Last week’s post about WEIRD values (that’s “Western, Educated, Industrialized, Rich, and Democratic”) drew a number of comments. Readers focused on the implications for the West’s relations with the Muslim world. It’s worth pointing out, though, that the clash is not limited to Muslim-majority societies. Most of the world is non-WEIRD. Events is Russia last week demonstrate what I mean.
By now, most readers are familiar with Pussy Riot, the feminist punk band that stormed the main altar of Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral to protest collusion between the Russian Orthodox Church and President Vladimir Putin. Three members of the band were convicted of “hooliganism” and sentenced to two years in prison. Last week, authorities released one of the three on appeal, in response to evidence that she had not, in fact, participated in the cathedral protest. The other two band members continue to serve their sentences.
In the West, Pussy Riot has become a cause célèbre, with human rights groups protesting the authoritarianism in Putin’s Russia. This is not surprising. From a Western perspective, the band’s punishment seems unduly harsh. Yes, Pussy Riot insulted a place of worship – one with important, and sad, historical associations – but no one was harmed. At most, the members should have been fined for a misdemeanor and let go. Within Russia, however, support for Pussy Riot is remarkably low. Although some Russians believe the band members made a valid point about church corruption and have served enough time, the large majority of Russians apparently believes the sentences were appropriate, even too lenient. Reuters reports that a poll “by the independent Levada centre found 35 percent of Russians believe the two-year sentences were appropriate, while 34 percent said they were too lenient and only 14 percent said they were excessive.”
One can dismiss these results. Maybe people are just saying what they think the pollsters want to hear. It’s possible, though, that the poll reflects what Russians actually believe. It’s possible, in other words, that Russia genuinely has a non-WEIRD value system, one in which the ethics of community and divinity take precedence over the WEIRD ethic of autonomy and expression. When Putin says, regarding the prison sentences, “It is right that [the members of Pussy Riot] were arrested and it was right that the court took this decision because you cannot undermine the fundamental morals and values to destroy the country,” he may in fact reflect consensus public opinion.
Where does this leave us? It seems to me that there are three possibilities. The first is that the WEIRD value system will eventually dominate the others worldwide. There’s some evidence for this. WEIRD culture has a lot going for it, and America projects it around the world relentlessly, through movies, advertising, the Internet, and so on. The second is that Western culture will become less WEIRD. This could happen, too. Western Europe already restricts religiously offensive speech. Moreover, as one of the commentators pointed out, there are already plenty of Westerners who do not share WEIRD values; the members of conservative religious traditions, for example. The final possibility is that the WEIRD and non-WEIRD worlds will continue to face off against one another for the foreseeable future, with inevitable clashes and occasional compromises. We’ll see.
Mark Movsesian is Director of the Center for Law and Religion at St. John’s University.
October 15th, 2012 | 9:10 am
“Three members of the band were convicted of “hooliganism” and sentenced to two years in prison. Last week, authorities released one of the three on appeal, in response to evidence that she had not, in fact, participated in the cathedral protest.”
Even though it was videotaped, they only just discovered that the third member did not participate in the protest? That tells you all you need to know about the original conviction.
“Western Europe already restricts religiously offensive speech.”
No, this is not true. Some countries sadly restrict attacking a member of a religion on that basis, but no country that I know of restricts speech that members of a religion choose to take offense at.
“there are already plenty of Westerners who do not share WEIRD values; the members of conservative religious traditions, for example. ”
Very true. As I have said many times, fundamentalist Christians have more in common with fundamentalist Muslims than they do with me, or with liberal Christians.
October 15th, 2012 | 10:23 am
Disturbing the peace is a crime everywhere in the free world.
And severe punishment for hate crimes is a WEIRD invention.
One wonders what the problem is — except whose ox got gored.
October 15th, 2012 | 12:37 pm
Mary –
A widely-abused concept, too. E.g. the Suffragettes, the 1960′s civil rights movement, etc.
The question is whether it was legitimate or a pretext in this case.
In the parlance of wikipedia, [citation needed].
October 15th, 2012 | 1:58 pm
The best possibility is the third. There is absoulutely no reason that WEIRD values can dominate worldwide because of the simple fact that WEIRDness is not so much philosophically practically untenable. Man has an infinite capacity for nonsense in abstract logic but the prospect of being hanged concentrates a man’s mind quite a bit.
No community can survive WEIRDness. Even WEIRD people when their life is threatened call the police and fire which depend on non-WEIRD values like hierarchy and loyalty. Firemen don’t run into a burning building because of their fond feelings for people they don’t know and might conceivably dislike if they knew them. Or even from some ethic of charity to their Fellow Humans. They do so because they were told to and they don’t want to be disgraced in front of their buddies. Perhaps it is possible to make a fire department that depends on charity and not loyalty or reverence but it is not likely nor is it clear why anyone would want to bother.
