Respecting a Child's Point of View

Chain The Dogma       December 14, 2011

Respecting a Child's Point of View         

Kids would rather play than pray

by Perry Bulwer

“This post is part of a series inspired by the Prevent Abuse of Children Today (PACT) campaign, hosted by Stepping Stones Nigeria. Please add your name to the PACT petition to prevent abuse of innocent children in the Niger Delta and visit the site to find out more: www.makeapact.org

An Australian professor of child and family health nursing, Cathrine Fowler, caused a minor controversy this past August when she suggested that sitting babies faced forward in pushchairs or carrying them in slings in that position is selfish, may stunt their development and causes unnecessary stress which can turn them into anxious adults. She said:  "In not considering our baby’s perspective, we are inadvertently quite cruel to children."

That insight goes far beyond the practical question of how best to push or carry a baby, and into the legal territory of the 'best interests of the child' standard, which is the guiding principle of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (the Convention). It is important to keep in mind that the best interest of a child is also the best interest of the adult that child will become, so that standard protects not just children, but adults as well. If an inadvertent failure to consider a child's point of view can cause harm in such a pedestrian matter as the correct position to carry them, then far greater harm, even death, can be caused by parents who deliberately act to subsume their child's rights and perspective. And that is exactly what religious parents do when they indoctrinate their children so that they conform to their beliefs. Indoctrinating children into one religion before they are capable of making their own free and informed decision whether to believe or not is a direct denial of their human rights. Protecting the right to religious freedom for children, which includes freedom from religion, is one of the best ways to protect that right for adults.

All children are born atheists. If allowed to develop without having a belief system imposed on them through constantly reinforced direct and/or cultural indoctrination, most children eventually reach the stage where they abandon belief in fantastical figures. Given the time of year I'm writing this, Santa Claus is a perfect example of that, and belief in God would follow that pattern too if children were free to grapple with belief in the supernatural on their own without interference from dogmatic adults.  Unfortunately, most children in the world are not allowed to exercise their inherent human right to develop free from religious impositions. However, I am certain that if given a free choice unhindered by dogma or superstition, all children would prefer playing to praying.

Kids just want to have fun and be happy, which is their right recognized in Article 31 of the Convention:

Article 31
1. States Parties recognize the right of the child to rest and leisure, to engage in play and recreational activities appropriate to the age of the child and to participate freely in cultural life and the arts.

2. States Parties shall respect and promote the right of the child to participate fully in cultural and artistic life and shall encourage the provision of appropriate and equal opportunities for cultural, artistic, recreational and leisure activity.

Many children never get the chance to play and have fun, however, let alone enjoy their own right to religious freedom. The unlucky ones are burdened with supernatural religious beliefs, either imposed on them or targeted against them. In extreme cases,  children who have religion forced on them are denied even the most simple childhood pleasures. Some are forced to become adults before their time. Parents indoctrinate them with their own beliefs that forbid playing with toys or riding bikes,  or deny educational opportunities, or worst of all reject medical care; religious groups target them for unethical proselytising  or exorcisms; and child-traffickers abduct, maim and murder them for body parts used in witchcraft rituals.

I recently wrote an article arguing that corporal punishment by parents is an abuse of authority  and an infringement of children's rights. In the course of that argument, I touched on the issue of a child's right to religious freedom. It is an important point that is worth repeating over and over, because although all countries except for the United States and Somalia have ratified the Convention, the denial of religious freedom for children is still rampant around the world. Here is what I recently wrote about Article 14 of the Convention, which sets out a child's right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion:

Article 14 is crucial for establishing the proper balance between parental and children's rights. Clearly, children have the right to freely form their own thoughts and conscience, and choose their own religious beliefs, or none. After all, freedom of religion for children, and for adults, would be no freedom at all if it did not include the right to be free from religion. Since parents also have the right to the same freedoms, it is inevitable that conflicts between those rights will arise. As it must and does throughout, the Convention sides with children. Sub-section 2 clearly states that the rights and duties of parents in this regard must not be directed towards protecting their own freedoms, but towards ensuring their children are able to exercise their personal religious rights in accordance with their evolving capacities. Anticipating objections from parents who only read the first few words in sub-section 2 and insist that their own religious freedom gives them a right to indoctrinate their children, sub-section 3 clarifies that the right to religious freedom is not absolute. A parent's right to religious freedom does not give them the right to deny that same freedom to their child, regardless of the child's age. Or, as the U.S. Supreme Court famously said: "Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it does not follow they are free, in identical circumstances, to make martyrs of their children before they have reached the age of full and legal discretion when they can make that choice for themselves."

That quotation also touches on the principle of the "evolving capacities of the child" as well as the concept of a child's right to an open future. That is a right that is not specifically set out in the Convention, but is implied in this Article and elsewhere. After all, if a parent makes an irreversible religious decision on behalf of their child, such as to rely on faith alone and refuse necessary medical treatment and the child dies, then that child has no future at all. Circumcision of both boys and girls is another common example of a religious decision made by parents that causes irreversible harm to children. But even where death or injury does not occur, a child's right to an open future can still be easily denied them through indoctrination that cuts off their capacity for critical thinking and ability to freely form their own thoughts, conscience and beliefs.

If a child is indoctrinated into a particular religious dogma by authoritarian parents from the earliest age, their right to freedom of expression and information denied through restrictive, narrow-minded 'education', and they are unaware of the full extent of their human rights, it becomes impossible for them to exercise those rights, either as a child or later as an adult. I have encountered countless believers who are so unaware of their own rights that they insist that religious freedom does not include the right to be free from religion. But if the right to freedom of religion has any meaning at all, it must mean that everyone, including children, is free to choose their own religious beliefs or none. When that freedom is denied to a child, it is also denied to the adult that child will become. Protecting a person's rights while they are a child is the only to way to protect that person's rights once they are an adult. That's what a child's right to an open future means, reaching adulthood with their capacity to exercise all their rights still intact. Protecting the full range of children's rights protects human rights for everyone.

Imagine, John Lennon exhorted, a world where there is no religion to kill or die for. That would be a world where all children were truly free to be children -- to play, laugh and have fun without fear or threat.

