Another Terrible Court Decision In Europe: Insulting A Religion Is Not Free Speech
from the wait,-what? dept
Let's start off with the basics, because if I don't, I know we'll be flooded with these comments: no, the European concept of "free speech" differs quite a bit from the American one. The American 1st Amendment creates extremely strong protections for all sorts of expression -- including insulting or offending expression. Europe has always been a bit more willing to shove various exceptions into the right of freedom of expression, while mostly paying lip service to the concept. Article 10 of the Human Rights Act says that you have the right to your own opinions and the freedom to share them without government interference but, in practice, Europe has always been much quicker in brushing that aside in order to engage in all sorts of censorship from prior restraint to rewriting history.
And, according to a new ruling from the European Court of Human Rights, another exception to free expression is that you can't disparage religions because it might hurt the feelings of religious practitioners. No, really.
The case, which was originally brought in Austria, involved a woman who hosted an event where she made a bunch of silly and misleading claims about Muslims and the Prophet Muhammad, in particular, claiming that because one of his marriages was to a very young girl, there was an implication that he was a pedophile (and further, strongly implying that other Muslims sought to emulate Muhammad). I'm not entirely clear as to why anyone cares what someone did over a thousand years ago (nor could anyone know with any real certainly what actually happened), but either way, some were offended by these comments -- and that's fine. If someone says offensive things, it's reasonable for some to take offense.
But to claim its a human rights violation?
Multiple lower courts found that such comments could not be permitted, and it finally went up to the European Court of Human Rights, where much of the discussion centered around what the court believed was a clash, of sorts, between freedom to express opinions and freedom to manifest religion. And, the court comes down in this with an argument that would be laughed out of any US court, in that it sets up a "balancing" test. As Ken White has explained multiple times, the Supreme Court in the US doesn't recognize any "balancing" test when it comes to free speech. In US v. Stevens, the Supreme Court explicitly rejected any sort of balancing test:
The Government's proposed test would broadly balance the value of the speech against its societal costs to determine whether the First Amendment even applies. But the First Amendment's free speech guarantee does not extend only to categories of speech that survive an ad hoc balancing of relative social costs and benefits. The Amendment itself reflects a judgment by the American people that the benefits of its restrictions on the Government outweigh the costs.
With this ruling, the ECHR has clearly stated that it's going in the exact opposite direction. It directly argues that one’s free speech can be limited by law if it somehow interferes with someone else's "religious feelings."
While the applicant stressed that her statements had never been aimed at disparaging Muhammad, she did not dispute the legitimate purpose of criminal convictions under Article 188 of the Criminal Code, namely to protect religious peace. The Court endorses the Government’s assessment that the impugned interference pursued the aim of preventing disorder by safeguarding religious peace, as well as protecting religious feelings, which corresponds to protecting the rights of others...
And, while Europeans may argue, this is madness. It is exceptionally dangerous to free speech. I'm not advocating that anyone should be running around spewing ignorant arguments about religious figures that people adore, but saying that you can block free speech if it will "prevent disorder" or "protect religious feelings," means that you've created a massive heckler's veto. All you need to do is claim that hearing the speech will make you and your friends riot, or say it's truly insulted your religious "feelings", and suddenly it means the speech is not allowed. That's crazy and will lead to lots of abuse and questionable situations where people censor themselves to avoid any liability at all.
There's also some truly bizarre and incomprehensible language about how, because free expression includes "duties and responsibilities", that also means you must "ensure the peaceful enjoyment" of others’ religious beliefs. And the court states this right after noting that freedom of expression should allow for offensive, shocking and disturbing comments from non-believers about a religion:
The Court reiterates the fundamental principles underlying its judgments relating to Article 10 .... Freedom of expression constitutes one of the essential foundations of a democratic society and one of the basic conditions for its progress and for each individual’s self-fulfilment. Subject to paragraph 2 of Article 10, it is applicable not only to “information” or “ideas” that are favourably received or regarded as inoffensive or as a matter of indifference, but also to those that offend, shock or disturb. The Court further notes that there is little scope... for restrictions on political speech or on debate on questions of public interest.... Those who choose to exercise the freedom to manifest their religion under Article 9 of the Convention, irrespective of whether they do so as members of a religious majority or a minority, therefore cannot expect to be exempt from criticism. They must tolerate and accept the denial by others of their religious beliefs and even the propagation by others of doctrines hostile to their faith
So, while that sounds reasonable, in the very next paragraph the court pulls out a "however..." and then proceeds to basically rip to shreds everything in the paragraph above.
... however, the exercise of the freedom of expression carries with it duties and responsibilities. Amongst them, in the context of religious beliefs, is the general requirement to ensure the peaceful enjoyment of the rights guaranteed under Article 9 to the holders of such beliefs including a duty to avoid as far as possible an expression that is, in regard to objects of veneration, gratuitously offensive to others and profane
And then it's right back to the old balancing game:
The issue before the Court therefore involves weighing up the conflicting interests of the exercise of two fundamental freedoms, namely the right of the applicant to impart to the public her views on religious doctrine on the one hand, and the right of others to respect for their freedom of thought, conscience and religion on the other
The Court, towards the end, tries to argue that it's really only the truly egregious insults that will matter, but gives little guidance at all on that:
The Court reiterates that a religious group must tolerate the denial by others of their religious beliefs and even the propagation by others of doctrines hostile to their faith, as long as the statements at issue do not incite hatred or religious intolerance. Article 188 of the Criminal Code (see paragraph 24 above) in fact does not incriminate all behaviour that is likely to hurt religious feelings or amounts to blasphemy, but additionally requires that the circumstances of such behaviour were able to arouse justified indignation, therefore aiming at the protection of religious peace and tolerance. The Court notes that the domestic courts extensively explained why they considered that the applicant’s statements had been capable of arousing justified indignation, namely that they had not been made in an objective manner aiming at contributing to a debate of public interest, but could only be understood as having been aimed at demonstrating that Muhammad was not a worthy subject of worship... The Court endorses this assessment.
