Why doesn’t Pakistan reform its blasphemy laws? | Hacker News Reader

Why doesn’t Pakistan reform its blasphemy laws?

economist.com

54 pointsJumpCrisscross111 comments

There is little incentive for Pakistan to change the laws. People see it as morally correct. And it silences any criticism, particularly theological, about the religion or Muhammad PBUH. They infact have a larger incentive to remained hardline and aligned with the gulf states like Saudi. I have seen the transformation among Pakistanis over the last 20 years ("Allah hafiz", "Al bakistan"). Hopefully a Pakistani person can expand more.

Having grown up in a similarly oppressive environment, I absolutely cherish the freedom of speech in the US and I hope it is protected as the most sacred thing in this nation because a lot of places in the world don't have it. And when you don't have it, it is like being suffocated. Any criticism of the religion will quickly get you labeled as a kafir because you are trying to cover the "truth" (defined as Islam). You can never have a real conversation because first you will be called names and then, you will likely face violence. You cannot get together with others of similar mindsets openly because mobs will shut you down, start riots, etc.

For people who don't know, please read up on Salmaan Taseer. Interestingly, his son's article about getting a greencard was on the front page of HN 10 months ago:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12025996

The failure to consider the obvious answer, "because they like their blasphemy laws just fine", reminds me of the following from Mitchell Heisman:

"According to one variant of postmodern, liberal theory, all humans of all cultures are really Western liberals (with the possible exception of Western conservatives)."

Exactly, punishment is hold in high esteem when you believe yourself to be righteously demanding it, and no-one believes themselves more righteous than a religious person doing "god's will".

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience.

-- C. S. Lewis

Religious zealots certainly can justify extreme actions as being mandated or approved by a supreme being, but let's not kid ourselves: there are plenty of secular examples as well. Consider, for example, the millions of deaths that took place under anti-religious Communist regimes.

This certainly isn't to say one is more acceptable than the other; it isn't.

Any time ideology comes before living, breathing humans we have a problem.

Religion certainly seems to provoke this in some people. Political systems can do the same.

I guess I should be shocked that what should be a non-controversial statement has been downvoted heavily.

But this is HN. Feels before reals.

It is true that it is not that controversial and mostly true, the thing is that in most places there is much less repulsion from saying "Marx was wrong, communism doesn't work" than for saying "God is wrong, these divine laws are useless". So religion is a strong barricade against criticism, it uses fears no other ideology can use (fear of death/afterlife, fear of non-purpose), and yeah some people have made of communism or fascism and other ideologies even stronger barricades, but at the end of the day, the less ideologies (incl. religions) there are as possible barricades for demagogues to use the better we out to be.

Good work, you've managed to paint all religious persons under one brush.

Not really, I'm excluding all those who never punish others in the name of god's will.

There are many Muslim while paying Zakat also believe themselves to be acting in the name "God's Will". I disagree with you linking demanding punishment of others and acting in the name of God.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14171704

Righteously killing other's sons....?

Make the ad-hominem more subtle next time; anyway, that time it was a thread about coal pollution and jobs, it was meant as in leaving the town's offspring without jobs (not actually killing them).

I repealed your argument before the accusation of your own willingness to punish others in pursuit of your ideology merely highlight your own hypocrisy. There is no subtlety there.

EDIT: You changed the label of the group you demonise, "non-rational punishment executioners", from "religious persons doing God's will" to "non-rational punishment executioners", and renounced the poem you wrote while drunk. Now we're on the same page.

EDIT2: You changed Will -> Punishment. That's right it's an important difference.

No hypocrisy there, I would renounce to everything I have ever said shall someone prove me wrong in each one of them; which is something the non-rational punishment executioners we are talking about will never be able to do or claim.

And please don't play dumb, that was suppose to be a poem I wrote when I was a bit drunk, not a final law with no right to be criticized for which to kill those who disagree.

EDIT: No, you changed it, I always meant "religious persons doing God's punishment" like I said in the reply on your first comment.

> They infact have a larger incentive to remained hardline and aligned with the gulf states like Saudi.

You mean "aligned with Saudi". None of the other Gulf states are anywhere near as culturally backwards as KSA.

