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Richard, Nick, Salman, Ayaan
Richard Dawkins has a response to “Froborr.” Ok I’m lying, he doesn’t really, but it might as well be. Plus it’s a response to all the “oh won’t you please think of the poor fragile believers?” wails...
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“Open to all” does not mean “pleasing to all”
The LSESU Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society issued a statement yesterday. It starts with thanks for support from various groups (including One Law for All) and a chronology of the exciting...
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Free Hamza Kashgari
You know the drill – same old same old. Join this Facebook group. You know the media report it when causes get big support on Facebook, so join. I added a few people, because you can’t just invite any...
View ArticleThose who are wanted by their countries of origin
Malaysia today is defending its extradition of Hamza Kashgari back to Saudi Arabia where he could easily be executed for saying he has questions about Mohammed. International rights groups have slammed...
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Known for his reformist views
PEN International on Kashgari. PEN demands his immediate and unconditional release, in accordance with Article 19 of the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It also calls upon the...
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Interpol as theocracies’ little helper
Interpol has said it had nothing to do with the extradition of Hamza Kashgari, but Dennis McShane MP apparently didn’t get the memo – or got the memo and didn’t believe it. The charge of apostasy was...
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Lawyers for Liberty are pissed
At Malaysia’s Home Minister, for one. Lawyers for Liberty is simply astonished and outraged at Home Minister Hishamuddin Hussein and PDRM’s continuing attempt to spin further lies and deceit over the...
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Nick Cohen on a culture that pretends to be brave
At the Rally for Free Expression. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lffXO_LLWo
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A bargain
It can seem strange how entirely alien the whole idea of free discussion can seem to people who (I suppose) have never had any experience of it. A Bangladesh court on Wednesday ordered authorities to...
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Donohue’s success
Useful background on the Catholic League. The Catholic League was founded in 1973 by Jesuit priest Virgil Blum. William Donohue assumed leadership in July 1993. Since then, the membership has grown...
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Banned as it contradicted the Quran and Hadith
More squalid airless stupidity from Malaysia: banning Irshad Manji’s book and confiscating copies from bookstores. The Home Ministry has banned the controversial book by liberal Muslim activist...
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Insulting Islamic values in Twitter messages
Another entry in the annals of Persecuting and Prosecuting People For Having an Opinion That Reactonaries Dislike. A court here on Friday charged Fazil Say, a classical and jazz pianist with an...
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My useful advice
Career advice: don’t do anything book-related in Malaysia. They bust people for managing bookstores that distribute Irshad Manji’s book. KUALA LUMPUR, Malaysia – A Borders bookstore manager in Malaysia...
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It’s OK, we’re on the 10th floor
Alom Shaha notices an excess of timidity about discussing Islam. “We can’t publish this, we’ll get firebombed.” Apparently this was the response from one of the staff at Biteback Publishing, the UK...
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Pakistan tells the world
Via Paul Fidalgo’s Morning Heresy – the Prime Minister of Pakistan says the UN “should frame laws to stop blasphemous acts.” Oh, yes, absolutely, because that kind of thing is working out so well in...
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Xianityophobia
Right right right, I’m an “Islamophobe,” and criticizing Islam is punching down because Muslims are a despised group. (The second part is true, but the first part doesn’t follow. Punching Muslims is...
View ArticleDesigns by a wonderfully acid British cartoonist
Nick Cohen has a piece in the Observer on censorship at UK universities. He starts, as he should, with Chris and Abhishek. On the morning of 3 October, Chris Moos and Abhishek Phadnis put on joke...
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Banned in New Zealand
Welcome to a brave new world of censorship. From the New Zealand Herald: The author of the first book to be banned in New Zealand for at least 22 years is asking: “Will I be burnt next?” Ted Dawe, 64,...
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Currently being pulled from libraries, schools and bookshops
The Guardian has more details on the banning of Philip Dawe’s book Into the River. Ted Dawe’s Into the River has been banned from sale or supply by the Film and Literature Board of Review (FLBR) after...
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The required balance
I want to take a more extended look at that gloating statement from “Family First.” The scare quotes are because it’s really from Bob McCoskrie, just as statements from “The Catholic League” are always...
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