In this week’s podcast Jeff explores the Muslim/Western fault lines exposed in the Charlie Hebdo massacre, where twelve people were killed in an attack on the satirical magazine by Muslim extremists who were offended by their depictions of Muhammad. In the 2nd half of the show, Jeff is joined by special guest Amir Ahmad Nasr, author of The Future of Islam In the Age of New Media, and My Isl@m: How Fundamentalism Stole My Mind–And Doubt Freed My Soul.
Remember, this season we are offering not just the full podcast (in the player at the bottom of this post), but also an edited written transcript, as well as some bite-sized excerpts.
EXCERPT 1 AN ASSAULT ON MODERNITY
JEFF: “From an evolutionary perspective, Charlie Hebdois less a story about the crazy, violent elements in our society, and more a story of how small a part of our world the crazy violent elements have become.”
“I think of it as the pain-versus-gain ratio. As we develop (as cultures and individuals), it takes less and less pain to give us more and more gain. Last week I talked about how Nazi Germany conducted an industrial genocide of six million people, one of the most horrific events in human history. Today, Germany is one of the most civilized, intelligent, pacified, industrious nations on earth, as well as officially the most admired nation on earth. Just seventy years later — it’s astonishing!
“Did the historic horror create the present peace and prosperity? I’d say yes. One of the engines of evolution is the realization of the painful consequences of one’s own actions. We realized that there is a better way forward. That there is new insight, new wisdom, and an ever larger circle of compassion available to us. This is built into our development.”
EXCERPT 2 INTERVIEW WITH AMIR AHMAD NASR
AMIR: “Something big that’s really emerging [in Muslim culture] is the change in the media landscape that has happened over the past two decades. I’m not just talking about the internet and social media, I’m also talking about satellite TV because that’s how it started. Take for instance the series Friends. Friends is subtitled in Arabic and is extremely popular in the Arab world.
“You had certain episodes in which Russ and Monica would express their Jewish faith. For some viewers, it’s like, ‘Wait a second. They’re Jewish characters…how interesting;’ but then you just go along and laugh. When American pop culture started being broadcast a lot of people started asking questions like, ‘Why do they get to live like that? Why do they get to do these things? Ooh,let’s tune in.’
“People began to just understand the world differently. And they see that they have a certain kind of individuality that they can express, and they want to express it. And then comes the social media, and now it’s a two-way conversation. It’s not just information being broadcasted at you. You can go and seek information. Saudi Arabia is where you will find the highest consumption of YouTube per capita in the world, often young women educating themselves.”
FULL PODCAST BELOW INCLUDES BOTH EXCERPTS PLUS FURTHER COMMENTARY ON:
- How Integral thinking helps us hold multiple perspectives
- How the pre-modern Muslim mind is wired for magic, not logic
- How myth conquers and organizes magic to support more complex consciousness
- The spirit of blasphemy and it’s place in the ascent of humanity
- Am I Charlie Hebdo? Yes, as long as I remember I am everybody else as well
The Daily Evolver | Episode 109 | Am I Charlie Hebdo? An Integralist Considers the Events in Paris
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Hello Jeff,
This was excellent integral coverage of a hot topic, as usual. Thank you. But…(always a but, huh?)…I don’t feel the conversation has gone far enough or deep enough.
What has dismayed me by media coverage of both the hacks on Sony pictures around the movie “The Interview” and the murderous attacks at Charlie Hebdo is that there has been almost no commentary around the moral decision-making of either Sony and the makers of “The Interview” or of the folks at Charlie in choosing to publish the cartoons. I have thought about this a lot and feel that the morality line of development is one that has been excluded from the discussion–and I’m not talking about the morality of the North Korean leader or jhadists at this point, but the morality of Westerners, and particularly in this case, “Hollywood” and journalists, including cartoon journalists.
From Seth Rogan to Sony execs, from George Clooney to President Obama, the outcry around the hacking of Sony has been about the right to freedom of speech. I immediately thought of Kohlberg’s studies on moral development, and Carol Gilligan’s, and it appears to me that Kohlberg’s emphasis on rights has won the day in this circumstance, without there being much regard for Gilligan’s emphasis on responsibility. Just because one has a right to freedom of speech does not mean that exercising it is a responsible or moral thing to do. This applies to Charlie Hebdo as well. In what way is it a responsible act, much less a caring one, to offend, provoke and antagonize persons and groups of people that one knows are given to decidedly immature or dangerous, violent behavior?
An integral morality applied to decisions and actions would cover all bases, not just rights and justice, but responsibility and care. It seems only after the second cartoon at Charlie have some of the mainstream media decided to not reprint/republish that cartoon (NBC, PBS, to name two). Because they learned it could provoke unwanted consequences such as death? Of course.
Freedom of speech is of course a cherished and treasured right, but it is a right that has to be exercised with care and responsibility, and in my opinion, that applies to Hollywood and the media as well. When an editor at Charlie states they want to keep the “spirit of blasphemy” alive, I question whether the beloved right to freedom of speech is in good hands; I wonder about where the line is drawn between this type of free speech and hate speech.
Mostly I wonder why there has been hardly any discussion of this issue, the judgment or lack thereof used by Sony and Charlie in releasing their “art.” I feel one of the reasons is perhaps because a framework in which to discuss the issues has not been apparent. I feel you could do some good with this, at least for the community that tunes into your recordings/writings, and I encourage you to take it on. Thank you.
Dear friends, This answer is coming rather late, BUT I’m glad to have let time support my reflecting on this drama….what a complicated issue indeed, La Wanna I basically agree with what you say, however it seems to me that EVERYTHING that’s said everywhere refers again again to only a part of the story, and does NOT strecht all the way to what to me is really really what matter: the ultimate consequence of our choice of stand-point – whichever it is, of course.
I first like to point that the slogan is “I am Charlie”, it is NOT “I am Charlie Hebdo”: it’s not the same! “I am Charlie” means “I stand for freedom” – whereas “I am Charlie Hebdo” would stand for “I fully agree with “. Beleive me for being french and in France and having taken part in the big sunday march, most of us while standing for freedom and showing our outrage and our compassionand ABIOVE ALL sending a serious wake up call, do not necessarily blindly agree with the newspaper itself.
This is too long a story to tell here – my personal stand is that, while not fully agreeing with the cartoons in question, while disagreeing with that (stange, weird) use of the word “blasphemy” – please however do look up the original meaning of this word in dictionnaries – my stand is that IF we forbid the kind of publication like Charlie Hebdo, this is the end my friends, the end of freedom. Freedom point. By all means: supporting the publication does NOT mean we have to or do agree with it! All are welcomed to express their disagreement! Need it be said!
ALSO: These particular cartoons are NOT an attack on any religion as such whatsoever. I’ve read somewhere that “the french state” discourages religions!!!!!” What a terrible thing and terribly ignorant thing to say ! France is indeed a laïc state, which thus garanties the right for ALL religions to be.
I hope I make (some) sense, my sense in any case. Food for thinking….With love……and hope…..