Terrible dissent – for the record, “ethics” and “morality” aren’t synonyms for “religion”

The dissent by Justice Alito, joined by Thomas and Roberts, in Stormans v. Wiesman is disturbing for a number of reasons. It’s poorly argued, and simply wrong. The line drawn between this case and Church of Lukumi Babalu Aye v. Hialeah is based on truly weak reasoning. As Mark Joseph Stern suggests, the implications of the dissent are concerning: “If this unholy trinity ever managed to rewrite the First Amendment this way, they could effectively bar states from protecting women, gays, and other minorities from religious-based discrimination.”

Here’s the background:

Ralph’s Thriftway is a grocery store and pharmacy in Washington run by a religious family. It is not a church, or a church-affiliated nonprofit; it is a for-profit business, created and designed to make money for the Stormans. But the Stormans family are devout Christians who believe that Plan B is “tantamount to abortion” and thus refuse to stock it. For years, when customers came to the pharmacy seeking emergency contraception, the Stormans turned them away.

But in 2007, the Washington State Board of Pharmacy issued new regulations declaring that a pharmacy may not “refuse to deliver a drug or device to a patient because its owner objects to delivery on religious, moral, or other personal grounds.” Quite reasonably, the board felt Washington pharmacies should not be permitted to deny patients safe, legal drugs—which was a growing problem within the state: In addition to Plan B, religious pharmacists had refused to give patients diabetic syringes, insulin, HIV-related medications, and Valium. That, the board decided, was unacceptable. Pharmacists have every right to believe whatever they wish, but when those beliefs are manifested in the form of brazen discrimination against customers, they cannot be sanctioned by the law. In 2015, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals affirmed the constitutionality of Washington’s regulation.

The most shocking aspect of the dissent, in my view, was its complete conflation of ethics and morality with religion. (To be perfectly clear, when I’m discussing ethics and morality here I mean the spheres or categories.) The dissent’s argument is based on the assumption that these categories are essentially synonymous. Alito argues that the regulations and the ruling effectively discriminate against religion (and intentionally so) because they allow for “secular” exceptions in which a pharmacy doesn’t have to stock or dispense certain drugs or devices but expressly disallow religious ones. He repeats and highlights the words “moral” and “moral beliefs” throughout the dissent as though they supported his contention that “the regulations…are improperly designed to stamp out religious objectors” (p. 9):

As Steven Saxe, the Board’s executive director, explained at the time: “‘[T]he public, legislators and governor are telling us loud and clear that they expect the rule to protect the public from unwanted intervention based on the moral beliefs . . . of a pharmacist.’” Ibid. “‘[T]he moral issue IS the basis of the concern.’” Ibid. Saxe, a primary drafter of the regulations, recognized that the task was “‘to draft language to allow facilitating a referral for only these non-moral or non-religious reasons.’” Ibid. He suggested that making an express “‘statement that does not allow a pharmacist/pharmacy the right to refuse for moral or religious judgment’” might be a “‘clearer’” way to “‘leave intact the ability to decline to dispense . . . for most legitimate examples raised; clinical, fraud, business, skill, etc.’” Ibid. And in the end, that is what the Board did. While the regulations themselves do not expressly single out religiously motivated referrals, the Board’s guidance accompanying the regulations does: “The rule,” it warns, “does not allow a pharmacy to refer a patient to another pharmacy to avoid filling the prescription due to moral or ethical objections.” SER 1248 (emphasis added). (p. 4)

Note especially this last quote. The regulations, he acknowledges, don’t single out religious judgments, but disallow refusals based on “moral or ethical objections.” Here Alito is either trying to convince the reader that “moral or ethical” are equivalent to “religious” or expressing this as his own belief. Indeed, Alito states that “While requiring pharmacies to dispense all prescription medications for which there is demand, the regulations contain broad secular exceptions but none relating to religious or moral objections.” He quotes the District Court’s findings that “the rules exempt pharmacies and pharmacists from stocking and delivering lawfully prescribed drugs for an almost unlimited variety of secular reasons [sic], but fail to provide exemptions for reasons of conscience.” Secular here is set in opposition – both by Alito and by the District Court - not only to religious but to moral and to reasons of conscience.

This distinction between religious/moral/ethical and secular is of course absurd, and I assume thousands of Philosophy departments would have something say about it. Alito provides a few of the accepted “secular” reasons for exceptions to the regulations – related to financial or equipment-related issues, suspicions of fraud, nonpayment, and so forth. I don’t think anywhere in the dissent does he offer a single example of a non-religious objection that would be considered a matter of ethics, morality, or personal beliefs. I can provide one easily: I don’t believe psychiatric drugs (or at least the vast majority) should be dispensed to children. The evidence shows that the biopsychiatric diagnosis of children is quackery, the drugs themselves are often highly harmful and dangerous, and children aren’t able to give informed consent or to refuse. I see the psychiatric drugging of children as a form of abuse, if often an unintentional one.

So if I were a pharmacist, I think it would be unethical for me to dispense them for children. This judgment is based on evidence, and is in no way religious, but it certainly falls under the category of a moral or ethical objection or one based on my personal beliefs. And it would not be a justified exception to the Washington regulations. I could protest pharmacies that dispensed these drugs for children; I can fight for a general ban on their use on children; and, were I a pharmacist or owner of a pharmacy, I could resign or close up shop rather than dispense these drugs to children, as a form of civil disobedience that I would expect to have serious personal consequences. But what I would not expect is that my personal objections would be protected by law.

Moral or ethical refusals, those based on personal beliefs, are not constitutionally defensible justifications to refuse to stock or dispense legal and legally prescribed drugs or devices. This is true regardless of whether that moral objection is purely religious, not at all religious, or any combination thereof. In one sense, the invocation of religion by Alito (it probably needed to be mentioned explicitly in the regulations since the vast majority of, if not all, refusals – including that at issue in this case – were made explicitly on the basis of religious faith, and because religious judgments are often disingenuously claimed as medically or sociologically grounded) is a red herring. A business can’t refuse to provide a legal service on these grounds whether that refusal is religiously inspired or not.

