Newsline 27 February 2015

Newsline 27 February 2015

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News, Blogs & Opinion

NSS warns of ‘de-facto’ blasphemy laws at European Parliament

News | Thu, 26th Feb 2015

The National Secular Society has raised concerns about the limits imposed on free speech by unofficial blasphemy laws enforced by the threat of violence.

At a meeting of the European Parliament Platform for Secularism in Politics (EPPSP) in Brussels, NSS executive director Keith Porteous Wood cited polling which found that 25% of Muslims aged 18-34 disagreed with the statement, "acts of violence against those who publish images of the Prophet Mohammad can never be justified". He described this as a "huge challenge."

He also noted the danger of anti-blasphemy campaigns in the UN and said that secularists "ought to be aware that there has been a 15 year project by the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) to have defamation made an international law."

The NSS, which has long opposed any restrictions on freedom of expression on religious grounds, expressed its serious concerns in 2012 after Baroness Sayeeda Warsi, who was then "Minister for Faith", signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the OIC to "work together on issue of peace, stability and religious freedom."

Keith Porteous Wood added that the West should be "very worried" by "unofficial blasphemy laws" and also raised the issue of "religious-aggravated public order offences" in the UK that have "very low prosecution thresholds but a 7 year prison term". He described the threat to free speech posed by this legislation as "poisonous" and said it was "almost worse" than explicit blasphemy laws.

Sophie in 't Veld MEP, an honorary associate of the National Secular Society, who chaired the panel, said she was "against any kind of restrictions solely for the reasons of protecting or defending religion or belief".

The director of Justitia, Jacob Mchangama, said that secularists should not "appease extremism" through "misguided identity politics" and criticised the "redistribution of blame" that occurred after the Charlie Hebdo attack, and the way many commentators argued that the cartoonists were in some way to blame.

Rabbi Jonathan Romain of the Movement for Reform Judaism said that whilst "some Christians were horrified" by blasphemy like the Life of Brian, as many Muslims were by the Danish cartoons, and although "of course" religious satire causes offence, it is "one person's right to express their view, and another person's right to express that they are offended". The Rabbi argued that there were "plenty of religious targets that are worth hitting" with blasphemy and said that there is no right not to be offended.

Rabbi Romain noted that every "tyrannical regime" restricts freedom of speech. He added that free speech "enables us to expose hypocrisy" and quoted examples from scripture of blasphemy and the ridicule of religious beliefs.

He argued that "Blasphemy is in the ear of the hearer, and one person's sanctity is another person's idiocy." Rabbi Romain said restricting free speech to protect religion would be a "cost too high" and added that "freedom of speech has to be total".

Elizabeth O'Casey from the International Humanist and Ethical Union, which the NSS is affiliated with, discussed the fear of violence that was stifling free speech, particularly with regard to newspapers and other media outlets refusing to show images from Charlie Hebdo.

The full discussion can be watched here.

UPDATE: Just two days after this meeting Avijit Roy, whose Mukto-Mona (Free-mind) blog championed liberal secular writing, was murdered in Bangladesh. He had received numerous threats from Islamists. See full story.

New poll shows significant minority of UK Muslims support attacks on Charlie Hebdo

News | Wed, 25th Feb 2015

A poll of Muslim opinion in the UK has exposed a large minority who believe violence against those who depict Mohammed is justified.

10% of UK Muslims aged 18-34 agreed with the statement that "organisations which publish images of the Prophet Mohammed deserve to be attacked". 14% of over 45s agreed, as did 7% of 35-44 year olds. Overall, 11% of UK Muslims agreed with the statement, with 85% disapproving and 3% saying they "didn't know."

Muslim men were only slightly more likely to agree with the statement than women, by 1%, with 10% of Muslim women agreeing.

The poll also revealed that over a quarter of British Muslims have some sympathy for the motives behind the Charlie Hebdo massacre – a finding the former faith and communities minister Baroness Warsi described as "worrying".

