Author: Ophelia Benson

  • Terry Glavin on AI and Cage Prisoners

    They don’t belong together.

  • Ukpabio’s Lawsuit Against Igwe Struck Out

    Helen Ukpabio of the Liberty Gospel Church failed to show up, so her suit against Leo Igwe is over.

  • The ‘Islamophobia Watch’ Take on Gita Sahgal

    She is ‘a member of a nutty group called Women Against Fundamentalisms.’

  • Nick Cohen on Amnesty and Gita Sahgal

    Given a choice between violent patriachy and women’s rights, like many liberal institutions AI chooses reaction.

  • Amnesty Shafts What it Purports to Defend

    AI suspended Gita Sahgal for suggesting AI should not cozy up to the Taliban.

  • Humanism and the Quest for Justice in Africa

    Justice, they say, is the first condition of humanity. That means justice is imperative for human existence and coexistence. Justice is necessary for any society to grow, develop and flourish. Any movement that gives primary consideration to the human being must take the quest for justice- the enthronement of a just society- seriously. Millions of people around the world are living, languishing, suffering and dying under unjust conditions imposed on them by fellow human beings. And this is particularly the case in Africa.

    The humanist outlook cannot thrive in a situation of so much injustice and deprivation. Humanism cannot take a firm hold on a society where unjust institutions abound and oppression prevails.

    So for humanism to flourish in Africa, humanists must take the quest for justice and human emancipation seriously. In fact humanists must take part, contribute to and advance this important struggle for the realization of human happiness and well being in this world. Part of the reason why Africans are deeply religious, spiritual and supernatural in outlook is because the people have given up hope of achieving justice and happiness in this life and in this world. Humanists must be involved in changing and challenging unjust institutions, customs, and traditions. Humanists must work to dismantle all machineries of oppression, exploitation and dehumanization in Africa.

    The humanist movement must lobby the governments or petition them before international bodies so that they would take action against injustice.

    Humanists must be involved in marshalling ideas for social change and transformation.

    They must champion the cause of addressing and redressing cases and instances of injustice against all persons. Humanists must strive to ensure that justice, equality and human rights are enjoyed by all no matter the age, race, nationality, sex, sexual orientation, religion or belief. To achieve this, humanists must be ready to speak truth to power and be the agents of the change they desire. Because very often, in Africa, power is used to oppress, exploit and dehumanize the people. Power is employed to victimize poor and defenceless citizens. Power is used against vulnerable groups and minorities.

    Justice is light and injustice is darkness. Eradicating injustice is an enlightening and illuminating process. So tackling unjust systems is critical to the growth and development of humanism in Africa. Today Africa is a dark continent not because there is something fundamentally wrong or lacking or extraordinary with the regional geography and weather conditions. Africa is a dark continent because of so many acts of injustice that reign supreme in the region. Africa is mired in darkness because of the reign of anomie, the terror of barbarism, the ubiquity of impunity, criminality and savage acts.

    Unfortunately, Africans always point accusing fingers on colonialism and imperialism for injustices on the continent. As if there were no unjust acts or systems in Africa before its contact and ‘corruption’ by the outside world. When it comes to analyzing and addressing Africa’s problems and predicament, colonialism is always a cop-out or an alibi. Imperialism is a reason or an excuse Africans always tender to avoid responsibility- accepting or taking responsibility for their mistakes and failures.

    Africans always comfortably prefer blaming the West and the whites for their woes and troubles. Surely, injustices predate and post date colonialism in Africa. Unjust acts have been going on in Africa for ages.

    Humanism is a philosophy of hope, reformation and rebirth. Humanism is an outlook of liberation, emancipation, intellectual awakening and enlightenment. So humanists cannot afford to look away or turn a blind eye on the suffering and oppression of the people. They must strive to correct and reform systems and institutions responsible for human suffering and misery in this world. Above all humanists must show compassion, empathy, solidarity and goodwill. For these values encapsulate humanism par excellence.

  • Holding onto a shadow

    Der Spiegel takes a hard look at the Vatican’s secretive ways with abusive employees.

    According to the instructions from Rome, the bishops were to deal very firmly with each individual case — so firmly, in fact, that everything would remain within the confines of the Holy Church…On the surface, the Vatican’s objective is to protect the sacrament of the confession. In reality, however, it is trying to uphold the Catholic Church’s claim to being a superior moral authority. Nothing can be allowed to besmirch this authority: not the sexual abuse of children and adolescents, committed by thousands of Catholic priests worldwide…

    And there you have it – the Catholic church’s total moral failure, in a nutshell. The failure is total because if the Church actually had any superior moral authority it would instantly realize – it would be aware without even having to pause to realize – that this attempt was an effort to square the circle – was an exercise in meaninglessness. An organization cannot perpetrate gross harms on vulnerable people and then try to uphold its claim to being a superior moral authority by failing to prevent further such gross harms. It’s like trying to have your cake after you’ve eaten it by clinging like grim death to the empty plate. It can’t be done – it’s too late.

