There has been a covert menace in the debate over the stigmatization by Kevin Myers of children born outside marriage - and the menace is to the idea of freedom of speech, writes Vincent Browne.
And before I go further, let me repeat my abhorrence over The Irish Times publishing the column, my rejection of Kevin Myers's insistence that he intended to cause no offence (manifestly this is false for he exulted in the offence he was causing), my bewilderment over the editorial justifying the publication, and my further bafflement by the elaboration on that justification by Geraldine Kennedy last Saturday.
I believe it was wrong for The Irish Times to have published the column but that is not the same as contending that there should be a legal prohibition on the publication of material that is offensive or any other formal sanction on the publication of material that is considered objectionable. I raise this issue in the context of the promised establishment of a press council, whose powers might encompass the censoring of objectionable, offensive, denigratory or obnoxious ideas.
This would be a step too far, far too far.
For a start there is no consensus on what constitutes offensive, objectionable or obnoxious material. Any attempt to frame parameters for this inevitably would involve the exclusion of material that ought not to be censored.
Then there is the problem of censoring views simply because they cause offence. The vigorous expression of almost all strong views will offend someone, but should that be a reason for censoring such views? A few years ago I made reference in a column here to the Lord's Prayer. Many found that to be deeply offensive but I would contend that the issues I raised were valid. I find chilling the phrase "thy will be done on earth as it is done in heaven" because of the crimes against humanity that have been perpetrated under the guise of the "will of God". I am troubled by the phrase "lead us not into temptation" because the idea of a God that deliberately would induce people to "sin" is bizarre. I made the reference to the Lord's Prayer because I wanted to draw attention to the extraordinary challenge contained in the phrase "forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us".
Maybe I was (am) wrong about this, but should I be prevented from expressing these views, even were I to do so in terms that were deliberately and gratuitously offensive? I did not do that and had I done so The Irish Times would have been justified in censoring the column because of respect the newspaper owes to conscientious believers.
But that is different from a contention that such gratuitous offence should be legally prohibited.
Is there not a value in the promulgation of such views however offensive and however wrong-headed? Do opposing views, however mistaken, not illuminate the truth or validity of the views they challenge? Actually you could make that point in defence of Kevin Myers. Has the debate on the use of the depiction "bastard" to children of unwed parents not sharpened our sensitivity to the use of denigratory language, to the stigmatization of vulnerable innocent people and to the scorn of the needs of a disadvantaged group, in this instance lone parents? That does not justify the publication of the column in The Irish Times but it argues against the general censorship of such views, even when so despicably expressed.
The censorship of falsehood, inevitably will cause the censorship of truth. The best defence to the use of free speech for the propagation of denigratory, offensive and false views is more speech not less, the kind of "more speech" we have had in the past week in response to the column and the subsequent justifications.
I am not sure of John Stuart Mill's confidence that truth will emerge from the free contest of opposing arguments but I am sure (well "sure-ish") that the freedom of expression, except where it causes direct harm, is a better arrangement than the suppression of that freedom. (By "direct harm" I mean where speech is used not to communicate ideas but for the direct infliction of harm, such as harm to reputation or damage to national security or in the course of the commission of a crime.)
I am conscious that power relations in society will ordain that the powerful will use freedom of expression to enhance their power and marginalise and further suppress the powerless, a recurrent feature of the journalism of Kevin Myers, as illustrated in the general theme of that column of last week on lone parents. But the curtailment of freedom of expression, however denigratory and stigmatizing, carries with it such hazard to the free communication of ideas and the possible, indeed inevitable, curtailment of truth, that any curtailment is worse than freedom, however abused. In any event I am conscious that the powerful would use instruments of curtailment as a further weapon in the consolidation of their advantage and the disadvantage of others.
So a press council should stay well away from this arena.