Danish law banning public burning of Quran sparks outcry
https://www.lemonde.fr/en/international/article/2023/09/25/in-denmark-outcry-against-law-banning-the-public-burning-of-the-quran_6139117_4.htmlOpen linkView original on lemmy.world276
Comments161
Burning a symbol to upset people is a shitty thing to do, but it should not be illegal.
Assaulting people, whether they burned a symbol you like or not, is a shitty thing to do that should remain illegal.
And yes, some people in my country have burned symbols that represent people like me recently. Nobody from my community assaulted the people who did it in response. Just the way it should be.
Why not? Why do people need to burn anything in public? Just behave like normal people already
The burning of qurans is clearly meant to incite hate and violence though, and frankly people shouldn't be burning anything in public anyways.
They're still perfectly free to invite anyone to their backyard book burnings, don't act like this is some authoritarian limit on freedom, this is an active intervention to PRESERVE freedom from the nazis who want to take it from us.
I do not approve of burning holy books, but I think it should be legal.
What people shouldn't do and what should be banned are different things. I don't want to live in a place where what is not mandatory is banned. There has to be some room for freedom of expression, even for people expressing ideas we dislike.
I do not approve of burning books, full stop. I couldn’t care less whose imaginary friend the book is or isn’t about.
But I completely agree that the government should categorically not be legislating which books you can and cannot burn. Burning a book is a form of free speech. It’s often offensive to many people, but it’s still important - if for no other reason than it lets the people doing the burning show their true colors.
Yes! That's something I have also thought about. When some angry folks burned the rainbow flag this summer, I was unhappy that they did, but glad that they showed their intolerance publicly so that we can learn about who they are.
Exactly. People can burn anything they want in their backyard. Just keep out of public spaces
That’s absolutely not what I am saying.
And it remains legal, you just can't do it in public.
Feel free to buy a cartload of qurans to use for your backyard barbeques.
And there still is plenty of room of public expression of opinions without burning a book representing a religious group. Seriously there are thousands of ways to do so.
But European countries did learn some lessons and that's why some actions such as calling for religious or other minority groups to be killed or to intimindate such groups with displays of violence isn't allowed in many of them. And burning a religious book in public is such an act of intimidation which serves absolutely no constructive purpose. That's why many European countries don't allow such behaviour.
You act like there would be less of a reaction if people ripped up, walked on, or in other ways desecrated the Quran. This isn't about book burning, this is about a group of people not tolerating that on of their symbols is desecrated.
Imagine if we prosecuted people for burning flags or signs with slogans... but maybe you think that should be illegal as well?
Doyou care if I burn a stack of paper? Then you shouldn't care if I burn a fucking book.
I certainly care if you burn a stack of paper in the middle of the street, there's no good reason to do it and it's a public danger.
Okay, people will rip the holy book of the week instead. You may not have a good reason to do it, but others should be free to do so.
Then why are you giving groups who threaten violence an incentive to do that more often by giving in to their demands?
So we now should base our laws only on doing the opposite of what a few lunatics demand regardless on how it will affect a lot more people? I really don't think so.
Well, rightwing people have proved over and over again that they’re willing to not only burn books but to burn people.
So we should make action A by right-wing people illegal because they are known to do action B?
Buddy, the people getting angry over the quran burnings are also right wing. They indeed have shown they are willing to burn people.
I just think we shouldn't tolerate intolerance, from christians or muslims alike.
I think it should be allowed in any way anything else can be burned in public by an individual. If a group or organization is burning stuff I think its fine to put limits. That being said I don't think individuals should have a lot of rights to set things ablaze in public. If someone wants to sell a chimney sweep koran or toilet paper with suras it should be fine though but hey no reason it can't be bibles and verses or flags and pictures of politicians or whatever. Its crass and such but really the people being offended should just tit for tat it and make their own crass thing or whatever.
As they say: “You let a snake into your house and you wonder why there’s venom in your food.”
can you be more clear about what youre saying, I don't get it
I think they're saying that Muslims are subhuman, and any society that welcome them deserves any violence or death as a result of allowing such impurity. Doesn't sound like a fucking Nazi at all...
https://lemmy.world/comment/3854669
I mean that to let Alt Right folks practice hatred in your country, don’t be surprised when the hatred begins to take over.