And what if I were to join a religion focused on worshiping free speech -- and declared that this ridiculous ruling harmed my religious feelings by suggesting such worship was not only misplaced, but illegal? Would I then be able to claim the Court itself had violated my apparent rights to not have my religious feelings offended?
Again, no matter what you think of the nameless plaintiff's statements, which were silly, the idea that (1) that should be balanced against how upset it might make people and (2) that the balance should weigh against her, seems crazy and outright offensive to freedom of expression.
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Filed Under: article 10, echr, europe, european court of human rights, free speech, human rights, religion, religious feelings
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One immediately wonders, however, if this is a universal law that will hold Muslims accountable for defaming the Christian and Jewish religions also.
I have a sneaking suspicion not; this'll be another of those "it only works one way" type of things.
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The hell its not.
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Google for the age of Aisha, ridda apostasy Islam, or read the responses to similar questions under the islam or exmuslim Reddit sub.
The women shouldn't have called Mohammed a pedophile, but simply quoted Islamic sources letting them speak for themselves.
An excellent source is Reliance of the traveller spelling out what is permitted and forbidden under Islamic law.
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What you are technically doing is highlighting words in the Qu’ran, yes. But with this admission, I can now say you are also trying to paint a billion people with a broad brush, as if all the world’s Muslims have uncriticial reverence for the prophet Mohammed and see what he is alleged to have done as something to emulate. You have no basis on which to claim that assumption as a fact.
That ain’t it, chief. She had every right to say “Mohammed was a pedophile”. She should not be punished for some Muslims taking offense on behalf of their religion’s holy figure. What she did is no better or worse than if I referred to the Christian God as a mass-murdering authoritarian, considering God is cited by The Bible as the killer of several million people.
No idea, including religious ideas, should ever be considered completely verboten. As much as I despise the ideas of racists, homophobes, TERFs, anti-choice advocates, and Kanye West, any idea they espouse that does not cross into “illegal speech” territory should remain legal to say. (Whether someone wants to give those assholes a platform is a whole other discussion.) By the same token, ideas and speech espoused by anti-racism advocates, pro-LGBT groups, pro-choice advocates, and Taylor Swift—including mockery of the racists, homophobes, etc.—should also remain legal. No idea, no matter how popular or heinous or downright ignorant, deserves to be protected against ridicule, mockery, and being torn to shreds by better ideas.
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I don't even have to go to the shocking Pew poll results in England, just ask your moderate moslem on the street what they think about anyone criticizing their prophet. See where that leads you. While you're at it ask if anyone consider his deeds as only "alleged" or undeniable facts.
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If only one Muslim answers the way you do not think they will, your absolutist position is null and void. Think carefully about that before you imply—or explicitly state—that all the world’s Muslims feel the exact same way about their religion and its dogma.
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Yeah. I didn't think so.
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How many murders can be directly attributed to followers of Islam, and how many of those murders can be directly attributed to religious motivations? What percentage of all murders in the entirety of Europe fit that narrow set of specific details?
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Imaging enforcing these laws against Donald Trump's hate speech?
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Erdogon will be thrilled
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Re: Erdogon will be thrilled
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Well - that is easy to define and will in no way ever be twisted into something that was not originally intended.
In addition, it is quite apparent from past history which religion will benefit, and which will not, from this legislation.
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Here's the obvious absurdity of the ECHR argument: religious statements that claim other religious views are false, dangerous, or otherwise detrimental. Patently offensive to the one religion, self evident to the espousing religion, but now both protected... Unless some particular religion is now going to be protected above others... which will be the true test.
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I am an XXX will be an insult to anyone who is a YYY
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Re: I am an XXX will be an insult to anyone who is a YYY
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Re: I am an XXX will be an insult to anyone who is a YYY
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Quite simple
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One might be driving a BMW while another might be driving a Porsche or a Benz
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What then?
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Re: Quite simple
And vice versa. To christianity you're being an asshole for NOT saying he's the son of god.
And to some religions you're an asshole for not yelling this from the streets, converting the heathens on a daily basis.
So which is it?
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Re: Quite simple
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In that case, I'm afraid we're going to need to place you under citizens' arrest.
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Be careful the standards you support, less they apply to YOU
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Re: Quite simple
There's a good handful of examples provided (including Jesus), and a better explanation of it than I can give without digging out the book and transcribing the section verbatim, but the basic principle boils down to "Everyone is an asshole, and that includes both me and you".
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If your god/religious figure is so insulted by my blasphemy, let him take his own revenge upon me, otherwise, go f*ck off. I went to bible school too, I'm not afraid to use those lessons to contradict your own messed up interpretation of scripture.
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This is going to be Fun..
By not saying Anything??
and I REALLY love Christians(and other) that dont know their OWN religious history..
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Re: This is going to be Fun..
Or their own religious teachings.
A poll from a half decade ago found that a majority of Christians in Western countries believe that non-Christians who live a good & moral life can get into heaven. But if they read the bible or listened to their preacher they'd realize that such beliefs contradict their own religion. (they worship other gods a sin in Christianity & haven't been baptized)
Another piece of irony, when they polled a ton of Americans on their knowledge of Christianity and other major religions, the ones who knew the most about those religions were... Atheists. And the Christian denomination that scored highest on knowledge of Christianity? Mormons, even though a lot of Christians don't consider them a part of Christianity.
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Re: Re: This is going to be Fun..
Happens everywhere, but as a Christian, I will agree that most of my fellow Christians don't know anything about their own religion. But the claim that Atheists (on average) have greater knowledge than any other Christian (on average) is pretty specious, in my opinion most atheists are just as ignorant as their religious counter parts.
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Re: Re: Re: This is going to be Fun..
example: the sky is NOT an upturned copper bowl with holes poked in it (stars) where the light of heaven shines through
It's not right to take slaves or beat your wife.
It's not a "moral duty" for a woman to sacrifice two pigeons every month to atone for menstruation.