National Secular Society campaigns manager Stephen Evans said: "These findings should concern anyone who values fundamental rights and freedoms. Like most other citizens, the vast majority of British Muslims are rightly appalled by violent reprisals for depicting Mohammed. But if 11% of Muslims think violence should be used to stifle free expression – and that Paris-style attacks are an appropriate response to cartoons, as this poll indicates, then we have a very serious problem.

"The findings also demonstrate the importance of amplifying the progressive Muslim voices that are countering poisonous narratives within the Muslim community, but which are not being sufficiently heard."

25% of Muslims aged 18-34 disagreed with the statement, "acts of violence against those who publish images of the Prophet Mohammad can never be justified". 82% of 18-34 year olds said that it is "deeply offensive" to them when images of the Prophet Mohammed were published, compared with 71% of Muslims aged over 45, perhaps offering some evidence that younger Muslims are more religious than their parents and grandparents.

30% of 18-34 year olds said they had "some sympathy for the motives" behind the attacks on Charlie Hebdo, whilst 24% of those over the age of 45 said the same. Almost one-third of UK Muslims agreed with the statement, "I understand the motives of those who launch attacks in the name of Islam because the religion has been insulted". 32% were not surprised that "the attacks in Paris happened".

14% said that if they could, they would leave Britain "to go and live in a Muslim country".

Opinion was divided nearly in half when respondents were asked if "Muslim clerics who preach that violence against the West can be justified" were out of touch with "mainstream Muslim opinion". 49% said that they were, whilst 45% indicated that they were not.

Whilst 94% said they would report someone they knew for planning an act of violence, 5% said they would not, and 8% said that they knew "Muslims who feel strongly sympathetic towards people fighting for IS and Al-Qaeda".

The pollsters also questions respondents on other issues, and found that 17% of UK Muslims agreed that "it is appropriate that Muslims who convert to other religions are cut off by their family".

Two-thirds of respondents disagreed when asked if they would like their children "to go to a Muslim state school" if given the choice.

The full ComRes poll for the BBC can be found here.

MPs cite “overwhelming” public support in debate on non-stun animal slaughter

News | Tue, 24th Feb 2015

MPs have debated ending non-stun slaughter, after a petition to end the religious exemption to animal welfare laws was signed by over 115,000 people.

The Westminster Hall debate on Monday 23 February was led by Conservative MP Phillip Hollobone, and was triggered by a petition backed by a range of organisations, including the National Secular Society. Mr Hollobone began by noting the very high levels of public support for ending non-stun slaughter. He also suggested better labelling of meat products, and called for a system where meat was labelled as stun or non-stun, and where packaging specified if meat was halal or kosher.

However, the former Minister for the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, Sir James Paice, said that because 80% of halal meat comes from animals which are stunned first, it would "be inviting people to discriminate on religious grounds" if food was labelled as halal, rather than over concerns about animal welfare. Sir James added, "We are talking about welfare, which has nothing to do with religion".

Mr Paice said that after witnessing non-stun slaughter at a halal slaughterhouse he regarded the killing of an animal without stunning as "repugnant". He told MPs "It should be stopped" but said he accepted there are "constraints on taking that final step".

Several MPs said that the debate was not about religion; however Mr Hollobone said that the issue could not be understood "unless we tackle the religious dimension". Hollobone noted that religion was "the elephant in the room." He added that "the Muslim and Jewish communities have a lot of persuading to do if they want their point of view to win the day."

Diane Abbott said that her "local Muslim community" was concerned that the debate was not "really about animal welfare" and was "some sort of covert attack on them and their way of life." She said she was not at the debate to speak about "the technicalities or detail of the issue, but about how it is seen by communities." She called on MPs to "avoid a narrative that makes it sound as if one is trying to say that communities of faith are backward or mediaeval, or unnecessarily cruel to animals." Matthew Offord MP claimed that many people felt "under attack".

The Government's response to the petition stated that "there would be no ban on religious slaughter in the UK."

