The rise of radical Islam poses a threat to freedom of expression and the implications for Europe’s traditional rights and freedoms are dire. Roy Brown examines the issues involved.

Introduction

Radical Islam is by no means the only source of challenge to freedom of expression in the modern world. There are others, for example: misguided government policies, authoritarian and corrupt regimes, the concentration of media ownership, commercial pressures, and self-censorship in the face of threats and violence. In a short paper however it is not possible to do more than simply mention that these other threats exist.

Our Changing World
Our human rights and freedoms are now recognised as the basis of Western secular society. It wasn’t always so.

400 years ago, Europe was riven by wars of religion. Religion within a territory was uniform: imposed and enforced by the state. Torture and death awaited those who were accused of witchcraft, blasphemy, heresy or atheism. We arrived at our present state of tolerance and freedom through long years of struggle by our forebears.

By the early 20th century we had won the battle for freedom of speech based on the philosophy and arguments of Voltaire, John Stewart Mill, GW Foote and others. But the Second World War and the revelation of the genocidal consequences of Nazi racism led to revulsion across the Western world, and the realisation that freedom of speech could go too far in inciting hatred of minorities. The rights of minorities became the frontline in the battle for human rights and freedom itself.

The other important change at that time was recognition of the individual, rather than the group, as the rightful repository of rights and freedoms. This view was enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights of 1948 and the International Bill of Rights. This change has had a dramatic effect in transforming society for the better, allowing individual development and fulfilment, and helping eliminate the last vestiges of class privilege.

The Holocaust showed the world that the persecution of minorities can have appalling consequences, and the lesson was well-learned. The past 60 years have seen an historic transformation in Western society. In the United States the civil rights movement achieved the almost total integration of African Americans into mainstream society; in South Africa, decades of oppression came to an end with the abandonment of apartheid; and despite lingering opposition from religious zealots, gays and lesbians have achieved a semblance of equality in the West.

The West has become highly sensitive to the rights of minorities.

The new Europe

Immigration into Europe from the developing world has been accelerating. According to the International Herald Tribune (9 June 2006), the number of foreign-born workers in Spain increased six-fold from 1994 to 2004. In Italy in the same period the number increased four- fold. Much of this immigration has been from North Africa where, according to the Population Reference Bureau, the population stood at 193 million in 2005 and was still growing by more than 4 million per year. So immigration pressure is likely to remain high for the foreseeable future. The great majority of these immigrants are Muslims.

Demographers are predicting that the combined effect of immigration and the high birth rates common in immigrant communities will lead to many of Europe’s cities having Muslim majority populations by 2050.

Muslims come to Europe in search of a better life, some to escape from tyranny or oppression at home, others simply for greater economic opportunity. But government policies of multiculturalism have meant that immigrants have not been encouraged to integrate into mainstream European society, and the special needs of these communities have been neglected. As a result, youth unemployment in many of Europe’s inner cities has reached levels of 40% or more, and many young immigrants feel alienated from the rest of society.

Radical Islam

Into this vacuum has come radical Islam, a well-funded, well-organised fundamentalist creed that provides a new, strong sense of identity for many young Muslims.

Radical Islam has its own clear agenda: the eventual submission of the entire world to Islam. To achieve this it must separate Muslim society from the rest, promoting the idea of the “Muslim exception”. It rejects Western values as having nothing to teach Muslims: the only decent life is submission to the will of Allah – as expounded by the radical imams and mullahs. It is a totalitarian creed, completely at odds with the real needs of Muslims.

Radical Islam eschews all friendship between Muslims and non-Muslims, creating a ghetto mindset in its followers and denying them the contact and skills they need to fully develop as citizens. It has promoted the notion that all of the ills of the Islamic world are the fault of Western greed and duplicity. It rejects the Western way of life as decadent, and fails to appreciate the universal values of individual freedom and autonomy, democracy and social responsibility on which Western civilisation is based. Radical Islam has betrayed an entire generation of young Muslims.

