Reason # 1,234,459 The US Should Get Out Of The UN

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The United Nations, providing yet another reason why it is an utterly execrable institution that serves the interests of undemocratic, retrograde forces has banned criticism of Islam during debates in the UN Human Rights Council.

GENEVA: Muslim countries have won a battle to prevent Islam from being criticised during debates by the UN Human Rights Council. Religions deserve special protection because any debate about faith is bound to be “very complex, very sensitive and very intense”, council President Doru-Romulus Costea said Wednesday.

Scholars: Only religious scholars should be allowed to discuss matters of faith, he told journalists in Geneva.

While Costea’s ban applies to all religions, it was prompted by Muslim countries complaining about references to Islam.

Costea issued his “presidential ruling” on Monday during the eighth meeting of the council’s 47 members, which do not include the United States. The ruling will not affect findings by the council’s experts, just its chamber debates.

Muslims have found a very effective method in which to prevent criticism: Since many Muslim countries are, to one degree or another guided by Sharia law, any criticism of such a nation's human rights violations allowed by their laws would be a criticism of Muslim based Sharia - therefore any criticism of their violations would be a criticism of Islam. Since Islam isn't just a religion but a legal system as well it is very easy to conflate Islam and Islamic nations .

The ban came after a heated session on Monday, when the representative of the Association for World Education (AWE), in a joint statement with the International Humanist and Ethical Union, denounced female genital mutilation, the penalty of stoning for adultery and child marriage as sanctioned by Islamic law. Egypt, Pakistan and Iran angrily protested, interrupting the AWE speaker, David Littman, with no less than 16 points of order, and succeeding in getting the Council’s proceedings suspended for over half an hour. In the course of this contentious discussion, the representatives from the Islamic countries made numerous revealing statements – statements that are well worth examining as Islamic nations and organizations call with increasing insistence for restrictions on free speech in the West.


Imran Ahmed Siddiqui, the representative from Pakistan, echoed the ever-echoing refrain of all Islamic apologists in the West, when he complained that Littman’s initiative on genital mutilation, stoning and child marriage amounted to an “out-of-context, selective discussion on the Sharia law.” He asked that Littman not be allowed to speak: “I would therefore request the president to exercise his judgment and authority and request the speaker not to touch issues which have already been debarred from discussion in this Council.” The representative from Slovenia then protested mildly against this attempt to silence Littman: “Any NGO representative,” he reminded Siddiqui, “has the right to make a statement within the merits of the agenda item under discussion. We see the statement being made pertaining within the purview of the agenda item and we don’t see grounds for any restricting censorship in that respect.”


The representative from Egypt thereupon responded: “I would humbly and kindly ask my colleague from Slovenia to reconsider.” He warned: “We will not take this lightly….This is not about NGOs and their participation in the Council. This is about the Sharia law.” Pakistan’s Siddiqui added: “I would like to state again that this is not the forum to discuss religious sensitivity.” Why not? Again sounding notes that are increasingly familiar in any discussion of the elements of Islam that jihadists and Sharia supremacists use to justify oppression, Siddiqui explained: “It will amount to spreading hatred against certain members of the Council. I mean, it has happened before also that selective discussions were raised in the Council to demonize a particular group.” He addressed Costea: “So we would again request you to please use your authority to bar any such discussion again, at the Council.”


After more discussion, a recess, and another warning from the representative from Egypt, Littman was finally allowed to proceed. After noting that “almost 90% of the female population in the north of Sudan undergo FGM which, in many cases, is practiced in its most extreme form known as infibulation,” Littman declared: “We believe that only a fatwa from Al-Azhar Grand Sheikh Sayyed Tantawi – replacing the ambiguous fatwas of 1949, 1951 and 1981 – will change this barbaric, criminal practice, which is now growing even in Europe.”


At this point Egypt interrupted, complaining that “this is an attempt to raise a bad traditional practice to Islam. Sheikh Al-Azhar [Sayyed Tantawi] is the president of the largest and the biggest and the oldest Islamic university in the world.” He exclaimed: “My point is that Islam will not be crucified in this Council. That’s why we are challenging this ruling” – that is, Costea’s decision to allow Littman to deliver his address.

Instead of standing up for human rights, which this being the Human Rights Council one would think he might Costea caved, thereby removing from discussion many of the horrors committed by Muslims against woman (as well as assorted other atrocities) from even being discussed.

It is time to leave the useless and noxious UN.

Cross-Posted at Because I'm Right

Has Anybody Around Here Seen the ACLU?

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This headline, Council: Mongtomery schools cave to pressue with Islam book pretty much says it all.

Washington, D.C. -

A new report issued by the American Textbook Council says books approved for use in local school districts for teaching middle and high school students about Islam caved in to political correctness and dumbed down the topic at a critical moment in its history.