Something like that, I was agreeing with OP. Idk what the other guy below you was talking about.
Yeah, no, sorry. The Arabic world with the monstrous societal issues they're suffering, has no right to dictate how our western world laws should look like. We have no obligation to bow to them, especially concidering there is nothing more anti Muslim than neighboring muslim countries. We had our borders open while the rich Arabic world shut theirs. This is just those rich countries grasping for more power. Fuck off or no more assistance programs, we'll spend our tax payers money on our own country instead of giving it to some ungrateful Arabic leaders new Ferrari.
In the interests of informed debate: Europe does not make no-strings welfare payments to Arab despots. What money they have they usually get from resource extraction, oil and so on. To the extent Europe pays anyone off, it is very much conditional - stopping migrants, for example.
While you're right in one way, it's not entirely correct and an oversimplification. Sweden, for instance, pays roughly 1 billion sek (100 million euro, or thereabouts) for assistance programs in Afghanistan, of this about 30 million euro is purely humanitarian aid. However, you can't deny knowing about the widespread corruption within the Arabic countries, where these funds and aids creates a space of available funds that's channeled into the pockets of the rulers. A famous example is Hamid Karzai and his brother Ahmed Wali Karzai. They sure LOVED the assistance from the western world.
To make things worse, the widespread corruption in certain areas puts the assistance programs in a position where they're forced to pay bribes to be given access to the people they're trying to help. This is very common according to transparency.org in their report "mapping the risks of corruption in humanitarian action."
To quote the report:
Aswell as:
But sure, yes, your comment is definitely for the informed debate.
I agree with your views on the Arab world but that's irrelevant to the discussion here?
Should it be illegal to burn religious books for
the sole purpose of inciting hatedfreedom of speech? Probably not, but there needs to be some measure against people who are doing stuff like that purely for that reaction.It turned the relatively peaceful streets of Finland into one with anger and violence, because one guy wanted to make a point. People were happy to let it happen until people from the opposite camp started burning Torahs. Suddenly it became an actionable issue.
Regardless of your views on the Arab world (of which I again, agree), a law that protects some and condemns others is the fastest path to instability and chaos and must be avoided at all costs. That's what's being discussed here.
I don't have an answer. I don't think it should be illegal, but I do think freedom of speech needs to have limits.
The problem is still feeling entitled to rioting, death threatening, and all that for simply being circumstancly offended. The protest is justified imo, and should always be so. How are we supposed to protest any fascistic and dogmatic entities if we're not allowed to protest using symbols?
Agreed, anybody has the right to be angry, mad, feel disrespected, and protest his actions. What they did instead by rioting and attacking people was to prove the point he was trying to make.
It's quite simple in my opinion: Be better, PROVE you're the religion of peace by separating yourself from the radicalism preached by the rich Arab countries and power hungry imams enriching themselves. Prove that you're compatible with the western world and embrace the fruits of our freedom instead of rioting to have the captivity you escaped from.
I believe any form of burning books regardless of source should be legal. The ramifications of doing it is to get laughed at and have people shaking their heads; the same reaction that was given when bibles and swedish flags were burnt.
In fact, we even had a torah being burnt outside a synagogue here. The rabbi defended the action, calling the "right of free expression" a holy right within the borders.
The fact that this is even a debate is ridiculous, as it's clouded by disinformation and lies.
We should ban religion, it's for our freedom
Fuck this. The right to free expression is at the very core of a free society. Religious assholes need to deal with it or get the fuck out. If they can’t live in the west without starting violent riots every time someone offends their beliefs then they have no place in a pluralist and democratic society.
What even is free expressing. There are already limits to free speech in Denmark. This is just another.
Obviously there isn’t completely free speech possible. I myself am german, we have several laws dealing with nazism in relation to the right to free expression.
That doesn’t mean I welcome additional restrictions to placate religious zealots who are implicitly threatening violence if they don’t get their way. Even if I agreed with their demand I would categorically reject it out of principle.
