Miriam Díez Bosch
and Jordi Sánchez Torrents (eds.)
Facultat de Comunicació i Relacions Internacionals Blanquerna
Universitat Ramon Llull
Barcelona, 2015
This project has been funded with support from the European Commission. This publication reflects the views only of the author, and the Commission cannot be held responsible for any use which may be made of the information contained therein.
Facultat de Comunicació i Relacions Internacionals Blanquerna
Plaça Joan Coromines s/n. Barcelona 08001
Tel. 93 253 31 08. http://blanquerna.edu/fcc
Primera edició: abril 2015
Drets d’edició: Facultat de Comunicació i Relacions Internacionals Blanquerna. Universitat Ramon Llull
ISBN: 978-84-941193-3-0
Dipósit Legal: B-13013-2015
Table of Contents / Índex
Preface
Blasphemy in Denmark - The Muhammad Cartoons, and Recent Discussions and Developments
Blasphemy: Information sacrificed on altar of religion
Blasphemy, religion, freedom of expression and the law. A juridical perspective in Europe
Blasphemy in European Law
Anti-Semites: Looking for Blasphemy
Ads that offend: Some cases of controversy in advertising
The Muhammad Cartoons, the Global Map of Blasphemy and Freedom of Expression in the World, Religious Advertising, and Anti-Semitism were some of the issues addressed in the Barcelona Seminar “On Blasphemy” held in February 2014, by the Blanquerna Observatory of Media, Culture and Religion in the context of the European RISECI Project (Religion in the Shaping of European Identity).
Professor Tim Jensen from Denmark, Malena Mangas from ‘Reporters without Borders’ Spain, professors Carles Torner and Josep Rom from Blanquerna School of Communication and International Relations of Ramon Llull University, and professor Mar Aguilera from the University of Barcelona were some of the speakers at this gathering.
Issues such as the concept of “defamation of religion” versus “blasphemy”, the rulings of the European Court for Human Rights or the Dieudonné anti-Semitic monologues were also dealt with in the workshop.
Like this book, the workshop wanted to address the question of freedom of speech when it comes to religious beliefs and feeling. The objective is to discuss whether blasphemy could be considered a European phenomenon.
A second goal is to explore in greater depth whether disrespect shown to God or something holy is an attack on the European Identity.
A third objective is to analyze whether religions are too sensitive when they are exposed to criticism from the media. Aware that blasphemy was a topic that was coming to the forefront we organized this meeting almost a year before the dramatic events at Charlie Hebdo.
In this book, we have gathered observations about irreverence toward something that is considered sacred or inviolable (which is the core concept of blasphemy). One of the issues that have come up is that at times religions may consider any expression of criticism towards them to be blasphemy.
One further question for discussion is the protection of religious feelings as a limitation on freedom of expression. We also want to show aspects of hate speech or racial hatred and to observe if so-called blasphemy or religion defamation is a violation of human rights.
Freedom of expression is a fundamental principle in the context of any democratic state. Freedom of expression guarantees not only the possibility that citizens, taken individually, can spread ideas, thoughts, views and information, but also that, within a particular political and social system, there is a real diversity of views, and any matter of public interest is subject to an open discussion.
But when it comes to religion, things get complicated.
To what extent could the feelings, beliefs and respect for religious practices of certain groups justify the imposition of limits on the free circulation of ideas and opinions? Or put another way, should there be limits to criticism, parody, derision and rejection when they go against the moral and philosophical system of a religion, or against any of its liturgical practices or events?
This is why we have gathered different profiles of contributors for this discussion which we hope will be both enriching and useful as well as serving as a starting point for further discussion.