There are worrying signs in Britain that a blasphemy law – abolished in 2008 – might be sneaking in through the back door. Last week, a Turkish man allegedly set fire to the Quran as part of a protest against the Turkish government outside its consulate in Rutland Gate, London. He was then attacked by an outraged zealot with a knife, arrested and charged with a similar offence. He has pleaded not guilty and remains to be tried.
Earlier this month, a Manchester man filmed publicly burning pages from the Quran in protest at Islamist excesses was also very swiftly arrested and locked up. Two days later, the man pleaded guilty to a religiously-aggravated offence under the Public Order Act for abusive behaviour likely to cause distress. He will be sentenced in April.
Whether Quran-burners are guilty of a religiously-aggravated public order offence is open to some doubt
These are worrying developments, for lots of reasons. For one thing, they contradict at least the spirit of the suppression of the blasphemy laws: that at least in the eyes of the law, all religions need to accept that they are a legitimate target for full-throated scandalisation, derision and satire.
Moreover, abusive behaviour charges, if brought here, could serve as cover to suppress almost any forceful protest to which an opponent takes strong objection, thus creating a kind of legal heckler’s veto on steroids. Think of publicly burning the Bible, the Communist manifesto, or the Book of Mormon, over the objections of opponents who make their distress and their objection clear. Should these really be criminal offences?
Of course, in contrast to Quran-burning, arrests and prosecutions for that kind of thing are unlikely. But while this might at first sight look like good news for free speech, especially for atheists, anti-Communists and the like, on a deeper level it actually makes it worse. Contrary to the liberal idea that if there are to be bars to free speech, they should be at least content-neutral, allowing public order law to act as a kind of catch-all makes space for protest to be selectively policed and the prosecution of demonstrators to be conducted according to the political or social sensitivity of the cause being advanced or attacked.
Unfortunately, despite all the arguments on free speech, there are plausible reasons to think that at least two institutions may be quietly delighted that a way has been found to make life awkward for Quran-burners. One is the government. Always seeming to look for ways to reassure militant Islam, a growing influence in a worryingly increasing number of constituencies, Keir Starmer’s administration is already mulling a definition of Islamophobia that would be highly intrusive on speech critical of Islam. One suspects it would welcome with open arms a de facto rule saying that anything which distresses religious (read Muslim) sensibilities can be prosecuted under public order laws.
Ministers will no doubt add sanctimoniously that protesters always retain the protection of the free speech provisions of the European Convention on Human Rights. In fact, as they know well, the convention is a broken reed here. The Strasbourg court solemnly decided six years ago, in a case about the bad-mouthing of Muhammad, that forceful insults to religion do not count as free speech. But unfortunately few, apart from human rights experts, are going to see through this exercise in disingenuity.
The other group likely to celebrate is, regrettably, police top brass – or at least some of them. Many forces have more or less official contacts with groups claiming to represent the Muslim community, which will exert pressure at every instance of what they see as unwarranted attacks on Islam. What better than a wide-ranging public order law that will allow them to assure such groups that they have been taking fast and strong steps to nip in the bud anything that upsets their sensibilities?
There is one ray of light. Whether Quran-burners are actually guilty of a religiously-aggravated public order offence is, to say the least, open to some doubt. It might be seen as stretching matters to say that merely burning a book is abusive. Also, to be religiously-aggravated an offence must be motivated by hostility to the adherents of a religion rather than the religion itself, which Quran-desecrators may well not be. As previous defendants have generally chosen to admit the offence, these points have not been fully aired. The Rutland Gate defendant, however, has pleaded not guilty.
We can at least now hope to have some proper legal argument about whether we take seriously the abolition of blasphemy and the right that should go with it to mock, belittle and attack religious beliefs we disagree with. An acquittal would no doubt please Elon Musk: more to the point, it would be splendid news for those of us in Britain who take freedom seriously.
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