The ability to cope with ridicule and adverse opinion is the absolute base line for life and participation in a healthy society. If someone can’t, that’s an insufficiency on their part and not a cue for society to drop their values and principles to accommodate them.
Quoth §166 StGB, "Revilement of religious faiths and religious and ideological communities":
...we already have that law. Have had for ages, AFAIK it was introduced after the 30
dayyear war to make sure Lutherans and Catholics stopped with the incitement.(side note: "ideological community" isn't a good translation, the original says Weltanschauung. Think Humanism, Stoicism, and the like, philosophies dealing with subject matters also close to the heart of religions).
Which then leads to things like the Catholic Church complaining about a pig nailed to a cross in he leaflet of one of WIZO's albums (a punk band), which led to them not lifting a finger and trying to fight it -- they could've easily won if they had given a damn. Thing is having a big "censored by decision of court on request of the Catholic Church" censor bar slapped over it is a much more punk artistic statement than the pig on the cross itself.
Then there was that guy who printed "The Quran, the holy Quran" on toilet paper and sent rolls to mosques and TV stations. That's not ridicule and not mere adverse opinion, that's revilement, an important distinction.
The Churches themselves don't really ever get in trouble based on that paragraph -- that's because they have had plenty of time to learn their lesson and get used to toning it down: Lutherans did not cease to call Catholics idolaters because they changed their doctrine, or because Catholics ceased to pray to beings that are not gods (such as Mary), but because it's inciting. If they were to start saying things like "Atheists are inherently immoral and vicious" they'd get in trouble, fast (though that's incitement of the people not reviling of a world-view, couldn't think of a proper example right now).
[30 day war 1897](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greco-Turkish_War _(1897))?
Or rather 30 years war 1618/1648?
Definitely years, brainfart.
But it taught me that there was indedd a 30 days war. Thanks for that!
There's limits to speech in every country on the planet. The only difference is where they draw the lines.
The funny thing is proper way to get rid of Qur'an is burning it. So they are getting offended some non Muslim is burning the Qur'an.
Blasphemy laws in 2023...
Don't you dare incite the religion of peace into violence!! We all know burning ink and paper are grounds for terror!! 🤡...
What I fail to see is how is burning a book achieving anything remotely as useful as cooking beef. You cook beef to eat it, you burn a book to make a clear political and/or religious message and purposefully offend people.
Yes. Heating (i.e. burning) beef to more than medium is now punishable by up to 2 years in prison. Asking people to commit a crime by ordering such a product can result in hefty fines up to 5000€.
I love a good rare steak, but making that and medium rare your only legal options is a bit much.
They aren't your only legal options. Not eating a steak would also be an option.
Simplistic reductionism does indeed lead to stupid questions.
That is indeed a stupid question.
Because burning the quaran is clearly motivated by hate speech while cooking beef is for food and hindus are allowed to exclude themselves from eating beef, they are not forced by law to eat it
Hatespeech itself is illegal and if someone cooked a cow with the motivation of communicating hate speech then they should be banned from whatever social media platform they are communicating it on and be arrested if they are a threat to someone or incite a threat towards a group / person
A silly response to this post that looks to me like it was made partially in bad faith If you realise that consciously or not
It is supposed to be under anti-discrimination laws but bigots also known as right wingers, conservatives, republicans, tories, whatever your local countries right wing party is called are aiming to undo those laws or not enforce them because they are bigots
The law is so vague that no one actually know what it makes illegal
They shouldn't have put religion into this bill. In France, filming Quran burnings would be illegal in regards so the "incite hate law". I hope so at least! It's better to word it this way, so you can condemn provocation like holy book burnings, but keep caricature out of it.
Yes. Everyone told them to use the “disturbance of public peace” angle. They chose this idiocy. No f— clue why.
This Saturday is international blasphemy day (30 Sept):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_Day
To me, this falls under the Paradox of Tolerance. Acts of hate should be strongly discouraged.
That doesn't work in this case since it applies to both sides. The rioting religious people and the Quran burners are both filled with hate.
That doesn't make them equal.
