All entries by this author

The organisers have refused to hand over the tapes

Jan 21st, 2012 3:33 pm | By

The police are still policing the writers who read from The Satanic Verses at the Jaipur festival yesterday.

A day after author Salman Rushdie made it clear that he would not be coming to India, alleging that he was told that underworld hitmen were out to get him, the raging debate at the Jaipur Literature Festival is still on. The police have now asked for the tape recordings of author Amitava Kumar reading out excerpts from Mr Rushdie’s controversial book – Satanic Verses – which is illegal in India. The organisers of the event, however, have refused to hand over the tapes.

…

Authors Hari Kunzru and Amitava Kumar, as a mark of protest, used their session at the festival

… Read the rest

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Telegraph obit of Frank Cioffi *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

Later critics of Freud such as Frederick Crews, Allen Esterson and Malcolm Macmillan always acknowledged their debt to Cioffi, and Freud’s frequent departures from truthfulness are now conceded by even ardent admirers.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


‘Rajasthan police invented plot to keep away Rushdie’ *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

Local cops made up a story that hit men were planning to kill Rushdie in a plot to deter him from attending the Jaipur Literature Festival, police sources have told The Hindu.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


David Remnick on a writer under threat again *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

The festival is an astonishingly diverse and gaudy affair, with five enormous venues centered around the Diggi Palace, smack in the middle of Jaipur’s Pink City.… Read the rest

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Hank Fox’s book

Jan 21st, 2012 10:06 am | By

I’m reading Hank Fox’s book Blue Collar Atheist - and it’s fantastic.

He has me choking up on one page, then giggling on the next, then shrieking with laughter on the next. He’s a genius with metaphors. I love love love this book.

Some good lines -

…we live in a society so permeated by goddiness that the idea that there might not be a God seems perversely even more mystical. [p 5]

On the emancipation of escaping the entanglement of religion and the peace that goes with it:

It was the peace of understanding that, while there might be quite a lot of the world unknown to me, there was nothing purposely concealed. [p 14]

I love that. … Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

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The UN plans to make everybody gay!!11!

Jan 21st, 2012 9:35 am | By

And then there are those zany Spanish bishops.

During his Boxing Day sermon, the Bishop of Córdoba, Demetrio Fernández, said there was a conspiracy by the United Nations. “The Minister for Family of the Papal Government, Cardinal Antonelli, told me a few days ago in Zaragoza that UNESCO has a program for the next 20 years to make half the world population homosexual. To do this they have distinct programs, and will continue to implant the ideology that is already present in our schools.”

Wheeeeeee! Demetrio Fernández must have a whole wardrobe full of tinfoil hats.… Read the rest

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A big win for theocracy

Jan 21st, 2012 9:26 am | By

So Egypt is doomed. Islamists control two thirds of the seats in the People’s Assembly. In other words, the Assembly is in the hands of avowed theocrats.

The final results in Egypt’s first post-Mubarak parliamentary elections confirm an overwhelming victory for Islamist parties.

The Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP) won the largest number of seats under Egypt’s complex electoral system.

The hardline Salafist Nour party came second.

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The overall results mean that Islamist parties control around two-thirds of the seats in the assembly, though the final share out of seats is not yet known.

It’s a disaster.

Check out some Islamists in Derby.

Ihjaz Ali, 42, Kabir Ahmed, 28, and Razwan Javed, 27, were found

… Read the rest

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Egypt: Islamist parties win *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

The overall results mean that Islamist parties control around two-thirds of the seats in the assembly.… Read the rest

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Nigeria: bombs kill at least 120 in Kano *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

Boko Haram said they carried out the attacks. A BBC reporter in Kano said he had counted 150 bodies in the mortuary of the city’s main hospital.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


Church in Spain goes for the crazy *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

Bishop of Córdoba: “Cardinal Antonelli told me a few days ago in Zaragoza that UNESCO has a program for the next 20 years to make half the world population homosexual.”… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


Praveen Swami on Salman Rushdie and India’s new theocracy *

Jan 21st, 2012 | Filed by

Rushdie’s censoring-out from the ongoing literary festival in Jaipur will be remembered as a milestone that marked the slow motion disintegration of India’s secular state.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


My Visit to Australia

Jan 20th, 2012 | By Leo Igwe

From August 17 to September 5 2011, I visited Australia. I was invited by the the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) and the Australian Skeptics to deliver the Canberra Lecture and to do a speaking tour of the country. It was my first visit to the country and continent. Late in 2010, I was contacted by Kevin Davies to know if I could visit Australia and deliver a lecture as part of events marking the National Science Week. I readily accepted.

