LIMITES PARA LO ILIMITADO, AUNQUE SEA LA LIBERTAD DE EXPRESIÓN.

(*)http://mondoweiss.net/2015/01/moral-hysteria-charlie 

Conocernos a nosotros mismos, conocer nuestra mente, dice este profesor británico en el campo de la filosofía, es lo que la muerte de los caricaturistas del periódico francés exige de cada uno de nosotros. ¿Hay límites para lo que se considera ilimitado: la “libertad de expresión”? 

Los hay, pero para saber cuáles son la persona que los exige de otros ha de conocerlos en sí misma. Y de ahí que no todo puede ser ridiculizado, hecho sátira o motivo de burla. 

El escritor nos hace considerar como un experimento mental la posibilidad de que las masas, manifestándose a favor de los seres humanos asesinados, confrontaran a un hombre solo, enarbolando una pancarta que les pudiera resultar ofensiva. ¿Actuarían ellos como los fieles defensores de la libertad de expresión que  en ese instante creían serlo, o arremeterían contra ese ser humano, él  solo exigiendo respeto a su derecho para expresarse, y acaso no lo harían en nombre de la libertad de expresión que decían defender? 

Para ser conscientes de tales contradicciones se hace necesario el autoconocimiento. El “conócete a ti mismo” del viejo Sócrates. 

Pero todos sabemos que una cosa es obrar cuando uno está en posesión de uno mismo, y otra cosa bien diferente cuando uno  se siente parte de una masa. 

Sea que defienda o ataque la libertad de expresión, o cualquier otro tipo de libertad. 

El antídoto para no cometer excesos, y tomar decisiones correctas,  es uno y solo uno, parece decirnos este sabio profesor, y se llama reflexión  filosófica la cual se ha de llevar acabo solo, no en masa.

lmp

OoO

 (*) The moral hysteria of Je suis charlie

Brian Klug on January 11, 2015 

I read this on a blog yesterday; it is a version of a claim that has been made over and over again in the last couple of days, lionising Charlie Hebdo: “In its cartoons, Charlie Hebdo did not discriminate. The magazine lampooned all and sundry in its cartoons: racists, bigots, right-wing politicians, the uber-rich, Judaism, Christianity, Islam, and more.” And what does ‘more’ include? More to the point: what does it not include? Did they, for example, lampoon journalists who, in the name of freedom of expression, mock Muslims and Jews regardless of the consequences? Did they, in other words, ever satirize themselves? Apparently Charlie Hebdo has announced it will produce a million copies of its next issue. Will this issue ridicule the scenes of mourning and solemn demonstrations on the grand boulevards of Paris, poking fun at people who raised pens skyward and lit candles in the dark? And why not? Nothing is sacred. Wouldn’t this be just the kind of outrageous act, defying convention and challenging popular ideas of decency, that puts freedom of expression to the test?

Here is a thought experiment: Suppose that while the demonstrators stood solemnly at Place de la Republique the other night, holding up their pens and wearing their “je suis charlie” badges, a man stepped out in front brandishing a water pistol and wearing a badge that said “je suis cherif” (the first name of one of the two brothers who gunned down the Charlie Hebdo staff). Suppose he was carrying a placard with a cartoon depicting the editor of the magazine lying in a pool of blood, saying, “Well I’ll be a son of a gun!” or “You’ve really blown me away!” or some such witticism. How would the crowd have reacted? Would they have laughed? Would they have applauded this gesture as quintessentially French? Would they have seen this lone individual as a hero, standing up for liberty and freedom of speech? Or would they have been profoundly offended? And infuriated. And then what? Perhaps many of them would have denounced the offender, screaming imprecations at him. Some might have thrown their pens at him. One or two individuals — two brothers perhaps — might have raced towards him and (cheered on by the crowd) attacked him with their fists, smashing his head against the ground. All in the name of freedom of expression. He would have been lucky to get away with his life.

Masses of people have turned the victims of a horrific assassination (which the staff of the magazine truly are) into heroes of France and free speech. The point of the thought experiment is not to show that such people are hypocrites. Rather, it is to suggest that they don’t know their own minds. They see themselves as committed to the proposition that there are no limits to freedom of expression: no subject so sensitive, no symbol so sacrosanct, that it cannot be sent up, sneered at and parodied, consequences be damned. They call this “courage” and they think it is the defining difference between them and the killers – and not just the killers but anyone who thinks there are limits to what can be said or printed. But they too have their limits. They just don’t know it.

When people don’t know their own minds — but think they do — they are liable to be swept away by self-righteous moral passion; which is just what we don’t need as the storm clouds gather on the European horizon.

About Brian Klug

Brian Klug is senior research fellow in philosophy at St Benet's Hall, Oxford and member of the Faculty of Philosophy at Oxford University. He is an honorary fellow in the Parkes Institute for the Study of Jewish/non-Jewish Relations at the University of Southampton, associate editor of Patterns of Prejudice and a co-founder of Independent Jewish Voices (UK).

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