By Piero Tozzi, J.D.
(NEW YORK C-FAM) Tension between free speech advocacy and efforts to curb “hate speech” has arisen over the past year as the result of recent initiatives at the United Nations (UN) and by the Obama administration.
Freedom of opinion and expression have long been recognized as fundamental, and a recent UN Human Rights Committee “General Comment” affirmed these twin liberties as “the foundation stone for every free and democratic society.”
Yet while heralding these bedrock rights, others are seeking to curtail criticism of homosexual behavior and shelter certain religions from “defamation.” Such efforts also butt against religious liberty and conscience rights, two other bright constellations in the firmament of fundamental rights.
The tension became evident in a 2010 initiative by the UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR), which sought to reconcile broad free speech protections found in Article 19 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR) with article 20, which calls upon governments to limit “advocacy of national, racial or religious hatred that constitutes incitement to discrimination, hostility or violence.”
Though the ICCPR is largely a charter of “negative rights” protecting liberties from government intrusion, article 20 is anomalous, calling for affirmative governmental action. Concern over Article 20’s compatibility with domestic constitutional guarantees caused the United States (US) and other western governments to opt out from this particular article at the time of the ICCPR’s ratification.
Critics noted that in calling for dialogue on the interplay between free speech and “hate speech”, the OCHCR conspicuously misquoted the text of Article 20, stating that it banned “incitement of hatred” – a lowered standard that could cause provocative speech which did not incite violence to be banned. Such concern is not merely theoretical, as a number of Western nations once tolerant of the free exchange of ideas have enacted strictures curbing non-violent speech deemed critical of certain groups and individuals.
For example, Germany’s criminal code punishes “insults” – defined as “an illegal attack on the honor of another person by intentionally showing disrespect or no respect at all” – with up to one year’s imprisonment.
Fortunately, free-speech stalwarts such as the UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Expression, Frank La Rue, pushed back, and the General Comment on ICCPR article 19 issued last September is largely protective of free expression while giving short shrift to article 20.
How such interpretations work in practice is another matter, however. “Workshops” on the interplay of the two articles have taken place in a number of cities around the world, including Vienna and Santiago de Chile. At the latter, most panelists sought to import “sexual orientation,” a concept absent from the ICCPR, as a category equivalent to the specified categories of nationality, race, and religion.
The cheerleading at the Santiago meeting in favor of “sexual orientation” speech restrictions by the Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Religion and Belief, Heiner Bielfeldt, was especially disconcerting. It indicated lack of awareness or concern over heavy-handed state restrictions on legitimate religion-based criticism of homosexual behavior by the rapporteur tasked with speaking out in defense of religious liberties.
Attempts to punish religious speech include Sweden’s criminal prosecution of a Pentecostal pastor for a sermon he gave in church critical of homosexual behavior and human rights proceedings in Canada against a pastor who had written a letter to a newspaper critical of the “homosexual agenda” and its threat to “innocent children and youth.” A human rights panel held the cleric to have violated a provincial statute that prohibited speech “likely to expose a person or class of persons to hatred or contempt” due to the “sexual orientation of that person or class of persons.”
Global concern over the issue has been heightened by the Obama administration’s initiative, announced last month, that would make promotion of the rights of “lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender” persons a high US foreign policy priority. US embassies across the globe are now tasked with advocating repeal of anti-sodomy laws in nations which have them and with monitoring groups, including religious groups, deemed opposed to this agenda.
Piero A. Tozzi is a Senior Fellow at the Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute (C-FAM). This article first appeared in the Friday Fax, an internet report published weekly by C-FAM (Catholic Family & Human Rights Institute), a New York and Washington DC-based research institute (http://www.c-fam.org/). This article appears with permission.
The Ten Commandments: Ancient and Modern
Western civilization and its legal heritage was in part built upon the solid rock of Ten Commandments. These ten laws were first etched into a tablet of stone by the God. After Moses had broke them, God made Moses chisel those laws into another set of stone tablets, according to the Bible (see chapter 20 of Exodus and 5 of Dueteronomy).
Nearly all of the writings that informed our nations founding refered to the Ten Commandments are foundation of all law. Even Blackstone’s Commentary on English Common Law stated the same. Some readers may not know that the Commentary was among the primary legal sources for all American lawyers before and after the Revolution.
Since the beginning of the 20th Century, many changes have occurred. Changes of laws, beliefs, values and practices have reciprocated in creating a new version of the Ten Commandments.
In a recent article, Dallas Henry delineated this modern version of Ten Commandments that American citizens are expected to live. The modern Ten Commandments are as follows:
Commandment #1: “Thou shalt love thyself with all thy heart and all thy mind and with all thy soul and with all thy strength.” We can all remember the old mantras, “To thine own self, be true.” “Look out for #1.”
Commandment #2: “Let us recognize the good in all religions.” Being that our 21st century key words are diversity, plurality and acceptance, the second commandment is politically correct.
Commandment #3: “Thou shalt revere the highly honored name of Darwin.
Commandment #4: “ Honor your sexuality. Flaunt thy sensual self. Promote thy perversions and protect them. Strut thy seductiveness. Propagate thy perversity. Take thy degeneracy public (television, radio, movies). Show the world that thou art perverse and proud of it. And hate and revile those who dare to call your perversity sin.”
Commandment #5: “Honor thy mother earth . . . Thou shalt eat no meat, i.e., no beef, no wild game, no fowl or fish”
Commandment #6: “Thou shalt not kill animals, birds or fish. Thou shalt not execute criminals, including robbers, rapists, murderers, kidnappers or terrorists. Only shalt thou kill human embryos and babies in that they have committed the horrific crime of being an inconvenience to thy lifestyle. Babies only shalt thou kill and human embryos are to be sacrificed on the sacred altar of scientific research.”
Commandment #7: “Thou shalt not forbid marriage to anyone”
Commandments #8 and #9: “Thou shalt not condemn. Who are you to condemn another for his lifestyle or sexual preferences? Thou shalt not criticize or judge. Let’s make it inclusive: Thou shalt tolerate everything except Bible believing Christianity. That cannot be tolerated because it’s narrow minded and bigoted. Those Bible believers are totally unacceptable and are not to be condoned.”
Commandment #10: “Thou shalt recognize no absolute truth.” Empiricism, naturalism, and science has consistnently proven konwledge is changeable and, therefore, truth is relative to facts.
This blogger is of the opinion that Henry’s view is too narrow. The scope of these “politically correct” commandments, as he calls them, encompass all nations and cultures. These laws have been given by which all global citizens are to live. The Creator of universe may not have commanded them but the global powers that be certainly have.
To read Dallas Henry’s commentary on both sets of 10 Commandments, click here.
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Tagged beliefs, commentary, law, political correctness, social mores, Ten Commandments