Glenn Greenwald tried to school Maajid Nawaz. That didn’t go well.
@ggreenwald @SamHarrisOrg as if to say “those poor natives are just born like that and we must patronisingly defend everything about them”
Aka the racism of low expectations.
Pope pope pope. You really should learn to think before you speak. NPR says why.
Pope Francis said that couples who opt not to have children are being “selfish” as he spoke of a “greedy generation” that’s choosing not to procreate.
Think, pope pope. Slow down, stop talking, take a breath, and think.
Any luck yet?
Pope pope, you opted not to have children yourself. Officially. You look very fucking stupid saying things like that, given your own choices. [Read more…]
Peter Tatchell spoke at the “Sharia law, apostasy and secularism” conference in London last Saturday, the one that Maryam organized.
Although Sharia law is not the law of the UK, there have been repeated and on-going attempts by Islamists to apply Sharia principles in law and education, in a bid to make these public institutions Sharia-accommodating. This is a direct threat to human rights; most notably to the human rights of UK Muslims. [Read more…]
The government of Quebec is once again calling for the release of Raif Badawi.
The National Assembly unanimously passed a motion condemning the whipping of Badawi, and expressing support for his wife, Ensaf Haidar, and their three children.
The motion calls on the governments of Quebec and Canada to do everything possible to secure Badawi’s freedom.
“We will not put our arms down. The democratic world has to say loud and clear that we don’t want those practices to go again without any notice from the rest of the world,” said Premier Philippe Couillard.
Haidar, as well as some of Badawi’s supporters, watched the debate as it happened.
The premier has brought up the case directly with Saudi Arabian ambassador to Canada.
Poor Saudi Arabia. They must be getting so tired of hearing about this.
The case has sparked international outcry and widespread protest.
There have been numerous demonstrations across Quebec, asking for Badawi’s release.
The UN high commissioner for human rights, Zeid Raad al-Hussein, has called on Saudi Arabia’s King Abdullah to pardon him. The United States has also asked Saudi Arabia to cancel the 1,000 lashes.
And so has Charles Windsor. We’ll have a starling shall be taught to speak nothing but ‘Raif’…
A really gruesome thought has occurred to me.
First, fair warning: I’m speculating about the motives of Craig Hicks in killing the three people in that Chapel Hill condo. I know it’s stupid to speculate about the motives of killers in the absence of knowledge…but that ship has sailed. People already are speculating about the motives, and if we – by which I mean we vocal atheists – stay silent we just come across as evasive or worse.
Plus there’s the fact that it looks like a hate crime against Muslims because Muslims, and there was anger at the fact that it wasn’t being reported.For that reason too I think we shouldn’t ignore it.
So I’m speculating; that is, I’m trying to think about what might be his motives, or perhaps more accurately what set him off. [Read more…]
From a press release today by the European Parliament:
Case of Raif Badawi in Saudi Arabia
MEPs strongly condemn the flogging of Raif Badawi by the Saudi Arabian authorities as a “cruel and shocking act” and call on them “to release him immediately and unconditionally” and to ensure that his conviction and sentence, including his travel ban, are quashed. They see Mr Badawi’s case as a symbol of the assault on freedom of expression and peaceful dissent in the country, and “more broadly of the Kingdom’s characteristic policies of intolerance and extremist interpretation of Islamic law”.
Parliament instructs its Delegation for Relations with the Arab Peninsula to raise the cases of Mr Badawi and other prisoners of conscience during its forthcoming visit to Saudi Arabia and to report back to its Subcommittee on Human Rights.
The resolution was passed by 460 votes, to 153, with 29 abstentions.
Pariah state.
Now for some better news at last – Priss Choss did talk to the Saudi dictator about Raif Badawi. Who knows if it did any good or not, but he did it. Well done Choss. I’ve said very hard things about you, especially about your promotion of homeopathy and other woo, but fair play to you: good job.
Prince Charles has raised the plight of jailed blogger Raif Badawi with Saudi Arabia’s King Salman. [Read more…]
Yusor Mohammad Abu-Salha’s best friend talks about her and about the murders. She’s very generous, and very level-headed.
As told to Latoya Peterson.
Words can’t really describe who she was. She’s such an amazing person. I feel like people always say that after they lose someone. This isn’t to boost her after her death—she really was a good person.
She always put others ahead of herself, just like her husband, Deah Barakat. I am the person I am today because of her. She’s a really sweet person, you never catch her angry. She’s patient, very loving, like her mom, she’s caring. She’s a good person. She was newly married and getting used to that life transition. She had just been accepted at Chapel Hill for dentistry.
Over the summer, Yusor went to Turkey. I’m a teacher at a small private school in Raleigh, and my school ran a collection drive for Project Refugee Smiles. My students were so excited to help. They collected so many toothbrushes and packages of dental floss that Yusor couldn’t carry it—she had to pay extra bag fees. She went with her mom to assist.
The Huffington Post has some more details on Deah Shaddy Barakat, Yusor Mohammad, and her sister Razan Mohammad Abu-Salha, and on Craig Hicks.
Barakat and Mohammad were newlyweds who helped the homeless and raised funds to help Syrian refugees in Turkey this summer. They met while running the Muslim Student Association at N.C. State before he began pursuing an advanced degree in dentistry at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Mohammad planned to join her husband in dentistry school in the fall.
Abu-Salha was visiting them Tuesday from Raleigh, where she was majoring in design at N.C. State.
The Charlotte [North Carolina] Observer reports that the father of the two women murdered in Chapel Hill says it was a hate crime.
…the women’s father, Dr. Mohammad Abu-Salha, who has a psychiatry practice in Clayton, said regardless of the precise trigger Tuesday night, Hicks’ underlying animosity toward Barakat and Abu-Salha was based on their religion and culture. Abu-Salha said police told him Hicks shot the three inside their apartment.
“It was execution style, a bullet in every head,” Abu-Salha said Wednesday morning. “This was not a dispute over a parking space; this was a hate crime. This man had picked on my daughter and her husband a couple of times before, and he talked with them with his gun in his belt. And they were uncomfortable with him, but they did not know he would go this far.” [Read more…]