Slashdot Mirror
Publications Divided On Self-Censorship After Terrorist Attack
New submitter wmofr writes: Major U.S. and British publications refused to publish related satirical cartoons, at least those about the "prophet", after the terrorist attack in Charlie Hebdo's office, which had 12 people killed. An editor of the Independent said:"But the fact is as an editor you have got to balance principle with pragmatism, and I felt yesterday evening a few different conflicting principles: I felt a duty to readers; a duty to the dead; I felt a duty to journalism – and I also felt a duty to my staff. I think it would have been too much of a risk to unilaterally decide in Britain to be the only newspaper that went ahead and published so in a sense it is true one has self-censored in a way I feel very uncomfortable with. It's an incredibly difficult decision to make." But still many media organizations bravely publishing those cartoons, declining self-censorship.
Charlie Hebdo's surviving staff say the magazine will publish again next week, saying, "stupidity will not win." Meanwhile, cartoonists around the world have published strips in response to the attack. The Onion has a poignant take as well. With regard to the attackers, one suspect turned himself in to police, and the other two remain at large.
When these incidents occur, burn 10,000 Korans for every innocent person murdered. Covered in bacon grease.
I think it would have been too much of a risk to unilaterally decide in Britain to be the only newspaper that went ahead and published
Then don't. Call them up, sure you're competitors but at least some feel just like you. And if you manage to enlist some, more might join you. Accept conditionals if you have to like "If at least five national newspapers publish we will too" until you have five. Or you were the only one, in which case journalism is already pretty boned.
Live today, because you never know what tomorrow brings
If you're a profiteering advert monetizing clickbait pandering mainstream outlet with a mandate to deliver ROI on content and ensure channel marketing buy-in consistently realizes revenue, then please work to censor all 11 forbidden media words as well as any overt references to political, social, or religious figures that may impact quarterly earnings, subscribership, and total time of view. Also take note that wearable technology is fashionable this year.
if on the other hand you're an actual newspaper, journalist, podcaster, or god forbid television news programme that works to inform viewers objectively and spark meaningful discussion of current events be they political, social, or religious regardless of their tie-in ability to a product or service, please accept my sincere condolences as this type of response has always been a threat to your work. now that someone has actualized it, the real question is, are your convictions still genuine when tested?
Good people go to bed earlier.
It's hard to tell what the terrorists actually want to achieve.
Maybe they want to stop the publication of these kinds of pictures, like they claim, in which case refusing to print them means they win.
Maybe they want to cause outrage, hate against Muslims (including peaceful non-radical ones) and more publicity for the caricatures, so they have an easier time convincing other Muslims that the world is against them and it's time to fight back.
If you remain silent, because of fear, they have already won.
Fear = Fight or Flight. I pity those that choose flight, but we should let them leave. However, we shouldn't let those cowering in fear dictate our response, simply because their choice is borderline irrational. Neither should we allow the kneejerk response from the "fight" crowd.
Here is my view:
1) Islam, is not a peaceful religion. There is no major Muslim outcry over any of the acts committed by Muslims. I didn't say there was none, I said there was no major outcry.
2) Islam, does take offense at things that Western Culture deems acceptable for the purposes of liberty, even tasteless crude humor. Muslims in general haven not expressed any desire to curb their rhetoric.
3) Islam doesn't teach co-existence, it teaches domination.
Therefore, for these reasons (and more) I have concluded that as it stands right now, Islam is not compatible with Western culture. Flat out not possible. I have NO problem with Muslims staying and living in their own countries, where they can fight and have all the intolerance they want. However, people who want to come to western countries, and still be Muslim, need to realize that their cultural antics will not be accepted at all, as they are contrary to western culture.
Western cultures do no need Islam. We don't want Islam. We don't like Islam. Muslims need to go back the their asswipe countries in the desert and stay there.
Agent K: A *person* is smart. People are dumb, stupid, panicky animals, and you know it.
Yes.
Just because you haven't seen them does not mean that they haven't happened. Have you gone looking for them? The media usually skips them because blood gets more views.
There are at least a million Muslims living in the USofA. The majority seem to be okay with it.
What you claim Islam teaches and how a million Muslims live, every day, in the USofA ... well there seems to be a disconnect there.
I've heard the same rhetoric about blacks. And Hispanics. It's easy to hate someone you've never met.
But then, I live in Seattle and there are two halal markets within a mile of me.
I know it's really easy to just lambast the publishers as cowards for refusing to publish the cartoons (as you post anonymously or semi-anonymously on slashdot, you brave soul), but it's not an easy choice to make. It's been clearly demonstrated that by publishing mohammed cartoons, there's a non-zero chance that some nut-job will break into your building and murder a bunch of your staff. Are you as an editor willing to take that chance? Are you willing to put your staff at risk, even for a minimal chance of violence against your station? It's sooooo easy to criticize them for not publishing offensive cartoon, but I really doubt that the majority of you would post a crude drawing of mohammed on your facebook accounts, or drop off a few thousand copies of an offensive cartoon in your neighborhood mailboxes (with your personal address listed). Because then you're truly willing to take the same upon the same risk that these cartoonists (and their publishers) take.