"Textbook editors try to avoid any subject that could turn into a political grenade," wrote Gilbert Sewall, director of the council, who railed against five popular history texts for "adjust[ing] the definition of jihad or sharia or remov[ing] these words from lessons to avoid inconvenient truths.".....

Sewall's report blames publishing companies for allowing the influence of groups like the California-based Council on Islamic Education to serve throughout the editorial process as "screeners" for textbooks, softening or deleting potentially unflattering topics within the faith.

"Fundamentally I'm worried about dumbing down textbooks," he said, "by groups that come to state education officials saying we want this and that - and publishers need to find a happy medium."

This kind of nonsense is seen regularly in the UK which is in full retreat in the face of a rapidly growing, soon to be dominant Muslim wave. The fact that textbooks here in the US which are already frequently twisted to politically correct ends are now caving to Islamist sensibilities is not a good portent for our future.

Maybe someone should call the ACLU.....LOL Just kidding.

Barking Moonbat Early Warning System discusses

Britain: The Bad News Then The Good

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Hat tip to Mark Steyn

Christian Britain is fading into history:

From The Church of England Newspaper:

If recent reports of trends in religious observance prove to be correct, then in some 30 years the mosque will be able to claim that, religiously speaking, the UK is an Islamic nation, and therefore needs a share in any religious establishment to reflect this....

At all levels of national life Islam has gained state funding, protection from any criticism, and the insertion of advisors and experts in government departs national and local. A Muslim Home Office adviser, for example, was responsible for Baroness Scotland’s aborting of the legislation against honour killings, arguing that informal methods would be better. In the police we hear of girls under police protection having the addresses of their safe houses disclosed to their parents by Muslim officers who think they are doing their religious duty.

While men-only gentlemen’s clubs are now being dubbed unlawful, we hear of municipal swimming baths encouraging ‘Muslim women only’ sessions and in Dewsbury Hospitals staff waste time by turning beds to face Mecca five times a day — a Monty Pythonesque scenario of lunacy, but astonishingly true...

The point is that Islam is being institutionalised, incarnated, into national structures amazingly fast, at the same time as demography is showing very high birthrates...

Today the Christian story is fading from public imagination, while Islam grows apace.

But do not despair; the red squirrels will remain to carry the standard high:

MINISTERS are planning to build a £100,000 wildlife bridge over a new road to protect Scotland's dwindling red squirrel population.

The 375ft Kingcausie Wildlife Overbridge will span a section of the new Aberdeen bypass, near the ancient Cleanill Wood.

It will allow squirrels and other wildlife to safely scamper above the road.

Environment minister Mike Russell has approved the bridge building as part of the £390million road scheme.

There are around 120,000 red squirrels in Scotland.

Buttle's World notes

High Noon In The West

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The invaluable Daniel Pipes has written an article on what he sees as the three most likely possible futures for Europe:

Europe may constitute a mere 7 per cent of the world's landmass but for 500 years, 1450-1950, for good and ill, it was the global engine of change.

How it develops in the future will affect all humanity, especially daughter countries such as Australia that still retain close and important ties to the old continent. I foresee potentially one of three paths for Europe: Muslims dominating, Muslims rejected or harmonious integration.

The first scenario, Muslims dominating, is most famously articulated in Mark Steyn's America Alone. In this possible future, Europe does not wake from its current cultural and demographic stupor. Native Europeans are currently at nowhere near population replacement levels. Liberal guilt, coupled with Socialist economics and moral relativism (highlighted by a rejection of religion) has lulled the continent into a suicidal stupor from which it doesn't wake. Islam, though lacking in the inner dynamism of Western civilization retains its religious fervor coupled with a resentment of the West and a fecundity that leads it to swamping the continent.

The second scenario, Muslims rejected, posits a future in which Europe , at the 11th hour, rouses itself from its stupor and pushes back against the Muslim influx. The result is likely to be bloody and difficult, requiring not just the likely expulsion of large numbers of Muslims but a reconfiguration of dead-end European Socialist economies and a muscular reclamation of European culture.

The final scenario is favored by "most politicians, journalists, and academics, but it has little basis in fact." It basically posits a future in which the idea of either the old style conception of the "melting pot" or the current in-vogue multicultural idea takes hold and Muslims and Europeans mingle happily, happily reveling in the gorgeous mosaic Jesse Jackson likes to bleat about.

Looking around at the current social landscape of Europe it is depressingly easy to assume that the first scenario in which Muslims eventually become ascendant while shunting aside Western culture in the process, is even now taking place. Pipes however, while hardly being an optimist in this matter is a realist first and makes this final point:

Forecasting is difficult because the crisis has not yet struck. But it may not be far off. Within a decade, perhaps, the continent's evolution will become clear as the Europe-Muslim relationship takes shape.