But the staggering aspect of this dissent is its attempt to seamlessly join religion to ethics and morality as the basis for the argument that the regulations discriminate against religion and thus run afoul of the First Amendment. The irony is that the dissent itself raises First Amendment issues. That Supreme Court justices could present arguments so unsound is more than disappointing; the assumptions underlying their argument speak to a religious bias among these men that is itself arguably anti-constitutional. The inability or refusal of Supreme Court judges even to recognize the existence of secular ethics and their readiness to equate morality and religion are astonishing, and could amount to a state recognition of religion.

Quote of the day – Caroline Fourest, Judith Butler, and responsibility

“Yes, thank you very much Delphine to…giving me this opportunity to, to speak about this legendary newspaper of…who was already a legend before the seventh of January, before this drama. For the anti-racist left, I do belong to, it’s not only the newspaper that you know today [is] describe[d] as “Islamophobic” just because they, they dare mock fanatics from all religions, including Islamists. Charlie Hebdo is also mostly known in France as one of the most anti-racist newspapers.

…Between the ‘90s, all the movements against racism, like S.O.S. Racisme, who did fight the anti-Arab racism in France, took their cartoons from Charb, from Honoré, from…from people who are dead today. And not only dead - who are described as Islamophobic and racist after they are dead.

This is incredibly painful. You cannot imagine. It’s even…It’s like if they are dead twice, actually. When I have to explain it again and again, how much those guys were open-minded, were deeply anti-racist, and strongly, strongly open to every culture, and the most brilliant, talented, and funny guys I’ve ever known. And that people can [twist] their intentions, [twist] their cartoons, put them out of their context, to help the propaganda of the killers.

Because this is actually what these people are doing. And I really want to point that out. I really want to…to insist on that. It’s not only unprofessional, for example, as journalists to describe Charlie Hebdo as Islamophobic. It’s not only wrong and false. It is dangerous.

Because this word, “Islamophobia,” who is confusing the secularist intention, the fact that an atheist satirical newspaper wants to be able to laugh about fanatism – whatever it is, fanatics from Islam, fanatism from Judaism, or fanatism from Christianism – describing it as racist against Muslims by calling it Islamophobic is not only wrong and false, it is really, really dangerous. It is putting a target on the head of those journalists, on those cartoonists. It’s already killed those people. It’s maybe going to kill tomorrow the others who are being called Islamophobic still today.

And to answer your question: how is Charlie Hebdo today, how they are living today. They are living like prisoners. They are living in hell. Because they are all under police protection. Riss, the editor-in-chief of Charlie Hebdo, have been… You know that Charb have been really targeted by Al-Qaeda. Now it’s Riss who’s targeted today. And not only by terrorist groups – also by, for example, a Pakistani very famous politician who said he will pay for everyone who is going to kill Riss.

We are in that crazy situation today. And this is why it’s so important first to stop to call secularist, or atheist, or just, again, anti-racist but secularist cartoonists and journalists “Islamophobic,” when they are just…who they are, which is the opposite. It’s important to…even to stop to use that word, actually. If you want to, if you want to target the real racism, which do exist, and that Charlie Hebdo is denouncing, when it’s fighting against the National Front for example, but not only, then you should say…words or acts “anti-Muslims.” And at least it is clear – it’s not saying phobia against Islam but phobia against Muslims. And phobia against Muslims is really speaking about racism, which is something we all want to fight against.”

It happens, fortuitously, that just after I transcribed these remarks by Caroline Fourest from early in the recent Newseum panel discussion I read the chapter “The Charge of Anti-Semitism: Jews, Israel and the Risks of Public Critique” in Judith Butler’s 2004 Precarious Life: The Powers of Mourning and Violence.* (A shorter version of was printed in the London Review of Books where it can still be read: “No, it’s not anti-semitic.”)

The chapter responds to portrayals of criticisms of the Israeli state as anti-Semitic, taking as its starting point a 2002 comment by Lawrence Summers, then still president of Harvard: “Profoundly anti-Israel views are increasingly finding support in progressive intellectual communities. Serious and thoughtful people are advocating and taking actions that are anti-semitic in their effect if not their intent.”

Butler’s chapter is as relevant today, in a context of widespread censorious attacks on Palestinian rights activists and the BDS movement, as it was when it was first published. It’s worthwhile for its specific content. But it occurred to me that the response to Charlie Hebdo during the past year has in many ways been analogous to the portrayals and silencing tactics Butler discusses with regard to Israel, and that her arguments about our collective epistemic and political responsibility are also helpful in this context.

Summers’ remarks, Butler suggests, propose a few fundamental claims: first, the insinuation that criticisms of Israel are, or should be assumed to be, anti-Semitic in intent; second, that regardless of the critic’s intent the audience of these criticisms will hear them as anti-Semitic, such that the criticisms unavoidably help to foster and further anti-Semitism; third, that – again, whatever the alleged intentions of the critics themselves - such criticisms are so inherently and easily exploitable by anti-Semites that making them publicly is irresponsible and basically complicit with racism – “effectively” anti-Semitic. Butler contends, rightly, that these sorts of claims lead to a silencing of and self-censorship among those who would be critical of state violence, racism, and injustice. Anti-racists more than anyone fear being charged with racism or with stupidly or callously abetting racists.

She takes issue with the premise of these claims. With regard to intent, she offers:

[W]hereas Summers himself introduces a distinction between intentional and effective anti-Semitism, it would seem that effective anti-Semitism can be understood only by conjuring a seamless world of listeners and readers who take certain statements critical of Israel to be tacitly or overtly intended as anti-Semitic expression. The only way to understand effective anti-Semitism would be to presuppose intentional anti-Semitism. The effective anti-Semitism of any criticism of Israel will turn out to reside in the intention of the speaker as it is retrospectively attributed by the one who receives – listens to or reads – that criticism. The intention of a speech, then, does not belong to the one who speaks, but is attributed to that speaker later by the one who listens. The intention of the speech act is thus determined belatedly by the listener. (105-106; emphasis in original)

