Brickbat: Finished Off

Prosecutors have charged Finnish parliament member Paivi Rasanen with three counts of hate speech for remarks she made about homosexuality. The government is citing a tweet she made questioning why the Finnish Lutheran Church was officially supporting Finland's Pride week. The tweet included an image of Bible verses condemning homosexual acts. Also considered evidence: a 2004 pamphlet published by her church outlining the traditional Christian view on sexuality, and a radio interview. Rasanen faces prison time if convicted, but the prosecution has indicated it will ask for a fine.

Comments

[m4019597]

Before anyone jokes, they have an article 12 of their constitution which guarantees free speech. It was ignored to persecute her.

Here she is explaining herself. This case has dragged out a while.

https://www.helsinkitimes.fi/columns/columns/mp-talk/18842-the-value-of-free-speech.html

[Kevin Smith]

"Hate speech is not free speech" or something like that

[m4019597]

Fist, at least you’re consistent.

I found this Joe Biden quip you made in 2015, related to another Finnish brickbat.

https://reason.com/2015/10/26/pizza-pizza/?comments=true#comment-5671177

[Jerryskids]

Good thing there are no Muslims in Finland - those people would have a shit fit if they found out what Muslims think of the gays.

[Idaho Bob]

Oh, c'mon, these prosecutions only apply to right leaning whiteys.

No different than the US.

[Chumby]

Is Finland even allowed to publish the Bible anymore?

[Utkonos]

As long as they met the Finnish Line for publication. It involves a Lat of work. Hell, sinki-nation of efforts!

[Chumby]

Paivi used to work as one of the talent at a Helsinki gentlemen’s club. It was called Lapland.

[Utkonos]

Plenty of grass in Lapland….to stay aroused stay E-STONE-iad!

[Jerry B.]

Seriously, Reason. Quit giving the Democrats ideas.

[Roberta]

Is there a way the prosecution has of wanking this to say, yes, you have the right to believe these things in your religion (the religion most people in the country share), and you have the right to bring out publicly all these facts about your church and Bible, but if you consider the audience you had for these things, you should've taken it into account and presented it in a way that wouldn't insult any/many of them?

[Roberta]

Like maybe a line of jurisprudence akin to the one at the federal level in the USA to distinguish unprotected obscenity from other speech? For instance, to be obscene it has to appeal primarily to prurient interest, while the same exact content presented another way might not appeal primarily to prurient interest. So maybe Finnish jurisprudence could come up with similar criteria of "hate speech" that would say that in its totality it has to appeal primarily to hateful interest, while in some other setting the same statements about the Bible or religion would not appeal primarily to hateful interest.

[Agammamon]

Obscenity law is a dead letter in the US. Free speech is the only are where the courts are consistently good about protecting rights.

And there is no right to not be offended.

[Diane Reynolds (Paul.)]

I'm not convinced anything is a "dead letter" at this point. It may be well buttressed at this moment... but moments change into new moments.

"If you'd have said in any intellectual circle in the 1990s that Western European countries would seriously be debating blasphemy laws, you'd have been laughed out of the room..." -- Douglas Murray.

[Earth-based Human Skeptic]

No right to not be offended? No right to live free of emotional, intellectual, or physical challenges?

Then why even bother with progressive politics?

[Quo Usque Tandem]

Kind of the whole point, no?

[Roberta]

Apparently in Finland there is. Since it seems they don't want to give up either the idea that their speech is free, especially when it comes to such a widespread religion, or that you shouldn't be allowed to make people feel bad in certain ways by talking about them, how do you think they'll walk that line?

[Roberta]

I think they'll probably do it by adopting a mandatory disclaimer. Something like, "The following is only my religious belief, and is not meant to apply or refer to any living person." Something that effectively says religious beliefs are real but not true, sincere but not applicable, heartfelt but not serious. Because, whether we say so or not, that's effectively the compromise-paradox the Western world has adopted. Religion exists in its own world that is 100% believed but has no intersection with the world of fact.

[m4019597]

Disclaimers don’t apply for illegal conduct.

[Roberta]

No, I think the proper disclaimer will make it legal conduct. It's clear they need something like that to maintain the cognitive dissonance of having both free speech and hate speech simultaneously.

[Bubba Jones]

The most interesting thing is that she's just wrong.

The Old Testament law simply isn't relevant to gentiles.

Paul had some serious hangups about sex, but it was largely in the context where homosexuality was 1) Greek exploitation and/or 2) temple prostitution.

[Chumby]

Thou shall not cross thy neighbor’s sword.

[MatthewSlyfield]

Thou shall not cross the streams in the nation of Uri

[Malvolio]

I really don’t think one person gets to tell another person that the other person is doing her own religion “wrong”.

Even if you could, if she is practicing it the way 95% of her co-religionists have been practicing it over the last 2000 years, your claim that your conflicting interpretation of her scripture is superior seems laughably implausible.