Opinion: "Drawing Fire and Blood: Free Speech and Religion"

February 12, 2006

Source: First Amendment Center Press Release

http://www.firstamendmentcenter.org/commentary.aspx?id=16451

On February 12, 2006 a First Amendment Center Press Release issued an opinion piece by Paul K. McMasters, First Amendment ombudsman at the First Amendment Center, on the controversy over cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. McMasters writes, "For their part, Western leaders' initial response to the violence and protests by government [in Muslim countries] was to call for restraint and responsibility on the part of the press... Calls for self-regulation are viewed with caution, if not outright suspicion, by free-speech advocates because they frequently turn into a roadmap to regulation. That concern is especially relevant in this context. Censorship is historically and inextricably linked with religion. It is only in modern times that censorship has been directed at political and cultural speech. Since language was invented, the leaders of all faiths and followings have attempted to protect dogma and status by restricting the speech of their followers. Dissent, therefore, most often appeared in the form of art and caricatures, since the artist could use it to make his point more sharply than in words � or to cloak the defiance in ambiguity to ward off retaliation.

We are right to worry about expression that crosses a line. But we also must concern ourselves about the difference between responsibility and fear and the danger of sensitivity becoming silence.

Nothing controversial or offensive � which is to say very little of consequence � gets said if the presumed or actual reaction of some listeners determines the boundaries for all speakers."