Charlie is back

Last week, we were shocked by the acts of terror in Paris. This week, Charlie Hebdo is back with a new issue. That’s great.  The artists and cartoonists are brave.  

I think duck liver is a hype, but I always liked the French cheese, and the French attitude to freedom of speech. Charlie Hebdo’s satire offends the Muslims. That’s fine. They just have to learn to live with it, like the Christians, Jews and Satanists have learnt.

What’s holy for you is not holy for me.  Mocking the gods and prophets can be fun, for sure. But blasphemy is more than entertainment. Blasphemy is an important part of the freedom of speech. Religion mixed with a political agenda is a bad combo, because it makes the agenda indisputable. Who are you to challenge God?

• Imagine Obama coming to The House proposing a new law received from God, and the Republicans could do nothing to stop it. 
• Imagine the Labor party coming to the Parliament with a political program given by God, and Cameron had to approve it right away. 

The French and the Americans (I think) were the first to develop a secular constitution. This is very important, splitting governing, legislative and religious power. Turkey is Muslim-secular, but develops in the wrong direction. Many Muslim countries are stuck in their political-religious swamp. The list of ridiculous laws and rules coming out of religion is endless:

• Women are not allowed to watch football games (Iran)
• Women are not allowed to drive cars (Saudi)
• Death penalty for blasphemy (Pakistan)
• Separate ski lifts for men and women (Iran)
• One-hour marriage with prostitutes (which makes prostitution compliant with the Quran; Bahrain).
• Men can’t sit next to women on airplanes (orthodox Jews)
• Women can’t become priests (Catholics)
• Priests must live in celibate (Catholics)
• Ban on condoms (Catholics)

None of these rules come from God. They were invented by powerful people as tools to control people. When rules can't be justified by rational arguments, the easiest solution is God. No wonder religious authorities  who make up such laws and rules (and their Prophets and Gods) become subject to satire and blasphemy.

The French author Michel Houellebecq once said that “among all ridiculous religions, Islam is the most stupid”. He was taken to court in Paris for this statement, but was acquitted based on freedom of speech. They are all about equally bad; I dislike religion in general. 

I have plenty of religous books in my shelf; the Bible, the Quran and the Book of Mormon, and I have read a fair part of them (but far from everything). Sharia is mostly useless as legislation for the modern world. But taking the worst of the Bible, it would make a pretty bizarre law too.

Some of the religious texts can be quite entertaining. Once we had fun drinking beer and reading load from the Quran in a pub up north. I think the pub was a safe place for our blasphemy. It's an unlikely place to meet jihadists and inquisition.

In Satan we trust >:)

(Cover page of this week's issue of Charlie Hebdo; link to WIkipedia. The text above Muhammsd's head says "Everything is forgiven".)

Our weapon

When our country was hit by terror, I was happy to hear the wise responses, from our Prime Minister, and not the least, from the young politicians who were the victims of the shooting:

"Our response will be be more democracy and more openness."

The purpose of terror is to scare people. Statistically, the probability of getting killed in a terror attack is much smaller than being killed in a car crash, or some other accident (at least if we exclude extreme countries like Iraq and Afghanistan from the statistics).

We have been lucky to live in a country with little violence. Not even the police carry handguns. I hope this remains in the future.

I hope and believe we will not become a country where people are afraid of each other, and protecting ourselves from each other. If we do, the terrorists have won.

We must stick to the ideas and values of the social democracy, where conflict is handled by means of dialogue and debate. Hate and revenge don't bring us forward.

In the spirit of Nordahl Grieg, the Prime Minister said:

"Freedom of speech is our weapon."

I will use that weapon, and it's the only weapon I will use.

(After the terrorist attacks, people have covered towns and cities in flowers. I took the picture above a couple of days ago when I passed by town square. The statue of the king who founded our city in the year 997 (an official random number) was surrounded by flowers and candle lights.)