Return to Alum Rock

I see that the pressure group, Christian Voice, have announced plans to descend on the Alum Rock area of Birmingham, where two Christian preachers were recently threatened with arrest by a PCSO. As Christian Voice have often been described as "Christian fundamentalists" by left-wing secularists who wish to imply that they are some Christian equivalent of al-Qaeda, we can presumably expect to see them engage in a vengeful orgy of violent destruction? Astonishingly enough, no. Rather, they will be restricting their activities to the handing-out of leaflets, the same heinous act that Arthur Cunningham and Joseph Abraham committed.

The protest will take place next Saturday, the 14th June. According to the Christian Voice website, the organisation's director, Stephen Green (who has himself previously been arrested and prosecuted for handing out leaflets), had this to say:

The case also raises concerns about the association of Islam and the Police. If people like Naguthney are using the British Police as a launching ground for Muslim activism, whether in the National Association of Muslim Police or in day-to-day police activities, then they should be expelled.

It is less than two years ago when the then Home Secretary John Reid was asked by Abu Izzadeen at a meeting in Leyton, East London : "How dare you come to a Muslim area when over 1,000 Muslims have been arrested?" There was an outcry, but now we find a Muslim police employee, someone his Chief Constable probably regards as a 'moderate', clearly has the same mind-set as a convicted terrorist.

By the grace of God, this no-go area for the Gospel will be challenged. West Midlands Police Chief Constable Sir Paul Scott-Lee has an odd sense of humour creating a post of counter-terrorism and cohesion for Anil Patani to be in charge of. But with people like that at the top, and with its tarnished record, we need to ask how far up West Midlands Police the peculiar bias to Islam demonstrated by the Dispatches affair and Naeem Naguthney's attitude actually goes.

N.B. Anil Patani is the officer responsible for the Undercover Mosque debacle.

It is to be hoped that the West Midlands Police will manage to resist the temptation to arrest, or otherwise impede, Mr Green and his supporters. After all, you'd think that they might have learnt their lesson by now! But then again, it is the West Midlands Police we're talking about: who knows how far their ability to make complete fools of themselves goes?

The reaction of the local Muslims will also be interesting to see. Will the "moderate majority" behave with the same restraint as the "Christian fundamentalists", I wonder?

Hat-tip: Pub Philosopher

Promoting Christianity is now a hate crime

What is wrong with the West Midlands Police? Just last month they had to pay out £100,000 over their handling of the Undercover Mosque fiasco, and now they are being taken to court by two Christian evangelists who were threatened with arrest for handing out leaflets in a Muslim area of Birmingham.

Arthur Cunningham and Joseph Abraham, both of whom are American, were talking to a group of young men in the Alum Rock Road area of the city when they were approached by a PCSO, who began questioning them about their beliefs. When he discovered their nationality, he, displaying the professionalism for which PCSOs are justly renowned, favoured them with a lengthy diatribe against George Bush, before telling them that as the area was a Muslim one, they were not allowed to preach Christianity there, that doing so constituted a "hate crime", and that if they did not desist they would be arrested. He also told them not to return to the area, saying, "you have been warned. If you come back here and get beaten up, well you have been warned".

As I've remarked before, it seems that incidents like this are happening on a weekly basis, if not more frequently. The West Midlands force has a particularly poor record, but officers from all police forces seem quite happy to use threats and intimidation in order to silence politically-incorrect views, and prevent politically-incorrect behaviour, a category within which promulgating Christian doctrine apparently now falls. I particularly note that, rather than make an effort to ensure that all people are safe to go anywhere in the country without getting beaten up, the PCSO in this case evidently feels that if Messrs Cunningham and Abraham were to get attacked, it would be their own fault, and no concern of his. No wonder dissatisfaction with the police is at record levels!

The PCSO's comments also indicate that, when Michael Nazir-Ali made his famous remarks about "no go areas", he was absolutely right. After all, the PCSO - who I rather suspect may have been a Muslim himself (update: he was) - made no bones about telling the men that if they preached Christianity in a Muslim area they were at risk of being assaulted. If that doesn't make an area a "no go area", then what does?

This, then, is Britain in 2008: a country in which Muslim preachers can incite murder with impunity, while Christian preachers are threatened with arrest for peacefully handing out leaflets; a country in which free speech is stifled to appease favoured minorities; a country in which certain areas become unsafe for non-Muslims, and our political and religious leaders turn a blind eye. And liberals still can't understand why we don't all embrace multiculturalism and "diversity"!

Hat-tip: Anon, in the comments

Even a stopped clock...

The police force that issued a teenager with a court summons for calling Scientology a cult could face a judicial review over the legality of its policing guidelines.

Although prosecutors last week declined to take the 16-year-old to court, freedom of speech campaigners are to ask City of London police to explain how the initial decision to issue the summons was made.

Campaigners said they would call for a judicial review if it is found that the force's guidelines for policing demonstrations led officers to confront the schoolboy.

If it emerges that the policy relates only to anti-Scientology demonstrations, a complaint could be lodged with the Independent Police Complaints Commission instead.

Shami Chakrabarti, the director of the civil liberties organisation Liberty, which spearheaded the teenager's defence, said: "We want to know who gave the instruction to issue this summons.

"Curtailing people's freedom of speech is a very serious issue and it's important to know whether this is part of the force's policy or a decision relating specifically to the Church of Scientology. There is the possibility of a complaint to the IPCC or a judicial review."