People with crushed testicles are NOT utterly beyond redemption.
and of course the Bibles ULTIMATE SIN: waking up every single morning without fail and praising god as your first thought. - thats the big unforgivable the victorians decided to remove because it was eating into the levels of church attendance.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: This is going to be Fun..
In general, slavery is not okay, any servants you had were to be treated fairly. Men were to cherish their wives not beat them. The whole testicle crushing thing... well which one are you referring too, because there was a shocking amount of chatter over testicle crushing. many laws passed down in the Old testament were decided upon by mankind and God just allowed a few of them, even though He did not specifically agree that it should be done that way.
And the Bible says what the ultimate sin is... and that is Blasphemy. Failing to praise God every morning you get up is not Blasphemy and neither is taking God's name in vain though that is not wise to be doing either. Speaking against God and mocking God is blasphemy. Sins that are not forgiven in this life or the next.
Depending on which denomination you follow, I am non-denominational, they have all concocted all sorts of sins and evils that we should not be allowed for pretty shakey reasons.
Pre-Marital sex is not a major sin for example, though many Christians advance that notion.
Being naked is only people seeing your shame, not some hell worthy trespass.
There is no such thing as the 10 commandments... there are actually more than that given to the Israelites by Moses, and there are only 2 great commandments as put for by Christ.
Dancing, drinking, and partaking of herbs are not sins, they were given with purpose by God for our use, it's just that their misuse is what causes the sin.
In most cases... Christianity is just like Atheism... a system of false believes based on what people think about life. They will happily take the parts they like and use them as an excuse to mistreat people and will eschew the parts they hate that accuse them of iniquity.
God does not want people to have a religion... religion is the institution of man and how false God's and prophets are made. You will know ever false religion by the fact that they create Seminary and then one man must get another man's blessing to lead their religion in their God's name.
What true religion would think they have the authority or wisdom to decide who is a worthy prophet? Only God creates those... and often times God has used terrible people to become prophets.
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Actually, I'm pretty sure anyone with a quantum computer will probably understand the universe a lot more than most of us plebs.
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Where does the old testament come from..?
NO PEEKING..
Make a guess..
Its still used today, by another religion..
IF you want the best conversion, Look at that Book, not the christian one.
Then comes the Hard one..
When was the New testament discovered..When did they get it translated?
How many books, and how many NOT published by the church..
(go find the Full book of Solomon..Its very interesting)
Which Means we lived by that OTHER BOOK, That has been Changed many times over many years..
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Also the fact that in the gospel according to jesus "I come to you with a sword in my mouth not as a lamb, all my fathers laws remain and NONE shall pass away in my kingdom" basically says the entire book has to be obeyed literally word for word.
Then you have the horror parts that got removed in the 19th century where jesus tells people to take the babies of unbelievers and swing them by their legs and smash their heads against a rock.
So you've said your GOD isn't perfect, claiming Jesus made a mistake there too? are you gonna add a third testament?
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And the NEW testament..isnt more then a few hundred years..We lived by the OLD testament for ALONG TIME..
Want a link to the Original??
The Tanakh..
from the same people that gave you the Kabbalah..
The Hebrew..
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The usual BS by christians who just can handle the fact the burden of proof for their weird beliefs in on them. Atheism is no system at all but a position on a single position: the atheist does not see sufficient evidence to believe there's a god. That's it.
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Maybe in *your* backwards religion, but to the One True Religion, the sky is Oblivion, and the stars are holes through which the magicka of Aether can travel through to Mundus and bless our lands. I bet you spurn Malacath in favor of the traitorous Trinimac lovers.
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Sounds like a colander
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This varies by sect and doctrine. While your branch may believe that not all do.
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I practice the religioin of Asshattery
Our religion consists of making fun of all other religions as there can be only one. We will rule them all with an iron spork to the eye if anyone objects (don't be offended, it's the highest honor of our religion to be sporked).
If we say the Pope is a lying devil on a rope, it's just how we feel (and we use pope on a rope soap exclusively... so we would know).
If we say that Muhammad fellow seems to prefer the younger girls (and boys), we only speak from conjecture as it's been passed down in our hymns for at least a couple days...
I am a special snowflake and I will sue anyone and everyone who tries to stop the spread of MY RELIGION...
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The Court notes that the domestic courts extensively explained why they considered that the applicant’s statements had been capable of arousing justified indignation, namely that they had not been made in an objective manner aiming at contributing to a debate of public interest
This decision doesn't seem all that bad, and really shouldn't affect many people: after all, most discussions of a religious nature I've ever read or heard have all been quite objective and contributed greatly to public harmony.
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Or the religion I just thought up called "don't go to church ever againism". The primary rules are you never go to church ever again for any reason and don't give ANY money to anyone religious ever.
Amen/women/gender choice.
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Criticizing the tenets of Islam is different than disparaging Muslims as if they are a monolithic group wherein everyone adheres to the exact same specific dogma down to the last detail. One makes you a critic of religion; the other makes you an asshole.
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Every Muslim may not feel the same way, but if a majority of them do, then it becomes a problem. If you insult a group of a dozen people and all but two of them want to beat you to a pulp for it, does it really matter that not every single member of the group wants your blood?
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Religion is special in ths US as well
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Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
Until some people band together and declare it religious attire, like the people who wear colanders while getting a driver's license photo taken.
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https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/First_Amendment_to_the_United_States_Constitution
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
...in hindsight, I should expand on that.
The First Amendment does not, itself, protect individuals from religious discrimination by private entities such as a private employer.
However, it's relevant because it establishes freedom of religion as a foundational principle of the US. (As does the no religious test clause in Article VI.)
That's useful for understanding the context of Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and why it includes religion as a protected class alongside race, color, sex, and national origin. Protection from religious discrimination is a foundational principle of the United States; hence, its inclusion in the Civil Rights Act is unsurprising.
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Protecting religion is as dumb as prosecuting speech offensive to the religious.
