A central promise of the Obama administration has been to jettison the arrogant unilateralism of the Bush-Cheney era by reaching out to the world, particularly the Muslim world, and forging true multilateral dialog and alliances.

The goal is laudable and in many ways the President has followed through in pursuing it, perhaps most notably in his speech in Cairo in June of this year, where he eloquently declared his intention to “seek a new beginning between the US and Muslims around the world, one based upon mutual interest and mutual respect.”

The goal of engaging and fostering cooperation with allies is likely the motivation behind the administration’s recent support of a U.N. Human Rights Council push to recognize exceptions to free speech for any “negative racial and religious stereotyping.”

Jonathan Turley, professor of Public Interest Law at George Washington University and noted constitutional scholar, argues in a stinging op-ed in USA Today that, however well motivated, the administration’s policy treads a treacherously slippery slope for civil liberties.

Turley writes:

Thinly disguised blasphemy laws are often defended as necessary to protect the ideals of tolerance and pluralism. They ignore the fact that the laws achieve tolerance through the ultimate act of intolerance: criminalizing the ability of some individuals to denounce sacred or sensitive values. We do not need free speech to protect popular thoughts or popular people. It is designed to protect those who challenge the majority and its institutions. Criticism of religion is the very measure of the guarantee of free speech—the literal sacred institution of society.

Tags: free speech

This entry was posted on Tuesday, October 20th, 2009 at 10:17 am and is filed under Current Events. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.