Heroic Lefties

[Doggy Styles]

As in the Soviet Union, North Korea?

British Leyland?

[DodgyAgent]

Dodgy, on the face of it it is generous of you to praise the spirit of those from a widely different part of the political spectrum. But in fact historically the Left have always had to fight much more than the Right. The Right generally attempt to achieve their aims by obtaining or holding on to power; the Left often strive to achieve worthwhile aims against the odds.

As in the Soviet Union, North Korea?

[Ignis Fatuus]

Lefties they may be but they have guts. Maggie would be proud of them.
.....

Dodgy, on the face of it it is generous of you to praise the spirit of those from a widely different part of the political spectrum. But in fact historically the Left have always had to fight much more than the Right. The Right generally attempt to achieve their aims by obtaining or holding on to power; the Left often strive to achieve worthwhile aims against the odds.

[d000hg]

Yeah but it's a great way to get a bit of publicity.

[nomadd]

If you make money and gain notoriety from it are you really doing it "in the name of freedom of expression" or simply for your own sense of self gratification/importance?

Freedom of expression.

EDIT: Google Images returns "About 381,000,000 results (0.26 seconds)" on a search of "mohammed." I don't think all 381,000,000 of those image creators are getting paid for their work.

[Robinho]

[d000hg]

If you make money and gain notoriety from it are you really doing it "in the name of freedom of expression" or simply for your own sense of self gratification/importance?

[SimonMac]

KUATB

[DodgyAgent]

Lefties they may be but they have guts. Maggie would be proud of them.

No rules, no regrets for French cartoonists in Mohammad storm | Reuters

Sometimes funny, often crass, always irreverent. Charlie Hebdo, the French satirical weekly that has published lewd cartoons of the Prophet Mohammad is a serial offender and proud of it.

As copies of the magazine priced at 2.50 euros ($3.25) flew off French news stands on Wednesday, its publishers insisted as always on their right to poke fun at all symbols of political and religious authority in the name of freedom of expression.

Several of the caricatures relied on drawings of genitals to mock the furor over a film made in the United States that depicts the Prophet as a lecher, confirming Charlie Hebdo's reputation for no-limits satire.

"To me, these religious hardliners who protest and kill over a crappy film are no different to the people who made the crappy film. They're all the same pack, a bunch of assholes," editor Stephane Charbonnier, under police protection since printing similar caricatures last November, told Reuters.

Some of the cartoonists who work with him now are diehards who worked in the 1960s for a publication - Hara-Kiri - whose self-proclaimed ambition was to be "inane and nasty".

That publication was banned in 1970 after publishing a mock death notice inspired by two events that traumatized the nation - the death of General Charles de Gaulle at his country abode in Colombey, east of Paris, and a discotheque blaze that killed close to 150 people.

"Ball tragedy in Colombey. One dead," Hara-Kiri said in a headline that led to it being ordered shut.

Reborn as Charlie Hebdo months later, the tradition remained the same - viscerally anti-establishment and critical of all religious persuasions.

It once greeted the Pope, head of the Roman Catholic faith, with a headline that read "Bienvenu au Pape de merde", words that roughly translate as "Welcome crappy pope".

This week's foray followed another in November 2011 when the weekly enraged Muslims by renaming itself Charia Hebdo, a play on the French word for Islamic sharia law, and in 2006 when it republished Danish cartoons that caused protests and at least 50 deaths worldwide.

To this day, it sticks steadfastly to a tradition that makes waves, and more money when the waves crash hard.

"This is a satirical paper produced by left-wingers and when I say left-wingers that goes all the way from anarchists to communists to Greens, Socialists and the rest. Above all it is a secular and atheist newspaper," said Charbonnier, who signs his own sketches and goes by the name of "Charb".

"When we attack the Catholic hard right...nobody talks about it in the papers. It's as if Charie Hebdo has official authorization to attack the Catholic hard right. But we are not allowed to make fun of Muslim hardliners. It's the new rule...but we will not obey it," he says.

Charbonnier said the heavy demand meant he would print a fresh run of about 70,000 copies to meet demand for the latest controversial edition, as it did when it made waves last year.