A child is forced to be a Hindu

A child is forced to be a Jew

A child is forced to be a Buddhist

A child is  forced to be a  Zoroastran

A child is forced to be a Sikh

A child is forced to be a Mormon

A child is forced to be a Muslim

A child is forced to be a Scientologist

A child is forced to be a Christian

A child is forced to be a Catholic

A father tortures his child as a witch 

A child is forced to be a Jain nun

RELATED ARTICLES:

Child sacrifice: a review of the documentary All God's Children - the ultimate sacrifice

Corporal Punishment, the Abuse of Authority and the Rights of Children

A Snapshot of Religion Related Child Abuse From June 2007 to June 2011
https://religiouschildabuse.blogspot.com/2011/07/a-snapshot-of-religion-related-child.html

Corporal Punishment, the Abuse of Authority and the Rights of Children

Chain The Dogma   November 16, 2011

Corporal Punishment, the Abuse of Authority and the Rights of Children

Protecting children's rights protects human rights for everyone

by Perry Bulwer


Abuse of authority is a theme common to most of the posts on this blog. It applies whether I am writing about corrupt religious leaders, corrupt politicians, or corrupt police, three groups I frequently criticize here. But there is another group of people I have not yet specifically written about that regularly abuses their authority. Those people, as you probably guessed by the title of this article, are parents who believe that corporal punishment is a just and effective way to discipline children. My first draft used 'spanking' in the title, but corporal punishment often involves far more than hitting just one body part. Here is what I wrote in the main article on the home page of my archive, Religion and Child Abuse News:

 Of course, there is an awful lot of physical child abuse that is not related to religion. Children are easy targets. But it is more than just sad when religion is used to justify assaulting children, it is immoral and criminal. Corporal punishment takes many forms ranging from slaps to torture. In my opinion, even a slap is an affront to the dignity of a child, or any human for that matter. Spanking children is not necessary. There are better ways to train children than hitting them, so why do believers who claim to have superior morals to those of unbelievers think it is okay to assault vulnerable children? If a slap is ok, why not a punch, or a beating, or a whipping, or water torture, or other tortures? Some believers don't know where to draw the line and children suffer or die.

Furthermore, the term 'corporal punishment' also applies to situations where no physical assault occurs, but where necessities of life are purposely withheld, such as forced fasting, sleep deprivation  or deliberate and prolonged exposure to the elements causing hypothermia, or other similar evils.

The words 'discipline' and 'disciple' are obviously related, and it is no surprise that religious people who believe it is their duty to make disciples of their children  are the most ardent supporters of corporal punishment. For example, some of the scriptures most often cited by Christians to justify assaulting their children are Proverbs 13: 24; 19:18; 22:6,15; 23:13,14; and 29:15.  Those verses encourage beating children with an instrument as the proper way to discipline or train them. While Proverbs 22:6  does not specifically refer to beating children, it does indicate that such training, or 'training up a child', is intended to instruct children in the right way or path according to that dogma, so that when they become adults they will not depart from it. In other words, Biblical corporal punishment of children is specifically directed at so thoroughly indoctrinating them with dogma that it becomes extremely difficult to escape it, even when they become adults. There is no choice or freedom for children imprisoned by such dogma, they simply must obey authority without question: do it because mommy, daddy, or God says so. Those children certainly have no freedom of religion, for they are told exactly what to believe, and threatened with punishment if they do not.

By the way, To Train Up a Child,  is the title of a very popular book among Christian fundamentalists that teaches them how to properly beat children. It was found in the homes of at least three families where children died as a result of the methods taught by its author, pastor Michael Pearl, who insists that the Bible gives parents authority to assault their children and violate their inherent human rights. Michael Pearl is an evil man. At least two of those murdered children were adopted, and may have been victims of the evangelical movement's use of international adoptions for the religious conversion of children.   Undoubtedly, there are many more victims we may never hear about.

Authority is synonymous with power, so to abuse authority is to abuse the power one holds over another. Such abuse is evil. In The Lucifer Effect: Understanding How Good People Turn Evil,  Philip Zimbardo wrote:

Let's begin with a definition of evil. Mine is a simple, psychologically based one: Evil consists in intentionally behaving in ways that harm, abuse, demean, dehumanize, or destroy innocent others—or using one's authority and systemic power to encourage or permit others to do so on your behalf. In short, it is "knowing better but doing worse."

Continuing with that theme, William Antonio Boyle, in a footnote to his essay on "Sibling Rivalry", wrote the following about abuse of authority (emphasis in the original):

Abuse of power or authority may be the prime source and true essence of moral EVIL - Evil is the ABUSE of power. Moral EVIL begins to exist when someone refuses to accept responsibility for the welfare of others, especially those naturally under his or her direct care. It can be said that someone has POWER, if that someone can decisively influence (the) reality (of others).

In this context, AUTHORITY is power that derives from a social accord or convention, such as the laws or customs of a social group such as a state or an organization. So then, what is "abuse of power"? ABUSE OF POWER is the illegitimate use of power.

ABUSE OF POWER is that situation that exists whenever someone who has POWER over others, (that is, the capacity to impose his or her will on those others) for example, by virtue of his or her superior mental dexterity, social position, physical strength, knowledge, technology, weapons, wealth, or the trust that others have in him or her, unjustifiably uses that power to EXPLOIT or HARM those others, or through lack of action, ALLOWS exploitation or harm to occur to them.

It follows that someone who does not have (a particular form of) power cannot abuse it. It also follows that the main (and perhaps the only) principle of human ethics and morality should be to avoid the abuse of power.

Obviously, parents have some natural authority and power over their children, but it is not absolute, at least not in a civilized society. Not only are there national laws forbidding parental neglect and mistreatment of their children, but the international community has recognized in various declarations, conventions and treaties that, unlike parents, the vulnerability of children requires they be given special rights and protections, as set out in the Convention on the Rights of the Child (the Convention),  which all nations have ratified except for the United States and Somalia.

Although the rights of parents and legal guardians must be taken into account when considering the rights of a child, that balancing act is always weighted toward the child since the primary consideration must be the best interests of the child (see Article 3). When articulating specific rights of children, the Convention also considers the developmental stage of the child. Those various considerations are also set out in Article 5:

Article 5

States Parties shall respect the responsibilities, rights and duties of parents or, where applicable, the members of the extended family or community as provided for by local custom, legal guardians or other persons legally responsible for the child, to provide, in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child, appropriate direction and guidance in the exercise by the child of the rights recognized in the present Convention.

That article indicates that the rights and obligations of parents must be directed towards ensuring that their child is able to eventually exercise all of their Convention rights, which would be in the best interests of the child, though not necessarily the parents. The phrase "evolving capacities of the child" also appears later in the Convention in relation to religion. It recognizes that as children mature they are increasingly able to form their own thoughts, opinions and beliefs, and that their exercise of particular rights is on a continuum according to their maturation level. While parents "... have the primary responsibility for the upbringing and development of the child [t]he best interests of the child will be their basic concern." (Article 18) In other words, the authority of a parent over their child is not absolute, for not only is it limited by national laws related to child welfare, it must also be directed to ensuring the best interests of their child in accordance with their inherent human rights as set out under international law in the Convention.