And despite making this distinction which ostensibly allows for a nonracist intent, as Butler points out, Summers himself, as listener, assumes, proffers, and models a reading of all criticisms of the state of Israel as anti-Semitic: “[N]ot only, it seems, will Summers regard such criticisms as anti-Semitic, but he is, by his example, and by the normative status of his utterance, recommending that others regard such utterances that way as well” (108). “His understanding of what constitutes anti-Semitic rhetoric,” she argues,

depends upon a very specific and very questionable reading of the field of reception for such speech. He seems, through his statement, to be describing a sociological condition under which speech acts occur and are interpreted, that is, describing the fact that we are living in a world where, for better or worse, criticisms of Israel are simply heard as anti-Semitic. He is, however, also speaking as one who is doing the hearing, and so modeling the very hearing he describes. (108)

In other words, he himself is priming the audience to hear these criticisms in precisely the way he’s arguing they’re inevitably heard. Regarding Summers’ depiction of the audience’s response – which assumes that the audience will naturally understand these criticisms as anti-Semitic or actively use them in promotion of anti-Semitism - Butler argues that “to claim that the only meaning that such criticism can have is to be taken up as negative comments about Jews is to attribute to that particular interpretation an enormous power to monopolize the field of reception for that criticism.” And of course such selective attention has the effect of promoting the interpretation favored by the Israeli government and the Right generally.

Of great importance here is what Butler goes on to argue about responsibility. Note that Summers’ argument places all of the responsibility on the critic of Israel (even for the intent attributed to her!) and, despite the powerful interpretive role he attributes to the audience, none whatsoever on them. You’re left with the impression that while these criticisms are so dangerous that would-be critics are best off refraining from voicing them publicly, potential hearers and interpreters are under no epistemic or political obligation to base their interpretations on facts or to challenge misrepresentations. This is a very convenient situation for those who seek to silence dissent.

As Butler sensibly offers: “According to Summers, there are some forms of anti-Semitism that are characterized retroactively by those who decide upon their status. This means that nothing should be said or done that will be taken to be anti-Semitic by others. But what if the others who are listening are wrong?” (110; emphasis added). It seems so plainly obvious that we have a responsibility to try our best not to be wrong, particularly in situations in which there are reputations and lives at stake, that it never ceases to amaze me how passive and irresponsible audiences are expected and encouraged to be.

Moreover, people in positions of power or influence, those putting forward interpretations for large audiences, have both a “negative” obligation not to promote misreadings and a “positive” one to educate actual and potential audiences. Butler doesn’t deny the very real potential for criticisms of Israel to be misread, misrepresented, or exploited, and argues that critics should be on guard for and seek to counteract such misuse. But that many people can and do misunderstand or misrepresent criticisms of Israel as anti-Semitic isn’t a fact of nature to which critics and other public speakers must resign themselves but a social and political problem everyone needs to address:

[E]ven if one did believe that criticisms of Israel are by and large heard as anti-Semitic (by Jews, by anti-Semites, by people who could be described as neither), it would then become the responsibility of all of us to change the conditions of reception so that the public might begin to learn a crucial political distinction between a criticism of Israel, on the one hand, and a hatred of Jews, on the other (106: emphasis added).

Arguments like Summers’ have deleterious consequences:

If the possibility of…exploitation serves as a reason to quell political dissent, then one has effectively given the domain of public discourse over to those who accept and perpetrate the view that anti-Semitism is authorized by criticisms of Israel, including those who seek to perpetuate anti-Semitism through such criticisms and those who seek to quell such criticisms for fear that they perpetuate anti-Semitism…. To remain silent for fear of anti-Semitic appropriation that one deems to be certain is to give up on the possibility of combating anti-Semitism by other means.

This week we’re in the midst of yet another wave of performative outrage and self-righteous denunciations of Charlie Hebdo’s “racist” cartoons. Article after article after article after article after article after article after article after article rushing to join the chorus of condemnation and rebuke and to offer stupidly earnest responses to so-called racist provocations.**

I have no idea what Butler’s views are on Charlie Hebdo. (Of course I also have no idea how knowledgeable she is on the subject and thus of what weight I would give her views.) But it seems to me that the response to the magazine over the past year strongly resembles the sorts of comments Butler is addressing and that her arguments are useful in understanding this phenomenon. We see the same claims of “effective racism” intermingled with insinuations of intentional racism, the same attribution of overwhelming power to a single interpretation, the same refusal to accept responsibility for making claims of racist intent, the same priming of audiences for attributions of racist intent or effect under the guise of mere sociological observation, and the same propensity to encourage self-censorship and hostility toward challenging voices.

I’ve argued for a long while, fairly fruitlessly it appears, for a recognition of our epistemic responsibilities in this context. I and others have repeatedly called on people to refrain from uncritically accepting superficial interpretations, to actively investigate Charlie Hebdo’s history and mission; its primary audience (the French anti-racist, atheist, and secularist Left); its primary targets (political figures and institutions, primarily the Right); the nature of its satire and the history of its form of humor in France; the fact that the cartoons are connected to pages and pages of text which informs their meaning;*** the powerful people and groups who have a strong interest in misrepresenting the magazine and alienating its potential supporters, and the way they’ve altered its cartoons and encouraged others to interpret them as racist; and so on. I’ve called on influential people to work themselves to make, and educate others about, crucial distinctions between satire of powerful people and institutions or mockery of ideologies on the one hand and racism on the other. I’ve asked that at the very least people appreciate their own level of ignorance before making consequential declarations and judgments.

But the journalists and opinionators involved in round after round of ignorant denunciations have willfully ignored any such requests and persisted in misrepresenting Charlie Hebdo and encouraging others to do the same. Maybe the most ironic and galling aspect of these boilerplate condemnations is their preening judgment of the alleged irresponsibility and callousness of the magazine’s cartoonists. These people, whose colleagues and friends have been massacred, work every day under immediate threat of violence and death. They live the responsibility for their actions and choices in the starkest possible terms. Their supposedly sensitive and responsible judges, on the other hand, can’t be bothered to investigate whether their public statements are true or false, whether they’re blithely destroying the reputations of murder victims, whether they’re being used by censorious and authoritarian forces, or whether they’re contributing to an environment of abandonment and hostility toward the magazine which increases the chances of further violence against them and others as well. That is as irresponsible and callous as I can imagine.

* A book which I recommend highly despite its significant flaws (rampant speciesism in particular).

** As usual, there have been a handful of dissenting voices, but far too few.

*** At the panel discussion in New York last spring, Gérard Biard joked that it sometimes felt like people thought that the magazine consisted entirely of cover cartoons; I’m starting to suspect that, with the addition of a few images plucked from inside pages (but often misrepresented as covers), this might actually be the case.

