Is Garry Trudeau Right About Charlie Hebdo?

Garry Trudeau’s recent Polk award speech on the Charlie Hebdo attacks was both criticized and praised for his views on where to draw “red lines” with satire. Some saw his remarks as victim-blaming while others agreed the Hebdo cartoonists were racist, punching down instead of up.

He appeared on Meet The Press Sunday to discuss it further. His remarks in part:

I was as outraged as the rest of the word at the time. I mourn them deeply. We’re a very small fraternity of political cartoonists around the globe… What I didn’t do is necessarily agree with the decisions they made that brought a world of pain to France.

I think that in France the wider Muslim community feels disempowered and disenfranchised in way that I’m sure is also true in this country. And that while I would imagine only a tiny fraction were sympathetic to the acts that were carried out and the killings, I think probably the vast majority shared in the outraged. Certainly that seems to be what people are hearing in the schoolyards in France now, is that they’re finding common cause at least with the issue, if not with the action.

I think that’s bad for France, it’s unfortunate, it’s a tragedy that could have been avoided. But every body has to decide where the red lines are for themselves.

Is Trudeau right?

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