Before getting back to the issue of corporal punishment, which the Convention addresses in Article 19, other Articles addressing the issues of freedom of speech and freedom of thought, conscience and religion are also instructive for determining the proper balance between parental and children's rights. Article 12 states:

Article 12

1. States Parties shall assure to the child who is capable of forming his or her own views the right to express those views freely in all matters affecting the child, the views of the child being given due weight in accordance with the age and maturity of the child.

2. For this purpose, the child shall in particular be provided the opportunity to be heard in any judicial and administrative proceedings affecting the child, either directly, or through a representative or an appropriate body, in a manner consistent with the procedural rules of national law.

That article addresses a child's right to freedom of expression, and so does Article 13. Article 12 speaks to the obligations of States Parties, in other words, those governments that have ratified the Convention. The age and maturity of the child is specifically considered in that Article because it concerns all matters and decisions that affect the child. The more a matter effects the child, such as in a custody dispute, and the more mature the child is, the more weight given to their views on the matter. Moreover, while sub-section 2 indicates that although a child's right of free expression on matters affecting them is particularly important in judicial or administrative proceedings, the right is not confined to that. Article 13 clarifies that point by speaking directly to a child's right to freedom of expression, without any regard to parental rights or the maturity and capacity of the child.

Article 13

1. The child shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of the child's choice.

2. The exercise of this right may be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary:

(a) For respect of the rights or reputations of others; or

(b) For the protection of national security or of public order (ordre public), or of public health or morals.

Importantly, freedom of expression for children includes the right to "seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds". And just as important, there are no specific parental restrictions on this right. However, this right may be violated by authoritarian parents more often than most others, except for the right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion. After all, it is rather easy to control a child's access to information and ideas, even in this information age. Books can be banned or burned,  access to university  and the internet can be denied, thoughts, opinions and facts  can be censored. Many religious people home school their children and many religious groups set up their own private schools for precisely that reason, but in direct contradiction to the principle of the best interests of the child. It is not in any child's interest to be denied their right to freely seek and receive information of any kind in any form. And it is also not in any child's interest to be denied their right to freedom of thought, conscience and religion, as set out in Article 14:

Article 14

1. States Parties shall respect the right of the child to freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

2. States Parties shall respect the rights and duties of the parents and, when applicable, legal guardians, to provide direction to the child in the exercise of his or her right in a manner consistent with the evolving capacities of the child.

3. Freedom to manifest one's religion or beliefs may be subject only to such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary to protect public safety, order, health or morals, or the fundamental rights and freedoms of others.

Article 14 is crucial for establishing the proper balance between parental and children's rights. Clearly, children have the right to freely form their own thoughts and conscience, and choose their own religious beliefs, or none. After all, freedom of religion for children, and for adults, would be no freedom at all if it did not include the right to be free from religion. Since parents also have the right to the same freedoms, it is inevitable that conflicts between those rights will arise. As it must and does throughout, the Convention sides with children. Sub-section 2 clearly states that the rights and duties of parents in this regard must not be directed towards protecting their own freedoms, but towards ensuring their children are able to exercise their personal religious rights in accordance with their evolving capacities. Anticipating objections from parents who only read the first few words in sub-section 2 and insist that their own religious freedom gives them a right to indoctrinate their children, sub-section 3 clarifies that the right to religious freedom is not absolute. A parent's right to religious freedom does not give them the right to deny that same freedom to their child, regardless of the child's age. Or, as the U.S. Supreme Court famously said:

Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it does not follow they are free, in identical circumstances, to make martyrs of their children before they have reached the age of full and legal discretion when they can make that choice for themselves.

That quotation also touches on the principle of the "evolving capacities of the child" as well as the concept of a child's right to an open future. That is a right that is not specifically set out in the Convention, but is implied in this Article and elsewhere. After all, if a parent makes an irreversible religious decision on behalf of their child, such as to rely on faith alone and refuse necessary medical treatment  and the child dies, then that child has no future at all. Circumcision of both boys and girls  is another common example of a religious decision made by parents that causes irreversible harm to children. But even where death or injury does not occur, a child's right to an open future can still be easily denied them through indoctrination that cuts off their capacity for critical thinking  and ability to freely form their own thoughts, conscience and beliefs.

If a child is indoctrinated into a particular religious dogma by authoritarian parents from the earliest age, their right to freedom of expression and information denied through restrictive, narrow-minded 'education', and they are unaware of the full extent of their human rights, it becomes impossible for them to exercise those rights, either as a child or later as an adult. I have encountered countless believers who are so unaware of their own rights that they insist that religious freedom does not include the right to be free from religion. But if the right to freedom of religion has any meaning at all, it must mean that everyone, including children, is free to choose their own religious beliefs or none. When that freedom is denied to a child, it is also denied to the adult that child will become. Protecting a person's rights while they are a child is the only to way to protect that person's rights once they are an adult. That's what a child's right to an open future means, reaching adulthood with their capacity to exercise all their rights still intact. Protecting the full range of children's rights protects human rights for everyone.

Finally, we get to the heart of the issue of corporal punishment and children's rights in Article 19 of the Convention, which states:

Article 19

1. States Parties shall take all appropriate legislative, administrative, social and educational measures to protect the child from all forms of physical or mental violence, injury or abuse, neglect or negligent treatment, maltreatment or exploitation, including sexual abuse, while in the care of parent(s), legal guardian(s) or any other person who has the care of the child.

It could hardly be stated clearer than that. State Parties, that is every country in the world except the U.S. and Somalia, are required to take all measures necessary for protecting children from all forms of harm while in the care of their parents. In other words, children are vulnerable and therefore need protection from all forms of harm, even from their own parents or guardians. The question then becomes: does corporal punishment harm children? The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) does not endorse corporal punishment  for any reason because it is ineffective for changing behaviour in the long term. But there is also evidence that, even if a milder form of corporal punishment such as spanking does not cause physical harm it still causes emotional  and intellectual harm.