Oman? Qatar? UAE?

I lived in the UAE for quite some time and it's definitely much better than KSA; still, it has ways to go. I hear Qatar, Kuwait, and Oman are the same.

For expats and wealthy powerful locals, you just don't see the real dirt from those towers and tidy beaches.

We're talking about culture and religion as compared to KSA. Try to stick to the topic.

As a general rule and as someone who grew up extremely religious in Pakistan, I started making fun of mohammad at every opportunity I got but the sad reality is that he was not a very funny man and that was that.

The reason Pakistan won't reform its blasphemy laws is that a large portion of the population will strangle the politician that tries to. This country (more than just about anywhere else in the islamic world) needs education for next two to three generations. The lack of action on this front has resulted in the tumor of religious bigotry and extremism to become a full fledged cancer that is now airborne. I don't support killing this patient, but forced quarantine and non-stop medication for next generation or two is the only way to save it and everyone else.

On the optimist side of things, the April 14th lynching of Mishal Khan at Abdul Wali Khan University has started a debate in the country about reforming these laws. There's been wide-spread support for Mishal among political leaders and common people. Supporting a blasphemy-accused person was a death sentence previously (see Salman Taseer).

It's also getting ridiculous lately with everyone being accused of blasphemy left and right, like even the Prime Minister lol - and the accusers are too stupid to realize that "blasphemy" is starting to lose all meaning. It's also got people thinking about requiring evidence for the purported "blasphemy". Currently you only need a clerk accusing you, without any evidence or witness and get ready to be lynched by a mob.

Source: Atheist/ex-Muslim living in Pakistan. Pretty open about it to all my Muslim relatives, although they probably keep it cool only because I'm more successful than them and they look up to me :P.

Can you elaborate a bit more on being an atheist in Pakistan? i had conducted a little bit of research a few years ago, but was unable to find any organizations that were openly atheistic (the best I could find were curated but anonymous blogs).

Technically which would be possible and to what degree: 1) being an atheist, 2) Informing immediate family and friends, 3) Informing the local/town community, 4) Widely publishing atheism via media.

Thanks

For the same reason why the US doesn't relent on its socially destructive minimum sentencing requirements. There is no political capital in being soft on <insert despised minority group here>.

To put that in even more simple terms - because they like their awful laws, thank you very much.

Here's some perspective from a Pakistani agnostic who supports blasphemy laws.

This article is an example of how people in the West really don't get how religious countries in the third world work. Because rule of law is absolute in Western countries, articles like this make it sound like the problem is the unjust law. That is absolutely false.

There are two major problems with blasphemy reform. The first problem is that the PEOPLE want blasphemy punished. There is a significant minority in Pakistan who is OK with a blasphemer being killed. It is not an unjust law imposed on people - the people WANT it. The second problem is that the rule of law in most third world countries is very weak. Which means that if people want something punished, and the law isn't there to punish it, they will take the law into their own hands. We saw this very recently when a huge mob lynched a university student who was accused of blasphemy. So... the people want blasphemy punished, and you cannot stop them from taking the law into their own hands. What do you do in this case?

Consider the options in front of a Pakistani politician who is personally against punishment for blasphemy. He can either revoke the law (at risk to his own life) and then watch as people form huge mobs who lynch people accused of blasphemy at random. He will be unable to control this because the police might empathize with the killers. OR he can impose blasphemy law, and then weaken implementation. When the blasphemy law is imposed, then people are discouraged from taking the law into their own hands. At the same time, he can weaken implementation to the point that no one Really gets punished for blasphemy (as in the case in Pakistan - the state does not execute people for blasphemy). With a blasphemy law, the religious nuts are appeased, and at the same time, with weak implementation, a semblance of freedom is maintained.

That means, the blasphemy law keeps the lid on the monster that is public opinion until it can be reformed. And that comes through education, where the Pakistani government is trying to make strides. (Unsuccessfully, I might add, since it is a poor country.) In any case, THAT is the logic behind blasphemy law - it prevents the country from descending into anarchy. It is easy to sit in a country with great rule of law to say that why are these people in third world countries making stupid laws, but the lawmakers in these countries aren't stupid. The obviously see that their people are backward, and there needs to be imperfect stopgap solutions until the country can implement better rule of law.

