Danish cartoonist Kurt Westergaard’s illustration of the Prophet Muhammad with a ticking bomb in his turban was part of a collection that sparked violent protests in Muslim nations around the world in 2005 and ignited the most controversial freedom-of-speech debate…

Most everyone, no doubt, has read stories about Chinese authorities intimidating journalists, restricting Internet access at Olympic media centers, and other various reports of violations of Beijing’s supposed promise to allow freedom for the international press during the Games. You’ve…

Canada’s Maclean’s magazine (involved in another controversial human rights case that I wrote about here and here) has published an extensive article detailing the “remarkably successful” campaign to make “defamation of religions” a violation of international law. (H/t: Volokh Conspiracy)

Led by…

With the start of the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games only 9 days away, I’ve compiled a roundup of stories that give some indication of what to watch for as the games begin:

Air pollution: This is undoubtedly the biggest concern…

A story in the New York Times today details a case where government prosecutors in New York attempted to determine the identities of anonymous posters on a political blog:

A grand jury subpoena sent by prosecutors in the Bronx earlier this…

The Post-Dispatch ran a story today about the ongoing battle at Saint Louis University between communications professor Avis Meyer and the university administrators.

At issue is Meyer’s involvement in the student newspaper — The University News — where he was once the…

On Friday, Canada’s Human Rights Tribunal did something it has never done before: it dismissed a “hate speech” complaint.

The Canadian Human Rights Commission dismissed a hate speech complaint against Maclean’s magazine on Friday in a decision the complainants blamed on…

USA Today reports that a Philadelphia man was arrested and charged with several crimes, including “making terroristic threats” and “corrupting the morals of a minor” after he appeared in a YouTube video encouraging viewers to kill cops.

The Daily News says members of…

In what is, I guess, becoming a sort of recurring theme lately, I thought I’d point out perhaps the most potentially dangerous example of an attempt to censor what has until now been the freest medium for speech — the Internet.

Steve Boriss, of our own…