From TheNews.pl:
A Polish pop star has been fined 5000 zloty (1140 euro) by a Warsaw court for offending religious feelings.
Dorota Rabczewska, known to the public as Doda, was taken to court owing to an interview she gave for the Gazeta Dziennik Prawna daily in 2009. In the interview, the singer lamented that there were no references to dinosaurs in the Bible, and said it was “hard to believe in something written by someone who was hammered on wine and who’d been smoking herbs.”
The Warsaw Business Journal adds:
[T]he judge in the case, Agnieszka Jarosz, ruled that the artist’s statements could not be defended by an appeal to freedom of speech. She said Ms Rabczewska had the right “to assess [the content of the Bible] in the context of scientific discovery but had no right to insult” the religious text.
For more on this case, see this post from when the case was filed.
PersonFromPorlock says:
A classic example of “yes but” = “no.”
January 17, 2012, 12:19 pmAndyK says:
Poland seems a lot more liberal than either Islamic nations that would execute her, or Britain that would fine / imprison her on saying much less, or even the U.S. that would deny her permits / ruin her public image if she didn’t toe the P.C. line. A one-time fee of $1000 is probably among the best penalties available, worldwide.
[AndyK: What permits would someone be denied in the U.S. for making a statement such as Dorota Rabczewska made? As to "ruin her public image," what exactly do you mean -- just that some fans would no longer like her as much?]
January 17, 2012, 1:59 pmEvan says:
As a Christian, I would like to apologize for people like Ms. Jarosz who do stupid and dangerous things for the sake of Christianity.
I’m pleasantly surprised, however, to see them being so consistent as to convict people of insulting Christianity as well. However, consistently enforcing a bad law is much worse than not enforcing it at all.
January 17, 2012, 2:04 pmTatil says:
Could you kindly offer a link about a person who got imprisoned in UK for insulting religion by saying even less (even tough it is hard to believe you could say less than “hammered” and still be considered insulting) so that we can distinguish between uninformed idle rant and valuable commentary?
January 17, 2012, 2:33 pmJatinder says:
What do you mean by “as well”? Poland is a country in which the Catholic Church has strong influence and that is why she was tried. I am fairly certain that you cannot find instances of Poland prosecuting people for insulting non-Christian religious groups. In Poland, you can freely Wiccans and Buddhists as much as you want.
January 17, 2012, 2:44 pmMatt says:
As a Christian and a pastor I am more insulted that the judge thought Christians so weak as to need protection from that insult.People have been insulting Christianity since the beginning with much more creativity:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexamenos_graffito
Honestly, if the Roman persecutions didn’t kill us off than I have a hard time feeling threatened by a pop singer from Poland!
For crying out loud, its not even a good heresy, just an understandable doubt about a legitimately difficult issue in scripture — at least she has a passing familiarity with scripture and has interacted with it enough to have doubts.
January 17, 2012, 2:49 pmCalderon says:
Evan said:
However, consistently enforcing a bad law is much worse than not enforcing it at all.
I’m skeptical of this proposition. If a bad law is consistently enforced and applied to all groups, then its badness will more likely become apparent to a majority of the population and thus it more likely will be repealed. If a bad law is inconsistently enforced, it likely will be enforced only against minority groups with less political power and may never create a concern for repeal among the majority.
January 17, 2012, 3:03 pmDavid C. Brayton says:
Why does it seem so obvious to me that freedom of speech must include the right to sometimes be insulting yet, in so much of the world, this terrible result seems obvious and just?
January 17, 2012, 3:03 pmBill of Rights says:
Read Job 40 and 41. I did a whole lecture at my church on this subject. But if this pop star was American I would defend her right to say what she wanted to about the subject
January 17, 2012, 3:08 pmLaura(southernxyl) says:
Evan, it’s possible that Judge Jarosz did not rule the way she did for the sake of Christianity, but because that is the way Polish law is written.
I don’t think it’s necessarily a good idea to not enforce a bad law. If you enforce it, and people see what that’s like, that may lead to getting it off the books. Otherwise you are kicking the can down the road.
