Against the law to criticize religion in Europe?

[Silent3]

Dutch politician faces charges over anti-Islam film

I've never seen this film. It could well be that if I had seen it, I'd find it offensive. That's a moot point as far as I'm concerned. I don't care how offensive the film might be, how unfounded or unfair any of its criticisms of Islam might be. I wouldn't care if it were atheists or Christians or Jews or Wiccans being offended, or blacks or gays or immigrants or tennis players for that matter.

The answer to speech you don't like is using your own freedom of speech to speak out about what you don't like. If it's a politician spewing hateful speech, don't vote for him, campaign against him. If it's a company promoting hate, don't buy their products.

What I find most offensive is that any film, any expressive act, can be censored or outlawed simply because some group takes offense at that which someone else says about their group. In my opinion public debate of all topics should be fully open. While calm, careful, reasoned argumentation and presentation of facts is the highest form for such discussions, open public debate must permit free emotional expression, humor, scorn, satire and insult as well.

The only valid restrictions I can support are typically accepted limits on free speech: no reckless endangerment, like falsely yelling "fire" in a crowded theater, no expression against private individuals that meets tough standards for libel or slander, and perhaps, held to an even stricter and tougher-to-prove standard than that used for private individuals, no "group libel" or "group slander", where clearly, demonstrably, and deliberately false things are said against members of a group in an effort to promote public discrimination against members of that group.

[47of74]

1. Wonder how long it will take Bill Orally to tilt against this windmill?

[nichomachus]

2. Different countries have different laws

In some countries, it's against the law to criticize the head of state -- although you can criticize the government. You can call the prime minister names, foe example, but not the king.

In some countries, you can't criticize on the basis of religion, but that cuts both ways. Religious people can't criticize you either based solely on their religious beliefs. That would be a real blessing here in the US, where "religious leaders" are free to go on national TV and say the most hateful things about me and other gay people -- and even incite violence against us.

Some countries have very strict advertising laws. In some cases you can't put down your competitor's product. In the most extreme case, you can't even say yours is "the best," because that implies a put down of your competitors.

[Silent3]

4. I'm aware that different countries have different laws.

Where those laws restrict free speech, especially open public debate using a full range of both polite and impolite rhetorical tools, I think those laws are bad laws.

[nichomachus]

5. That's your view -- people in those countries see it differently

England's libel laws, for example, are very different from ours. In the US, the truth is a defense against libel. Not so in England. You can libel someone there, even if what you say is the truth.

Let's not assume that our way is the only possible way.

[Silent3]

9. Who's assuming anything about "the only possible way"?

You seem to think "the only possible way" (or at least permissible way, that wouldn't invoke your ire) for me express myself in this forum is to withhold judgment on the way things are done in other countries. I disagree. I disagree with plenty that happens in the US too, including some of our American interpretations of free speech. I feel no particular reticence about offering similar criticism when it comes to other countries.

If the law in some other country is to cut off someone's hand for stealing a loaf of bread, do you recommend I refrain from criticism of such harsh punishment and simply say, "Ah, well. Different people, different ways!"?

[muriel_volestrangler]

18. Incorrect - the truth is a defence againat a libel charge in the UK

but the defendant has to prove what they wrote was the truth. Frequently, libel cases revolve around something that can't be proven of disproven; and in that case, the defendant loses (unless they can use another defence, which rarely they can).

[atreides1]

6. You Can Fix It

Become a Dutch citizen and start pushing for a change to the law.

[Silent3]

11. I'll get right on it...

...as soon as I'm finished fixing this country, sometime around 2178 by my current estimates. :)

[endarkenment]

3. They had this thing 70 years ago which resulted in genocide. nt.

[Silent3]

7. I can understand how the tragedy of the Holocaust...

...is something no one wants repeated, and why that bad history makes people, especially Europeans, wary of anything that even hints of the possibility of things going that way again, but the Holocaust was not the result of individual intolerant use of free speech against Jews, it was the result of incitement to violence (which I spoke against in my OP) against Jews from within government, by people acting within their public not private capacity to promote discrimination and violent action.

[endarkenment]

8. Not the result of individual intolerant use of free speech against Jews?

well sure it was. The NSDAP organized around outspoken anti-semitic publications, speeches, books etc. Many European nations simply draw a line around free speech that excludes attacks on religion. We draw other lines, typically around sex, that they ignore. Almost all nations compromise absolute free speech through some 'fire in a crowded theater' concept that more or less arbitrarily puts certain expressions out of bounds.

[Silent3]

10. Why do people keep quoting me dull, unsurprising facts...

...about how other countries do things other ways (what a shocker!) as if that constitutes some sort of refutation of what I'm saying?

