UN Report on Denmark and Caricatures

The UN report that I mentioned the other day concerning Denmark and the uproar over the Muhammed caricatures is now available online, but not in English. Agora (not to be confused with In the Agora) has a partial translation here and a post on the subject here. It provides a good opportunity to look at how legal language can be vague enough to mean whatever someone wants it to mean. Listen to this bureaucratic nonsense from the UN representative:

Their uncompromising defense of a Freedom of Speech without limits or restrictions is not in accordance with the international rules which are based on a necessary balance between Freedom of Speech and Freedom of Religion, especially to combat calls for racial and religious hatred, and which all the member countries of UN have decided are the basic rules for Human Rights. This attitude shows an alarming lack of sensitivity and understanding of the religious conviction and deep emotions of the groups of society in question. Thus the newspapers strengthen the connection between Islam and Terrorism which arose after September 11th and which is the most important reason for Islamophobia being on the rise in the world at large and in their own countries.

First, no one in Denmark or anywhere else has proposed freedom of speech "without limits or restrictions"; they have proposed that the mere fact that a group is offended by criticism or mockery of their beliefs is not a legitimate reason to place such a restriction on freedom of speech. I'm as staunch a defender of free speech as you will find anywhere and even I don't propose that there be no limits at all on free speech (I exclude perjury, fraud, and other narrowly defined exceptions). So immediately, the UN official is engaging in, ironically, a caricature of Denmark's position on the matter, erecting a straw man to be easily knocked down.

Second, notice the contrast between freedom of speech and freedom of religion in his statement. There simply is no such clash here. The freedom of Muslims to practice their religion is in no way diminished or impeded by criticism of their beliefs, no more than Catholics were prevented from practicing their religion after Candide was published. The expressed views of others against your beliefs is not a violation of your rights; no one has a right not to have their beliefs criticized, period.

Third, it's surreal how he blames the newspapers for "strengthening the connection" between Islam and terrorism while saying nothing at all about the actual terrorism that has been both threatened and carried out by many Muslims around the world in response to the situation. If I say that Group X is a bunch of murderous thugs who will try and kill anyone who challenges their hateful ideology, and then Group X tries to kill me for saying so, they have proven me right. The blame for their violent thuggery lies with them, not with those who point out that they are violent thugs.

The purpose of the caricatures in the first place was to express the extent to which threats of terrorism and violence from radical elements in the Muslim community had already led to self-censorship in Denmark. The fact that such expression did in fact trigger the kinds of violent threats that had led to the initial fear only shows the validity of that expression. But the apologists for such behavior want to blame the person who points it out rather than the one who engages in it. This is lunacy.

Now let's look at the specific accusations made in the report. The report claims that Denmark has violated the international agreements to which they are signatories, specifically the UN Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. Here are the sections of that agreement that they claim Denmark has violated:

Article 18, paragraph three:

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.

Notice how vaguely this is written. It could justify pretty much any intrusion that any government may see fit at any time. A government could claim that a given restriction was necessary to protect "public morals", as often happens in this country, and they have complied with the law. Or they could do what the UN has done here and simply declare that there is a "right" not to have one's beliefs criticized. This is the kind of meaningless bureaucratic language that seeks to say nothing and everything all at once. Given the desire to reach such a conclusion, one could accuse every nation of violating it at any time.

Article 19, paragraph three:

The exercise of the rights provided for in paragraph 2 of this article carries with it special duties and responsibilities. It may therefore be subject to certain restrictions, but these shall only be such as are provided by law and are necessary:

1. For respect of the rights or reputations of others;
2. For the protection of national security or of public order (ordre public), or of public health or morals.

Which limits certain rights in paragraph two:

Everyone 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 his choice.

Here again, the blame for the loss of public order is being placed at the feet of those who engaged in legal and accurate criticism of a set of beliefs. This is like Tony Soprano going into a business and saying, "I would hate to see this place destroyed by any unsavory elements in the area. If you were to pay me $1000, I might make sure that didn't happen." Then when they refuse to pay the $1000, he destroys the place and blames them for not wanting to protect their property.

What happens here is essentially blackmail from the Muslim radicals - "If you criticize us, we'll burn down buildings, threaten your lives and promote holy war against you. If you criticize us for making those threats, we'll do them anyway. And our apologists at the UN will be more than happy to come in and blame you rather than us. And by the way, despite our feigned shock at such religious insensitivity, we still retain the right to say and write the most reprehensible things imaginable about Jews and Christians and infidels. Heads we win, tails you lose."

And where is the UN report on how Muslim nations are violating international agreements by allowing the publication of stories claiming that Jews eat Muslim babies and the like? Where is the UN report condemning the president of Iran for his outrageous statements about Israel and Jews and his denial of the holocaust? They'll put out a report condemning Denmark for not punishing private speech, but give the Iranian president a pass for statements he made himself? Who in their right mind is going to take such hypocrisy seriously?

Article 20, paragraph two:

Any advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence shall be prohibited by law.

The problem, of course, is deciding which statements constitute incitement to violence or discrimination. By the UN's reasoning here, it seems that any time someone does react violently to another person's criticisms, then those criticisms must constitute an incitement to violence. But this is a recipe for tyranny - all one has to do to get rid of speech they don't like is to engage in violence. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the end of all liberty.

Here's the part that is most irksome to me. After all of this verbiage blaming the Danish government for everything under the sun, the UN report finally gets around to mentioning the actual violence that has been carried out around the world in response to the expressed opinions of others. And this is about as mealy-mouthed as it gets:

Lastly, the special Rapporteur deplores the violent reactions which followed the publication of the caricatures in question, and in particular the threats and attacks against people were in no way related to the publication of them and which were targeted only on the basis of their nationality, as well as the attacks against diplomatic representations. The Special Rapporteur deplores also the violence exerted towards places of worship of other religions, such as was done against a catholic church in Beirut. This constitute a lack of respect and an attack towards other religious communities and does not help the fight against defamation of religions, quite the contrary.

No, the problem is not that this constitutes a "lack of respect"; the problem is that it constitutes violent thuggery in an attempt to silence criticism. No one has a right to have their beliefs "respected"; indeed, the right to free speech must include the right to "disrespect" and criticize the views of others or it means nothing at all. The problem here is this surreal attempt to make the free expression of ideas the equivalent of a violent and terroristic response to that free expression. It's completely meaningless to claim to "deplore" such violence while simultaneously refusing to place the blame for that violence on the ones who are perpetrating it.

It is not defamation of religions that needs to be fought, it is violence in the name of religion that needs to be fought. It's those who think that their religious beliefs justify killing people for their opinions that are the threat here and it is their ideology of insanity that must be confronted, defeated and, yes, mocked and criticized.