In the case of the university student who was lynched, did the crowd even try to report him to the police and provide their evidence, or did they just go ahead with the lynching?

Apparently they reported to the university administration which failed to take action and may even have tacitly accepted the decision of the mob (presumably because of fear of reprisal themselves). But the good thing is now the police can take action against the killers because they took the law into their hands.

The police (local, not university) were on the scene egging the crowd on, according to some reports from those university staff on the scene who weren't involved. The university security chief started it all with a threat to kill him at a staff meeting called to discuss his case.

You may want to read Arafat Mazhar's excellent series of articles in DAWN on how exactly 295C came to carry only the death penalty. This is now way beyond some trophy to dull the masses into compliance. (The article is technically incorrect, by the way, the option of life imprisonment which existed under Zia was removed in 1990 during Nawaz' first term, entirely democratically)

Did Pakistan have its blasphemy law in its current state since founding, or was it significantly broadened under Zia-ul-Haq?

I mean, these are some of the most hard-line extremists alive. Of course they aren't going to reform their blasphemy laws.

Pakistan is a backwards theocracy, which created the Taliban and has been attempting to spread their awful model of governance ever since. I imagine they wish to set an example.

This is absolutely false. Pakistan has a system of laws that is based on the British system - it is very obviously not a theocracy.

Pakistan created the Taliban out of political necessity, and the United States is to blame for it. When the USA and Russia fought a proxy war in Afghanistan, it left the country in tatters. Pakistan got millions of refugees (1/5 of the population of Afghanistan was living in Pakistan at one time). Think of how Americans start to hyperventilate even at the thought of accepting a few thousand refugees. Pakistan took in millions - and it had to stabilize Afghanistan to restore order and stop the flow. At that time, Pakistan supported the Taliban so that the mess that the United States and Russia made could be controlled. Blame the Cold War, not Pakistan.

> Pakistan has a system of laws that is based on the British system

It also has a different set of laws, added later, that is based on Sharia.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hudood_Ordinances

An addition to a system of constitutional law does not make a country a theocracy.

I didn't say that it does. But it seems to be an important addition to the claim that "Pakistan has a system of laws that is based on the British system". Hudood Ordinances are certainly not based on the British system. And they're a big part of the problem being discussed here.

Nevertheless, the question of whether any given act of blasphemy is automatically deserving of a hadd punishment is by no means an open and shut case.

I think for most westerners, the real WTF is the notion that any act of blasphemy can potentially deserve punishment at all.

As the child of an Pak expatriate, believe me I'd love to get there too. Unfortunately, you don't eat a cow like this all at once.

I didn't get an answer to my question in another thread; perhaps you could help with that? It is as follows:

Did Pakistan have its blasphemy law in its current state since founding, or was it significantly broadened under Zia-ul-Haq?

I'm genuinely curious about this, because if it's a later addition, then wouldn't several decades of Pakistan's existence without laws as stringent as they are today indicate that the society can actually handle this being dialed down quite a bit just fine?

295AB were put in the penal code by the British. 295C is due to Zia, and the current prime minister, during his first term in 1990-1, oversaw the removal of life imprisonment as an option leaving only the death penalty.

The hardliners' response to your last argument gets tied up in something like "the British took us away from true Sharia" or something along those lines. On talk shows you hear "This is a law from Quran and Sunnah, not a man-made law"

I'm not convinced the British system isn't a theocracy, at a very technical level anyway. The head of state is the head of the church after all. On a purely structural level it's almost a mirror of Iran.

Because they're devout Muslims who favour the mainstream interpretation of Islamic theology, which includes punishment for blasphemy and capital punishment for apostasy.

If these were American Scientologists torturing people for blasphemy and murdering people for leaving their cult, no-one would hesitate to point the finger at their religion as the problem.

I got curious about whether these were mainstream beliefs with muslims. Muslim culture is so varied as it's very large.

Here's a breakdown:

http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2017/02/27/muslims-and-...

The parent is correct in that most muslims, broken down by country, do support sharia law when surveyed.

Edited because I was wrong about numbers.

