Does the right to free speech and free thought end where someone else's freedom of thought and freedom of speech start?
The issue is not an academic one with the killing of several Charlie Hebdo cartoonists and journalists in Paris and with a liberal Saudi Arabian blogger sentenced to 10 years imprisonment, 1,000 lashes, and a 1 million Saudi riyal fine (roughly $266,000) for insulting Islam, Foreign Policy's Michael Wahid Hanna reports. The Organization of the Islamic Conference has promoted the notion of defamation of religion as a cognizable legal concept, Hanna reports, but "international human rights law remains quite clear on the impermissibility of such discriminatory measures." However, laws against blasphemy, apostasy or defamation are not rare: "In 2011, the Pew Research Center’s Forum on Religion and Public Life found that nearly half the countries in the world have laws or policies that penalize blasphemy, apostasy, or defamation," Hanna further reports.
He argues that blasphemy laws are problematic because they chill free thought and inquiry and because authoriarian counties use such laws to suppress minority rights and punish nonconfirmity.
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