Lander

🚨🚨 BREAKING NEWS: Blasphemy law is back — but it only applies to Muslims. FSU member and retired police officer Stephen Gray was found guilty of being "grossly offensive", a criminal offence under s127 of the Communications Act 2003, for repeating a joke about Mohammed. Stephen reposted a message he saw on Facebook that said: “Fun facts about bacon! People who eat bacon have a lower chance of marrying a 9 year old!” While giving evidence, Stephen explained that the post was a reference to the marriage between the Prophet Mohammed and Aisha — which was consummated when she was just nine years old, after he married her when she was six. Stephen said the post was intended to be satirical but he also hoped it would spark a serious debate: did that marriage, as recorded in the Hadiths, contribute to the acceptability of child marriage in Muslim countries? District Judge Steven Hood found the post to be “grossly offensive” and dismissed Stephen's defence that it was making a serious political point about the acceptability of child marriage. He found that the post was designed to be offensive and could not be making a serious point because it was light-hearted in nature. He concluded that a conviction would not amount to a disproportionate interference with Stephen’s right to freedom of expression. The Free Speech Union is helping Stephen appeal his conviction and has instructed a top criminal silk, John Beggs KC, to act for him. With your support, we hope to be able to pay for Stephen’s legal defence in the Crown Court and meet the costs of any further appeals. Please donate Stephen's crowdfunder in the link below. Earlier this year, the FSU paid for the defence of Hamit Coskun, who burnt a copy of the Quran outside the Turkish consulate in London. He was initially convicted, but we managed to get that conviction overturned on appeal. When the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) then tried to appeal the acquittal, we took them on and won again. More recently, the Free Speech Union threatened South Wales Police with legal action after it adopted a draconian version of the Government’s definition of anti-Muslim hostility, instructing officers to record any comment that went beyond “legitimate” discussion of Islam as a 'non-crime hate incident'. We won, and the force withdrew the guidance. Stephen’s case gives us another opportunity to reaffirm the principle that there is nothing illegal about criticising any religion, including Islam. It should not be a criminal offence to repost jokes about Islam that some Muslims find offensive. Read more below and please donate to our Crowdfunder 👇