In Britain, five Muslim men from the East Midlands city of Derby have been put on trial for the composition and distribution of leaflets. The literature — entitled “The Death Penalty?” — contends that gay sex is a sin that leads its practitioners directly to hell; it also calls for homosexuals to be given the death penalty and features on its front side a picture of a mannequin hanging from a noose. The prosecution is the first under a new “hate crime” law passed in March 2010 that makes it illegal to “stir up hatred on the grounds of sexual orientation.”
In court, prosecution lawyer Bobbie Cheema told a jury comprising seven men and five women that the leaflets were “threatening, offensive, frightening, and nasty.” She is right; they are exactly that. But one has to ask the question: So what? “Offensive” they may be, “nasty” too, but there is a world of difference between material that is repugnant and upsets people — an inherently subjective designation — and acts that are physically harmful, and to which one can apply a proper legal objectivity. Note that the men are not being prosecuted for inciting violence; the leaflets call for the death penalty, not for vigilante attacks.
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The passage of the law, and its first use this week, is the continuation of a worrying trend in the United Kingdom. Laws governing thought and speech, rather than deed, are becoming commonplace. So much so, in fact, that artists — ranging from comedian Rowan Atkinson (best known as “Mr. Bean” in the United States) to actor Stephen Fry (who is gay) to writer Ian McEwan — have worried out loud that, well-intended as it might be, such legislation inevitably leads to “a culture of censoriousness” and “a questioning, negative, and leaden attitude.” Worse, it cripples free expression and leaves people looking over their shoulders.
There is a world of moral difference between poetic license and the noisome leaflets put out by the accused. But therein lies the problem: Who decides where the line is? In cases like these, the gray areas so beloved to the British need rubbing out and replacing with the cold certitude afforded by principles marked out in black and white. (The American First Amendment might be a good place to start.) Context, complexity, and delicacy are all values properly cherished in the right circumstances, but they have no place in discussions of fundamental liberty. One either has freedom of speech, or one does not. It is, as A. A. Gill so wryly observed, like being pregnant: “You either are, or you’re not.” One can no more say that a person’s comment or cartoon or article or leaflet was “too offensive” to be covered by free-speech protections than one can say that someone is “too guilty” to stand trial. Freedom of speech means just that, regardless of whom it offends.
Unfortunately, British politicians all too frequently promise that they “believe in freedom of speech, but . . . ,” and, in recent years, the temptation to act has proven too much for many parliamentarians to resist. Among the recent developments, perhaps the most execrable is the quiet 1994 addendum to the 1986 Public Order Act that prohibits Britons from causing anyone “alarm or distress.” It provides that
A person is guilty of an offence if, with intent to cause a person harassment, alarm or distress, he — (a) uses threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour, or (b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, thereby causing that or another person harassment, alarm or distress.
As a Brit, I should defend my land against this attack, but...we're guilty as charged. I hope British Conservative politicians read this; we really need a 1st Amendment in the UK.
You are right that citizens have the right to say offennsivbe things . but what if you said something offensive about "sharia law". these same five men wouldn't be so understanding. that is the point. it's a two way street.
While I support gay marriage on the (perfectly conservative) grounds of equal protection under the law, when concern for gay civil rights become a hammer to smash the civil rights of others, something is definitely gone horribly wrong.
This is exactly the case in some anti-discrimination laws in the US these days, where photographers can be sued for not wanting to work in gay marriages or psychologists can be sued for counciling that homosexuality is wrong.
C'mon, free speech is not absolute even in the U.S. (falsely shouting "fire" in a crowded theater, inciting to riot, etc.). And we already have a universe of thought crimes, which we lovingly call "hate crimes." We're all headed down the same path, apparently unaware or uncaring that there is no way back. But it is quite surprising that Muslims were actually accused of something. I thought they were immune.
The rules for determining what is "too offensive" are complex.
1. If the person making a negative comment is a member of a non-protected group and the object of the comment is a protected group then the comment is "too offensive"!
2. If the person making a negative comment is a member of a protected group and the object of the comment is a member of another protected group then we have to look at the established hierarchy of protected groups and if the one making the comment is less protected than the object of the comment then the comment is "too offensive".
3. If the person making the negative comment and the object of the comment are in the same group, then you have to look at the hierarchy of protection within the particular group, and ...
On second thought let's forget the whole thing and just go with free speech!
Is there any doubt that these 5 Muslims would never be charged if their leaflets contained a similarly worded condemnation of the Catholic Church along with an image of the Pope hanging in effigy? Make that the same for the Church of England and Archbishop of Canterbury. It would seem that the feelings of homosexuals are so important to British society that they trump the rights of Englishmen to speak freely. This development does not bode well for England or for America.
Normally, it is radical Islamists who seek to censor others. In this case, the status of gays as a politically favored victim group trumps that of even radical Islam.
Obviously neither of you read the article very carefully, since it said that a man was convicted for leaving anti-religious cartoons in an airport prayer room.
Here's the information you apparently missed:
"Also in 2010, Harry Taylor was convicted of “insulting, offending, and alarming” an airport chaplain at Liverpool’s John Lennon Airport when he left anti-religious cartoons in the prayer room, and was ordered to spend six months in prison, perform 100 hours of unpaid work, and pay £250 in damages. It was the second time that Taylor had been convicted of distributing cartoons, so, for good measure, the judge imposed on him a five-year ban on carrying cartoons."
But, any chance to pounce on homosexuals is probably your first priority.
The shortsightedness of those that would curtail the speech of others is astonishing. It is not difficult to imagine a group of vegetarians being "alarmed" by the display at a butcher shop (often high art in my opinion!) or the roast duck on a menu. So are the butcher and the chef (knowing that their displays could cause alarm) guilty of an offense? And what of those of us who value free speech with religious fervor? When we are alarmed by those calling for its curtailment, may we assume the speech code activists will be hoisted on their own petard?
"On the day after their arrival one of them came rushing to Shakespear in distress. He had just seen the Russian soldiers feeding their pet dogs- unclean creatures to muslims -and thought that they were being fattened for eating. 'There was a woman there too,' he told Shakespear, 'whose face and neck were uncovered.' Worse, still, he went on, her legs were bare, 'and I saw up to her knee!' He and his companions also had peered into the garrison chapel. "They worship idols,' he exclaimed. 'I saw it. All of us saw it.' Muttering 'Repentance ... Repentance', he begged to be allowed to depart..."
This is all very "amusing". We have millions of people in the United States who believe deep down that Gays and Lesbians should be executed, or at least that their behavior should be recriminalized. Many of these Americans call themselves Christians. In fact there is more than one organization (and two main ones) that want to run the United States by Old Testament Law. All Muslims are expressing in England are part of Islamic Sharia Law.
"We have millions of people in the United States who believe deep down that Gays and Lesbians should be executed, or at least that their behavior should be recriminalized."
That's a very serious accusation. Can you back it with evidence? How do you know what "millions of people in the United States who believe deep down"? Can you read minds?
Richard--you won't get any grown-up talk from trolls. I just make a list of who they are (there are 3 or 4 repeat offenders here on NR) and avoid "feeding" them with the attention they crave. As far as I know, they may be 10-year-old kids with a chip on their shoulder and too much time on their hands.
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