The Guardian has more detail on the suppression of Malala’s book launch.

Malala Yousafzai’s book was due to be launched at an event on Monday at Peshawar University but organisers were forced to scrap it after the intervention of two senior members of the government of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province (KP).

The episode underlines the antipathy among many Pakistanis towards the 16-year-old who campaigned for education in the face of Taliban opposition.

While she has been hailed in the west for her campaign against extremism, in Pakistan she is widely regarded with suspicion, with many people believing conspiracy theories that the story of the Taliban attempt to assassinate her as she travelled to school in October 2012 was untrue or

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Another PBUH from Gnu Atheism.

 … Read the rest

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Meanwhile, in Peshawar – there was going to be an event to launch Malala Yousafzai’s book today, but it got canceled because some bullies demanded that it should be.

The book launch had been organised by Peshawar University’s Area Study Centre in collaboration with the Bacha Khan Education Trust (BKET), a non-profit education network set up by the secular Pashtun ANP party, and a civil society NGO called Strengthening Participatory Organisation (SPO).

Dr Hussain of BKET said that police had informed organisers they could not provide security for the programme. But he added that political pressure had also been put on the university administration to suspend the event.

“Two ministers of the KP government put pressure on the university

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Says Joe, “But I ain’t dead.”

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f_yC4ffyGiw… Read the rest

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We’re women and men together, we shall not be moved.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wt7soE8gVf8… Read the rest

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Now we stand outcast and starving, ‘mid the wonders we have made.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ly5ZKjjxMNM… Read the rest

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Pete Seeger.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2b24Ewk934g… Read the rest

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More tunnel-visioned dogma-drunk hate-mongering for your enlightenment.

University of Plymouth Islamic Society

Plymouth ISoc

ATTENTION ALL STUDENTS!! …… MASS DEMONSTRATION ALERT!

The university has decided NOT to listen to the concerns of hundreds of it’s British & international students regarding banning the Quilliam Foundation event this Wednesday!

Maajid Nawaz (the chairman of QF) has recently posted offensive cartoons of the Prophet Muhammad and Jesus (peace be upon them) from a comic strip called “Jesus and Mo” which features them drinking at the bar, in bed together and other filthy behaviors. This is as offensive, if not more than the Denmark cartoons which caused a worldwide response in 2005. The Chaplaincy have invited Usama Hasan a senior lecturer who is due

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A joint statement in the Liberal Democrat Voice by Maajid Nawaz and Mohammed Shafiq.

We wish to make a statement about the recent concern expressed over issues related to conflicting views on depictions of Prophet Muhammad.

We recognise that, when it comes to this question, some Muslims of various persuasions may take different views. However, we also recognise that there are many Muslims who have taken offence, and we assert that images of the spiritual leaders of all religions should be deemed to be respectful.

Stop right there.

No.

No.

No. Your religion is your religion, and it is not binding on me or on anyone else who does not choose to be bound by it. I don’t have … Read the rest

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Via Monte Albert -

Yes. That.… Read the rest

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Hmm. Meral Hussein Ece – she’s a LibDem peer. She’s not very liberal. She had this to say last week on Stephen Tall’s post about Maajid at LibDem Voice:

I condemn anyone issuing death threats, and of course this should be reported to the Police. Im all for a mature ‘debate’ on any religion, but using a cartoon is unhelpful and trivial. This cartoon is part of a cartoon strip which depicts the Prophet Mohammed in bed with Jesus drinking beer. Clearly offensive to even the most moderate Muslims, and even many Christians who will be aware of this. I believe in living and let living, and would not want to offend Jews, Christians, Hindus, Sikhs, or any other

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Tunisia’s assembly passed a new constitution yesterday. It’s better than it might have been but it’s still flawed.

Parliament agreed the text on Friday after the governing Ennahda party granted a number of concessions, including dropping references to Islamic law.

It guarantees freedom of worship but says Islam is the state religion. It also forbids “attacks on the sacred”, which analysts say is open to interpretation.

That. Very good that references to sharia were dropped, but not good that any religion is the state religion, and bad that it forbids attacks on “the sacred,” whatever the hell that is when it’s at home.

