5/ CENSORSHIP, ART, BLASPHEMY: RELIGION AS THE “FOUNDATION OF THE STATE” Our review of Greek case-law reveals numerous interpretations and implementations of the provisions on blasphemy. Prosecutions regarding such crimes are extremely common, in total contrast with the virtually unused anti-racist law. In summarizing the attitudes of the judiciary towards such crimes, two things need to be pointed out. First, it is usual if not universal that whenever a complaint or lawsuit is iled because of an artwork, book, visual artifact, play or other work, prosecutors at the very least initiate a criminal prosecution; artists become defendants and artworks unworthy to be deemed as or integrated into the holy community of Art. This is to say that no such complaint is found inadmissible by prosecuting authorities (as is the case with the anti-racist law described above) on grounds that might at least mention freedom of speech and artistic expression; although both of the latter are constitutionally guaranteed. In 2003, as part of the Cultural Olympiad, a visual exhibition called “Outlook” occupied public opinion for a long time, causing severe controversy among artists, politicians and clergymen.60 The eye of the storm was a painting by Belgian painter Thierry de Cordier, Asperges me. It showed a human igure covered with a shroud and bearing a cross, while on the let side a penis ejaculates towards the cross. Amid the growing fuss, the hosts decided to remove the painting a short while ater the exhibition opened, even as a public prosecutor initiated criminal proceedings against the curator for violation of the law on obscenity and defamation of religions. The curator was eventually acquitted. However, the right of the artist to exhibit his work and the right of the public to enjoy an artwork without obstruction and intrusion were deinitely annulled.61 Two years later, the artwork at issue was the graphic novel The Life of Christ by Austrian cartoonist G. Haderer. Copies of the comic were seized at the request of a public prosecutor, with criminal proceedings for defamation of religion initiated against the author, the publisher, and even bookshop owners and employees (as “primary accessories”!) who had been present at the time of the seizure. The court eventually acquitted the bookshop owners, their employees, and the publisher from charges of being primary accessories in defamation, “on grounds of lack of malice”. But the author was convicted. Ater ierce protests from cartoonists, publishing houses, authors and newspapers, Haderer was inally acquitted during a second-instance trial, which arrived at the (obvious) conclusion that the book was a humorous one (Decision No. 4532/2005 of the Athens Three-Member Court of Appeal). 60. 61. Miltiades Evert, former leader of the governing party of “New Democracy”, said that if the painting was not removed immediately, he would remove it himself, while the press oicer of the Archbishop of Athens asked then Minister of Culture and current Vice-President of the Government Evangelos Venizelos to intervene in order to stop the disgrace. And so he did… Cf. the opinion of the Greek Ombudsman in 2005: www.synigoros.gr. MAPPING ULTRA-RIGHT EXTREMISM, XENOPHOBIA AND RACISM WITHIN THE GREEK STATE APPARATUS | 55