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Is the point saying "we wont be cowed" or is it to actually make muslims think about violence? Because "we won't be cowed" really does nothing to change anythin
by Noos 10y ago
Is the point saying "we wont be cowed" or is it to actually make muslims think about violence? Because "we won't be cowed" really does nothing to change anything, and might make things worse if they say this in a way that offends people that might otherwise be neutral or receptive to the message.
The second part was no rhetorical trick. Satire has shifted from skewering the people in power to reinforcing them, and going after unpopular minorities. In the west, there's virtually no effective response for said minority if they go after the correct ones. If anything a Streisand effect can happen where even legitimately challenging the offense makes you look even worse and brings more popularity to the offending side.
The Hebdo case was a statistical outlier if anything. In general, the west's idea that we no longer kill each other over blasphemy and speech has created a culture where the ones satired grin and bear it mostly, because we do not kill. Hebdo was a grim reminder that extremists do not play by that implicit code. The thing we should be thankful for in the west is that so few people break it.