For example, if you look at two people, one that is a Nazi and one that hates Nazis, they are both hating. But it's quite clearly due to said paradox of tolerance. Only one of them is the asshole.
edit: apperently the analogy wasn't quite clear.
One is an ideological organisation which is has been causing oppression of minorities for a thousand years up to this day with countless atrocities commited in it's name, without going into details ... the other one is a person with a book, matches and a message.
Okay so, which one is the nazi? The religious zealot willing to chop teachers heads off for "wrong teaching" or the person burning their "holy" books as protest?
The religious zealot of course. I really didn't think I had to spell that out....
The latter, since they are extremely often LITERALLY self-proclaimed nazis or at the very least like to hang out with self-proclaimed nazis.
That's pretty damn bad argument though. We don't systematically ban everything Nazis are doing, was it burning some books or pissing by standing. Burning Quran is victimless protest, as would be burning of any other symbol hate like bible or a flag of an shit country in front of their embassy.
So the murdering terrorist is the good guy to you?
Well, then in this case I guess the religious person who is willing to riot, injure and kill would be the asshole going purely by their actions and motivations for those actions. Or are you arguing that killing someone for a symbolic insult to your world view is comparable to hating a Nazi?
Obviously, yes.
I'm still not sure which side you're talking about.
Are you retarded?
how does it applying to both sides make it not work?
yall act like you can either be fine with religious riots or be fine with inciting religious riots
"inciting" is basically just a fancy euphemism for "those people are violent in a very predictable way" in this case. It is not as if we are talking about someone holding a fiery speech, telling people lies until they are angry enough to become violent. They are violent in the first place. So predictably violent for so long in fact that people apparently make laws forbidding others from triggering the predictably violent people.
And yes, if you make those laws you are absolutely in favour of religious riots because you do what the rioting people demand which has rarely been considered a disincentive for any behaviour.
“BoTh SiDeS aRe BaD!”
To be perfectly honest, no, both sides aren't equally bad, the one that burns the book isn't as bad as the one who tries to kill the other over it, at least not for the book burning (they might very well be for other actions they take). But both come from a position of intolerance.
The one that burns the book is overwhelmingly nazi, which is quite possibly the worst thing anyone can possibly be.
That is a nonsense argument. We don't make every action someone does illegal because we don't like that kind of person. We make actions illegal because of the kind of action it is.
Yes, there are issues where both major sides are bad. You don't always have to pick a side and 100% adopt their beliefs.
If I am not wrong Sweden tried something similarly stupid, luckily some court ruled against it in the end!
Why did they do this? A book only burns at fahrenheit 451 anyway
Bradbury pulled that number of of his ass, FYI
After he ate chilies then
As I think this is closely related, but no one mentions it, what do you think about those laws: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag_desecration
If I paid for that flag, then I should be able to use it as a cum sock if I want to.
Yea and if I want to burn a Bible that's my choice too, I mean, paper is paper and paper works well to start a fire!
Agreed! Having laws to prevent blasphemy in 2023 is hilariously stupid.
you can, just not in public
I am fairly sure that's already covered by other laws!
Tricky subject with no easy answer. What I will say, is that I think the governments should not grant allowance to burn religious scripture, or destruction of important symbols outside of embassies. That I think is 100% taking it too far. You are now purposefully, intending to incite a group of people. And there is no doubt that, that is your intent.
Personally I've been back and forth on my stance as I've reflected on the proposal, various arguments for and against, and my thoughts. I'm leaning towards it shouldnt be banned in public in general. But it should not be allowed directly outside of embassies as the only intention to wanting to do that is to incite others.
Nope. Freedom is Freedom. Can't compromise with extremists. Burn any book whenever, wherever. If you're offended, tough cookies.
Not nope. You do not have the freedom to incite violence.
Come up with a better argument than "freedom is freedom" because that simply does not exist.
You also do not have the freedom to roam the streets nude.
We have freedom of speech and freedom of expression. That doesn't mean you can say anything you want. You can't express yourself in any way you want.
Hate speech is not protected speech here.
And it's not about giving in to extremeists. They may want the same thing. That doesn't mean it's the reason for it.
