In the aftermath of the massacre at the Charlie Hebdo offices in Paris, people have been taking a closer look at our freedom of expression.

In the West we value this freedom. It is part of the foundation on which we established other rights, such as the freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, the right to a fair trial and the right to vote in free and democratic elections - all of which depend on the right to express yourself freely and hear the views of others.

Of course even this freedom has its limitations but these should be extremely limited - such as the requirement to tell the truth when taking the witness stand, the prohibition of filing false reports with the police, or of incitement to commit a crime - all aimed at preventing harm and not mere offence.

This freedom of expression also means the right to offend. This might come as a surprise to many - after all, offending others is not seen as a nice thing to do. Nevertheless, it is critically important. After all, what use is freedom of expression that only applies as long as everybody likes what you say? There have been many court cases that affirmed this. In "Handyside v. the United Kingdom" in 1976, the European Court of Human Rights stated: "Freedom of expression constitutes one of the essential foundations of such a society, one of the basic conditions for its progress and for the development of every man... it is applicable not only to information or ideas that are favourably received or regarded as inoffensive or as a matter of indifference, but also to those that offend, shock or disturb the State or any sector of the population. Such are the demands of that pluralism, tolerance and broadmindedness without which there is no democratic society."

This means of course that there is no such thing as a right not to be offended. To a great extent this is because what makes something offensive is entirely subjective. Some are particularly sensitive about a political party, or a sport, or a band club or village feast, but few things elicit feelings of indignation like religion does.

Yet there is no reason why religion should be protected from criticism and even mockery any more than these other examples. This is especially important given the things done in the name of religion. Religion has been and often still is a driving force behind many problems we have in society, from the Muslim violence of Boko Haram in Nigeria or ISIS in Syria and other countries, to the Christian attempted introduction of the death penalty for gay people in Uganda, the Catholic Church's ongoing war against condoms in Africa, Buddhist violence against Muslims in Myanmar and many other examples. The least one can do is to be able to criticise, to point out these problems, to force others to face and address the issues inherent in every religion.

It is for this reason that I feel the time has come to revise and repeal those laws still in our statute books that stifle free speech. The Criminal Code prohibits public blasphemy, while also making it a crime to "publicly vilify the Roman Catholic Apostolic Religion", which includes "those who profess such religion or its ministers, or anything which forms the object of, or is consecrated to, or is necessarily destined for Roman Catholic worship". If you add the vague concept of "offending public morals" to the mix, a person could theoretically be jailed for up to a year for insulting a pulpit. These are not some mediaeval laws that haven't been used for decades. They are used, regularly, to prosecute and harass people today, for such "crimes" as writing an article containing vulgar language in a student magazine, to revellers dressing up as nuns during carnival. Over a hundred people were charged with blasphemy in 2012.

The world is rightly shocked at the blatant disregard for human rights shown by the Saudi dictatorship which sentenced an atheist blogger to a flogging of 1000 lashes and 10 years in jail for "insulting Islam", but we'd be far more believable if our own laws did not make it also illegal, otherwise it's only a matter of the harshness of the sentence, and not the core concept of freedom of speech that we can complain about.

 

Ramon Casha is the Deputy Chairman of the Malta Humanist Association