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Blasphemy and Freedom of Expression: Comparative, Theoretical and Historical Reflections After the Charlie Hebdo Massacre

Jeroen Temperman, András Koltay (eds.)

Cambridge et al.: Cambridge University Press (2017), xix, 740 pp.

"The tension between blasphemy laws and the freedom of expression in modern times is a key area of debate within legal academia and beyond. With contributions by leading scholars, this volume compares blasphemy laws within a number of Western liberal democracies and debates the legitimacy of these l ... more

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Blasphemy, Defamation of Religions and Human Rights Law

Jeroen Temperman

Netherlands Quarterly of Human Rights, volume 26, issue 4 (2017), pp. 517-545

"Blasphemy is a serious wrongdoing in all monotheistic world religions. Blasphemy prohibitions have been brought into being and enforced so as to protect the dominant religion specifically. Religions as such, however, are not protected by international human rights law. Human rights law protects and ... more

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Médias et diversité au Proche-Orient: Etude de la couverture médiatique de la diversité dans les médias libanais, syrienes et irakiens

Beirut: Samir Kassir Foundation; Fondation Adyan; CFI (2017), 46 pp.

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Blasphemie: Geschichte eines "imaginären Verbrechens"

Jacques de Saint-Victor

Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (bpb), Lizenzausg. (2017), 138 pp.

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"They Are Not Our Brothers": Hate Speech by Saudi Officials

Adam Coogle et al.

Human Rights Watch (2017), 62 pp.

"The Saudi state has permitted government-appointed religious scholars and clerics and government institutions to refer to religious minorities such as Shia in derogatory terms or demonize them in official documents and religious rulings. In addition, in recent years, government-appointed clerics ha ... more

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Blasphemy and Related Laws in Selected Jurisdictions

Washington, DC: Law Library of Congress (2017), 57 pp.

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Respecting Rights? Measuring the World’s Blasphemy Laws

Joel Fiss, Jocelyn Getgen Kastenbaum

Washington, DC: United States Commission of International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) (2017), ix, 138 pp.

"We have seen in our monitoring of religious freedom worldwide how blasphemy laws, in both theory and practice, harm individuals and societies. In commissioning the study found in the following pages, USCIRF sought to ascertain the prevalence of blasphemy laws worldwide and measure how the content o ... more

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Selected Blasphemy Cases

Washington, DC: United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) (2017), 18 pp.

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Manifestations of Online Hate Speech: Reports on Antisemitic, Antiziganistic, Homophobic and Anti-Muslim Hate Speech

Maren Hamelmann, Camille Lhopitault, Andreas Schadauer

Amsterdam: International Network Against Cyber Hate (INACH) (2017), 232 pp.

"The aim of this report is to illustrate, on the basis of online hate speech examples from six countries - Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, the Netherlands and Spain -, patterns of cyber hate against four communities. The topics that will be subsequently analysed are: antisemitism, antiziganism, h ... more

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Blasphemy Law and Public Neutrality in Indonesia

Victor Imanuel W. Nalle

Mediterranean Journal of Social Sciences, volume 8, issue 2 (2017), pp. 57-62

"Indonesia has the potential for social conflict and violence due to blasphemy. Currently, Indonesia has a blasphemy law that has been in effect since 1965. The blasphemy law formed on political factors and tend to ignore the public neutrality. Recently due to a case of blasphemy by the Governor of ... more

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Fearing the Majority: Catholic Media in Muslim Indonesia

