Je suis William Godwin

The debate over censorship and the Charlie Hebdo affair has gone quiet but the issue won't go away. I have said in a tweet today that the measure of a civilized society is not how many laws it has but how few it needs. I think we can apply this to this debate. William Godwin, the early anarchist-leaning philosopher of the later eighteenth century talked of the need for the exercise of 'private judgment' in a moral society. He meant that the exercise of self restraint in the interests of others was far preferable to man made laws enforcing such behaviour. I once met Geoffrey Howe, the (in my opinion) underrated Conservative cabinet minister under Thatcher who told me that he believed something similar - that democracy will only truly work if there is widespread 'obedience to the unenforceable'. He was suggesting that we must all take into consideration the freedom, opinions and feelings of others before we act, whether or not laws exist to force us to do so. George Orwell called this 'common humanity'. I have no problem criticising evil behaviour carried out in the name of religion but it does seem uncivilized to criticise people's faith gratuitously. (in the way, for example, Richard Dawkins does). We should exercise private judgment, obey the unenforceable and respect common humanity before criticising another's beliefs as long as those beliefs exist in a peaceful context. So, yes, I would criticise anyone who mocks a religion for its own sake but oppose the passage of laws to prevent them doing so. If we are a civilized and democratic society, we should not need censorship.