Is there room for empathy in the context of free speech?

With privilege comes responsibility

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On January 7, two gunmen (later identified as Muslim extremists) entered the offices of satirical Paris magazine Charlie Hebdo and opened fire, killing 12 people, allegedly over offence caused by illustrations of the prophet Muhammad.

Muslim leader and teacher Yahya Adel Ibrahim posted the following on his Facebook page on Jan. 12:

“As it is clear that the cartoons are to be published again, Muslims will inevitably be hurt and angered, but our reaction must be a reflection of the teachings of the one we love & are angered for.”

The post was intended as a guideline for Muslims on how to react to Charlie Hebdo’s decision to print additional images of Muhammad. It received over 2,000 shares and 3,000 likes.

Seeing this post and the responses made me realize something that, while in theory I understand, I for some reason ignored in light of the Paris shootings:  there is more than free speech at stake here.

Imagine for a moment your upbringing on the Canadian prairies - a place populated by small farm towns and hundreds of churches, where some of us may have been dragged to Sunday school and many of us left at the first chance we had. Religion is an element in many of our childhoods, and it’s up to us to choose how to utilize that upbringing in our day-to-day lives. 

The majority of faith in central Canada is some branch of Christianity, and most of us are familiar with images of Jesus. Unlike in Islam, there are no laws, religious or otherwise, banning the portrayal of Jesus, and characters based on him make regular appearances on satirical TV shows like Family Guy and South Park.

But imagine seeing images of Jesus that aren’t attempting to get you to laugh along. Imagine your reaction and the reactions of those you know to portrayals that are indisputably malicious, in a way that isn’t just pushing the boundaries, but crossing them ferociously.

Regardless of whether you are religious now, something bigger than your current faith or lack thereof would be under attack: mornings spent in dusty rooms learning about the Bible, and lunches at your grandmother’s house, a place liberally decorated with crosses. Something deeper and more human would be violated than your beliefs about religion or faith.

 The point, of course, is not that anything exists to justify the acts of terrorism that Paris saw that day. It’s more that when it comes to freedom of speech, we seem to forget that those on the receiving end of our opinions are not just a large, abstract other. They’re comprised of the same small, complex, kind of people we are.

 Charlie Hebdo’s decision to print more images of Muhammad is, as some have said, not surprising. Demand for the magazine has caused it to go from printing its regular 60 thousand copies to three million, and the world is watching what this satirical magazine is saying in its newly political position. So maybe the example being set is, after all, the wrong one.

 Having the right to dispraise whatever we want is part of what we are allowed to do as freely acting people. Does Charlie Hebdo printing more of the same images that set off the tragic events in Paris make them come off as less righteous and more like the obnoxious kid on the playground that doesn’t know when to stop? Does having freedom of speech cancel out our responsibility to be empathetic citizens of the world? It shouldn’t.

Published in Volume 69, Number 17 of The Uniter (January 21, 2015)

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