"Prophets, Cartoons, and Legal Norms: Rethinking the United Nations Defamation of Religion Provisions"

Joshua Foster, Prophets, Cartoons, and Legal Norms: Rethinking the United Nations Defamation of Religion Provisions, 48 J. Cath. Leg. Stud. 19 (2009)

Foster's article offers an analysis the several U.N. resolutions condemning the "defamation of religions" as well a nice background of the events leading up to and following the Danish Cartoon Controversy. The article argues that the defamation of religion resolutions fail to protect freedom of speech and are "an overly paternalistic response" to the problem of religiously offensive communications. (p. 24) After an over-long summary of the U.N.'s general approach to human rights, the article discusses domestic American constitutional law around the First Amendment and concludes that it provides a far better model for the international community to adopt as it "is far more receptive to free speech than Europe and other countries around the world" (p. 47) and is more consonant with notions of human dignity.