If Germany had had no restrictions against private citizens merely saying bad things about Jews, but did have laws restricting agents of the government from promoting such views while acting in their public roles, and did have laws enshrining individual rights against discriminatory treatment by their own government, and those laws were enforced, then the Holocaust could not have happened. People saying bad things about Jews, in and of itself, would not have been anywhere near enough to cause the tragedy that occurred.

Modern Europe can easily prevent any similar repetition of history without having to restrict speech for merely being offensive to a religious group.

Now please, can you avoid any response to my post that contains saying something obliviously obvious like, "That's not how they choose to handle the problem?"

[bos1]

54. no, it was individual hate speech by those outside gov't (Hitler before

he came to power.) So Europe prohibits this kind of thing now. It's simple, really. Free exchange of ideas, yes. Incitement to hatred and violence against race and religions, preaching negation of basic human rights, no.

[supernova]

14. This is the reason

Many European nations, including The Netherlands have laws that outlaw the kind behavior resulting in the propoganda the Nazis engaged in. I can sort of understand their reluctance to go down this road when they have sizable muslim populations.

It seems to me that they are running up against these laws that seemed great at keeping their own lilly white skinheads in check, but are now being used as a way to protect some of the more inflammatory dimensions of Islam.

What was described of this film in the article didn't seem all that inflammatory to me. :shrug: The same could be said of christianity at various times in history (and I'm a christian saying that.)

No one is Europe is quite sure how to respond to their own muslim populations in their own countries. But outlawing a flim that if it were about say the evils of The Dutch Reform Church, would get only a passing nod in some avant-guarde theatre for five minutes doesn't seem quite right either.

[stopbush]

12. At its core, religion is mere OPINION. It is not fact. It is not history.

It is not a matter of race or gender. It has no connection to human rights (in fact, most religions advocate against human rights).

In a free society, any and all opinions should be open to discussion, ridicule, whatever.

Strange how puny the gods of religion appear when their adherents find offense in remarks questioning their existence. You'd think such powerful supernatural beings could defend themselves, rather than depending on the whining of weak, corporeal beings to serve as a check against the onslaughts of reality.

[LeftishBrit]

13. No, at least not in most Europaean countries

A few do have 'blasphemy laws' dating from long ago, but prosecutions have been infrequent for a long time, and such laws have been abolished in many places where they existed. The UK used to have blasphemy laws that only covered the Church of England, so you could blaspheme against Methodism, Catholicism, Islam or Judaism as much as you wanted! These laws were only formally abolished in - are you sitting down? - 2008; but like many archaic laws here, had not been applied for decades. The last time there was an attempt to apply it was in 1977 when nutty moral pro-censorship campaigner Mary Whitehouse brought a private prosecution against the magazine Gay News for publishing a poem, The Love That Dares To Speak Its Name, about a centurion's love for Christ. It didn't get anywhere.

The reason why Wilders is being prosecuted is not that he attacked Islam as such, but for alleged hate-speech against Muslim immigrants in the Netherlands. He is very right-wing on most things, and, like many very right-wing Europaean politicians, directs a lot of it against immigrants. (From what I gather, Virgil Goode might be an American equivalent.) Here is some context, from his entry in Wikipedia:


'Referring to the increased population of Muslims in the Netherlands, Wilders has said:

"Take a walk down the street and see where this is going. You no longer feel like you are living in your own country. There is a battle going on and we have to defend ourselves. Before you know it there will be more mosques than churches!"<18>

Later, Wilders suggested that Muslims should “tear out half of the Koran if they wished to stay in the Netherlands” because it contained 'terrible things' and that Muhammad would “in these days be hunted down as a terrorist”<19>.

On 8 August 2007, Wilders opined in a letter<20> to the Dutch newspaper De Volkskrant that the Koran, which he called a "fascist book", should be outlawed in the Netherlands, like Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf.<21> He stated that: "The book incites hatred and killing and therefore has no place in our legal order."<22>'

One may still object to the prosecution on general freedom-of-speech grounds; but it's hard to conjure up a lot of personal sympathy for the man, especially as he's no great defender of freedom of speech himself (see last item).

[supernova]

15. So, is he being tried for the film, really

or is the film a stand in for all the other rotten stuff he's said over the years?

Wow, The Netherlands own little David Duke. :puke:

[moggie]

16. Contrast him with Theo van Gogh

Theo van Gogh was the Dutch guy who was murdered by a Muslim nutter because of the film he made with Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the ex-Muslim politician and campaigner. The film was certainly critical of Islam, specifically of its treatment of women, but it was not illegal.

[Silent3]

17. I wonder if the Bible, the Torah, and the Qur'an could stand up...

...to the same scrutiny applied by laws against hateful or inflammatory speech, applied in order to protect the followers of those books from discrimination or offense?