What started as an invitation to deliver a lecture gradually ‘evolved’ to become a grand tour that would take me to all states in Australia. It was only the Northern Territory that has Darwin as its capital … Read the rest

Posted in Articles


Guardian on Rushdie not in Jaipur *

Jan 20th, 2012 | Filed by

A cleric’s description of Rushdie as having “hurt the sentiments of Muslims all over the world” was widely reported in India, and prompted calls for Rushdie to be denied a visa.

 … Read the rest

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Nigerian reporter murdered while covering bombings *

Jan 20th, 2012 | Filed by

Enenche Akogwu, 31, was shot by unidentified gunmen as he attempted to interview witnesses of a deadly terrorist attack in Kano.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


Mr Rushdie regrets

Jan 20th, 2012 1:41 pm | By

More on Rushdie not in Jaipur.

Times of India:

Two prominent authors on Friday read out portions from Salman Rushdie’s banned book “Satanic Verses” at the Jaipur Literature Festival as a mark of protest after the India-born author had to pull out of the event over security concerns.

As the literary community expressed outrage over Rushdie not being able to make the trip, Hari Kunzru and Amitava Kumar used their session at the festival to read from “Satanic Verses”. The controversial book was banned in the country shortly after it was published in 1988, for allegedly hurting the sentiments of Muslims.

Love those guys.

The organizers later asked Kumar not to go ahead with his reading. Kumar initially agreed

… Read the rest

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No longer a “safe space”

Jan 20th, 2012 11:52 am | By

Alex Gabriel reports another front in the battle against “Islamophobia” (meaning, in the battle against any and all criticism or mockery of Islam). This time it’s LSE’s Student Union hassling LSE’s student atheist society. It has to do with the atheist society’s Facebook page not being a “safe space” for Muslim students.

What?

Well don’t look at me, it’s not my idea. It’s what they were told:

Here’s part of the e-mail I got today from the society, who’ve just met with their union to discuss the issues:

Essentially, a large of group of Muslim students felt offended that there were pictures of Mohammed on the facebook group. As a result, they felt that our facebook group was no

… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

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These crimes happen everywhere in the world

Jan 20th, 2012 10:26 am | By

Speaking of “Islamophobia,” as we were, we can always count on the Guardian for lashings of Islamophilia. David Shariatmadari tells us the University of East Anglia is going to set everyone straight on women, Islam, and the media. I bet you can figure out what’s coming.

Women, Islam and the media are topics often found in close conjunction, and not always in the happiest of circumstances. So in a canny move, the University of East Anglia (UEA), which often gives better-known institutions a run for their money in terms of column inches, has developed a course entitled exactly that.

The 12-week module, which the university claims is the first of its kind in the UK, will cover the

… Read the rest

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Malawi: women assaulted and stripped for wearing trousers *

Jan 20th, 2012 | Filed by

Hundreds of people have protested in Blantyre including Vice-President Joyce Banda, the gender minister, several MPs, church leaders, university lecturers and activists.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


Atheism is illegal in Indonesia *

Jan 20th, 2012 | Filed by

An Indonesian man who said that God did not exist in a posting on a Facebook page for atheists was attacked by a mob, could face jail and loss of his job.… Read the rest

Posted in Latest News


Muscle v truth and humour

Jan 20th, 2012 8:42 am | By

Salman Rushdie stayed away from the Jaipur Literary Festival because of threats. So, defying the organizers of the festival, Hari Kunzru and Amitava Kumar read from The Satanic Verses, then Jeet Thayil and Ruchir Joshi joined them.

And then what happened? According to Stephanie Nolen, South Asia correspondent for the Globe and Mail, who is at the festival and tweeting from and about it, the four writers are being investigated by the police. Since she tweeted that from the festival, it must mean that the cops were “investigating” the writers up close and personal, right then and there.

I get all this via the invaluable Salil Tripathi (#FF!), who said at Facebook about an hour ago:

Stephanie Nolen

… Read the rest

(This is a syndicated post. Read the original at FreeThoughtBlogs.)

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