Chakrabarti said she was concerned the police action could have a "chilling effect" on other protesters who wanted to express their opinions.

"Some people are very easily intimidated and will be put off exercising their right to free speech by the thought that they may face court action over it. We have to defend that right and show how wrong the police were in issuing this summons," she said.

Well, on this occasion, Chakrabarti's right, and it is good that Liberty (indeed, that anyone) is challenging the police's handling of this matter. Although I'm not quite certain of the manner in which Liberty "spearheaded the teenager's defence", other than by the lovely and fragrant Ms Chakrabarti describing the summons as "barmy", and thereby getting herself in the papers.

But, while on this occasion Chakrabarti's organisation is doing the right thing, it's worth pointing out that she seems to take a remarkably selective approach to the question of free speech, and its suppression. After all, in recent years we have seen, inter alia, the leader of the BNP twice prosecuted for calling Islam a "wicked, vicious faith", an anti-Islamic blogger arrested for the content of his postings, a schoolgirl arrested for complaining that fellow pupils did not speak English, an academic forced out of his job for expressing politically incorrect views about the link between race and IQ, and measures passed banning BNP members from certain jobs. Yet on all these issues, and many more, Shami Chakrabarti has, notwithstanding her abundantly evident love of the media spotlight, maintained a strict silence. Maybe she was on holiday when they happened.

'Straight' added to the List of Banned Words

I see that the Crown Prosecution Service has decided that prosecuting the teenager who called Scientology a cult would not be in the public interest. I suppose that we should be thankful that the CPS have, on this occasion, demonstrated a modicum of good sense. However, the fact remains that the police attempted to stifle free speech, purely on the grounds that that speech was, or might be, "offensive".

On Tuesday, I noted that cases such as the above - innocuous conduct being treated as criminal by an overbearing police force - seemed to be happening on a weekly basis. Well, I may have underestimated the frequency with which it occurs, for here is yet another instance of this phenomenon:

A complaint has been made to police over a banner declaring a former gay bar in Sunderland city centre has now gone "straight".

The sign outside the Retox bar, in High Street West, read: "Retox under new management! Now Straight! Top totty dancers on match days!"

A police inquiry is under way into a complaint that the sign, which has now been taken down, was offensive.

The bar owners said it was never their intention to offend.

Assistant manager Carl Lovett said: "We admit it was not the best banner but there was never any intention to cause offence."

I assume, from the way in which this is reported, that the "offensive" part of the sign was the word 'straight', although I suppose that it might just possibly have been the "top totty dancers" bit that did it. Either way, while the sign might have been slightly crude, I fail to see what, precisely, was so upsetting to the complainant. Is mentioning the very existence of heterosexuality now deemed "homophobic"? This bar had changed its commercial direction, to one which it presumably hopes will prove more profitable: is it to be prohibited from announcing that fact to the world?

In any event, as I have repeated time after time, the fact that something is offensive to someone is not in itself sufficient reason for banning it. After all, the right to free speech would have precious little meaning if it was restricted in scope to speech which no one would ever want to silence. But, as we see time and again, that is the road down which this country is heading, at a pretty rapid rate. And, as the behaviour of the complainant in this case demonstrates, there is no shortage of people who not only support the suppression of free speech, but are also willing to assist in it, by becoming informers against those who transgress against the state's notion of acceptable language.

The banned C word

Yes, 'cult'. This is the word that has led to a fifteen-year-old boy being taken to court, after participating in a protest against the Church of Scientology, outside the organisation's headquarters in the City of London. During the protest, the unnamed malefactor held a placard which read "Scientology is not a religion, it is a dangerous cult". A police officer immediately informed him that the word 'cult' was prohibited, and he was subsequently told that his sign violated section 5 of the Public Order Act 1986, and was "strongly advised" to remove the offending placard. When the teenager refused to do so, he was handed a court summons, and the sign was confiscated. According to the City of London Police (whose officers, incidentally, have something of a track record of taking bribes gifts from the Scientologists), the matter will now be referred to the Crown Prosecution Service.

It seems that we can barely go a week in this country without hearing of the police taking action against some perfectly harmless person, for engaging in perfectly innocuous behaviour, on the grounds of that behaviour's real or (more often) imagined offensiveness to members of some minority group. A Down's Syndrome sufferer is subjected to a seven month investigation for having a playground spat with an Asian girl; a man is arrested for singing "I'd rather wear a turban"; an Oxford undergraduate is prosecuted for questioning the sexuality of a police horse. These are just a handful drawn from the growing litany of such absurd cases. What we are witnessing is nothing less than the eradication of our freedoms, in the name of non-offensiveness.

Undercover Mosque vindicated

An update on these stories:

West Midlands Police and the Crown Prosecution Service have apologised for accusing the makers of a Channel 4 documentary of distortion.

The apology and the promise of £100,000 were made at the High Court on Thursday.

It follows comments made about a Dispatches programme, Undercover Mosque, which tackled claims of Islamic extremism in the West Midlands.

The police statement said the force was wrong to make the allegations.

[...]

The statement, released to the media after the High Court hearing by West Midlands Police, said they accepted there had been no evidence that Channel 4 or the documentary makers had "misled the audience or that the programme was likely to encourage or incite criminal activity".

It added that the Ofcom report showed the documentary had "accurately represented the material it had gathered and dealt with the subject matter responsibly and in context".