Recommended: “One Year After Charlie Hebdo” - panel discussion on the Charlie Hebdo attack and free expression

(with a bit of levity provided by Caroline Fourest’s cat, Henri)

(also available on C-SPAN)

Quotes of the day – Charb

“So long as the biggest jerk in the Taliban is unable to understand my art, I refuse to express myself – is that it?”

“Asserting that Islam is not compatible with humor is as absurd as claiming that Islam is not compatible with democracy or secular governance.”

“Forgive me, but the fact that racists may also be Islamophobic is essentially incidental. They are racists first, and merely use Islam to target their intended victim: the foreigner or person of foreign extraction. By taking only the racist’s Islamophobia into account, we minimize the danger of his [sic] racism.”

“While, unlike the existence of God, it is difficult to deny the existence of Marx, Lenin, or Georges Marchais, it is neither blasphemous, racist, nor communistophobic to cast doubt on the validity of their writings or their speech. In France, a religion is nothing more than a collection of texts, traditions, and customs that it is perfectly legitimate to criticize. Sticking a clown nose on Marx is no more offensive or scandalous than popping the same schnoz on Muhammad.”

“In protest against the decree of July 21, 2010, which outlawed the desecration of the French flag, and against the law of March 18, 2003, which outlawed any public affront to the national anthem or the tricolor flag, in January 2011 Charlie Hebdo called on the citizenry to rise up against censorship. We asked them to ridicule, destroy, or soil the symbol of the Republic. This was an invitation not to destroy anyone’s property, but to demonstrate that a secular republic may not decide for its citizens which symbols are sacred and which are not.”

“[O]n February 18, 2014, François Hollande visited the Grand Mosque of Paris to inaugurate a memorial honoring Muslim soldiers who died for France from 1914 to 1918.

…

It’s perfectly natural for Muslim leaders to pay homage to Muslims killed in the First World War. But it’s absurd for a President of the Republic to pay homage to Muslims ‘who died for France’. These natives – colonized and enslaved who, for the most part, were rounded up and enlisted by force – did not die for France in their capacity as Muslims. They died in their capacity as low-cost cannon fodder. And if they did die for France, it wasn’t by choice. They died because of France; they died defending a country that had stolen their own. Hollande honored them as heroes, but they were, above all, victims. Before them, German bullets; behind them, French bayonets. Among the native colonial casualties of the Great War who are purported to have been Muslims, it would be astonishing to find even one who fought to defend the values of Islam.

…

Let the Republic raise a monument to the colonial peoples it led to slaughter rather than dream up Muslim fighters who died for France!”

-Stéphane Charbonnier, Charlie Hebdo editor murdered a year ago today, from Open Letter: On Blasphemy, Islamophobia, and the True Enemies of Free Expression, completed days before the massacre

The Charlie Hebdo response

Here’s the newest cover:

Also, from cartoonist Joann Sfar on Instagram:

“The Bangladesh Blogger Murders” on BBC

BBC Our World is showing a report on the murders of atheist and secularist bloggers in Bangladesh. It describes the strong Bangladeshi secular traditions the courageous bloggers and others are determined to preserve and defend.

Our World: The Bangladesh Blogger Murders will be broadcast this weekend on BBC World News, at 11.30, 16.30 & 22.30 GMT on Saturday, 26th September and at 17.30 GMT on Sunday, 27th September.

I’ll post the video if/when it becomes available.

The existentialism of Between the World and Me

Ta-Nehisi Coates’s Between the World and Me (2015) is almost an existentialist manifesto. Here are a few quotes:

“Hate gives identity. The nigger, the fag, the bitch illuminate the border, illuminate what we ostensibly are not, illuminate the Dream of being white, of being a Man. We name the hated strangers and are thus confirmed in the tribe.”

“There is no them without you, and without the right to break you they must necessarily fall from the mountain, lose their divinity, and tumble out of the Dream. And then they would have to determine how to build their suburbs on something other than human bones, how to angle their jails toward something other than a human stockyard, how to erect a democracy independent of cannibalism.”

“I am convinced that the Dreamers, at least the Dreamers of today, would rather live white than live free. In the Dream they are Buck Rogers, Prince Aragorn, an entire race of Skywalkers. To awaken them is to reveal that they are an empire of humans, are built on the destruction of the body. It is to stain their nobility, to make them vulnerable, fallible, breakable humans.”

Coates’s Dream is Sartre’s and Beauvoir’s bad faith. It’s Baldwin’s innocence. And his vision of living and struggling authentically is an existentialist one. The book contributes to the long and great tradition of humanistic, atheistic political writing.

Good news!

No more Icelandic blasphemy law…,

and another huge march in Honduras.

Indecent: my position on (the response to) Charlie Hebdo

“Tignous and his from now on inseparable comrades. Journalists, cartoonists, economist, psychoanalyst, proofreader, guards—they were the sentinels, the watchmen, the lookouts even, who kept watch over democracy to make sure it didn’t fall asleep. Constantly, relentlessly denouncing intolerance, discrimination, simplification. Uncompromising. Armed only with their intelligence, with their sharp eyes, with this art of making it possible to see. Armed with only their pencils. Inseparable. United in irreverence, in a gentle cruelty. They brought about the awakening of three generations. The awakening of the consciences of three generations. They taught us, sometimes without our knowing it, about the virtues of freedom of thought and speech. They nurtured our capacity for indignation. And they led us sometimes into the dizzy pleasure of forbidden laughter.

…And at the end of these horrible crimes, we can see that something was in the process of going lax in us. And this alarm reminds of our ambitions—which have been too long silent, too easily abandoned—for social justice, equality, education, and attention to others. We must find again that humanity and that uncompromising outlook that characterized Tignous.”

I’ve been asked to clarify my argument with regard to Charlie Hebdo and the various claims that have been made about the magazine since many of its staff were murdered by an Islamist death squad in January. I have never claimed, as this comment insinuates, that my views about various individual cartoons, whatever they may be, are the only decent ones. My argument all along has concerned the ethics of learning and speaking about the magazine.

