The point about free speech is that you don’t get to pick and choose what the issues are

One response I saw from a senior Christian leader to  the Krish Kandiah, Thought For the Day episode was that this wasn’t really a “massive Christian liberty or free speech issue.”

Now over the years, prominent Christians and Christian organisations have been quick to announce that this or that issue was not only a matter of Christian morality, what God says and values but also about broader human rights.  These have included human sexuality and fertility, abortion, euthanasia, street preaching and even Christian private schools.

Now the question of free speech and liberty has been real in most of those cases. For example, Kate Forbes, the deputy first minister of Scotland was recently told that she would no longer be welcome as a participant on stage at a theatre because of her faith views.  Other people have been arrested, censored or cancelled. 

There is no question about the seriousness of the issues in those cases. However, it is worth remembering what happened to Krish Kandiah.  He has been censored.  Words he said that passed editorial checks have been edited out since because a politician was upset.  He has been subject to a sustained attack from politicians and journalists, an attempt to belittle l, marginalize and to in effect, defacto cancel him.

So, why are the previous examples considered serious matters of liberty and freedom of speech but this one is not.  One gets the impression that it is not to do with how egregious the censorship was but rather to do with the subject matter.  The re has long been suspicion from the other side that our protests about freedom of speech are a smoke screen.  We aren’t really concerned about human rights and liberties but rather it is the issue we were concerned about. It’s our freedom to speak on specific things that is at stake not a general freedom of speech

Now there is a case for saying that this is what we should care about. However, if so, we should be open about this. Stick to the real case, the rights and wrongs of the ethical issue

However, if we are going to say we care about freedom of speech,  then we don’t get to pick and choose the issues. 

Further, this also raises a further question. Remember that Kandiah was not censored for disagreeing over or using strong language to describe the other point of view when it comes to the more general matter of immigration

Rather Kandiah picked up on particularly explosive comments from a politician that sought to cast asylum seekers as men from “backward countries” who have broke in and who we “know nothing about.”. Such statements go well beyond reasonable concerns and debate and have the affect of demonizing others because of their ethnicity. 

The reality is that people have taken offence at Kendiah pointing out that fear of the stranger has a technical term “xenophobia”.  What this also means is that he was addressing heart issues. In other words, like it or not, he was identifying something as a form of sin. You may disagree with his assessment there but if so you should engage from Scripture with him to show why he is wrong. 

I am concerned that we have a pick and mix church culture where we prioritise some issues and not others both when it comes to freedom speech and when it comes to morality

To repeat again, we cannot pick and choose in either case.