IN 2011 Charlie Hebdo, a French satirical newspaper, was firebombed. Its editor, Stéphane Charbonnier, was asked if he could understand that moderate Muslims might have been offended by its cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad. “Of course!” he replied. “Myself, when I pass by a mosque, a church or a synagogue, and I hear the idiocies that are spoken in them, I am shocked.” Charlie Hebdo kept publishing such images. On January 7th Mr Charbonnier and 11 others were murdered by radical Islamists for their “offence”. The paper’s actions were a sign of defiance. But they also reflect France’s free-speech law, which protects commentary on religion, even when it insults or mocks.
The reason lies in French history. Blasphemy laws carried the death penalty before the 1789 revolution, but were scrapped in 1881 as part of a bloody struggle against the Catholic church. Such latitude is not granted to incitement to racial or religious hatred, which was made a crime in 1972, partly as a response to a rise in attacks on Algerians. Holocaust denial was outlawed in 1990, and “apology for terrorism” last year. There is a “fundamental difference”, declared the French prime minister, Manuel Valls, in a speech to parliament on January 13th, between the “freedom of impertinence” and “anti-Semitism, racism, apology for terrorism, Holocaust denial”.
Every country limits free speech. Some do so only to prevent immediate harms, such as libel, violence or child pornography; others ban “hate speech” (offensive utterances against groups such as gay people or racial minorities) or blasphemy. In the wake of the Paris attacks, these differing approaches are colliding—both with each other and with free speech, which is in many places at best a wavering ideal.
Even in France, not all agree with the distinction drawn between “impertinence” and racism, Holocaust denial and the like. A poll published a week after the Charlie Hebdo attacks found that two-fifths felt that, since images of the Prophet offended Muslims, they should not be published. And some see double standards. In the banlieues, or outer-city estates, there were around 200 reported incidents of disruption in schools, mostly during a nationwide minute of silence on January 8th to honour the victims. How could a newspaper mock Islam with impunity, some Muslim pupils asked, but Dieudonné M’bala M’bala, a comedian with past links to Jean-Marie Le Pen of the far-right National Front, be arrested for apparently sympathising with the killers on Facebook? Along with dozens of others who commented on the attacks, mostly on social media, he has been charged with apology for terrorism. He faces up to seven years in jail.
Elsewhere in Europe, laws against hate speech can backfire by making free-speech martyrs out of provocateurs. In a Dutch parliamentary debate on January 14th on the Paris attacks, Geert Wilders, a populist politician, thundered that Islam must be eradicated from the Netherlands: “In every country where Islam is strong, it comes at the cost of freedom.” For a decade he has been calling for bans on the burqa and the Koran, and an end to immigration by Muslims. Such a platform would seem at odds with his claims to support liberty and free speech. But he says Islam is a totalitarian ideology rather than a religion, and likens the Koran to Hitler’s “Mein Kampf”, which is banned in the Netherlands.
Mr Wilders has already been acquitted of charges of fomenting discrimination in 2011. The court ruled that criticism of religion, especially by politicians, should enjoy strong protection. But last year he prompted followers at a rally to shout that they wanted “fewer Moroccans”. Over 6,000 people filed complaints. Last month prosecutors decided to take up the case, saying the words demonised a population group rather than criticised a religion. Mr Wilders will no doubt exploit his new trial for free publicity, as he did his last.