From a litigation standpoint alone, is it worth publishing an offensive cartoon? Probably not if you're in a litigious friendly nation. If you're the editor, and if some shit goes down, and there's the slightest possibility your organization could be held liable for the deaths of your staff because you totally *knew* this could happen, and could have avoided it by not publishing the offensive article - you bet your ass they'll get sued by the families of the victims. That risk probably isn't worth whatever benefit they get for being more ballsy in the eyes of the viewer. The editors know this and factor this in their decision making.
Whether to publish or not is more of a Prisoner's dilemma than it is Streisand effect as mentioned elsewhere in the comments here, except with more than 2 "prisoners" (publishers - assume not publishing is equivalent to testifying in the analogy). The better move for yourself is to not publish and have no risk. But the better move for the collective is to publish. If all the publishers decided to publish, that would be the greatest overall benefit for freedom of speech, because it demonstrates they're not afraid of terrorism. It also minimizes the risk for each publisher, because terrorists don't have the resources to target all of the publishers in existence. They might even give up completely, realizing there's too many people offending their religion. But if nobody publishes cartoons out of fear, it reinforces the idea that threats of violence work (and the censored SouthPark scene in the "I learned something today" segment is true). If only handful of publishers decide to publish offensive mohammed cartoons, then it still reinforces the idea that threats of violence work (because most publishers aren't doing it, clearly because they're afraid of terrorism), AND it puts these few publishers at a much greater risk of terrorism. It fucking sucks, but the only way this is going to work is if a large majority of publishers decide to print these cartoons as a response.
Global warming and other natural disasters are a direct effect of the shrinking number of pirates - Gospel of the FSM
Me and my boss at lunch today:
Me: "They should have had that building way better secured, especially after being firebombed."
Boss: "What would you do to secure it?"
Me: "Armored building like a US embassy, armed guards at the door, and a heavy armored door between the lobby and work area."
Boss: "What if they hit it with a rocket launcher? It'll go through even an armored door."
Me: "Maybe build it in a basement?"
Boss: "Or you could just not print Mohammed cartoons."
And that's what any business is going to do, the much cheaper and easier solution. The terrorists won. No business could print such things after yesterday.
"When information is power, privacy is freedom" - Jah-Wren Ryel
No, we need to "Edit" the religion, and stamp out the practices we find incompatible with our culture. Just as was done with Christianity (stoning adulterers and witches, killing homosexuals etc)
Israel, where the Jews lived 2000 years ago (along with a bunch of other people), where various people including some Jews lived for the following 2000 years, and which was then taken by force, from the people who had been living there continuously for generations, by the British and friends, and given to people mostly born in Europe who may have been extremely distant descendants of the Jews who had lived there those 2000 years before, as a way of assuaging their own guilt over not stopping Nazi assholes.
Oh, and by the way, the Jews' folk history says that they originally took that same land from its prior inhabitants in a genocidal invasion. I don't know if that's true, but since that's how people usually get land, I'm inclined to believe it. So if we can find the descendants of the Philistines or the Midianites or whoever, can we give the land back to them? I honestly don't know who they'd be, but I wouldn't be surprised to learn that some of them were among the people displaced to create Israel...
Israel is there now, and it would be a stupid mistake to ignore that or try to undo it. What's done is done, and 60 years makes Israel as legitimate as any other state. That doesn't change the fact that it was another stupid mistake to create Israel in the first place, and, yes, that mistake was absolutely an imperialistic and racist one.
States based on ethnicity or religion are a bad idea anyway, no matter how popular they may be.
Oh, and to avoid being called an "islamofascist", I'd like to point out that Muhammed was a pedophilic warlord cult leader. Actually not a bad guy as pedophilic warlord cult leaders go, but a pedophilic warlord cult leader nonetheless. And obviously he was not inspired by any real sky fairy. Not that any of that is relevant to anything going on this century. In independent news, the most visible carriers of the banner of Islam right now are fanatical tribal assholes who can't handle the real world, are trying to hide from it using religion, and would make any bad thing Israel has ever done look like naughty toddler games if they got any real power.
The problem is, modern Western society is built on the idea that anything can be questioned, and that includes outright ridicule. Furthermore, we didn't just wake up one day and decide it might be fun; rather, we went through Dark Age after Dark Age trying to keep our holy cows untouchable. It didn't work. Every single time it brought nothing but shame on those who did it, misery and death on everyone else, and rot for the whole society. So this is the one thing we can't do.
If Islam cannot abide depicting Mohammed, then Islam is not compatible with Western civilization. You can ignore those saying things you don't like; you can condemn them to the deepest pit of Hell and glorify in their coming torture; but the second you actually take up arms to silence them you've crossed a line. If the price of peace with Islam is self-censorship, then there can be no peace because that's the one price that West can't pay.
Of course, it could well be that Muslims can't give up this point either. I'm not a religious scholar, so I can't say. But if it's true, then we - Muslims and non-Muslims alike - should begin negotiations on how to separate Islam from the West peacefully ASAP, seeing how the alternative is open war.
Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.