Ireland and Pakistan, BFFs
I said good evening but that was before I saw this BBC item:
Police in the Republic of Ireland have launched an investigation after a viewer claimed comments made by Stephen Fry on a TV show were blasphemous.
Officers are understood to be examining whether the British comedian committed a criminal offence under the Defamation Act when he appeared on RTE in 2015.
Fry had asked why he should “respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid god who creates a world…. full of injustice”.
I’ve said all that, many times. Come and get me.
Appearing on The Meaning of Life, hosted by Gay Byrne, in February 2015, Fry had been asked what he might say to God at the gates of heaven.
Fry said: “How dare you create a world in which there is such misery? It’s not our fault? It’s not right. It’s utterly, utterly evil. Why should I respect a capricious, mean-minded, stupid god who creates a world which is so full of injustice and pain?”
He went on to say that Greek gods “didn’t present themselves as being all seeing, all wise, all beneficent”, adding “the god who created this universe, if it was created by god, is quite clearly a maniac, an utter maniac, totally selfish”.
The Irish Independent reported a member of the public made a complaint to police in Ennis in the same month the programme was broadcast. He was recently contacted by a detective to say they were looking into his complaint.
Hungry for publicity, are they?
How has god managed to survive in the two years since he was so harmed?
Not that I wish it on him, but I expect Fry is in a position to fight such a legal action vigorously, and with luck the result will be the discrediting and repeal of the Irish blasphemy law. It’s hard to imagine the complainants and prosecution coming out looking anything other than ridiculous, in the public eye.
OK, I know it’s not nice to laugh at someone because of their name but Gay Byrne sounds like a character from a 1970’s Carry On film.
I thought it sounded a bit too obvious for porn.
I’ve been to Ennis. Not a bad place. Not medieval at all. At least, not then.
But times change….backwards.
And now, with the Internet, apparently anyone in one country can charge someone else in another country, if anyone in Country A happens to read the online writings of someone from Country B.
Although I’m not sure that this is any worse than the woman arrested here in the US for laughing at Sessions swearing in.
It’s all over the top policing of thought. Censors to the left of me, censors to the right, censors in front, and censors to the rear.
The Carry On films weren’t porn, just not very good comedies which relied a lot on both sexism and double entendres for their ‘humour’. Were you thinking of the Confessions Of….series?