The police statement concluded: "We accept, without reservation, the conclusions of Ofcom and apologise to the programme makers for the damage and distress caused by our original press release."

So, if the police now accept that the programme was wholly accurate, what are we to make of the force's earlier claim that the programme makers - Hardcash Productions - were guilty of "completely distorting" what was said? Or, indeed, of their long-running vendetta against Hardcash, which included attempting to have them prosecuted for "inciting racial hatred", and, when this plan was frustrated, making an official complaint about the documentary to the communications regulator?
Presumably the police have not seen any new footage which might have explained their change of heart. As such, their original claim that the programme distorted what was said must surely be no more or less tenable than it was when they first made it. Why, then, have they now performed a complete U-turn, and accepted that it was untenable? I suspect that it is because they always knew that the accusations they were making were utterly unfounded, but that they hoped that, by making them, they could intimidate the programme makers, and anyone else who might be tempted to criticise Islam (or, indeed, any Muslims), into silence. As with so much else that the police do these days, their conduct in this matter really does beg the question, whose side are they on?

Thought Policeman of the Day: PC Paul Hughes

Here is a short video which really sums up the extent to which free speech is being suppressed in Britain today. A man is arrested on suspicion of a "racially aggravated public order offence", for singing the words "I'd rather wear a turban":



The speed with which PC Hughes pounced on the man as soon as he heard the "racist" words was really rather impressive. And am I being utterly paranoid, or did a slight smirk, as of a bully exulting in his own power, briefly leap across his face as he told his victim what his "crime" was (at 14 seconds in)?

Still, I'm sure we can all agree that arresting people like the heinous (and totally unrepentant) evildoer seen in this video is a far more valuable use of police time than such petty trivialities as, for example, stopping axe wielding burglars. Thank Heavens the police have their priorities straight!

Hat-tip: John Trenchard

Lionheart arrested

Just a brief note to say that the anti-Islamic blogger Lionheart's long-anticipated arrest, on suspicion of "stirring up racial hatred", took place at the end of March, as the Luton and Dunstable on Sunday newspaper reported a fortnight ago. He has since been released on bail, and will find out later this month whether or not he is to be charged.

Hat-tip: Lionheart

Alan Craig's judicial review application fails

An update on this post:

A Christian party has lost a High Court bid to have its party election broadcast (PEB) repeated, after claims it was censored by the BBC and ITV.

Christian Choice said the BBC forced changes to its description of a Muslim group in a PEB aired in London.

The BBC said it expressed concern and Christian Choice responded by agreeing to change the form of words.

The judge said the request had been left "far too late" - although he did not think the PEB had been libellous.

Alan Craig, the party's candidate for London mayor, had argued the action breached his rights under the European Convention on Human Rights - which guarantees the right to freedom of expression.

Rejecting Mr Craig's request for a judicial review, the judge, Mr Justice Collins, said he should have launched the legal challenge before the broadcast took place on 23 April.

He said it was "perfectly permissible" for the BBC to take into account legal advice that the original broadcast might have been libellous - although he did not think it would have been.

However he said he was not a libel lawyer, and that was not the point.

Mr Craig said the BBC had "commanded" the words be changed about the Muslim group planning to build a large mosque in east London; a proposal which Mr Craig opposes.

But the judge said the BBC had indicated that if a legal challenge had been issued before the broadcast it would have "backed down and let them publish as they wished."

"Unfortunately that was not done," Mr Justice Collins added.

According to Melanie Phillips in the Spectator, Mr Justice Collins added that "the Tablighi Jamaat could properly be described as 'extremist'; that it was 'responsible for imbuing ideas leading to terrorist activities'; and that it was 'understandable that Cllr Craig should have concerns'". Nothing in the judgment sounds like a ringing endorsement of the conduct of the BBC and ITV; rather, they appear to have won only because of Mr Craig's delay in bringing the matter before the court.

It's hardly a ringing endorsement of Tablighi Jamaat, either. After all, the organisation has now been described as "extremist" by a High Court judge. That goes some way beyond Mr Craig's preferred term, "separatist", and massively further than "controversial", the word that ITV deemed just too offensive to be broadcast. I'd venture to suggest that Mr Justice Collins' description of Tablighi Jamaat might well make a rather nice quote for the anti-mega mosque campaigners to use in their future campaign literature!

Postscript: As the building of the mega mosque draws ever nearer, and as Ken Livingstone promises to help the Brick Lane mosque get public money to build a minaret, spare a thought for the ten thousand members of Europe's largest church, the Kingsway International Christian Church. They were forced off their site in East London to make way for the Olympic development, and have been unable to find any appropriate replacement premises. It says rather a lot about the religious and cultural state of our country, when Europe's largest church is made homeless, while just a few miles away the authorities connive in the creation of what will be Europe's largest mosque.

Censoring election broadcasts

Readers may be familiar with the name of Alan Craig, the Christian Peoples Alliance councillor in Newham, who has been leading the opposition to the creation of the East London mega mosque. Mr Craig is also standing for the Christian Choice in Thursday's London mayoral election. Last Wednesday, the Christian Choice released their election broadcast for the mayoral and London Assembly elections. The broadcast, which can be seen here, contains a brief mention of the mega mosque, and refers to Alan Craig's opposition to it.

