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> They have a law criminalizing offending religious feelings.

Happens in the first world too! 2018: "In Europe, Speech Is an Alienable Right: [the European Court of Human Rights] upheld an Austrian woman’s conviction for disparaging the Prophet Muhammad."

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2018/10/its-not-fr...

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I know it does. It’s a matter of degree. How bad does the threat to free expression have to be before a society is not a functional democracy? It’s a judgement call.

Although I know what you meant by 1st world (e.g. Western Europe / N. America), I found it funny because technically Austria isn’t in the first world and never has been. Since it never aligned itself with the US, Austria was considered a 3rd world country just like Ireland, Finland, Sweden, Hungry and Mexico.

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

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