Sir, – After dismissing some opposing arguments as facile, Senator Ivana Bacik advances her first argument for removing the provision in the Constitution on blasphemy by denouncing it as outdated ("Blasphemy referendum offers chance to remove dangerous law", Opinion & Analysis, October 16th).
There are many very good arguments for deleting blasphemy from article 40, and to be fair to Ms Bacik, she goes on to make some of them, but suggesting we should remove it because it has passed a best-before date is mildly absurd. Does this mean that there was a time when punishing blasphemy was acceptable, because the idea was in-date?
There is some value in arguing that ideas that suit one culture and time cannot work in another, but this notion has limited application to fundamental ideas like freedom of thought and expression.
There is also a danger that dismissing arguments as outdated will engender prejudice against the past, and blindness towards the possibility of fault in the present.
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This can lead to the oversimplified and somewhat conceited belief that modern ideas are progressive, and traditional ideas are regressive. There are already signs that we are sliding down that path.
Our civilisation brought itself to the brink of destruction in the Cold War at the end of the last century, and is unable to halt the rampant consumerism that’s fuelling climate change in this century, and yet we are so convinced of our superiority over past civilisations that we can use the term “outdated” as a put-down without the slightest sense of irony. – Yours, etc,
COLIN WALSH,
Templeogue,
Dublin 6W.