Dieudonne M'bala M'bala arrested for voicing support for Kosher market gunman

[Famous Mortimer]

Yeah, as much as I hate Dieudonné, I have to admit his post is too nonsensical to qualify as an apology of terrorism. He'll probably be acquitted (if he's even indicted). Still, I'm glad he got locked up for a while, to teach him a little lesson.

And yeah, I support a zero-tolerance policy for those who outright express support for terrorism. It's time to fight back.

The last thing anyone should want after the Charlie Hebdo attacks is for violent force to be able to "teach a little lesson" when it comes to what is acceptable speech.

I have nothing against restrictions of freedom of speech when it goes against racism and bigotry. Neither does Charlie Hebdo. For the record, they even support banning the FN (which I don't).

So people don't have a right to express their opinion if others don't like it?

People have the right to express their opinions until they cross the line into advocating violence.

Not hard to understand.

[Deus Naturae]

Yeah, as much as I hate Dieudonné, I have to admit his post is too nonsensical to qualify as an apology of terrorism. He'll probably be acquitted (if he's even indicted). Still, I'm glad he got locked up for a while, to teach him a little lesson.

And yeah, I support a zero-tolerance policy for those who outright express support for terrorism. It's time to fight back.

The last thing anyone should want after the Charlie Hebdo attacks is for violent force to be able to "teach a little lesson" when it comes to what is acceptable speech.

I have nothing against restrictions of freedom of speech when it goes against racism and bigotry. Neither does Charlie Hebdo. For the record, they even support banning the FN (which I don't).

So people don't have a right to express their opinion if others don't like it?

People have the right to express their opinions until they cross the line into advocating violence.

Not hard to understand.

Espousing racist or "bigoted" views =/= advocating violence.

[Famous Mortimer]

Yeah, as much as I hate Dieudonné, I have to admit his post is too nonsensical to qualify as an apology of terrorism. He'll probably be acquitted (if he's even indicted). Still, I'm glad he got locked up for a while, to teach him a little lesson.

And yeah, I support a zero-tolerance policy for those who outright express support for terrorism. It's time to fight back.

The last thing anyone should want after the Charlie Hebdo attacks is for violent force to be able to "teach a little lesson" when it comes to what is acceptable speech.

I have nothing against restrictions of freedom of speech when it goes against racism and bigotry. Neither does Charlie Hebdo. For the record, they even support banning the FN (which I don't).

So people don't have a right to express their opinion if others don't like it?

People have the right to express their opinions until they cross the line into advocating violence.

Not hard to understand.

Espousing racist or "bigoted" views =/= advocating violence.

He wasn't arrested simply for bigoted views. He was arrested for saying he sympathized with a guy who shot up a kosher supermarket.

[Deus Naturae]

Yeah, as much as I hate Dieudonné, I have to admit his post is too nonsensical to qualify as an apology of terrorism. He'll probably be acquitted (if he's even indicted). Still, I'm glad he got locked up for a while, to teach him a little lesson.

And yeah, I support a zero-tolerance policy for those who outright express support for terrorism. It's time to fight back.

The last thing anyone should want after the Charlie Hebdo attacks is for violent force to be able to "teach a little lesson" when it comes to what is acceptable speech.

I have nothing against restrictions of freedom of speech when it goes against racism and bigotry. Neither does Charlie Hebdo. For the record, they even support banning the FN (which I don't).

So people don't have a right to express their opinion if others don't like it?

People have the right to express their opinions until they cross the line into advocating violence.

Not hard to understand.

Espousing racist or "bigoted" views =/= advocating violence.

He wasn't arrested simply for bigoted views. He was arrested for saying he sympathized with a guy who shot up a kosher supermarket.

I was responding to a poster who said that freedom of speech should be restricted for racists and bigots.

