Je Suis Right Charlie

It occurred to me the other day that if I had somehow known nothing of the events in Paris last week and had simply come across the phrase 'Je suis Charlie' trending everywhere, I might have thought it some kind of belated tribute to the late Charlie Cairoli, the clown who blighted my childhood.  I should make clear here that Cairoli - who died in 1980 - didn't personally harass me: it was worse than that - he blighted every UK child's life in the 1970s.  The BBC back then had this curious idea that children found clowns funny, so persisted in allowing Cairoli and his troupe onto children's TV, culminating in him having his own show, Right Charlie!, for several years.  The problem was, of course, that clowns just aren't funny.  Not even to children.  But being children, we were transfixed by TV and when we came home from school just watched it, regardless of what was on or whether or not we liked it - so we all had to endure Charlie bloody Cairoli.  Once a week, every week, for six weeks at a time (the length of each series of Right Charlie!) we sat unsmiling and unamused through twenty five minutes of his excruciating slapstick clowning.

Quite why the world would want to pay tribute to Charlie Cairoli, some thirty five years after his death, I have no idea, which was where my idle speculations foundered.  However, I did think that my hypothetical Cairoli confusion might provide those who have a problem with the whole 'Je suis Charlie' thing with a solution.  If they were to imagine that they are simply paying tribute to a long dead clown rather than a satire magazine whose content they disapprove of. then they could satisfy their desire to uphold the principle of free speech without condoning cartoons of Mohammed which they clearly find offensive.  I can't help but feel those who are getting so worked up about the idea of being identified with what they see as offensive content if they show any support for 'Charlie Hebdo' magazine are sorely missing the point.  Satire, by its very nature, is always going to be offensive to someone.  I can only judge 'Charlie Hebdo's' content on the little I've seen since the attack on its offices and, to be perfectly frank, some of it does seem to tread a very fine line between satire and outright racism.  Certainly, I wouldn't be comfortable running some of it on The Sleaze.   But the point is that nothing is so offensive as to justify murder and, surely, we should support victims of such over reactions.  Which is what the 'Je suis Charlie' thing is about - not condoning the content, but merely acknowledging that the reaction to it was outrageous and beyond the pale.  We need to show solidarity because who knows what fanatics or lunatics might find something we write so offensive they  might consider using violence to silence us?  We have to show solidarity so as to deter them by showing that such actions won't silence us.  So, 'Je suis Right Charlie'.