The list of unhinged statements and rants coming from left-leaning journalists in the wake of the Charlie Hebdo massacre in Paris is getting miles long.
Among them all, one especially sticks out. In one of the earliest retreats to twisted, gutless characterizations of the Charlie Hebdo terrorists, CNN's Christiane Amanpour, who is also ABC's global affairs anchor, called them "activists." Greg Gutfeld of Fox News commented on Amanpour's annihilation of the English langauge and went after the "fear of (right-wing) backlash" mindset on Friday.
Video:
Transcript (bolds are mine):
GREG GUTFELD: It’s good to see all these vocal free speech supporters, many of whom were silent when [Ayaan] Hirsi Ali, Condoleezza Rice and others were kept from speaking on campuses. I suppose you only express solidarity when it's cool, and there's a neat hashtag.
But as we know, one aids terror by blocking speech through the fabrication of offense. We must fight evil, but what happens when the fight is labeled as "bigoted" by the media, our campuses, our leaders? Terror wins.
And so CNN's Christiane Amanpour calls terrorists "activists." I'm really not kidding.
CHRISTIANE AMANPOUR (in a broadcast on the day of the massacre, perhaps even shortly after it took place, given that CNN considered it "Breaking News"): On this day, these activists found their targets, and their targets were journalists. This was a clear attack on the freedom of expression, on the press, and on satire.
GUTFELD: What?
Anyway, and editors worrying more about right-wing reaction to terror than terror itself.
NICHOLAS KRISTOF (at MSNBC on Wednesday, Clip 1): I think they should have been more sensitive. I don't believe in gratuitously offending people.
NICHOLAS KRISTOF (at MSNBC on Wednesday, Clip 2): We have to be really, really careful not to respond to the extraordinary intolerance of these jihadis with our own intolerance.
DAVID ROTHKOPF (at MSNBC on Wednesday, Clip 3): I think we have to be just as worried about the reaction to the attack from nationalists, from right-wingers, from people who have sought to drive this wedge, as it was described earlier, between the Islamic communities and the mainstream communities in Europe.
GUTFELD: I get it. The enemy is pre-ordained. It's us. Which means Howard Dean is right. This is a cult, a cult of apologists. But Dean is also right when he says this is not a religious issue, which means, if I don't see Islam when I fight terror, then you cannot see Islamophobia when I fight it.
What should we see instead? Again, a death cult, one that needs no understanding, just eradication. It would be nice for moderate Muslims to help, but if they don't, we can handle it, it's nothing personal, Muslims. Just step aside.
Finally, where did this cult learn to punish language? From the Quran? From Al Qaeda? How about Harvard, and our modern cult of hate speech activists, who see language as violence, creating speech codes with penalties? Seeing "activists" silence critics so easily must make them drool with envy.
Gutfeld's point about Islamic denial and "Islamophobia" is especially excellent.
As to Amanpour, her history of terror-sympathetic bias runs wide and deep. Just a few of many examples can be found in compilations at the Media Research Center and NewsBusters.
Cross-posted at BizzyBlog.com.