[Beezer]

This is extremely counterproductive since it will - in the eyes of many disaffected young Muslims - confirm that French society is indeed racist and will only protect controversial or insulting statements if they're targeted towards Muslims. You don't fight back by silencing people like Dieudonne; you fight back by taking them and their views head on.

[Stranger in a strange land]

Deiudonne is an asshole, but arresting him over this is a bit much.

[Storebought]

Deiudonne is an asshole, but arresting him over this is a bit much.

Seeing the French fall into the Dick Cheney-esque "you're with us or against us" is really regrettable.

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

[Linus Van Pelt]

Sympathy with killers can appear in artistic or critical contexts in which the relation to the overall standpoint of the author is subtle and complex. Suppose a poem or a novel is written from the point of view of someone sympathetic to, say, Palestinian suicide bombers. How explicit does the detachment between the work and the author's real-life view for this to count as legal? Furthermore, advocacy of violence is clearly not banned in general in France. This is a country with a major tradition of intellectuals supporting violent regimes, and in which tactics in wars are debated openly. I guess the response will be that in these cases, the deaths of civilians are mere by-products of tactics rather than the end goal as with Charlie Hebdo. But really it is not so clear that the Charlie Hebdo killings are not tactics in a larger geopolitical effort. Prosecutors and bureaucrats are ill-placed to adjudicate these boundaries in binary fashion, and the risk that the law will be applied asymmetrically from issue to issue and victim to victim is serious.

Of course, the existence of difficult borderline cases does not automatically make for bad law. But on the converse side, it is pretty unclear what the positive effect of these hate laws is. When one compares the situation of Islamic fundamentalist radicalism or the racist far right in Europe and the US, it is hard to reach the conclusion that these laws are actually lessening the attitudes they target. Granted, there are many other social variables. But other areas of contrast between American permissiveness and the restrictiveness of other democracies - say on guns or campaign finance (no First Amendment absolutist am I, on this issue!) - there are clear distinctions visible in the actual effects on gun violence or money in politics. These hate laws appear much more ineffective.

[politicus]

Sympathy with killers can appear in artistic or critical contexts in which the relation to the overall standpoint of the author is subtle and complex. Suppose a poem or a novel is written from the point of view of someone sympathetic to, say, Palestinian suicide bombers. How explicit does the detachment between the work and the author's real-life view for this to count as legal? Furthermore, advocacy of violence is clearly not banned in general in France. This is a country with a major tradition of intellectuals supporting violent regimes, and in which tactics in wars are debated openly. I guess the response will be that in these cases, the deaths of civilians are mere by-products of tactics rather than the end goal as with Charlie Hebdo. But really it is not so clear that the Charlie Hebdo killings are not tactics in a larger geopolitical effort. Prosecutors and bureaucrats are ill-placed to adjudicate these boundaries in binary fashion, and the risk that the law will be applied asymmetrically from issue to issue and victim to victim is serious.

Of course, the existence of difficult borderline cases does not automatically make for bad law. But on the converse side, it is pretty unclear what the positive effect of these hate laws is. When one compares the situation of Islamic fundamentalist radicalism or the racist far right in Europe and the US, it is hard to reach the conclusion that these laws are actually lessening the attitudes they target. Granted, there are many other social variables. But other areas of contrast between American permissiveness and the restrictiveness of other democracies - say on guns or campaign finance (no First Amendment absolutist am I, on this issue!) - there are clear distinctions visible in the actual effects on gun violence or money in politics. These hate laws appear much more ineffective.

It is not just support of violence, but support of terrorists attacking your own country. That is treason.

[DavidB.]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

[warandwar]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

The Supreme Court in the U.S. made the distinction between advocating violence and advocating imminent violence in Brandenberg v. Ohio. I don't know the law in France, but it seems completely reasonable to have the distinction from saying "I want to kill all of you" and "I want to kill all of you with the 10 guns in my car".

