Our President Reluctantly Rediscovers the First Amendment
James Lileks returns to vintage Screeeeedblog form. This is just a warm-up:
I believe that it is boorish to lampoon in public other people’s religious beliefs, no matter how preposterous you find them; I have great respect for the American military. That said, when you get a call from the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff that requests you to tone down your public criticism of another faith, the only proper response is to quote another great general: “Nuts.” Then you hang up the phone.
If it rings? Let it ring. To save anyone any additional shame, just let it ring, like it never happened in the first place.
Meanwhile, at the Daily Caller, “Obama caves to Romney, embraces free speech for critics of Islam:”
President Barack Obama used Air Force One to conduct a policy loop-de-loop Wednesday, asserting in a CBS interview that he supports Americans’ right to criticize Islam, following almost 18 hours of determined condemnation from Team Romney and damaging news from Egypt and Libya.
“We believe in the First Amendment,” Obama told CBS’s Steve Kroft during an interview arranged days earlier.
“It is one of the hallmarks of our Constitution that I’m sworn to uphold, and so we are always going to uphold the rights for individuals to speak their mind,” he said, according to a transcript narrated by White House spokesman Jay Carney.
The transcript was released several hours after Obama had a Rose garden statement to condemn criticism of Islam.
Could there be a more grudging and reluctant defense of the First Amendment, from a president with two books to his name?
Law professor Eugene Volokh writes, “All of You Who Harshly Condemn Anti-Homosexuality Religious Beliefs, Take Note:”
And same for all of you who mock young earthers, or devout Scientologists, or believers in miracles — and all who say that, for instance, racist or sexist religious beliefs are contemptible — and maybe even all those who, even politely, contend that rival religions’ views are wrong and will deny salvation to the holders of those views:
The United States deplores any intentional effort to denigrate the religious beliefs of others.
So says the Secretary of State, in quite categorical terms. After all, in all the examples given above, you would presumably be intentionally denigrating the religious beliefs of others: saying that they are immoral and foolish. The U.S. government deplores your speech. It’s not just that the government doesn’t endorse the speech, not just that it deplores a limited and narrow category of blasphemous acts (e.g., burning a Koran, treading on a crucifix, and the like), but rather that it deplores any attempt to denigrate religious beliefs. Religious beliefs, which are routinely used by billions as a guide to private action and a guide to lawmaking, are supposed to be somehow immune from the denigration that is a commonplace and necessary part of debate about ideological beliefs generally.
According to Israel’s Ynet Website, “Egypt to take legal action in US against Prophet film makers.” I await the Vatican ordering similar action against the incontinent anti-religious* offerings of Andres Serrano and similar “artists.”
* And thoroughly New York Times-approved.
The Secretary deplores the intentional denigration of religious beliefs. James Lileks thinks it’s boorish to mock anyone’s religion. I disagree. I think that the insults and ridicule are very useful.
From the 16th century onward, Protestants regularly critiqued the Roman Catholic church in every way imaginable (including mockery); their denominations were built on those critiques. Not only do I think Protestants themselves became better and truer Christians thereby, but it launched the Counter Reformation which revitalized the Catholic church and its rituals. And the battle between those two branches of that faith created space for religious freedom. Without the insults and the ridicule, I don’t think we could have gotten there.
From the 18th century, secularists and atheists, in the name of scientific advancement and freedom from established religion, have brutally demeaned Christianity in all its various denominations, as well as other religions. That created space for doubters and unbelievers. But it also revitalized the Christian faith here in the United States. (In Europe, the outcome has been less beneficial, where a general decline in religious faith took hold, following the devastation of the Great War.)
What I think islam needs is a general drubbing from everyone who believes in ordered liberty, free market capitalism, the rule of law, widespread education, personal responsibility, and representative democracy (the foundational principles of Classical Liberalism). Keep pounding them over the subjugation of women, the persecution of infidels, the brutal punishments of sharia, the repression of human sexuality, the killing of apostates and all the other atrocious aspects of that faith, until muslims good and well reform their faith into something recognizably decent.
I’m gonna brag on myself. Ace discourses at greater length this afternoon on the point I made here this morning.
I must have missed the angry Mormon riots after the release of the Mountain Meadows Massacre film (during the 2008 GOP primary season) or after the debut of the Book of Mormon broadway musical or the “Angels in America” Tony award-winning play.
I must have missed the angry Mormon pogrom of gays after Book of Mormons were burnt on the steps of Mormon chapels after California’s Proposition 8.
I must have missed the rocket and mortar attacks on civilian populations by angry Mormons after each and every “magic underwear” comment by a leftist during this political campaign season.
According to Left’s recent First Amendment theories, Mormons are certainly entitled to a “Get of Jail Free” card should they respond to any of the above denigration in any of the above manner. Since there isn’t a US Ambassador to Utah, perhaps the Left could suggest which US Federal official angry Mormons are entitled to (per their Get Out of Jail Free card) to murder, corpse-rape, and drag down State Street in jubilant triumph.
Methinks now that the Dems’ didy has sunk to their knees (after the witch burning..oh, excuse me, convention in Charlotte, even they are beginning to see the poo and pee in it, and are now beginning to realize that it ain’t roses to hardly anyone except their fellow koolaid drinkers.
Even with the media in their pocket, how long can cognitive dissonance survive, once the real stink begins to be plainly smelt?
We shall see…