10 Oct 12 | Middle East and North Africa, Tunisia
In Tunisia, politicians and the people are abandoning freedom of expression. In a conservative society, Islamists’ obsession with blasphemy and the opposition’s passivity in defying an illiberal constitutional clause are placing free speech and Tunisia’s democratic transition under threat.
After years of being deprived of it, the Tunisian public agrees that freedom of expression is a fundamental right which needs to be guaranteed by the country’s new constitution. Six assembly committees which were elected last February have separately drafted different sections of the text which is yet to be presented for debate and voted in the 217-member constituent assembly. An absolute majority is required for the adoption of each article. MPs will then have to approve the entire draft by a two-thirds majority.
“Freedom of expression, opinion, media and creativity is guaranteed,” states article 26 of Tunisia’s draft constitution written by the rights and liberties assembly committee. Article 3 contradicts it saying: “The state guarantees freedom of religious belief and practice and criminalises all attacks on that which is sacred.”
But in August the Islamist Ennahdha party filed an anti-blasphemy bill which criminalises “curses, insults mockery, and desecration” of Allah, the Prophets, the three Abrahamic books, the Sunnah (the practices of the Prophet Muhammad), churches, synagogues and the Kaaba (the most sacred building in Islam). The bill also forbids pictorial representation of God and Prophet Muhammad.
Sadly, secular politicians are not pushing back against these new threats to free expression. When Islamists portray themselves as the guardians of the “sacred” in order to score points against their rivals, secular politicians face a dilemma. Should they stand up for their secular values and oppose blasphemy laws — and so risk losing popular support among the populace — or stay silent?
They have chosen silence.
In an essay entitled Speaking on the Unspeakable: Blasphemy & the Tunisian Constitution, columnist Monika Marks condemns their decision to stay mute:
Groups that would typically be expected to oppose Article 3, like the Tunisian League of Human Rights, journalists’ associations, and secularly oriented political parties, have kept silent — likely for fear of losing legitimacy with Tunisian society, which tends to view offences against Abrahamic faiths in general, and Islam in particular, as unacceptable.
Free speech advocate and journalist Henda Hendoud shares the Marks’ view and argues that the opposition is not strong enough to tackle the issue of religion and freedom of expression at the National Constituent Assembly.
“I think that if there is going to be pressure and controversy regarding article three, it will come from the civil society, which is somewhat more independent and distant from political calculations,” she says.
The view that freedom of expression must be regulated to protect “sacred religious symbols” is widely held in Tunisian society. It is a Sunni Muslim-dominated country and religion still plays a major role in the people’s daily lives despite 56 years of secular dictatorship under the presidency of Habib Bourguiba and his successor Zine El Abidine Ben Ali. It is likely that Tunisia’s new constitution will criminalise blasphemy, and the public will not protest because “protection of the sacred” and the “sacred” are important to them.
A sculpture by Nadia Jelassi depicting the stoning of women at this summer’s Tunis Spring Arts Fair
Only a small group of free speech advocates, journalists and activists regard blasphemy laws as a curb on free expression. They are worried new blasphemy legislation will see similar incidents to that which took place at the Spring of Arts fair between 1 and 10 June this year, when ultra-conservative protesters clashed with police over an exhibition which they claimed included “blasphemous” artworks. The government and, surprisingly, the Minister of Culture blamed the fair for attacking Tunisians’ sacred religious symbols.
The “blasphemy” pretext was enough to bring “public disorder” charges against two artists, Mohamed Ben Slama and Nadia Jelassi. Ben Slama exhibited an artwork illustrating the “Praise God” phrase inscribed by ants, while Jelassi displayed sculptures depicting the stoning of women.
In late June, Hendoud helped set up a support committee for Ghazi Beji and Jabeur Mejri, two young men sentenced to seven and a half years in prison for publishing cartoons of the prophet on the internet. “The political parties are still not talking about the case of Ghazi and Jabeur,” she says. “However, the two young men are supported by Tunisian and international civil society.”
Blasphemy can be used as a pretext to stifle freedom of expression and pave the way for the comeback of dictatorship. Former dictator Ben Ali exiled, jailed and tortured his Islamist political opponents, who today rule the country, under the pretexts of “national security” and “extremism”.
Criminalising blasphemy is only going to deepen divisions in a country which endured decades of oppression and abuse.
ALSO READ: A NEW ARGUMENT FOR CENSORSHIP?
08 Oct 12 | News and features
Lancashire man Matthew Woods has been sentenced to 12 weeks in a young offender’s institute for making some very poor jokes.
It’s hard to know what to say after that.
