People Are Furious With Charlie Hebdo For Publishing This Controversial Aylan Kurdi Cartoon

French satire magazine Charlie Hebdo is picking up tons of abuse at the moment after they published a cartoon based on drowned Syrian refugee Aylan Kurdi.

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The image includes text that reads ‘Welcome to migrants!’, ‘So near his goal…’, a McDonald’s-style promotion offering ‘2 kids menus for the price of one’ and ‘Proof that Europe is Christian. Christians walk on water — Muslim children sink.’

Some reckon that Charlie Hebdo – who you’ll remember lost 11 staff in a terror attack earlier in the year — were mocking Aylan. That seems unthinkable but of course they’ll have known the reaction this illustration would stir up. Some have even suggested that the Hebdo answer to the International Criminal Court.

https://twitter.com/SimplyRim/status/643025434830065664?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

However a dude named Maajid Nawag who is part of counter-extremism think-tank ‘Quillam’, sees the cartoon differently. He wrote on Facebook:

Taste is in the eye of the beholder.

But these cartoons are a damning indictment on our anti-refugee sentiment.

The McDonald’s image is a searing critique of heartless European consumerism in the face of one of the worst human tragedies of our times.

The image about Christians walking on water while Muslims drown is (so obviously) critiquing hypocritical European Christian “love”.

Fellow Muslims, not everything and everyone are against us, every time. But if we keep assuming they are by reacting like this, they will surely become so.

Journalist Sunny Hundal agreed:

I’ve seen a LOT of angry FB posts today about the cover from the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo, which apparently mocks the dead Syrian child Aylan Kurdi.

It does not do that! It is actually mocking Europeans and their attitudes towards Muslims. It is annoying to see people claim the opposite.

Regardless, is it still a bit much to use the boy to make that point so soon after his death?

Charlie Hebdo publishes cartoon of Aylan Kurdi. Because nothing says satire like a dead kid. http://t.co/qoK8nQJ8ol

— Gary Younge (@garyyounge) September 14, 2015

I get it. I do. But at what cost? Should I mock the neo-Nazis by using gas chambers? No thanks. Have some taste. https://t.co/bZN8VSGU5y

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) September 14, 2015

This is racism pure and simple and I say again: I am not Charlie. Charlie Hebdo mocks the death of Syrian toddler: http://t.co/fHDcaYJAEJ

— Deepa Kumar (@ProfessorKumar) September 15, 2015