The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs stated that: "The Government encourages the highest standards of welfare at slaughter and would prefer to see all animals stunned before they are slaughtered for food. However, we also respect the rights of the Jewish and Muslim communities to eat meat prepared in accordance with their religious beliefs."

A rival petition to "protect religious slaughter" has now reached over 100,000 signatures. An RSPCA-commissioned poll showed that 77% of the general public want non-stun slaughter to end.

In May 2012, the Food Standards Authority published research that indicated 3% of cattle, 10% of sheep and goats, and 4% of poultry was not pre-stunned before slaughter.

After the debate, MPs voted simply to state that they had "considered the petition".

Stephen Evans, campaigns manager for the National Secular Society, said the time had come for Parliament to act: "The scientific consensus is clear that when carried out correctly, the pre-stunning of animals prevents them suffering unnecessarily at the time of slaughter – which is why UK and European law requires it.

"Despite widespread concerns over farm animal welfare, the number of animals not being stunned before slaughter is on the rise. The time has therefore come to do the right thing and remove the exemption, and stop allowing religious considerations to compromise animal welfare."

The debate can be read here.

Homophobic preacher invited to address University of Westminster Islamic Society

News | Mon, 23rd Feb 2015

Sheikh Haitham al-Haddad, who once said "godless homosexuals" engaged in a "criminal act", is to be hosted by the University of Westminster Islamic Society.

Al-Haddad will give a talk titled "who is Muhammad". The event is being held on Thursday 26 February, shortly before the University hosts a weekend of events to celebrate the National Student Pride Festival.

The Sheikh has a long history of articulating an extremely homophobic ideology. In an online article called "Standing up against homosexuality and LGBTs" he compared homosexuality with adultery, and said "Allah has ordained us to speak out" in order to "combat the scourge of homosexuality". He argued that homosexuality was a "criminal act".

He also used the article to praise the president of Liberia for "defending a law that criminalises homosexual acts" and commended "the many Christian bishops and ministers" who opposed equal marriage. He called on Christians "to refer back to the original teachings revealed by their creator, Allah" and said he prayed to Allah "to preserve this country from evil practices" and to "keep us steadfast in enjoining good and forbidding evil".

Al-Haddad has also been recorded discussing the "proper way" to conduct female genital mutilation, and said that domestic abuse should be sorted out between a husband and wife, because Islam "is looking for the bigger picture in order to keep the relationship between the husband and wife together."

Sheikh al-Haddad serves as a 'judge' for the Islamic Sharia Council based in East London, and describes himself as a specialist in "many of the Islamic sciences". Al-Haddad also boasts of studying under the late Grand Mufti of Saudi Arabia and is said to provide "complex theories which address the role of Islamic jurisprudence within a western environment". He wrote his doctoral thesis on "Islamic jurisprudence concerning Muslim minorities."

A petition to stop al-Haddad from speaking on the university campus has already drawn well over 2000 signatures. The petition describes al-Haddad as a "controversial and homophobic speaker" and criticises the fact that the talk is to take place shortly before National Student Pride.

The University of Westminster said that they were "committed to maintaining freedom of speech and a diversity of views as set out in the Education Act 1986" but that "respect and tolerance" were their foremost concerns. The University says they will be "monitoring the event carefully".

National Secular Society campaigns manager, Stephen Evans, said: "Free speech extends up to the point of incitement, and judging by al-Haddad's previous comments, he is walking an extremely fine line.

"There's no doubt that the influence of political Islam in British universities is growing and with Islamic societies frequently hosting extremist preachers, universities need to be mindful of the effect that such speakers are having on young British Muslims.

"But the best response to their poisonous narrative is open discussion and debate, where it can be systematically exposed, ridiculed and defeated."

UPDATE 26/2/14: Westminster University has today 'postponed' the event following the revelation that the 'Jihadi John' figure who appears as a masked executioner in Islamic State propaganda videos is Londoner Mohammed Emwazi, 27, a former student at the University of Westminster.

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