THE Mid West Humanists (MWH) group is calling on voters to contact local TDs to demand a referendum on removing the prohibition of blasphemy from the Irish constitution.
The group, which has members in Limerick, Clare and Tipperary, says it is launching the campaign to support freedom of speech following last week’s murders at the offices of French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo.
Stating they support the right to life of those killed in Paris, the humanists say that this also extends to freedom of speech, and everyone’s right to read any “writing, cartoon or other communication, whether or not it criticises or satirises any idea, whether religious, political, social, sporting, or scientific”.
The group also praised Charlie Hebdo staff “for publishing words and pictures without any respect for the ideas of several religions. In doing their job, they also enable people in Ireland to read things that are prohibited in some countries”.
“Ireland is weak in secularism, as the Constitution since 1937 states that blasphemy is an offence, and in 2009 our legislators continued a law to give effect to that article of the Constitution. Government and other people in Pakistan quote Ireland’s law to say that it is normal, including in Europe, for the law to prohibit criticism of religion,” said an MWH spokesperson.
“In 2013, the Constitutional Convention asked the Government to hold a referendum on the law against blasphemy from the Constitution. The Government promised that it would hold this referendum, but last year they reneged on this”, the spokesperson added.
