François-Marie Arouet fought for freedom of expression. Voltaire, as he later called himself, took great risks to do so. Undaunted, he criticised the fanaticism of religions – 244 years after his death, he is now an example of kowtowing to Islamism.
A poem about the rumour that Philippe of Orléans, the short-term reigning brother of the late Sun King, had fathered a child with his daughter put Voltaire behind bars. As punishment, he was sent into exile. During his imprisonment he wrote “Oedipus”. In it, he also processed the doubts about his own origins.
He became the epitome of a fighter for freedom of expression. Fearlessly, he criticised the fanaticism of religions. With consequences: He was refused a Catholic funeral in Paris. But today he is almost more persecuted than he once was by the Catholics. Muslims have been opposing the performance of his play “Mahomet the Prophet” for thirty years now. A poetic statement against religious fanaticism and against the hypocrisy and arbitrariness of the powerful, it was influenced by the ideas of the Enlightenment. In the Arab world, Voltaire is a bogeyman for doing so, summarises the “FAZ” in an article.
And so Voltaire is to be “cancelled”. The usual suspects are also getting in on the act. At a “Black Lives Matter” demonstration in France, there was a spray paint attack on a statue. The clean-up has now been going on for two years. And here the fate of the satirist repeats itself: once cleaned, the statue is placed in the courtyard of the medical faculty. Lockable behind an iron gate – to protect it from religious extremists.
https://exxpress.at/kniefall-vor-islamisten-voltaire-statue-kommt-hinter-gitter/
