Religious Freedom and Saudi Arabia

As I've noted several times, Brian Grim and Roger Finke ("Religious Freedom and Religious Violence","Religious Freedom and Human Rights") have empirically documented that religious freedom is a good thing. It is inversely associated with violence and positively correlated with a whole host of other goods, such as women's rights, civil liberties, and economic development.

Now consider the plight of Raif Badawi, blogger and the founding editor of the liberal internet forum, Free Saudi Liberals. He is set to serve ten years in jail, followed by a ten-year travel ban, face 1,000 lashes, fined around $266,000, and banned from ever working in the media again. His crime? Insulting Islam.