According to Zimbardo's definition of evil, any action that among other things demeans or dehumanizes others is evil, in other words, harmful. Corporal punishment, even in its mildest forms, certainly demeans the dignity of children, but even worse, it dehumanizes them. Long before Michael Pearl's book became a best seller on how to beat children into submission, James Dobson, another evil evangelist and founder of Focus on the Family, wrote a book in 1977 called Dare to Discipline, in which he "glorified a sadomasochistic/spiritual ritual of discipline." And in his 1992 book, The Strong Willed Child, Dobson compares beating children to beating dogs. After describing his efforts to make his defiant dog obey him, he writes: "Just as surely as a dog will occasionally challenge the authority of his leaders, so will a little child, only more so."  Not to be out done, Pearl writes in his book that he uses "the same principles the Amish use to train their stubborn mules".  To those evangelical child beaters and others like them, such as Bill Gothard,
children are mere chattel,  or personal property, akin to slaves or domesticated animals, without any personal rights. They are not just using dogs and mules as metaphors for how to train children, they are using exactly the same methods on children as they use on animals. If that is not dehumanizing, therefore evil, I don't know what is. And it is an evil they call good (Isaiah 5:20),  which makes it even more evil.

If you have followed any of the links here to news articles detailing the horrifying results of corporal punishment you will understand that referring to it as evil is not hyperbole. Some will object that my examples are all extreme cases and that most corporal punishment takes the form of mild spanks or slaps that do not cause physical harm, and therefore it is unfair to call that evil. However, as I have pointed out, growing evidence suggests that even that type of corporal punishment can cause emotional and intellectual harm, in violation of Article 19. Furthermore, consider the issue from a child's point of view and imagine what it must be like to have a giant human who is several times larger and more powerful in every way hitting you for reasons that may not be entirely clear to you. But because most corporal punishment is hidden behind closed doors, it can be difficult to imagine what corporal punishment is like for children, even after reading horrific accounts. So, here is a video, courtesy of a Texas judge,  who adjudicated dozens of family law cases, beating his teenage daughter with a belt. Now, imagine again that same brutality or even worse being applied to even younger children, and tell me that is not evil. By the way, the judge would have been criminally charged, but the statute of limitation had run out. That video contradicts claims by many advocates of corporal punishment that it is only used against young children, as do the well documented abuses in the 'troubled teen' industry of boot camps or similar behaviour modification programs.

I have used the ordinary meaning of 'assault' in this article to refer to physical blows by one person against another, but in most common law jurisdictions (where I'm writing from) the legal meaning of 'assault' refers to threats of harm to another, while actual physical contact is called battery. The point is, the law in those jurisdictions protects adults not just from physical violence but also from threats of violence. Even the most benign threats can attract criminal charges. For example, a Canadian police officer had a young female protester arrested for assault for blowing soap bubbles in his direction. So, if adults are protected from even the mildest forms of assault, why are children who are far more vulnerable not similarly protected? Of all the countries using the common law,  only New Zealand,  Kenya and Tongo are among the 31 countries that have enacted laws prohibiting all corporal punishment  of children, as Article 19 of the convention requires all parties to do.  In all other countries, including here in Canada, it is illegal to threaten or hit adults, but it remains legal to threaten and beat children, in direct contravention of their inherent human rights recognized in the Convention. And that is a crying shame.


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Mormon pedophile polygamist, Warren Jeffs, guilty of raping girls for God

Chain the Dogma    August 7, 2011

Mormon pedophile polygamist, Warren Jeffs, guilty of raping girls for God

He argued that religious freedom gave him the right to rape girls

by Perry Bulwer


It is no surprise that Warren Jeffs was found guilty  by a Texas jury for child sexual assault, given the overwhelming evidence  against him. Eleven other men in his FLDS cult were also charged with similar crimes and all seven of those who have been prosecuted so far were also found guilty  and given lengthy prison sentences. In fact, nothing about this case surprises me.

I am not surprised by Jeffs antics in the courtroom in his latest trial. Once captured and presented with solid evidence against him, he knew he had almost no chance to escape punishment through the legal system. Forced to face reality for the first time in his life, he momentarily awoke from his religious delusion and admitted to being an immoral, spiritual fraud. That jailhouse confession  in phone calls to his family members reveals a broken man who, realizing how wicked he has been, not only renounces his claim to being a prophet, but even attempts suicide.

Jeffs would later recant that confession and retake control of his cult from prison, but for that brief moment the curtain was drawn back and the world, though not most of his followers, saw the true nature of that evil man. Apologists (see jailhouse confession link above) have tried to downplay Jeffs' admission of immoralities with a sister and a daughter by saying that the FLDS standard of immorality is different than society's, insinuating that it was not incest he was admitting to. However, at Jeffs' sentencing hearing  his niece

... described an incident that allegedly occurred between her and Jeffs when she was 7 years old. "He made me sit on his lap," she testified, and did "inappropriate things to me." She was crying so hard at one point that the prosecutor stopped questioning. Neither side pressed her for details. CNN is withholding the niece's name because she is the alleged victim of a sexual assault.  

It is fairly safe to assume, as CNN has done by withholding her name, that she was describing sexual molestation, if not rape. At the same hearing, Warren Jeffs nephew, Brent Jeffs, testified that his uncle raped him when he was five years old. Brent had previously revealed that in his book, Lost Boy, as well as in public interviews, in a lawsuit against his uncle, and in an affidavit  submitted to the Canadian court considering the constitutionality of the anti-polygamy law. Jeffs was well aware of all the evidence the state had against him because he attempted many times to have that evidence rejected. So, knowing he had no defence other than his ridiculous claim that religious freedom gave him the right to rape little girls, Jeffs simply used the legal process and the courtroom as a pulpit, further consolidating control over his followers.

I am not surprised that Jeffs claimed religious persecution and tried to use the religious freedom defence after firing all of his lawyers. Most people are mistaken about the concept of religious freedom, thinking it gives them the right to not only believe anything they want, but to act on those beliefs. However, it is not an absolute right that allows all religious behaviour. As the U.S. Supreme Court famously said:

Parents may be free to become martyrs themselves. But it does not follow they are free, in identical circumstances, to make martyrs of their children before they have reached the age of full and legal discretion when they can make that choice for themselves.

Religious freedom necessarily includes the right to be free from religion otherwise it is an empty right, and it is also a right that children have. Jeffs' claim that religious freedom gives him the right to rape girls is one of the more extreme versions of the argument. Faith healing parents who claim religious freedom to let their children die  from treatable conditions without any medical care is another example of religious extremism that denies religious freedom to children. But mainstream and moderate religious leaders and believers, not just fundamentalists, fringe sects and cults, also frequently appeal to their right to religious freedom while denying the same right to their children, so they should not feel smug in their criticisms of Jeffs and the FLDS.

