Next in Irish Voters’ Cross Hairs? A Law Banning Blasphemy.

  Local restrictions   Fines and restrictions   Prison sentences   Death sentences

These are the fucktard countries that have fines, prison sentences, and death sentences for blasphemy. In other words assholes for Allah will murder anyone who doesn't suck up to Mohammad. If you're a Muslim get off my planet you fucking moron.

Please notice that here in the United States we have something called freedom of speech. Anyone can say anything and that speech is protected by the Bill of Rights in our Constitution.

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Wikipedia - Blasphemy

Some religions consider blasphemy to be a religious crime. As of 2012, anti-blasphemy laws existed in 32 countries, while 87 nations had hate speech laws that covered defamation of religion and public expression of hate against a religious group. Anti-blasphemy laws are particularly common in Muslim-majority nations, such as those in the Middle East and North Africa, although they are also present in some Asian and European countries.

In some countries with a state religion, blasphemy is outlawed under the criminal code. Such laws have led to the persecution, lynchings, murder or arrest of minorities and dissident members, after flimsy accusations.

As of 2012, 33 countries had some form of anti-blasphemy laws in their legal code. Of these, 21 were Muslim-majority nations – Afghanistan, Algeria, Bahrain, Egypt, Indonesia, Iran, Jordan, Kuwait, Lebanon, Malaysia, the Maldives, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, Sudan, Turkey, the UAE and the Western Sahara. The other twelve nations with anti-blasphemy laws in 2012 were Denmark (abolished in 2017), Finland, Germany, Greece, India, Ireland (referendum expected October 2018), Italy, Malta (abolished in 2016), the Netherlands (abolished in 2014), Nigeria, Poland and Singapore. Blasphemy was treated as a capital crime (death penalty) in some Muslim nations.

Other countries have removed the ban of blasphemy. France did so in 1881 to allow freedom of religion and freedom of the press and blasphemy was abolished or repealed in Sweden in 1970, England and Wales in 2008, Norway with Acts in 2009 and 2015, the Netherlands in 2014, Iceland in 2015, Malta in 2016 and Denmark in 2017.

Where blasphemy is banned, it can be either some laws which directly punish religious blasphemy, or some laws that allow those who are offended by blasphemy to punish blasphemers. Those laws may condone penalties or retaliation for blasphemy under the labels of blasphemous libel, expression of opposition, or "vilification," of religion or of some religious practices, religious insult, or hate speech.

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Wikipedia - Islam and blasphemy

Blasphemy in Islam is impious utterance or action concerning God, Muhammad or anything considered sacred in Islam. The Quran admonishes blasphemy, but does not specify any worldly punishment for blasphemy. The hadiths, which are another source of Sharia, suggest various punishments for blasphemy, which may include death. However, it has been argued that the death penalty applies only to cases where there is treason involved that may seriously harm the Muslim community, especially during times of war. Different traditional schools of jurisprudence prescribe different punishment for blasphemy, depending on whether the blasphemer is Muslim or non-Muslim, a man or a woman. In the modern Muslim world, the laws pertaining to blasphemy vary by country, and some countries prescribe punishments consisting of fines, imprisonment, flogging, hanging, or beheading. Blasphemy laws were rarely enforced in pre-modern Islamic societies, but in the modern era some states and radical groups have used charges of blasphemy in an effort to burnish their religious credentials and gain popular support at the expense of liberal Muslim intellectuals and religious minorities. In recent years, accusations of blasphemy against Islam have sparked international controversies and played part in incidents of mob violence and assassinations of prominent figures.

Flemming Rose, an editor at the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten, invited professional illustrators to depict Muhammad as an experiment to see how much they felt threatened. The newspaper announced that this was an attempt to contribute to the debate about criticism of Islam and self-censorship. On 30 September 2005, the Jyllands-Posten published 12 editorial cartoons, most of which depicted the prophet Muhammad. One cartoon by Kurt Westergaard depicted Muhammad with a bomb in his turban, which resulted in the Jyllands-Posten Muhammad cartoons controversy (or Muhammad cartoons crisis) (Danish: Muhammedkrisen) i.e. complains by Muslim groups in Denmark, the withdrawal of the ambassadors of Libya, Saudi Arabia and Syria from Denmark, protests around the world including violent demonstrations and riots in some Muslim countries as well as consumer boycotts of Danish products. Carsten Juste, editor-in-chief at the Jyllands-Posten, claimed the international furor over the cartoons amounted to a victory for opponents of free expression. "Those who have won are dictatorships in the Middle East, in Saudi Arabia, where they cut criminals' hands and give women no rights," Juste told The Associated Press. "The dark dictatorships have won."

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New York Times - Next in Irish Voters’ Cross Hairs? A Law Banning Blasphemy.

By Ed O’Loughlin
June 13, 2018

DUBLIN — For eight decades, the blasphemous of Ireland have risked the wrath not just of their maker and of the Roman Catholic Church, but of the government itself.

“The publication or utterance of blasphemous, seditious, or indecent matter is an offence which shall be punishable in accordance with law,” says Article 40 of the Irish Constitution.

But the government may soon step out of the religious enforcement business. In October, Irish citizens will vote in a referendum on whether the blasphemy clause should be stripped from the Constitution.

