Is Nothing Sacred?
By John C Beyer, Director of mediawatch-uk
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o commemorate the twenty-fifth anniversary of the successful prosecution
of James Kirkup's blasphemous poem, 'The Love That Dares To Speak Its Name'
a group of secularists recently arranged for a public recitation of it on the
steps of St Martin's in the Field church in central London. Advanced
notice of the event was announced in the press: "Celebrities will be
challenging Britain's blasphemy laws …". The "celebrities"
included the accomplished jazz singer George Melly, agony aunt Claire Rayner,
Brian Sedgemore MP and Jonathan Meades, feature writer for 'The Times'.
These four, with others, are listed as Honorary Associates of the National
Secular Society and Ms Rayner has the further distinction of being the Vice
President of the Gay and Lesbian Humanist Association.
The summer 2002 edition of the 'Gay and Lesbian Humanist' is a
special issue devoting half of its pages to the trial in 1977 with articles
attacking the judge, his judgement and the law against blasphemy. The editor of
this magazine invited me to write an article to balance contributions from
others. I was hesitant but agreed on the understanding that Kirkup's poem would
not be published again. When I received the magazine I was really taken aback
by the vehemence of the ill feeling that persists towards Mary Whitehouse so
many years after her court action upholding the law. It is evident from this
magazine that gay and lesbian humanists, for seemingly obscure reasons,
perceive the law on blasphemy to be an obstacle to their endeavours.
Described by some as a "homoerotic fantasy", the obscene poem
is even being used by secular activists for purposes disapproved of by the
author. Kirkup has said: "They are using it for political ends … The whole
thing is ridiculous … Let the law wither away". In November last year the
Home Secretary, David Blunkett, said in the House of Commons: "Its my own
view that there will come a time when it will be appropriate for the blasphemy
law to find its place in history" but there should be an offence of
"incitement to religious hatred." Mr Blunkett went on: "We
believe people of all faiths have the right to live and practice their faith in
peace." Everyone would agree with this although it should surely be a
complementary offence rather than an alternative.
The European Convention on Human Rights (Article 9) provides that
everyone has the right to manifest his religion in worship, teaching, practice
and observance. By necessary implication this article imposes a duty on all of
us to refrain from insulting or outraging the religious feelings of others. The
Convention also provides for freedom of expression but this is not absolute and
carries with it duties and responsibilities aimed at preventing, among other
things, outraging peoples' religious feelings.
Rather than show respect for these "feelings" those who have an
irrational and spiteful desire to insult others in this way suggest that God
does not need us to protect Him and so blasphemy laws are an anachronism and
should be swept away.
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n recent years film, radio and especially television, have been
responsible for considerable - and continuing - offence by the inclusion, as
expletives, of holy names, Jesus and/or Christ, on their own or in combination
with obscenities. Whilst this would not necessarily be regarded as criminally
blasphemous, within the meaning of the law, it nevertheless offends and hurts
those who love our Lord and Saviour. Such abusive language in the media has
become commonplace and is almost entirely unnecessary, without dramatic
integrity or purpose or justifiable in any context. It demonstrates a careless
lack of imagination and poor command of the English language. Given that the
modern means of social communication are so pervasive any offence is likely to
be caused simultaneously to millions of people.
It is coincidental that a House of Lords Select Committee, chaired by
Lord Avebury, is currently considering and will be reporting on the law
relating to religious offences. This committee has called for evidence on two
main issues: whether existing religious offences (notably blasphemy) be amended
or abolished (but not maintained!) and whether a new criminal offence of
incitement to religious hatred is created.
In our short submission mediawatch-uk said: "A primary objective
of the law should be to secure against widespread offence by the powerful mass
media". We acknowledged that the Government's draft Communications
Bill, currently progressing through Parliament, provides, rather
inconsistently, for safeguards against religious bigotry but we said that this
needed to be buttressed by effective law. The fact that the existing law has
been invoked so rarely is a sure sign of its efficacy! We believe that this
objective, perhaps more than any other, would win broad public support and
would promote respect, civility and generally advance human progress.
