When you read in the Los Angeles Times or Washington Post about how we need “hate speech” laws to foster “harmony,” this is the ugly reality of what they’re calling for: thoughtcrime laws that enshrine one particular point of view as above questioning or criticism.
“Poet summoned for interrogation over contempt of religion,” from Al-Masry Al-Youm, October 9 (thanks to Heliogabalus):
The New Cairo Prosecutor summoned poet Hisham al-Gokh over a claim filed by a lawyer accusing him of contempt of religion.
Lawyer Salwa al-Faresy filed a complaint accusing Gokh of the contempt of religion in one of his poems, providing the part of the poem on which she based her claim.
The complainant added that the poet used words and religious images and comparisons in his work, especially in the title of the poem called “Human is Based on Five.” Faresy said that the title of the poem referred to the five pillars of Islam.
Prosecutors summoned the lawyer and the poet for testimony.
Gokh also likened his beloved in the poem to Ka’bah, and used distorted verses from the Qur’an, Faresy said.
Which probably means that he quoted inconvenient Qur’an verses accurately.