It seems that I have been added to The Atheist Blogroll. You can see the blogroll in my left sidebar. The Atheist blogroll is a community building service provided free of charge to Atheist bloggers from around the world. I'm proud to be added. If you would like to join, you can visit Mojoey at Deep Thoughts for more information.
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Today is International Blasphemy Day.
Blasphemy is defined as the contemptuous use of religious symbols or names. The crime, known in British Common Law as blasphemous libel, remains enshrined in the constitutions of a variety of western nations. The origin of the term is linguistic, found in the Greek blasphemia, which translates to mean, “profane speech or evil slander.” This found its first use in common law around the year 1230, in the Ancrene Riwle (the “Rule for Nuns,” or “Rule of Anchoresses”). In this document, blasphemy meant “to utter impious or profane words” and was usually followed by the words “against,” or “upon”.
There is a distinction made between blasphemy and profanity, on the grounds that the former is intentional while the latter simply habitual. Simple cursing would be categorized as profanity, but practicing devil worship or “that old black magic” might qualify as blasphemy. The distinction is not easily determined and never absolute, but many publishers and writers have faced the court over the years for their writings. The seriousness of blasphemy as an offense has declined with worldwide secularization and the blending of cultures.
In earlier years the charge of blasphemy was deadly serious, but the church overdid it. Over the ensuing centuries, and with much misuse, the word eventually came to mean simply “abuse,” losing much of the original power.
Then in 1755, Dr. Samuel Johnson, in his Dictionary of the English Language, defined blasphemy as “… an offering of some indignity, or injury, unto God himself, either by words or writing.” This is the definition that has since been used when prosecuting blasphemers. As Great Britain in the days of Dr. Johnson was a Christian monarchy, the category in English Law of Blasphemous Libel referred to the crime committed if a person insults, offends, or vilifies God, Christ, or the Christian religion. Blasphemous libel in a state where Christianity was considered to be part of the law itself, became construed as sedition.
Since the days of Johnson’s dictionary, blasphemy laws have been invoked irregularly, with interesting peaks and valleys. In 1811 Shelley published the notorious pamphlet, The Necessity of Atheism. While this did not lead to a prosecution, he was kicked out of Oxford. In 1952 much the same happened to Mark Boxer, editor of the Cambridge literary magazine Granta , for publishing a poem beginning “God, God, the silly sod.” However, in 1882 a charge was made and a case brought against a publisher for distributing cartoons ridiculing Christianity.
More recently there have been two controversial cases. The first, in 1977, was the first such private prosecution brought under common law in Great Brittan for fifty years. Self-proclaimed moral crusader, Mary Whitehouse brought the complaint against the editor of UK Gay News for the publication of an allegedly blasphemous poem, by James Kirkup. The poem, titled The Love That Dares to Speak it's Name (Careful. Potentially offensive link), portrayed Jesus as a promiscuous homosexual. Whitehouse won the case. The editor was fined £500 (US $ 800) and sentenced to a year and a half behind bars. Further, the court ruled that the poem could not be printed by any publication in Great Brittan.
The editor’s defense attorney, John Mortimer, in an article appearing in The Spectator (April 21, 1990), related that, “at the trial it was ruled that we could call not evidence on the poem’s literary merit.” So it would seem that, under British common law, blasphemers are treated far more harshly than even pornographers.
Interestingly, in 1989 an attempt to invoke the same law against author Salman Rushdie’s for his controversial novel The Satanic Verses, failed on the grounds that the blasphemy law covers only Christianity.
The Irish constitution also contains a blasphemy clause, but there is only one case taken under this article, Corway -v- Independent Newspapers, (1999), for an editorial cartoon published in the Sunday Independent. The court, in rejecting the claim, ruled that it was impossible to say “of what the offence of blasphemy consists”. The exact constitutional requirement for the blasphemy bar, as stated in Article 40 of the Irish constitution, defines the term as “The publication or utterance of blasphemous, seditious, or indecent material is an offence which shall be punishable in accordance with law.” As you can see, there is no definition for any of the terms
Since then, the Irish Justice Minister has proposed a new section for insertion into a proposed Defamation Bill, stating: “A person who publishes or utters blasphemous matter shall be guilty of an offence and shall be liable upon conviction on indictment to a fine not exceeding €100,000.” He further describes "blasphemous matter" as something “that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters held sacred by any religion, thereby causing outrage among a substantial number of the adherents of that religion; and he or she intends, by the publication of the matter concerned, to cause such outrage.” The defamation law passed with no debate on the blasphemy section, and now the organization Atheist Ireland plans some sort of response.