See, for example,

• “A bad epistemic approach is anti-humanist, unwise, and unkind”

• “Guest post: The problem with ‘Je ne suis pas Charlie’”

What I’ve consistently found indecent is the approach so many have taken, one in which they were immediately prepared to believe the worst claims about Charlie Hebdo and to coldly repeat them. One in which people who knew nothing or virtually nothing (or less than nothing, having seen altered images and read false reports) about the publication set themselves up as implacable judges. One in which upon learning that the claims of intentional racism were false, people immediately shifted to accusations of negligent, callous, or irresponsible racism, propped up by clichés about intent not being magic, punching down, and splash damage.

I expected better. I expected that people would show a modicum of intellectual humility and responsibility, especially when they began to see indications that their early suspicions didn’t hold up on further inspection. First, because our community is supposed to be about humility, questioning, curiosity, evidence, and care in our claims-making. Second, because having been murdered the people they were discussing were no longer here to defend themselves. Third, because tossing out irresponsible claims about the willful or negligent racism of people who were just massacred for drawing cartoons and whose families and colleagues are grieving is disrespectful and cruel - not to mention hypocritical - and so the only decent way to proceed is to take great care in our public statements so as not to perpetuate falsehoods. (I think this is what we’d want for ourselves in similar circumstances.) Fourth, because isolating the victims and targets of Islamist hit men on the basis of an ignorantly-applied purity test endangers us all.

Certainly, the fact that Charlie Hebdo is and is well known in France to be a leftwing, anti-racist publication whose primary target is the racist, xenophobic Right, was information easily available to anyone who cared to look, and is relevant not only to understanding their intent but to understanding the likely reception of the images in context. If nothing else, I would have expected that fact to give people pause before they continued to comment on the subject. No one was being compelled to declare themselves Charlie. It makes sense for people who don’t feel they have enough information to step back before taking a position. But in that case the decent approach is to remain silent while you seek out more information, including the statements of the survivors and of the victims before their deaths, and listen to those who perhaps know more. It’s also to conscientiously retract previous public statements or insinuations that have turned out to be unsupported.

At the time the people of Charlie Hebdo were being isolated on the Left on the basis of some image-mined cartoons of which the self-appointed critics had little understanding, their funerals were ongoing. The person rendering the moving tribute at the funeral of Tignous quoted at the top of this post was Christiane Taubira, the French Justice Minister who now seems to be known on the English-speaking internet as “the black woman they drew as a monkey.”



I think we can all agree that her understanding of the image, its intent, context, and effects is probably greater than ours. But many of Charlie’s critics were either ignorant of or unconcerned with her views. Those who thought the publication of the images of Mohammed was racist or purely provocative in intent or consequence didn’t care to hear from those of us who knew better. Those who had claimed the magazine targeted Muslims weren’t generally provoked to correct themselves when this appeared. In fact, in general the self-appointed prosecutors went silent – not, as I’d hoped, in order to learn more so as to correct misconceptions, but evidently more for a lack of continuing interest.

Then came the controversy surrounding the PEN award. Shortly before the awards gala, several writers who were members of PEN wrote an open letter explaining their objection to the magazine’s receiving the award and announcing their intent to boycott the awards gala. They had clearly done little research since January to determine whether or not their beliefs about CH were correct. They refused to support their claims or to engage with those pointing out their ignorance. They evidently weren’t interested in the strong words of Dominique Sopo, head of the French anti-racist organization SOS Racisme, who attempted to set the record straight:



Translation:

We’ve reached an incredibly high level of stupidity and intellectual dishonesty.

This must stop. Charlie Hebdo is the greatest antiracist weekly magazine in this country. Every week in Charlie Hebdo, every week, half [of the magazine’s articles] is against racism, against antisemitism, against hatred towards Muslims… I mean, [some people didn’t like a caricature and said “Well, okay but…”] There is no “but”. Charlie Hebdo fought against all kinds of racisms. Cabu drew cartoons for us, he even made a book for us. Charb drew cartoons for us, they [the cartoonists] gave us drawings on a regular basis, every time we asked; we used those drawings as we wished. Wolinski did the same. [Take a look at the past and ask] every antiracist organisation, they’ll tell you [that] they [Charlie Hebdo] really were antiracist and obviously everyone knows it. And so, people who argue that “Ah, Charlie Hebdo, so full of hate…” Did you know that Charlie Hebdo petitioned to ask for Claude Guéant [then minister of the Interior] to resign right after his anti-Muslim words? For an islamophobic weekly magazine, honestly, that’s quite unusual. So actually, this must stop, okay? And these people who try to make you believe that Charlie Hebdo was a racist magazine, honestly, this is scandalous, they insult the memories and the fights of the ones we lost, most of whom we knew on a personal level, needless to say, and you have to stop insulting the living and the dead. Because when you insult, and when you spread an ideology full of hate, when you lash out at journalists like a pack, this is what happens. So this must stop, everyone is called to its personal responsibility.

The morning of the awards gala in New York there was a panel discussion on “Charlie Hebdo and Challenges to Free Expression.” I went, reported back, and posted the video of the event.* I was hoping that at least one or two of the more than 200 writers who had sanctimoniously denounced the magazine would accept the invitation to come and discuss the matter with Charlie Hebdo’s editor and film critic. But none did. Not a single one. I don’t think anything could have been a bigger insult to the dead and to the survivors at CH than this refusal even to talk with them. That was indecent.

They went ahead with the boycott. Dominique Sopo was among the speakers at the presentation of the award:

I think that for us tonight, in honoring Charlie Hebdo, we honor the magazine, we honor the talent and the courage of the people who work for it, and above all we honor their antiracist commitment which has been consistent throughout their existence. Charlie Hebdo in France is something that has stood for the antiracist voice in many kinds of combat, whether it be combat due to religious dogma, a rising up against anti-Semitism, against violence, against Jews, against the Roma people, against Arabs. Charlie Hebdo is always in the forefront of all of these battles. I speak both on behalf of my own organization, SOS Racisme, but also for all of the other organizations—we know this.

Fortunately, Biard and Thoret, accepting the award, received a standing ovation. And then, from the boycotters, silence. There was a bit of self-righteous muttering about how the protest had been necessary, but now it was over and can’t we all just move on? I was thrilled last week to see that one of those who’d signed the letter, Jennifer Cody Epstein, asked for her name to be removed, apologizing and acknowledging that she had failed to adequately inform herself before taking a public position. This was admirable, but so far she’s the only one. That’s indecent.

