Welcome to the Liberty Insider.
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This is a program designed
to bring you up to speed
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with one of the
many developments
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and in the program,
maybe several topics,
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developments relating to
religious liberty in the US
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and around the world.
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My name is Lincoln Steed,
editor of Liberty magazine.
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And my guest on the
program is Sonia DeWitt,
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Attorney Sonia
DeWitt, and Liberty author.
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Let's talk about
something that's been
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troubling me
for a long time now.
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I watch current
events, and I know you do too.
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And it struck me
is rather anomalous
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for a western
country, the United States,
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back in the
Bush era, Bush's son,
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speech was a big
issue and they established
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free speech zones.
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You remember that?
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They didn't really want
disruption to public events.
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So there was a roped
off area, sometimes as much,
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I think in one case three miles
from where the president was,
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there will be a roped off area
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entitled The Free Speech Zone
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where people could speak freely.
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How important does free
speech to modern democracy
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to real freedom and thereby to,
of course, religious liberty,
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which is a vital freedom?
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Well, free speech is obviously
essential to any free society.
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If you don't have free speech,
you don't have free thought,
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you don't have free
exercise of religion,
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you don't have
free communication
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about grievances.
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There are so many things
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that are
impacted by free speech.
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Now is free speech good speech?
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No, not necessarily.
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The old saying
applies, I will...
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I may disagree
with what you say,
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but I will defend to the
death your right to say it.
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And I say that about
religious liberty in general.
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I can have huge issues
with someone else's faith,
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I can think it's
puerile, foolish or whatever,
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but if religious
liberty means anything,
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I have to go to
any length to defend
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someone's right to believe that.
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If free speech is
restricted for anybody,
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it's not,
there's no free speech.
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Yeah.
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And I think in
our era right now,
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people have
forgotten the basic dynamic
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that when speech
is offensive to you
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that it's most
important to protect it.
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Right.
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Nobody needs to
protect agreeable speech.
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Right?
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No, something everybody likes
is doesn't need protection.
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Right.
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Do you think
we're in a period where,
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you know, it's
under some threat?
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Well, that's an
interesting question.
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I guess there's different
answers to that question.
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I think, in the
current administration
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with the latest...
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The President's
latest initiative
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threatening campuses
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who supposedly
threatened for free speech...
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Now it wasn't
an executive order,
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I wasn't even quite sure
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if it was formally
'cause an executive orders...
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I believe it was...
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Is only a terminology,
not a legal requirement.
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It is an executive order,
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but it doesn't
really do anything.
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I think what is more
noteworthy about it is the fact
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that he felt it was
necessary and that I believe,
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comes from this
Christian right paranoia
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about their
rights being infringed
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and them being victims
of the secular society,
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which I think is
a way overblown fear
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and they, you know, maybe...
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I mean, there's opposition
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on both sides to the
other side's viewpoints.
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There's no question about that.
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But are
Christians being targeted
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for their viewpoints?
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I don't see that.
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Well, to me, there's a
couple of things at play
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on this issue of
speech on college campuses.
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The President says
to withhold the money
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and that bothers
me whether or not
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he's the one to withhold it.
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On religious liberty,
we've always cautioned
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against taking,
especially church institutions,
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taking government money.
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But even a private institution
taking government money means
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they're somewhat beholden,
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and there is a
controlling interest.
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And when the government
does partially fund something,
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we would expect as
citizens in a country
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with the separation of church
and state that the government
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not be promoting any
particular religious viewpoint
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with all that institution
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with the
government money, right?
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So it seems like
Trump is trying to turn it
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on its head in some ways
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if it's on behalf
of the religious right.
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It makes sure
that with the control
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of government money,
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they advance the
concerns of a religious group.
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Well, that concern is not over,
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that's a covert motivation,
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and that's not listed
in his speaking about it
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or in the regulation itself.
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No, but we can guess that...
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The other thing that
I wonder is it as simple
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as Ann Coulter was disinvited,
I think recently on the campus,
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and she has the ability
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to raise the
President's ire on her behalf.
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Or against her
as the case may be.
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Well, yes.
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Yes.
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It's a very
complicated relationship.