The only caveat to that I'd add is that the numbers are probably a bit inflated, given they're being often being polled in countries where apostasy is punishable by death. I'd be a mite careful how I answered polls on religious beliefs in those places.

What do you mean #1?

Christianity has a lot more adherents (numbers wise) than Islam.

My mistake - it's just the fastest growing and the #2 religion.

Well, yes and no. While Shariah is generally in line with your description, there are plenty of Muslim countries that have secular law - though they may still have blasphemy and/or apostasy laws on the books. And there are theoretically Christian countries with blasphemy laws, too[1]

1: http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/07/29/which-countr...

> Because they're devout Muslims who favour the mainstream interpretation of Islamic theology

I'm a Muslim and this is the first time I hear that this is the "mainstream" position. Do you have any reasonable sources for that claim?

The most mentioned study on this topic that I've seen is: http://www.pewforum.org/2013/04/30/the-worlds-muslims-religi...

Multiply the percentages out and it does not paint a favourable picture of the actual interpretation of Islam, as believed by most users.

It's odd that you're downvoted. It'd appear that most of the people in those countries would agree with your statement exactly. They are devout, and that is literally what they believe.

That's quite surprising actually. Given my own experience, I would have likely doubted these results had they not been published by Pew (or Gallup).

I was surprised, too. My gut feel is that most Muslim people I've known _would_ be surprised, because they don't espouse such beliefs themselves, and they're not common among Muslim communities in the West.

In what country do you live, and in which Muslim community do you practice? I would imagine that these views vary widely by culture, school, and region.

The Muslim countries I've lived in are Tunisia (origin country) and the UAE.

Why yes, I do:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law

... And more specifically:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Islam_and_blasphemy

Blasphemy is punishable in the vast majority of Islamic countries. Most Muslims worldwide support these laws, and most schools of Islamic jurisprudence support their position in Islamic law.

It's probably not true of most Muslims in Western countries however. I have a sneaking suspicion - but no way of proving it - that people who think this sort of thing is nuts are more likely to want to emigrate to countries without it.

Note that blasphemy is also punishable in many Western countries. This is driven by the same problem: religion. Usually Christianity.

The verse that entire Wikipedia page centers on is referring to a particular incident that occurred to the Prophet[1]. Furthermore, the verse is not referring to blasphemers in any way.

It's important to note that a large portion of verses in the Quran were revealed to the Prophet in response to a particular event that took place during his lifetime. Tafsir (exegesis) is the subfield of Islamic science that deals with figuring out the context of a particular verse.

[1] Explanation of that verse (5:33): http://www.altafsir.com/Tafasir.asp?tMadhNo=2&tTafsirNo=73&t...

It's also important to note that such interpretation is subjective, and there are different schools of thought within Islam, that ascribe different contexts (and, consequently, different scopes) to the verses.

Also, the mainstream consensus changes over time - there has been a fairly long period, for example, during which the Sword Verse was interpreted to imply that the Caliph does have the authority (and in some madhabs, the obligation) to wage offensive war against unbelievers:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_of_Islamic_scholars_on...

Yes. As with people arguing about the interpretation of other religious texts, though, the main issue is: what do the _majority_ of followers of the religion believe? Or, perhaps: do _enough_ followers of the religion believe the problematic interpretation?

Had Al-Ghazali been less successful in his reactionary unwinding of the Islamic world's enlightenment, we'd probably be having a very different conversation now.

Most Americans support a ban on flag-burning too.

It's unclear if that's still true or not. The most recent good data is a Gallup poll from 2006.[1] When asked if the constitution should be amended (the only way such a ban could exist), support was at 54%. Also, support was higher in the 90's. If trends have continued, supporters should be in the minority today.

Also, it's a bit rich to compare a nonexistent flag burning ban (which would punish with fines or jail) to Pakistan's very-much-existent blasphemy laws (which execute people).

1. http://www.gallup.com/poll/23524/public-support-constitution...

Unfortunately a lot of people figure that reading a few critical articles means they know more about something than its actual practitioners, which is why you're, bafflingly, being downvoted. As a Christian, I've had non-Christians actually get angry at me for not being a bigot, and as a feminist I've had non-feminists tell me that I'm "supposed to" hate myself and all men.

