Up to recently, news coverage in the 2020’s has been overwhelmingly dominated by the COVID-19 pandemic and the many considerations, concerns and controversies it has led to. Not least of these has been recurring concerns over the nature of public discourse about COVID-19, mRNA vaccines, the roles of big pharmaceutical companies, media corporations, government, churches and community organizations. One hopes that the world is emerging from active concern over the uncertainties of a global pandemic.

But our experience so far in these 2020’s out to make one think about the nature of the freedom of expression and about the various kinds of laws designed to curtail it. And it makes us think….so what is the state of blasphemy these days?

Well, as always, the Pew Research Center, has some information. A recent headline on the Pew website states that 40% of countries wordwide still have a blasphemy law on the books. That’s 79 countries. 22 countries have a law against apostasy.

As the infographic implies, most of the countries where this is a fact are in Africa and the Middle-East. With that, there’s more than a billion people on the planet for whom blasphemy, in its more original speaking-against-god(s)-and-religious-authoritarians context, is still a clear and present restriction of their fundamental human right to the freedom of expression.

Do a modest internet search at any given time, and you’ll still read such headlines as:

• Man accused of blasphemy stoned to death by mob in Pakistan
• Police foil mob attempt to lynch blasphemy suspect
• 85 held for lynching man for blasphemy in Pakistan’s Punjab
• Mob attacks Shia scholar over blasphemy allegations in Punjab
• Nigeria: Blasphemy – Kano Musician Asks Court to Quash Retrial Order, Hearing Holds Today
• Sharia court orders recall of Niger Republic-based witness in blasphemy trial
• Blasphemy convictions divide Nigeria as child is given 10 years
• Nigeria Singer Sentenced to Death in North for Blasphemy
• A Secular Blasphemy Trial: A Christian Finnish member of Parliament is prosecuted for “hate speech”

A list of headlines (and the situations they describe) is not, unfortunately, exhaustive, authoritative and final. There’s certainly more going on in the world of “Don’t Say it….or else” than this. But with all the pandemic distractions in mainstream media, maybe the fact that some ideologues don’t intend to tolerate ideas they don’t agree with has been escaping our collective notice? Maybe.

Maybe it’s time to catch up on some reading.

Citations, References And Other Reading

1. Featured Photo Courtesy of: https://end-blasphemy-laws.org/

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Citations, References And Other Reading

1. Featured Photo Courtesy of: https://en.unesco.org/news/toolkit-judges-freedom-expression
2. https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2022/01/25/four-in-ten-countries-and-territories-worldwide-had-blasphemy-laws-in-2019-2/

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The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.

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The views, opinions and analyses expressed in the articles on Humanist Freedoms are those of the contributor(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views or opinions of the publishers.