Perhaps the most common example of denying religious freedom to children is the indoctrination of young people (kids are people too!) before they have a chance to form their own opinions. For religious freedom to have any meaning for adults, it must be protected for children. If a child becomes so indoctrinated by a particular dogma that it becomes almost impossible for her to break out of that indoctrination as an adult, then her freedom to choose her own religion has been violated and denied. In order for adults to have the freedom to exercise their religious autonomy, they must as children have the right to an open future. God experts know this all to well, which is why they specifically target little children for proselytizing, to ensure they have future congregations they can exploit. As a Jesuit famously said, "Give me the child until he is seven, and I will give you the man", which is a paraphrasing of Proverbs 22:6 "Train up a child in the way he should go and when he is old he will not depart from it." At least that's what they hope.

Adult believers value religious freedom for themselves and would reject any attempt to force dogma on them, yet they do not hesitate to do that to their children. This is the great hypocrisy surrounding religious freedom, parents supposedly having a greater right to that freedom than their children, which may be the main reason why the United States, one of the most religious countries in the world, is also the only one (Somalia is a failed state) not to have signed the Convention on the Rights of the Child. But I think the opposite is true. I think that all conflicts between parental and children's religious rights should be decided in favour of children. They are the more vulnerable party and their right to an open future can be completely denied them by zealous parents, preachers, teachers and priests who think it is perfectly acceptable to manipulate immature minds. In my opinion, proselytizing and indoctrinating little children with religious dogma is a sign of a weak, irrational ideology that only uninformed, gullible adults and naive, innocent children can be convinced to believe. It is a form of entrapment that captures and enslaves the mind of a child before they gain the maturity and critical thinking skills to resist such psychological manipulation.

Finally, I am not surprised that several Mormon fundamentalist groups that practice polygamy only denounced Jeffs after he was convicted.  Statements by those groups, quoted in the Salt Lake Tribune, indicate that they only became alarmed, shocked, horrified after hearing the new evidence that has surfaced in this latest trial.

The Principle Rights Coalition (PRC) — representing five polygamous churches, along with others who practice polygamy but are unaffiliated with any church — called the sexual abuse of children "reprehensible."

"As new evidence has surfaced in Texas ... we are alarmed that such depravity could have been perpetrated by anyone," according to the statement.

"While we understand that horrific abuse can occur in any part of society, it is especially devastating to discover that sexual assault of young children may have occurred behind the false pretense of a religious ideology," the statement says.
...
An accompanying statement by the Apostolic United Brethren (AUB) said they were "shocked and horrified" by what has been revealed during Jeffs’ trial.

What took them so long? And even with the conviction, it sounds as if they still are not sure child sex crimes happened: "...sexual assault of young children may have occurred...". Jeffs was arrested in 2006. Even before his capture while on he run from law enforcement, the allegations of child sex crimes were well known. Since 2007 there has been steady stream of publications in both the U.S. and Canada detailing the crimes by Jeffs and other FLDS leaders: newspaper  and magazine articles, books  and documentaries  by survivors, affidavits and court videos and transcripts, and more. Furthermore, this was not Jeffs first trial. Much of the evidence in this one was already public knowledge, having been submitted in previous trials and hearings. It seems to me that the Mormon polygamists now condemning Jeffs were engaged in wilful blindness to the crimes and abuses committed by one of their own. If they were really concerned for the children in Jeffs sect they could have denounced him long ago, but they didn't so their public relations statements now appear disingenuous, designed to protect the practice of polygamy from state interference rather than protect children from religious interference. I am not surprised.


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The Center for Inquiry Announces Blasphemy Contest Winners

Chain The Dogma    November 20, 2009

by Perry Bulwer

I was recently a runner-up in a blasphemy contest held as part of The Center for Inquiry's campaign for free expression, and in conjunction with commemorations for Blasphemy Day International. Although the contest was somewhat tongue-in-cheek, and there was no consensus within humanist/atheist circles that such a contest was appropriate, which is what you would expect amongst free-thinkers, the contest addressed a very serious development. Ever since the uproar over Danish editorial cartoons four years ago, Islamic countries have been working to enact anti-blasphemy laws. And it is not just Islamic countries. Recently, the Irish government has also been toying with the idea of criminalizing blasphemy. The human rights and free speech aspects of this trend towards outlawing the ridicule of religious beliefs is what prompted me to enter the contest. I happened to win a t-shirt (woo hoo!) but that's not why I entered. I could care less about a prize. What I was really interested in was creating a meme, and then watching to see how far it would spread. My winning entry? "I Survived the God Virus". I mean that in a very literal way; I know many people who did not survive that deadly infection. Unlike the other winning entries, mine makes most sense to those, like me, who are former believers who have escaped the God delusion. Following is the official announcement of the contest winners.

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CFI Announces Blasphemy Contest Winners

November 16, 2009

The Center for Inquiry is pleased to announce that Ken Peters of California is the Grand Prize winner of its Blasphemy Contest, which asked contestants to submit statements of no more than twenty words critical of religious beliefs. The entry Mr. Peters submitted was: “Faith is no reason.” Regarding Mr. Peters’ entry, CFI president and CEO Ronald A. Lindsay observes, “This entry, using only four words, summarizes nicely one of the key principles of post-Enlightenment thought. Beliefs should be based on evidence and reason. Faith is not a basis for logically sound belief.”

In addition to the Grand Prize winner, there were four other winners.

“There’s no religion like no religion,” submitted by Daniel Boles of Thailand;

“I wouldn’t even follow your god on Twitter,” submitted by Michael Hein of South Carolina;

“The reason religious beliefs need protection from ridicule is that they are ridiculous,” submitted by Michael Nugent of Ireland; and

“I survived the God virus,” submitted by Perry Bulwer of British Columbia, Canada.

All top five winners will receive a CFI T-shirt with their submission imprinted on the shirt. Ken Peters, the Grand Prize winner, will also receive a coffee mug with his slogan and he will be officially recognized in a forthcoming issue of Free Inquiry, the magazine published by CFI’s affiliate, the Council for Secular Humanism. Also, as indicated in the contest rules, Ken Peters will likely be able to look forward to eternal damnation, although that prize is not entirely within CFI’s control.

The T-shirts featuring the individual winning phrases can be viewed and ordered for purchase in the CFI On-line Store.

Many will recall that when CFI decided in September to hold a contest in conjunction with its commemoration of International Blasphemy Day, it generated a firestorm of controversy. Some observers claimed that CFI was soliciting hate speech, and they likened CFI to Nazis publishing anti-Semitic attacks.

CFI rejected those mischaracterizations then and continues to reject them now. “In holding a blasphemy contest, we wished to underscore our position that religious beliefs are subject to examination and criticism, just like other beliefs,” said Lindsay. “Sometimes that criticism may take the form of a scholarly essay; sometimes the criticism may take the form of a pithy, pointed remark. Both are appropriate forms of free expression.”