If you have an actual argument for your stance. Please share it.
You seem to think I'm offended by burning books. I'm not. Doesn't mean I can't understand the viewpoint that it can be seen as incitement.
So how exactly do you justify the ban without referencing the reaction by violent extremists?
As mentioned already. You can justify it by classifying the action as incitement.
Incitement is illegal. What the bill proposes. Is to classify burning of religious texts as incitement.
The reaction to the burnings can also be illegal, if that reaction is violence and/or threat of violence. Two wrongs doesn't make a right.
The violent reactions are also not the only ones. Those are just the ones you hear about, because making an article of how some people talk about why they think it's wrong and hateful in a peaceful way just doesn't sell as many papers or generate nearly as many clicks.
So who exactly is going to be incited if there are no violent extremists?
And those people are absolutely entitled to their opinion but not to laws banning all the actions they consider wrong. There are many, many, many things that we consider basic freedoms that someone else considers wrong (religious people seem to be particularly prone to that but far from the only ones). The reasons we ban things should be based on objective facts and objectively burning a single copy you own yourself of a symbol of something that exists in billions of copies is just about as inoffensive as criticism of a group can get when it goes beyond mere words.
What? There doesn't have to be a violent response for something to be incitement.
Do you understand what incitement means? It's what we call actions that intend to provoke unlawful behavior.
There does not need to be a response for something to be provokiotive. The question is. How much provocation us too much.
You have to balance freedom against what is too much provocation. We do it all the time. If you go into town and just start to insult random people. You might be charged with disturbance of the peace. Freedom isn't limitless.
You can be charged with "Incitement against ethnic/religious groups" that is already illegal. And we decided those are actions punishable by law. That already exists.
They are arguing that burning their holy scripture in public, is a form of hateful incitement. That it is inciting enough that it shouldn't be allowed in public.
Others are arguing that it is not inciting enough to be deemed unlawful. Even if done in public.
You are, and will be allowed to burn whatever book you want in private. No one is banning that. No one is taking that right away from you. This is solely about if it should be allowed in public. If it's just a form of protest. Or if it is too inciting.
Personally. In general. I don't think it is too inciting to be banned in public. Unless done outside of embassies or religious buildings. I think that's too far, that is too inciting with the sole purpose of needless incitement.
If your opinion differ that's fine.
Where I live there's no ban on public nudity. The law forbids actions that are "sexually offensive and otherwise indecent behaviour".
That means you can walk the streets naked, sunbathe in a park og the beach naked or with no top on etc. No one has gotten arrested or sentenced in our courts for being naked in public and minding their own business.
Right. But we're not talking about where you are from. We're talking about where this bill is ongoing. Which is Denmark. What is and isn't allowed elsewhere isn't really relevant now is it?
There are no rules forbinding people to be naked in public in Denmark
Let me be more specific. You are not allowed to be butt naken in the streets of copenhagen. That would be disorderly conduct.
You do not have the freedom to be naked wherever you please.
The argument of "freedom is freedom" is not a good one. Because that doesn't exist anywhere. Your freedom is always limited one way or the other.
Your are.
It is not.
You have.
Freedom is freedom.
No books should be burnt just because you don't like them or are "controversial".
Burning Mein Kampf because it's controversial, is the same as burning To Kill A Mockingbird.
There is a difference between collecting all copies of a book and burning them as a means of removing that book entirely and one person burning one copy of a book that they themselves own as form of protest.
I'm not sure which of the two you are referring to.
Ok, so you are saying what is the difference of an act of expression/protest vs an act of oppression then?
So where do you draw the line between the two then?
Genuinely asking, not trying to start an argument.
If the state or some public institution decides to burn all copies of To Kill A Mockingbird and deprives the public from the possibility to read it then it's censorship.
If you burn your own copy of To Kill A Mockingbird then it's not stopping anyone else from reading the book and you're effectively just burning your own money.
Sure, but the key word here is "should". Making it illegal to burn one specific book is immoral and wrong
Thank you for semantics.
I'm sorry you live in a place that makes that difference.