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But I think it's easily provable
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that on many public
campuses and private campuses,
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except that
overtly church run ones,
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I think the
intellectual environment
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is a little dismissive of
what they say is historical,
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fundamental Christianity,
it's an element of sneering.
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Well, certainly that's
true. There is no question.
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But that's not gonna be
solved by government edict.
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Right.
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And, you know,
that is their right.
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Right.
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As long as they don't
engage, as long as they don't,
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you know, overtly
threaten or harass,
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they have the right
to smear all they want.
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Yeah.
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You know, that's the
function of free speech.
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Yeah.
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So sneering is...
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Well, yeah.
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So we need to condition,
especially since we're coming
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from a Christian community,
maybe we need to condition
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our fellow
Christians to be able to bear
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a little bit of
jeering and public shame
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on the Lord's behalf.
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I mean, we're...
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The Bible says those
who live godly in Christ
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will suffer persecution.
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Will suffer persecution.
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So that shouldn't be
a surprise to anybody.
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And I don't
think a little sneering
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is hardcore persecution.
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No, not compared
to what's going on
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in other parts of the world.
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But it's a push me
pull you sort of a question
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because in addressing a
concern if the religious right
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are somewhat the
force behind the scenes,
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then they're actually
creating another problem,
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even as they're
trying to solve one.
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How do you see that?
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Well, the government
is in essence middling
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in the free
speech issue to increase
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their particular speech.
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Yes, well, that...
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Free speech is not
something that can be forced.
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That goes back to
the whole Christian
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right agenda...
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That they want to
control every area of life
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so that their
agenda is advanced.
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So that's pretty much a
part of their whole agenda.
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You want to make sure
that Christians and Christians
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of their variety
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have preference in every sphere.
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Now we don't much talk
about it on this program
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or at least haven't in the past,
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but I know
there's a strong movement
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at the United Nations promoted
by a whole front of countries
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most of which
are Islamic culture,
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which sort of callus their
way, they look at this issue.
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And they are pressuring
there to be an international
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understanding against
defamatory religious speech.
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Well, you know, we don't want
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to encourage
loose and negative talk
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about any religion,
but when you're protecting
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free space, I
don't think this is right
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to penalize
someone that says something
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that's offensive
to another religion
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because depending
how you define it,
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just explaining,
say a doctrinal error
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or saying I have a
more satisfactory religion,
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which is, an essence,
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what evangelists
are doing all the time,
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that can be taken
as offensive or someone
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that chooses to.
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And is that going
to be criminalized
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or the very least
that just inhibits
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your ability to talk
about your own religion?
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Right. Yeah.
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And I think that
proselytizing is the covert...
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Preventing
proselytizing is a covert reason
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for that emphasis
they want to avoid
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because as you know, a
lot of Islamic countries
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forbid proselytizing by
anyone who's not Muslim,
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so...
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I think most of
them do one way or other.
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Yeah.
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No, it's a big problem.
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It's a big problem.
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And I think we're headed
down that track even in the west
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because we don't want to offend
this political correctness.
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He's now no longer
pope, but I remember,
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Benedict took a speech
at Regensburg University
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where he told a historical tale.
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Didn't even make up the
thing or put any slide on it,
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just told a
story of a discussion
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between a Muslim
military commander
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and a Byzantine emperor.
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And Muslims went
on a violent streak
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all around the world.
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He should have had
the right to speak.
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Well, you have, you
know, Salman Rushdie threatened
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with that,
because he wrote a novel.
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Very complex.
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He mentioned something
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that many Muslim
scholars know about.
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There are some
passages in the Quran
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that are inexplicable.
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And they've been
called and he called them
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in his book a Satanic Verses
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because they don't
seem to come from the angel.
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It was a deeply
theological argument.
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It wasn't just a
maligning statement
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against Islam.
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But that was unacceptable.
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Of course, it wasn't
really so long ago in the West,
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and even in the
US, where you could be
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severely punished for blasphemy
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speaking against Christianity
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or taking the
name of God in vain.
00:11:18.37\00:11:21.21
None of neither,
which is a good thing,
00:11:21.24\00:11:23.41
but it's a bit horrific
to think you could get end up
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in the stock so
severely fined or ostracized
00:11:26.25\00:11:29.55
for that sort of
behavior that any longshoreman
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now indulge
themselves endlessly.
