By Kelly Rae Mathews
“Silence is death.
If you are silent you are dead,
And if you speak you are dead,
So speak and die.”
As soon as I heard about the attack on Charlie Hebdo, I thought of these words about freedom of speech and self-expression in the face of oppression penned by author Tahar Djaout. Djaout was a writer from Algeria whose outspoken and deeply thought-out advocacy for democracy and secularism in the midst of opposition from religious fundamentalists eventually took his life.
If we want to stop terrorism — if we want to truly heal our broken world — every one of us must do our part to fight the silence tearing down, from the inside out, all the peace we try to build.
Peace does not equal silence.
Tragically, fear has kept us all from achieving peace.
In the wake of the tragedy at Charlie Hebdo, as I read through the news articles one after the other from around the world, I was moved by the outpouring of support and empathy and solidarity for free speech, as well as the camaraderie it inspired. I admired very much the esprit de corps and the strength of the people coming together.
There should always be a million people filling the streets of cities to protest when there is oppression and where there is silence, whether it is oppression in America, Syria, Palestine, France, Russia, Japan, or China.
Perhaps, I thought to myself, just perhaps, the world has finally learned the lesson about silence and how fundamentally important freedom of expression will always be to a thriving, just society.
Our laws in the West protecting freedom of speech and freedom of expression were meant to protect any person standing up to the hierarchy of politics so that they would literally not be executed for voicing a different opinion than the ruling class – whether it was religious, political, economic, social, or a combination of any or all of these.
As I read the American reactions to Charlie Hebdo, however, I noticed that there was no particular commentary on the Islamic and Arabic peoples’ lack of equal opportunity to express themselves or have agency to solve problems in the places in which they live. There was also little discussion regarding the sort of repercussions and social consequences they might face if they did speak up, including if they spoke up within Europe and America.
I read instead an outpouring of vitriolic hatred and fear toward all Muslims as a whole and of everything Islamic, from non-Muslim Americans who refused to even acknowledge that there was such a thing as Americans who were also Muslim. Also, everyone wanted to tell the Arabic world how they should run things.
The story of the attack on Charlie Hebdo is also set within the context of immigration and how various societies treat immigrants and service workers, as well as within the context of the social displacement of immigrants and class oppression everywhere in a globalized society.
There would be true equality of freedom of speech, and more peace, if every immigrant and thus every Muslim in America and Europe felt they could speak their piece and satirize the culture in which they have been encapsulated.
Can you imagine a witty satirical Arabic and Islamic publication being allowed to skewer and roast our Western civilization and make good money doing so? I hope so, because if not, it’s time to stretch your imagination.
Cultures influenced by Islam have a rich tradition of satire and for loving humor.
Muslims must have the same freedom to express themselves and satire Western values as we do.
We must not enjoy our liberties at the expense of the silence of others.
For a starter course in satire by an author within an Islamic context I recommend “Persepolis,” the graphic novels as well as the movie, as great examples of freedom of expression and insight from the perspective of Iranian author Marjorie Satrap, who speaks to what it is like to be an immigrant and refugee from an Islamic background in France.
And, best of all, the heroine in the books is so utterly human in her fierceness, her vulnerability, her pain, her anger, her defiance, her brokenness, and her love. She is real, and cannot be dismissed out of hand.
Don’t stop there.
Find and read and watch everything you can get your hands on that tells the other side of the story.
Be part of community discussion groups and forums.
Remember the Nobel Peace Prize winner last year. Malala Yousafzai was a young Islamic woman who showed courage in the face of terrorists at her school.
You and I can no longer afford the horror perpetuated by the ignorance that comes from dehumanizing an entire people. It is intolerable and unjust to think of everyone who is Muslim as evil out of unhealthy Western psychological identity politics in which Westerners always need to be “heroes” and Muslims the “bad guys.”
That makes us no better than those who equate simply being born in America as evil and corrupt.
Reacting to terrorism with eye-for-an-eye policies or torture will only bring more violence and hatred and fear.
The misery and suffering of others strikes us as consequence in our own lives when we can no longer easily ignore the pain and suffering of the rest of the world because finally, we hurt too.
We need wisdom, not fear, to come from our hurt.
Integrity, humility, wisdom, and empathy are not easily come by in our world.
We can start by developing a worldview that is empathetic and acknowledges the voice that speaks pain. We must not try to put a silver lining on it, but realize this is something which requires deep thinking, deep commitment, and a conscious effort to insure we are not part of the silence.
I hope to hear your voice.