I rather doubt these books would survive that scrutiny. If hateful or offensive speech are to be outlawed at all, should particular examples of such speech be exempt from those laws simply because they're found in very old books, because large enough a number of people support those books, because those books are called "religious" books?

The Bible, for example, recommends stoning children to death if they don't behave. I imagine any new book published today making such a recommendation would swiftly be banned in many countries. The Bible, however, gets "grandfathered". I guess one excuse would be something like, "Well, hardly anyone takes that literally, there are other passages of the Bible that seem to say that sort of thing is bad idea, and besides, there are laws to protect children against stoning even if someone did take that particular passage of the Bible literally." Another excuse would be that, regardless of what the laws say, trying to ban or censor the Bible simply wouldn't be politically convenient, so turn a blind eye when doing otherwise would raise an unpopular ruckus, impartiality of legal enforcement be damned.

If the Qur'an contains passages which recommend the killing of non-believers (and I believe it does, even if other passages, or creative interpretations, might argue against such violence), and those passages are not censored or the book containing them banned, shouldn't a critic of the Qur'an have an equal right to recommend the killing of all who follow the Qur'an? Shouldn't both exhortations of violence be equally legal or illegal? Isn't the fact that other laws exist, to make any such killings illegal by either party, sufficient to protect public welfare, without outlawing the speech itself that recommends those illegal actions?

[struggle4progress]

19. Y'know, although Malkin and Jawa and the other rapid righties are foaming about this,

I really suspect that residents of the Netherlands can probably defend basic free speech while curtailing incitement -- and that they can do so entirely without our help

You provide nothing to support your claim that any film, any expressive act, can be censored or outlawed simply because some group takes offense at that which someone else says about their group: no statutes, no case law, no prosecution histories, zip, nada, zilch

[Silent3]

20. I didn't make any such contention, I didn't make any specific claims about this specific case.

I merely cited this case as an example of something that brings issues of free speech vs. "hate speech" to mind. I specifically said I haven't seen the particular film, never made any specific claims about the laws being applied behind the phrase "facing charges", nor on the merits of how well any of those unmentioned specific laws may or may not properly apply to the case.

Nor do I see that stating my opinion about a particular legal case in the Netherlands, and much more so, general issues surrounding that case, is in any way, shape, or form equivalent to a claim that the people of the Netherlands are in need of any particular help from me.

Is it your opinion that, say, any citizen of the Netherlands who ever criticized the Bush administration's treatment of prisoners at Guantanamo was in fact therein making the claim that the United States couldn't possibly solve its own problems without the assistance of that particular Dutch citizen, and that if said Dutch citizen didn't want to imply such a ridiculous thing that he or she should have kept their mouth shut, or else otherwise be seen as being rudely intrusive upon American affairs?

You, sir, may wish to examine yourself to determine if any large insects have invaded the far end of your gastrointestinal tract. This particular medical condition is often associated with, among other symptoms, the need to make petulant demands for evidence for things one only imagines have been said, or imagining intrusive imposition upon the business of others where there is none.

[struggle4progress]

21. I quoted directly from the third paragraph of your OP

[Silent3]

23. And that paragraph states what I find offensive...

...about attempts at censorship in general, not that those specific offenses are exhibited specifically in the Wilders case. From further talk about the film that has come out in this thread, I'd say that so far I don't think the case (no, not according to the specifics of Dutch and EU law, which I am not attempting to address in a lawyerly fashion, but according to mine own notions of freedom of expression) is strong for censorship here. What the courts will eventually decide, who knows?

At any rate, given the manufactured offense in your line about "and that they can do so entirely without our help", why keep belaboring this? The ridiculousness of that posturing shows you came into this thread in mood to be pedantic, ready to find or invent whatever demons you needed as an audience for your lecture.

[struggle4progress]

24. Anyone interested in genuine freedom of speech issues, rather than rightwing noise, can begin by

consulting some of the organizations committeed to free speech:

http://www.indexoncensorship.org/
http://www.amnestyusa.org/individuals-at-risk/priority-cases/page.do?id=1106638
http://www.cpj.org/

[Silent3]

28. What does "rightwing noise" have to do with this?

There is both left-wing and right-wing censorship. The impulse for censorship exists across the political spectrum -- from someone on the right wanting to punish flag burning to someone on the left wanting to ban pornography as harmful to women's rights.

Is it your opinion that Wilders' free speech isn't at all at risk, and that stories to that effect are "rightwing noise"? Is it your opinion that Wilders has gone beyond that which should be protected as free speech?

I'm a "card carrying member" of the ACLU, and regularly donate money to them. Is that "good enough" for you, or would you prefer I shut my mouth until I quit my day job and devote myself full time to protecting the free speech rights of everyone, especially the cases you're more sympathetic to than Wilders?

