Suddenly, everybody's Charlie

This post isn't about Malawi. Through the magic of the internet, I've been following the unfolding events in Paris - and the subsequent media comment - with mounting anger. My anger, perhaps surprisingly, isn't directed at the perpetrators of the Charlie Hebdo killings - there will always be those willing to kill in the name of some misheld belief, and there's not much more that can be said about that. My anger, is at the hypocrisy of the British establishment - the mass media, the MPs, the commentariat, and possibly you - which, after a decade or more mired in moral cowardice and ambiguity, has belatedly turned a volte-face and is now proclaiming that it too is Charlie.

I should preface this note by saying that I don't normally write like this anymore; that is to say, about issues that matter. In fact the last time I wrote anything of length about real issues was nearly five years ago, on a long forgotten blog which I hope nobody ever finds - mainly on account of the quality of the prose. In short, in the age of the internet, there's too much noise. Everyone has an opinion and, frankly, I prefer not to add to the racket. But I'll make an exception today because I'm angry, so please excuse me.

Today, everybody seems to be Charlie. My Facebook feed is full of people proclaiming their Charlie-ness; politicians are tripping over each other in their efforts to be the biggest Charlie; and hacks and columnists are penning lengthy screeds in an attempt to out-Charlie one another. Everyone - or almost everyone - is lining up to declare their unyielding support for the principle of being able to say or write - or draw - whatever the hell they want, regardless of how offensive that might be to some. And that's all well and good, but what really fucks me off is that no one wanted to be Charlie a week ago, or a year ago, or ten years ago. And that was when it mattered: when individuals and small, independent publications were risking - and losing - their lives and their liberty in defence of the freedom to say what they wanted without fear or favour.

It's not brave to be Charlie now. It was brave when those who published irreverent cartoons in the face of death threats - often realised - were criticised by the mainstream media and politicians for lacking judgement and damaging the fragile fabric of inter-faith relations. So it's irksome now to see so many people proclaim 'je suis Charlie' when they have been nothing of the sort. Not only have they not been Charlies, but they've actively discouraged those who would be and isolated those who are, and in doing so have contributed towards the climate of intolerance and appeasement that - I would argue - led to Wednesday's atrocity.

The best way to normalise a taboo is to repeat it, and repeat it again, until it becomes barely noticeable. If a word triggers a violent reaction, that word should be repeated ad infinitum until those it antagonises have got bored, and gone home, and realised that oppression is fruitless. For every journalist or filmmaker that is threatened with violence in response to their work, ten more should step forward to reprint and republish and redistribute. As well as being a moral imperative, there is a practical application to such proliferation; as the activist Ayaan Hirsi Ali has said, we need to 'spread the risk'.

It might be an uncomfortable truth, but it is a truth none the less, that it is not a small minority of Muslims who have an issue with freedom of expression. When it first published cartoons of the Prophet Muhammed in 2006, Charlie Hebdo was sued (unsuccessfully) by the Grand Mosque of Paris, the Muslim World League, and the Union of French Islamic Organisations - hardly fringe groups. And despite Wednesday's events, mainstream Muslim commentators - like Tariq Ramadan and Nesrine Malik, both writing in the Guardian this week - continue to warn media outlets against the publication of cartoons of the Prophet, on the grounds that they are offensive.

The painful irony is that the virulently left-wing, anti-racist Charlie Hebdo didn't print pictures of Muhammed because it had a free-floating urge to offend Muslims, but because it had a problem with exactly the sort of oppressive sentiments expressed by Ramadan and Malik, who would wish to impose the requirements of their own sensitivities onto those around them. Charlie Hebdo printed those pictures on a point of principle - the principle that nothing should be sacred, nothing should be beyond the pale; that the freedom to say what one wants without fear of violence is one of the most important freedoms we have. And that's a principle which should brook no challenge.

Maybe now we've got so many new Charlies, things will change. It's just a shame that more good people had to die to bring that about. Vive le crayon. Vive la liberté. Vive Charlie.

"It's hard being loved by jerks"