Damned If You Do: Should New Zealand Criminalise or Censor Expression that Offends Islam?

This paper canvasses the relationship between the fundamental human rights of freedom of expression and freedom of religion to establish whether New Zealand should criminalise or censor expression that causes offence to the religious sensibilities of followers of Islam. It analyses the legal framework in New Zealand and in the international arena to assess whether this adequately protects Muslims from offence on the basis of their belief, while retaining other people’s right to free speech. This paper draws on a number of international examples to highlight what the repercussions can be when one person’s right to free speech collides with another’s right to freedom of religion. Bearing in mind these examples, this paper analyses a number of key argument in favour of allowing free speech and in favour of introducing wider censorship regimes, to establish whether these examples should have been subject to censorship and how this could apply in the New Zealand context. This paper concludes that criminalisation is not the ideal way to prevent these occurrences in future, but censorship could be an option. This paper recommends a balancing exercise is undertaken within the current New Zealand Bill of Rights framework to establish whether an item of offensive expression should or should not be subject to censorship