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Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey
May 25 2013
Insulting Muslimness
by Mustafa Akyol
This week, yet another court decision underlined the limits of free
speech in Turkey. Sevan NiĊ?anyan, a Turkish citizen of Armenian
identity, was sentenced for `openly denigrating the religious values
held by a certain portion of the population.' According to the court,
NiĊ?anyan had committed this `crime,' by the following statement he put
on his Internet blog while commenting on a similar `denigrating
religious values' case opened against pianist FazÄħl Say:
`It is not a `hate crime' to poke fun at some Arab leader who, many
hundred years ago, claimed to have established contact with the Deity
and gained political, economic and sexual profit as a result. It is
almost a kindergarten-level case of what we call freedom of
expression.'
However, the court did not agree that this was `kindergarten-level of
freedom of expression' and decided that NiĊ?anyan should serve 13
months in prison. He is not in jail yet, but he might be.
Before commenting on this, it might be worthwhile to note who NiĊ?anyan
is. He is, by most definitions, a radical liberal who minces no words
against any political camp in Turkey. He in fact made his fame partly
by condemning Turkey's Kemalist heritage, a stance which had gained
him some sympathy among religious conservatives. In his 2009 book,
`The Wrong Republic,' he defined Kemalism as the Turkish version of
fascism, and was soon sued by a Kemalist lawyer for `insulting
Atatürk.' He survived that, but now he is being targeted by the very
religious conservatives he once defended against the Kemalists.
I was against NiĊ?anyan's prosecution then, and I am against his
prosecution now. In fact, as a Muslim, I also found his words about
the Prophet Muhammad a bit distasteful and disrespectful. Yet I think
he did not even explicitly insult the Prophet, but only voiced the
third of these three possible views one can have about the Prophet of
Islam:
1) A true messenger of God who indeed received divine revelation.
2) A mystic who genuinely imagined that he received divine revelation.
3) A charlatan who dishonestly claimed that he had received divine revelation.
It is obvious that only religious believers, particularly Muslims,
will believe in the first option. Others have to choose between the
second and the third. In my book, `Islam without Extremes: A Muslim
Case for Liberty,' I argue that the second option ` that Muhammad was
honest in his convictions ` is a much more credible theory even when
viewed with secular eyes. But one can certainly assert the third
option as well, and NiĊ?anyan did in blunt, if not crude, language.
The question that pious Muslims need to think, in Turkey and
elsewhere, is what they will achieve by banning (or getting infuriated
at) such expressions of infidelity. Nothing really, I must say,
besides their own mental comfort. Plus, there will be some big losses:
Muslim societies will prove to be fundamentally at odds with freedom
of speech, a cornerstone of democracy. Moreover, the same societies
will be devoid of one of the greatest blessings of freedom of speech:
The development of a rational, refined and nuanced discourse.
That is the case, because failing to counter the criticisms against
Islam with argumentation, and rather resorting to bans on blasphemy or
`insulting Muslimness,' has a downside: You will end up becoming
intellectually feeble. It is sad to see these days that even in
Turkey, the home of an arguably more liberal-leaning Islamic
tradition, many believers fail to see that.
May/25/2013
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/insulting-muslimness.aspx?pageID=238&nID=47550&NewsCatID=411
May 25 2013
Insulting Muslimness
by Mustafa Akyol
This week, yet another court decision underlined the limits of free
speech in Turkey. Sevan NiĊ?anyan, a Turkish citizen of Armenian
identity, was sentenced for `openly denigrating the religious values
held by a certain portion of the population.' According to the court,
NiĊ?anyan had committed this `crime,' by the following statement he put
on his Internet blog while commenting on a similar `denigrating
religious values' case opened against pianist FazÄħl Say:
`It is not a `hate crime' to poke fun at some Arab leader who, many
hundred years ago, claimed to have established contact with the Deity
and gained political, economic and sexual profit as a result. It is
almost a kindergarten-level case of what we call freedom of
expression.'
However, the court did not agree that this was `kindergarten-level of
freedom of expression' and decided that NiĊ?anyan should serve 13
months in prison. He is not in jail yet, but he might be.
Before commenting on this, it might be worthwhile to note who NiĊ?anyan
is. He is, by most definitions, a radical liberal who minces no words
against any political camp in Turkey. He in fact made his fame partly
by condemning Turkey's Kemalist heritage, a stance which had gained
him some sympathy among religious conservatives. In his 2009 book,
`The Wrong Republic,' he defined Kemalism as the Turkish version of
fascism, and was soon sued by a Kemalist lawyer for `insulting
Atatürk.' He survived that, but now he is being targeted by the very
religious conservatives he once defended against the Kemalists.
I was against NiĊ?anyan's prosecution then, and I am against his
prosecution now. In fact, as a Muslim, I also found his words about
the Prophet Muhammad a bit distasteful and disrespectful. Yet I think
he did not even explicitly insult the Prophet, but only voiced the
third of these three possible views one can have about the Prophet of
Islam:
1) A true messenger of God who indeed received divine revelation.
2) A mystic who genuinely imagined that he received divine revelation.
3) A charlatan who dishonestly claimed that he had received divine revelation.
It is obvious that only religious believers, particularly Muslims,
will believe in the first option. Others have to choose between the
second and the third. In my book, `Islam without Extremes: A Muslim
Case for Liberty,' I argue that the second option ` that Muhammad was
honest in his convictions ` is a much more credible theory even when
viewed with secular eyes. But one can certainly assert the third
option as well, and NiĊ?anyan did in blunt, if not crude, language.
The question that pious Muslims need to think, in Turkey and
elsewhere, is what they will achieve by banning (or getting infuriated
at) such expressions of infidelity. Nothing really, I must say,
besides their own mental comfort. Plus, there will be some big losses:
Muslim societies will prove to be fundamentally at odds with freedom
of speech, a cornerstone of democracy. Moreover, the same societies
will be devoid of one of the greatest blessings of freedom of speech:
The development of a rational, refined and nuanced discourse.
That is the case, because failing to counter the criticisms against
Islam with argumentation, and rather resorting to bans on blasphemy or
`insulting Muslimness,' has a downside: You will end up becoming
intellectually feeble. It is sad to see these days that even in
Turkey, the home of an arguably more liberal-leaning Islamic
tradition, many believers fail to see that.
May/25/2013
http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/insulting-muslimness.aspx?pageID=238&nID=47550&NewsCatID=411