By Jacob Mchangama
In 1742 David Hume boasted that: “Nothing is more apt to surprise a foreigner than the extreme liberty which we enjoy in this country of communicating whatever we please to the public”. Voltaire saw 18th-century Britain as a paradise of tolerance and freedom that stood in stark contrast to despotic France. Today foreigners are more likely to be shocked by Britain’s determination to eviscerate that proud tradition.
The nation that gave us John Milton’s Areopagitica and John Stuart Mill’s On Liberty has failed to learn the lesson of the Rushdie affair: when a vicious theocracy in a foreign country put a death warrant on a novelist for writing a “blasphemous” book.
Ever since then, on that fateful day in February 1989 when ayatollah Khomeini issued a fatwa against Salman Rushdie for his novel The Satanic Verses, Britain has been haunted by the threat of Islamist violence. This past week marks a continuation of that sinister moment.
Earlier this year, Hamit Coskun burned a Koran and shouted profanities against Islam outside the Turkish consulate in London. His protest targeted what he called the “Islamist government of [president] Erdogan,” accusing Turkey of harbouring “radical Islamists.”
Local Moussa Kadri responded by threatening to kill Coskun. He retrieved a bread knife from his home and launched a frenzied attack. He slashed at Coskun, knocked him to the ground; and kicked and spat on him until bystanders intervened.
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Jacob Mchangama is the Founder and Executive Director of The Future of Free Speech. He is also a research professor at Vanderbilt University and a Senior Fellow at The Foundation for Individual Rights and Expression (FIRE).