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Re: tl;dr
...yes, I'm sure allowing businesses to refuse to hire Muslims couldn't possibly have any negative consequences in 2018.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
We protect religion because yours might one day be the basis for a government's desire to oppress you, possibly even with violence. You'll want those protections then. You already have them now.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
You want President Mike Pence and Vice President Mike Huckabee (or their like) with no protection of religious freedom or separation of church and state? Because I sure don't.
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Re: tl;dr
Like I said: given how hung up you seem to be on this whole turban thing, I find it very hard to believe that this is really about turbans.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
The First Amendment is by design only applicable to state action, and just because the government shouldn't be permitted to do something does not explain why private conduct ought to be regulated.
Also the Establishment Clause limits how government can speak in favor or against a religion, it does in no way explain or justify any restrictions on private speech.
Note that the Establishment Clause also protects atheists, if the Muslim or Jew has a right to protection, same does the atheist and agnostic.
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Re: tl;dr
I see you missed by followup post.
Try reading the comments in threaded mode.
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Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
Say 50 people in a group of 1,000 are Muslims and 700 of the remainder are Christians. For what reason should the Christians have the right to decide what the Muslims can or can't wear in public or while at work? And if the remaining 250 are split up in various numbers between different religious groups, including atheists, for what reason should the Christians have the right to dictate what those religious groups can or can't wear, say, or do?
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You cannot cite the law that bans Islamic clothing in public—up to and including the niqab—across the United States because no such law exists.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
Why should the Christians have the right to enforce what clothing the Christians should wear? If the other 250 are athiests, why shouldn't they have as much right to choose their clothing as Muslims?
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Hi there! I’m Stephen; welcome to my entire point.
No one from any religion (and atheism is a “religion” for the purposes of this discussion) should have the right to enforce their dogma, their standards, their rules for living upon anyone else. A Catholic should no more be able to force a Protestant to live like a Catholic than a Protestant…well, you get where that logic is going. Relatedly, when deference to religious beliefs/practices presents an undue burden to someone else (e.g., employers trying to enforce safety regulations), that someone should have the right to say “don’t do that here” as a dictate rather than a request.
You might now be thinking, “Well what about atheists and religious invocations?” Maybe you have some other “gotcha” jab about secularism vs. religion in the public sphere in mind. In those cases, the enforcement of equal treatment of all religious beliefs and religious sects under the law is not “enforcing secular standards” upon religion, in that those “standards” force people of a given religious sect to act/believe a certain way. If a Christian group is allowed to have a monument placed in a public park, any other religious group (again, this includes atheists) should be able to place their own monument in the same park. If Christians are allowed to give invocations before city council meetings and the like, all other religious groups should have the same right. How the Christians feel about other religious groups receiving equal treatment generally does not (and should not) matter.
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The turban should be no more protected than shorts.
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Re: tl;dr
In other words, the only difference between one article of clothing and another article of clothing is that one reflects something that is explicitly protected under the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and one isn't.
That's not an insignificant difference, dogg.
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Re: Re: tl;dr
Why not protect all groups in a similar way? For example, why shouldn't punk rockers be protected in the same way that Scientologists or Christians are?
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Of course not; that would infringe on freedom of expression. And since blasphemy doesn't infringe on anyone's rights, there's no justification for banning it.
If you want an honest debate, it's best not to put words in others' mouths. It's possible it was an honest misunderstanding, but I'm skeptical since I never said or implied that I would support laws banning blasphemy.
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Re: tl;dr
Thank you for clearly marking your strawman.
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Re: Re: tl;dr
My lessons in otherwording have paid off, I see. :)
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Re: Re: Re: tl;dr
Say that head coverings and shorts are prohibited if they are a safety hazard to the shop environment. Those limitations are already in place.
No matter who or what you are and what you can change it doesn't change the fact that wearing conductive substances metals around high voltage industrial or having them embedded in you is a terrible idea and that anyone should be barred from doing so to avoid hurting people and damaging expensive equipment unless there is a reasonable accommodation otherwise - like wearing a $5 insulative clothing over them.
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Re: tl;dr
Nice try. You really think I'm going to fall for the old "I'm going to make a statement without any argument to support it, and then say that you have to make an argument to refute it" trick?
Not my first day on the Internet, son.
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Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
"trust me..under here is luscious wavy hair" ?
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Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
If there is a legitimate job performance reason it's OK to discriminate. For example - OSHA says you must wear this helmet. If that's not compatible with your turban, you can choose to wear the helmet or you can choose to not have this job. Another example - this role is for a black man. Discrimination for the job on the basis of sex and race is fine.
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Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
Unless a job fundamentally requires someone be of a certain sex/gender or certain race/ethnic background? No, ScarJo, that kind of discrimination is not okay.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
Right. Did you not read my whole comment? Or perhaps it wasn't obvious that these two sentences are related:
"Another example - this role is for a black man. Discrimination for the job on the basis of sex and race is fine."
Or on the third hand, maybe it wasn't clear that by "role" I meant a role in a play, TV show, or movie.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Religion is special in ths US as well
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Re:
No, there is not an 'approved' list, though.
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UK is leaving. Spain is holding a referendum. Italy has said it wants to leave. Greece is getting kicked out, every single new applicant has frozen their application.
The UK is so lucky to only have a few months left, and we can basically ignore this religious bigoted, self-serving evil non-elected pile of freedom of speech hating twats.
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Besides, I thought you were all terrified of Turkey and other Balkan countries joining the EU and flooding our 'wonderful' country?
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but now you get prosecuted for pointing out the damn truth.
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Re:
You have references for these facts then?
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Powerful people will sometimes go to great lengths so they can keep their power - or the institutions that have it.
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You made this up.
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...
Ouch!
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> where she made a bunch of silly and misleading claims about Muslims and the Prophet Muhammad
Silly and misleading as in written down in the Quoran and the Haddith?
> in particular, claiming that because one of his marriages was to a very young girl,
> there was an implication that he was a pedophile
Yeah that's what you get when you're married to an underage girl *and have sex with her*! You're a pedophile. Period.
