Free Speech Under Attack in Ireland

Current Tunes: Rose Bowl on TV

Well according to this article in The Guardian, as of today in Ireland it is a punishable offense under the law to commit blasphemy. I’m absolutely baffled. How do people in civilized nations allows laws like this to be passed? If I were a citizen of Ireland, I would be ashamed for my country, whether I was religious or not.

Well the law, which was passed all the way back in July, states that blasphemy is “publishing or uttering matter that is grossly abusive or insulting in relation to matters sacred by any religion, thereby intentionally causing outrage among a substantial number of adherents of that religion." If you look at a textbook definition of blasphemy though, you get a significantly different view of this word. The definition I found on Merriam Webster says it is “the act of showing contempt or reverence for God,” but my favorite is the 2nd definition given which simply says blasphemy is “irreverence toward something considered sacred.”

Working with that 2nd definition, you can see some disturbing psychological implications going on here. The major one for me being that the law is essentially forcing all citizens to pay reverence to major religious institutions or else pay a substantial fee. So you’re essentially making it law that all people must hold a specific opinion about religion (or at least pretend to). What’s especially frustrating too is I’m sure this law pretty much only applies to Christianity, given how Ireland is just about 100% Catholic, or comes from a Catholic upbringing anyway. I’m sure if you ran around making ‘blasphemous’ comments about Buddha or Vishnu or something no one would raise a stink, which to mean reeks of hypocrisy and shows just how invalid and prejudiced this law is.

Forget event talking about what constitutes 'offensive', you really have to ask yourself what constitutes something as sacred? The answers are near limitless. Hell, in Ireland I'm sure you could find a significant portion of the population who considers the national soccer team "sacred." Does that mean its a religious institution that you therefore can't speak offensively about?

This is a limitation on free speech though, pure and simple. But luckily, from the looks of the article, not everyone in the country is taking this lying down. My hat’s off to Michael Nugent & the Irish Atheists for combating this ridiculous law. I especially like this quote in the article from Nugent: “You would think that after all the scandals the Catholic Church endured in 2009 the introduction of a blasphemy law would be the last thing that the Irish state would be considering in terms of defending religion and its place in society.” Good call Nugent, good call.

Come to think of it, under this law it might be blasphemous to bring up the church’s past if you talk about it in any negative light whatsoever. Such an act might ‘offend’ someone, and we just can’t have that, can we? Absolutely disgusting.