Religion is on the march again. The government of the United Kingdom recently attempted to pass a law that would outlaw “incitement to religious hatred”, which would chill free speech in return for locking up a handful of extremists (and, of course, make them more extreme). It would have provided no assistance to those who’ve been harrassed by religious extremists for their art – including Gupreet Bhatti (who had to go in to hiding after her play, Behzti, was the target of a violent riot by Sikhists), the producer of the Jerry Springer opera (which has been mired in controversy – the broadcast was loudly protested by Christian extremists, who have been following the show as it’s toured the country) nor would it provide people like Salman Rushdie or the Danish cartoonists any protection from fatwas and violent protests.

This book contains essays by people who, rightly, are against this ludicrous expansion of authoritarianism and infringement of civil liberties and human rights.

At points, it gets a little heavy with Freudian interpretation for what is essentially a political book. The essay on Christian creationism was interesting and eye-opening even for myself (I have been following the craziness of creationists and advocates of Intelligent Design – which is creationism after having the lawyer’s version of the Queer Eye guys wash out all the constutitonal problems – and the essay in this tome reinforced how nuts these folk are). Despite these minor transgressions, this book is an excellent response to the pseudo-liberalism of those who want to sacrifice our essential liberties to a shifting idol of religious “communities”.