In its contest, CFI emphasized it wanted clever, concise statements that might capture some of the flaws of religious beliefs. CFI was not interested in crude attacks on believers. Overall, CFI was not disappointed in quality of the entries.

Nor was CFI disappointed in the quantity of entries. About 650 individuals submitted well over 1,000 entries (contestants could submit two entries). In fact, deciding which entries deserved to make it into the top five was difficult. Accordingly, the judges have decided that the following entries deserved honorable mention.

HONORABLE MENTION:

"Think outside the pew."
Gerry Stearns

"GodLess is more."
Harout Markarian

"Minds harbor incongruous memes:
Religion and fairytale dreams.
Relentlessly nutty,
They turn brains to putty,
Inculcating scurrilous schemes."
Kate Jones

"A fool says in his heart, 'There is no God.'
A wise man shouts it from the rooftops."
Mark Palmer

"Jesus has all the answers...to your vague, non-specific questions to which you already know the answer."
aaoe98 (no name accompanied the email)

"God is incredible."
J. Laudig and George Tipton (submitted separately)

"A perplexing entity, God
Exhibited properties odd
A generous savior
With wrathful behavior
Both Barney and Marquis de Sade."
Tim Harrod

:–) <-- Muhammad
Nicholas Rinard

"Religion is the blasphemy of reality."
Joe

"Our Father, Heavenly King
Stop watching me sleep.
It's creepy.
Amen"
Jacky Chow

Finally, the judges decided that a blasphemous joke uttered by CFI Founder Paul Kurtz at a CFI event in early November merited special mention—even though the joke is longer than twenty words, it was made after the contest ended, Dr. Kurtz is disqualified from making an entry, and Dr. Kurtz never formally submitted the joke as an entry. But, hey, it’s our contest. Anyway, here’s the joke:


A priest and a nun went golfing. On the priest's first swing, the ball went wide of the green.

"Shit," said the priest. "I missed!"

"Oh Father, please don't speak like that," said the nun. "God wouldn't like it."

On the priest's second swing, the ball went into the rough.

"Shit," said the priest. "I missed!"

"Oh Father, you mustn't curse," said the nun. "God will strike you dead if you use such language."

On the priest's third swing, the ball went right into the water hazard.

"Shit," said the priest. "I missed!"

Suddenly it got very dark. Black clouds boiled up. There was a flash of lightning, an ear-splitting crack of thunder.

And the nun was gone.

"Shit," said a great voice from above. "I missed!"

Note that when Dr. Kurtz told this joke, he decorously substituted “merde” for “shit” about halfway through. But we don’t want to imply that God is French. Not even the French deserve that.

CFI thanks everyone who took the time to submit an entry. Your participation helped make the contest a success.

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January 1, 2010

Atheist Ireland Publishes 25 Blasphemous Quotes

From today, 1 January 2010, the new Irish blasphemy law becomes operational, and we begin our campaign to have it repealed. Blasphemy is now a crime punishable by a €25,000 fine. The new law defines blasphemy as publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion, with some defences permitted.

This new law is both silly and dangerous. It is silly because medieval religious laws have no place in a modern secular republic, where the criminal law should protect people and not ideas. And it is dangerous because it incentives religious outrage, and because Islamic States led by Pakistan are already using the wording of this Irish law to promote new blasphemy laws at UN level.

We believe in the golden rule: that we have a right to be treated justly, and that we have a responsibility to treat other people justly. Blasphemy laws are unjust: they silence people in order to protect ideas. In a civilised society, people have a right to to express and to hear ideas about religion even if other people find those ideas to be outrageous.

Publication of 25 blasphemous quotes

In this context we now publish a list of 25 blasphemous quotes, which have previously been published by or uttered by or attributed to Jesus Christ, Muhammad, Mark Twain, Tom Lehrer, Randy Newman, James Kirkup, Monty Python, Rev Ian Paisley, Conor Cruise O’Brien, Frank Zappa, Salman Rushdie, Bjork, Amanda Donohoe, George Carlin, Paul Woodfull, Jerry Springer the Opera, Tim Minchin, Richard Dawkins, Pope Benedict XVI, Christopher Hitchens, PZ Myers, Ian O’Doherty, Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor and Dermot Ahern.

Despite these quotes being abusive and insulting in relation to matters held sacred by various religions, we unreservedly support the right of these people to have published or uttered them, and we unreservedly support the right of any Irish citizen to make comparable statements about matters held sacred by any religion without fear of being criminalised, and without having to prove to a court that a reasonable person would find any particular value in the statement.

Campaign begins to repeal the Irish blasphemy law

We ask Fianna Fail and the Green Party to repeal their anachronistic blasphemy law, as part of the revision of the Defamation Act that is included within the Act. We ask them to hold a referendum to remove the reference to blasphemy from the Irish Constitution.

We also ask all TDs and Senators to support a referendum to remove references to God from the Irish Constitution, including the clauses that prevent atheists from being appointed as President of Ireland or as a Judge without swearing a religious oath asking God to direct them in their work.

If you run a website, blog or other media publication, please feel free to republish this statement and the list of quotes yourself, in order to show your support for the campaign to repeal the Irish blasphemy law and to promote a rational, ethical, secular Ireland.

List of 25 Blasphemous Quotes Published by Atheist Ireland

1. Jesus Christ, when asked if he was the son of God, in Matthew 26:64: “Thou hast said: nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power, and coming in the clouds of heaven.” According to the Christian Bible, the Jewish chief priests and elders and council deemed this statement by Jesus to be blasphemous, and they sentenced Jesus to death for saying it.

2. Jesus Christ, talking to Jews about their God, in John 8:44: “Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him.” This is one of several chapters in the Christian Bible that can give a scriptural foundation to Christian anti-Semitism. The first part of John 8, the story of “whoever is without sin cast the first stone”, was not in the original version, but was added centuries later. The original John 8 is a debate between Jesus and some Jews. In brief, Jesus calls the Jews who disbelieve him sons of the Devil, the Jews try to stone him, and Jesus runs away and hides.

3. Muhammad, quoted in Hadith of Bukhari, Vol 1 Book 8 Hadith 427: “May Allah curse the Jews and Christians for they built the places of worship at the graves of their prophets.” This quote is attributed to Muhammad on his death-bed as a warning to Muslims not to copy this practice of the Jews and Christians. It is one of several passages in the Koran and in Hadith that can give a scriptural foundation to Islamic anti-Semitism, including the assertion in Sura 5:60 that Allah cursed Jews and turned some of them into apes and swine.

