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October 03, 2006

EU: Debate Grows Over Freedom Of Speech, Religion

by Jeremy Bransten

Does freedom of expression include the freedom to offend beliefs? (epa)

PRAGUE, October 3, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- In France, a philosophy teacher is in hiding, the target of death threats, after publishing a commentary in a national newspaper denouncing Islam as a violent religion.
Leading French intellectuals have already compared the case of Robert Redeker to that of British writer Salman Rushdie 15 years ago. But Redeker's editors, unlike Rushdie's, are not standing by the embattled intellectual.

A day after Redeker's critical commentary appeared in "Le Figaro" on September 19, the newspaper's editor went on Arabic Al-Jazeera television to apologize, saying publishing the piece had been a mistake.

In Berlin, meanwhile, the head of the Deutsche Oper, the German capital's leading opera house, has cancelled an avant-garde Mozart production over security fears. 
 

The reason? Director Hans Neuenfels had added a controversial scene to Mozart's classical staging of "Idomeneo." In the scene, the hero King Idomeneo appears on stage carrying a bloodstained bag. From the bag, he pulls out, one by one, the decapitated heads of the Greek god Poseidon, then Jesus, then the Buddha, and finally the Prophet Muhammad.

The message, according to the atheist director, was meant to be that all religions are harmful.

The head of the Deutsche Oper, Kirsten Harms, said she could not take the risk of airing such a provocative message. The Berlin police had warned the opera house it could be targeted by extremists.

Self-Censorship A 'Mistake'

These cases, coming just after Pope Benedict XVI's controversial remarks on Islam last month, have once again put the issue of free speech, censorship, and religion at the top of discussions in Europe.

In the Berlin case, German politicians have criticized the head of the Deutsche Oper for canceling the controversial opera. Even Chancellor Angela Merkel stepped into the fray.

"It's my personal opinion that the [opera] cancellation is a mistake," she said. "I believe that self-censorship does not help curtail the spread of violence [and] people who, in the name of Islam, practice violence. And that's why it makes no sense to always yield -- rather, we should discuss the issue and -- I believe -- we should give our support to the press and media freedom."

Some members of the Muslim community, on the contrary, have welcomed the opera's cancellation.

Free Speech 'No Offense'

One thing is clear: the issue is not going to go away. European artists in decades and centuries past may have thought they had broken all the taboos. But religion, and how it should be treated, has once again become a central issue.

And that concerns many artists in Europe. One of them is English writer Lisa Appignanesi, who is deputy president of the English chapter of the PEN Club, which is leading a campaign called "Free Expression Is No Offense."

What is going on, Appignanesi says, is a struggle to maintain Europe's identity as a continent of liberal democracies where free expression is guaranteed.

"If you curtail speech to do with offending religions or to do with offending anyone, you eventually end up with not having the right to speak at all about political matters, about social matters and so on," she says."

Spreading Fundamentalism

Although Muslim fundamentalism tends to be highlighted in Europe as the main threat to secular Western societies, Appignanesi sees an ominous radicalization of religious forces across the board.

Where does a newspaper's responsibility lie? (epa)

She cites a recent attack by Sikhs in Britain against a regional theater and periodic campaigns by fundamentalist Christians against material they deem offensive.

"Because of so-called terrorism and the war on terror, Islam seem to be further in the forefront and [some] people in the Muslim world -- as happened with the cartoons outside Europe -- are very keen to foment and to use these so-called offenses to Islam in the West as part of their political campaign against the West," Appignanesi says.

"But the radicalization through religion has happened in all the religions," she continues. "It's true of parts of Hinduism, parts of Christianity, parts of Islam, it's true of parts of Judaism. They've all become radicalized and incredibly territorial about what insults them."

Faith Is A Choice

Appignanesi says an important distinction has to be drawn between religion and race. Insulting or discriminating against someone because of their race, she says, is taboo in European democracies -- and rightly so. People do not choose their race.

That is why, for example, anti-Semitic acts carried out against Jews just because they are Jews, can be prosecuted.

But faith, she says, is different. It is a matter of choice and like art, philosophy and politics, it should remain open for discussion -- even at the risk of causing offense.

When it comes to Islam, however, Appignanesi says there is an attempt by some to blur the line.

"Nobody has passed laws which say you cannot criticize the religion of Judaism. The laws that are there are simply ones that talk about race," she notes. "The difficulty with Islam is that it isn't one race, so people have banded together behind the banner of religion. In fact, in Britain, where we have people of Muslim faith from many continents and many ethnicities, it's tricky."

Supporting The Gadflies

Ultimately, European free-speech advocates like Appignanesi say they are mounting their campaign not to protect a few atheist intellectuals, but society as a whole, including artists whose own religious communities are trying to censor them.

In this respect, Appignanesi says it is especially important for leading European cultural institutions like the Deutsche Oper, or newspapers like "Le Figaro," to support their gadflies.

"As soon as the management are saying to artists, writers, musicians: 'You mustn't touch this area,' then you're closing down the possibilities of the very people who want to say something about those areas -- most of whom come from these faiths -- from speaking about them," she says.

"So actually, the community itself is shutting up -- the Muslim community, or the Hindu community or the Sikh community -- they're shutting up their own imaginative people," she continues. "And usually they're shutting them up because a small group wants to keep the power -- a small, traditional, and conservative group -- wants to keep power over its young. This is certainly what's been happening here."

With both sides in this debate determined to prevail, how Europe resolves its free-speech dilemma remains up for grabs.
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