Holy Offensive

Just watched Dispatches "Holy Offensive" on C4. The programme confirmed my belief that Labour's law to ban incitement to religious hatred will be counterproductive. The law was obviously conceived to buy back Muslim votes after the Iraq invasion. Up to now Muslims felt discriminated against because Sikhs and Jews are protected as ethnic groups while the head hackers are not.

Sikhs have already used violence and the threat of it to stop the showing of a play in Birmingham. Then the Christians jumped on the offense bandwagon and tried to stop the BBC airing Jerry Springer: The Opera because it's "blasphemous". The Christians failed, though if it had been the Muslim Council of Britain complaining things might have been different.

One of the reasons the law will be counterproductive is that any religious group wanting the gov. to bring a prosecution against a person for incitement simply has to get a lot angry supporters onto the streets(think Satanic Verses). Then the religious group can use the treat of violence as reason for a prosecution. A rather morally perverse state of affairs if you ask me.

Any censorship law chills debate and debate is the only way to get truth. Eventually truth will win any argument, let's hope it will win this one sooner rather than latter.