BUBUBUBUBUT Amanda! This does not in any way reflect on the vast majority of Christians! Stop defending people perscuted by Christians and start defending those who are offended, but not in any way physically or finanically threatened, by people being critical of religion, or you’re Just As Bad As The Fundamentalists!

MikeEss—don’t be silly—in Gilead, the papist, idol-worshipping Catholics will be up against the wall as soon as they run out of homos to shoot.

She lost me at poofter.  I hope she rots.

I’m not sure I see any sign that her being a woman had anything to do with it.  I’m not sure religion had much to do with it either, really. 

She said a bunch of things about Berlusconi, too, and she’s a long-time political enemy of him.  She’s being prosecuted because under an old treaty with the Vatican, under which Italy has to treat an insult to the Pope in the same way it treats an insult to the Italian president.  It seems rather likely that the prosecutors don’t really give a shit about the Pope, and she’s really being prosecuted as an enemy of the government.

Not to invoke godwin’s law, (or the Italisn translation of it), but guess wasn’t Il Duce the leader of Italy when this treaty was signed? I wasn’t aware that treaties invoked under the Fascist government were still honored. I wonder, do Germany and Russia still honor the pact of steel?

IT’S NOT ABOUT RELIGION.

It’s PAYBACK for daring to criticize proto-Fascist media mogul, Prime Minister, and all-round Il Duce, BERLUSCONI.

Read the click-through article carefully.

This is prosecution using any convenient law to nail a popular and vocal political critic of Berlusconi. The Pope is used as the pretext because under the law, it is still (somehow) possible to criticize Berlusconi - apparently he hasn’t got round to that detail yet, he’s been working the blackball angle first.

Berlusconi and the Vatican are political allies and more or less have an ‘understanding’ (Mussolini and the Lateran Concordat, anyone?). It gets Berlusconi points with the Vatican to harass people.

The average Italian is not exactly pious. I get the impression that a good many would appreciate her joke, and many of the ones who would object, would object because the Italians have the right to diss their “own” Pope - used to be family, after all, these foriegners are a newfangled innovation and still belong to the Italians - outsiders butt out!

I’m torn.  On the one hand, anti-Pope Benedict joke:  good.  On the other hand, prison rape joke:  not good.

Undoubtedly, this qualifies as a human rights case for the World Court.

There is no such thing as Godwin’s Law in this instance. Berlusconi actively admires Mussolini and courts the votes of the party which is the direct descendant of the pre-WWII Italian Fascist party.

I can predict the right-wing response to this right now: they’ll point out that had she made fun of Mohammed, she’s be receiving death threats instead of “just” jail.  If you really push them on the issue, they’ll make some sort of ridiculous claim about how the liberals supported the extremist Muslims during the Danish cartoon controversy, proving once again that the sole liberal goal is the complete destruction of Christianity.

the ones who would object, would object because the Italians have the right to diss their “own” Pope - used to be family, after all, these foriegners are a newfangled innovation and still belong to the Italians - outsiders butt out!

I’m confused.  The woman who “insulted” the pope is an Italian, no?

I’m torn.  On the one hand, anti-Pope Benedict joke:  good.  On the other hand, prison rape joke:  not good.

Going to jail for any joke: not good, no qualifiers.

rea, one of the major functions of religion seems to be as an excuse to go after political enemies under the guise of blasphemy. Certainly, that’s what Bill Donohue seems to think it is.

I quite agree—and you would certainly know.  But I can’t get mad at religion for things like this, any more than I can get made at feminism for the antics of Sarah Palin.

Opoponax - I think he was referring to the fact that Benedict is German and the vast majority of popes have been Italian.

That’s what I thought, until he finished the sentence with “outsiders butt out!”, which implies that the Italians dislike non-Italian popes, not that they feel protective of them.

The fact that she can be prosecuted for this is appalling.

And I would feel the same way even if she criticized a catholic figure I really liked, like Archbishop Romero.