And it’s possible that the people of Poland like their (non)freedom of speech just the way it is.
January 17, 2012, 3:10 pmRandy says:
It doesn’t seem right or just to me. Are you suggesting that to the people of Poland it seems right and just?
January 17, 2012, 3:12 pmMalvolio says:
No, it’s a terrible idea to not enforce a bad law. Sooner or later, that law will be enforced against somebody, somebody unpopular and without the resources to defend himself.
It might be nice to have a provision of your constitution that any offense for which there is neither an indictment nor a re-affirmation of the the underlying law by the legislature for X years automatically lapses.
It’s possible but irrelevant. Self-evidently, Ms Rabczewska has the unalienable right to speak her opinion of the Bible, the opinion of her countrymen, however unanimous, notwithstanding.
January 17, 2012, 3:24 pmJoseph Slater says:
For crying out loud, its not even a good heresy
OK, that made me chuckle.
January 17, 2012, 3:29 pmJoeJP says:
Matt says:
As a Christian and a pastor I am more insulted that the judge thought
The “judge” didn’t think it … it was the rule pursuant to Polish law which was applied. The application of free speech law in places without our long history of free speech (itself much more limited not that long ago), especially one where religious minorities had much more harm than those here did (including as soon ago as the 1990s) is going to be different than we are familiar with.
I think as a whole on this issue the law is better here but the chauvinism of some on this issue is a bit much.
January 17, 2012, 3:32 pmAlast says:
“[B]ad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still, while they continue in force, for the sake of example they should be religiously observed.” — A. Lincoln.
Enforcing bad laws rigorously is how you get them repealed.
January 17, 2012, 3:35 pmJoeJP says:
I don’t think it’s necessarily a good idea to not enforce a bad law.
In this case, the articles suggests a claim was brought by an organization, so it is not — if that is the implication — the case of the state itself enforcing the law such as not enforcing a federal marijuana law against medicinal use.
January 17, 2012, 3:35 pmrob bob says:
“The U.S.” would ruin her public image? As in the government? Or did you mean to say that people just won’t like it? I don’t see anything wrong with public disapproval.
January 17, 2012, 3:52 pmLuc Prefontain says:
What has happened in this court is what Christians everywhere (at least some of them) wishes would happen in the states. Stopping insensitive and un-thoughtful PUBLISHED remarks can go along way to reversing a trend where Christianity slowly gets rid of the target put upon it by pop culture in the marketplace of idiots and hopefully reverses the momentum of the fashionable sport of denigrating against Christian ideas. It has come to this because of the inability to sue with force of law for damages against public relations that aren’t considered (anymore) damaging enough to really hurt.
January 17, 2012, 4:04 pmAssistant Village Idiot says:
I think we got to where we are by humorously insulting our own religion. Serious insult would suggest that the religion is no longer “one’s own” and perhaps doesn’t count, but you catch my drift.
In psychology, the ability to make fun of oneself is a sign of emotional health, for many reasons. Some Christians can certainly be touchy, but most can chuckle. Jews are notoriously good at poking fun at themselves. Atheists don’t seem to have that knack, though a lot of the agnostic/atheist-lite/questioners do. By reputation, Muslims don’t – I don’t know if that’s actually true; I don’t know that the followers of Eastern religions parody themselves much. With each other, perhaps.
But that’s how we get from here to there, I think.
January 17, 2012, 4:06 pmSarcastro says:
Man, what story are you reading? It sounds much less nuanced than this one!
Yes, this seems plausible.
Yes, censorship seems an efficient method of extermination…
Oddly, not sure I believe you. It may be the lack of evidence, the outlandish counterfactual claims, or the statement of unique and yet complete understanding of the dark secrets of the Polish government.
January 17, 2012, 4:12 pmChristopher Taylor says:
Well this is the first time I have seen Christianity be the religion people are said to have criminally insulted. Still, it doesn’t matter what the faith: blasphemy laws are idiotic and strangle liberty. Freedom of conscience and expression are critical to a free society, and saying someone’s faith is dumb is not sufficiently damaging to a culture or other people’s rights to warrant legal sanction.