> (and further, strongly implying that other Muslims sought to emulate Muhammad).
Which might be related to the idea in islam that Muhammad is 'the perfect man' who has to be adored and must not be critized by anyone. Nice example for this, see here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TvsaOC3v38
Also, do you really think Rotherham just came out of nowhere?
> I'm not entirely clear as to why anyone cares what someone did over a thousand years ago
How about the fact that more than a billion people in 2018 (!) care enough to organize their life around what happened back then and will do so with your life too as soon as they are in the majority? This can be witnessed by looking at countries with such demographics and realizing the state of free speech and the rights of apostates, homosexuals, women...
It's sad to see that even Masnick has succumbed to drinking the leftist Kool-Aid.
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...we have a billion Evangelical Christians in the world?
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a) that doesn't negate ANY of the dangers posed by islam to free societies
b) even if you're living in the US the tally of attacks goes in favor of christianity
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Islamist_terrorist_attacks
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Resorting to moving the goalposts is kinda sad
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Re: Resorting to moving the goalposts is kinda sad
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Re: Re: Resorting to moving the goalposts is kinda sad
Sorry, I grew up under Catholic terrorism, I can't take Muslim terrorism as seriously as the dominant local religious terrorism, which is evangelical Protestant in the US. Like already sending mail bombs and shooting up synagogues. Or Ultra-Orthodox Judaism in Israel. Religion is insane, and 'true believers' are more insane, whatever the religion.
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Re: Re: Re: Resorting to moving the goalposts is kinda sad
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Unless you lived 14 centuries ago when it was legal and considered perfectly normal in the place you lived.
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Re: Re:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-turkey-wedding-girl/turkish-photographer-praised-for-his-shot -to-stop-child-marriage-idUSKBN1K12GO
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/sep/01/thailand-malaysia -muslim-child-forced-marriage
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But if you really want to play the numbers game: even with many priests over the centuries who act(ed) against their faith, you won't be able to match the numbers of marriages to underage girls in islamic countries. Somewhere in this thread there's a link to the current situation in Turkey which is still somewhat moderate country.
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Pain and suffering is not a contest with a “winner”. You can argue all day about which religion is “worse” about inflicting it (or covering it up), but those who suffer do not care about your perverse dick-measuring contest. And really, your insistence that we focus on Islam, its dogma, and how the billion Muslims around the world feel about said dogma feel like attempts to express hatred toward Muslims under the guise of “I’m just talking about facts”. I could do the same thing for various Christian sects; other than the broad brush I paint with “pedophile Catholic priests” jokes and comments on Dominionism/the Religious Right, I try to avoid doing that because I recognize reality: Not everyone in a religious sect feels the exact same way about the dogma.
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Re:
Given the sheer number of moderate muslims still supporting a lot of the really crazy ideas of said dogma (see Pew poll results for the UK e.g.), you have to wonder how an influx of people with such beliefs will influence free societies. I'd say a look at muslim majority countries will demonstrate quite clearly what living in a society where 'Not everyone in a religious sect feels the exact same way about the dogma' looks like.
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https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2015/05/01/statutory-rape-laws-in-the -u-s/
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Absolutely. Some people have moved on despite their religion others have not and that is the problem.
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parens patriae
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But one need to look no further than the laws of multiple Muslim majority nations, Malaysia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Maldives, Egypt and the Arab Middle East to discover why caring about what the prophet did centuries ago.
The reason why Pakistan has capital punishment for blasphemy and apostasy from Islam is exactly that the prophet ordered the killing of people who insulted his new religion.
The European Court is twisting the definition of untruth to justify crackdown on speech critical of Islam.
A final note on the laws of Muslim majority nations, these aren't repressive relics imposed against the popular will but rather a result of what a large majority of the population wants.
And democracy doesn't help either.
When Maldives ratified its new constitution, a majority of the population voted for declaring all non-Muslims noncitizens, thereby subjecting apostates to capital punishment and loss of civil rights.
Muslims are the only religious people who unashamedly call for killing apostates from their religion by large majorities.
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I doubt it.
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Article 9
Here's Article 9:
Article 9 – Freedom of thought, conscience and religion 1. Everyone has the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion; this right includes freedom to change his religion or belief and freedom, either alone or in community with others and in public or private, to manifest his religion or belief, in worship, teaching, practice and observance. 2. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs shall be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.I don't see anything about a right to not be offended. I guess the EU court likes to just make up rights like US courts do. Unless they're saying insulting someone's religion infringes on their right to practice it. Which would be just idiotic.
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Re: Article 9
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Finally
/s
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Re: Finally
unless you are a high school senior in the city of Juneau, Alaska.
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I see an oxymoron coming on (well, a whole bunch of oxymorons).
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Muhammed was a child rapist, amongst his many flaws. Further, majority Muslim countries have strenuously resisted efforts to ban child marriages on the grounds that doing so would be un-Islamic. This means that pedophilia is condoned by Islam.
I eagerly await the no-true-Scotsman arguments.
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Perhaps Mike should read more of the page he linked to....
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Perhaps Mike should read more of the page he linked to....
Europe has a different history and culture regarding freedom of speech. Other examples include the fact that denying the holocaust is illegal in Germany and that (unlike the USA) money is not equated to speech in Europe.
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Re: Perhaps Mike should read more of the page he linked to....
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A Joke
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Re: A Joke
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"Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
I know it's inconvenient and all, but there is zero historical dispute here.
The concept of "pedophiles" is a modern one, so let's deal with the factual assertion. The factual assertion is that Muhammad first had sex with his wife, Aisha, when she was about nine years old (and he was somewhere north of 50).
The first thing to notice is that whether some guy had sex with a nine year old girl 1000 years ago is a lot less relevant to the assessment of Islam as a religion than is the undisputed fact that pretty much everbody in Islam accepted for centuries that their prophet did so The Islamic establishment based all kinds of its rules about what was acceptable on that belief, and in some places still does so.