[Stand With Israel. Crush Hamas]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

The Supreme Court in the U.S. made the distinction between advocating violence and advocating imminent violence in Brandenberg v. Ohio. I don't know the law in France, but it seems completely reasonable to have the distinction from saying "I want to kill all of you" and "I want to kill all of you with the 10 guns in my car".

And that seems like a good, logical distinction in this country, where we have to thread the needle between respecting the first amendment and protecting people.

In France, where they don't have a first amendment, it seems crystal clear why Charlie Hebro's mockery of the prophet Islam is allowed while M'bala's celebration of the mass murder of Jews isn't.

[warandwar]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

The Supreme Court in the U.S. made the distinction between advocating violence and advocating imminent violence in Brandenberg v. Ohio. I don't know the law in France, but it seems completely reasonable to have the distinction from saying "I want to kill all of you" and "I want to kill all of you with the 10 guns in my car".

And that seems like a good, logical distinction in this country, where we have to thread the needle between respecting the first amendment and protecting people.

In France, where they don't have a first amendment, it seems crystal clear why Charlie Hebro's mockery of the prophet Islam is allowed while M'bala's celebration of the mass murder of Jews isn't.

I don't know, Article 11 of the Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen ensures freedom of speech. It's just the interpretation of it that's changed. Why the interpretation of illegal speech differs so much between France and the U.S. isn't "crystal clear" to me. I'd be interested to know more about this.

[swl]

The judgement will happen tomorrow fyi.

To those who wonder why antisemitism and Islamophobia may be treated differently, I think France realized something we would prefer not to happen, and that is the following:

During the last years, victims of anti-semitism in France:
2012: Attack on a Jewish school in Toulouse: 4 victims
2014: Attack on the Jewish museum in Brussels (but the perpetrator was a French citizen): 4 victims
2015: Attack on a Jewish supermarket in Paris: 4 victims

Victims of Islamophobia: 0

[warandwar]

The judgement will happen tomorrow fyi.

To those who wonder why antisemitism and Islamophobia may be treated differently, I think France realized something we would prefer not to happen, and that is the following:

During the last years, victims of anti-semitism in France:
2012: Attack on a Jewish school in Toulouse: 4 victims
2014: Attack on the Jewish museum in Brussels (but the perpetrator was a French citizen): 4 victims
2015: Attack on a Jewish supermarket in Paris: 4 victims

Victims of Islamophobia: 0

[ur=http://big.assets.huffingtonpost.com/IslamophobiaFrance2.pngl]No[/url]

Even if what you were saying was true, which it isn't, you can't measure hatred by a body count! By your logic, you should be against hate speech only after it's resulted in multiple deaths. If you're inciting imminent violence, no matter against who, it should be illegal.

[swl]

Even if what you were saying was true, which it isn't,

It is. By victims, I meant people killed.

We all wish a world where everyone loves each other, but a government has limited means: it cannot prosecute everyone who says something insulting on social medias, and it cannot put soldiers in front of every school and every place of worship.
When prioritizing its actions, it makes sense to prioritize things that lead to real murder and terror attacks compared to thing that lead to verbal insults or damages on buildings (even though these things are bad as well).

[warandwar]

Even if what you were saying was true, which it isn't,

It is. By victims, I meant people killed.

We all wish a world where everyone loves each other, but a government has limited means: it cannot prosecute everyone who says something insulting on social medias, and it cannot put soldiers in front of every school and every place of worship.
When prioritizing its actions, it makes sense to prioritize things that lead to real murder and terror attacks compared to thing that lead to verbal insults or damages on buildings (even though these things are bad as well).

I'm sure if you ask muslim immigrants in France, they'll point to plenty of incidents related to Islamophobia. Les émeutes de 2005 dans les banlieus, for example, arose partly from anger in the immigrant community over their mistreatment by police. People died at the start of those, so maybe that counts for you.

