Why free expression?

An unredeemable fact of British liberal society is that each individual is free to enjoy certain basic and personal freedoms, including that of expressing oneself freely. In our history, that sense of expressing oneself freely is often felt to be most sincerely manifested when it comes to defending free expression on religious matters.

It is widely recognised that the most fundamental defence of free expression in relation to religious diversity, within modern British literature, derives from the work of one of Britain's true philosophical greats, John Stuart Mill. In the doctrine of John Stuart Mill's On Liberty, published in 1859, the right to freedom of expression and its conditions are stated clearly. The most fundamental principle of a freely operating liberal society is the right to the "freedom of opinion". This "independence is, of right, absolute." The only exception in which Mill conceived such freedom to be limited was if it were to impose severe harm onto others —he declared this to be a rare thing.

I believe that this provides a positive perspective on the Rushdie affair. In the Rushdie controversy, the right to freedom of expression prevailed, albeit with the author in hiding and in fear of his life. It is certain that free expression on matters pertaining to Islam will and ought to prevail, since the conditions, especially of free and critical discussion, have always been upheld. It is through recourse to the grounds of "offence", upon which the anachronistic Christian-centric blasphemy laws were entrenched, that Muslims attempted to base the right to interfere in this controversy. Since the harm done did not present a physical injury, or anything of that magnitude, to any individual or group, there were few grounds for rightful interference.

For British Muslims, the most effective route to preventing the offence that Rushdie had caused was through the prosecution of Rushdie-Penguin, with reference to the blasphemy laws. In the modern history of the blasphemy laws, prior to the nineteenth century, the political architecture in England protected the truth that lay behind Christianity. During and after the nineteenth century —demonstrated in Coleridge's judgment, acting as Lord Chief Justice —the blasphemy laws changed in their character and application so that they now protected Christians from indecency in the expression of beliefs, rather than espousing the positive truth of Christianity. Christians were protected from blasphemous beliefs, since they were considered offensive. It might be said that the character of the law had changed such that it "was now concerned with 'decency' in the treatment of Christianity —the manner of attacks on that religion rather than the matter of the assertion. Following Coleridge's ruling, the precedent was set for criticisms to be made of the Christian faith without there having to be necessary changes to the laws. When we approach the Rushdie affair, the laws were entirely impractical since they referred only to the protection of 'decency' with regards to the Christian faith.