There are new books by Caroline Fourest, Charb (posthumously), and Luz. I’ve yet to read these last two, although I’ve read excerpts from Charb’s, but I have read Fourest’s, which was published earlier this week. It gives a good deal of background which would be useful to those trying to sort out their understanding of Charlie Hebdo. But again, I haven’t seen people who were so keen to interrogate CH going out of their way to engage with them.

And guess what? Both Fourest and Charb, as well as others I agree with in general, say several things with which I disagree. There are probably also many individual CH cartoons I’d find cringeworthy or offensive or “problematic” (not the ones I’ve seen shared around, but surely some). And I’ve never seen any representative of CH dismiss that reaction or treat it as invalid. In fact, even in the face of the most vicious attacks and unfair criticisms, they’ve been entirely decent.

As I said at the beginning of this post, my concern here isn’t about any specific content. My idea of what’s decent, as I’ve said all along, doesn’t necessarily concern any particular opinion, but the way in which opinions are reached, expressed, and revised. I think it’s decent, when people have just been massacred, to avoid rushing to judgment about them. To appreciate the limits of our knowledge, recognizing when we might not have the requisite information or skills to form a proper opinion. To hold off on making public suggestions about their motives, actions, or impact until we’ve learned more. To treat the question holistically instead of plucking a handful of superficially questionable images out of context. To approach the matter, not with a prosecutorial zeal, but with a high level of care that we not erroneously smear people (we could still in the end conclude that they’re intentional or negligent racists, but this is different from beginning with this presumption and then expecting to have to be convinced out of it).

To correct previous statements if they prove to have been exaggerated or mistaken, and to correct other people when they make those errors. To apologize if we’ve said something ignorant and potentially damaging. To seek out more information, especially from the people about whom we’re forming our views, and to take that information fully into account. To appreciate that our intentions are (ha – not magic!) irrelevant, no matter how good or well-meaning, if their application is based on misinformation and stubborn ignorance. To recognize that it doesn’t show a weaker commitment to social justice or give comfort to racists to admit that our initial judgments were mistaken in any particular instance.

To proceed otherwise is, yes, offensive and indecent.

* Incidentally, Voltaire’s play Fanaticism was mentioned there. I’ve now read it and have been writing about it: part 1, part 2.

Quote of the day

“A ceux qui n’aiment pas les blasphèmes, redisons que personne ne les oblige à les aimer. Ni à acheter Charlie Hebdo, ni à dessiner Mahomet, ni à aller voir des expositions ou des pièces de theater moquant Jésus. Mais qu’ils n’interdisent pas aux autres de penser librement et rejoignent clairement le camp de la liberté de conscience.

Qu’ils passent du « oui mais » au « mais oui ».

…

Que chacun en soit bien conscient. Le « oui mais » conduit à une société où le sacré redevient tabou, où les croyants sont privilégiés par rapport aux non-croyants, où les religions majoritaires passent avant les religions minoritaires, où l’intimidation et la violence ont gagné.

Le « mais oui » dessine un monde où l’on continue à se parler malgré nos disputes, où les croyants et les non-croyants sont à égalité, où toutes les religions s’expriment sans privilèges, où l’on peut rire de ce qui nous fait peur et donc tenir tête, ensemble, aux plus violents.

Il n’existe pas d’autre choix. Ce sera le courage ou la lâcheté. Ceux qui pense que la lâcheté permet d’éviter la guerre se trompent. La guerre a déjà commencé. Seul le courage peut ramener la paix.”

- Caroline Fourest, Eloge du blasphème: essai

Quote of the day

“Why? So that in the future, Bangladesh will be a place where she and others can condemn Islam and any other ideology they don’t like in its/their entirety…without fear of being murdered for it.”

- commenter “eric” on “An Appalling Reaction to Taslima’s Escape from Threats”

Voltaire’s Fanaticism, part 2: Fanaticism, or Bush the President

At the end of my previous post, I summarized Voltaire’s entry for “Fanaticism” in his Philosophical Dictionary:

In sum, then, rather than attributing it to any particular religion, Voltaire saw fanaticism as a global scourge with devastating consequences. He tried to find the psychological and social conditions in which fanaticism and fanatical movements took root and spread. He viewed fanaticism as a sort of contagious illness, progressive and almost always incurable – once “the human mind has…quitted the luminous track pointed out by nature,” it was nearly impossible to return to it. He sought to capture the dual nature of the leaders of fanatical movements, both self-serving manipulators and themselves suffering from the same sickness. Finally, he considered possible checks to the growth of fanaticism, arguing that neither law nor religion were effective and placing his hopes in a reason grounded in nature, the tranquil “spirit of philosophy,” while acknowledging that even this didn’t always protect us.

This is the context and spirit in which the play Fanaticism, or Mahomet the Prophet, should be read and understood. It’s essential that we keep readily in mind that Voltaire worked to comprehend and present fanaticism as a generic psychological and social phenomenon, as a universal danger rather than a characteristic tendency of any particular religion or culture.

To read the play in the belief that it applies specifically or exclusively to Muslims is contrary to Voltaire’s clear intent (as described in my previous post), and smacks of intellectual dishonesty and bad faith. True, a reader could always think “I know how Voltaire saw it, but I believe some sorts of people – like Muslims – are especially susceptible to fanaticism and that I myself or my culture have largely advanced beyond that danger.” But such a belief is plainly unsustainable in the face of the historical and sociological evidence. Furthermore, clinging to it despite all indications to the contrary tends toward precisely the sort of fanatical bigotry Voltaire warned against, as when he offered as an example of Christian fanaticism a certain “Biscayan bishop” who “even accused” the lord of a parish in his diocese “of having said, in the way of pleasantry, that there were good people in Morocco as well as in Biscay, and that an honest inhabitant of Morocco might absolutely not be a mortal enemy of the Supreme Being, who is the father of all mankind.”