Woods, 20, was arrested after posting jokes about missing Welsh schoolgirl April Jones on his Facebook page last Thursday. An angry mob reportedly later gathered at his house in Chorley, and he was taken by police at a separate address (quite possibly for his own protection).
According to reports, Woods was charged under sec 127 of the Communications Act — the same law, readers will recall, that Twitter Joke Trial defendant Paul Chambers found himself on the wrong side of.
It is worth noting that in his judgement on Paul Chambers appeal, the Lord Chief Justice made it quite clear that the Communications Act should not diminish
“Satirical, or iconoclastic, or rude comment, the expression of unpopular or unfashionable opinion about serious or trivial matters, banter or humour, even if distasteful to some or painful to those subjected to it”
But it has been used exactly to diminish Woods’s right to express unpopular, unfashionable and distasteful humour.
The “unfashionable” and “unpopular” elements of Woods’s comments and subsequent conviction bring to mind Liam Stacey’s conviction after he tweeted stupid comments about footballer Fabrice Muamba. Just as the nation then was apparently united in sympathy for the collapsed footballer, so now we are united in grief with the people of Machynlleth. Woods would appear to have been found “guilty” of crimes against taste and against sentiment.
We cannot allow this to continue. No one should be put in prison for making a joke that other people don’t like.
This week, the Crown Prosecution Service is consulting interested parties (including Index on Censorship) on whether new guidelines for prosecutions of social media cases are needed. This case goes to show how desperately urgent this reform is. In the past on this blog, we’ve bemoaned the something-must-be-done attitude that can lead to these cases coming to court. But now we have to say it ourselves: Something must be done about these absurd prosecutions. They are a danger to free speech, and a danger to the web.
ALSO READ: How do we legislate for social media?
05 Oct 12 | Uncategorized
Allegations about the late Jimmy Savile’s abuse of young girls have led to a curious binary set of reactions. On the one hand, we are shocked and appalled. On the other hand, we knew all along.
There were always rumours, of course. Journalist Lynn Barber, in a 1990 interview, put the allegation to Savile: “What people say is that you like little girls.”
But a mixture of fear of privacy and libel laws, and the censorious pressure that prominent, well-connected figures can impose not just on weak and insecure young girls and their families, meant the rumours were never properly confronted. Even the BBC’s Newsnight would not broadcast the allegations .
Former tabloid editor Brian Hitchen wrote yesterday that England’s libel laws “too often help make those like Savile untouchable.”
Even now, the threat of libel suits could hang over newspapers seeking to further investigate allegations made by women who testified in ITV’s documentary about Savile.
The law should not be a tool for the powerful to silence the weak. And this is all about power: men over women, celebrity over the unknown, rich over poor.
As more stories emerge about the likes of Savile and Gary Glitter, I cannot help but compare it with the widespread clerical abuse that gripped the state of Ireland for many years. The enormity of this child Gulag has been revealed in a series of official reports in the past few years, with grim testimony given as victims finally found a space where they could speak of their experiences.
The reaction to those reports was revulsion. But it came from that same place of knowing and not knowing as the reaction to the Savile story. There cannot have been a person in Ireland who did not know that the church covered up child abuse. But we were reassured that they were bad apples, and it felt wrong to complain when there were so many good priests who did so much for our spiritual and physical wellbeing.
Savile pulled the same trick. How could you attack a man who did so much for the community?
In even the worst totalitarian regime, rumours about the rulers can circulate below the censor’s radar. But it’s only when we can proclaim, on the record and with confidence, our doubts about the rich, famous and powerful, that we can actually bring about change.
Padraig Reidy is News Editor of Index on Censorship
More on libel:
Why it’s vital that the government act to protect free speech
Five ludicrous libel cases
Last chance to sign our petition to reform libel laws that stifle debate, curtail criticism and even endanger lives
02 Oct 12 | News and features, Statements
This letter appeared in the Financial Times
Sir, Your editorial (“Obama’s realist foreign policy”, September 27) claims that free speech purists were offended by Barack Obama’s comments on Innocence of Muslims. As an organisation that defends free expression around the world, Index on Censorship would certainly include itself in the free speech purist camp. Even the president of the US is entitled to say what he likes under the first amendment, as long as he upholds that vital part of the US constitution for all.
In his address this week to world leaders at the UN General Assembly, President Obama defended “the right of all people to express their views — even views that we disagree with”.
However, in reality, the White House is guilty of “reaching out” to Google to look into taking the video off YouTube on the grounds that it breached Google’s terms of service, justifying its removal. This intervention by the US government suggests censorship by stealth, whereby governments can claim to protect free speech while putting pressure on “middle men” such as internet service providers to censor for them. All of which raises the question: “Who should control the internet?”
Kirsty Hughes, Chief Executive, Index on Censorship, London EC1, UK