The text also recognises equality between men and women for the first time.

Well that is … Read the rest

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All right – a bad decision withdrawn. The councillors of Newtownabbey have thought better of it.

Newtownabbey Borough Council’s artistic board last week cancelled the Reduced Shakespeare Company’s The Bible: The Complete Word of God (Abridged).

The comic play was due to run at the council’s Theatre at the Mill from Wednesday, 29 January, for two nights.

But on Monday the artistic board decided to put the play back on and the full council ratified that decision.

The play will now go ahead as scheduled on Wednesday and Thursday.

Reduced Shakespeare Company vindicated!

Mayor of Newtownabbey Fraser Agnew, who is an Ulster Unionist councillor, said there was a “need to defend Christian values”.

“If it was a play to do

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So it’s cold in Champaign-Urbana today. It was forecast to be cold yesterday. Nevertheless classes and operations were scheduled to go ahead. The chancellor, Phyllis Wise, emailed the students yesterday to tell them so. They responded with sexist racist attacks on Twitter.

Well of course they did. What else does one do when a woman does something one dislikes?

Andrei Andreev@AndreiAndreev33 Follow

It’s going to be -27 without wind chill tomorrow morning and I have class at 8 #FuckPhyllis #Cunt #Bitch #Whore

♡ kimi ♡@kimiskis Follow

phyllis can go shove tomorrow’s weather up her wideset vagina. #fuckphyllis

haily cook@hailycookk Follow

I hope you slip on ice and break a hip #fuckphyllis

goombatoomba@goombatoomba Follow

Asians and women

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Great, we don’t have to worry about purely local problems in Sochi between gay people and everyone else, because the mayor of Sochi says there are no gay people in Sochi. Whew! That’s one bullet dodged.

The mayor of Sochi, host of the Winter Olympics, has said there are no gay people in the city.

Anatoly Pakhomov said homosexuals were welcome at the Games – as long as they “respect Russian law” and “don’t impose their habits on others”.

When Putin said it was “as long as they don’t go after children.” Pakhomov’s formula seems potentially more restrictive. It depends what he means by “impose their habits on others.” I sort of kind of suspect he means just…”as long … Read the rest

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Maajid Nawaz has a rather beautiful mini-statement (all right all right it’s a tweet) from yesterday:

I am a free Muslim. My prophet left no heir. My faith was never ruled by pope nor clergy. For my sins I answer to God alone. You are not God

Wouldn’t it be fantastic if there were more free Muslims (and free Christians, free Hindus, free Mormons…)?

That version of faith/religion still has the problem that the nature of the sins depends on the concept of “God” – but that’s true of any concept of morality. Taking heirs and popes and clergy out of the equation makes it much easier to avoid identifying your god with bits of dogma left over from the … Read the rest

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This is depressing – a statement by a group called Ethnic Minority Liberal Democrats, doing the same irritating “we deplore violence, we approve of free speech, but” shuffle that we’ve already seen.

Ethnic Minority Liberal Democrats (EMLD) deplores the reported death threats against Maajid Nawaz, a Prospective Parliamentary Candidate for Hampstead and Kilburn. Death threats can never be justified and we wholeheartedly condemn them.

Impressive? They condemn death threats. Now that that’s out of the way – on to their real passion – demanding respect for all the cultures and faiths, no matter what.

EMLD also deplores the portrayal of Muslim communities – in the mainstream media and party blogs – as not valuing free speech. Many British Muslims

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All right. Nick Clegg has given a statement to the Independent, and he did it without the giving with one hand while taking back with the other approach.

Nick Clegg has intervened in a growing row over freedom of expression, describing as “unacceptable” death threats made against a prospective Liberal Democrat parliamentary candidate who tweeted a cartoon of the Prophet Mohammed and Jesus greeting each other.

…

The Deputy Prime Minister defended Mr Nawaz’s right to send the personal tweet of the “Jesus and Mo” cartoon after BBC producers decided it was too offensive to be worn on T-shirts by two atheist audience members at a televised debate attended by the Lib Dem candidate.

In a letter to

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