However, Mr Craig today launched legal action against the BBC and ITV, claiming that they had forced him to edit the broadcast to remove criticisms of Tablighi Jamaat, the Islamic organisation behind the building of the mega mosque. In the first version of his broadcast, Mr Craig described the group as "separatist". This term proved unacceptable to the broadcasters, who ordered him to substitute the word "controversial", which he did, under protest. Subsequently, however, ITV decided that even this mild description was intolerable, and insisted that the appellation be applied only to the mega mosque, and not to the group building it. Ironically, Mr Craig was even prevented from using the hackneyed phrase "moderate Muslims", in reference to those Muslims who have opposed the mega mosque, because it was felt that this could imply that Tablighi Jamaat was not "moderate". The fact that all the evidence suggests that the group is both separatist and extremist, and that it is, in consequence, undeniably controversial, did not deter the BBC and ITV from censoring anything that could remotely resemble a criticism of the organisation.

But even if one does not agree with Mr Craig's views on Tablighi Jamaat, it is still unreasonable to censor his broadcast. As Andrea Minichiello Williams, director of the Christian Legal Centre, put it "providing that the content of an election broadcast is within the law, the BBC and ITV should enable the electorate to hear the unedited views of candidates and allow them to make up their own minds as to whether they agree or not". In censoring the Christian Choice election broadcast, the BBC and ITV have restricted the ability of a candidate to put his views to the public, have prevented the public from developing the fullest possible knowledge of a candidate, and have thus sought to undermine democracy.

Hat-tip: English Rose

Witch hunt of the day

I read that the Labour MP for Hastings and Rye, Michael Foster, has called for members of the BNP to be banned from working in the public services, after it was revealed that the Department of Work and Pensions had granted permission to two of its employees to stand for the party in the forthcoming council elections. Foster's demands have been backed by the general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services Union, Mark Serwotka.

Members of the BNP are already banned from working in the police force, and an officer in the Greater Manchester force is currently facing disciplinary proceedings for allegedly committing the heinous crime of wearing a badge supporting the party. In the past, it has also been suggested that they should be banned from working as firemen, and there have been a number of individual cases of BNP members being dismissed from their jobs, in both the public and private sector, on account of their political affiliations. Oddly enough that great champion of liberty and human rights, Shami Chakrabarti, has yet to interest herself in these matters...

There is no suggestion that either of the two civil servants at the centre of this case have been performing their duties in any manner other than that required of them. Nor, so far as I am aware, has there ever been any such accusation in any of the numerous cases of people being hounded out of their jobs for either supporting the BNP, or in some other manner offending the sensibilities of goodthinkful liberals (vide Frank Ellis). In a decent society, an individual's ability to do their job properly would, in most cases, be the sole determinant of the question whether or not they kept that job.

In modern British society, however, there is an increasing tendency to deny known thought criminals the legal and moral rights that everyone else takes for granted. As I have written before, this is profoundly dangerous to the democratic process (or what's left of it), and has the potential to fatally undermine all political debate. After all, it is difficult to view the bans and consequent witch hunts that the likes of Michael "Matthew Hopkins" Foster favour as being anything other than an attempt to intimidate people into not exercising their rights of free speech and freedom of association in a manner other than that approved by the liberal-left, by threatening to take away their livelihoods if they speak heresy, or associate with heretics. And yet Foster and his ilk have the nerve to call themselves "anti-fascists"!

Thought Crime Roundup (1)

At a time when various leftists are throwing tantrums over the decision of the Hampstead and Highgate Express (the "Ham and High") to publish a BNP advertisement, a potentially rather more important bit of news relating to the party has gone largely unnoticed. BNP for Cleveland relates the story of Barry Towers, who has been dismissed from his job as a steward at Middlesbrough Football Club, allegedly because he stood for the BNP in a recent council by-election in the city.

Now, I have no personal knowledge of the circumstances surrounding Barry Towers' dismissal. In the absence of any MSM coverage, or any comment from the football club on the case, all my remarks must be based solely on Mr Towers' version of events, as relayed via the BNP for Cleveland blog. And certainly, it would be desirable to be apprised of a few more facts about the dismissal; notably, what reason the club gave Mr Towers for dismissing him - did they say that it was on account of his involvement with the BNP, or are they claiming that there was another, more justifiable, reason?
In the absence of such information, it is impossible to be certain what the true situation is. However, the temporal proximity between Mr Towers' candidature (the election only took place a month ago), and his dismissal, is interesting, to say the least. And he would not be the first BNP member to have been sacked for his involvement with the party.

To allow election candidates, whatever their party, to be dismissed from their jobs on account of their political activity is to undermine the very basis of the democratic process. Such behaviour cannot be construed as anything other than an attempt to stifle debate, by intimidating people into not expressing certain views, and preventing certain policies or ideologies from being put before the electorate. If this is indeed what has happened here, then that is deplorable. Equally deplorable is the fact that the decision of a local newspaper to promote free speech and debate has been met with greater outrage, than the apparent attempt of an employer to suppress it.

An imam walks into a bar...

I read that the left-wing "comedian" Ben Elton has made the astounding suggestion that the BBC is too scared to allow jokes about Islam to be broadcast. Speaking to the Christian cultural magazine, Third Way, Elton, who is apparently a churchgoing atheist (presumably that fits with the hypocrisy of a supposed radical leftist who fawns over the Royal Family, and writes kitsch musicals with Andrew Lloyd Webber), said that:

I believe that part of it is due to the genuine fear that the authorities and the communities have about provoking the radical elements of Islam. There is no doubt about it, the BBC will let vicar gags pass but they would not let imam gags pass...I wanted to use the phrase 'Mohammed came to the mountain' and everybody said, 'Oh, just don't! Just don't! Don't go there!' It was nothing to do with Islam, I was merely referring to the old proverb, 'If the mountain won't come to Mohammed, Mohammed must go to the mountain.' And people just said, 'Let's not!' It's incredible.