Tbh, I kind of think it should be. Not de facto illegal, like if you accidentally burn it somehow, but if you intentionally do it to piss people off then that intention isn't exactly right itself. If you're putting on a public display purely to incite and antagonise people by destroying things they hold dear, then you're not merely exercising your freedoms but actively seeking to harm others.
It's all very grey area though, and any punishment should reflect that the harm is not physical and relatively low. This law almost definitely goes too far.
If i went into the street and condemned people for whatever choices they make, without harassing them, that would be legal. You're not harming anyone by burning a book and you wouldn't hurt anyone either by just pissing them off. The problem is a very vocal part of the world have been brainwashed to incite violence when this specific area of their feelings get hurt.
It's only made a gray area because you can't tell them that they can in fact just learn to ignore it and practice their religion in peace and expect it to work. Their beliefs are not built upon letting others express their views freely if they react with violence when someone burns their printed holy word. Their actions would be justified if there was only one copy or a building was burnt down, but it's a worthless material thing, and the disrespect it signifies will not go away just because you disallow people to express it.
Sorry, long rant to say I actually agree that this law goes too far.
If you went to the streets with posters or speeches that talk about how you believe the teachings or religious organizations to be wrong that is perfectly legal.
If you cannot think of civilized ways to express critique and opposition, than it is your problem and not that of the people that rightfully fear the burning of symbols to escalate into violanece against the people, like it did many times in history.
If you think burning religious books in public should be legal you also think that burning a Torah in a former concentration camp, or in front of a synagouge should be legal. If these ideas make you uncomfy, then you should ask yourself, why you want muslims to be treated differently from other religions.
Your last point is wrong and I don't think you should assume those are my views. Behavior in concentration camps should obviously be policed, because it's significant and not recreatable and should therefore be preserved as a place for the people it is significant to. A privately owned printed book is not, so you should be able to attempt to piss other people off by burning it, if that is your perogative. If we're getting specific, I don't think you should be allowed to start a fire anywhere near buildings you don't own, unless it's to light a cigarette or w\e
Other than that, I agree you should find a civilized way to express your beliefs, but we shouldn't, for good reasons, police the way people express themselves. A law like this sets a precedent for religious organizations; that they can have their way if they (re)act violently. It will lead to more violence down the road so we need a better solution.
How is it your right to upset people? Freedom of speech is for speech towards the government, not everyone else. It isn't about what you're doing to the government, but to other citizens. You do not have a right to hurt or upset people, be it physical or non-physical.
We shouldn't police peoples' expressions, but we should police their harmful actions against other people.
The law in this article is wrong, absolutely. It goes way too far and protects the symbol, which like you say the religion could then expand their symbols to cover more things. I'm saying the symbol shouldn't be protected, however it would be reasonable for the law to recognise the harmful intent against others and police that.
So, if you were to privately burn books or destroy religious symbols, that would be fine. However if you did it in public in front of religious people, then that could only reasonably be done with intent to cause harm, so it would be illegal.
We do not agree on what constitutes harm. I believe you should be free to try to upset others by expressing your views any way you want as long as it doesn't harm them. Getting upset is not getting harmed.
Why? Why should you be free to do this?
I believe you should be free to do whatever you like, so long as it does not impact others. When it starts to affect others, that's when your rights may need to be limited - because otherwise your rights will infringe upon theirs.
I am deeply offended by that statement. It has profoundly impacted my emotional wellbeing. Please be consequent with your own words and delete your comment.
because it doesn't harm them. read my comment fully maybe?
I would say targetting individuals when trying to upset them should be policed, however this is not about individuals but a large group.
If you, say, bankrupted someone's company so they had to sell all their possessions and then went up to them and burned the Quran they got from their now dead father as a present as a child or that had been in their family for generations right in front of them, that would be something that should be illegal as targetted harassment.
However here we are talking about criticism of a religion by burning a symbol of the religion, not one particular person's possessions.