4. Mark Twain, describing the Christian Bible in Letters from the Earth, 1909: “Also it has another name - The Word of God. For the Christian thinks every word of it was dictated by God. It is full of interest. It has noble poetry in it; and some clever fables; and some blood-drenched history; and some good morals; and a wealth of obscenity; and upwards of a thousand lies… But you notice that when the Lord God of Heaven and Earth, adored Father of Man, goes to war, there is no limit. He is totally without mercy - he, who is called the Fountain of Mercy. He slays, slays, slays! All the men, all the beasts, all the boys, all the babies; also all the women and all the girls, except those that have not been deflowered. He makes no distinction between innocent and guilty… What the insane Father required was blood and misery; he was indifferent as to who furnished it.” Twain’s book was published posthumously in 1939. His daughter, Clara Clemens, at first objected to it being published, but later changed her mind in 1960 when she believed that public opinion had grown more tolerant of the expression of such ideas. That was half a century before Fianna Fail and the Green Party imposed a new blasphemy law on the people of Ireland.

5. Tom Lehrer, The Vatican Rag, 1963: “Get in line in that processional, step into that small confessional. There, the guy who’s got religion’ll tell you if your sin’s original. If it is, try playing it safer, drink the wine and chew the wafer. Two, four, six, eight, time to transubstantiate!”

6. Randy Newman, God’s Song, 1972: “And the Lord said: I burn down your cities - how blind you must be. I take from you your children, and you say how blessed are we. You all must be crazy to put your faith in me. That’s why I love mankind.”

7. James Kirkup, The Love That Dares to Speak its Name, 1976: “While they prepared the tomb I kept guard over him. His mother and the Magdalen had gone to fetch clean linen to shroud his nakedness. I was alone with him… I laid my lips around the tip of that great cock, the instrument of our salvation, our eternal joy. The shaft, still throbbed, anointed with death’s final ejaculation.” This extract is from a poem that led to the last successful blasphemy prosecution in Britain, when Denis Lemon was given a suspended prison sentence after he published it in the now-defunct magazine Gay News. In 2002, a public reading of the poem, on the steps of St. Martin-in-the-Fields church in Trafalgar Square, failed to lead to any prosecution. In 2008, the British Parliament abolished the common law offences of blasphemy and blasphemous libel.

8. Matthias, son of Deuteronomy of Gath, in Monty Python’s Life of Brian, 1979: “Look, I had a lovely supper, and all I said to my wife was that piece of halibut was good enough for Jehovah.”

9. Rev Ian Paisley MEP to the Pope in the European Parliament, 1988: “I denounce you as the Antichrist.” Paisley’s website describes the Antichrist as being “a liar, the true son of the father of lies, the original liar from the beginning… he will imitate Christ, a diabolical imitation, Satan transformed into an angel of light, which will deceive the world.”

10. Conor Cruise O’Brien, 1989: “In the last century the Arab thinker Jamal al-Afghani wrote: ‘Every Muslim is sick and his only remedy is in the Koran.’ Unfortunately the sickness gets worse the more the remedy is taken.”

11. Frank Zappa, 1989: “If you want to get together in any exclusive situation and have people love you, fine - but to hang all this desperate sociology on the idea of The Cloud-Guy who has The Big Book, who knows if you’ve been bad or good - and cares about any of it - to hang it all on that, folks, is the chimpanzee part of the brain working.”

12. Salman Rushdie, 1990: “The idea of the sacred is quite simply one of the most conservative notions in any culture, because it seeks to turn other ideas - uncertainty, progress, change - into crimes.” In 1989, Ayatollah Khomeini of Iran issued a fatwa ordering Muslims to kill Rushdie because of blasphemous passages in Rushdie’s novel The Satanic Verses.

13. Bjork, 1995: “I do not believe in religion, but if I had to choose one it would be Buddhism. It seems more livable, closer to men… I’ve been reading about reincarnation, and the Buddhists say we come back as animals and they refer to them as lesser beings. Well, animals aren’t lesser beings, they’re just like us. So I say fuck the Buddhists.”

14. Amanda Donohoe on her role in the Ken Russell movie Lair of the White Worm, 1995: “Spitting on Christ was a great deal of fun. I can’t embrace a male god who has persecuted female sexuality throughout the ages, and that persecution still goes on today all over the world.”

15. George Carlin, 1999: “Religion easily has the greatest bullshit story ever told. Think about it. Religion has actually convinced people that there’s an invisible man living in the sky who watches everything you do, every minute of every day. And the invisible man has a special list of ten things he does not want you to do. And if you do any of these ten things, he has a special place, full of fire and smoke and burning and torture and anguish, where he will send you to live and suffer and burn and choke and scream and cry forever and ever ’til the end of time! But He loves you. He loves you, and He needs money! He always needs money! He’s all-powerful, all-perfect, all-knowing, and all-wise, somehow just can’t handle money! Religion takes in billions of dollars, they pay no taxes, and they always need a little more. Now, talk about a good bullshit story. Holy Shit!”

16. Paul Woodfull as Ding Dong Denny O’Reilly, The Ballad of Jaysus Christ, 2000: “He said me ma’s a virgin and sure no one disagreed, Cause they knew a lad who walks on water’s handy with his feet… Jaysus oh Jaysus, as cool as bleedin’ ice, With all the scrubbers in Israel he could not be enticed, Jaysus oh Jaysus, it’s funny you never rode, Cause it’s you I do be shoutin’ for each time I shoot me load.”

17. Jesus Christ, in Jerry Springer The Opera, 2003: “Actually, I’m a bit gay.” In 2005, the Christian Institute tried to bring a prosecution against the BBC for screening Jerry Springer the Opera, but the UK courts refused to issue a summons.

18. Tim Minchin, Ten-foot Cock and a Few Hundred Virgins, 2005: “So you’re gonna live in paradise, With a ten-foot cock and a few hundred virgins, So you’re gonna sacrifice your life, For a shot at the greener grass, And when the Lord comes down with his shiny rod of judgment, He’s gonna kick my heathen ass.”

19. Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion, 2006: “The God of the Old Testament is arguably the most unpleasant character in all fiction: jealous and proud of it; a petty, unjust, unforgiving control-freak; a vindictive, bloodthirsty ethnic cleanser; a misogynistic, homophobic, racist, infanticidal, genocidal, filicidal, pestilential, megalomaniacal, sadomasochistic, capriciously malevolent bully.” In 2007 Turkish publisher Erol Karaaslan was charged with the crime of insulting believers for publishing a Turkish translation of The God Delusion. He was acquitted in 2008, but another charge was brought in 2009. Karaaslan told the court that “it is a right to criticise religions and beliefs as part of the freedom of thought and expression.”

