Tuesday, December 3, 2013

"A conviction will not repair the damage as much as an apology will."

"Bob Dylan is being asked to apologise for remarks he made in an interview that have ran afoul of French anti-racism laws."
The legendary American singer has been charged with inciting hatred by Paris prosecutors after comments made to Rolling Stone magazine last year sparked a complaint from the Council of Croats in France (CRICCF).

"If you got a slave master or Klan in your blood, blacks can sense that. That stuff lingers to this day. Just like Jews can sense Nazi blood and the Serbs can sense Croatian blood," Dylan was quoted as saying in the context of an answer about race relations in the United States.

Dylan, 72, was informed of the charges against him last month, while he was in Paris for three concerts -- a visit during which the French government also awarded him its prestigious Legion d'Honneur decoration.
Although the CRICCF's formal complaint triggered automatic charges under French law, the 'mise en examen' or judicial probe, does not necessarily mean the matter will end up in court. It establishes a prima facie case that an investigating magistrate is required to look into, and the charges can either be pursued or dismissed.
The CRICCF said Tuesday said it was not looking for a conviction of the high-profile singer, and would regard a public apology as more valuable.
Read more about the reasoning behind the possible charge of "incitement" at this Yahoo News link

29 comments:

chickelit said...

The French will have a lot of oeuf on their face if they press Dylan on this.

Dylan will not walk back his words.

Maybe Jerry Lewis can help here.

The Dude said...

Jacques Tati should be the go-to guy. Or maybe Marcel Marceau. They don't mince words.

Michael Haz said...

France is jealous because it doesn't have aging hippie-era musicians.

Although if Dylan landed in a French prison, maybe Hurricane Carter could record a song about him. He owes Bob one.

chickelit said...

Or maybe Marcel Marceau.

I think he'd undermime Bob's cause.

AllenS said...

Take you Legion d'Honneur decoration and the Nobel Peace Prize and shove it where the sun doesn't shine.

edutcher said...

Looks like the old car crash did more damage than anybody thought.

The Dude said...

El Pollo Raylan wrote...

"Or maybe Marcel Marceau.

I think he'd undermime Bob's cause."

It might take a taciturn for the worse.

AllenS said...

An apology is blowin' in the wind.

[Blows on harmonica] ♪ ♫ ♪ ♫

ricpic said...

Inciting hate. Talk about a catchall.

Unknown said...

What is wrong with these people? I want to like the French, but they have a weird authoritarian steak.

bagoh20 said...

The French should be charged with insulting themselves.

And Dylan said a really dumb thing, but at least he didn't sing it.

Michael Haz said...

What's the over/under on the time when Althouse will be all over this topic? I mean, it is Bob Dylan.

I'll say 3:00 PM.

bagoh20 said...

I think Althouse already covered this a few days ago. I haven't commented over there since they showed their ugly side, but I do have an RSS feed that shows me her headlines.

Evi L. Bloggerlady said...

Man, the French are stepping all over someone's rant.

Chip Ahoy said...

If you got a slave master or Klan in your blood, blacks can sense that.

What a load. You can have that in your blood and not know it yourself.

What is he saying that isn't vapidly racially antagonistic?Asshole. They cannot sense shit if they must be spoken as a group, or else they'd sense their own racism en masse and Oprah wouldn't be so self-unaware. They came out of the woodworks to vote for a man based solely on race. A rejection of MLK, The very definition of bias, racial discrimination, and straight up racism. As a group, if we must, they have a very long way to go to not be the thing they cast upon others so glibly. Slave master? Klan? Where do you come up with this shit?

People get transfused. That is a whole lot of blood from unknown historic sources. Does Dylan suppose blacks sense traces of racism in that?

Can they sense racism within adoptions? According to Dylan they can.

Dylan is a loon and I never did like him. For some reason I do have his songs on my i-tunes and they're all wearisome shit.

Except for Isis because that's about Egypt.

And Black Diamond Bay is okay too. But everything else is shit. Here's how to tell, whenever one comes on you go, oh shit skip to the next song and if that one is Dylan too then you go, aw doubleshit skip ahead again.

If that is a poetic way of saying Blacks sense any trace of non-observable racism then Dylan is out of his mthrfkn projective mind. Thank you, France, for smacking Dylan off his clueless stump.

Amartel said...

Free speech helps you to identify who the assholes are. Let Bob talk! (Bob favors declarations of unproveable transgenerational neverending hostilities. Yay.)

Icepick said...

So, did the interview happen in France? Or is it just that Rolling Stone gets sold in French airports or something? As an American, I'm in favor of largely unfettered free speech, but if the French want to restrict freedom of speech in France, that's their business. This idea of bringing people up on charges even if what they said was elsewhere, well, that's fucked up.

Michael Haz said...

If you got a slave master or Klan in your blood, blacks can sense that.

If you've got $100 in your pocket, the tax man can sense that.

Michael Haz said...

It doesn't take a blood hound to know which way the blood flows.

Lydia said...

The whole notion of "sensing" and "blood" is repulsive, and I'm glad Dylan is being called out on it. It's really not different in kind from what a German, born in 1933, once said to me about Jews -- that he could "feel" them.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The whole notion of "sensing" and "blood" is repulsive...

But it's Bob Dylan, so it's ok... I guess.

Amartel said...

The Story of the Hurricane was, apparently, I've read, a crock. But I really liked the song ...

Aridog said...

Obama has slave-master and/or klan in his blood.

chickelit said...

If you have French armpit genes, people can sense that.

ampersand said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Synova said...

The quote is pretty darn silly, but inciting racism?

I'm very confused.

William said...

There is no ethnicity, ideology, or religion that allows man to transcend his biases. We're all cut on the bias and cut on our biases. That includes Dylan although, like many on the left, he thinks that since he doesn't have the biases of a Nazi or a klansman, then he doesn't have any biases....There are no protest songs about, say, the ethnic cleansing of the Chinese from Vietnam by the Communists. The left doesn't have sufficient imagination to be offended by crimes committed by those not on their official oppressor list.

William said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Mitch H. said...

It's a damn stupid thing to say, but [aphorism]the only solution to bad speech is more speech[/aphorism], and the French can stuff it where the sun don't shine.

Although if they want to trade Bob for Roman Polanski, I'm sure Bob would be willing to do the time for a good cause.