Football is dominating the agenda in Turkey these days, which would be fine, if only really important issues were not overshadowed. Never mind judicial coup attempt that threatens the country’s future, never mind military abandoning its principle to meddle into politics and risk damaging its credibility irreversibly.

I hope we win tonight, but there are other areas where we should compete.

(refers to the deaths in Tuzla dockyards)

Fair enough. The law was not applied but clearly some people were offended by the latest example. Once can say that the affair was resolved as it should be in a democracy: something happened, there were discussions and some appropriate action was taken. There was no need for legal/governmental involvement.

Then I found out about several European Human Rights Court decisions related to this subject. Let’s take a look at these cases: Otto-Preminger vs Austria; the story is quite relevant to the current controversy and telling:

In 1985, in a film “God the Father is presented both in image and in text as a senile, impotent idiot, Christ as a cretin and Mary Mother of God as a wanton lady with a corresponding manner of expression and in which the Eucharist is ridiculed”

1. At the request of the Innsbruck diocese of the Roman Catholic Church, The Austrian prosecutor stopped the showing of the film with the court approval under the Austrian “Media Act”. Hold on a second, what happened here. Don’t they have freedom of speech in Austria? Apparently not for everything. Well some people did not like the decision of the court, so the case was appealed. Let’s see what happened…

2. The Court of Appeal considered that artistic freedom was necessarily limited by the rights of others to freedom of religion and by the duty of the State to safeguard a society based on order and decided that the seizure was justified, upholding the original decision. The court reasoning is spectacularly relevant to the current controvery:

“The conditions of section 188 of the Penal Code are objectively fulfilled by this portrayal of the divine persons – God the Father, Mary Mother of God and Jesus Christ are the central figures in Roman Catholic religious doctrine and practice, being of the most essential importance, also for the religious understanding of the believers – as well as by the above-mentioned expressions concerning the Eucharist, which is one of the most important mysteries of the Roman Catholic religion, the more so in view of the general character of the film as an attack on Christian religions …”

Strike two for the absolute protection for the freedom of speech. Austrian laws does not seem to agree that freedom of speech allows anyone to insult someone’s religious beliefs (in this case Christian religion). So in Austria, it seems blasphemy is illegal by law and unlike Denmark, the law is still actively used.
3. This still did not sit well with the people involved, so they went to the European Human Rights Court. They asked the European Human Rights Court to “decide in favour of the applicant association and find that the seizure and forfeiture of the film were in breach of the Republic of Austria’s obligations arising from Article 10 (art. 10) of the Convention, and that just satisfaction as specified be afforded to the applicant association”.

What is Article 10 of the European Human Rights Convention, one may ask. Well, it is also quite relevant to our subject so let’s take a look:

“1. Everyone has the right to freedom of expression. This right shall include freedom to hold opinions and to receive and impart information and ideas without interference by public authority and regardless of frontiers. This Article shall not prevent States from requiring the licensing of broadcasting, television or cinema enterprises.
2. The exercise of these freedoms, since it carries with it duties and responsibilities, may be subject to such
formalities, conditions, restrictions or penalties as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society, in the interests of national security, territorial integrity or public safety, for the prevention of disorder or crime, for the protection of health or morals, for the protection of the reputation or rights of others, for preventing the disclosure of information received in confidence, or for maintaining the authority and impartiality of the judiciary.”

Basically it says that yes, you have the right to freedom of expression, BUT it can be restricted for number of reasons listed in 10.2 (which is way to broad for my taste by the way) that includes “protection of health or morals”.

In conclusion, European Human Rights court rejected the application. The full explanation for the decision can be read via the link posted above, and I’d highly recommend it as it goes methodically through many of the points currently being discussed in the blogosphere.

Bottom line: Freedom of Speech is far from being absolute as it is widely assumed by many in the western world. There are number of precedences where blasphemy was not considered under protection of the freedom of expression of the European Human Rights Convention or the laws of many European countries.

This is also not the only case, in 1996, Wingrove v. UK, UK authorities have decided that the videotape, which portrayed the crucified Christ in acts of a sexual nature with a nun, violated blasphemy laws and the European Human Rights Court have decided that Article 10 was not violated.
Hence, can we at least grant the people right to be offended by these cartoons (there seems to be no disagreement that the cartoons are blasphemous)? I cannot help but think that if the initial response to the Muslim protests were more open and fair, the Muslim extremists would not have been able to seize the opportunity to spew their hate and get wider support in the Muslim world.