Wijayanto

Media Asia, volume 44, issue 1 (2017), pp. 33-39

"It was 16 June 2016, during the fasting month of Ramadhan. Inside the Kompas newsroom, tens of uninvited guests, mostly wearing white, were visiting the office of the media group. They were members of Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), a hardline Islamic group well known for its sporadic sweeping of In ... donesia, mostly in the name of defending Syaria law. Two days before, a letter had been sent to Kompas newsroom from the FPI, saying they wanted to seek clarification about some of the paper’s coverage. That night, one of the journalists said to me with a bitter smile, “This is a special exception where a guest determined the date and time of the visit without waiting for approval.” As planned, around 1 pm on June 16, those special guests were seated in one of the newspaper’s conference rooms, welcomed by chief editor of Kompas daily newspaper, Budiman Tanuredjo, as well as some other chiefs of the media group from Kompas.TV and Kompas.com. In a video that went viral on YouTube, people could see that the discussion was rather one-sided. The FPI members spoke while the journalist were mostly listening to them. Munarman, the FPI’s spokesperson, accused the media group of unfairly covering recent events. He highlighted the news about the latest swoop in Serang Regency, which caught a middle-aged woman, Saeni, selling food during the day during the fasting month. It was carried out by Satpol PP, the municipal police of the local government specifically functions as public order enforcers. Munarman believed that the raid was virtuous, to enforce Syaria law. He said Kompas had reported the news in a way that portrayed Saeni as a victim and the Satpol PP as the aggressor. Thus, in the view of FPI, Kompas had hurt the feeling of Muslim people. They demanded the coverage to be stopped. They also warned the news organization to never again do such reportage. The FPI members did not stop there. Munarman and other FPI members also incited violence. In an aggressive tone, Munarman warned that such coverage could provoke a repeat of the incidents of 1998. This was a reference to the mass riots in the days before the forced resignation of President Suharto on 21 May 1998. The riot involved ethnic violence against the Chinese minority. Thousands of stores owned by Chinese Indonesians were destroyed, robbed and burnt. Furthermore, tens of Chinese women were sexually abused. There is still ongoing debate about the underlying reasons why the Chinese were targeted, but one theory suggests that it was part of a regime strategy to channel public anger away from President Suharto. Interestingly, despite believing that Kompas was not wrong in a journalistic sense, their journalists responded to the accusations with submission. Responding with smile and a lower tone, Budiman Tanuredjo said, “If we were seen as already crossing the boundaries (kebablasan), please kindly let us know” (Budiman Tanuredjo, 23 June 2016). In the same vein, the journalists from Kompas TV responded that “we were advised that we might have crossed the boundaries in our way, our news routine, we really make it as a lesson”. The other senior journalists who acted as a spokesperson of the media said, “Thank you for your reminder.” Instead of arguing that they were acting according to their journalistic judgment, they decided to admit that they were wrong and apologise to the hardliners. The submissiveness of Kompas becomes more interesting when viewed against the fact that it was not the only media to report the incident. There were at least 10 other online media that reported the raid on Saeni. Those media were Republika, SindoNews, DW, BBC, BeritaSatu, Detik, Tempo, The Jakarta Post, Media Indonesia and Viva. Republika – an Islamic newspaper – was one of the most critical of the raid, explicitly describing Saeni as a victim. On 13 June 2016, they wrote that the spokesperson of the President said that the President had given support to Saeni, “who had been the victim of Satpol PP”. The article’s title was, “Jokowi Gave Charity to a Mother Who Sold Food.” The use of the word “victim” implied that there was a perpetrator, which was the Satpol PP. Yet, FPI did not attack Republika or any other media. Only Kompas became their target. This article argues that the allegations against Kompas and its response were a result of historical factors. Kompas has been repeatedly attacked by Islamic groups due to its Catholic roots. This tendency is exacerbated by the fact that existing blasphemy law provides immense space to prosecute anyone deemed to be offending the feelings of religious believers. Kompas journalists end up internalizing a belief that being minority Catholic is an “original sin” in a majority Muslim country." (pp.33-34) more

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Transnational Religious Practices on Facebook

Seyedehbehnaz Hosseini

CyberOrient, volume 11, issue 2 (2017), pp. 6-91

"The Yezidis' re-appropriation of their religion in recent years reveals their beliefs more clearly than ever: especially through media. The community uses Facebook as a tool to show its identity in a way that was unimaginable throughout its prior history. Today, cyberspace provides them an environm ... more

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Hate Spin: The Manufacture of Religious Offense and its Threat to Democracy

Cherian George

Cambridge, Mass.: MIT Press (2016), xviii, 308 pp.

"Outbreaks of religious intolerance are usually assumed to be visceral and spontaneous. But in 'Hate Spin', Cherian George shows that they often involve sophisticated campaigns manufactured by political opportunists to mobilize supporters and marginalize opponents. Right-wing networks orchestrate th ... more

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Fixiert: Fotografische Quellen zur Verfolgung und Ermordung der Juden in Europa. Eine pädagogische Handreichung

Christoph Kreutzmüller, Julia Werner

Bonn: Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (bpb), Lizenzausg. (2016), 63 pp.

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Desecrating Expression: An Account of Freedom of Expression and Religion in Asia

Gayatri Khandhadai

Bytes for All; Asian Forum for Human Rights & Development; Global Partners Digital (2016), 80 pp.

"This report outlines the international human rights standards and processes related the protection of freedom of expression and religious belief, and discusses regional trends and challenges. The nine country case studies include the stories of many people across the region struggling to defend fre ... more

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"As Good as Dead": The Impact of the Blasphemy Laws in Pakistan

London: Amnesty International (2016), 66 pp.

"This report details how Pakistan’s blasphemy laws violate human rights, both in their substance and their application – whether this is violations of human rights by the state, or abuses of the laws by non-state actors. The laws do not meet human rights standards and lack essential safeguards t ... more