Government officials are also leaning toward giving voters a chance to jettison another artifact of old Ireland: a provision of the 1937 Constitution suggesting that a woman’s place is in the home.

As a practical matter, neither constitutional provision plays much of a role in modern Ireland, a country that little resembles the socially conservative bastion once firmly under the grip of the Catholic Church.

Whatever risks they may run in eternity, Irish blasphemers face little chance of punishment in this world. But the prohibition is still in the Constitution, and a corresponding law is on the books, with a top fine of almost $30,000.

Last year, the English actor Stephen Fry was reported to the Irish police for blasphemy after he made comments disparaging God in an interview on a religious affairs television program.

If he ever met God, Mr. Fry said, he would ask him: “How dare you create a world in which there is such misery that is not our fault. It’s not right. It’s utterly, utterly evil. Why should I respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid God who creates a world which is so full of injustice and pain?”

Prosecutors declined to pursue the case, and government officials have made clear that they view the blasphemy law as meaningless. Last year, Simon Harris, the health minister, called it “silly” and “a little embarrassing.”

When the law was introduced in 2009, officials claimed that they were just adhering to the constitutional requirement that one exist — and that they had written it to be essentially unenforceable. (The law replaced a measure outlawing only blasphemy against Christianity, not other faiths. It was found to be discriminatory.)

But Eoin Daly, a lecturer in constitutional law at the National University of Ireland, Galway, said that it was possible prosecution might occur in an “egregious case,” and that the law had a “chilling effect” as long as it stayed on the books.

Michael Nugent, a spokesman for the advocacy group Atheism Ireland, welcomed the referendum, saying that even in the absence of prosecutions the law was causing real damage to freedom of expression in Ireland, and to the country’s reputation abroad.

Mr. Nugent said he was aware of cases in which news organizations had “self-censored” to avoid the potential cost of a blasphemy complaint, however vexatious.

And internationally, he said, the wording of Ireland’s law has been taken up by Islamic states seeking to justify their own blasphemy laws.

“We became a Western poster boy for Islamic states and their oppressive practices,” Mr. Nugent said. “It’s never a good look when Pakistan, where people are killed for blasphemy, is speaking approvingly of your laws.”

In announcing the referendum on Tuesday, Ireland’s justice minister, Charles Flanagan, also pointed to countries where blasphemy was punishable by death.

“Such situations are abhorrent to our beliefs and values,” Mr. Flanagan said. “By removing this provision from our Constitution, we can send a strong message to the world that laws against blasphemy do not reflect Irish values.”

The second clause that may go before voters in October is in a part of the Constitution covering the family.

“In particular,” it says, “the State recognises that by her life within the home, woman gives to the State a support without which the common good cannot be achieved. The State shall, therefore, endeavour to ensure that mothers shall not be obliged by economic necessity to engage in labour to the neglect of their duties in the home.”

Ailbhe Smyth, a veteran feminist campaigner, said that provision was a relic.

“It was very patriarchal,” she said. “The problem was, it never did women any good. It was never used by any government to ensure that women, or anyone else who stayed in the home, got any extra support or recognition. It’s redundant and obsolete and needs to be placed with all the other relics that Ireland is now getting rid of.”

Irish citizens have, in fact, found repeated occasion in recent years to revisit the social strictures embedded in their Constitution. They have voted to allow divorce and same-sex marriage and, last month, to remove an abortion ban.

“Things like abortion and same-sex marriage and blasphemy are seen as religious issues, sectarian issues, and there is now a desire to remove them from the Constitution,” said Dr. Daly, the university lecturer. “It’s about how we make statements about ourselves and express our changing identity.”

Unlike the referendums on divorce, same-sex marriage and abortion, the move to decriminalize blasphemy has met with little opposition from the Irish Catholic Church or from most religious denominations.

David Quinn, a spokesman for the Iona Institute, a conservative Christian policy group, said he had long favored removing the blasphemy clause. He also supports either removing the clause on women in the home or changing it to make it gender neutral.

The blasphemy clause has drawn some support elsewhere. In 2013 a leading Dublin-based Islamic group, the Islamic Cultural Center, and the Knights of Columbanus, a conservative Catholic fraternity, both argued unsuccessfully against ending it at a constitutional convention in Dublin.

Ireland’s Constitution can be amended only by a majority vote in a popular referendum.

A version of this article appears in print on June 14, 2018, on Page A6 of the New York edition with the headline: Irish Voters to Consider Law Banning Blasphemy.

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All these quotes are from Robert Green Ingersoll:

This crime called blasphemy was invented by priests for the purpose of defending doctrines not able to take care of themselves.

Blasphemy is an epithet bestowed by superstition upon common sense.

Blasphemy is what an old dogma screams at a new truth.

In a world of cruelty, sympathy is a crime, and in a world of lies, truth is blasphemy.

All laws for the purpose of making man worship God, are born of the same spirit that kindled the fires of the auto da fe, and lovingly built the dungeons of the Inquisition. All laws defining and punishing blasphemy - making it a crime to give your honest ideas about the Bible, or to laugh at the ignorance of the ancient Jews, or to enjoy yourself on the Sabbath, or to give your opinion of Jehovah, were passed by impudent bigots, and should be at once repealed by honest men. An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures.