Church-state relations in European human rights law

Anyone want to broach this long article and tell me what it says? I'll await your reports in the morning.

Salman Rushdie: "We're losing the battle for freedom of speech"

Rushdie is on the money here. I can actually understand why Germany and Austria (and maybe some other countries like Poland) would ban holocaust denial - different jurisdictions do have different concerns arising from different historical experiences. At least for a period, you could argue, the Holocaust should not be denied within the borders of the countries most associated with it.

But that's open to debate. The overall message is that freedom of speech is far too precious to be trumped by hurt feelings.

Talk at Embiggen Books

My recent talk at Emiggen Books, up at Noosaville on the Sunshine Coast, is now available here. (Notice the total lack of Powerpoint slides ... my new policy is to do without them where possible.)

Ophelia's update on CFI

Over at Butterflies and Wheels, Ophelia Benson updates us on the murky situation at the Center for Inquiry. The situation is, well, murky.

But CFI still deserves our support, perhaps more than ever. It's undergoing a transition, and I'd like to see what comes out of it. I'd certainly like the new management to have a fair chance to make their vision of it work.

I have a long comment on Ophelia's thread, which you can read for yourself.

Be careful what you tweet

Over at Jack of Kent's blog you can follow the latest outrage against freedom of speech in the UK, where Mr Paul Chambers was convicted under section 127 of the Communications Act 2003. This provides, inter alia:

A person is guilty of an offence if he— .
(a)
sends by means of a public electronic communications network a message or other matter that is grossly offensive or of an indecent, obscene or menacing character; or
(b)
causes any such message or matter to be so sent.

This is a shockingly illiberal law, but the way it's been applied in this case is even more so. Chambers was convicted for sending a "menacing" message ... in the form of the following intemperate, ill-advised, but surely jocular tweet:

Crap! Robin Hood Airport is closed. You’ve got a week and a bit to get your shit together, otherwise I’m blowing the airport sky high!

The trial judge held that

I am therefore satisfied, so that I am sure, that the defendant sent the message via “Twitter” and it was of a menacing nature in the context of the times in which we live. Furthermore I am satisfied the defendant was, at the very least, aware that this was of a menacing nature and I find him guilty of the offence.

The case is now being appealed. Hopefully this "disgraceful and illiberal judgment" (per Jack of Kent) will be overturned.

Abstracts for the forthcoming AAP conference

Some of these abstracts look very interesting. Have a look. My own paper keeps changing in my head from day to day. It will be quite a short paper in the end, but I have several thousand words floating around. I'll probably have to cut them all and largely start again. However, I'm sure it'll be a case of "just in time". By early July I want to know what I'm going to say so well that I can present it without even reading the paper. If that's not possible, I'll be aiming for a short paper that makes a really good script when read aloud (and then provokes debate). Either of those is a long way away at the moment.

Will posthumans be atheists?

A fascinating article on this subject by Philippe Verdoux over at IEET. Check it out!

Sample:

On the assumption that humans succeed in engendering a “species” of technologized posthumans, one might ask whether such advanced beings will be atheists or not. And furthermore, would it be a good thing for our technological progeny to be atheists?

In my view, there is good reason for thinking that posthumans will most likely, on the whole, be atheists. In addition, there is good reason for thinking that widespread apostasy would, on the whole, be desirable – that is, it would be beneficial for Earth-originating intelligent life, promoting overall post/human well-being.

You might like to give the Center for Inquiry some help

See here for the CFI's current dire financial situation, with a major funder evidently pulling out. I'd hate to see this wonderful organisation go under or have to cut back until it ceases to be effective. Maybe consider joining (as I did recently) or giving a small donation (which I will do)?

A few days off

I'll be back soon! I've been working quite hard the last few days and am now feeling a li'l bit run down (it doesn't help that Felix the cat has been unhappy after having to have an operation, and has had to be kept inside ... and as a result is keeping us awake a lot of the time).

Okay, today I need a restful day. Will leave y'all to talk among yourselves.

Teenage births and abortions - responsibility is better than moralism

Citing a new study in The Canadian Journal of Human Sexuality, The Globe and Mail reports that Canada experienced a significant drop (36.9 per cent) in teenage births and abortions between 1996 and 2006. This is attributed to better access to contraception, better sex education, and changing social norms, but not to a decline in actual sex among teenagers. Rather, Canadian teenagers are now more likely to use condoms and/or the contraceptive pill than was the case in the mid-1990s.

I don't actually see anything terribly wrong - I mean morally wrong - with having a child when you're very young or with having an abortion. In neither case are you hurting someone else (leaving aside the very brief pain suffered by a fetus if the abortion is late enough in the pregnancy). However, having a child when you're still a teenager is highly imprudent (in modern societies where it takes so long to be qualified for most careers), and having an abortion is traumatic. It's better for teenage girls not to be confronted with the choice of either a career-stopping event or an abortion, so it's preferable if they are able to have active sex lives without getting pregnant. But for adults to insist that teenagers abstain from sex is unrealistic and in any event an outrageous demand - by what right do we tell young people who are biologically ready, and psychologically eager, for the extraordinary joys and pleasures of sex not to seek them? Why are we entitled to impose this burden on younger people with less power? (It's not as if the teenagers set things up so that early motherhood is such a career-stopper. Maybe we could do something about that.) When adults talk that way, demanding abstinence, it's pompous bullshit ... and it's no wonder that many teenagers regard it as such.

It's better and smarter if, as a society, we teach young people to have sex in ways that avoid pregnancy ... and to provide emotional and other support for those teenage girls who do nonetheless get pregnant. Moral condemnation and harsh treatment get us nowhere.

So, public policy should look kindly on teenage sex while encouraging teenagers to use the contraceptive pill, condoms, oral sex or mutual masturbation (as alternatives to vaginal sex), and whatever other practices are likely to make teenagers' sexual conduct safer and less likely to lead to pregnancy. In addition, public policy should make it easy for teenage girls to get tested for pregnancy and to obtain abortions if they so desire. We shouldn't be too solicitous of the "rights" of moralistic parents who make life hell for their children.

Above all, we should be frank about what we ask of teenagers, and should avoid loading them with moral guilt about behaviour that is very natural to them.

It seems that many people leap from the (perfectly plausible) idea that we'd like, as a society, to reduce teenage pregnancies to the (dangerous) idea that teenage sex is morally wrong. That's precisely the wrong approach. The more successful approach is to give teenagers reliable information and encourage them to think about it and use it responsibly. It seems fairly clear that unwanted outcomes (basically, teenage pregnancies) are lower in countries that take the latter path. As suggested in the article, it's actually better for societies to take a more relaxed, less moralistic, attitude to teenage sex. Paradoxical perhaps, but true.

E.g. compare the dramatic difference between the less moralistic Canada and Sweden, on one hand, with the more moralistic US and UK:

Among the four countries compared for 2006, Canada boasted the lowest teen birth and abortion rate per 1,000 women aged 15 to 19 (27.9), followed by Sweden (31.4), England/Wales (60.3), and the United States (61.2).

The policy choice is clear-cut.