Now, I would personally be happy with anything that keeps Ben Elton off the airwaves. I simply don't find the man remotely funny. Indeed, not only do I not find him even vaguely amusing, but I also find him deeply cringeworthy - a kind of real-life David Brent. No doubt his censored joke, whatever it was, was as dreadful as all his other ones.

But in this case, he is absolutely correct. It is abundantly evident that the mainstream media, and not just the BBC, does voluntarily censor itself to avoid offending Muslims, in a manner that it would never feel the need to do with any other religion. One need only consider the fact that, in the whole of the UK, the only newspaper that reprinted the infamous Danish Motoons was the student newspaper at Cardiff University. And when the university's students' union, who publish the newspaper - ironically titled Gair Rhydd (Welsh for "Free Word") - realised what they'd done, they issued a grovelling apology, recalled all the copies, and suspended the editor. Would the same thing have happened had the cartoons been anti-Christian?

This kind of double standard applies not only in the case of direct references to Muslims, or Mohammed. Today also brought the news that a set of books aimed at promoting homosexuality to schoolchildren aged five and upwards have been withdrawn from primary schools in Bristol, after Muslim parents complained en masse. Of course, it is quite reasonable to oppose the left-wing brainwashing of very young children, which was the evident purpose of these books, and complaints were also made by some Christian organisations, such as the Christian Institute. But a comparison of the responses to Christian and Muslim complaints is instructive. Last May, Sunderland University's Dr Elizabeth Atkinson, who is responsible for the production of the books, was scathingly dismissive of Christian concerns, saying that "we knew when we started this that the Christian groups wouldn't like it because they don't like homosexuals. It wasn't surprising." Yet as soon as Muslims complained, the books were swiftly removed, in order to, as Bristol City Council put it, allow schools to "operate safely".

Muslims constantly complain that they are the victims of discrimination, and many on the left are more than happy to give credence to their claims - indeed, Ben Elton's comments have already been recorded as an example of "secular, liberal Islamophobia" at Islamophobia Watch. But the fact is, that, by virtue of a unique combination of whining about how unbelievably oppressed they are, and expressly or impliedly threatening violence against anyone who challenges them (a tactic most recently observed in the actions that led to the temporary removal of Fitna from Liveleak's servers), they have achieved a privileged status in this country, and, indeed, across the entirety of Western Europe. As Ben Elton's comments show, this is something that is recognised by increasing numbers of people, including some on the left. The next challenge, of course, is to actually do something about it...

Fitna removed

Oh well, free speech was good while it lasted. Both versions of Geert Wilders' film have been removed from LiveLeak, and replaced with the following message:

The Removal of "Fitna": Official Liveleak Statement

Following threats to our staff of a very serious nature, and some ill informed comments from certain members of the British media that could directly affect the safety of some staff members, Liveleak has been left with no other choice but to remove Fitna from our servers.

This is a sad day for freedom of speech on the net but we have to place the safety and well being of our staff above all else. We would like to thank the thousands of people from all backgrounds and religions, who gave us their support. They realised LiveLeak.com is a vehicle for many opinions and not just for the support of one.

Perhaps there is still hope that this situation may produce a discussion that could benefit and educate all of us as to how we can accept one another’s culture.

We stood for what we believe in, the ability to be heard, but in the end the price was too high.

I'm not sure what the "ill informed comments from certain members of the British media that could directly affect the safety of some staff members" were. But I think that we can all guess where the threats of violence came from. A "Religion of Peace" indeed!

I don't blame LiveLeak for taking the film down: if they felt that there was a real risk of violence ensuing then they clearly have a duty not to compromise the safety of their staff. Indeed, they deserve praise for showing Fitna in the first place, when so many other media organisations were doing all they could to prevent the film from being seen. I do not, however, share their hope that "this situation may produce a discussion that could benefit and educate all of us as to how we can accept one another’s culture". I for one have no intention of accepting Islam, and see absolutely no reason why I should.

But what this really demonstrates is the extent to which it has become virtually impossible, in European countries, to criticise or challenge Islam. To do so is, as has been demonstrated time and again, to put one's very life at risk. Surely the speed with which LiveLeak has been forced to remove the film should serve to demonstrate that Islam is not like other religions, but is a threat to all the values of Western Civilisation.

There's a first time for everything. The only constant: angry Muslims

Astonishingly, the government (and, indeed, the normally particularly inept Home Office) has done something with which I agree:

The controversial Muslim cleric Yusuf al-Qaradawi has been refused a visa to visit Britain.

The Home Office said the UK would not tolerate the presence of those who seek to justify acts of terrorist violence.

During his last visit in 2004, Dr Al-Qaradawi defended suicide attacks on Israelis as "martyrdom in the name of God", during a BBC interview.

Dr Al-Qaradawi applied for the visa eight months ago, so that he could receive medical treatment in Britain.

Reacting to the decision, the Muslim Council of Britain (MCB) called it deplorable, and said the government had caved in to unreasonable demands spearheaded by the leader of the Conservative Party, David Cameron.

