Segacs's World I Know

Posts Tagged ‘freedom of speech’

A West Bank resident has been imprisoned for insulting Islam on Facebook:

A mysterious blogger who set off an uproar in the Arab world by claiming he was God and hurling insults at the Prophet Muhammad is now behind bars — caught in a sting that used Facebook to track him down.

The case of the unlikely apostate, a shy barber from this backwater West Bank town, is highlighting the limits of tolerance in the Western-backed Palestinian Authority — and illustrating a new trend by authorities in the Arab world to mine social media for evidence.

Residents of Qalqiliya say they had no idea that Walid Husayin — the 26-year-old son of a Muslim scholar — was leading a double life

Known as a quiet man who prayed with his family each Friday and spent his evenings working in his father’s barbershop, Husayin was secretly posting anti-religion rants on the Internet during his free time.

Now, he faces a potential life prison sentence on heresy charges for “insulting the divine essence.” Many in this conservative Muslim town say he should be killed for renouncing Islam, and even family members say he should remain behind bars for life.

“He should be burned to death,” said Abdul-Latif Dahoud, a 35-year-old Qalqiliya resident. The execution should take place in public “to be an example to others,” he added.

At a time when the United Nations is trying to pass a resolution that would make blasphemy illegal, it’s important that we see cases like these as cautionary tales of what we can expect when we allow political correctness to trump free speech. There is no free speech in the supposedly secular, liberal Palestinian Authority. None whatsoever. There is no free speech in Iran, or in Saudi Arabia, or in Egypt, or in Pakistan, or in most of the countries sponsoring the resolution. And while the supposedly pro-freedom left marches and protests against the supposedly imperialist Israel and in support of the poor, suffering Palestinians, it can never be pointed out often enough just where the free speech limits exist in that part of the world.

Nor is it only in the Arab world where these laws exist. Ireland passed anti-blasphemy laws last year. Laws against blasphemy or religious defamation exist, to some varying degree, in the Netherlands, in Germany, in Greece, in Finland… even Canada’s hate speech laws allow for a lot of grey areas and potential abuse depending on which way the political wind blows.

These types of “anti-blasphemy” resolutions and laws are just tools wielded by extremists to silence any voices of freedom or dissent. Speech – whether or not it’s offensive – should be protected, and the right to satirize, insult, offend or simply denounce religion is a right that we need to protect, for all our sakes. And that, in a nutshell, is the basis for my position on freedom of speech.

Big. Huge. Potentially game-changing.

These attacks and the surveillance they have uncovered–combined with the attempts over the past year to further limit free speech on the web–have led us to conclude that we should review the feasibility of our business operations in China. We have decided we are no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn, and so over the next few weeks we will be discussing with the Chinese government the basis on which we could operate an unfiltered search engine within the law, if at all. We recognize that this may well mean having to shut down Google.cn, and potentially our offices in China.

Ian Paul doesn’t think that Google will actually pull out of China. But whatever ends up happening, the implications of this statement could be huge – both for Google as a business, and for China. Stay tuned.

Islamist group Islam4UK, expressing outrage over their recent ban by the British government:

Bakri said that the ban was ”the gravest mistake,” describing his group was peaceful think-tank whose younger members would be pushed toward violence if it were driven underground.

[ . . . ]

”We (were) never involved with any violence, yet,” he said.

Yet, eh? Sounds awfully close to a threat, there.

Now, normally I would be inclined to agree that banning any group for holding views, however offensive or despicable, is a violation of freedom of speech as long as no other laws are being transgressed. But in this case, we’re not just talking about pissing people off by marching:

Bakri’s group argues that, as Muslims, they’re not bound by British law and has expressed support for bin Laden and al-Qaida. In its previous incarnation as al-Muhajiroun, the group was linked to several terror suspects and was accused of recruiting British Muslims to fight in Afghanistan and Chechnya. Bakri has acknowledged that some of al-Muhajiroun members have engaged in militant attacks but says the group can’t be held responsible for their actions.

Bakri, who was deported from Britain in 2005, added that, whatever happened, his followers could regroup under a different name.

”Tomorrow we can call ourselves whatever we think is suitable for us,” he said.

He’s right, of course. Banning the groups won’t erase the sentiment. But allowing them to openly collect funds and organise isn’t the answer either. The British government might have reacted to the wrong thing – moral outrage at the group’s planned (and cancelled) protest march through Wootton Bassett – when they implemented the ban. But it’s clear that we’re not just talking about distasteful speech here, but illegal actions. And that’s where the line gets drawn.

And they can always ban whatever the group decides to call itself tomorrow, too.

Ireland’s anti-blasphemy laws came into effect on January 1st, setting a shining example of hypocrisy that should make the EU proud:

The new law defines blasphemy as:

 “publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion, with some defences permitted.”

In other words, a complete trampling of the notion of freedom of speech. In fact, this blog post probably violates that law. Good thing this site isn’t hosted in Ireland.

The best response to this that I’ve seen so far? Atheist Ireland published 25 blasphemous quotes by everyone from Salman Rushdie to Richard Dawkins to Christopher Hitchens to Jesus Christ to the Pope, and even Muhammed. My favourite is this one:

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.

