Sunday, April 19, 2015

Why Garry Trudeau Is Wrong About "Charlie Hebdo"

David Frum responds to Garry Trudeau in The Atlantic.


Excerpts:

In thanks for an award honoring his lifetime of achievement as a cartoonist, Trudeau used the occasion to denounce the murdered cartoonists and editors of Charlie Hebdo. The Atlantic posted his remarks.
 ... 
Almost exactly three months have passed since two heavily armed gunmen killed 11 people and wounded 11 more to punish a satirical weekly for publishing images they did not like. At the same time, two associates took hostages in a Parisian kosher supermarket, leading to the deaths of four shoppers. 
About a month later, a sympathizer with the Charlie Hebdo killers opened fire upon a meeting in Copenhagen attended by another cartoonist. One person was killed; three police officers were wounded. That same killer then proceeded to Copenhagen’s main synagogue, where he murdered a volunteer security guard and wounded two more police.  
For this long record of death and destruction—and for many other deaths as well—Garry Trudeau blamed the people who drew and published the offending cartoons.
... 
The closest Trudeau will approach to any sympathetic word for the victims of mass killing is his approving quotation from Jon Stewart: “Comedy in a free society shouldn’t take courage.”

No comments:

Post a Comment