Inayat Bunglawala of the MCB said the decision had "worrying implications for freedom of speech".

"Whatever one may think of some of Qaradawi's views, the way forward is surely to allow them to be aired and then, if appropriate, to challenge them openly."

You know, calls for free speech always sound so much more convincing when made by people who don't have a track record of trying to suppress the free speech of others. As I have previously noted, Bunglawala was an enthusiastic supporter of the restrictions imposed on free speech by the Religious Hatred Act, and was among those calling for the laws against "inciting racial hatred" to be expanded in scope after Nick Griffin's acquittal. Why is it that Bunglawala thinks that Qaradawi's opinions should be challenged and debated, but that Griffin's should be silenced?
Furthermore, it is almost universally accepted that the right to free speech does not extend to the right to incite others to criminality, which is what Qaradawi certainly came very close to doing, when he sought to justify acts of mass murder.

In any event, this is not really a free speech issue. Qaradawi is not having any of his human rights violated: there is no right to be granted a visa to enter the UK, and the question of a right to exercise free speech here only arises once someone has arrived here. Accordingly, it is perfectly reasonable for the government to make this decision based solely on the question of whether or not his presence would be beneficial.

Last week Mr Cameron called Dr Al-Qaradawi "dangerous and divisive", and called on the government not to allow him an entry visa.

Well said Cameron. Not something I say a lot, but when set against the likes of Inayat Bunglawala, even Call Me Dave comes up smelling of roses.

"This decision will send the wrong message to Muslims everywhere about the state of British society and culture", said Muhammad Abdul Bari, secretary-general of the Muslim Council.

He said Dr Al-Qaradawi was respected as a scholar throughout the Islamic world.

Well, that tells you rather a lot about the Muslim world, doesn't it? As I wrote in my last post, there are very few shared values between them and us.

He's right about it sending the wrong message about "the state of British society and culture", though. This is, after all, an unusually tough response on the part of the government to Islamic extremists, and as such sends a rather misleading message. The more usual response to such people is to stick them on a government taskforce.

Mohammed Shafiq, from Muslim youth organisation the Ramadhan Foundation, criticised the decision.

He said: "We've had figures like Nick Griffin and the BNP operating freely and promoting violence towards ethnic minorities, and nothing is done.

"This smacks of double standards, and will isolate Muslim communities further."

So far as I am aware, there is no evidence that Nick Griffin, or the BNP as a party, has ever promoted violence towards anyone, and certainly not towards non-whites in general. Nor is it accurate to say that "nothing is done". As Shafiq might recall, Nick Griffin, and his associate Mark Collett, were twice brought to trial on charges of "inciting racial hatred" (a crime which is itself a restriction on free speech). The police and CPS have hardly shown themselves to be averse to prosecuting Mr Griffin: on the contrary, they seem all too keen to do it.

Indeed, the only cases that I can think of in which people have openly incited violence and got away with it have involved Muslims. I am thinking in particular of the police response to last year's television programme, Undercover Mosque. As readers will no doubt recall, that programme featured Islamic clerics inciting a variety of crimes, including murder. And yet the response of the police was to investigate the possibility of having the film-makers charged with "inciting racial hatred", before making a complaint about the programme to the media regulator, Ofcom (a complaint which was subsequently rejected). So, while there may well be double standards, it doesn't look like they are operating against Muslims.

It should also be noted, once again, that Qaradawi has no right to enter the UK, and, as such, cannot have a right to exercise free speech here. Nick Griffin, by contrast, is a British citizen, and does, therefore, have the right to live here, and to exercise free speech here. As, indeed, do the likes of Bunglawala, Bari, and Shafiq. Considering the above, I have to say that Shafiq's remarks, based as they are on a possibly libellous accusation, a misleading comparison, and a falsehood so severe that it completely inverts the truth, serve only to demonstrate the utter weakness of Muslim claims that they are being oppressed and discriminated against.

Anyway, Qaradawi isn't coming, and, as an added bonus, we may also be getting shot of Abu Hamza pretty soon. Now, if only we could find someone willing to take Rowan Williams...

Police confirm Lionheart arrest claim

It seems that the news of Lionheart's impending arrest has made the MSM. Well, alright, it's only the Bedfordshire on Sunday local paper. Still, it's better than nothing.

The full article can be read here, although most of it simply seems to have been regurgitated from Lionheart's own posts on the matter. But there is one interesting piece of information, right at the end of the piece:

A spokesman for Bedfordshire Police said: "We are aware of this particular internet site and we are taking action."

This would appear to be the first confirmation of Lionheart's story by the police. Some bloggers and commenters have expressed scepticism, to one degree or another, about the veracity of Lionheart's claim that he was facing arrest, on the grounds that it was uncorroborated. I myself was only prepared to accept his story provisionally, pending confirmation from an impartial source. Well, the fact that the police spokesman admitted that "action" is to be taken over Lionheart's blog constitutes that confirmation. As does the Bedfordshire on Sunday report, in fact.

Hat-tip: Lionheart

Anti-Islamic blogger facing arrest?

In my perambulations around the blogosphere, I have occasionally come across the Luton-based anti-Islamic blogger Lionheart. Well, yesterday he left the following message at his blog:

I am currently out of the Country and on my return home to England I am going to be arrested by British detectives on suspicion of Stirring up Racial Hatred by displaying written material" contrary to sections 18(1) and 27(3) of the Public Order Act 1986.