[struggle4progress]

37. As far as I can tell, almost nobody believes in unfettered freedom of speech:

the limits, that various people want imposed, depend on particular views of the function of free speech and of history

If speech is protected only to allow the development of political policy ideas, for example, then all manner of rhetoric falls outside the protected sphere. But if speech is protected to encourage dissenters to vent their frustrations verbally, rather than by physical violence, then the protected sphere must be rather larger -- and likewise, if a purpose of protecting speech is to allow wackos to expose themselves in bright public light, where they can be clearly seen

I myself have always rather liked the view of Justice Douglas in Terminiello v. Chicago: Accordingly, a function of free speech under our system of government is to invite dispute. It may indeed best serve its high purpose when it induces a condition of unrest, creates dissatisfaction with conditions as they are, or even stirs people to anger. Speech is often provocative and challenging. It may strike at prejudices and preconceptions and have profound unsettling effects as it presses for acceptance of an idea. That is why freedom of speech, though not absolute, .. , is nevertheless protected against censorship or punishment, unless shown likely to produce a clear and present danger of a serious substantive evil that rises far above public inconvenience, annoyance, or unrest

In the US, the traditional view is that incitement presenting a clear and present danger is judged unacceptable. But Europeans may want to read the history of Nazi incitement as evidence that incitement to hatred by politicians can pose dangers that are both clear and substantive without being instant. The Dutch court's view, that politicians have a "special responsibility" in this regard, may reflect that history: can anyone really doubt that Nazi incitement provides an example of a serious substantive evil .. far above public inconvenience, annoyance, or unrest?

There appears to be no arbitrariness here: the Dutch seem to have a functional judicial system, and (regardless of its outcome) the case does not appear poised to prevent anyone in the Netherlands from criticizing religion -- your overblown OP subject line notwithstanding

[struggle4progress]

38. The rightwing noise machine has taken up Wilders as its current cause: I have already cited

Malkin and Jawa in my #19, and one should also note Pipes' involvement

The rightwing is using the Wilders case as an organizing platform, on which they will mount the usual hateful stereotypes

I actually have at present no opinion on the Wilders case. I am not familiar with Dutch or European law on free speech, and I have not seen the actual text of the court's opinion. In judging whether prosecuting Wilders poses a threat to free speech, one wants to know the details of the prosecution -- but of course there is not yet a complaint to read, as he has not even been charged yet -- so what penalty (if any) he might face, if prosecuted, is unknown.

I am, of course, happy to support the free speech rights of people with whom I disagree. I have, for example, supported the right of Nazis to parade in the United States: though I find their views utterly despicable, my current view is that here it is best to confront them with counter-demonstrations. But Europe is not the US: its histories and political cultures differ from ours, and if the Europeans draw some lines slightly differently than I would, I think that it for them to decide. That fact, that Europe has had in recent years some problems with xenophobic violence, may raise certain legitimate concerns there in light of the Nazi era

Your claim, that I want you to shut your mouth and devote yourself that I supposedly consider more worthy than Wilders, is of course overheated nonsense: I merely provide links to sites where interested readers can find real examples of people imprisoned for expressing opinions

[muriel_volestrangler]

26. You appear to think this is just about the film

It's not; it's also about various speeches and articles by Wilders.

It seems to me you're now calling your 3rd paragraph in the OP a strawman - that it wasn't meant to be related to what has happened in the Netherlands, but was just a cri de coeur from you. It'd help us all if you made that clear in future, because I think your OP reads as if that's what you thought was happening in this case, too.

Here's a sample of what Wilders says in speeches (though this was in Israel, so may not have beedn considered by the court):

Dutch Parliamentarian Geert Wilders screened his controversial film Fitna in Jerusalem on Sunday, calling on Europe to restrict immigration "from backward Islamic countries" and describing Islam as a totalitarian ideology "full of hate, violence and submission."

"Europe is in the process of 'Islamization.' We need to fight it," Wilders said. "We have to win the war against Islam. If we don't... we will lose our cultural identity, our rule of law, our liberties and our freedom."
...
"Without placing all Muslims in the same category, I think I have succeeded in showing that the Koran is not some dusty, old book, but that it's still used today as a source of inspiration for, and justification of, hatred, violence and terrorism all over the world," Wilders said during the conference, which was held at the Begin Heritage Center.
...
Israel, he said, was not fighting a territorial war, but an ideological one, in which Islam "aims for dominance over non-Muslims." He said there was no such thing "as moderate Islam."

http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1228728196542&pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull

So, "without placing all Muslims in the same category", he still thinks there is no such thing "as moderate Islam." He calls for a war on Islam. So, the possibility that he is inciting hatred of Islam, and its followers, seems real to me.

