by Damozel | I am as politically correct as it is possible be, because "politically correct" is just another word for "civil," which is the root of "civilized." I'm a civilized person, so I would never dream of insulting the religious views of another person.
But that's a choice I've made. In my milieu, a different one would threaten all my most valued social relationships and cause my peers to look at me askance and with beetling brows. What I'm saying is: nobody has to force me to be civil.
But what about those who are less tolerant? While I feel free to look askance at them myself, it would never occur to me to force either tolerance or courtesy down their throats, since that wouldn't be, you know, civil. Nor would it occur to me to try to get them thrown in jail to shut them up.
Furthermore, the idea of doing either strikes me as eminently dangerous. If you silence the intolerant (including the crazy and the vile), how will you know who they are? Among other benefits, free speech helps us identify the people we need to move away from when they sit down next to us on the bus. So though I am in favor of social censure for the non-PC, the following trend -- discussed here by Jonathan Turley, who hopes the US won't go along with it -- disturbs me:
Emblematic of the assault is the effort to pass an international ban on religious defamation supported by United Nations General Assembly President Miguel d'Escoto Brockmann. Brockmann is a suspended Roman Catholic priest who served as Nicaragua's foreign minister in the 1980s under the Sandinista regime, the socialist government that had a penchant for crushing civil liberties before it was tossed out of power in 1990. Since then, Brockmann has literally embraced such free-speech-loving figures as Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, whom he wrapped in a bear hug at the U.N. last year.
The U.N. resolution, which has been introduced for the past couple of years, is backed by countries such as Saudi Arabia, one of the most repressive nations when it comes to the free exercise of religion. Blasphemers there are frequently executed.....
While it hasn't gone so far as to support the U.N. resolution, the West is prosecuting "religious hatred" cases under anti-discrimination and hate-crime laws. British citizens can be arrested and prosecuted under the 2006 Racial and Religious Hatred Act, which makes it a crime to "abuse" religion. In 2008, a 15-year-old boy was arrested for holding up a sign reading "Scientology is not a religion, it is a dangerous cult" outside the organization's London headquarters. Earlier this year, the British police issued a public warning that insulting Scientology would now be treated as a crime....
In May 2008, Dutch prosecutors arrested cartoonist Gregorius Nekschot for insulting Christians and Muslims with a cartoon that caricatured a Christian fundamentalist and a Muslim fundamentalist as zombies who meet at an anti-gay rally and want to marry.
Last September, Italian prosecutors launched an investigation of comedian Sabina Guzzanti for joking about Pope Benedict VXI. "In 20 years, [he] will be dead and will end up in hell, tormented by queer demons, and very active ones," she said at a rally.
In February, Rowan Laxton, an aide to British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, was arrested for "inciting religious hatred" when, watching news reports of Israel's bombardment of Gaza while exercising at his gym, he allegedly shouted obscenities about Israelis and Jews at the television.
Also in February, Britain barred controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders from entry because of his film "Fitna," which describes the Koran as a "fascist" book and Islam as a violent religion. Wilders was declared a "threat to public policy, public security or public health."....
Even countries that the United States has helped liberate have joined the assault on free speech, rejecting the core values of our First Amendment. Afghan journalist Sayed Perwiz Kambakhsh was sentenced to death under Sharia law last year just for downloading Internet material on the role of women in Islamic societies that authorities judged to be blasphemous. The provincial deputy attorney general, Hafizullah Khaliqyar, has been quoted as saying: "Journalists are supporting Kambakhsh. I will arrest any journalist trying to support him after this."
Not only does this trend threaten free speech, freedom of association and a free press, it even undermines free exercise of religion. Challenging the beliefs of other faiths can be part of that exercise. Countries such as Saudi Arabia don't prosecute blasphemers to protect the exercise of all religions but to protect one religion. (WaPo)
As Turley says, "[F]ree speech is not limited to non-offensive subjects. The purpose of free speech is to be able to challenge widely held views." And also, though Turley doesn't say so, to allow us to identify those who hold them so we can avoid them or challenge them. If people can't speak, for example, the wrong ideas of -- let's say -- the far right don't get challenged.
If I believed suppressing hate speech also suppressed the hatred, I'd of course feel differently about this. But we know that it doesn't. Hatred, unexpressed, festers on in the heart. Know your enemy, I say...
Memeorandum has more.
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