I Duly acknowledging that the plural of anecdote is not data, I begin with some stories drawn from the recent history of liberal democracy. • In November 2010, the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution removed an edited version of footage used in David Wojnarowicz’s short silent film A Fire in My Belly from “Hide/Seek: Difference and Desire in American Portraiture” at the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery after complaints from the Catholic League, and in response to threats of reduced federal funding. The video contains a scene with a crucifix covered in ants. William Donohue of the Catholic League claimed the work was “hate speech” against Catholics. The affair was initiated by an article contributed to the Christian News Service, a division of the Media Research Center, whose mission is to “prove — through sound scientific research — that liberal bias in the media does exist and undermines traditional American values.” • In October 2015, Dareen Tatour, an Israeli Arab from a village in the Galilee, was arrested. She had written a poem: “I will not succumb to the ‘peaceful solution’ / Never lower my flags / Until I evict them from my land.” A video clip uploaded by Tatour shows her reading the poem, “Resist, my people, resist them,” against the backdrop of masked people throwing rocks and firebombs at Israeli security forces. The day after the uploading, she posted: “The Islamic Jihad movement hereby declares the continuation of the intifada throughout the West Bank…. Continuation means expansion… which means all of Palestine. And we must begin within the Green Line… for the victory of Al-Aqsa, and we shall declare a general intifada. #Resist.” In 2018, Tatour was given a five months’ jail sentence. In May 2019, her conviction for the poem was overturned by the Nazareth District Court, but not the conviction for her other social media posts. The poem, said the court, did not “involve unequivocal remarks that would provide the basis for a direct call to carry out acts.” And the court acknowledged that Tatour was known as a poet: “freedom of expression is [to be] accorded added weight when it also involves freedom of artistic and creative [expression].” The Israeli Supreme Court rejected the state’s motion for appeal. • In 2017, the artist Sam Durant made a public sculpture, “Scaffold,” for location in the open grounds of the Walker Art Center in Minneapolis. It was an unpainted wood-and-metal structure, more than fifty feet tall, with a stairway that led to a platform with a scaffold. The work referred to seven executions between 1859 and 2006, including the execution in 1862 of thirty-eight Dakota-Sioux men. Protesters demanded the work’s destruction: “Not your story,” “Respect Dakota People!” “$200.00 reward for scalp of artist!!” Following mediation, the work was surrendered to the activists, who reportedly dismantled it, ceremonially burning the wood. Art critics endorsed the protest: “In general it’s time for all of us to shut up and listen.” “White Americans bear a responsibility to dismantle white supremacy. Let it burn.” The artist himself denied that he had been censored. “Censorship is when a more powerful group or individual removes speech or images from a less powerful party. That wasn’t the case. I chose to do what I did freely.” • In April 2019, three Catholic priests in the Polish city of Koszalin burned books that they said promote sorcery, including one of J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter novels, in a ceremony that they photographed and posted on Facebook. The books were ignited as prayers were said and a small group of people watched on. They cited in justification of the ceremony passages from Deuteronomy (“The graven images of their gods shall ye burn with fire”) and Acts (“Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together and burned them before all men”). In August of the same year, a Roman Catholic pastor at a school in Nashville, Tennessee banned the Rowling novels: “These books present magic as both good and evil, which is not true, but in fact a clever deception. The curses and spells used in the books are actual curses and spells; which when read by a human being risk conjuring evil spirits into the presence of the person reading the text.” • In August 2019, the release of the film The Hunt, in which “red state” Americans are stalked for sport by “elite liberals,” was cancelled. Donald Trump had tweeted: “Liberal Hollywood is Racist at the highest level, and with great Anger and Hate! They like to call themselves ‘Elite,’ but they are not Elite. In fact, it is often the people that they so strongly oppose that are actually the Elite. The movie coming out is made in order to inflame and cause chaos. They create their own violence, and then try to blame others. They are the true Racists, and are very bad for our Country!” The studio explained: “We stand by our film-makers and will continue to distribute films in partnership with bold and visionary creators, like those associated with this satirical social thriller, but we understand that now is not the right time to release this film.” Nine months later, with a new marketing campaign, the film duly appeared. The director explained: “The film was supposed to be an absurd satire and was not supposed to be serious and boring……. It’s been a long road.” • In Germany, a Jewish activist has been litigating to have removed a thirteenth-century church carving of the Judensau, or “Jewish pig,” an infamous trope of medieval anti-Semitism, from the outer wall of the main church in Wittenberg. A memorial plaque installed in November 1988, containing in Hebrew words from Psalm 130, “Out of the depths, I cry to you,” does not satisfy the litigant. The district court ruled that the continued presence of the carving did not constitute evidence of “disregard for Jews living in Germany.” The judgment was upheld this year by the Higher Regional Court: the presence at the church of both a memorial to the
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