To put it another way, assuming punishment for hate crimes(for instance) to be a WEIRD invention, someone has to do the punishing.
October 15th, 2012 | 2:25 pm
Maximilian, actually, Western European countries have restricted religiously offensive speech and the European Court of Human Rights has allowed them to do so. The leading case is Otto-Preminger-Institut v. Austria, 87 Eur. Ct. H.R. (1994).
October 15th, 2012 | 3:42 pm
jason taylor –
“Placing less emphasis on” is not the same thing as “rejecting”. Be careful not to dehumanize those with whom you disagree.
October 15th, 2012 | 4:02 pm
The “official” video of the protest shows at least four masked women prancing around in front of the iconostasis, alternately kicking their legs high in the air and jerking their fists downward. To one side, a group of males played clangorous chords on amplified electrical guitars.
The action took place on what (in Catholic terms) would be called the “sanctuary”, an area clearly demarcated so as to exclude the public (railed off, in fact). The performers by no means “stormed the main altar”, which is behind the iconostasis.
What they did was perpetrate a vulgar, irreligious performance in a place of worship which was filmed for the express purpose of disseminating it widely through youtube. It parodied worship of God by their kneeling, prostrating, and making signs of the cross, all the while shouting out a parody of a hymn to the Blessed Virgin. This occurred while the cathedral was open for worship, although no liturgy was in progress.
Three of the women were convicted not of “hooliganism”, but of “hooliganism motivated by religious hatred” – a somewhat significant detail omitted from the article. All three appealed, and one had her sentence suspended on the grounds that she had been forcibly led away before the stunt had ripened.
Now, it is perverse to say the women “insulted a place of worship”. That was no part of the crime of which they were convicted. What they did was deliberately insult Russian Orthodoxy and scandalize devout Christians. Their defence was that they had done it with a political motive – denouncing the close links between the Russian President and the Metropolitan of the Russian Orthodox Church. That is as may be, but seems to be not so much a defence as a plea in mitigation.
A motley group of westerners turned up at the sentencing to voice support for the performers in the name of “freedom of speech and freedom of conscience”. Since the three were not convicted for their opinions, “freedom of conscience” is beside the point; and who will claim that “freedom of speech” is an absolute value?
Neil Addison on his religionlaw blog draws attention to English statutes under which the “Moscow Three” might – had they done in London what they did in Moscow – have been charged with a criminal offence for which, if convicted, they risked up to two years in gaol.
October 15th, 2012 | 4:44 pm
Firemen don’t run into a burning building because of their fond feelings for people they don’t know and might conceivably dislike if they knew them. Or even from some ethic of charity to their Fellow Humans. They do so because they were told to and they don’t want to be disgraced in front of their buddies.
Nobody gets told to join the local volunteer fire brigade. It seems hard to imagine that anybody would, without at least some form of charity ethic.
October 15th, 2012 | 7:17 pm
I wonder how the reaction would be different if Christians were to do the same in a mosque in the Middle East. I would imagine the key WEIRD concept cited would be “respect for differences” rather than “freedom of speech.”
October 15th, 2012 | 9:46 pm
“I wonder how the reaction would be different if Christians were to do the same in a mosque in the Middle East. I would imagine the key WEIRD concept cited would be “respect for differences” rather than “freedom of speech.”
Or how about a similar protest by atheists in a mosque? Maybe the WEIRD concern would again be “freedom of speech” rather than “respect for differences”.
October 16th, 2012 | 2:03 am
Jason Taylor,
“They do so because they were told to and they don’t want to be disgraced in front of their buddies”
Is it inconceivable that a fireman might want to save people and buildings? That he might care about his work?
October 16th, 2012 | 4:16 pm
Mark: Maximilian, actually, Western European countries have restricted religiously offensive speech and the European Court of Human Rights has allowed them to do so. The leading case is Otto-Preminger-Institut v. Austria, 87 Eur. Ct. H.R. (1994).
I know that this court is useless in the defense of free speech. Reading this particular decision was nonetheless very chilling. Austria is a good example, it also criminalized an accurate description of Islam’s prophet. However, it is not clear to me that this is generalizable to the rest of Western Europe. Britain recently abolished its blasphemy law, and where they do exist, they are generally a dead letter. Germany has distinguished itself rather negatively on the matter of religion of late, wanting to ban the Muhammad video and legalizing practices simply because they are religious, so it may be another example.
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