Some people get really uncomfortable when others don't fit into their tidy labels.

Most of us live in our own little bubbles of like-minded people, so I trust Pew polls far more than anecdotes.

I also trust polls more than my own experience. If someone cites Pew saying 30% of Americans are young-earth creationists[1], I'd never consider responding with, "I'm an American and I know a lot of Americans and none of them believe that." I'd simply verify the data and accept it.

1. http://www.pewforum.org/2013/12/30/publics-views-on-human-ev...

Reminds me of the (probably urban legend) story of a Hollywood celebrity remarking on Nixon's election: "But I don't know anyone who voted for Nixon!"

I don't care for blasphemy laws one bit, but "reform" is a bit of a loaded word in this context.

I am guessing it is because of vote banks. There might be a chance that a good percentage of the people don't want really want the law - but they are moderate/silent. At least, I hope so.

It is an Islamic country and blasphemy is indeed punishable by death in Islam.

Contrary to what people might think India too has blasphemy laws and people are regularly jailed even for academic work on religion (mostly Islam) or even private comments that insult the prophet. [http://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2016/07/29/which-countr...]

I looked up the history of India's blasphemy laws it is indeed a creation of British to outlaw criticism of Islam in India to maintain peace in their colony though now mostly used by Hindus. (Islamists simply hack people to death or put a bounty on people's head. They do not bother with courts).

http://koenraadelst.blogspot.com/2014/02/banning-wendy-donig...

> It is an Islamic country and blasphemy is indeed punishable by death in Islam.

By some Muslims. Islam is not a monolithic entity and many Muslims manage to get by just fine without throwing fits about blasphemy, just as most Christians don't play much attention to the Biblical rules about not wearing mixed fabrics or cutting your beard.

The biblical rules you site are from the pre-Christ laws. They were laws that needed to be followed to save man from the wrath of God. Christians believe that Jesus died and therefore took the punishment of their sins away, and all they need to do now is believe in him. So it's not the same at all. As far as I understand the laws of the Koran are very much the laws Muslims must follow.

Most Christians believe that some of the Old Testament rules still apply, such as the prohibition on homosexuality or adultery. To explain why other rules (like the various dietary restrictions, or need to circumcise) do not apply, a rather arbitrary line is drawn between "moral" and "ritual" commandments. This is the position of all Orthodox and Catholic churches (Catholics complicate it further by claiming that the "moral" Old Testament commandments are valid because they constitute "natural law", discoverable through reason alone).

Some Christians believe that none of the Old Testament applies, and only restrictions that can be derived entirely from the New Testament are still valid. This is fairly popular among the more liberal Protestant churches.

Some Christians believe that all laws apply, and would like to see a theocratic state that is actively enforcing all the Old Testament laws and punishments: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian_Reconstructionism

And these Christians in your last example are a significant problem (or any problem) where and to whom?

I'd like to introduce you to a two-bit politician called Ted Cruz.

I had the impression that belief wasn't sufficient for a Christian and they still have to avoid sin. E.g., a gay Christian is supposed to abstain from sex.

There is a ton of leeway in the New Testament writings to let people decide what it means. I particularly love the line "everything is permissible, but not every is beneficial". Paul's letters are more like "oh come on, do you really have to be so degenerate?" with no real teeth. Unless you curse the Spirit.

Jesus says he fulfills the law, and despite saying not a stroke of the old law should differ, that's a loophole to drive a truck through (on the Sabbath nonetheless).

Islam doesn't have the benefit of a second prophet coming along and saying "eh, it's all good".

Islam has any number of prophets actually, including Jesus. But the view in Islam appears to be that Muhammad trumps all the others because he's the only one whose message hasn't been corrupted.

I'm an Episcopalian Christian, and my church's priest recently married his long-time boyfriend, with the full support of the American Episcopal Church. I haven't asked him about his sex life, because that would be weird, but I have no reason to think it's anything but normal.

You really can't stereotype the beliefs of one group of Christians (or Muslims) based on another group's.

Edit: It's odd that I get upvoted for pointing out that many Christians are not bigots, and downvoted for saying the same thing about Muslims.