Even more important is that reading the play as describing a specific religion or culture serves to block virtually any insights we might otherwise gain from it about ourselves, our societies (including historical and contemporary Muslim societies), and the sources and appeal of fanaticism in the past and present. Which is why, while I highly recommend reading both the play and the dictionary entry, I don’t think the play should be performed as it’s written, at least outside of predominantly Muslim contexts. Updating the work so that it can be set in the modern era would be complicated, but this would undoubtedly be the best way to draw out its insights.

While Voltaire included in the category of fanatics many Crusaders, Inquisitors, and Conquistadors, he lived only at the very birth of modern political movements. He certainly recognized the overlap between fanatical religious and political movements, but his frame of reference was primarily religious. The modern gods of History, Race, State, Civilization, and so on were still being crafted. But a critical and educational production of his work now would take this political landscape into account. Not Fanaticism, or Mahomet the Prophet, but Fanaticism, or Lenin the Bolshevik; Fanaticism, or Hitler the Racist; Fanaticism, or North the Cold Warrior; Fanaticism, or Pinochet the Dictator; Fanaticism, or Pol Pot the Revolutionary; Fanaticism, or Putin the Strongman; Fanaticism, or Franco the Caudillo; Fanaticism, or Friedman the Neoliberal;...

As several of these examples make clear, even today no sharp line can be drawn between “religious” and “political” movements or fanaticisms. And I don’t mean by offering these suggestions to imply that a contemporary religious movement – maybe especially an Islamist movement - wouldn’t make a valid subject for an updated version of the play. But, again, if the point is to lead people to think about fanaticism and its persistent sources and dangers, that choice of subject would likely be intellectually counterproductive in addition to fomenting bigotry.

Voltaire didn’t have much choice when it came to the subject of his play about religious-political fanaticism. If the play was going to be performed, it had to situate fanaticism in another culture, preferably one to which the more fanatical of his own society were hostile. While the more enlightened in the audience would likely recognize the broader target, this inevitably carried the risk of leaving his society’s fanaticisms unquestioned by those most caught up in them (though the danger was cleverly addressed and minimized by the anonymous dictionary entry).

Today we have much more choice, the consequences for Muslims of using the play’s original subject and setting are more serious, and the need to expose the fanaticisms of our own culture is more pressing than ever. When a person whose views many (for some reason) take seriously can write something as ill-informed and idiotic as

It is time for us to admit that not all cultures are at the same stage of moral development. This is a radically impolitic thing to say, of course, but it seems as objectively true as saying that not all societies have equal material resources. We might even conceive of our moral differences in just these terms: not all societies have the same degree of moral wealth…. To say of another culture that it lags a hundred and fifty years behind our own in social development is a terrible criticism indeed, given how far we’ve come in that time. Now imagine the benighted Americans of 1863 coming to possess chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons. This is more or less the situation we confront in much of the developing world.

and claim the US is a “well-intentioned giant,” we should all recognize of the urgent necessity of shining a light on our own society’s murderous fanaticisms. Fanaticism, or Mahomet the Prophet understood generically and applied to movements within our culture can enlighten; Fanaticism, or Mahomet the Prophet seen through the lens of prejudice, arrogance, and, well, fanaticism can only do harm. It’s time for Fanaticism, or Bush the President.

17

The percentage of individual atheist blogs at Patheos written by women, by my rough count.*

Just an observation.

* There are 37 total, of which two are the work of “various contributors.” Of the remaining 35, it appears that 29 are written by men and six by women.

Quote of the day

“As a writer whose work is largely predicated on diligent and careful research, I am reluctant to admit that in this case, I didn’t do enough of it before sending my name out into the Cloud. Unfortunately, though, that is the conclusion to which I’ve been forced to come, and I thought it best to acknowledge it publically and head-on rather than disingenuously pretending otherwise.”

- Jennifer Cody Epstein, removing her name from the PEN petition

Well done. May there be more to come.

I read Epstein’s letter at Ophelia’s blog moments after beginning Caroline Fourest’s new book on blasphemy (released today!). The beginning is about her experience of going to the Charlie Hebdo office in the immediate wake of the attack and learning of her murdered colleagues, and then finding hope in the solidarity of so many in France and elsewhere in the days that followed. Reading that section reignited my anger toward the PEN protesters, but Epstein’s letter has been a salve.

Interlude – the tenderness of patient minds

Wilfred Owen:

Anthem for Doomed Youth

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, -
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing down of blinds.

I’m still reading Pat Barker’s beautiful Regeneration, drawing it out slowly. I’ve just read the scene in which Barker depicts Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon in Owen’s room at Craiglockhart discussing and revising what would become “Anthem for Doomed Youth.”

As an animal liberationist surrounded by the horrors of industrialized animal exploitation, I find the first line more rather than less poignant.

Self-unaware quotes of the day

“What was disillusioning about l'affair Charlie Hebdo was not basic misunderstandings -- which might have been eased through discussion—but immediate name-calling & denunciations; disrespect for a dissenting opinion, in the very name of ‘freedom’ of speech. Hard to comprehend.”

- Joyce Carol Oates on Twitter

“It’s hard...to reevaluate strongly held opinions and to publicly admit that your original opinions weren’t accurate.”

- Glenn Greenwald on The Last Word with Lawrence O’Donnell praising those who’ve retracted their earlier ignorant attacks on Edward Snowden

Luz to leave Charlie Hebdo

Luz, the cartoonist who created the moving cover of Charlie Hebdo in the wake of the attack, will be leaving the magazine in September:

“Each issue is torture because the others are gone,” said Luz.

…“Spending sleepless nights summoning the dead, wondering what Charb, Cabu, Honoré, Tignous would have done is exhausting,” he added.

He’s recently published a new work, Catharsis, which he calls a “therapeutic book,” about his experience of the murder of his friends and colleagues and its aftermath. This article about the book also refers to the dispute among the CH staff which I mentioned recently.

Glenn Greenwald’s semi-reverse Dear Muslima

Glenn Greenwald is a sincere and articulate advocate for freedom and human rights and has done an incredible amount of good work. I read his pieces regularly. Which is why I’m so highly annoyed at how he’s positioned himself with regard to Charlie Hebdo and those supporting blasphemy and other forms of free expression that drive some theocrats into a censorious homicidal rage.

