printLots of displays of profound, understandable sorrow are underway around the Western world, in response to the massacre by native (as in French) Muslims of French journalists and caricaturists. Plaintive signs and symbols are being held up, mournfully. In Barcelona, Brussels, London, Paris, Nice, Lyon, tens of thousands of Europeans are flaunting their feelings: “Je Suis Charlie,” “Not Afraid.” Pencils and notepads are being piled up on sidewalks, symbolically.
But where is the rage?
Anderson Cooper interviewed a French “documentary maker”—a title everyone with a camera assumes these days. The Frenchman declared that we were winning. How so? Coming out en masse to plonk teddy bears on a sidewalk: Is that winning?
As Diana West observed, “Islamic blasphemy law, the barbarous essence of mainstream, authoritative Islam,” is making progress in the West. West, like myself, looked to the Netherlands’ Geert Wilders for a prescription.
The assassinations of ten journalists and two policemen today in Paris serve as a warning to all the countries in the free world. We are at war. Charlie Hebdo was under police protection following numerous threats because of its outspoken criticism of Islam. Despite the protection by the police, terrorists were able to murder their opponents.
He gave it.
If we continue dying while we practice what we believe in; how, pray tell, are we winning?
UPDATED (1/8): More of What Winning Looks Like In The West:
We contribute “an outpouring of art in response,” as signatories to the dhimma pact (“pact of surrender”) at CNN called the response to the execution of irreverent talent in Paris.
We add a plural option to the rallying cry, Je Suis Charlie: We are Charlie Hebdo – Nous Sommes Charlie.