But you can. Just like you can stereotype folks from SF being against Trump or pro gay-rights. See the study linked elsewhere in the thread. The majority of Muslims believe things that aren't acceptable by current Western standards (like having Sharia be the law).

> But you can. Just like you can stereotype folks from SF being against Trump or pro gay-rights.

Yes, my mistake. You can stereotype all Muslims as terrorists, just like you can stereotype all Christians as homophobes, or all atheists as sanctimonious jerks, or all black people as watermelon-loving gangsters. It's just, y'know, stupid and bigoted.

No, that's a post-Biblical rationalization. There's nothing in the Bible that specifically rescinds, say, the clothing laws, and some Christians still take the time to rationalize it away specifically, e.g. here: http://www.cgg.org/index.cfm/fuseaction/Library.sr/CT/BQA/k/...

What people don't seem to get is that many, many theists do not choose to follow all the rules in their particular holy book. How many Christian churches now endorse gay marriage, for example? You may call this hypocrisy or, indeed, heresy if you like, but you need to understand that being a Muslim does not necessarily mean that a person, their family, or their religious community holds identical beliefs to Osama bin Laden. If you judge people based on stereotypes rather than words and actions, you will judge them incorrectly.

But Christianity does not have an equivalent of Sharia (Pakistan has Sharia courts) nor does it have much to say about statecraft in general. Saying "not all Muslims" or outlining oddities from other religions does not do justice to Islam's role as a geopolitical force.

Christian sharia is called 'the law' in much of the Western hemisphere, which is pretty much what 'sharia' means.

Americans (and others in the liberal democracies of the West) forget about things like 'blue laws' or attempts to prohibit gay-marriage, 'miscegenation' and other moral policing primarily because we have moved away from those practices. So while the current Christian version of sharia is somewhat limited to things like whether folks can buy beer or get their car fixed on a Sunday, it's still there exerting its influence.

I mean, swearing on a Bible? heh

Sure, but these are laws which were the result of shared beliefs of it's constituents. They were not laws because the religion says they should be laws.

Islamic laws are also from the shared beliefs of their constituents.

So if the beliefs change then islamic law can change? What makes it Islamic law then?

Religions change when the beliefs of people in religious communities change. Christianity, including both beliefs and ecclesiastical legal systems (which Christianity has, and which have historically been enforced with State power, or State-like power by the Church.)

Consider, in the Roman Catholic Church, the modern Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, as compared to its early 20th Century predecessor, the Congregation for the Holy Office, and it's predecessor, the Supreme Sacred Congregation for the Universal Inquisition, both in terms of the body of law applied, the beliefs underlying that body of law, and the practical methods applied and the persons subjected to the jurisdiction of the Congregation.

> So if the beliefs change then islamic law can change?

Yes, of course. Why wouldn't it?

I feel like people don't understand how religion works in practice. A major religion is never a changeless monolith. Some practitioners will always insist that their way is the unchanging and eternal word of God, but even with a 2000-year-old book at hand, religion is a human institution and has always changed to fit the needs of the people practicing it. As a liberal Episcopalian, my religious practice couldn't be more different than a fundamentalist Baptist's, and both would be unrecognizable to a Catholic from a few centuries back.

> Sure, but these are laws which were the result of shared beliefs of it's constituents.

...What do you think Islamic laws are?

The shared belief rose from them being laws first, and people growing up with those laws as normal.

Church in India uses its influence to pass "Bible compliant" laws.

Christians in India caused a riot because government proposed reservation for women. (Local christian community believes women should remain at home).

> But Christianity does not have an equivalent of Sharia

Christianity absolutely has, in each of it's iterations, bodies of behavioral norms which believers seek to have instituted by the State, or institute by themselves (sometimes through violence) independent of the State.

> (Pakistan has Sharia courts)

The UK, for example, doesn't need the Christian equivalent (ecclesiastical courts, which, also, the established Church has) for blasphemy, because blasphemy against Chritianity has, for over 400 years, been cognizable as an offense against the common law, so the regular courts deal with that. [0]

> nor does it have much to say about statecraft in general.

