By John Ballard
Yesterday's Supreme Court decision defending the odious tactics of Westboro Baptist Church rekindles arguments about the limits of free speech. Justice Alito stands alone in the good graces of those accusing the rest of the court of being overly politically correct. To put this decision into focus it is helpful to compare Pakistan's blasphemy laws. What you are about to read is a slippery slope reminder. As free speech extremists we in America are at the extremely permissive end of the continuum and near the restricted speech extreme is Pakistan. Not on paper, of course, as the following incidents will attest, but in the form of what we take for granted as of civil society.
I applaud the members of the Supreme Court for their courage sticking with one of America's most fundamental freedoms. As an institution they have done a poor job of curbing the excesses of oversized corporations both domestic and trans-national. But the Court is no better than the legislative road maps, both state and federal, they are obliged to follow. Their only metric is the US Constitution. And laws passed at the state and federal level are often so poorly crafted (read "politically cowardly") that the high court will never run out of business.
Consider this case from Pakistan:
Only last month I had followed another blasphemy case. A pharmaceutical salesman walked into a well respected paediatrician's clinic in the city of Hyderabad and tried to sell him his company's medicines. The good doctor was in a bad mood. He tossed the salesman's visiting card in the bin. The very next day the salesman got together some local religious party activists and got a blasphemy case registered against the doctor.
How did the wily salesman manage to achieve that?
You see, Mohammed was part of salesman's name, as it is with half the male population of this country, including this scribe. So if you toss away a piece of paper with the word Mohammed written on it, you are obviously committing a blasphemy against our beloved Prophet. And there is a law against that in this country, introduced by Pakistan's military dictator and part-architect of the global jihad industry, General Ziaul Haq. The law is popularly known as the Namoos-e-Risalat Act; the law to protect the honour of the Prophet, and there is only one punishment: death by hanging. A number of non-Muslims as well as Muslims have been awarded this punishment, but nobody has actually been hanged yet. Higher courts usually overturn the punishment. In many cases a mob, or motivated gunmen, have carried out the punishment themselves.
This chart shows an increase in the number of cases over the last thirty years.
[FIR stands for First Information Report]
According to the article the legal outcome of these cases is largely immaterial because in most cases the accused were dispatched by vigilante action, either by police, others prisoners while in custody or revenge-seeking individuals or mobs.
Despite the dangers, some public figures have spoken out against these laws and since the first of the year two have been killed for doing so.
Salmaan Taseer was an exceptional figure in Pakistani politics, a flamboyant and bold leader who never shirked from speaking his mind. He left poverty behind to make a fortune in business, and survived imprisonment to become governor of Punjab. He has died aged 66, after one of his bodyguards shot him 27 times in an Islamabad car park. [January 4]
Last November Taseer applied his singlemindedness to the cause of Aasia Bibi, a Christian woman sentenced to death under Pakistan's blasphemy laws. A visit to her jail cell caused consternation among conservative clerics, who burned his effigy at the gates of the governor's residence in Lahore.
His eventual killing has prompted anguished talk about the death knell of Pakistani liberalism. But Taseer, an ambitious and gloriously profane man, never held himself out as the patron saint of anything. He invested personally and financially in his own country, and felt its people should pull themselves up by their bootstraps, as he had done. (More at the link)
?Minorities minister Shahbaz Bhatti assassinated in Islamabad
Shahbaz Bhatti was on his way to work in Islamabad when unknown gunmen riddled his car with bullets, police officer Mohmmad Iqbal said. The minister arrived dead at Shifa Hospital and his driver was also wounded badly, hospital spokesman Asmatullah Qureshi said.
The Pakistani Taliban claimed responsibility for the killing, saying the minister had been �punished� for being a blasphemer.
Witnesses said the attackers scattered leaflets signed by �The Qaeda and the Taliban of Punjab� at the attack scene, which read: �This is the punishment of this cursed man.�
Taliban militants had called for Bhatti�s death because of his attempts to amend the blasphemy law.
�He was a blasphemer like Salman Taseer,� spokesman Sajjad Mohmand said by telephone from an undisclosed location.
Shahbaz Bhatti was killed yesterday, and unbelievably the name of yet another individual targeted for assassination is being openly reported.
?Sherry Rehman next on Pakistan militants' hitlist, friends fear
And then there was one. Of the three brave Pakistani politicians who stood up for Aasia Bibi, an embattled Christian woman flung on to death row last year, just one is still alive: Sherry Rehman. The liberal parliamentarian from Karachi, known for her glamorous style and outspoken views, spearheaded efforts to reform the much-abused blasphemy law after Bibi, a mother of four, was sentenced to death for allegedly insulting the prophet Muhammad.Rehman, 50, was joined in her lonely struggle by two men � the Punjab governor, Salmaan Taseer, and the minorities minister, Shahbaz Bhatti. Now both of them are dead and worries are growing that Rehman is next. "Make no mistake: she is in grave danger, like nobody else," one friend said.
Rehman, is currently in New Delhi, visiting the Indian capital for a conference, in a rare public appearance. Since Taseer was gunned down by his guard outside an Islamabad cafe on 4 January she has lived in near hiding. She spent most of January holed up inside her Karachi home, surrounded by police and advised by senior government ministers to flee Pakistan lest she be assassinated.
"I get two types of advice about leaving," she said then. "One from concerned friends, the other from those who want me out so I'll stop making trouble. But I'm going nowhere."
The particulars of the Aasia Bibi case are worth reviewing. The extremism of the blasphemy law is not limited to the name of Mohammad on a business card. Notice how this from Dawn, a leading newspaper in Pakistan, meticulously includes the obligatory PBUH after printing the name of the prophet. I'm reminded of our own prissy use of alleged, accused and suspect even if something appears on live television in front of a large crowd of witnesses.
Ms Asia�s case dates back to June 2009 when she was asked to fetch water while out working in the fields. But a group of Muslim women labourers objected, saying that as a non-Muslim she should not touch the water bowl.A few days later the women went to a local cleric and alleged that Ms Asia made derogatory remarks about the Prophet (peace be upon him). The cleric went to police, who opened an investigation.
Ms Asia was arrested in Ittanwalai village and prosecuted under Section 295-C of the PPC, which carries the death penalty.
Husband Ashiq Masih, 51, said he would appeal her death sentence.
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What have these cases to do with the antics of the Westboro Baptist Church?
The lesson for America, from Pakistan as well as the Arab Democrats, is that in the absence of any other protections, the way to confront oppression, ignorance, intolerance and perhaps even terrorism is to confront them with individual personal courage. Unfortunately, that degree of courage sometimes includes the willingness to die for a principle. It's easy to pay lip service to that idea. And those who would have the Supreme Court mandate civil conduct overlook the power of society to do collectively what cannot be done by law.
Legislation can help change behavior. Racial discrimination, women's equality, smoking and recently genter issues are examples of social norms that have been shaped for the better by laws. But real changes in many social norms come about very slowly. Offensive signs and slogans are ugly, but do not present threats to life or safety. The Ku Klux Klan is no longer ubiquitous but like the crowd from Westboro Baptist Church still makes the news occasionally. Dedicated organizations track their activities and growth. But in the end whether they succeed in influencing anyone is determined by how much attention they receive. Like trolls in a comments thread the most effective antidote is not to feed them with attention but to ignore them.
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