Taslima’s readers and fans

Taslima Nasreen has a lot of tweets about the cancellation of (or move outside of) her book launch in Kolkata. News media have been quoting her tweets, so I might as well do a few too. (How nice it would be if she had a blog.) She is getting plenty of support. The bullies don’t have a monopoly, by any means.

Wow! Veiled girls buying & reading my books. I hope they would soon remove their veils & start living w dignity.

Dhaka: Eminent writer Syed Abul Maksud holds Taslima Nasreen’s autobigraphy books ‘Nirbasan’ at Ekushe Boimela.

pic.twitter.com/vSE6Ou52

One from twelve hours ago:

Dhaka Book Fair in Muslim Majority Bangladesh now successfully launched my book. Kolkata Book Fair in Muslim minority India could not.

More publications that will uphold love for truth

Now it’s Taslima Nasreen’s turn.

Taslima Nasreen has faced protests at the launch of her latest memoir, with an event at the Calcutta Book Fair cancelled. Ms Nasreen is not at the event, and tweeted that her publisher was forced to launch the book outside the hall.

It would be nice if she had a blog. Twitter is all very well, but a blog gives a person room to move. I do think Taslima Nasreen should have a blog. [Read more…]

Treason and offending

How not to understand free speech.

The case of a cartoonist charged with treason and offending India’s national sentiments reflects a growing debate over what constitutes freedom of expression in India. His accusers argue that while it is permissible to make fun of politicians, you cannot make fun of the state.

That’s how, right there. No no no, that’s entirely wrong. Yes you can make fun of the state. The state and the church or mosque are right at the top of the list of things you must be able to make fun of in order to have free speech at all. If free speech applies just to things that don’t matter, then it’s not free. [Read more…]

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 that keep being wailed.

Actually he’s talking specifically about the Jaipur Festival (where he was one of the speakers) and Salman Rushdie and Nick Cohen’s new book – but he’s also talking generally, as is only natural, since all of those items have wide implications. [Read more…]

Ideas that undermine received wisdom

This claim of “Froborr’s” is really appallingly hostile to a great many of the foundations of a liberal open thoughtful society or culture or world.

First, the move to make a truth claim about reality part of one’s identity (“a huge part of who I am”) is death to thinking. It’s the same move the shouters about “hurting religious sentiments” make: it turns one’s ideas into one’s Self in a move to make it taboo to question them. Making it taboo to question ideas is death to thinking.

Second, the move to equate public discussion with forcible conversion is, obviously, death to public discussion. If all argument that [X is better or more true or more evidence-based than Y] amounts to forcible conversion and thus is “evil in one of its purest forms” – well I don’t even need to say more: the upshot is obvious. [Read more…]

“Evil in one of its purest forms”

Are we seeing a new trend? A new variety of passive-aggressive accommodationist mendacious gnu-bashing?

Ray Moscow alerted me to a new* entry in the genre at something called The Slacktiverse by someone called “Froborr.” It starts with: I’m an atheist. That’s my identity. It would be traumatic to change that. It’s just as traumatic to change the other way around. It ends with: Therefore, Greta Christina and other overt atheists are evil.

There’s a lot in between, of course, but that’s where it ends up. [Read more…]