Free Speech and Tolerance

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Horrors! I find myself in agreement with Lou Dobbs on something!

In this case, the exploitability of liberal sensibilities to prevent criticism.

A consortium of Islamic nations has purportedly initiated legislation to make it an international crime to openly criticize Islam. If this is actually true (I heard it on CNN, so you never can tell) then alea iacta est - and you have to admire the ingenuity of the consortium, assuming of course that their aim is to make a "final showdown" between "us" and "them" unavoidable. Free speech is one issue on which Left and Right agree (although of course the Left mean it for everyone and the Right mean it just for them), and I myself am of the opinion that it is the indispensable foundation of democracy. Thus we cannot abide by any such law, and if the consortium has the clout to push it through, then they have effectively "hijacked" the UN - which would of course serve the USA right, since they have bullied, ignored and starved the UN for decades. Nevertheless, this would usher in a new era in which the UN and the USA would actually be, in effect, at war.

This has been brewing for a while. Several years ago there was an international brouhaha over not-particularly-funny cartoons of Mohammed published in a Danish newspaper, provoking a singularly humorless response from the world Islamic community. Someone wrote a letter to the Vancouver Sun expressing the supposedly liberal sentiment,

"Freedom of speech is one thing; disrespecting and degrading 
a holy figure of a religion is a completely different issue."  

I was compelled to reply, "No, it's not." Making fun of other people's beliefs is precisely what freedom of speech is all about. Anyone without a sense of humor about his or her own beliefs is ipso facto incapable of tolerance for the beliefs of others, and tolerance is a prerequisite for peace, not to mention civilization or freedom. It is therefore the duty of humorists to identify such people and ridicule them mercilessly until they lighten up. And it is the duty of all citizens to stand up in defense of humorists who play this vital role. This is no joke.

Of course, it is the responsibility of humorists to actually be funny, and I'm not sure if the Danish cartoonists actually lived up to their end of the deal. I saw the cartoons. They were all pretty lame, except maybe the one about running out of virgins. I find it entirely plausible that the cartoonists and their editors really were just trying to be as insulting as possible to Islam, rather than to make a subtle point or even to be funny. Shame on them!

However, free speech is not reserved for the talented, tasteful or considerate. These guys may not be poster children for free speech, but we still have to stand behind them. As Voltaire is said to have said,

"I disapprove of what you say, but I will 
defend to the death your right to say it."

A lot of people have defended that right to their deaths. Are we now ready to let it slip away out of fear? Fear of what? What could be worse than to lose that right, upon which all of Western Civilization is built?

Lack of tolerance for ridicule is by no means limited to Muslims. It is becoming quite fashionable these days. We have all known Christians, Marxists, Environmentalists and assorted Politically Correct individuals who distinguish themselves from the reasonable, tolerant majority of their peers by brooking no blasphemy - by expanding the concept of courtesy into an unconditional prohibition of criticism. People who can't take a joke are people who will kill for their beliefs. They are also, in my opinion, people whose beliefs must be pretty fragile.

These are the targets of satirists like Samuel Clemens (Mark Twain) or, more recently, Saturday Night Live and South Park, who have made fun of everyone from Jesus to L. Ron Hubbard, but so far not The Prophet. Will they steer clear of that forbidden target out of fear for their lives? Will we? Is that wise in the long run?

You are welcome to embrace whatever belief system you like. That's a freedom you can't enjoy unless you grant it to others. The world's not big enough for exceptions.

It appears now that the Islamic consortium in the UN has recognized this and is utilizing it to say, "Armageddon now!"