I love the first amendment.  Let’s hope it stays robust.

I love the first amendment.  Let’s hope it stays robust.

This took place in Italy, where I would guess the US Constitution has no jurisdiction.

“This took place in Italy, where I would guess the US Constitution has no jurisdiction.”

At least until they hit oil.

This took place in Italy, where I would guess the US Constitution has no jurisdiction.

It’s not like it’s got a lot of force here lately…

I’m with everybody that no one deserves to go to jail for making a joke, but since when are homophobic rape jokes funny?

I think hell rape jokes are better than prison rape jokes. 

Prison rape is a social problem that requires serious and sympathetic attention.  Hell rape, not so much.

I’m with everybody that no one deserves to go to jail for making a joke, but since when are homophobic rape jokes funny?

Who said the joke was funny? People were saying the fact that she was threatened with jail was chilling.

Homophobic rape jokes are not inappropriate when it comes to the Pope, I think, because getting raped by demons *is* part of their vision of hell.

Going to jail for any joke: not good, no qualifiers.

Well, duh.  But I still can’t say, “Wow, that was a funny joke!  Tell that rape joke about the Pope again!”

Well, duh.  But I still can’t say, “Wow, that was a funny joke!  Tell that rape joke about the Pope again!”

Yeah, but imagining you saying it, in just that wording, is making me laugh right now.

I’m calling the police.

I’m guessing Opopo was making a joke, b/c yeah, I of course know that the first amendment doesn’t apply in Europe.  My point was that I’m glad it applies here.

This, of course, calls for a link to XKCD…

http://xkcd.com/459/

Italy has been growing more scarily conservative these days.  The state has been rounding up Gypsies, with much approval by the populace.

I was under the impression that only free countries were admitted to the EU.

Ross Lincoln: Italy is the motherland of political compromise. Our Constitution is a tripartisan work of beauty and we not only still have Fascist laws in place, but probably still a couple Royal Decrees as well. At the time we got into NATO, our second national party was the Socialist Party and our third was the Communist Party. What can I say? it kept us free from fascism for sixty years. Now we are growing our very own brand of neoconservativism, and we can’t even look at the French for inspiration anymore (unless the sort of “inspiration” you seek is how to become a better xenophobic social conservative).

The Catholic church is a mixed bag: on one hand you have the well-known, irresponsibly backwards views on sexuality; on the other hand, oddly enough, they are amongst the strongest opposers to racist tendencies (the aforementioned round-up of Gypsies, for one), and the only people who care about the poor (although their ideal answer to poverty is charity, of course, not a stronger welfare). They are, by and large, Italy’s conscience. It’s unfortunate that our ethics have to be tied to a religion, but in our politics, ethics is a minority position. Mainstream progressive parties are extremely weak on it.

Grammar RWA: thanks to Berlusconi, Italian press has been rated as “semi-free” at least once

Others have talked about this: the point here isn’t that Guzzanti’s being targetted for insulting the Pope. It’s that there’s a law on the books from the Mussolini era that the short-arse billionaire Berlusconi can throw at her, after a very long battle that began with the 2003 cancellation of her political satire show on RAI.

The BBC made a documentary on her work three years ago. The institution to worry about here isn’t the Catholic church, it’s Bossman Silvio.

The institution to worry about here isn’t the Catholic church, it’s Bossman Silvio.

In other words, the problem is the politicians who hide behind religion to do whatever they want.  Not that it ever happens here in the United States of America or anything ...

This is why the US´s approach to free speech is superior to Continental Europe´s, much as I admire Europe more than the US on so many other issues. Nonetheless, the Italians´ choice of sacred topics, the leader of a torturing, murdering, and child molesting cult strikes me as far less worthy than France and the Netherlands´s choice of Holocaust victims in prohibting Holocaust denial. Italy should be expelled from the EU, for both this kind of authoritarianism and its refusal to get on board with European commitments to equality for women and gays.