I agree that their response - which itself is far more wrong than anything else here - doesn't justify the law, but that's not the argument I'm making. What I'm saying is that the burning of the Quran is done with harmful intent (to piss off Mulsims), rather than as a traditional protest against some oppressor. It makes sense for the law to recognise that harmful intent as something that is wrong - not because they're desecrating a religious symbol, but because they're doing it with malicious intent. However, the punishment should fit the crime, and there is no physical or direct harm. It really shouldn't be much more than a court-mandated inclusivity course or something.
intent to piss off is not intent to harm. you are not being harmed by being pissed off. it is not harmful. in a civilized society, claiming harm from a book burning is called being a little piss baby. they should grow up
That's debateable.
First off, harm isn't just physical, it can be verbal or non-physical. The only question is what level of non-physical abuse constitutes harm in a legal setting.
As I've mentioned elsewhere, there isn't really anything comparable in value for a non-religious person to how a religious person feels about their religious symbols. The closest example might be national symbols and war memorials, however those are protected by law - people have faced prison for peeing on war memorials, let alone destroying them. This is kind of taken for granted as the way things are, of course a nation is going to protect its own symbols. But just because we don't agree with a religious person's values towards a symbol doesn't somehow make it ok to use those values to abuse them.
Like I say, I don't think the symbols themselves should be protected, but it isn't right to antagonise others, and developing a law to establish that isn't necessarily a bad thing.
This law sounds bad though.
you don't see the irony in saying that you're not hurting anyone by burning things in public? Is arson okay because it was an accident?
Arson means it's deliberate...?
But then you could always pretend to be offended by something to get it banned. I understand that by your definition it would only include things done to spite other people but the line is thin. And it would create a dangerous precedent for the freedom of expression.
I might become offended by people wearing a tie. If it becomes well-known, should we ban ties?
I agree that in an ideal world, people shouldn't be assholes and burn Qur'ans just to antagonise people. But it should also be clear to the offended people, that this actually harms no one. It's like burning a dictionary. It's idiotic but harmless. If you expect to live in an open society, you have to realise that the book of your religion is just an object.
What I'm getting at is not the victim's view of it, but the perpetrator's intent. If you can prove that harmful intent, then there would be a crime. Granted, that would be incredibly easy to subvert and get around, and kind of rightly so - it can only be a relatively low level of non-physical harm.
But it is still harm, in the form of causing emotional distress. People aren't burning Qurans because they feel oppressed by Qurans or what they represent, they're not disposing of possessions they no longer want, they're doing it to upset Muslims. Burning a dictionary isn't the same, a better example would be throwing food down a disposal in front of a starving child.
That is a ridiculous comparison. The copy of the book they are burning represents no real unfulfilled need for the believer like the food does for the starving child.
It's not a perfect example, but I'm not sure there really is one. However it's a much better example than burning a dictionary.
The fact is, there are few similar symbols that a non-religious person would hold precious in the same way a religious person would theirs, so examples are not going to get this right. That doesn't mean that a religious person's sentiment should be disregarded entirely, not when the whole intent is to use that to cause them harm.
Why should society attach any value to a persons imaginary friend?
Society isn't. However society should have some respect for citizens and what they hold value to.
Respect is not laughing in someones face when they talk about their imaginary friend - no more.
though i disagree with their sentiment, i sort get their example. it is not about practical need, but more of the object's perceived value. the qran is valuable to its believer as much as food is to the starving. that was not a ridiculous comparison.
Anyoe who values a book as much as not starving to death is objectively an idiot.
and that is where conflict comes from. some value an imaginary god while others do not. it is idiotic to you, but not to them. again, i was not defending the idea, just the other commenter's example.
There are good reasons not to go by perceived anything when it comes to offense though. Offending people is very much not something that can be avoided for everyone simultaneously, unlike needs and desires in the real world like food, water,... which are much more predictable and much less incompatible.
If I put on a public display to antagonise religious people, and they, based on their religion find harmfulx shoud that be banned?
The display itself wouldn't be banned, nor the act, but the intent to cause harm or distress to others. Proving that intent might not be easy in a lot of cases, but it would be hard to argue that a public book burning wasn't done to piss off religious people. A private book burning would be ok though.
In any case, burning books isn't exactly a good thing. At least, burning them because of what is written inside, feeding a book to fuel a fire is a different matter.
