@Kenanmalik "on the importance of the right to offend"

Kenan Malik (@kenanmalik) is a writer, lecturer and broadcaster, including a presenter of BBC Radio 4's Analysis. His last book From Fatwa to Jihad was shortlisted for the Orwell Prize. He recently wrote a piece on his blog, 'On the importance of the right to offend.' He said:

"There is something truly bizarre (and yet in keeping with the zeitgeist of our age) that someone should become the focus of death threats and an international campaign of vilification for suggesting that an inoffensive cartoon was, well, inoffensive. 

From the Rushdie affair to the controversy over the Danish cartoons, from the forcing offstage of Gurpreet Kaur Bhatti’s play Behzti to the attempt this week by members of Northern Ireland’s Democratic Unionist Party to shut down the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s production of The Bible: The Complete Word Of God (a decision thankfully later reversed),  reactionaries have often used campaigns against ‘offence’ as a political weapon with which to harass opponents and as a means of bolstering their community support. The anti-Nawaz campaign is no different. Muhammad Shafiq and Muhammad Ansar both have had public spats with Nawaz, and both are cynically exploiting the claim of ‘offensiveness’ to reclaim political kudos."

Bob Dylan meets Europe’s neo-blasphemy laws

Ed West writes in The Spectator here:

"The French authorities are investigating Bob Dylan after some Croats were offended by something he said in an interview with Rolling Stone last year. The singer had said: ‘If you got a slave master or [Ku Klux] Klan in your blood, blacks can sense that. That stuff lingers to this day. Just like Jews can sense Nazi blood and the Serbs can sense Croatian blood.’ 

Dylan is the latest victim of Europe’s neo-blasphemy laws, in which offending someone’s group identity is treated in the same way that offending God once was. When Christianity stops being sacred, everything becomes sacred; did GK Chesterton say that? Well it’s the sort of thing he might have said."

Removing Blasphemy from the Irish Constitution

Blasphemy offence is national irrelevance and international embarrassment @ICCLtweet #ccven #blasphemy @atheistie
— Ivana Bacik (@ivanabacik) November 2, 2013

Members of the Convention on the Irish Constitution voted on Sunday 3 November 2013 on whether the reference to the offence of blasphemy should be kept as it is in the Constitution, 38% said Yes, 61% said No and 1% were either undecided or had no opinion. In a follow-up question, 38% of members believed the offence should be removed from the Constitution altogether, 53% said it should be replaced with a new general provision to include incitement to religious hatred and 9% had no opinion

Abolish Northern Ireland's Blasphemy Law

There's now an effort to abolish the old blasphemy law that still exists in Northern Ireland. See here:

"Blasphemy and blasphemous libel are legal offences in Northern Ireland.

In May 2008, blasphemy laws were abolished by the UK Parliament but this did not extend to Northern Ireland, leaving the matter to be decided by the NI Assembly which has shown no interest in addressing the issue.

Abolition of these archaic laws will bring Northern Ireland into line with the rest of UK legislation. It will also be a symbolic act showing that Northern Ireland is finally moving away from religious prejudice, is shunning its fundamentalist elements and is prepared to embrace an inclusive, tolerant and secular future.

Blasphemy laws are used throughout the world to prevent free speech and to oppress and persecute religious minorities. Repeal of the Northern Ireland blasphemy laws will show solidarity with the oppressed while raising awareness of the issue and setting an example for other countries to follow."

Michael Nugent also wrote a compelling piece in The Journal on Ireland's blasphemy law in the summer 2013. He said:

"The Irish blasphemy law reinforces the religious ethos of the 1937 Constitution. The preamble states that all authority of the State comes from a specific god called the Most Holy Trinity. You cannot become President or be appointed as a Judge unless you take a religious oath. There are also other references in the Constitution to religion, as opposed to gods. We should be removing 1930s theistic references from the Irish Constitution, or updating them to reflect the reality of Ireland today, not legislating to enforce them."

Blasphemy Laws still stand in Northern Ireland

Blasphemy was abolished in England and Wales in 2008 through the action of Liberal Democrat MP Dr Evan Harris who described the law as, "ancient, discriminatory, unnecessary, illiberal and non-human rights compliant."

Because the law applied only to Christians and in fact the Church of England representing Anglican views. So that was born out of events from 1989 when someone tried to get permission to have a summons presented against Salmon Rushdie in respect of his novel, The Satanic Verses. That wasn't allowed because Islam was not protected by the blasphemy laws.

The last time a case was brought was by the state against an individual in 1922 who compared Jesus with a circus clown and they were sentenced to hard labour. After that there was nothing until the case of Mary Whitehouse which was brought in the 1977 when the art teacher used the law to try and prosecute the editor of Gay News. The ground for her action was on the basis that the publication has published an explicit poem about Jesus. They were found guilty by a majority of 10-2 and every court in the land upheld it.

Chris Ledgard said of Northern Ireland: "So, thinking about Northern Ireland, if I wanted to read out the poem on this programme, it probably wouldn't be a very good idea?"

Nicola Cain said: "Not if we're broadcasting to Northern Ireland but I also think we'd probably be in breach of our guidelines as well."

The law that was abolished in England and Wales in 2008 still stands in Northern Ireland. The law was so old in Scotland that it fell into non-use and became unusable in modern times.