[Silent3]

27. Is anything that Wilders has said...

...in film or interviews or speeches or published articles or scribbles on a blackboard any more inflammatory than the contents of the Bible or the Qur'an? If Wilders is inciting hatred, is he doing so any more than some priests and preachers and mullahs have done, people whose rights to free speech are protected?

Suppose there existed a real Satanic cult (as opposed to the cults that only exist in the fevered imaginations of parents in cases like the McMartin preschool case many years ago) that supported and practiced ritual human sacrifice, including the molestation and killing of children. Simply reporting the facts about such a cult would incite hatred -- many might say rightfully so. Strong emotional reactions to a story like that would likely produce much more than calls for arrests and trials under applicable law. Many people would respond by loudly and passionately advocating clearly illegal actions, such as killing the followers on the spot, perhaps with colorful descriptions of punishments like cutting off genitalia and the like before killing these people -- the kind of talk many of us have probably heard, and some of us might have personally engaged in, when sitting around a television when the story of a terrible crime is reported.

We generally make allowances for angry bluster in situations like this, knowing that 99.99% of people who say such things won't do any of the things they say, at least not unless a mob scene or a war breaks out, when many people do terrible things regardless of what they've previously said or done.

Where is the clear line between the above kind of reaction to a particularly evil Satanic cult, and saying bad things about more mainstream religions that may also invoke negative feelings about the followers of those religions? If I, rightly or wrongly, have the opinion that the teachings of a particular religion and the actions of some members of that religion make the whole religion, to me, seem potentially dangerous and threatening, and when I express this opinion and my reasons for it some people who hear me come to agree with me, is that "spreading hatred"? Does someone like Wilders get an "angry bluster allowance"?

[Meshuga]

30. Focus on the act not on a group of people

It is one thing to react to certain behaviors. It is another to go out of the way to blame an entire group for the behavior of some.

The example you give of the bible is not that simple but rather complex since while the bible can be used by some to incite hate against a group there is a large group of people who study and follow the water down interpretation and base their tradition on that interpretation.

I believe that in countries where hate speech are not tolerated even the religious will get in trouble for using the bible to incite hatred. In Brazil, for example, one can face jail for hate language so if a religious group creates literature based on their own interpretation of the bible to incite hatred against gays then they might get in trouble with the law.

If there is such a law against inciting hate against a group of people and Wilders is catching flak for inciting hatred then the religious extremist groups should be catching flak for the same. And if that is the case then there is a double standard that should be obviously addressed.

[Silent3]

35. Please realize that the categorization "hate speech"...

...is part of what I'm having trouble with here, both whether it's a proper and necessary limitation of speech where actual hateful actions are already illegal, and if the notion of illegal hate speech is accepted, how fairly it's enforced.

Excusing the Bible because it's "complex" and subject to interpretation seems a poor defense to me. Someone like Wilders may be more direct and clear about his agenda than the Bible or the Qur'an, but as far as I know, he's not advocating violence or illegal action, he's advocating changes in the law (like limitations on immigration) to fit his intolerant views, and offending people in the process. The Bible might not be so direct, but parts of it advocate killing God's enemies, including their children (maybe keeping the little virgin girls in some cases), and sewing their fields with salt for good measure.

Which is worse? A direct call for intolerant immigration policy, offensively worded, or a fuzzy call for pillage and murder?

[Meshuga]

40. I am not saying the bible is complex

Neither I am defending the bible. All I am saying it is a complex situation because in one hand we have the bible that could be used by some to incite hate and on the other hand you have people who use it for other purposes in their own religious tradition. Coming up with an argument to ban the bible or not to ban the bible would be pretty hard given the complexity of the situation and how it is used by different groups. I even acknowleged in my post that the bible can be used to incite hate so I don't understand the charge. Perhaps you say I am defending the bible based on your own assumptions on how I should feel about the bible given my background?

I am not arguing for whether a direct or a fuzzy call to murder people is better or worse. That's an argument that you are creating. In my point of view, using the more direct way to justify hate or using the bible to justify hate are equally categorized. In any case, all I am saying is that I see the two situations as being different so I don't think the comparison work in the argument. But that doesn't mean I think one is worse or better than the other. There is no need to have to come up with fancy ways to charge scripture with values that we no longer hold. All you have to do is look in scripture to come up with examples.

And for the record, I don't have a strong opinion about this movie anyway since, like you, I have never watched the film.

[muriel_volestrangler]

33. I would say 'yes', it is more inflammatory than the books

That he's saying it now, rather than 1500 or 2500 years ago, is important. If there are preachers calling for 'war' on another religion, now, in countries with laws against hate speech, I'd like them prosecuted too, whether or not they're trying to use holy books to support their call.