This charge if found guilty carries a lengthy prison sentence, more than what most paedophiles and rapists receive, and all for writing words of truth about the barbarity that is living in the midst of our children , which threatens the very future of our Country.

Now, not being involved in this case myself, I cannot say for a certainty that Lionheart's claim is accurate. However, I will say that this would not be the first time that a British blogger has been arrested on account of his writings: in June I wrote about the case of Andrew Love, who pleaded guilty to committing a "racially-aggravated breach of the peace", after writing a blog in which he "directed insults at groups including black and disabled people, Muslims and homosexuals". If it can happen to Andrew Love, why can't it also happen to Lionheart, or, indeed, to any other blogger who offends against the dictates of political correctness, now given legal force by the ever-growing body of "anti-hatred" legislation?

Ultimately, those of us not directly involved cannot be certain of the truth of this matter until Lionheart returns to Britain, and the police act (or don't, as the case may be). Personally, given Andrew Love's case, as well as the numerous other cases of people being arrested on spurious pretexts over accusations of "racism", or related thought crimes, I am provisionally inclined to believe Lionheart's account. Certainly, the ramifications of this story for free speech in general, and the British blogosphere in particular, are potentially enormous. If Lionheart is arrested, how long will it be before more arrests follow? As he himself puts it:

Today it is me and my blog and tomorrow it is you and your blog.

All bloggers, all blog readers, and everyone with an interest in the maintenance of what free speech we in Britain have left, should be very concerned by this.

Hat-tip: Homophobic Horse, in the comments.

Update:

Lionheart now writes that he has employed a solicitor, Anthony Bennett, to act on his behalf in this matter. Mr Bennett is something of a minor political notable himself, and the content of the Wikipedia article about him makes for interesting reading. As does this Daily Mail report from last November, announcing that he was to launch a private prosecution for child neglect against Madeleine McCann's parents (having previously failed in an attempt to prosecute Michael Barrymore for drugs offences).

However, while Mr Bennett might have some eccentricities, the fact that Lionheart has taken the step of retaining a solicitor would seem to add credence to his claims. For a start, it is difficult to see why he would do so if he had fabricated the whole story. Secondly, it means that there is, in Mr Bennett, another source to confirm Lionheart's claims. The blogger GW, of Wolf Howling, has been in touch with Mr Bennett, who has forwarded to him the e-mail sent by the police to Lionheart, which does seem to confirm what Lionheart says. GW's post also provides some background details regarding the circumstances in which Lionheart discovered that he was to be arrested.

It is beginning to look like this news is indeed as bad as it appears to be.

Brown and Liberty!

I see that before he flew off to Lisbon to sell the country down the river (the Tagus, presumably), Gordon Brown favoured the members of the House of Commons liaison committee with some inspiring sentiments on the subject of liberty. To be precise, he said:

I think Britain was the pioneer of liberty for the modern world. I think in later years America took it upon itself to claim that it was the leading country in promoting liberty. I think Britain. But our view of liberty is different from the American view of liberty. Our view of liberty is not the 'leave me alone' liberty that we characterise with some of the American constitution. Our view of liberty is liberty in the context of social responsibility.

Now, to an extent, he's right. This country does have a long and proud tradition of liberty - the notion of the "free-born Englishman" is not merely apocryphal. Equally, I think that genuine social responsibility is important, although I don't really know what Brown means when he talks of "liberty in the context of social responsibility".

What is more, I suspect that if Brown did make his sentiments more explicit, I would not be greatly enamoured of what he had to say. Because Brown's praise for "liberty" rings somewhat hollow when you consider what the Labour government has done over the past ten years. This is, after all, the government which has:

Restricted free speech, with its laws against "inciting religious hatred";

Banned smoking in pubs;

Presided over the creation by the police of the world's largest DNA database;

Banned fox-hunting;

Passed laws compelling adoption agencies to place children with homosexual couples (a move which also undermines social responsibility, since it looks set to drive Catholic adoption agencies out of business);

Banned handguns.

And still on the cards we have:

The further restriction of free speech, with laws prohibiting the "incitement of hatred" against homosexuals and the disabled;

The introduction of compulsory ID cards, which that buffoon Liam Byrne says will become "a great British institution".

I do not pretend that the above lists come anywhere close to being definitive.

And then there are Gordon Brown's own words, in the aftermath of the acquittals of Nick Griffin and Mark Collett on charges of "inciting racial hatred":

Any preaching of religious or racial hatred will offend mainstream opinion in this country. We have got to do whatever we can to root it out from whatever quarter it comes. And if that means we have got to look at the laws again, we will have to do so.

So, in the first place, Brown appears to believe that simply because something "will offend mainstream opinion" (by which he means, Gordon Brown's opinion), it should automatically be illegal. Secondly, he advocates a reactive approach to law-making, under which the government waits to see what behaviour members of the public engage in, and then decides whether to criminalise that, rather than setting down the law as a guide to conduct. I fail to see how anyone who thinks in these terms can have the temerity to even mention Britain's tradition of liberty.

Fascists at the Oxford Union!

