?”, “Do you love me?”
One person’s silly cartoon is another person’s existential threat. Try as I might, I cannot get offended by a drawing. Maybe I’m a bad Muslim, maybe a true believer would be so mortally wounded by an image, any image, of the Prophet Mohammed that the only remedy is bloodshed. But I don’t think that’s the case. Much of the outrage is manufactured, stoked up by rabble-rousers for political purposes. Because that’s the brilliance of the right not to be offended (Irony — just to be crystal- clear): you can get offended on other people’s behalf, you can get offended about books you haven’t read, about things that may or may not exist.
Loath as I am to bring up scripture in a discussion about religion, the Islamic prohibition against making graven images of the Prophet Mohammed only really applies to Muslims. It stems from the same commandment not to worship false idols, intended to protect against idolatry.
As far as I’m aware neither Stephane Charbonnier nor any of his leading cartoonists at Charlie Hebdo was a practising Muslim. The two victims believed to be Muslims, copy-editor Mustapha Ourad and policeman Ahmed Merabet, appear to have been collateral damage rather than targets.
So, just to make the murders even more pointless, you have Muslims killing non-Muslims for not sufficiently respecting something which they don’t believe in. Irony? I’m not sure.
Not that there is any justification. It is a shabby excuse for a heinous act, convenient religious cover for something that is probably nothing more than a twisted marketing stunt for al Qaeda in Yemen, if initial accounts prove to be true. The killings were not carried out to “avenge” the Prophet’s honour. Their real intent was to remind the West: “We’re still here”.
Many lofty and true words will be written about the need to protect the freedom of expression. But the attack on Charlie Hebdo wasn’t an attack on freedom of expression. It was an attack on an easy target. A group of middle-aged, unarmed cartoonists were never going to be much of a match for battle-hardened jihadists brandishing Kalashnikovs.
Satire is scary for people who can’t live with doubt. Because satire is all about creating doubt, questioning the way things are done, challenging those in power, pushing for change. I don’t know if the killings say more about the power of satire or the weakness of the gunmen’s supposed faith.
The jihadists want us to accept their narrative, that they are brave holy warriors and not just some over-sensitive, bloodthirsty bullies. But I have my doubts. I think the terrorists continue to provoke fear because they’re afraid. Afraid that we’ll realise their brand of religion is a joke.
There’s a grand tradition of satire and mocking the great, the good and the very ordinary in Britain. From Swift’s Modest Proposal to Not the Nine O’Clock News, and from TV’s stunning Spitting Image to the magnificent everyday newspaper cartoons by masters such as Martin Rowson and The Independent’s own Dave Brown.
So as a nation that has grown up on a diet of cartoons and caricatures seen over our morning boiled eggs why should we worry about Banksy taking artistic aim at the current debate on immigration, and poking fun at it in a mural on a seaside town’s walls? Well we shouldn’t, of course, because we have grown up on that very same diet of mocking and magnifying debates using caustic comedy, and Banksy’s murals are just modern manifestations of that.
In his mural are some grey pigeons, carrying placards, and down there we have a colourful exotic bird, clearly one that has migrated here, possibly for the summer, and the grey ones are not keen. One of the grey birds holds a sign saying: “Go back to Africa” and another holds “Keep off our worms”.
Here, in the mural, are some of things people say about immigration on the streets of Clacton, and on the streets of other towns or cities. And what this mural is showing are some of those ordinary views. To me what it is suggesting is: “What next? Are we going to stop birds migrating here for the summer?” Anyway, whether you think it is funny or not, you surely can’t deny that it is magnifying some of the debates we are having about immigration in these past few months, and no doubt in the next six as we approach the general election, and locally in Clacton-on-Sea, in its upcoming by-election.
Swift suggested the Irish should eat their babies; Spitting Image had members of the cabinet spitting out vegetables. This is taking an idea or discussion that is in the public arena and magnifying it, sometime to outrageous proportions, to poke fun and to stir up debate over the cornflakes, and to make people think a bit harder.
Caricature has historically been able to point fingers, and make fun and spike discussion in ways that editorials in newspapers don’t reach; a sort of Heineken effect.
Tendring District Council has explained that it has a rapid reaction force on seafront graffiti, and when just one person complained and found the language racist, its anti-grafitti team was dispatched, agreed with that the language could be seen that way, and acted within “their remit” to get rid of it. Their spokesman said the team did not have to consult and no one knew this was a Banksy. Apparently it would be fine if Banksy wanted to come back and do something else though.
Sadly, all it takes one person to think something is racist, and we paint over a great bit of current commentary on intolerance, even though as lawyer Tamsin Allen outlines “political speech is given higher protection by the European court during an election period than at other times”. The British have a long and glorious history of satire and humour. And we should never feel the need to paint over things that challenge our views. Challenge and debate make us stronger, and we should grasp that freedom to debate as hard as we possibly can.
A version of this article was originally posted on 2 October on Independent Voices
SIR – The British sense of humour is famous around the world. Anyone who has watched Prime Minister’s Questions can see that even our MPs are funny – occasionally intentionally.
Satire is a vital tool for campaigning organisations to create debate, expose hypocrisy and change opinion. However, the importance of parody in public debate is not recognised in copyright law. This omission has led to the removal of material that is undoubtedly in the public interest – such as Greenpeace films taken down from YouTube.
Since 2005, two governments have run reviews on copyright, both of which said that there should be a copyright exception to allow parody.
We now have less than a week for the Government to commit to a vote. If it doesn’t, the opportunity to change the law may be postponed until after the next election. That isn’t funny. We call upon Vince Cable, the Business Secretary, and Lord Younger, the minister for intellectual property, to act now and ensure that an exception to copyright for parody is put into law.
Jenny Ricks
Director of Policy, ActionAid UK
Maureen Freely
President, English PEN
Kirsty Hughes
Chief Executive, Index on Censorship
John Sauven
Executive Director, Greenpeace UK
Thomas Hughes
Executive Director, ARTICLE 19
Ann Feltham
Parliamentary Co-ordinator, Campaign Against Arms Trade
Niall Cooper
Director, Church Action on Poverty
Simon Moss
Managing Director, Programs, Global Poverty Project