You say "We generally make allowances for angry bluster"; perhaps, but this is a politician (who thus inevitably gets an audience and publicity) who is basing his career on stirring up hatred. So, no, he (or a preacher, who gets listened to in a similar way) don't get an "angry bluster allowance".

"Many people would respond by loudly and passionately advocating clearly illegal actions, such as killing the followers on the spot, perhaps with colorful descriptions of punishments like cutting off genitalia and the like before killing these people -- the kind of talk many of us have probably heard, and some of us might have personally engaged in, when sitting around a television when the story of a terrible crime is reported.". Yeah, that's illegal, no doubt about it. Do that in public, and you deserve prosecuting, even if you're a private citizen.

[Silent3]

36. I think this post of mine, in reply to another post...

...pretty much answers your post here.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=214&topic_id=195323&mesg_id=195470

[Donald Ian Rankin]

31. The evidence suggests you may well be wrong.

I would say that the fact that they are prosecuting this guy - who, while what he said was clearly offensive to muslims, did not (from the excerpts I've heard; there may be a counterexample that hasn't been so heavily publicised) appear to be trying to incite anyone to break the law, just to change it - means that, ipse facto, they are not defending basic free speech.

[struggle4progress]

34. You say "evidence" yet provide none. "The Amsterdam appeals court has ordered the prosecution of

member of parliament Geert Wilders for inciting hatred," according to the BBC

I have posted what I can find regarding the decision in my #25 infra: the Court apparently makes clear that, as a general rule, it does not usually regard criticism or insult actionable but that a state interest results if fundamental boundaries to debate are exceeded

The following notion, expressed by the court, is perhaps best understood in the context of WWII history: "statements which create hate and grief made by politicians, taken their special responsibility into consideration, are not permitted according to European standards"

The notion that leaders might be held to a higher standard than the general population is interesting and worth considering: of course, the floor-debate clause of the US Constitution means that here we have rather the opposite, but it is not difficult to a law that simultaneously immunized politicians for parliamentary debate while holding them to a higher standard for other speech

[Donald Ian Rankin]

39. I'm afraid I think that's a fairly clear violation of free speech.

I think it's fairly vital to a Democracy that politicians are allowed to make statements that create hate and grief; criticisms of religions and their teachings strike me as the most obvious example of such statements which I think it is important to be able to make.

"Your religion is a)wrong and b)bad" will undoubtedly cause hatred and grief in some cases, and is something it's important to be able to say.

[struggle4progress]

44. I am afraid that what you think still does not qualify as "evidence"

Moreover, there is no indication whatsoever that the action of the Dutch court will chill "criticisms of religions and their teachings"

[Donald Ian Rankin]

47. Of course prosecuting someone for criticising a religion will chill criticism of religions.

That the Dutch are restricting freedom of speech is a fact that you can read about in newspapers.

That this is a bad things is, I admit, purely an opinion on my part.

[bos1]

52. I agree. There is plenty of free speech in Europe, maybe more than in the US

but they prohibit things that preach hate of a whole race or religion, due partly to their experience with Nazism, and on the logic that it is not debate, just incitement. I agree.

[TZ]

22. I've got mixed views on this

There are also laws on not speaking about some holocaust related stuff (the denier type stuff).
Europe has some very valid reasons to believe that hate speech about religion can be very damaging.

[ZombieHorde]

42. Europe also has valid reasons to believe the opposite.

[Meshuga]

48. And the laws created in Europe are to combat racism and xenophobia

They are not meant to protect only religious people. So I think that a more interesting debate here would be whether to preserving freedom of expression vs. the struggles against racism.

I don't think this can be reduced to a case of intolerant people offending religious people and religious people not liking to be offended like the OP *seems* to be doing. It is easy to come to that conclusion when the person's own freedoms are not compromised with certain freedoms of expression except for the "yelling fire in a theater" type of situations. But it is one thing to offend a group by saying "the bible is rubbish", that "God is shit", or drawing a cartoon of Mohamed and it is another when the so called "offense" is aimed at a specific group (religious or non-religious), especially when a group is being singled out in the process. And we cannot be so naive to think that hate speech and propaganda do not lead to hate crime.

Europe has a racism problem with groups being singled out so how does one address the issue? I don't have the right answer for it since it is a very hard issue to tackle but there were plenty of incidents where black soccer players had to deal with fans expressing their freedom of expression by making monkey noises every time black players touched the ball. On the surface these incidents can be called cases of ignorant fans expressing offensive language but what does that do to the human being who has to deal with that kind of racism? We won't know until we are able to put ourselves in the player's position. What about the soccer fans who held the "Auschwitz Is Your Country... the Ovens Are Your Homes" banner at the stadium in Rome? I myself could dismiss the ignorance (but still be fearful) but how would my young child be impacted by their freedom of expression?