20. Pope Benedict XVI quoting a 14th century Byzantine emperor, 2006: “Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached.” This statement has already led to both outrage and condemnation of the outrage. The Organisation of the Islamic Conference, the world’s largest Muslim body, said it was a “character assassination of the prophet Muhammad”. The Malaysian Prime Minister said that “the Pope must not take lightly the spread of outrage that has been created.” Pakistan’s foreign Ministry spokesperson said that “anyone who describes Islam as a religion as intolerant encourages violence”. The European Commission said that “reactions which are disproportionate and which are tantamount to rejecting freedom of speech are unacceptable.”

21. Christopher Hitchens in God is not Great, 2007: “There is some question as to whether Islam is a separate religion at all… Islam when examined is not much more than a rather obvious and ill-arranged set of plagiarisms, helping itself from earlier books and traditions as occasion appeared to require… It makes immense claims for itself, invokes prostrate submission or ‘surrender’ as a maxim to its adherents, and demands deference and respect from nonbelievers into the bargain. There is nothing-absolutely nothing-in its teachings that can even begin to justify such arrogance and presumption.”

22. PZ Myers, on the Roman Catholic communion host, 2008: “You would not believe how many people are writing to me, insisting that these horrible little crackers (they look like flattened bits of styrofoam) are literally pieces of their god, and that this omnipotent being who created the universe can actually be seriously harmed by some third-rate liberal intellectual at a third-rate university… However, inspired by an old woodcut of Jews stabbing the host, I thought of a simple, quick thing to do: I pierced it with a rusty nail (I hope Jesus’s tetanus shots are up to date). And then I simply threw it in the trash, followed by the classic, decorative items of trash cans everywhere, old coffeegrounds and a banana peel.”

23. Ian O’Doherty, 2009: “(If defamation of religion was illegal) it would be a crime for me to say that the notion of transubstantiation is so ridiculous that even a small child should be able to see the insanity and utter physical impossibility of a piece of bread and some wine somehow taking on corporeal form. It would be a crime for me to say that Islam is a backward desert superstition that has no place in modern, enlightened Europe and it would be a crime to point out that Jewish settlers in Israel who believe they have a God given right to take the land are, frankly, mad. All the above assertions will, no doubt, offend someone or other.”

24. Cardinal Cormac Murphy-O’Connor, 2009: “Whether a person is atheist or any other, there is in fact in my view something not totally human if they leave out the transcendent… we call it God… I think that if you leave that out you are not fully human.” Because atheism is not a religion, the Irish blasphemy law does not protect atheists from abusive and insulting statements about their fundamental beliefs. While atheists are not seeking such protection, we include the statement here to point out that it is discriminatory that this law does not hold all citizens equal.

25. Dermot Ahern, Irish Minister for Justice, introducing his blasphemy law at an Oireachtas Justice Committee meeting, 2009, and referring to comments made about him personally: “They are blasphemous.” Deputy Pat Rabbitte replied: “Given the Minister’s self-image, it could very well be that we are blaspheming,” and Minister Ahern replied: “Deputy Rabbitte says that I am close to the baby Jesus, I am so pure.” So here we have an Irish Justice Minister joking about himself being blasphemed, at a parliamentary Justice Committee discussing his own blasphemy law, that could make his own jokes illegal.

Finally, as a bonus, Micheal Martin, Irish Minister for Foreign Affairs, opposing attempts by Islamic States to make defamation of religion a crime at UN level, 2009: “We believe that the concept of defamation of religion is not consistent with the promotion and protection of human rights. It can be used to justify arbitrary limitations on, or the denial of, freedom of expression. Indeed, Ireland considers that freedom of expression is a key and inherent element in the manifestation of freedom of thought and conscience and as such is complementary to freedom of religion or belief.” Just months after Minister Martin made this comment, his colleague Dermot Ahern introduced Ireland’s new blasphemy law.

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This article was found at:

http://blasphemy.ie/2010/01/01/atheist-ireland-publishes-25-blasphemous-quotes/

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The Chronicle Herald - Halifax, Canada November 23, 2009

Bid for blasphemy ban: Wrong tack on religion

Chronicle Herald Editorial

WHAT constitutes blasphemy?

In this secular age, many people might say it’s the act of swearing, or taking the Lord’s name in vain. But that’s the lowest common denominator of irreverence. To the religious, blasphemy is much more than that. For example, to speak ill of God, or to claim God-like qualities, is to blaspheme. It is also blasphemous to desecrate or denigrate religious texts or symbols.

Even in the free-thinking West, where it is possible to discuss such concepts more dispassionately, it is impossible to find agreement on where the tripwire is. If there is a line not to be crossed, it’s a blurry one. There only exists a vague consensus that it is impolite, at the very least, to needlessly run roughshod over people’s religious sensibilities.

But how people frame the debate in Western democracies bears no resemblance to the mindset of people in other parts of the globe. In the Islamic world, blasphemy is not only a clear-cut concept but an extremely broad one. There is a litany of ways in which one can cause offence, in deed and in word.

For example, it is blasphemy to find fault with Islam or the Prophet Muhammad, to depict him in any manner, to espouse atheism or another faith, and if you are an infidel, to touch a Qur’an.

In Muslim countries, there are serious penalties for such transgressions. Anti-blasphemy laws are used to persecute dissidents.

Clearly, stifling prohibitions like these cannot be reconciled with freedom of thought, religion and expression and other basic human rights, which are upheld in the West.

Therefore, one should be wary of the current longshot lobby effort by the Organization of the Islamic Conference, an umbrella group representing 56 member states, to develop a UN treaty aimed at shielding religious symbols and beliefs from mockery. This would be a step up from the non-binding resolutions passed by the General Assembly condemning the "defamation of religions."

The intent would be to prohibit by law, in countries that would ratify such a treaty, sacrilegious deeds, like the publication four years ago of cartoons of Muhammad by a Danish newspaper.

The difficulty is that any ban on grossly abusive speech is grossly abusive in and of itself, and wide open to abuse. A global treaty on blasphemy would have the practical effect of sparing Islam from criticism while leaving other faiths wide open to it.

That’s because there is no common ground upon which to base a claim of defamation. In the West, to deny Christianity is not considered defamatory to that religion. But in the Middle East, to suggest that Islam is patently false is a grievous insult, although, manifestly, that’s what millions of adherents of other faiths believe.

There is no need for kid gloves here. On the contrary, people should be able to duke it out on matters of religion in the free marketplace of ideas, no matter where they live. The real problem is that they are often banned from doing so in Islamic countries.

This article was found at:

http://thechronicleherald.ca/Editorial/1154248.html