Recently, I’ve been absorbed by government counter-terror policy and the increasingly invasive tactics that push marginalised youth into the lure of jihadism. Hearing about two gunmen opening fire on a Muhammad cartoon competition in Texas, I skipped to reading for clues on what drove 31 year old Elton Simpson and 34 Year old Nadir Soofi to extremism.
At the same time, I was nagged by the reality of a competition that picks the best depiction of the prophet Muhammad, rewarding the slandering of Islamic faith to the tune of $10 000 US. That the competition was spearheaded by a radical anti-Islamist Dutch politician a long way from home falls nothing short of Lewis Carroll absurdity.
My attention was split between the gunmen’s monstrous act and an exhibition whose anti-Islamism was sure to offend many.
In equal strokes, the shooting was as evil as the exhibition was wrong.
What I found most uncomfortable was that here both parties equally fit the bill when asking which was an attack on our freedom of speech?
It’s certainly plausible the competition provoked the gunmen’s evil intent and they lashed out at the exhibit’s inflammatory message. Given the gunmen were under longterm FBI surveillance, it’s equally likely that the exhibition created an opportunity for an attack the gunmen had always intended, in which case, the exhibit was just a matter of convenience. That the gunmen were driven by the exhibit’s anti-Islamic message, an expression protected by the right to freedom of speech, is unclear.
What’s uncomfortable is how clearly the exhibition wielded this right to attack those powerless against Islamophobia. The right to freedom of speech goes hand in hand with our responsibility to ensure the powerless has a voice against the powerful.
In this sense, the exhibition’s anti-Islamic message is a dangerous reversal whereby powerless people are marginalised for their faith and the judgement of the powerful is exercised with reinforced discrimination. It’s difficult to see how depicting Mohammed liberates our society to any degree, and any such liberation would be far outweighed by the harm caused to people targeted by religious intolerance.
The majority of reportage is placing the attack in the wider context of the FBI surveillance operation that had been monitoring the two men for some time. However, the relevance of this operation pales in comparison to the uncomfortable truth that the shooting incident was really the perpetration of two attacks that rendered two casualties, the security guard who was shot and the Muslim community further alienated.
Pickwickian 