Criticism of Islam is a protected belief

You’re joking right?!

https://www.goodreads.com/quotes/35681-now-it-is-such-a-bizarrely-improbable-coincidence-that-anything

That isn’t true. Most terrorist suspects are from an ideology known as ‘alt-right’, which is an off shoot of far right ideology that worships a guy called Fore Chan. It is far more dangerous than Islam.

Nope, curtailing people’s right to criticise a religion is the dark age practice.

and there is much to criticise in the way Islam is practiced by many. It largely manifests with misogyny, homophobia and antisemitism. a report from M15 yesterday said 75% of activity/terror plots were by Islamic extremists. We absolutely must be able to question and challenge it.

A faith that has no faith in itself?

Absolutely! What sort of religious faith requires insulation from unbelief? That doesn’t sound like a faith at all!

To me you should be allowed to criticise or disagree with anything, as long as you are not abusive or bullying.

Strange that you mention the dark ages when Islam colonised large areas, including Spain and caused the death of millions and enslaved millions more, and where Christians and Jews had to pay a tax in order to be allowed to live. If we cannot criticise Islam then we are heading into a new dark age.

Yes exactly. And this certainly doesn’t get the term phobia.

I assume you don’t live in the UK. Of course criticism of Christianity is a protected belief. You can see examples from of everywhere. And thankfully you can be fully critical of Christianity without risk of cancellation or death threats.

This is not the right direction. Islamophobia is absolutely rife in the western hemisphere and there should be increased legal implications to combat it. You should not have the right to make fun of/insult the sincerely held religious and moral convictions of people from minority backgrounds who are already vulnerable to exploitation amongst the majority population.

We are heading for another dark age at this rate.

Christianity gets mocked left right and centre, and it’s taken on the chin. It’s so embedded in society, comedy, debate that nobody even questions it.

Have you never seen Monty Python?

Imagine them ever getting a comedy film off the ground that mocked Islam/Muhammed.

provided the criticism didn't rise to the level of being harassment, victimisation or discrimination against Muslims as people

Whilst individuals can harass, they are not covered by duties under the Equality Act unless in the course of their employment or providing services.

Are we eventually going to have to go through the process of legally determining every single opinion as a protected belief? "Pineapple tastes good on pizza is protected belief, Supreme Court finds." " Judge rules 'Conservative Party full of knobheads, Labour not much better' protected belief." And so on.

Nobody should need to go to court for the freedom to criticise any religion.

What gave you the impression that you couldn’t criticise Christianity? Criticism of Christianity is widespread.

Worldwide the Christians are the most persecuted religious group. Not just the currant massacres of hundreds of thousands of Christians by Islamists in Sudan and Nigeria, but also those in Syria, the genocide of Yazidis (Christians), those in Nagorno Karabakh, in India, China, Indonesia, the targeting of Christians in Pakistan under their notorious blasphemy laws… not to mention laws that discriminate against them in every Islamic country.

So does that also mean criticising Christianity is also a protected belief?

It's only fair right?

Yes.

Under European human rights law?

it is not just the belief that is protected - it is also the expression of that belief.

I think the law would treat you both just fine unless you started campaigns of violence & intimidation against priests and imams. We are going through a period of potential mission creep, however.

As @Bringemout says, it's very annoying that people have to go through court cases to get perfectly sound existing laws clarified. That's how our legal system works, though. It does mean that zealots trying to manipulate the law will (eventually, expensively) get knocked down.

I actively dislike every organised religion. I have what I think are good reasons. I'm free to talk about this - as I do!

I am not free to commit actual crimes - harassment, stalking, threats of harm, incitement to violence, etc - against anyone at all, religious or not. If I do that and make it about their religion, I commit a 'hate' crime: the crime's aggravated by their protected characteristic.

It seems utterly pointless to create an extra layer on this for one particular religion. Apart from the fact that we already have this law, it would be unfair to the other religions. And they'd be straight in court to stress the point!