Free speech, religion and global warming

Sebastian wrote a nice article that I've put below in its' near entirety. He echoes my own thoughts nicely. At some point I'll put my own thoughts down about this as I think this is a fascinating topic. I'd also bet that it is going to be a significant, recurring issue in this century.

On Friday, the United Nations Human Rights Council passed a resolution that urges members to adopt laws outlawing criticism of religions (read about it here, here, and here).

Now, let's put aside my personal views about religion, and let's just try to analyse this in a pragmatical way (which it won't be, as I am biased anyway).

"Defamation of religious is a serious affront to human dignity leading to a restriction on the freedom of their adherents and incitement to religious violence," the adopted text read, adding that "Islam is frequently and wrongly associated with human rights violations and terrorism."

This is wrong. Deeply so. Most sensible countries got rid of blasphemy laws a very long time ago (or never had them, Belgium for instance). A religion is not a person. It doesn't have feelings. It doesn't have an opinion. It cannot be offended, nor defamed. I feel like we have just warped 200 years backwards. Defamation of religion is very different from say, racism. Religion is something you can choose, race is something you are. You can believe there is a god and still not follow him. To deny someone their race is to deny their existence, hardly the same as calling them a fool for their choice in following a deity.

In the Reuters article I linked to above (second link), a representative of Canada says:

"It is individuals who have rights, not religions," Ottawa's representative told the body. "Canada believes that to extend (the notion of) defamation beyond its proper scope would jeopardize the fundamental right to freedom of expression, which includes freedom of expression on religious subjects."

Which makes me feel a bit more better, but still. Making laws to let religious intolerance run rampant is equivalent to committing violence in the name of religion.

I do understand that this is just a UN Forum that passed this non-binding text, as opposed to the UN General Assembly. In other words, you simply have a few guys saying "We think this might be a good idea", but it doesn't change the fact that once again, a lot of countries preferred restricting their power through boycotting the vote, rather than speak up and yell "NO". Why?

I believe that this resolution is aimed at least in part at secular attacks on religion. As Gandhi said, "first they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win."

Atheists have been given the short shrift for a very long time now. First they were burned at the stake, then persecuted, and now they're gradually gaining mainstream acceptance now. We've gone from Bush the Elder claiming that atheists should be considered neither citizens nor patriots to Obama including non-believers in his inauguration speech. Perhaps in my lifetime, it'll be politically feasible for an atheist to hold an elected office.

It's no wonder that the religious old guard is running scared.