The Stupidity of Charlie Hebdo

They are not drawings of actual recognisable individuals, are they?

I don't know whether anybody remembers the 1980s jokes about the Ethiopian famine. You can Google some of them. They were quite popular at the time (particularly amongst school children) and I think this is the same kind of 'joke'. It's a play on words about different kinds of pasta, but (in my opinion at least) not the slightest bit satirical or funny.

I don't specially want it banned. I just wonder, why? And how they could do it?

News pictures are a different thing altogether. This is poking fun. Not reporting.

Ok Bags. Who the fuck was Hieronymous Bosch?

Don't answer. don't answer. don't answer!

It is pure mocking.

Of earthquake victims.

TBH, if a member of my family was that badly injured (which has happened, actually) or killed, I don't think I'd be concerning myself with some weirdo cartoonist's impressions. I'd have more important things to think about. So no, I wouldn't feel any more hurt than I was already feeling. And neither would the injured relative.

Why is it necessarily mocking? I don't think it is.

Or if it is mocking, it's mocking Italian food.

Oh it is mocking! "Cartoon" type of drawing has to be. It over emphasises people's imperfections. That's how they get their nefarious (IMO) laughs.

It's mocking the people.

mocking means
making fun of....in a cruel way

so do you think it is not making fun
or not being cruel?
or perhaps both

I don't agree that all cartoon type drawings are mocking. CH omes may be but certainly not all. That's what I was getting at when I was talking about people not always getting cartoons. The cartoon drawing style is not just used for mocking.

I don't think it is cruel. I think it is very weird and it is not to my taste but I don't think it is mocking people. Italian food maybe but not people and it is most certainly not directed at anyone's particular relatives. It is not 'about' anyone real.

I think there is a tendency to take things personally which are not meant personally. That's not a criticism, just an observation.

I dont think cartoonists get their kicks from mocking a plate of pasta personally.

You think that the italian ones are mocking now?

I get that not all cartoons mock.

I think it's incredibly cruel (my opinion). I'm not taking it personally, because I don't have family of friends who were crushed to death in the Italian earthquake.

The italian ones are about real earthquake survivors. And those that did not survive, looking at the lasagne one.

Well, put it this way, if someone had drawn this type of cartoon to depict my brother's injuries, it wouldn't have made the slightest impression compared with seeing The Real Thing and sitting through three and a half weeks of coma and all the subsequent not quite total recovery and the long-term effects of such horrendous injuries as he had. It's just unimportant by comparison.

G'night, folks

I know. I don't really understand why anybody doesn't understand that it's about very 'real' people.

thatbags I think you just argue for the sake of arguing.

Sadly that is the Charlie Hebdo function, to oppose ordinary feeling and emotion, is it good to be challenged like this ? Makes us think doesn't it. Maybe this is a step too far.

You speak as if arguing for the sake of it is a wrong thing to do, eloethan. I call it tackling ideas that I'm uncomforatble with. I like challenging ideas and think it's a good thing to do.

I still don't think the cartoon is about people except indirectly. I think it's about the effect of an earthquake on people: reducing them to a messy mush, so to speak. Which is exactly what earthquakes do. Yes, I am being blunt. I don't think it's a step too far.

Earthquakes hurt real people. Cartoons don't. Bombs hurt real people. Drawings, cartoon or otherwise, of bombs don't. And so on, ad nauseam.

Do you like tackling ideas at other peoples' expense?
Do you like tackling ideas at other peoples' loss?

For your own ammusement

It is like gawping at tragedies.