It was treated as a simple, unremarkable truth in the Islamic world until it started to look like bad PR. Nobody suggested that Aisha was much older than nine until the 20th century. For that matter, nobody in the Christian world thought the question was all that important until the 19th or 20th century... because frankly it wasn't that big a deal to them, either.
The distinctly secondary thing is that although you're right that nobody can ever be absolutely sure about what happened 1000 years ago, the evidence on this one is pretty strong.
It turns out that, because Muhammad was both a powerful ruler and a powerful religious figure, and because he founded an empire that lasted for centuries in one form or another, there are some pretty detailed records about him and those around him. Aisha is a revered figure and people recorded every scrap they could get of anything about her, including much of what she personally said or wrote.
She said he had sex with her when she was nine, according to a lot of sources many of which seem to be independent of one another.
Now that revisionism has kicked in, some people claim that by "nine", she meant "nineteen", and that that was a common way of expressing numbers at the time in cases where the real number was obvious. The biggest problem with that, beyond the lack of much evidence of any such convention to begin with, is that the number nineteen wouldn't have been obvious. Marrying and having sex with a nine year old wasn't unusual at the time (as shown by the fact that the many reports about it both from near the time and for centuries afterwards don't treat it as a big deal). If she wanted it to be known that she was nineteen, she'd have had to say "nineteen".
... yet nobody disputes that she was an intelligent and erudite woman who was very gifted at making her thoughts understood.
Then there are people who bring up the point that people in those times didn't keep much in the way of records and weren't very meticulous about numbers. This is of course both true and idiotic.
Maybe Aisha wasn't sure whether she was nine or ten or eleven (or seven or eight), but she surely knew the difference between a nine year old and a nineteen year old. Even if she considered it COMPLETELY ACCEPTABLE to have sex with a nine year old (which she probably did), she would have known that the difference was biographically interesting and included it in her account. And if she didn't think it was acceptable, then she'd have had even more reason to be clear about the matter.
That argument is particularly amusing because some of those same people are eager to claim that although Aisha and her biographers weren't very meticulous about her age, a couple of third parties were absolutely meticulous about both her sister's age and their relative ages. That lets them use those minor sources to do "exact" calculations to get an older age for Aisha (they manage to get her into her teens somewhere; still pretty damned young by modern standards).
One of the "exact" facts they rely on, by the way, is an account that Aisha's sister Asma had all her teeth and all her faculties when she died at the nice round age of 100, and another was that Asma was a nice round ten years older than Aisha.
But, hey, those were exact numbers and are not to be challenged, whereas Aisha was just kind of vaguely rounding off to nine and should be ignored.
Sorry, no. The non-ignorant, non-misleading fact is that the historical Muhammad very probably had sex with a little girl. And, regardless of what that historical guy may have done, the mythic version of Muhammad that Muslims have been revering for centuries definitely had sex with a little girl, and they've only recently found any problem at all with accepting that.
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Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
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Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
I didn't bring up the topic. It was in the original text.
The article throws out a bunch of irrelevant opinions about the actual speech in question. It says "she made a bunch of silly and misleading claims", and talks about "spewing ignorant arguments about religious figures that people adore". None of those characterizations have anything to do with the point. They're a small step away from open name calling, if it's a step at all.
When people write articles like this, they always feel the need to make it very clear that THEY believe that the person whose speech they're defending is wrong, ignorant, bigoted, stupid, and a bad person.
Well, as you say, so what? You're right. What does that particular name calling have to do with the subject? Nothing. What does it contribute to the argument? Nothing.
... and not only is Masnick's opinion about what's "silly", "misleading" and "ignorant" irrelevant, but it's also uninteresting. He's some random blogger. There's no sign that he knows more about Islam or Muhammad than any random person on the street. If he has any credentials that should make anybody care about whether he thinks this woman is ignorant or not, I sure don't know about them.
Yet he feels the need to bring it in. He has to provide that little bit of ritual abuse. My guess is that's probably because he believes that if he doesn't he will be abused. And he may be right. He has to show the right amount of obesiance to "religious sensibilities" or whatever.
Well, that'd be OK, except that his ritual abuse is factually wrong. I don't know what else this woman said, but the stuff he mentioned is an absolutely reasonable way of stating objective truth. In his eagerness to show that he's one of the Good Guys, he's leaving her to twist in the wind.
If he actually cared about promoting useful discourse, as opposed to promoting his personal view of what the law should say, you'd think he'd spare a thought for the chilling effect of his offensive speech. I mean, hers at least has the benefit of being true.
For that matter, if he cared about her case as a matter of actual human dignity, as opposed to as a convenient place to hang a bunch of arguments he was itching to make anyway, then he might think about whether she should be able to say things that are factually true, without having them called "silly", "ignorant", and "misleading" by random clueless bloggers.
Furthermore, his rhetorical approach is bad rhetoric and actively damaging to the acceptance of his political approach to free speech.
Framing things like that accepts the idea that of course we right-thinking types can always tell who the bigoted scumbags are. That invites the assertion that since we can always reliably identify and agree on who they are, there's no problem with shutting them down. Shutting them up isn't a "heckler's veto"; it's just the Obviously Right refusing to be annoyed by the Obviously Wrong.
He's throwing aside one of the major practical justifications for having a strong free speech norm, namely the fact that even widely unpopular, uncomfortable speech is often true and that truth is valuable in itself as well as often useful.
... which is exactly the thought process that leads to the European approach he hates so much.
It's not the minority of "hecklers" you have to worry about, at least not mostly. The bigger problem is, and always has been, the majority of Right Thinking Folk who care more about having the Right Opinions in Harmony than about having any real discourse about anything.
It's repulsive to watch somebody keeping their hands oh-so-clean of any legal restriction on speech, while still being willing to join a mob and practically silence anybody uncomfortable by rhetorically spitting on them.