January 17, 2012, 4:38 pmAsher says:
@ Sarcastro
Many years ago TIME magazine published a front page article affirmatively promoting a future where there were no noticeably distinct ethnicities or groups with common genetic heritage. Of course, they were only advocating for this in “white” countries; no one was talking about shipping millions of Africans to China or millions of Japanese to India.
There is a not insignificant portion of the transnational left that wants to end white people as a distinct grouping, which is the definition of genocide under international norms.
So, given TIME magazine called for genocide of whites, claims like ricky’s are not unwarranted. Yes, suppression of speech protesting genocidal policies is a good first step toward genocide.
January 17, 2012, 4:52 pmAnthony J. Lawrence says:
I have no doubt about this proposition. Enforcing a bad law inconsistently, selectively, or to persecute certain minorities may be much worse than consistently enforcing a bad law. But, that’s changing the stated proposition, folks. If it’s never enforced, i.e., “not enforcing it at all,” it is never enforced – a much preferable outcome, I think, than even one inconsistent or selective enforcement of a bad law, let alone its total and consistent enforcement.
January 17, 2012, 4:52 pmCalderon says:
Anthony J. Lawrence, you’re correct, I was reading too quickly. I apologize to Evan for misreading his comment.
January 17, 2012, 4:56 pmegd says:
http://www.myfoxdetroit.com/dpp/news/ronnie_dahl/dearborn-may-deny-pastor-terry-jones-demonstration-permit-20110420-wpms
January 17, 2012, 5:07 pmEugene Volokh says:
Ricky: What are you talking about? What do Muslims and immigrants have to do with this story? And what’s your evidence for the proposition that there is a great deal of “third world” immigration into Poland?
Egd: I’ve sharply criticized the Terry Jones permit denial that you mentioned (see this post). But this is, to my knowledge, an isolated incident. How does this isolated incident, involving a planned protest in front of a mosque by someone who had publicly burned a Koran, show that someone who says a religious book was written by people who were intoxicated would likely be denied a permit in the U.S.?
January 17, 2012, 5:16 pmAJK says:
[EV says: The conviction is, the prosecution isn't -- see the Adam Darski prosecution. But in any event, I was criticizing the commenter's assertion that "the U.S. ... would deny her permits / ruin her public image if she didn’t toe the P.C. line." The fact that there was one instance of a permit denial for a speaker who had engaged in the past in rather different conduct doesn't tell us that U.S. governments "would deny ... permits" to Rabczewska for her speech.]
While I agree that US standards of free speech are vastly superior to Poland’s, isn’t this too an isolated incident?
January 17, 2012, 5:32 pmArthur Kirkland says:
Not much a fan of history, Mr. Taylor?
January 17, 2012, 5:35 pmJohn Singletary says:
This story does offend my American sensibilities, but I wonder if these laws seem more reasonable in European (or any other part of the world) nations that have a rather recent and awful history of ethnic/religious violence. Do those legislatures and judiciaries have more intimate knowledge of how anti-________ sentiments made publicly can escalate into systematic violence?
I’m not saying restricting speech is a good thing; I just wonder if it makes a certain sense in that context. Also, I wonder how legal scholars have tackled this tension between freedom of speech and hypersensitivity to mass violence against particular groups.
January 17, 2012, 7:01 pmEugene Volokh says:
Christopher Taylor: How about the Russian Mickey Jesus painting case and the English “Immaculate Conception” ad case and the Polish Bible-burning / calling Catholicism a “criminal sect” case, all in the last two years? Going back a few decades, there were also some bans on showing the Last Temptation of Christ, as well as the Austrian play case.
January 17, 2012, 7:19 pmHarryEagar says:
The Poles should have, and it does appear that the woman’s objections were to the OT more than to the NT (I think), so the assumption that the judge was protecting Christianity may be misplaced.