In Brazil (which I used as an example in another post) their own democratic society decided that hate speech should not be tolerated. I remember when I was visiting a couple of years ago, a soccer player from Argentina was arrested at a soccer stadium in São Paulo for breaking the law by calling an African Brazilian soccer player a monkey. Excessive or not, that is how Brazilians decided to handle a case where freedom of expression was infringing on another's individual freedom. This same Brazilian law applies to homophobia so if a religious person tries to use the bible"(which YES it is often used to incite hate) to break this law he will get in the same kind of trouble. And I say this because the OP makes religion the focus (after all the group being attacked is Muslim) but I think that the European drive to not tolerate discrimination is not limited to religion.

[bos1]

53. also, specifically due to the history of Nazism, to say incitement is not part of idea exchange. nt

[struggle4progress]

25. Amsterdam Court of Appeal orders the criminal prosecution of the Member of Parliament of the Dutch

Second Chamber Geert Wilders

... the Court of Appeal has answered the question whether a possible criminal prosecution or conviction would be admissible according to the norms of the European Convention on Human Rights and the jurisprudence of the European Court based thereon, which considers the freedom of expression of paramount importance. The Court of Appeal has concluded that the initiation of a criminal prosecution and a possible conviction later on as well, provided that it is proportionate, does not necessarily conflict with the freedom of expression of Wilders, since statements which create hate and grief made by politicians, taken their special responsibility into consideration, are not permitted according to European standards either.

... the Court of Appeal makes an exception as regards insulting statements in which a connection with Nazism is made (for instance by comparing the Koran with “Mein Kampf”). The Court of Appeal considers this insulting to such a degree for a community of Islamic worshippers that a general interest is deemed to be present in order to prosecute Wilders because of this ...

The Court of Appeal concludes that the way in which the public debate about controversial issues is held, such as the immigration and integration debate, does not fall within the ambit of the law in principle indeed, but the situation changes when fundamental boundaries are exceeded. Then criminal law does appear as well.

Otherwise, the Court of Appeal emphasizes that this is a provisional judgment in the sense that Wilders has not been convicted in this suit of complaint. The Court of Appeal has only judged whether there are sufficient indications – at the level of a reasonable suspicion – to start a criminal prosecution against Wilders. The penal judge who will ultimately render judgment in a public criminal trial will answer the question if there is ground for conviction, and if so, to which extent.

http://www.rechtspraak.nl/Gerechten/Gerechtshoven/Amsterdam/Actualiteiten/Amsterdam+Court+of+Appeal+orders+the+criminal+prosecution+of+the+Member+of+Parliament+of+the+Dutch+S.htm

[Silent3]

29. So we both agree that no verdict has been rendered so far...

...but that a legal procedure is under way. Sounds like a good launching point for a discussion on the general principles of free expression to me, and how they may or may not apply to Wilders' actions.

[struggle4progress]

41. Not only has no verdict been rendered, no charges have even been filed yet

[Silent3]

32. This part of the article you quote bothers me:

... the Court of Appeal makes an exception as regards insulting statements in which a connection with Nazism is made (for instance by comparing the Koran with “Mein Kampf”). The Court of Appeal considers this insulting to such a degree for a community of Islamic worshippers that a general interest is deemed to be present in order to prosecute Wilders because of this ...

I simply do not accept that any degree of insult is a proper basis for curtailment of free speech. People should be completely free to compare any book to any other book, I don't care which particular books are involved. If other people are insulted by such a comparison, let them use their freedoms to express how the feel, to denounce the comparison, to demand (with no legal force, such moral persuasion) an apology, to organize peaceful protests, etc.

Now, if in the particular case of Wilders the Dutch government doesn't want a person who says such things to represent their government, and would like to boot him out of the government because they don't want his words to be construed as having the imprimatur of the State, I have no problem with that. But as a private citizen Wilders and everyone else should be free to make whatever literary comparisons, well-founded or not, that they feel like making.

[struggle4progress]

43. Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire is an old US opinion that runs that direction:

315 U.S. 568
Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire
APPEAL FROM THE SUPREME COURT OF NEW HAMPSHIRE
No. 255 Argued: February 5, 1942 --- Decided: March 9, 1942

MR. JUSTICE MURPHY delivered the opinion of the Court.

Hampshire, for violation of Chapter 378, § 2, of the Public Laws of New Hampshire:

No person shall address any offensive, derisive or annoying word to any other person who is lawfully in any street or other public place, nor call him by any offensive or derisive name, nor make any noise or exclamation in his presence and hearing with intent to deride, offend or annoy him, or to prevent him from pursuing his lawful business or occupation.