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Re: Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
It interested you enough to comment with two multi-paragraph screeds. :)
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Re: Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
Are you suggesting that she should be free of such criticism? In other words, that Masnick ought not to have the right to say such things? I must say, I'm having a hard time figuring out if you're pro freedom of speech or anti.
I disagree. We must not let protection for speech hinge on whether it is true (except for narrow categories such as truth in advertising, sworn testimony, etc.), because then that just gives the power to censor to whomever decides what is true.
Again, who gets to decide? Both of them are exercising their free speech rights, as are you. Is it not disgusting that you are rhetorically spitting on Mike?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
> In other words, that Masnick ought not to have the right to say such things?
> I must say, I'm having a hard time figuring out if you're pro freedom of speech or anti.
Of course not. Masnick and everyone else is free to criticize her. The problem with Masnick's criticism however is that his points are factually untrue. What the women said wasn't misleading or wrong in the least.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
.... in your mind
Other people may not see the world from the same perspective as yours, but you knew that didn't you?
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: "Ignorant", "silly", "misleading"
OK, but if you think what's factually true is always generally agreed upon, you really haven't been paying attention.
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You said it, not me.
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So you're denying the basis of Judaism and nation of Israel?
Shorten that to 70 years and include myth of "the Holocaust", that it's illegal to question in Germany.
Or does your statement only apply to others?
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Re: So you're denying the basis of Judaism and nation of Israel?
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Re: So you're denying the basis of Judaism and nation of Israel?
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Re: Re: So you're denying the basis of Judaism and nation of Israel?
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'I'm not allowed to offend you? Challenge accepted.'
This? This is exactly the sort of thing that results in people going out of their way to commit some good old fashioned 'blasphemy'. Telling people you're not allowed to 'offend' someone's religious beliefs just makes people want to to it more to spite you and your attempt to silence them.
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Re: 'I'm not allowed to offend you? Challenge accepted.'
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No. Just no.
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Re: No. Just no.
Toxic masculinity, rejection of LGBTQ+, draining our planet of resources, just because they can't stand being made fun of.
Round them up. Shoot the bigots. What are the rest of the kumbayas going to do, fight on their behalf?
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The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
As I noted above, 'be careful what standards you set, lest they be turned on you'. Ignoring for a moment the massive ethical concerns involved, if killing people en-mass based upon their religious affiliation becomes acceptable, what makes you think you won't find yourself on the receiving end?
How sure are you that, once that option is on the table that that you wouldn't find yourself facing the ultimatum of 'Cease your heretical ways and submit to your lord and master, or be purged from his holy lands so that you will no longer blaspheme and undermine his righteous rule'?
Round them up. Shoot the bigots.
Funnily enough you're acting just like the most extreme of them by calling for death of the religious(worse in fact than a great many of them, as calling for the death of someone is quite a bit worse than merely discriminating against them), so if bigotry is a capital offense, well, that's not going to go over so well for you.
What are the rest of the kumbayas going to do, fight on their behalf?
There's a word you may have heard before that would apply there: Martyr. If you don't think that 'kill the christians' wouldn't have an extreme and violent pushback then you're only fooling yourself, as even the previously non-violent would find themselves backed into a corner, and desperate people will do things that they otherwise would not, including kill to survive.
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Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Their fault for reacting poorly just because we make fun of them. It's not our problem their imaginary friend does such a shit job of protecting them.
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Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Atheism is a faith too, and communist atheism racked up the largest body count of any ideology in the 20th century.
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Ah the classics..
'Atheism is a religion too!' and 'Atheists killed more people than other religions.'
Define religion and what makes a lack of belief one, followed by which tenants, dogma and doctrines in atheism suggest and/or demand the death of others.
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Re: Ah the classics..
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes
An organized atheist ideology that includes the militant overthrow and oftentimes murder of the religious. If that's not a faith I don't know what is. Not all religions have a god either, if it's the central figure you feel is missing.
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Re: Re: Ah the classics..
Because they presented a threat to the power of those in charge. If you want ultimate power and authority someone running around claiming to speak for/represent the ultimate authority, and who has a significant following among the populace is a threat, and one that if you're brutal enough you'll want to squash.
That has diddly squat to do with atheism even if the ones engaged in it wore the label, as atheism has no doctrines or rules that would order or even suggest killing.
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Re: Ah the classics..
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Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
atheism: disbelief or lack of belief in the existence of God or gods.
faith: a system of religious belief.
Looks like atheism is not a faith.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
I think (at least part of) the confusion arises from the "or" in the definition you cite: the fact that the word "atheism" is used to refer both to absence of belief in the divine ("I don't believe in God" - a superset of agnosticism), and to belief in absence of the divine ("I believe there is no God").
The latter would qualify as a belief system, such that the term "faith" could be argued to apply in at least some cases, but the former would not - and yet they're both referred to using the same word.
As to communism - while it's true that authoritarian communism as implemented did kill huge numbers of people, and (so far as I'm aware) that authoritarian communism as implemented did incorporate atheism among its tenets, I see no basis for concluding that the killing arose from the atheism - much less that there are tenets of atheism which require, call for, or even lead to.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Clerics were put to death since the Jacobins revolted in France, but moreso under the Communists in Spain (during the civil war), China and the Soviet Union.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes
---
This is just two of very many examples.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
True but it's a bit of stretch IMO to say that "I believe there is no god" is a system of religious belief. For one, it's not really a system, just a single belief. There's nothing more to it. Second, though it is a belief that has something to do with religion, the belief itself is not religious in nature.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Well, for some atheists it apparently is more complex, detailed, and even nuanced than that single one-sentence belief statement, and some of those atheists have (I think, based on what I've seen in quotelists and the like) been among the ones who have been sufficiently activist about their atheism to be relatively prominent and visible. (Unfortunately, I haven't bothered noting down their names, and I don't have the lists themselves in readily browseable form.) So it's possible that those who describe atheism that way are extrapolating from that sample set.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
More importantly however the doctrines of atheism, that there is no god and that belief in it is harmful features heavily in communist and pre-communist ideology, which has been extremely violent.
