The Tyranny of Silence - Why Liberty

“You have many rights in a democracy: the right to free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, and so on and so forth but the only right you should not have in a democracy is a right not to be offended.” Flemming Rose is a Danish journalist, author and cultural editor at the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten. He is author of the book "Tyranny of Silence." Source: catoinstitutevideo YouTube channel.

Transcript:

The starting point of the Danish cartoon crisis was a debate in Denmark about a children's book on the life of the prophet Muhammad. The writer went public in the middle of September of 2005, saying that he had written this book, but he had problems finding an illustrator. And the one who finally said yes, insisted on anonymity, which is a form of self censorship. You do not want to appear under your own name out of fear for what might happen to you.

In response, 12 editorial cartoons depicting the prophet Muhammad were published by the Danish newspaper Jyllands-posten on September 30, 2005.

Flemming Rose is the cultural editor at Jyllands-posten and has been called principally responsible for the publication of the cartoons.

That's the reason why we decided to publish. And we did not anticipate and expect that four months later this would turn into a global crisis about free speech and about the limits of free speech. And during that crisis about 200 people were killed. The vast majority in Nigeria in Africa, but also in other parts of the Muslim world.

Many newspapers that covered the controversy and chose to reprint the cartoons were closed. At others, editors were dismissed.

Free speech is being challenged by two fundamental processes that are a fact of life in a globalized world. The one thing is globalization. The fact that people move across borders in numbers never seen before in the history of mankind, and it makes every society more diverse in terms of culture, ethnicity, and religion. The other factor has to do with communications technology and the Internet. That everything in fact is published everywhere, when it's being published.

A lot of people may be offended by what their co-citizens a re saying. And there are basically two ways to solve this challenge. One way is to say, if you respect my taboo, I respect yours. If you do not criticize my religion, I will not criticize your religion. If you do not criticize my ideology, I will not criticize your ideology. I believe that that will lead to a tyranny of silence.

The other way to go is to ask ourselves what are the minimal limitations we need on speech in order to be able to live together in peace and enjoy that fundamental right. And I believe that the only limitation we need on speech is incitement to violence. We should not be allowed to call for the killing of other people. But the price we have to pay for living in a democracy is that from time to time people may say something that we find offensive. You have many rights in a democracy: the right to free speech, freedom of religion, freedom of assembly, and so on and so forth but the only right you should not have in a democracy is a right not to be offended.

The newspaper later published a statement, apoligizing for offending Muslims. Nonetheless the paper asserted that it had a right to print the cartoons. To this day, Flemming Rose and the 12 illustrators that contributed to the cartoons receive death threats for deprecating the prophet Muhammad.