Op Ed On Negative Impact of Protecting Religious Practice

Writing in Sunday's Observer, Nick Cohen has a provocative op ed criticizing the trend in both the United States and Europe to protect religious practice and belief through workplace religious freedom laws and blasphemy statutes. He argues that the price of these laws are unacceptable limitations on the freedoms of others in society. Says Cohen of fundamentalist religious believers: "Their life and faith must be one and no compromises can be made. In the past, most people who lived outside theocracies either compromised or withdrew into communities where they found sanctuary from the profane by living and working with co-believers."