I dare ask, could we not not protest the publishers of this unnecessarily provocative material rather than showing “solidarity” by siding with them and re-publishing the offensive material? Is the cause of freedom of expression better served by testing the limits of tolerance so aggresively? Don’t we have enough (and way more pressing problems) in these societies to deal with than exploration of the boundaries between freedom of expression and religious tolerance?
I plea that we should at least refrain from aiding the extremists in their quest to polarize the world and gain further support for their un-peaceful means.

For:
The right to protest, organize boycotts, etc. peacefully
Against:
Threaten anyone, use or insite violence

For:
Showing solidarity to ensure freedom of speech

Against:
Not condoning abuse of freedom of speech by supporting people who abuse it

For:
Analyzing dynamics of an event to understand the causes of problems such as terrorism, racism, etc.

From the tone and the content of the discussions (and the news), it is hard not to get the sense that the discussion has moved beyond the what may be a healthy discussion about the limits of freedom of speech. The discussion (if you can even call it that) is highly polarized and hijacked by the extremists.

Despite the fact that there are some thoughtful, constructive articles,  most of the stuff is not really about the particular event (cartoons) but more reflection of the underlying tensions at both ends. It is not difficult to see that the anger against the muslims has been growing steadily in Western countries last couple of years, as well as the anger against the West in the muslim countries. It may just be that the cartoon incident may be a trigger that unearthed this somewhat dormant anger, at least provide a medium where it is acceptable (as it’s shared by many) to express such anger publicly.

In such an environment, I am not sure that it does any good to discuss the actual event anymore. It was just a symptom, and it is almost irrelevant now. We are back at the depressing analysis by Samuel Huntington: Class of Civilizations. It is not clear yet whether the Danish Cartoon controversy will be the trigger that escalate the conflict from something that happens somewhere else in the world to our daily lives, but it certainly seems to have the potential.

One can only hope that sanity will prevail and people will understand the potential consequences of escalation.

Freedom comes with responsibility. Just because one can publish or say his/her heart desires, does not mean that one should.

The publishers of these cartoons abandoned their public responsiblity to have sense, and abused their freedom by publishing them. I wonder whether they are proud of themselves with their accomplishment, they certainly don’t seem to have any regret for having insulted some people. It is equally unfortunate that many people in the West, look at the matter as a simple freedom of speech and Islam extremism perspective and choose to support the Danish publisher, equating anyone that would be sensitive to the cartoons with the extremists.
Having the freedom of speech has a cost associated with it for the society. To protect the integrity of the principle, it is sometimes necessary to allow speeches and publications that we may consider harmful to the society. As a society, we believe this is a price we must accept to pay, to ensure our freedom. The publishers of the caricatures just have increased that cost dramatically, potentially eroding public support for freedom of speech in the future. Society may decide that the cost is simply too high and choose to restrict the free speech, given the significant social unrest caused by the incident. Would that further the cause of free speech as it was intended by the papers that re-published the caricatures for “solidarity”?

What is even more ironic is that freedom of speech is not absolute even in the western countries with liberal democrasies. In US, there is the notion of “screaming fire in a crowded theatre”, indicating that if your “speech” causes harm to the public directly, you would be held responsible. It is common sense.

In fact, in most European countries there is precedence for restricting free speech already when it concerns a sensitive topic. For example, in several countries, including France (I think Denmark as well but I could not verify it), it is a crime to dispute the official version of Holocaust history publicly. People are prosecuted and convicted for denying that Holocaust happened the way it’s officially stated. These laws are justified based on the trajedies of the past, and sensitivities of the public on this matter. Given the obvious conflict with the principles of freedom of speech, it is suprising that liberal democracies of the west would have such laws yet they are there. This is a restriction to freedom of speech that does not even pass “direct harm to the society” test stated above that is prevalent in the US.

Given that freedom of speech is not absolute, and is restricted for certain circumstances, it is unacceptable to use freedom of speech as an excuse for the desigration of sacred religious symbols. At minimum, muslims demands need to be taken seriously, instead of being brushed aside, using freedom of speech as a shield, as it was done by Danish Prime Minister. The publishers of these caricatures must be condemned, strongly, and not supported. Not for the sake of the religion, but to disarm the extremists that will most certainly cease this opportunity, and to ensure that the principle of “freedom of speech” is not further damaged by such irresponsible people.