Saudi Arabia? Turkey? Malaysia? Indonesia?

Which Muslim country do you think this headline is from?

The reality is that it’s from Italy, a Western democracy with blasphemy laws still active today that are being used for simply mentioning the word “God”. The law is applied to both Italian and non-Italian players. PEW figures from 2010 put Christianity as the top faith in the country, constituting 83.3% of the population. A more recent figure from WorldAtlas puts this figure for the Christian population at 71.4%. Historically, Roman Catholicism has been the faith of choice for Italians. BBC News put out a lengthy four sentence article detailing the issue, that article can be read here:

Two Italian footballers have been given one-match bans for blasphemy during Serie A matches.

Sassuolo’s Francesco Magnanelli and Parma’s Matteo Scozzarella were shown on television making blasphemous remarks in separate incidents.

There is a strict ban on taking God’s name in vain in Italy, and the nation’s football association has disciplined players heard doing so since 2010.

Udinese midfielder Rolando Mandragora was banned for the offence in 2018.

Well, that was quite exhaustive, wasn’t it? CNN’s article on the subject was much more elaborative, providing lots of details about previous instances of the blasphemy law being used in sports to censor players and coaches. Here are some quotes from the CNN article:

Blasphemy is hugely frowned upon in Italy and the country’s soccer authorities have sought to crack down on it over the past decade.

In August 2018, Rolando Mandragora was banned for one-game in August 2018 after taking God’s name in vain while playing for Udinese against Sampdoria.
Last season, Atalanta coach Gian Piero Gasperini was suspended after making blasphemous remarks during his side’s game with SPAL.

Italy’s soccer authorities have come in for criticism for their disciplinary judgments this season, particularly on racism.

Just last month the Italian Football Federeation (FIGC) said Cagliari would not be punished for the racist monkey chants directed towards Inter Milan striker Romelu Lukaku by its fans, while no punishment has been handed to Hellas Verona for its fans racially abusing AC Milan midfielder Franck Kessie.

FIFA President Gianni Infantino has urged the FIGC to take a stronger stance against racism.

Another article from The Guardian provides us with more details from a previous incident, where one player was investigated for potentially having said “Dio” or “God”:

Chievo’s coach was not the only one caught out; one of his players, Michele Marcolini, was deemed to have said “God” as he left the field after a red card. After scrutiny of TV footage, however, the league judge, Gianpaolo Tosel, was convinced Marcolini had deployed “a slang expression used in Lombardy and [the region around Venice] with a crude reference to ‘Diaz’ and not ‘Dio'” – although no one on the pitch was called Diaz.

One wonders where the moral outrage has gone regarding blasphemy laws, it seems as if it only becomes a problem when non-Christians use the same rules as Christians, but not when Christianity majority populations use the same rules. Many xenophobes from the Football Lad’s Alliance, Pediga, Britain First, and the Soldiers of Odin have always argued that by including hijabs in sports, religion is being introduced into sports and in an effort to keep sporting activities secular and outside of the influence of religion, hijabis should remove their religious symbol (the headscarf) before participating in sporting events.

Why then, would they not equally oppose religion in Italy, in a Western democracy, negatively influencing the sport and censoring non-Christians due to Christian laws? This only goes to demonstrate that their problem is not with religion, just with a religion that disagrees with their beliefs. Muslims should highlight this double standard. Do any Christian apologists who have an issue with the hijab (a female’s headscarf) in sport not equally have an issue with the blasphemy law in Italy curtailing their ‘freedoms’? If so, I’ve yet to see David Wood or Sam Shamoun rebuke what they refer to as “Romanism” for oppressing non-Catholics.

and God knows best.