Amanda Marcotte notices some online misogyny so that we don’t have to.

David Futrelle of We Hunted the Mammoth alerts me to the fact that some drunk MRAs recorded their bizarre sexual fantasies about myself and Jessica Valenti and, for some reason, felt it appropriate to put it on the internet:

https://youtu.be/WfimcqjWHIQ

I watched the video. It’s even more pathetic than it sounds from Amanda’s description. It’s just some highly unpleasant guys making a big point of how unpleasant they are. There’s some laughter but it sounds forced. The “humor” is that they tell Jessica Valenti that no, she can’t give them a blow job. Ha ha…ha? Why is that funny? When she obviously wouldn’t want to and never said … Read the rest

Maajid also defended Charlie Hebdo against new accusations of “Islamophobia” in a public Facebook post:

New Charlie Hebdo cartoons about Aylan Kurdi are causing online “Islamophobia” outrage:

Fellow Muslims, please, if you don’t get satire just *ask* someone before assuming an intelligent left-wing satirical magazine isn’t … satire.

Taste is always in the eye of the beholder. But these cartoons are a damning indictment on our anti-refugee sentiment.

The McDonald’s image is a searing critique of heartless European consumerism in the face of one of the worst human tragedies of our times.

The image about Christians walking on water while Muslims drown is (so obviously) critiquing hypocritical European Christian “love”.

Fellow Muslims, not everything and everyone are against us,

Maajid Nawaz has been extracting the Michael from Max Blumenthal on Twitter:

maajid nawaz ‏@MaajidNawaz Sep 13
maajid nawaz retweeted Max Blumenthal
A non-Muslim regressive-lefty calling me (a Muslim) an Islamophobe. But… isn’t that ‘cultural appropriation’?

Max Blumenthal ‏@MaxBlumenthal
.@HarvardIOP is hosting two of the most belligerent Islamophobes for a panel on “Islam & the future of tolerance”

Seriously. What is Max Blumenthal doing calling Maajid Nawaz – who is a Muslim! – an “Islamophobe”? Maajid is a liberal critic of reactionary Islamists; that hardly makes him a hater of Islam. Does Blumenthal think the only authentic Muslim is a murderous (male) reactionary misogynist theocrat? If so, he’s much more of an Islam-hater than Maajid is.… Read the rest

Via Scott Benson (no relation) on Twitter:

Quite striking, isn’t it.

 … Read the rest

Malibu. The beach. Millionaires’ McMansions built directly ON the beach. Millionaires trying to convince everyone that they own the beach.

Many celebrities and multimillionaires own sprawling Malibu homes overlooking the Pacific, including actors Robert Redford and Angelina Jolie, the rapper Dr Dre, the director Rob Reiner and media mogul David Geffen. In an effort to protect their privacy, some homeowners have now taken matters into their own hands by employing security guards to patrol the sands in front of their houses.

Twice in the past few weeks, members of the public have been asked to leave Malibu’s Escondido Beach by a uniformed security guard who wrongly claimed they were on private property and threatened them with a fine

Are we the baddies?

Update: try this one. H/t Bernard.

 … Read the rest

Oy.

… Read the rest

What is Abdullahi Ahmed An-Naim’s view of Sharia? A piece by Cem Say from 2006 explores the subject.

Islamic law, the Sharia, has a bad reputation – especially in the West, but also among many secular Muslims. It stands for the oppression of women, contempt for human rights, and backwardness. Abdullah An-Naim, Professor of Law at Emory University in Atlanta, USA and anything but a fundamentalist, understands the concept of Sharia quite differently. Sharia, he says, is positive and has a future.

According to An-Naim, the legal doctrines of the Sharia in their original form, which go back to the seventh century, are simply incompatible with the realities of life in the 21st century.

Yes. So then why hang … Read the rest

The Yale Daily News:

Abdallah Kamel, chief executive of a banking and real estate company based in Saudi Arabia, donated $10 million to the Yale Law School to create a center for the study of Islamic Law and Civilization, YLS Dean Robert Post and University President Peter Salovey announced Thursday.

Why does Yale Law School want a a center for the study of Islamic Law? I could see a history or sociology department being interested in that, but why a law school? Does Yale teach Christian law?

Also…based in Saudi Arabia. I don’t consider Saudi Arabia a very useful paradigm for the study of law. They behead people for “insulting Islam.” They want to give Raif Badawi 1000 lashes … Read the rest

The Industrial Workers of the World, aka the Wobblies, had the power fist back in the teens of the 20th century.

See what they did there?

It’s not appropriation for any left-wing movement to use the fist. What would be appropriation would be for right-wing movements to use it, or for WalMart or CocaCola to use it for advertising, as I’m sure they have.… Read the rest

Were you wondering about Kim Davis’s fashion choices and religious affiliation? Sojourners provides some background.

Kim Davis, the Rowan County, Ky., clerk jailed for five days for refusing to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples, identifies as an Apostolic Christian and attends Solid Rock Apostolic Church in Morehead, Ky.

What’s an Apostolic Christian?

Pentecostalism is a Christian movement that emphasizes a personal experience of God, including the miraculous gifts of the Holy Spirit and speaking in tongues. The movement grew out of the 1906 Azusa Street Revival in California and takes its name from Pentecost, when early Christians first received the gifts of the Holy Spirit, such as the ability to heal and prophesy.

Apostolic Pentecostals then split from the