This totalitarian creed is being preached and taught in Islamic schools and mosques across Europe by organisations such as the Muslim Brotherhood, which advocates the creation of Islamic government, and whose slogan includes the phrase: “...death for the sake of Allah is the loftiest of its wishes”. The Brotherhood reportedly controls around 25% of the mosques in France and is growing in influence in many other European countries. We all need fellowship, but the Islamic extremists have perverted this basic human need in the name of their uncompromising creed.

Meanwhile, any criticism of the extremists is met with cries of “Islamophobia” – a highly effective method of demonising their opponents by confusing criticism of Islamic extremism with hatred of Muslims. These are not at all the same thing. As the Quranic scholar Hassan Fatemolla has said “Muslims are the first victims of Islamic extremism”.

By encouraging young Muslims to close ranks and distance themselves from the rest of society, the Islamists are doing young Muslims a terrible wrong.

Meanwhile, our newfound sensitivity to the rights of minorities has left governments and the media at a loss to know how to react. “We cannot interfere” seems to be the mantra. And as a result, governments are leaving these young people to their fate. We have failed to recognise the difference between the demands of the Islamists and the needs of our Muslim fellow-citizens. Here are two recent quotes from Muslim Londoners:

“I’m tired of certain bodies i.e. Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) making statements in my name. I didn’t elect them.” Imran, London

“… it’s like a dictatorship that is appointed over the Muslim community. And it’s the government that helps these kind of organisations replicate dictatorial political cultures from abroad here in the UK. They don’t represent us, and the police should be talking to us Muslims through our local elected councillors and not tin-pot imams, mosques or the MCB. That’s what destroys the relationship, particularly amongst those of us born in the UK. Why should we be talked to differently to the rest of Britain?” Surayya Khan, London

Radical Islam is well organised and well funded. Saudi Arabia is known to have poured billions of dollars into the creation of a worldwide network of madrassas (Quranic schools), centres of Islamic studies, charities, information centres, sharia councils, Muslim parliaments, newspapers, training programs, as well as support for imams, mullahs, seminars and conferences. Most, if not all of this funding is spent on the promotion of their radical agenda, based on a literal interpretation of the Quran. In some parts of the world the radical indoctrination and rote learning provided by Saudi- funded madrassas is the only education many young Muslims ever receive. It is hard to imagine an education less well suited to helping them adapt to modern life, or less likely to provide them with the skills they need to compete in the modern world.

The Threat to Freedom of Expression

The violent reaction across the Muslim world to the publication of the Danish cartoons provided a chilling example of just how powerful radical Islam has become.

I am sure I don’t need to rehearse what happened. Flemming Rose, cultural editor of Jyllands-Posten said: “When I visit a mosque, I show my respect by taking off my shoes. I follow the customs, just as I do in a church, synagogue or other holy place. But if a believer demands that I, as a non- believer, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect, but for my submission…”

No doubt the cartoons were hurtful to the feelings of many Muslims. But the purpose of the protests was clear. It was an attack on the newspaper – and on Denmark – for daring to publish something of which the Islamists did not approve. In no sense, however, could the publication of the cartoons be considered incitement to hatred of Muslims. Last week the city court in Aarhus agreed, stating that there was “insufficient proof that the cartoons were intended to be insulting or harmful to Muslims”. But what was worrying was the statement which followed: “… there is no sufficient reason to assume that the cartoons are or were intended to be insulting ... or put forward ideas that could hurt the standing of Muslims in society.” Does this now mean that if I criticise Islam, that is “putting forward ideas that could hurt the standing of Muslims in society” I can be sued? It seems that Denmark now has a blasphemy law.

Just how this might be interpreted in future can be seen from the comments of Ahmed Abu Laban, a Copenhagen imam, who said: “Danish journalists should exercise self-censorship when reporting sensitive topics” He said he hoped Denmark would pass laws “guaranteeing the dignity of people”. But this is a trap.