Notice that Mr. Irish Justice Minister included “any religion” in his language. So I wonder, if I were to tell the waiter at the Italian restaurant in Dublin something to the effect of “these meatballs suck,” could that land me in the slammer for defaming the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
So today is Blasphemy Day. Celebrate by cursing the deity of your choice, and be glad you live in the United States of America, where (for now, at least) such an act is protected by the supreme law of the land.
UPDATE: Looks like there is a really good thesis on this topic already posted to the WWW. Good reading.
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The Minnesota Independent ran an interesting story a few days ago. It seems everybody’s favorite Minnesota politician, Michelle Bachmann, has been instrumental in steering $2.4 million in tax money to her favorite charity, Minnesota Teen Challenge. The money, $2,388,947 to be more accurate, is to support “evangelical” drug treatment programs.
Since I’ve ragged on Michelle a good bit I’ll leave her alone for now and dwell on the facility that received the taxpayer’s money. Here is how Alex Luchenitser, senior litigation counsel for Americans United for Separation of Church and State, sees the program.
“Teen Challenge is a program that should not be receiving state money,” he said. “It requires people who participate to convert to Christianity.”
If that is correct, then I fail to see how state support of the facility is legal. Minnesota has a growing atheist community who pay state taxes. I feel certain there are also a goodly portion of the population who have religious beliefs other than Christianity. To require tax money be spent on Christian conversion violates the Establishment Clause.
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Mojoey’s Atheist/Agnostic blogroll is at 999… poised on the brink of 1,000. This is significant is so many ways. As Hemant says over on The Friendly Atheist,
“Say what you will about the quality of some of the blogs on that list, but it’s one barometer of the growth of the atheist blogosphere over the past few years. It tells the world that there are more and more people offering opinions against the idea of theism — and it’s constantly growing in quality and quantity.”
So a hat tip to Joey for doing all the work involved in keeping the blogroll rolling.
You can scroll down to find the blogroll on my left sidebar. If you are a free thinker you will enjoy randomly selecting a new blog to read.
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The organizers of a local music festival have made a controversial decision to give the money raised by their event to an organization promoting evolution and atheism. The Charlotte Pop Fest '09 is a music festival taking place in Charlotte's Myers Park area this weekend. The event features some well-known local and national bands.Last year, proceeds from the Pop Fest went to an international children's charity. The proceeds from this year's Charlotte Pop Fest will be going to the Richard Dawkins Foundation. Dawkins is one of the best known evolutionists in the world and is also an atheist who wrote a book called The God Delusion.Pop Fest organizer James Deem says what he's trying to do is raise awareness for "science and science education."
We have a new conservative magazine. National Affairs, which published its maiden issue the first of this month. It is being trumpeted as the intellectual successor to Irving Kristol’s Public Affairs magazine. That rag ceased publication in 2005 following Kristol’s retirement as the last of the original editors. Kristol died just a few days ago, and long since departed were former editors and contributors to the publication, Nathan Glazer, Daniel Patrick Moynihan, Daniel Bell and William F. Buckley.
The loss of Public Affairs was an ominous sign, but with the advent of National Affairs, the original, true conservative movement has some hope for a return to fundamentals, based not in the anti-intellectualism championed by the “value voters” of today’s Republican party, but the former highbrow intellectualism of the early movement.
The right is in sad need right now of a little intellectualism. We can hope… and we will wait and see.
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The freedom of expression being enjoyed today by the various right wingnuts was not a pleasure always enjoyed by American citizens. As recently as the middle of last century, calling any elected official such names as “socialist,” “fascist,” or ”Nazi” could have been grounds for a liable judgment… or worse.
