Tweet
THE EXTENT OF DISPUTED BANS
Today's Zaman
Sept 18 2012
Turkey
Protests against the movie spread from Libya and Egypt across all
parts of the Muslim world. While the movie revived old debates over
the distinction between freedom of expression and insults or hate
crime, it is certain that the controversial movie mocking the Prophet
Muhammad was merely a provocation.
In his article titled "Can the US empathize with the protestors?" Yeni
Å~^afak's Akif Emre says the film, which was clearly produced to be
used as a tool for provocation and anger, brought two old arguments
back onto the agenda: Muslims don't grasp the West's principle of
freedom of expression, and the West does not want to understand what
religious values mean for Muslims. Emre argues that this two-sided
claim points out the inherent contradiction between the principles of
the modern Western world and religion, specifically Islam. Secular
societies exclude religion from public life, and moreover they
question the legitimacy of every statement that refers to religion,
whereas religion can never be held separate from public life for
Muslims. And the political reason for the West failing to understand
and build empathy with Muslims is that it does not need to understand
this concept due to its hegemonic position.
Sabah columnist Emre Aköz focuses on debates over whether the
controversial film should be banned for hate crime and whether
insulting religion should be criminalized. Aköz says it is one of our
common mistakes to make a law or introduce a ban over a contemporary
event. The controversial US-made film is indeed horrible and bearing
the film in mind, plans to bring in such a ban on insulting religions
or religious figures sounds reasonable. "But life is not black and
white. There are many grey areas as well. Where will the line between
insults and comments about religion stand? Who will draw that line?"
Aköz asks. Drawing a parallel between this issue and Article 301
of the Turkish Penal Code, criminalizing "defaming Turkishness,"
Aköz says this article has been wrongly used because of the obscure
definition of this "crime." When somebody says the 1915 killings of
Armenians as the Ottoman Empire broke up was genocide, he could be sued
for "defaming Turkishness." In this case, the article is wrongly used
with the excuse of "defending our nation" and the same situation might
occur for "defending religion." It is really difficult to determine
when insulting religion becomes a crime, the columnist maintains.
From: A. Papazian
Today's Zaman
Sept 18 2012
Turkey
Protests against the movie spread from Libya and Egypt across all
parts of the Muslim world. While the movie revived old debates over
the distinction between freedom of expression and insults or hate
crime, it is certain that the controversial movie mocking the Prophet
Muhammad was merely a provocation.
In his article titled "Can the US empathize with the protestors?" Yeni
Å~^afak's Akif Emre says the film, which was clearly produced to be
used as a tool for provocation and anger, brought two old arguments
back onto the agenda: Muslims don't grasp the West's principle of
freedom of expression, and the West does not want to understand what
religious values mean for Muslims. Emre argues that this two-sided
claim points out the inherent contradiction between the principles of
the modern Western world and religion, specifically Islam. Secular
societies exclude religion from public life, and moreover they
question the legitimacy of every statement that refers to religion,
whereas religion can never be held separate from public life for
Muslims. And the political reason for the West failing to understand
and build empathy with Muslims is that it does not need to understand
this concept due to its hegemonic position.
Sabah columnist Emre Aköz focuses on debates over whether the
controversial film should be banned for hate crime and whether
insulting religion should be criminalized. Aköz says it is one of our
common mistakes to make a law or introduce a ban over a contemporary
event. The controversial US-made film is indeed horrible and bearing
the film in mind, plans to bring in such a ban on insulting religions
or religious figures sounds reasonable. "But life is not black and
white. There are many grey areas as well. Where will the line between
insults and comments about religion stand? Who will draw that line?"
Aköz asks. Drawing a parallel between this issue and Article 301
of the Turkish Penal Code, criminalizing "defaming Turkishness,"
Aköz says this article has been wrongly used because of the obscure
definition of this "crime." When somebody says the 1915 killings of
Armenians as the Ottoman Empire broke up was genocide, he could be sued
for "defaming Turkishness." In this case, the article is wrongly used
with the excuse of "defending our nation" and the same situation might
occur for "defending religion." It is really difficult to determine
when insulting religion becomes a crime, the columnist maintains.
From: A. Papazian