By saying that anti-Semitism is more dangerous than Islamophobia, you make it seem like these concerns aren't as important. I'm sure plenty of people agree with that. But if that is the French government's position, it will do nothing to help the French Islamic community feel less marginalized and mistreated. 

[Antonio the Sixth]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

The Supreme Court in the U.S. made the distinction between advocating violence and advocating imminent violence in Brandenberg v. Ohio. I don't know the law in France, but it seems completely reasonable to have the distinction from saying "I want to kill all of you" and "I want to kill all of you with the 10 guns in my car".

And that seems like a good, logical distinction in this country, where we have to thread the needle between respecting the first amendment and protecting people.

In France, where they don't have a first amendment, it seems crystal clear why Charlie Hebro's mockery of the prophet Islam is allowed while M'bala's celebration of the mass murder of Jews isn't.

I don't know, Article 11 of the Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen ensures freedom of speech. It's just the interpretation of it that's changed. Why the interpretation of illegal speech differs so much between France and the U.S. isn't "crystal clear" to me. I'd be interested to know more about this.

The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law.

[warandwar]

Hate speech is illegal in France. I am glad it's not that way here in the US, but it seems silly to complain. And Dieudonne is a repeat offender when it comes to advocating violence against the Jewish minority. He's getting what he deserves.

And comparing this to the cartoons is silly. It's not hate speech to violate the tenets of a religion and mock their prophet. It is hate speech to advocate violence against the people in that group. That goes for Muslims and Jews.

^ This. I don't understand why people think that advocating violence should be legal. Mocking a guy who is considered a prophet by some is obviously very different from expressing support for killing people because of their religion. Jews in France (and in pretty much all of Western Europe) are already threatened because of anti-Semitism by Muslims, we'd better not legalize that.

Credit where credit due, I think that Manuel Valls' government has made a lot of effort to secure Jewish community and to counter terrorism.

The Supreme Court in the U.S. made the distinction between advocating violence and advocating imminent violence in Brandenberg v. Ohio. I don't know the law in France, but it seems completely reasonable to have the distinction from saying "I want to kill all of you" and "I want to kill all of you with the 10 guns in my car".

And that seems like a good, logical distinction in this country, where we have to thread the needle between respecting the first amendment and protecting people.

In France, where they don't have a first amendment, it seems crystal clear why Charlie Hebro's mockery of the prophet Islam is allowed while M'bala's celebration of the mass murder of Jews isn't.

I don't know, Article 11 of the Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen ensures freedom of speech. It's just the interpretation of it that's changed. Why the interpretation of illegal speech differs so much between France and the U.S. isn't "crystal clear" to me. I'd be interested to know more about this.

The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom, but shall be responsible for such abuses of this freedom as shall be defined by law.

Yeah, exactly. it ensures freedom of speech, except in certain cases. The 1st amendment does the same thing (no slander, libel, incitement, fire in a crowded theater stuff).

[Antonio the Sixth]

The 1st Amendment does not contain an explicit statement limiting its effectiveness, its language is much broader ("Congress shall make no law"). All the limits that have been found to apply to it were constructions by the SCOTUS.

[warandwar]

Yeah, I'm aware of that. What I was trying to say is is that in both countries, there's an enshrined principle of free speech, barring what they define as harmful. This interpretation of harmful speech is what differs and I'd be interested to know why.

[ingemann]

Yeah, I'm aware of that. What I was trying to say is is that in both countries, there's an enshrined principle of free speech, barring what they define as harmful. This interpretation of harmful speech is what differs and I'd be interested to know why.

Different political and judicial traditions, it's not really that interesting, what people and the courts think is harmful differ from country. The Westboro Church's demonstrations would likely be banned every else than USA as harassment and disturb the public order, Americans are in their full right to disagree with that, but as other countries are not USA, it's rather natural it differ. It's like there some places women are not allowed to bathe topless and other places they are. What people see as harmful differ, and the reasons for that can't be describe in a single post. It's usual something people just get, if they use to interact with other cultures.