This story has roots in the 1955 Montgomery, Alabama bus boycott (remember Rosa Parks?). In response to the Montgomery political machine’s actions, both during and after the decision in Browder V. Gayle, four black ministers decided to seek help and funding for the cause of segregation. They composed and paid for an advertisement to be placed in the New York Times, critical of a recalcitrant south. Montgomery elected officials responded by suing the four, including Martin Luther King and Ralph Abernathy, for defamation. The first of these actions, awarded by a state court and resulting in a $500,000 judgment against the Times, was later overturned by the Supreme Court.
In New York Times v. Sullivan (1960), SCOTUS ruled the existing common law of defamation of public officials violated free speech guarantees. The Warren Court held a citizen's right to criticize government officials to be of such tremendous importance in a free society that we could accommodate it only by tolerance of such criticism, even though the charges might eventually be determined to contain incorrect allegations.
In Sullivan, SCOTUS eliminated common law presumption of falsity and malice, and laid the burden of proof on the plaintiff to show that, at the time the defamatory statements were made, the defendant either knew them to be false, or showed reckless disregard as to the veracity of the statements. In other words, the onus was on the plaintiff to prove first that he was harmed, and secondly that the defendant did it on purpose. Until this ruling, only the harm provision required proof.
The social and political context of the times certainly influenced their decision. The source of the alleged defamation was an editorial advertisement placed in the New York Times, titled "Heed Their Rising Voices". Without naming names, the advertisement pointed caustically to the ongoing segregation dominating southern states, in spite of many court rulings prohibiting the practice. Some very prominent, well-respected individuals lent their name to the advertisement, including one of the leading names in fairness and desegregation of the time; Eleanor Roosevelt.
The advertisement detailed grievances, described abuses, and asked for financial support for the desegregation cause. Justice Brennan described the group sponsoring the advertisement as one "whose existence and objectives are matters of the highest public interest and concern." Justice Black described the controversial heart of the suit as “[O]ne of the acute and highly emotional issues in this country.” Black further described the efforts of many people, public officials included, who continued to enforce racial segregation in public schools and other public places, “despite our several holdings that such a state practice is forbidden by the Fourteenth Amendment.”
Plaintiff Sullivan, a white elected commissioner from Montgomery, Alabama, in claiming that he was personally injured by the advertisement, had several hurdles that he failed to clear. The advertisement did not mention him by name. Only 35 copies of the offending publication were circulated in that city, and only 394 in the entire state. The original trial that found the Times liable took place in a segregated courtroom, in Montgomery, before a white judge and all-white jury.
In overturning the verdict, SCOTUS viewed the libel action as a very serious attack not only on 1A freedoms, but on the desegregation of the southern states. In Justice Black’s words, the Court was concerned that a large damage award would threaten "an American press virile enough to publish unpopular views on public affairs and bold enough to criticize the conduct of public officials."
SCOTUS was further concerned because another libel verdict of $500,000 had already been awarded against the Times to another Montgomery elected official who was making the same claims as Sullivan, and 11 other libel suits arising out of the same advertisement were pending.
However, probably the greatest motivating factor for this radical change to previously sacrosanct common law was a judicial view to the effect that the statements of public officials, coming "within the outer perimeter of their duties" were privileged unless actual malice was proved.
The rationale behind this privilege, originating in Barr v. Matteo (1959), was that the threat of damage suits would "dampen the ardor of all but the most resolute, or the most irresponsible, in the unflinching discharge of their duties," SCOTUS, in the Sullivan decision, decided that parallel considerations supported protection for critics of the government and of elected officials.
Thus honest citizens may protest the actions of the government or any elected official, so long as they do not intentionally lie, or act with reckless disregard of the harm they may cause.
For the full history of this landmark case, please read New York Times Co. V. Sullivan Forty Years Later: Retrospective, Perspective , by W. Wat Hopkins.
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Our friend Edward Kimmel, the fellow who strolled through the D.C Mall 9/12 rally (to the great chagrin of some of those present) while carrying a banner reading, PUBLIC OPTION NOW, has been interviewed by Michael Tuck, of Walden Media’s Miami Examiner.com. He has an interesting story to tell.
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"I don't flap my arms, I don't make wild statements, I don't talk about secession, I will not embarrass Texas nationally."
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