It is not an insult to Muslims to insult Islam. Muslims are people, Islam is a religion. The two are distinct. It is the believer that needs the protection of the law, not the belief. The Islamists have set out to confuse the two in the public mind. If they succeed, medieval laws against blasphemy will have returned under another name.

Islamic laws and Islamic taboos do not, should and must not be allowed to apply to non-Muslims.

My final point on this issue is this. Calls by Muslim, Christian and other religious leaders at the UN, at the European Commission and in national governments to provide protection for religion are misplaced. People have human rights, religions and ideas do not. When ideas and beliefs can no longer be challenged, human progress will grind to a halt.

Why Freedom of Expression Matters

Freedom of expression is not absolute. Governments will always prohibit certain types of expression such as incitement to violence, threats to public order etc. And the civil courts will provide redress for those whose reputations have been unfairly damaged. But restrictions on freedom of expression should be the exception rather than the rule.

The price I pay for my freedom of expression is your right to yours, even if you offend me. We are all entitled to our beliefs, but no-one has the right to impose their beliefs, customs and taboos on others.

Freedom of expression is, uniquely, that freedom which enables us to defend all our other rights and freedoms. Without freedom of expression and freedom of the press how are we even to know about, far less expose tyranny, corruption, incompetence, injustice and oppression?

But even without legal sanctions, freedom of expression can sometimes be limited by social pressure, so that it becomes difficult to speak openly of sensitive issues. What may start as a well-meaning attempt to promote sensitivity and tolerance can lead to political correctness and the suppression of free speech.

How is a tolerant society to deal with an intolerant minority bent on subverting that tolerance? If Western society were intolerant the problem would not arise, but it is precisely because we are tolerant that we are vulnerable. The challenge is to preserve the freedoms we have won while learning to protect them. But right now this doesn’t seem to be happening.

In June, the Danish Minister for Church Affairs Bertel Haarder found his name on an “official enemies” list issued by The Islamic Faith Community, and he admitted that he no longer dared speak his mind for fear of having to live under police protection. Since the cartoons affair, Denmark may fairly be described as a place where not even members of the government dare speak freely for fear of being killed.

In Conclusion

Freedom of expression in the West is under sustained attack from radical Islam. Joining in the attack are the opportunistic leaders of some other religions, and politicians and cultural leaders misled by the shrill voices of the Islamists. All are calling for limits to freedom of expression on the grounds of religious freedom.

To weaken freedom of expression is to weaken our ability to expose injustice and oppression. Yet self-censorship has been at work in the Western press ever since the murder of Theo van Gogh. Without press freedom how will we ever know about, far less expose tyranny, corruption and injustice?

To understand what lies in store if we do not defend this freedom, we need look no further than the 2005 World Press Freedom Index. Of the 167 states in the index, Denmark stands proudly at the top alongside six other West European countries. Not one of the world’s 56 Islamic states is in the top half of the table. The highest-ranking Islamic state is Kuwait in 85th position. Turkey stands at 98, the Sudan is at 133, Egypt at 143, and Pakistan at 150. Saudi Arabia, guardian of the Islamic holy places and paymasters to radical Islam, stands miserably in 154th place. These states are in good company. Down there with them sit China, Cuba, Zimbabwe and North Korea. And virtually at the bottom of the Press Freedom Index, in 164th place out of 167, stands Iran – for the past 27 years the model Islamic state. That is the kind of society you create when your laws are defined by the Islamists.

Of course, correlation does not demonstrate cause, but I think the message is clear. The West can remain free, safeguarding the right to freedom of expression as the guarantor of all our other rights and freedoms, or it can allow itself to submit to the demands of radical Islam. It cannot do both.

This is the text of Roy Brown’s paper presented at the Seminar: Islam in Europe at the Baltic Humanist Conference, Stockholm Institute of Education, Sweden.