It was bad enough that Greenwald kept celebrating the PEN protesters and their ignorant smears while refusing, as they did, to engage with evidence and arguments that could lead to a rethinking of his position. But his latest article on the subject – “Greatest Threat to Free Speech Comes Not From Terrorism, But From Those Claiming to Fight It” – not only continues in that vein but demonstrates a twist on one of the most odious of rhetorical devices: the Dear Muslima.

He notes, correctly, that “[t]hreats to free speech can come from lots of places.” Yes, they can, and that’s essential to keep in mind. It’s not an aside, to be covered in one short phrase before moving on to judging whether some threats are best left unchallenged.

I’m going to approach this from my perspective as an anarchist. There’s a certain irony to the characterization of anarchists as being excessively or obsessively concerned with governments. What’s characterized anarchism from the beginning has been a recognition that any authority poses a threat to freedom. Anarchists have tended to emphasize the threats posed by governments, religions, and economic powers because they tend to be the largest concentrations capable of institutional repression, and often act in league. But we’ve always appreciated that threats to free expression can come from endlessly diverse sources – local gangs, traditional elites, internet harassers, parents and families,… Which danger looms largest for any particular person varies according to circumstance, and even the fact that some threats are more institutionalized and affect more people in a given time and place doesn’t mean the others are negligible.

At the same time, anarchists have – of necessity – remained all too aware of the specific threat posed by governments, including “liberal” regimes. Many of the policies and practices Greenwald writes about had their roots in the repression of anarchists a century ago and, more recently, in the corporate-state war on the animal liberation movement. I don’t know if he’s written about this history, or about recent targeted legislation like the Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act, but I wouldn’t necessarily hold it against him if that wasn’t the focus of his efforts. We all have different areas of interest and expertise, and that’s needed: people who specialize in one area rely on those who work in others.

Which is why I don’t understand Greenwald’s choice to frame his presentation of important evidence and analysis concerning some threats to free expression in opposition to those of us who focus – or, in many cases like mine, also focus – on other threats. He follows up his short statement recognizing that threats come from lots of places with

But right now, the greatest threat by far in the West to ideals of free expression is coming not from radical Muslims, but from the very Western governments claiming to fight them.

Again, even in the “West,” the “greatest threat” varies according to circumstances. But generally speaking this is plausible. The problem comes when he jumps from this assertion to a number of mistaken and counterproductive arguments:

Actually, there has long been a broad, sustained assault in the West on core political liberties — specifically due process, free speech and free assembly — perpetrated not by “radical Muslims,” but by those who endlessly claim to fight them. Sadly, and tellingly, none of that has triggered parades or marches or widespread condemnation by Western journalists and pundits. But for those who truly believe in principles of free expression — as opposed to pretending to when it allows one to bash the Other Tribe — these are the assaults that need marches and protests.

The broad, sustained assault is absolutely real. The same can’t be said of some of the arguments implied here:

• that the “greatest threat” to those in “the West” should be the exclusive focus of “Western” activists

• that focusing on threats from governments or groups targeted by Western governments is illegitimate

• that there are no radical Muslims who threaten free expression (at least not in the West)

• that those who defend the right to free expression against the threats and violence of Islamists are a monolithic group

• that all of those who defend the right to free expression against the threats and violence of Islamists focus singlemindedly on this one issue

• that all of those who defend the right to free expression against the threats and violence of Islamists are dishonest pretenders concerned not with free expression but with “bashing” the “Other Tribe”

None of this is true. If “threats to free speech can come from lots of places,” as of course they can and do, free speech needs to be defended against all of those threats. To argue that only some threats are legitimate and worthy of defending against – “these are the assaults that need marches and protests” – is to ignore or dismiss the victims of those threats deemed illegitimate and unworthy (not just Charlie Hebdo, but Raif Badawi, Bangladeshi freethought bloggers, feminist radicals in Afghanistan, Tunisian filmmakers, Algerian novelists,…). It’s as hypocritical as Greenwald accuses others of being.

And the worst of it is that there’s no need to make or dwell on these assumptions. We can defend free expression – all while distinguishing between rightwing racists from those genuinely fighting for universal rights and while appreciating the impact of our own social location – from any and all threats. Some people will focus on the US government; some on the Iranian or Saudi Arabian or Israeli or Russian or Honduran or…governments. Some will focus on university administrations; some on rape and death threats to women and gay and trans people online. Some will speak out for science or activism that threatens corporate interests; some for blasphemers and secularists. All of this is necessary, and while there are reactionary interests always poised to exploit movements in defense of free expression, they don’t discredit any of these efforts.

The last thing a global campaign for free expression needs is for some defenses of free expression to be framed in opposition to others or to show disdain for others.

“Je suis punie”

Well, this is odd.

Earlier this week, Charlie Hebdo management summoned French-Moroccan journalist Zineb El Rhazoui to a “preliminary meeting” to “remind her of her minimum obligations toward her employer following numerous incidents”.

The incidents in question were not specified and the magazine’s management has declined media requests to provide details.

In interviews with the French press, El Rhazoui, a well-known journalist who emerged as a leading voice for the magazine following the January 7 attack on Charlie Hebdo, has expressed her shock over the summons.

…Over the past few years, El Rhazoui has received death threats and lived under police protection – a cause, she has suggested in interviews with the French media, of heightened stress. “My husband lost his job because jihadists unveiled his workplace, he had to leave Morocco, I have been threatened, I live in friends’ guestrooms or hotels and management plans to fire me…Bravo Charlie,” she told Le Monde.

I’m still unclear on what this is all about.

We call on all countries

A third Bangladeshi atheist blogger, Ananta Bijoy Das, has been murdered by machete-wielding fanatics. The Swedish embassy had denied him a visa to travel to Sweden at the invitation of Swedish PEN. The International Humanist and Ethical Union, to whom he had reached out, released a statement today, reading in part:

We call on all countries to recognise the legitimacy and sometimes the urgency and moral necessity of asylum claims made by humanists, atheists and secularists who are being persecuted for daring to express those views.

We’ve been in contact with several Bangladeshi humanists, in particular since Avijit Roy was killed in February. These writers are not hateful, not intolerant; they write about science and politics, they are proponents of secularism, they voice skeptical and rationalist arguments, they call for justice and for humanism. They are desperately and increasingly concerned that they, too, have been named on the Islamist death lists.