Christianity has quite a lot to say about statecraft. Thanks to the success of European colonialism, much of what powerful branches of Christianity has said about it have been influential in shaping international law, both customary and treaty.

[0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blasphemy_law_in_the_United_...

There are key differences though and for what it's worth I would feel the same about a medieval-era Catholic monarchy as I do about an Islamic state. Islam has many unique concepts -- Sharia, jihad, the Calpihate -- that make it fundamentally difficult to compare to most other world religions. Mohammad was a prophet first, but he was also a conqueror and a statesman.

"Sharia" is just religious law. It is not particularly a unique feature to Islam, though religious law and religious courts have declined in the West over the last few centuries and now mostly are confined to dealing with members of their own religion, and usually lack the backing of the State or State-like power (though that's not universally the case, and is more a regional diffference that correlates with religion than a religious difference.)

"Jihad" has a close parallel in "Crusade", in both the violent and non-violent senses each term has within their respective religious communities.

I'll give you caliphate as somewhat unique, and at least without a close parallel in mainstream modern Christianity.

Speaking as a Christian, people will jump through all kinds of hoops to exempt Christians from the horrible bits of the Bible while insisting that all Muslims are bound by the horrible bits of the Koran.

Papacy?

Not really the same thing, which is kind of the central point behind the Holy Roman Empire.

"Give unto Ceasar what is Ceasar's, unto God what is God's". That kinda stuff sort of opens the way for accepting non religious laws.

You should absolutely acknowledge and resist the efforts of fundamentalists and bigots of every stripe. Islamic fundamentalism is dangerous and toxic and kills people. What bugs me is how many people refuse to admit any difference between Islamic fundamentalists and all Muslims. This is not a petty nitpick in an America where violent attacks against Muslims are skyrocketing. https://www.nytimes.com/2016/11/15/us/politics/fbi-hate-crim...

Pakistan implements Islamic law which includes a death penalty for blasphemy. Nobody's talking about Muslims in America.

The post that I was replying to in the first place said "blasphemy is indeed punishable by death in Islam," full stop. All I'm trying to do is make it clear that no major religion is a unified monolith. We both know that the crimes of terrorists and fundamentalists are used to condemn peaceful Muslims in the US and Europe.

But even in the US, religious tribunals exist among different religious groups and sometimes cross the line between arbritraion and the law.

They are mostly ignored because well organized religious sects are politically powerful.

You are more than welcome to come to India and live in mostly Muslim regions such as Kashmir or West Bengal! :)

Living in muslim majority or heck even places where there are 20% muslims is absolutely hell. You will have to hear ajaan on a large loudspeaker all day, you will have to see kids hacking lambs in the residential areas during Eid and heck if you have to wear or celebrate Pagan festivals around the place of worship.

Liberalism is cool to preach while sitting in a Starbucks in Silicon Valley but incredibly hard to find it in nooks of certain parts of the world.

The same reason any of the biggest countries with sharia law are always surrounded by human rights violations (Pakistan, Egypt, Iran, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, etc); because the justice system became a tool to protect ideas from citizens instead of aiming for the well-being of all its citizens (as in, prioritizing coexistence).

Do you have evidence those citizens desire a happy coexistence and repeal of these laws? The survey linked elsewhere in this thread claims the opposite.

Of course that doesn't mean the top people aren't "abusing" the laws to get more control.

Peaceful coexistence is one of those things where its desirability to society goes beyond personal preference. Not saying that there is no cost that is too high to pay for coexistence. However, in general "but they don't want to coexist" is a sign to look for ways in which that want itself might be fostered and differences reconciled, not an argument to let people hate each other to their heart's content. At least if you consider human life valuable, or, in modern nuclear-capable times, prefer the survival of the species to its potential extinction.

That said, I would still trust someone trying to reform that from within to be more likely to get it right, rather than people who have never lived in that society, and comment on it one way or the other in a programming forum (such as, particularly, myself).

In not a single part of my statement I'm saying they desire coexistence, I'm just saying the reasons they don't have it; anyway, if governments only followed everyone's desires no-one would pay taxes.

> anyway, if governments only followed everyone's desires no-one would pay taxes

Maybe in America? Not so in other countries.

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