(pasted from above)
Clerics were put to death since the Jacobins revolted in France, but moreso under the Communists in Spain, China and the Soviet Union.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Persecution_of_Christians_in_the_Soviet_Union
https://en.wikipedia.org/ wiki/Mass_killings_under_communist_regimes
An organized atheist ideology that includes the militant overthrow and oftentimes murder of the religious. If that's not a faith I don't know what is. Not all religions have a god either, if it's the central figure you feel is missing.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
More importantly however the doctrines of atheism, that there is no god and that belief in it is harmful features heavily in communist and pre-communist ideology, which has been extremely violent.
Certainly a... unique definition of atheism, though I might also go with 'dead wrong' given there are no 'doctrines of atheism', and the only attribute you can nail to the term is definitional.
If you believe in one or more deities, you're a theist.
If you do not believe in one or more deities, you're an atheist. This can include the belief that there is no god(s) rather than simply a lack of belief in them(and there is a difference), but it's not required to meet the definition.
Everything else is just frosting on the cake, extras you can add but that aren't required.
It's as true to say that atheism includes dictates and/or prohibitions as it would be to say that theism includes support for cannibalism/human sacrifice, believing that certain chucks of land are not only holy but so holy that you regularly need to bow to them, that a number of actions(some as simply as making a fire) are prohibited on certain days, or that certain animals are clean/holy/unclean.
As for your links, here's the problem you'll run into when you try to compare body counts: Atheism is a single position on a single subject, whether or not you believe in the existence of one or more deities. On it's own there is nothing there that could motivate someone to go out and kill someone else, so you'll have quite the time tying 'they were an atheist, they killed someone' to 'therefore it was their atheism that caused them to kill the other person.'
You might as well say that not believing in santa makes you a killer, because hey, if you don't care if you might end up on the naughty list why not go on a killing spree?
On the other hand, certain brands(I'll just cover christianity for the following, as I'm most familiar with that one) of theism can provide those motivations, ranging from death penalties for blasphemy(Leviticus 24:13-16), death penalties for being a witch(Exodus 22:18), the idea that there are certain groups of people 'chosen by god' who are better than others, and for whom if god 'gives' them some land that may already be occupied they are fully justified in killing everything in it with no mercy(Deuteronomy 2:33-34) and so on.
(Just to head one possible objection off at the pass, 'But that's the old testiment!' Same god, and unless someone wanted to claim that god was wrong back then the idea of it being just to kill in those examples has already been planted.)
Depending on the religion in question it can be trivial to make the argument that some people just need to die, and that is related to the religion, such that you can make the connection between 'they killed that other person while believing in religon A' to 'they killed that other person because of religion A'.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
See, you christians keep trying that and it always fails. Atheism has no dogma and it also does not say "there is no god". In that case the burden of proof would be on atheists to proof that. Since they don't say that but simply say that they don't believe a god exists until provided with sufficent evidence, the burden of proof still rests with you.
Tough shit you can't justify you beliefs.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
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Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
The only reason we let you fanatics live is because you're a punchline that never gets old. We're going to insult the fuck out of you and you're going to like it, because you're an idiot who believes in imaginary friends.
Fuck me, being an atheist is awesome!
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Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
If that were at all true, you would belong in a mental hospital. But you're just another Internet Tough Guy who for some reason thinks it's cool (funny?) to pretend to be a psychopath.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Maybe you'll grow out of it or just continue to be a shitty human being in general.
Oh, and I've flagged your comments, since they're y'know, genocidal hate crimes and all.
Not every day you see a troll/attention whore to be worse than Hitler.
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Re: Re: Re: Re: Re: The Inquisition/crusades: Terrible with a god AND without
Face it, you're a member of a dying cult. If a war is fought in the name of atheism, you'd lose. If you retaliate, you're a bigot. If you don't... well, what reason do we have to stop? A set of mandates by an entity we don't believe in? Ha!
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Re: Re: No. Just no.
Some of the AC's around here are from the UK. That's not you, is it? Because if it is, you should probably remember that a comment like that is almost certainly illegal here - and is likely more than enough to get you prosecuted.
--dg100
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Child marriage and Islam
Another fascinating aspect of Islam is its prophets commandment that whoever turns away from Islam must be killed.
The penalty for apostasy in Islam is death, and that punishment is directly derived from the sayings of the prophet. and guess which countries maintain capital punishment for apostasy, only Muslim nations.
It's notable that several Muslim nations are unashamed about their intend to kill apostates from Islam, and that large majorities of Muslims endorse capital punishment for leaving Islam.
Child marriage and the age of Aisha is directly correlated, because a truly Islamic state must be based on the Quran and the sunnah.
One of the first acts of the new Islamic government after the Iranian revolution 79 was lowering the marriage age for females to nine years.
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Re: Child marriage and Islam
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Re: Re: Child marriage and Islam
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Re: Child marriage and Islam
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Re: Re: Child marriage and Islam
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"Religious Peace"
This flat put presumes that some or all religious people may get violent if their little feelings get hurt. Which, for certain fanatical members of a number of major (and minor) religions is the "gospel" truth.
What I find even odder is that these laws could easily be applied to almost any sermon any where in any religion since almost all claim they alone have the one true god (tm) and all the others are demon-inspired hoaxes.
Not to mention any atheist that openly says he or she thinks all religions are a load of dingoes' kidneys risks not just death from the assorted followers of the "Religion of Peace" (There are several making this claim, all with millennia long histories of extreme violence to those who deny they are such) but now apparently faces criminal prosecution for upsetting the god botherers.
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I call BS
And I can state unequivocally that this ruling will ONLY apply to Muslims who are offended. Europe, especially in recent years, has a long and documented track record of speech that offends both Jews and Christians.
Funny how I don't remember THAT being a human rights violation.
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check new post
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So, you must tolerate criticism, unless you can't tolerate it?
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This basically covers literally every religion out there, as they all view anti-blasphemy laws as a huge boon.
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