The pope says we can’t insult religion.
Well he would, wouldn’t he. Anyway he does.
In provocative remarks which may cause consternation in France, the Pope said that freedom of expression had its limits, especially if it involved insulting or ridiculing religion. [Read more…]
Amnesty International has satellite photos that show the damage done by Boko Haram in Baga and Doron Baga last week.
Satellite images released by Amnesty International today provide indisputable and shocking evidence of the scale of last week’s attack on the towns of Baga and Doron Baga by Boko Haram militants.
Before and after images of two neighbouring towns, Baga (160 kilometres from Maiduguri) and Doron Baga (also known as Doro Gowon, 2.5 km from Baga), taken on 2 and 7 January show the devastating effect of the attacks which left over 3,700 structures damaged or completely destroyed. Other nearby towns and villages were also attacked over this period. [Read more…]
Raif’s wife, Ensaf Haider, thinks he won’t survive the second set of lashes tomorrow, the Huffington Post reports.
Last Friday he endured the first round of lashes — 50 strikes on the back of his body by a long, hard cane — in a public flogging held in the city of Jiddah. This Friday, he will reportedly be subjected to a second round of 50 lashes.
“Raif told me he is in a lot of pain after his flogging, his health is poor and I’m certain he will not be able to cope with another round of lashes,” Badawi’s wife, Ensaf Haider, told Amnesty International.
Sky News prevents Caroline Fourest from showing the Charlie Hebdo cover immediately after she explains that it’s a “very sweet drawing that puts Mohammed outside this crime.” They jerk the camera upward and then shift away altogether to the presenter, who apologizes to anyone who may have been Offended.
Cowardly obsequious crawling assholes. They endorse the stupid claim that the cover is “Offensive” and they endorse the fiction that Charlie Hebdo was to blame. C’est dégueullasse.
A ray of hope? The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights – who is Jordanian – has told Saudi Arabia to stop flogging Raif Badawi. Ok has asked, urged, called on, whatever – he’s not in a position to tell. But still.
The United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights called on Saudi Arabia on Thursday to stop the serial flogging of an atheist and civil rights blogger sentenced to receive 1,000 lashes over an extended period.
Raif Badawi, who set up a website called “Free Saudi Liberals”, received 50 lashes after Friday prayers last week and global rights groups say he is expected to be submitted to a second round on Friday.
“Flogging is in my view at very least a form of cruel and inhuman punishment,” High Commissioner Zeid Ra’ad Al Hussein said in a statement from his Geneva office. As such, it was banned under international rights law, he added.
“I appeal to the King of Saudi Arabia to exercise his power to halt the public flogging by pardoning Mr Badawi, and to urgently review this type of extraordinary harsh penalty,” said Zeid, a former Jordanian diplomat.
DO IT, KING.
Funny, I listened to an interview with Zeid by the BBC last night and the interviewer asked about Raif (without naming him) and I thought Zeid gave a completely useless answer – generalities about capital punishment elsewhere. I was frustrated and furious – I was not expecting this! On the contrary, I thought it was a sign of the opposite – he wasn’t going to do a damn thing about it.
Guest post by Saba Farbodkia. Originally a post at British Muslims for Secular Democracy on Facebook, published here by permission.
Dear offended religious people,
Please stop the hypocrisy. The right to offend is not exclusively yours.
If you know the holy scriptures of the religions that you uphold so dearly, you already know how offensive parts of them are to people. [Read more…]
AFP at the Guardian reports on the arrest of Dieudonné.
Notorious French comedian Dieudonné M’bala M’bala has been arrested for being an “apologist for terrorism” after suggesting on Facebook that he sympathised with one of the Paris gunmen, a judicial source has said.
Prosecutors had opened the case against him on Monday after he wrote “Tonight, as far as I’m concerned, I feel like Charlie Coulibaly” – mixing the slogan “Je suis Charlie”, used in tribute to the journalists killed at magazine Charlie Hebdo, with a reference to gunman Amédy Coulibaly. Dieudonné was arrested on Wednesday.
Coulibaly killed four people at a Jewish supermarket on Friday and a police officer the day before.
In the US that wouldn’t get him arrested, although it probably would get him investigated and spied on by “Homeland” security – and I’m Millian enough to think he shouldn’t be arrested for that. But I think he’s a colossal asshole for saying it. Coulibaly was a murdering piece of shit, who carefully singled out Jews for murder. Dieudonné is disgusting.
So. Someone whose case does not fall under the statute of limitations is pursuing criminal charges against Cosby.
A model who claims Bill Cosby drugged and sexually abused her at the Playboy Mansion met with Los Angeles police on Wednesday to pursue criminal charges against the comedian over the 2008 incident.
An attorney for Chloe Goins said after the meeting that his client is the first woman accusing Cosby of sexual misconduct whose case may fall within the statute of limitations. [Read more…]
Lliana Bird also objects to the whole “Charlie Hebdo is racist!” thing.
[O]ne thing I’ve found difficult to ignore is the growing voices of those who knew little of the cartoonists and journalists saying terrible things about them, which are quite frankly unsettling.
“Racist”, “Islamophobic” and “hypocritical” have been the most common accusations. Many seemingly educated friends and social media buddies seemed to be merely glancing at a few cherry-picked Charlie Hebdo covers without making any effort in understanding their true meaning or impetus (or often even of the French translation of the accompanying captions).