I'm not just talking about a book burning.
If the some religious organisation claimed an act (any act) caused harm or distress to them, should it be banned?
Like questioning their belief, or promoting other beliefs, or even worse, promoting non-belief?
Nowhere have I suggested anything like that.
According to them, promoting non-belief causes harm and distress to them. So should it be banned?
No. Because, like I've said over and over again, the act itself would not be banned. What should be prohibited is intentionally causing people distress - in which case, it doesn't matter what the act is, it only matters about the intent.
This is in fact a fairly high bar to meet. It would be very difficult in many cases to prove intent. Sometimes people make their intent clear, though, either directly with what they say or with the specifics of how they act.
Promoting non-belief would easily not be banned, because you're doing it for the purpose of sharing your beliefs - in exactly the same way a religious person preaches. Burning a cross in your back garden also would be fine, so long as you weren't directing it at a specific Christian with clear intent to upset them. Burning a cross in public would likely be wrong, though, as you can't reasonably argue that you weren't trying to target some Christians out on the street to upset.
Substitute religion and religious symbol as you see fit. I'd also draw a comparison to flags and war memories, those are already protected under law in the nation they represent. This makes sense, the people making the law say you can't descecrate their symbols, just like a religion makes its rules. The reason behind this is because it is disrespectful. Is it really that much bigger a leap to say that you shouldn't damage other peoples' symbols either - particularly when the only reason you're doing it is to be disrespectful?
Like, I don't think throwing a flag on a fire is inherently wrong, however burning a flag in front of a load of war veterans on Rememberance day is definitely wrong. One is just burning something, the other is done with clear malicious intent. But the law would say both are wrong here, yet none are wrong with other symbols. The law doesn't quite fit.
Again, the act would not be banned. Please re-read what I said and try to understand.
This is in defence of Article 9 of the European Convention of Human Rights. Do not forget: this includes EVERYONE.
As I see, it describes that freedom of religion shall be protected. It says nothing about harming what other religions may or may not consider to be sacred.
is that just an excuse to burn down any temples. Be it a church or a sock exchange.
That is arson, and illegal.
Unless it is your own property, like those books.
And burning things in public is dangerous, which means it shouldn't be allowed.
Yes, that includes cigarettes, they cause fires.
And if this was a general law against burning things in public you might have a point but it is not and the issue would be exactly the same if they had used some other means to deface and destroy it.
Good.
I beg to differ, and I certainly don't want any blasphemy laws in Sweden!
A total of 2.1% of Swedes are Muslim. It isn't going to happen.
It happened in Denmark. Denmark and Sweden both fall into the 5-10 % bracket according to Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_in_Sweden?wprov=sfla1
So why exactly 'isn't it going to happen'?
No reason to create political uncertainty and foreign relation nightmares just because a bunch of right wing dumbasses want to burn a book.
Not even mentioning possible terrorist attacks.
And so giving in to their demands, enforced by threats, is the way to go?
No, absolutely not, no.
So you are saying that terrorism works?
It surprisingly does at time, after all. Bin Laden destroyed the fabric of American domestic security and, more importantly, forced the US into a long, expensive, and disastrous war.
I'm not sure that worked given the goal of al quaeda was the US not interfering in the middle east lol
And now religious people will come up with something new that upsets them and demand it to be declared illeagal.
The other way. In private, you can make the rules and demand everybody to abide to your religious views or leave.
In public, people are free to ignore your religious demands.
Doing in public what others want to outlaw in public can be a form of protest to this encroachment.
Meh, it is supposed to be a provocation, but is a completely harmless one. It's not like they are doing bodily harm to anyone or destroying anyone elses property. Of course there are nutjobs out there that does it due to racisim, but that it so transparent and obvious that anyone should be able to write it of as such. But I also think that it can be a legit demonstration agains a system that has wronged them or against something horrific that has been done in the name of and/or by partisipants of whatever religion.
Say I do another act in public that provokes them, should that also be banned?
Based.
The appropriate reaction to a Nazi burning a book is to punch the Nazi in the face, but I guess this will have to do.