– Protect the individuals, not the ideas
ISFiT: Flemming Rose emphasizes the right to ask critical questions and to do satire.
The Muhammad caricatures that were published in Jyllands-Posten on September 30 2005 brought anger and frustration to the Muslim world. The newspaper’s cultural editor at the time, Flemming Rose, had the superior responsibility for the printing. He was a part of ISFiT’s third plenary session and the topic was freedom of speech. Under Dusken got a few minutes with him prior to the session.
– Given this allegation: We who have grown up in a Christian state like Norway, with a Christian objects clause in school and a state church, have a moral ownership to this culture. This makes it natural to make fun of its holy symbols. This right is not necessarily as natural in Islam. How much do you agree to this?
– If you ask this question: Why is it that the western culture that the western amount of freedom has established itself, you also have to look at Christianity. The freedom has evolved, and it came to be because of the opposition to Christianity.
– Take for instance Christianity’s division between the divine and the worldly: The acknowledgement of the laws are made by humans, not by God, and they may therefore be critiqued and many other things – what can one say, has laid a foundation that points toward the age of Enlightenment and the secular world.
He continues:
– But I feel that if you look at the world today, and the question of freedom of religion, it is exactly those societies that are secular, or that have been secularized, that have the most freedom of religion. And I do not think it is random, because in the countries where religion is in charge, there is no freedom of religion what so ever. And the ultimate freedom of religion is the right to say no to religion. If you do not have the right to say no to it, it is not freedom.
– May I ask-
– If you look at the Danish church, you see a church that is self-run, and to a certain degree is financed by the state. But I would say that the state is religiously neutral, even though we have a national church – and I find that much more important. But I do not think that religions have any special needs for protection, just because they are religions.
– But what about the weak individuals behind the religion, do they deserve protection?
– Of course, as individuals they have a right to be protected, but the ideology, the religion that they follow, it cannot claim protection. On the contrary, I feel that all ideas should be challenged and criticized and one should make fun of them, in every way. It is the western civilization’s history that we always are in a process where it is a basic condition for our society to challenge and ask critical questions.
– Of course it is that minorities have the right to be protected in a democracy, but the ideas they follow does not have that right. If it that was the case, you would have no right to criticize the Nazis in Germany. During the 1920’s the Nazis were a minority in Germany. Should not one be allowed to criticize them until 1933, when they came to power? I find that absurd. It is a misunderstanding in the term “minority protection”. The individuals have the right to be protected, not their ideas.
– Would the caricatures have been received differently if someone else, e.g. a third generation immigrant in a Muslim suburb of Copenhagen made them?
– I do not know. But for me there is no essential difference between criticizing a group internally or externally. Just like the example of the Nazis. Should the Nazis have the right to criticize Nazis? Should only communists have the right to criticize communists? Should only Muslims have the right to criticize Muslims?
Bildetekst: Bildetekst: Controversial: Individuals have the right to be protected, but the ideology, their religion they follow, it does not have that right, says Rose.
Ingresstekst: Flemming Rose emphasizes the right to ask critical questions and do satire.