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Yes, in fact, in the decades
leading up to the Civil War,
00:11:35.36\00:11:40.46
blasphemy laws were very common
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and you could be
criminally punished
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for speaking
against Christianity.
00:11:45.50\00:11:48.60
And, moreover, Protestantism
00:11:48.64\00:11:53.48
was taught in public schools,
00:11:53.51\00:11:55.88
and they read from
the Protestant Bible
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and prayed Protestant
prayers and any Catholic child
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or anyone else who
objected would be punished
00:12:02.42\00:12:04.75
if they didn't participate.
00:12:04.79\00:12:06.72
So it's actually
pretty disturbing
00:12:06.76\00:12:12.69
that kind of de facto
establishment continued
00:12:12.73\00:12:15.36
that late and that people
were being forced to comply
00:12:15.40\00:12:19.93
with the Protestant
religious viewpoint.
00:12:19.97\00:12:24.51
But we've moved on
from that, haven't we?
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And not all of
the social changes
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that have gone
with the liberalization
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are good,
00:12:32.11\00:12:33.62
but it does sort
of begs the question
00:12:33.65\00:12:35.68
what would happen if religion
was reinstated in society?
00:12:35.72\00:12:42.56
Would that mean
re-imposition of such things?
00:12:42.59\00:12:45.36
Could we have a
spiritual rejuvenation
00:12:45.39\00:12:49.23
as a nation without
an unnecessary spill over
00:12:49.26\00:12:52.40
into legal prohibitions?
00:12:52.43\00:12:54.27
Well, I think my opinion
00:12:54.30\00:12:56.27
is that the two
are mutually exclusive.
00:12:56.30\00:12:58.47
I don't think you can have
a revival using weaker means.
00:12:58.51\00:13:02.48
It's a good point.
00:13:02.51\00:13:04.51
But you can't have a resurgence
of interest in religion.
00:13:04.55\00:13:08.88
Well, yes.
00:13:08.92\00:13:10.25
And that's happened
multiple times in our country.
00:13:10.29\00:13:11.89
We had two great awakenings,
00:13:11.92\00:13:13.66
and there's been
many times when...
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I hope the great awakenings
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were more than
just societal shift.
00:13:16.89\00:13:21.36
That was deep.
00:13:21.40\00:13:22.73
Well, that was my point.
00:13:22.76\00:13:24.43
I mean, I'm talking
about the spiritual renewal
00:13:24.47\00:13:29.14
as opposed to legal enforcement
of Christian doctrine.
00:13:29.17\00:13:34.51
And I think those two
are really mutually exclusive
00:13:34.54\00:13:36.85
because you can't force a
genuine renewal or revival.
00:13:36.88\00:13:41.32
Which is something
00:13:41.35\00:13:42.68
that those in the
Christian community
00:13:42.72\00:13:45.05
who are pushing
for political actions
00:13:45.09\00:13:47.32
should keep in mind.
00:13:47.36\00:13:48.69
Yes.
00:13:48.72\00:13:50.06
That's not how these
great awakenings worked,
00:13:50.09\00:13:52.03
they didn't go to the lawyers,
fortunately to the legislators.
00:13:52.06\00:13:57.07
They went to their Bibles,
they went to camp meetings.
00:13:57.10\00:14:00.84
Even without PA system,
00:14:00.87\00:14:02.20
they listened
to George Whitfield
00:14:02.24\00:14:04.17
in the first great awakening.
00:14:04.21\00:14:06.84
I was just listening
to one of his sermons
00:14:06.88\00:14:09.71
the other day on a
DVD on a CD rather,
00:14:09.74\00:14:13.38
powerful stuff, even read in a,
00:14:13.42\00:14:16.69
you know, major
turn by the narrator,
00:14:16.72\00:14:18.95
still very good sermons.
00:14:18.99\00:14:20.32
I can see why
people were affected by it.
00:14:20.36\00:14:23.43
This is a time
for a short break.
00:14:23.46\00:14:25.53
Stay with us, we'll be
back to continue free speech,
00:14:25.56\00:14:28.56
which means we are free to speak
00:14:28.60\00:14:31.03
freely on this program.
00:14:31.07\00:14:33.44