The Satanic Verses controversy later wrote "God Is Not Great", a polemic against religion. The affair however led to greater caution and some degree of self-censorship when dealing with Islamic issues in the literary and other creative arts. Many religious figures in the United States and United Kingdom shared the aversion to blasphemy of pious Muslims (if not as intensely) and did not defend Rushdie like their secular compatriots. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Robert Runcie, demanded that the government expand the Blasphemy Act to cover other religions, including Islam. Michael Walzer wrote that the response revealed an evolution of the meaning of blasphemy; it
A Brief History of Blasphemy A Brief History of Blasphemy A Brief History of Blasphemy: Liberalism, Censorship and the Satanic Verses is a 1990 book by Richard Webster, in which the author discusses the controversy over Salman Rushdie's novel "The Satanic Verses" (1988). Webster critiques the freedom to blaspheme, and argues against "The Crime of Blasphemy" (which advocated the abolition of Britain's blasphemy laws "without replacement"). Webster notes that he named the book after the fourth section of "The Crime of Blasphemy", a pamphlet issued by the International Committee for the Defence of Salman Rushdie and his Publishers, and that his work is influenced by