Particle.news
Download on the App Store

Charlie Hebdo Cartoon of Rokhaya Diallo as Josephine Baker Draws Political Fire

The magazine frames the drawing as an illustration for a special issue on the “gravediggers of laïcité,” calling the racism allegation a manipulation.

Overview

  • Rokhaya Diallo denounced the depiction as racist and rooted in colonial imagery, saying it seeks to place her within a racial and sexist hierarchy.
  • Charlie Hebdo says the Riss cartoon accompanies an article titled “Rokhaya Diallo, la petite fiancée de l’Amérique,” which criticizes her stance on France’s 1905 secularism law.
  • Support for Diallo poured in from the left, including numerous La France insoumise lawmakers and Socialist Party leader Olivier Faure.
  • LFI deputy Antoine Léaument, MP Nadège Abomangoli, and IRIS director Pascal Boniface publicly condemned the drawing, with some calling it “infâme.”
  • The clash renews a long‑running dispute over universalism and laïcité and unfolds against the paper’s post‑2015 security constraints, with no legal action reported.