I regret to inform readers that, this evening, a number of fascists succeeded in forcing their way into the Oxford Union, where they attempted to prevent two British citizens - one of them the leader of a well-known democratic political party - from taking part in, irony of ironies, a debate about the limits of free speech. The fascist activists jumped over a wall into the courtyard of the Oxford Union building, before barging into the debating chamber itself. Thankfully, their bid to prevent the debate going ahead was unsuccessful, and both Nick Griffin and David Irving proceeded to express their views freely and without let or hindrance, albeit in two separate rooms. One Oxford undergraduate described the debate as "very balanced" and added that "both sides did really well".

However, while they were unsuccesful in their attempt to prevent the debate from going ahead, the behaviour of these far-leftists is just the latest in a string of incidents which have demonstrated that it is the far-left which today poses the greatest threat to free speech in Britain, and in Europe as a whole. In the past few months alone we have had:

A petition organised by left-wing students at Oxford University, calling for the sacking of the university's Professor David Coleman, for working with the think-tank MigrationWatch (at least Prof Coleman managed to keep his job, unlike Dr Frank Ellis, driven out of his post at Leeds University by the far-left in July 2006).

The use of violence to prevent supporters of the Swiss People's Party from rallying in Geneva.

The attempted murder of SIOE activists in Denmark, and threats of violence made against SIOE demonstrators in this country.

Schoolmaster Mark Walker suspended from his job for being a member of the BNP.

A vicious attack on peaceful BNP members campaigning in Barnsley.

The hounding of a Nobel Prize winner, including calls for his prosecution under "anti-racism" legislation, and his ultimate dismissal from his job, for expressing a politically-incorrect viewpoint.

Needless to say, the far-left was responsible for all these incidents. And I doubt that the list I have produced is even remotely close to being definitive. But when did you last hear of right-wingers hounding leftists out of their jobs, or of right-wing "extremists" physically attacking leftists? I can't recall a single case of either! And yet the Unite Against Fascism thugs, and the useful idiots from the student body at Oxford, who they brought along with them, want us to believe that it is the BNP who are the real threat to democracy. Well, I'll believe that when I see the BNP sending thugs to attack campaigners from rival parties, or invading the Oxford Union to prevent those they dislike from speaking. Until then, forgive me if I believe that the people who actually do those things are the somewhat greater threat.

Update: Another point to bear in mind regarding last night's debate, is that some of the demonstrators outside the Oxford Union were reported to be chanting the words "Kill Tryl" (Oxford Union president, Luke Tryl). So, aside from attempts to physically prevent the debate from taking place, some of the anti-free speech mob were also calling for a student to be murdered, because he gave a platform to people they don't like. As Nick Griffin said in the course of the debate, had these "anti-fascists" lived in Germany seventy years ago, "they would have made splendid Nazis".

Update (2): Meanwhile, Gates of Vienna has a translation of a newspaper article by the Danish MP Søren Krarup, on the subject of "Violence from the Left", which makes similar points to those I have made above, and gives yet more examples of this severely under-reported phenomenon.

Some are more equal than others

In the wake of the recent conviction of the self-styled "Lyrical Terrorist", Samina Malik, the Muslim Council of Britain's Inayat Bunglawala has penned a characteristically rambling piece, entitled "An attack on liberty", at the Guardian's Comment is Free site. After ranting for some time on various stock Muslim grievances, he concludes by saying that "a foolish young woman who did not harm anyone now faces a maximum 10-year term in prison for what can only be described as a thought crime".

Now, some might say that possessing terrorist propaganda and joining an organisation, Jihad Way, which aimed to disseminate such propaganda and to support al-Qaeda goes some way beyond mere "thought crime". Personally, I would definitely say that organisations such as Jihad Way ought to be illegal, although I don't really think that she should be punished for her (admittedly appalling) poetry, or for downloading offensive material from the internet. In any event, I fail to see why Samina Malik should be prosecuted, while the likes of Anjem Choudhary are left free to incite murder in peace. So, to some extent I do actually agree with Inayat Bunglawala, and I am certainly glad to see that he is taking a stance against thought crime, an issue which greatly concerns me, and about which I have written on numerous occasions.

But hang on a minute! This Inayat Bunglawala, this champion of free speech, this enemy of the criminalisation of thoughts, surely he cannot be the same Inayat Bunglawala who, in 2005, wrote in favour of the introduction of laws creating a new crime of "incitement to religious hatred"? He must be a different Bunglawala from the one who then said that:

We believe stirring up hatred against people simply because of their religious beliefs or lack of them should be regarded as a social evil...We understand the concerns about free speech, but we think that they are totally misplaced.

And he can't possibly be the same Bunglawala who last year supported plans to widen the scope of the laws against "inciting racial hatred", following the acquittals of Nick Griffin and Mark Collett. No, because anyone who felt that Nick Griffin should go to prison for saying that Islam was a "wicked, vicious faith" (which statement, I would point out, does not contain any explicit or implicit threat, nor any reference to individual Muslims), but that punishing Samina Malik for writing such delightful couplets as "Kafirs your time will come soon/and no one will save you from your doom" and "For the living martyrs are awakening/and Kuffars world soon to be shaking" is "an attack on liberty", would be a complete hypocrite.

Postscript: To be fair to Bunglawala, he's not the only person displaying a distinct hypocrisy over this. Following Malik's conviction, Martin Sullivan, of the Islamophobia Watch blog, quoted approvingly from both Bunglawala's article, and Boyd Tonkin's rather better written piece on the same theme. Yet in the past he too has repeatedly come out in favour of restricting the free speech of people like the BNP.