General Assembly Resolution #635 “Religious Freedom Protection” (Category: Civil Rights; Strength: Significant) shall be struck out and rendered null and void.
One may consider religious freedom to be so essential that it deserves specific, separate protection like that afforded to free
assembly and
expression.
One would be wrong. Religion, by its nature, is a slippery thing to legislate properly. Without proper care, well-meaning legislators can cripple national governments or empower bad actors to use religion as a weapon, tearing laws they disagree with to shreds.
The General Assembly finds as follows:
- The target bans any restriction on "performing a bona fide religious practice" that isn't "vital for the furtherment of a secular interest which outweighs the public's interest in religious freedom." If a restriction is not "vital" for the furtherment of such an interest, it is illegal under this resolution. This sets a ludicrously high bar for any limitation on religious practices and makes it wildly difficult for governments or private entities to curtail all manner of abuse.
- The aforementioned provision also declares open season for special interests and bad actors to challenge members' laws and policies left and right. If any regulation happens to restrict "performing a bona fide religious practice," even incidentally, then members must be able to demonstrate that the regulation passes the target's draconian test. Together with the issues articulated in the previous section, this effectively elevates religion above all other policymaking considerations, and amounts to forcing a soft theocracy on every member state.
- In addition to making good governance difficult and allowing zealots to punch holes in members' legal systems, the target denies governments the ability to wield public policy tools in good faith. The ban on "discriminating against individuals in tax" prevents promoting minority religions through tax incentives, and the ban on "enforcing legal penalties" opens the door for violent extremist groups to use religion as a shield to escape justice.
In light of these issues, religious freedom may be best left to the existing resolutions designed to cover expression and assembly more broadly. There are many rights and freedoms that can be contemplated and protected by such resolutions, and the protection of these freedoms ought to be the most important factor, not whether the freedom stands alone with its own specially tailored protections. It certainly shouldn't stand alone in a manner this harmful.
