A Savage blow to free speech

The ban on US shock jock Michael Savage’s entry into the UK is being seen by at least one commentator as a direct result of the UN’s decision to pass its silly anti-defamation-of-religion resolution.

I would say it is also much to do with give-us-your-votes-at-any-price politicians who are so afraid to say boo to Islam and its followers, both for the reason referred to in my rather long adjectival phrase and out of a woolly sense of political correctness.

Charles McVety, writing in Canada Free Press, says Savage was “the first American to be penalized for criticizing Islam when British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith banned Mr Savage from entering Britain”.

Given this country’s kowtowing to the Dark Ages religion, it’s hardly surprising. I think there are one or two other things on the list of reasons why the UK government’s hired gag, Jacqui Smith, is afraid of allowing Savage into the country, but criticism of Islam is probably the most prominent of them.

We can’t criticise the Religion of Peace™, now, can we?

“Today it is Michael Savage, tomorrow it will be you and me,” says McVety. He goes on:

In March 2009, the United Nations Human Rights Council passed Resolution A/HRC/10/L calling for the “creation of laws in member states to prevent criticism of religions”.

The UN’s anti-blasphemy resolution was written by Pakistan and presented by the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC). The UN Council, with a vote of 23 countries supporting the measure, 11 opposed and 13 that abstained, passed it in March, 2009.

He quotes Smith as saying to the media, “[Mr Savage is] someone who has fallen into the category of fomenting hatred, of such extreme views and expressing them in such a way that it is actually likely to cause inter-community tension or even violence if that person were allowed into the country.”

And we all know where the violence, or threats of it, would come from. And it wouldn’t be from Mr Savage. We have seen evidence of it on our streets before, as we see in our picture after the Danish cartoons fiasco.

McVety goes on:

The irony is that this UN resolution directly contradicts the UN Declaration of Human Rights Article 19 that states: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.” All free societies are based on fundamental freedom of speech, thought and expression.

Case made, Mr McVety. Admirably.