    But the Church failed to realize that, thus revealing itself to be morally bankrupt, and actively assisting its employees to go on harming people. Secrecy about crimes against people have exactly that effect, and the Church cannot be such a moral imbecile that it is not aware of that fact. The result is that all it upheld is a façade of superior moral authority, behind which lurks suppurating moral rot of the most sinister kind. All it upheld is a glittering shell decorating a gang of child-abusers and their aiders and abettors.

  • Just get on with the gardening

    Mark Vernon tells us that the key issue in Kant’s Critiques was understanding the limits of human knowledge.

    When Kant said that Enlightenment was maturity this is what he meant, being able to live with this finitude and not reach out for false certainty. So we have Enlightenment humanism as scepticism and grappling with the reality of human knowledge and experience. This I would actually relate to a tradition within religion, though it is one lamentably in decline today. It is called the ‘apophatic’, meaning ‘negative way’. It stands in marked contrast to the ‘cataphatic’, meaning ‘positive way’, the strident assertions of indisputable religious dogma and divine truth. The apophatic is a way of approaching what is ultimately unknown by identifying what that unknown cannot be. In religion it says God is not mortal (immortal), not visible (invisible) – note, saying nothing positive about God.

    Okay…but if you say nothing positive about God, how do you know it’s ‘God’ that you’re talking about? Or to put it another way, why is whatever the [?] you are talking about called ‘God’? Why that name in particular? Why not a different name, for a different subject, since this ‘God’ does seem to be a different subject. The ‘God’ that is usually meant by ‘God’ is not ‘that which no one says anything positive about’ – on the contrary. So why use that one name for two such different items?

    Well, because we have to have ‘God,’ because it wouldn’t be respectable not to, so we have to hang onto it by simply doing away with all the rules and saying God is this, God is that, God is not this or that, God is everything, God is nothing, God is whatever. God is just whatever you want God to be, darling, and nobody can tell you otherwise. We can be apophatic one day and cataphatic the next and there is not a damn thing those pesky secular bastards can do about it.

    Anthony Gottlieb is not much impressed by the whole ‘apophatic’ thing.

    Consider, for example, “The Case for God”, the latest of 22 books on religion by Karen Armstrong, who was once a Catholic nun but now espouses a vague, universalist religion of compassion. In her opinion, God “is not good, divine, powerful or intelligent in any way that we can understand. We could not even say that God ‘exists’, because our concept of existence is too limited.” Her main idea is that the only authentic and defensible God is one who utterly transcends human understanding and therefore cannot be described at all…What is even more baffling is the idea that one can talk about a wholly indescribable God who cannot be said to “exist” but who nevertheless in some sense “is”.

    Quite. Gottlieb goes on to Eagleton next (Armstrong and Eagleton should form an act of some sort, like Abbot and Costello). Same kind of thing. He concludes sagely: ‘A wiser response to the apparent inexpressibility of statements about God may be simply not to express them, and just get on with the gardening.’ That’s my view. If you’re going to be apophatic, why not just move on and do something else? What is the point of saying you don’t know and calling that ‘God’?

  • Gita Sahgal Publishes a Statement

    Defence of the torture standard has been allied to political legitimization of individuals and organisations on the Islamic Right.

  • Richard Bartholomew on Gita Sahgal

    Amnesty has suspended her in the wake of the article.

  • Gita Sahgal and Amnesty International

    Sahgal suggests AI supports Begg and Cageprisoners out of fear of being branded racist and ‘Islamophobic.’

  • The Role of Program Code in Climate Research

    We really do need to be sure that we’re not getting any of our sums wrong.

  • The People Speak on Autism and MMR

    My kids aren’t vaccinated and they don’t have autism. Explain that, smarty! [The Onion]

  • As Close as Private Eye Gets to a Mea Culpa?

    For its ‘largely uncritical and unquestioning adherence to the Andrew Wakefield school of junk science.’

  • Ben Goldacre on the Wakefield MMR Verdict

    Wakefield is being blamed by journalists as if he were the only one at fault; the media are equally guilty.