We also stated that casual profanity in the media is a form of
gratuitous discrimination that is unacceptable in plural society and, indeed,
disregards the human rights of Christian believers and sympathisers not to
suffer offence and insult. Accordingly, the current law on this matter should
be retained.
At the conclusion of the Court of Appeal hearing in 1978 Lord Justice
Scarman said: "I do not subscribe to the view that the Common Law offence
of blasphemous libel serves no useful purpose in the modern law. On the
contrary, I think there is a case for legislation extending it to protect the
religious beliefs and feelings of non-Christians. The offence belongs to a
group of criminal offences designed to safeguard the internal tranquillity of
the Kingdom. In an increasingly plural society, such as modern Britain, it is
necessary not only to respect the differing religious beliefs, feelings and
practices of all but also to protect them from scurrility, vilification,
ridicule and contempt …"
We must hope that the Select
Committee will pay attention to these noble words and those in the creative
media will look afresh at what Lord Scarman said. As a society we have given in
to the demands of the pornographers to saturate our culture with sexually
explicit imagery, we have given in to film and TV producers who demand the
right to assault our senses with ever more brutal violence, we have given in to
scriptwriters who demand the freedom to fill our ears with obscenities. If we
give way to a vociferous group of fundamentalist atheists it will take no time
at all for us to be hit by an unremitting wave of intolerant abuse. Nothing,
indeed, will any longer be sacred.
This article first appeared in 'The Catholic Herald' 9 August
2002
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n the 29 April 2003 David Cowan, lecturer at Westfield House,
Cambridge, had an article published in 'The Times' legal section
(page 8) on a House of Lords Select Committee which is about to report on laws
on blasphemy and religious hatred. He
said: "These are issues the committee may not wish to raise and we can
expect reference to letting sleeping dogs lie, despite pressure to bring in the
vet". The article said that the
last successful prosecution was R v Gott in 1922. He went on:
"The committee, which held a private meeting on
10 April to consider a draft report, may well support the status quo … Whatever
the outcome of the committee's deliberations, two things are certain. First, we are reminded that religion remains
a force of social import. Second, there
is a need to understand our religious heritage and the role of the established
church in our society. Neither of these
is likely to be resolved by the creation of new offences."
The Director of mediawatch-uk, John Beyer, sent the
letter below to 'The Times' on 1 May 2003:
Sir, David Cowan (Law 29
April page 8) is not correct in stating that there were "no successful
prosecutions" after RV Gott (1922) for blasphemy. In 1977 Gay News Ltd was successfully
prosecuted for publishing a blasphemous libel.
The Court of Appeal, the House of Lords and the European Court at
Strasbourg dismissed appeals against the guilty verdict.
We hope that the Select
Committee on Religious Offences will recommend a strengthening of the criminal
law so that adherents of all religions will in future be protected from
vilification, scurrilous attack and intolerant abuse. It is a matter of natural justice in our multi-faith society that
discrimination of this sort should be outlawed.
After seeing
the above Mr Cowan sent us the following letter, which we are pleased to
publish, on 15 July 2003:
Dear Mr. Beyer,
I note that you have posted a letter to The Times on your
website, and I wanted to respond to you directly.
I was aware of the Gay News case, and included reference to this in the
article I submitted to The Times. Unfortunately, the paragraph
discussing that case was excised during the sub-editing process to fit the
page, which then rendered the article incorrect in this respect. The article as
it stands was correct I believe, however, in respect to the outcome of the
Committee's report, and I suspect that the report will now get lost in the
labyrinth of Parliament. This is somewhat unfortunate, since there is a major
public debate to be had on both issues and I am disappointed that there
was not more media coverage of the publication. Perhaps the parliamentary
debate will allow the issue to resurface, but I do not hold out much hope.
I hope this communication clarifies and is useful.
Yours sincerely,
David Cowan