If they’re looking to prosecute people under the new law, I suggest they start in their own backyard.

Is Vietnam the latest country to block access to Facebook?

Since last week, it seems that way. Even though the Vietnamese government is issuing denials.

Some Vietnamese Facebook users launched a Facebook group in protest of the blockage, but as of right now it appears to only have a handful of members. Hmmm, wonder why that could be?

Of course, as Barack Obama found out last week after giving a speech in China about internet freedom, protests against censorship have an above-average risk of, well, being censored.

So says this Gazette editorial about the government’s case against Paul Bryan for posting election results from eastern Canada on the internet before the polls closed in western Canada:

It was almost 1,000 years ago when Canute, king of England, Denmark and Norway, led his courtiers down to the Sussex seashore. Weary of their flattery, he ordered them to watch as he loudly commanded the waves to recede – and as the waves did not. A king’s powers, he demonstrated, go only so far.

In a gesture almost as futile, but without any of Canute’s wise humility, the government of Canada is fighting in the Supreme Court to make sure Canadians on the West Coast can’t see federal election results from Atlantic Canada until after western polling stations close. As legal causes go, this one is pointless, wrong-headed, arrogant and utterly out of touch with reality.

[ . . . ]

Section 2(b) of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms guarantees Canadians freedom of expression. There was nothing malicious or even inaccurate about what Paul Bryan did. No one can demonstrate that he did anyone any harm. And in any case, nobody could stop a foreigner from putting results on a website outside Canada.

Information wants to be free, and in this case, at least, the government should stop trying to reverse the tide.

In the last election, I decided to toe the line on this blog and I didn’t post any results until the last poll closed in B.C. But it was an exercise in nonsense, because those results were freely available to anyone with an internet connection and the brains to search for a US-based news or blog source. Not to mention anyone with a telephone and a friend or acquaintance out east.

This law, and the government’s efforts in enforcing it, are completely pointless. I agree with the Gazette: Allow the information to be broadcast, because everyone’s getting it anyway.

Dissidents or secularist bloggers are still being gagged in Iran… but the clerics are blogging up a storm.

This started off as merely an amusing tidbit but I wonder what’s in store. The blogosphere is one of the last arenas of freedom of speech, and it seems that Iran’s hardline religious leaders have chosen it as their next battleground. So far they’ve only been concentrating on Iran, but the global nature of the Internet makes me wonder how far off we are from seeing attempts by Islamists to control worldwide blogging content. It’s something every blogger ought to be keeping a close watch on.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is taking more steps to stamp out dissent and reform in Iran:

Iran’s hard-line president urged students Tuesday to push for a purge of liberal and secular university teachers, another sign of his determination to strengthen Islamic fundamentalism in the country.

With his call echoing the rhetoric of the nation’s 1979 Islamic revolution, Ahmadinejad appears determined to remake Iran by reviving the fundamentalist goals pursued under the republic’s late founder, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Iran still has strong moderate factions, and since taking office a year ago Ahmadinejad has moved to replace pragmatic veterans in the government and diplomatic corps with former military commanders and inexperienced religious hard-liners. His administration also has launched crackdowns on independent journalists, Web sites and bloggers.

Hey Mahmoud, what’s wrong? Can’t stand the blogging competition?

All right, that’s it: It was one thing when it was just getting Google to censor search results or other such “minor” infringements on freedom of speech. But now China has gone too far: It’s restricted the Simpsons:

D’oh! China has banished Homer Simpson, Pokemon and Mickey Mouse from prime time. Beginning Sept. 1, regulators have barred foreign cartoons from TV from 5 to 8 p.m. in an effort to protect China’s struggling animation studios, news reports said Sunday. The move allows the Monkey King and his Chinese pals to get the top TV viewing hours to themselves.

Foreign cartoons, especially from Japan, are hugely popular with China’s 250 million children and the country’s own animation studios have struggled to compete. Communist leaders are said to be frustrated that so many cartoons are foreign-made, especially after efforts to build up Chinese animation studios.

The most ironic part of this news story? That China, a Communist nation, is really doing nothing worse than what the CRTC does here in Canada. Ain’t it great living in such a free country?

After all his other spewings, Holocaust denials, and promises to murder millions of Jews, this seems almost droll in comparison:

Hard-line President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has banned Western music from Iran’s radio and TV stations, reviving one of the harshest cultural decrees from the early days of 1979 Islamic Revolution.

Songs such as George Michael’s “Careless Whisper,” Eric Clapton’s “Rush” and the Eagles’ “Hotel California” have regularly accompanied Iranian broadcasts, as do tunes by saxophonist Kenny G.

But the official IRAN Persian daily reported Monday that Ahmadinejad, as head of Iran’s Supreme Cultural Revolutionary Council, ordered the enactment of an October ruling by the council to ban Western music.

Cause after all, everyone knows that the saxophone stylings of Kenny G. contain hidden Zionist brainwashing propaganda.

Though we may scoff, cultural restrictions are key components of Ahmadinejad’s renewed fanatical war on the West and against any kind of freedom or reform for his people. One only wonders how far he can push before the forces for change in Iran push back.