On the other hand, the idea that a Polish judge would go out of his way to protect Jewish sensibilities is too farfetched to believe.
January 17, 2012, 8:15 pmBart says:
[T]he singer … said it was ‘hard to believe in something written by someone who was hammered on wine and who’d been smoking herbs.’”
A pop singer who argues against believing that which is written by “someone who was hammered on wine and who’d been smoking herbs”?
Just how much pop music would we have if we didn’t have songwriters who were hammered on wine and who smoked herbs?
January 17, 2012, 8:20 pmCockleCove says:
Asher, I’d be surprised if the 1997 Polish legislature was aware of — let alone influenced by — a Time magazine cover story of “many years ago” which purportedly “called for white genocide”.
In any event, no such article showed up for me in the first several, results pages of my Google search. Can you give us a link to it?
January 17, 2012, 8:40 pmMatt P says:
JoeJP — the point I was trying to make is that what the singer said doesn’t rise to the level of insult as properly understood and therefore even under the Polish laws should have been ignored. The judge did have to make the judgement call that the statement was an insult (unless there is a big book-o-insults out there that he consulted) and in doing so needlessly elevated an innocuous statement into a meaningful one.
Mostly I was just making a joke though, sorry if you were insulted.
January 17, 2012, 8:52 pmRicardo says:
In fact, Prof. Volokh has cited numerous such cases in the past few years if you care to look.
January 17, 2012, 9:26 pmAsher says:
@ CockleCove
I’m not drawing a linear line of influence from TIME magazine to any actions of any particular government. There is a not insubstantial portion of the post-national left that is pretty explicit about calling for genocide of white people. Yes, they couch it in terms of ending “whiteness”, but it ends up being the same thing. Policies criminalizing speech protesting immigration is just an aspect of this post-national leftism.
Monday, the New York Times ran a column by Lee Siegel, indirectly, calling for the genocide of white people. Siegel mockingly derided all the kinds of things to which average, middle-class white people aspire. Siegel, and many other leftists, want to use government force to render a social environment that makes it impossible for people like me to engage in the cultural norms, tradition and ways of life that my ancestors have passed over the course of many generations.
For people to thrive and flourish they require an identity, who they are. They need fellowship, people who share a general sense of life and perspective of the world.
Lee Siegel wants to make impossible for me, as a white person, to find such a place in this world. Lee Siegel wants genocide against whites.
The New York Times printed his column.
January 17, 2012, 9:58 pmJohn Herbison says:
Is this the column that “indirectly, call[s] for the genocide of white people[?]“:
http://campaignstops.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/01/14/whats-race-got-to-do-with-it/?scp=1&sq=Lee%20Siegel&st=cse
Yeah, right. Hyperbole, thy name is Asher.
January 17, 2012, 11:22 pmbillo says:
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2011/04/uk-man-faces-sentencing-for-burning-quran.html
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-cumbria-13119241
You’re welcome
January 17, 2012, 11:41 pmAsher says:
@ John Herbison
Yep, that’s the column. Yep, it’s and indirect call for genocide.
January 17, 2012, 11:46 pmFub says:
Yabbut nobody believes pop music.
January 17, 2012, 11:51 pmAlan K. Henderson says:
I take it that Left Behind, The Da Vinci Code and His Dark Materials are banned in Poland.
January 18, 2012, 12:27 amMalvolio says:
I don’t know about genocide, but man, that is one shitty article. It’s all equivocation: first, Siegel expands the definition of “white” to mean “things Republicans like”, and then, when he’s wrapped that up, he turns around and argues that since Republicans prefer “white” things, they must be racist.
I’m told the New York Times was once a good paper.
January 18, 2012, 12:34 amClark says:
If you think it’s bad now, you should read the special copy that us liberals read when we pour our special invisible ink display potion that us libs get with our copy of the NYT.
January 18, 2012, 1:00 amKatja says:
In this case, the more likely reason is that Poland (like Ireland) is a very Catholic country, with around 90% (give or take) of citizens being Catholics. Accordingly, laws, and even parts of the constitution, tend to have a Christian/Catholic aspect. See, e.g., article 25 of the Polish constitution.