The complaint charged that appellant,

with force and arms, in a certain public place in said city of Rochester, to-wit, on the public sidewalk on the easterly side of Wakefield Street, near unto the entrance of the City Hall, did unlawfully repeat the words following, addressed to the complainant, that is to say, "You are a God damned racketeer" and "a damned Fascist and the whole government of Rochester are Fascists or agents of Fascists," the same being offensive, derisive and annoying words and names ...

By motions and exceptions, appellant raised the questions that the statute was invalid under the Fourteenth Amendment of the Constitution of the United States in that it placed an unreasonable restraint on freedom of speech, freedom of the press, and freedom of worship, and because it was vague and indefinite. These contentions were overruled, and the case comes here on appeal ...

On the authority of its earlier decisions, the state court declared that the statute's purpose was to preserve the public peace, no words being "forbidden except such as have a direct tendency to cause acts of violence by the persons to whom, individually, the remark is addressed." It was further said:

The word "offensive" is not to be defined in terms of what a particular addressee thinks. . . . The test is what men of common intelligence would understand would be words likely to cause an average addressee to fight. . . . The English language has a number of words and expressions which, by general consent, are "fighting words" when said without a disarming smile. . . . <S>uch words, as ordinary men know, are likely to cause a fight. So are threatening, profane or obscene revilings. Derisive and annoying words can be taken as coming within the purview of the statute as heretofore interpreted only when they have this characteristic of plainly tending to excite the addressee to a breach of the peace. . . . The statute, as construed, does no more than prohibit the face-to-face words plainly likely to cause a breach of the peace by the addressee, words whose speaking constitutes a breach of the peace by the speaker -- including "classical fighting words," words in current use less "classical" but equally likely to cause violence, and other disorderly words, including profanity, obscenity and threats.

We are unable to say that the limited scope of the statute as thus construed contravenes the Constitutional right of free expression. It is a statute narrowly drawn and limited to define and punish specific conduct lying within the domain of state power, the use in a public place of words likely to cause a breach of the peace ...

Nor can we say that the application of the statute to the facts disclosed by the record substantially or unreasonably impinges upon the privilege of free speech. Argument is unnecessary to demonstrate that the appellations "damned racketeer" and "damned Fascist" are epithets likely to provoke the average person to retaliation, and thereby cause a breach of the peace ...

Affirmed.

http://www.law.cornell.edu/supct/html/historics/USSC_CR_0315_0568_ZO.html

So even in the US, it is recognized that speech might be sufficiently insulting so as to lack protection as a right

[Silent3]

45. I'm well aware of the notion of "fighting words".

The decision you cite involves more than the degree of insult, however, but a matter of direct confrontation and the type of personal accusation that, if unfounded, could even constitute libel.

Further, before you feel the need to quote some other legal decision which is either already known to me or otherwise unsurprising, I'm well aware, and can agree with, the notion that saying "George Bush is a war criminal!" loses any reasonabe expectation of protection as free speech when it's being screamed repeatedly at the top of the lungs of someone wandering an otherwise quiet residential neighborhood at 3:00 AM.

I don't think Wilders was running up to people in the street and getting in anyone's face, however, yelling that the Qur'an is like Mein Kompf.

Further, I hope you aren't laboring under the assumption that I think that Holland or all of Europe should be just like the US when it comes to the protection of free speech -- I don't think the US always lives up to the best of the ideal either.

[struggle4progress]

46. yawn

:hi:

[anonymous171]

49. European countries sometimes have interesting laws regarding free speech.

[Taitertots]

50. Offensive to Islam

The whole problem is what is offensive to Islam and their reactions when offended. There is a problem with Islam when drawings of Mohamed draw enormous portions of the muslim population to advocate violence. Violence against people for images of the prophet Mohamed is Islam. So any "hate speech" laws are going to be abused by the fickle muslims and claimed as hate speech or incitements to violence. So it is alright for Islam to advocate murder and censorship, but to call them out on it is now a hate crime. So we stifle free speech because someone might get offended if I call Mohamed a warlord, a false prophet, and a child molester or publish my Mo-Ham-Duh picture of Mohamed.

[bos1]

51. European laws are different, maybe better.

Partly due to Nazism, there are limits to speech that is supporting neo-Nazism, speech that insults an entire race or religion, and speech that is clearly aimed only to provoke such hatred. I would argue that there is just as much, if not more, actual free debate going on in Europe. Just look at the way the British PM gets grilled by reporters and the parliament, while US presidents hardly ever face tough questions.

The American Way of free speech is interesting historically but is not necessarily the best.