  • Jesus and Mo on the Moderate Majority

    A graceful job of moving the goalposts.

  • Amnesty International and Cageprisoners

    This morning the Sunday Times published an article about Amnesty International’s association with groups that support the Taliban and promote Islamic Right ideas. In that article, I was quoted as raising concerns about Amnesty’s very high profile associations with Guantanamo-detainee Moazzam Begg. I felt that Amnesty International was risking its reputation by associating itself with Begg, who heads an organization, Cageprisoners, that actively promotes Islamic Right ideas and individuals.

    Within a few hours of the article being published, Amnesty had suspended me from my job.

    A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when a great organisation must ask: if it lies to itself, can it demand the truth of others? For in defending the torture standard, one of the strongest and most embedded in international human rights law, Amnesty International has sanitized the history and politics of the ex-Guantanamo detainee, Moazzam Begg and completely failed to recognize the nature of his organisation Cageprisoners.

    The tragedy here is that the necessary defence of the torture standard has been inexcusably allied to the political legitimization of individuals and organisations belonging to the Islamic Right.

    I have always opposed the illegal detention and torture of Muslim men at Guantanamo Bay and during the so-called War on Terror. I have been horrified and appalled by the treatment of people like Moazzam Begg and I have personally told him so. I have vocally opposed attempts by governments to justify ‘torture lite’.

    The issue is not about Moazzam Begg’s freedom of opinion, nor about his right to propound his views: he already exercises these rights fully as he should. The issue is a fundamental one about the importance of the human rights movement maintaining an objective distance from groups and ideas that are committed to systematic discrimination and fundamentally undermine the universality of human rights. I have raised this issue because of my firm belief in human rights for all.

    I sent two memos to my management asking a series of questions about what considerations were given to the nature of the relationship with Moazzam Begg and his organisation, Cageprisoners. I have received no answer to my questions. There has been a history of warnings within Amnesty that it is inadvisable to partner with Begg. Amnesty has created the impression that Begg is not only a victim of human rights violations but a defender of human rights. Many of my highly respected colleagues, each well-regarded in their area of expertise has said so. Each has been set aside.

    As a result of my speaking to the Sunday Times, Amnesty International has announced that it has launched an internal inquiry. This is the moment to press for public answers, and to demonstrate that there is already a public demand including from Amnesty International members, to restore the integrity of the organisation and remind it of its fundamental principles.

    I have been a human rights campaigner for over three decades, defending the rights of women and ethnic minorities, defending religious freedom and the rights of victims of torture, and campaigning against illegal detention and state repression. I have raised the issue of the association of Amnesty International with groups such as Begg’s consistently within the organisation. I have now been suspended for trying to do my job and staying faithful to Amnesty’s mission to protect and defend human rights universally and impartially.

    February 7, 2010

    Amnesty’s Statement.

  • Drive-by insults

    Andrew Brown does love to yank the chain of non-believers.

    Judges are paid to discriminate among prisoners before them, and to distinguish those for whom prison is the right treatment from everyone else. Defendants of otherwise good character should obviously get different sentences to habitual recidivists. The real disagreement is whether being a devout Muslim (or Christian) is in itself a sign of good character. Cherie Booth seems to be arguing that it is, though less important than his previously spotless record.

    Right, Cherie Booth seems to be arguing that it is, and by implication that its absence is a sign of bad character, or else why mention it at all? She didn’t say ‘you have a spotless record and you drink Ribena’ or ‘ ‘you have a spotless record and you wear trainers’; she didn’t make a random observation that no reasonable observer would construe as a claim about his character; she said ‘you are a religious man.

    .

    For Sanderson and those who think like him, being a devout believer is quite the opposite. It’s evidence of bad character. For Sanderson and those who think like him, being a devout believer is quite the opposite. It’s evidence of bad character.

    Interesting, except that Sanderson said nothing like that (and much less did ‘those who think like him’) so one is left wondering how Andrew Brown knows it. No one isn’t, one is left marveling yet again at Andrew Brown’s fondness for the truculent and untrue passing insult.

    In Sanderson’s world, judges should say things like “Although you have no previous convictions, you are none the less a follower of Pope Benedict XVI and so unable to tell right from wrong. I therefore find myself compelled to impose a custodial sentence.”

    There’s another one. Not true, not pleasant, not justifiable.

    I say this, of course, with the utmost affection.

  • Taliban Blow Up Girls’ School in NW Pakistan

    They are opposed to girls’ education.

  • Mary Midgley Sets ‘Neo-Darwnists’ Straight

    She’s still fretting about the metaphors.