This is a very different situation from, say, laicist France (or the middle-of-the road Germany).
January 18, 2012, 1:01 amBart says:
You obviously don’t have teenagers.
January 18, 2012, 2:48 amMatt says:
O Holy Canadian
January 18, 2012, 10:56 amBeiber Be Thy Name….
Christopher Taylor says:
Well, true, in the distant past it happened, but I’m referring to the recent “religious defamation” laws, which are almost exclusively used to protect Islam.
I’m sure many things have happened that I’m unaware of in very recent history, that’s why I used the words “that I’m aware of” in plain English.
January 18, 2012, 2:25 pmSykes Five says:
. . . as far as you’re aware.
January 18, 2012, 3:53 pmTJ says:
Unrestrained speech is a sacrament of my religion.
My religious views are insulted whenever freedom of speech is restricted.
January 18, 2012, 5:25 pmHarryEagar says:
Christopher Taylor needs to become acquainted with the work of the Becket Fund for Religious Liberty.
January 18, 2012, 8:35 pmMichael Ejercito says:
Is there any evidence?
People are emigrating from Poland to wealthier nations in western Europe and North America.
Plenty of Chinese shipped themselves to Malaysia, Indonesia, Brazil, Jamaica, etc.
They seem reasonable if the purpose is to stifle criticism of the government.
Do you have any quotes? How much influence do they have?
I wonder when it stopped being a good paper.
January 18, 2012, 9:32 pmKanageloa says:
What a horrible bigoted law. Another anti-freedom nail driven in the coffin of free people around the world. I get a slight shiver of fear realizing that we are headed for a world government on the order of “Big Brother.” Tell me I’m wrong.
January 18, 2012, 9:41 pmMichael Ejercito says:
Poland does not have a longtime tradition of freedom of speech.
January 19, 2012, 12:59 pmSteverino says:
“Representative government” is more and more an oxymoron. I doubt the people of Poland thought they were voting for this.
We hardly have room to criticize. Sending a rep to Congress is a roll of the dice. They make all sorts of promises, but you just never know what they’re going to do. It’s kind of like letting your kid go on what you were told was a chaperoned school-sponsored field trip, and then a few months down the road you find out she’s starring in a new “Girls Gone Wild” video.”
January 20, 2012, 1:15 pmSteverino says:
“Representative government” is more and more an oxymoron. I doubt the people of Poland thought they were voting for this.
We hardly have room to criticize. Sending a rep to Congress is a roll of the dice. They make all sorts of promises, but you just never know what they’re going to do. It’s kind of like letting your kid go on what you were told was a chaperoned school-sponsored field trip, and then a few months down the road you find out she’s starring in a new “Girls Gone Wild” video.”
January 20, 2012, 1:35 pmSteverino says:
“Representative government” is more and more an oxymoron. I doubt the people of Poland thought they were voting for this.
We hardly have room to criticize. Sending a rep to Congress is a roll of the dice. They make all sorts of promises, but you just never know what they’re going to do. It’s kind of like letting your kid go on what you were told was a chaperoned school-sponsored field trip, and then a few months down the road you find out she’s starring in a new “Girls Gone Wild” video.”
January 20, 2012, 1:38 pmSteverino says:
Sorry for the multiple posts. The “Database error” messages I kept getting when I tried to submit it, combined with the fact that when I refreshed my screen my comment didn’t appear, hoodwinked me into thinking some sort of electronic gremlin was at work.
It still may be; I would have deleted at least on of the prior posts but I never was given the option to edit/delete.
January 20, 2012, 1:54 pma3203024 says:
I’ve said that least 3203024 times. The problem this like that is they are just too compilcated for the average bird, if you know what I mean
January 31, 2012, 1:52 pmEuropean roundup says:
[...] conviction in Europe for insulting religion” [Volokh; Polish pop star] Campus secularists’ speech under fire in the U.K. as “Jesus and [...]
February 2, 2012, 12:07 am