Obama Seeks to Silence Free Speech Through Blasphemy Laws
Written by James Heiser
Friday, 23 October 2009
There was outrage — in some circles, anyway — when the news broke several weeks ago that the Obama administration had essentially aligned our nation with the Egyptian government’s efforts to stifle free speech. There has been an effort on the part of Muslim regimes to make it illegal to speak out against Islam; after all, why meaningfully address issues such as (a) the gross injustices of coerced conversions to Islam, (b) the brutal mistreatment of women around the world, and (c) the truth that Jihadist butchery has been a fundamental element of Islam since the time of Mohammed — to cite just a few examples — if one may simply legally coerce all opposition into silence? After all, the curtailing of free speech may not be quite as effective as imposing sharia law on the Western world, but it would keep the imams happy for a while.
Jonathan Turley, a professor of Law at George Washington University in Washington, D.C. wrote in the USA Today:
Around the world, free speech is being sacrificed on the altar of religion. Whether defined as hate speech, discrimination or simple blasphemy, governments are declaring unlimited free speech as the enemy of freedom of religion. This growing movement has reached the United Nations, where religiously conservative countries received a boost in their campaign to pass an international blasphemy law. It came from the most unlikely of places: the United States.
While attracting surprisingly little attention, the Obama administration supported the effort of largely Muslim nations in the U.N. Human Rights Council to recognize exceptions to free speech for any “negative racial and religious stereotyping.” The exception was made as part of a resolution supporting free speech that passed this month, but it is the exception, not the rule that worries civil libertarians. Though the resolution was passed unanimously, European and developing countries made it clear that they remain at odds on the issue of protecting religions from criticism. It is viewed as a transparent bid to appeal to the “Muslim street” and our Arab allies, with the administration seeking greater coexistence through the curtailment of objectionable speech. Though it has no direct enforcement (and is weaker than earlier versions), it is still viewed as a victory for those who sought to juxtapose and balance the rights of speech and religion.
Presumably the whole issue of anti-Islamic ‘blasphemy’ laws is a little confusing for the American left. Still, those who have built a career touting “free speech” in defense of anti-Christian obscenity and pornography have often simultaneously supported ‘politically-correct’ speech, which aims at reshaping the categories of thought by making certain forms of expression socially unacceptable, or even illegal. This is what an entire movement has come to: those who once took up the slogan “speaking truth to power” end up supporting a President whose policies support the anti-free speech agenda of vicious tyrants who silence their opponents with a gun shot, branding them “apostates.”
The absurdity of the position taken by the Obama administration is that while it is attempting to present the issue as if it were simply an international extension of American notions regarding the fight against racism, the truth is that any sort of ‘international blasphemy law’ acceptable to the world’s Islamic regimes would in fact prove impossible to ratify in the United States in the form of a treaty because it would de facto criminalize any expression of orthodox Christianity.
How could this be? To cite one example: Although Islam purportedly honors Jesus as a ‘prophet,’ a central tenet of the Christian faith — that Jesus is both divine and human, the incarnate Son of God — is universally rejected as blasphemy by Islam. Any of the historic creeds of the Christian Church would by definition be rejected by Muslims as blasphemy.
Part of living in a free society is tolerating the right of citizens to believe what they will, according to the dictates of their own consciences. Individuals may even celebrate “Blasphemy Day”— even as those who disagree with them retain the right to denounce such a non-holiday.
The nightmare of the international blasphemy law which Obama and the Muslims are pushing is that it denies this fundamental right. As Turley observes,
Thinly disguised blasphemy laws are often defended as necessary to protect the ideals of tolerance and pluralism. They ignore the fact that the laws achieve tolerance through the ultimate act of intolerance: criminalizing the ability of some individuals to denounce sacred or sensitive values. We do not need free speech to protect popular thoughts or popular people. It is designed to protect those who challenge the majority and its institutions. Criticism of religion is the very measure of the guarantee of free speech — the literal sacred institution of society.
Turley is right. Freedom of thought and freedom of expression are fundamental human rights — and a key element of this freedom is the ability to say that you believe that someone else’s position is wrong. The advocates of blasphemy laws wish to restrict this freedom to themselves alone: they would sit above all of us, dictating what may be said and thought on the most fundamental questions which confront us as human beings. No greater tyranny is imaginable than to seek to compel another man’s conscience through coercion of law.
Copyright 2009. The John Birch Society
Rt. Rev. James Heiser has served as Pastor of Salem Lutheran Church in Malone, Texas, while maintaining his responsibilities as publisher of Repristination Press, which he established in 1993 to publish academic and popular theological books to serve the Lutheran Church. Heiser has also served since 2005 as the Dean of Missions for The Augustana Ministerium and in 2006 was called to serve as Bishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Diocese of North America (ELDoNA). An advocate of manned space exploration, Heiser serves on the Steering Committee of the Mars Society. His publications include two books; The Office of the Ministry in N. Hunnius' Epitome Credendorum (1996) and A Shining City on a Higher Hill: Christianity and the Next New World (2006), as well as dozens of journal articles and book reviews.
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