The unprecedented nature of Europe's situation also renders a forecast exceedingly difficult. Never in history has a civilisation peaceably dissolved, nor has a people risen to reclaim its patrimony. Europe's unique circumstances make the outcome difficult to comprehend, tempting to overlook and virtually impossible to predict. With Europe, we all enter into terra incognita.

Whatever the outcome, it will have tremendous ramifications for the US, either pointing the way to our own future or acting as a cautionary tale that might cause us to develop strategies that might yet save the ideals of the West, the best of which have have yet to be equalled by any other culture.

Cross-Posted at Liberty Pundit

Islam In Decline?

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Via Pajamas Media


After the recent story about Islam overtaking Catholicism as the world's largest religion, this story, Muslims Leaving Islam in Droves comes as an encouraging surprise. Apparently prominent Muslim journalist Magdi Allam's conversion to Catholicism (highlighted by his very public baptism by Pope Benedict) is not an aberration, but a trend.

Interviewed by al-Jazeera in 2006, Ahmad al Qataani, leader of the Companions Lighthouse for the Science of Islamic Law in Libya, explains the decline:

Islam used to represent … Africa’s main religion and there were 30 African languages that used to be written in Arabic script. The number of Muslims in Africa has diminished to 316 million, half of whom are Arabs in North Africa. So in the section of Africa that we are talking about, the non-Arab section, the number of Muslims does not exceed 150 million people. When we realize that the entire population of Africa is one billion people, we see that the number of Muslims has diminished greatly from what it was in the beginning of the last century.

On the other hand, the number of Catholics has increased from one million in 1902 to 329 million 882 thousand (329,882,000). Let us round off that number to 330 million in the year 2000.

As to how that happened, well there are now 1.5 million churches whose congregations account for 46 million people. In every hour, 667 Muslims convert to Christianity. Everyday, 16,000 Muslims convert to Christianity. Every year, 6 million Muslims convert to Christianity. These numbers are very large indeed.

Watching the horrors that seem to flourish wherever Islam takes root it has always struck me as unfathomable why so many remain faithful to it, let alone why others would convert. Allam's comments are much more in line with the kind of reaction a rational mind would have. He says he,

“has been freed from the obscurantism of an ideology that legitimizes lies and deception, violent death that leads to homicide and suicide, blind submission to tyranny, permitting me to join the authentic religion of Truth, Life, and Liberty. … I realize what I am going up against but I will confront my fate with my head high, with my back straight, and the interior strength of one who is certain about his faith.”

Africa is not the only place experiencing this phenomenon:

In Iran as many as 1 million people have surreptitiously converted to Evangelical Christianity in the last five years.

Some additional reasons for this:

One Iranian religious scholar believes youth are abandoning Islam because it is identified with the corrupt Iranian government.

Iran being Iran and Islam being Islam of course this is cannot be allowed so,

Now the Iranian Majlis (parliament) is debating the death penalty for conversion.

But there is reason to hope that this won't be enough. So while it seems that much of the West is too weak and morally bankrupt to present a coherent ideological defense to radical Islam, the seeds of the opposition might actually reside within Islam itself.

And You Thought Cartoons Were Trouble?

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After the violence that followed the publication of the now famous Danish cartoons that showed the prophet Mohammed, supposedly in contravention of the Koran and the murder of Danish filmmaker Theo Van Gogh you might have thought no other Dane would have the guts to thwart Islamofascist demands. Fortunately, you'd be wrong. Filmmaker and Dutch Cabinet member Geert Wilders is scheduled to release Fitna, which

will elaborate on verses from the Quran accompanied by documentary
footage from the world of Islam.

It is, as you might expect, very violent showing such acts of savagery as beheadings, suicide bombings etc. and ties them directly to the Koranic passages that authorize them. Needless to say the impending release of the film has caused a huge amount of alarm and controversy in Denmark; the Dutch cabinet met last night to discuss what to do about it. It is reported that the Dutch public prosecution department had considered investigating the possibility of filing charges against the filmmaker but never followed through. And the Dutch are not the only concerned party; the EU is putting their diplomatic missions on alert, preparing for the possibility of trouble.

And trouble is something they just may get.

• Zabihullah Mujahid has stressed that the Taliban will increase their
  attacks on Dutch military and humanitarian peacekeepers in Afghanistan, if the film was ever aired.


• Wilders received a fatwa by Al-Qaeda, calling all Muslims around the world to assassinate Wilders in the name of Islam.


• Syria’s Grand Mufti, leader Ahmad Badr al-Din said that if Geert Wilders pictures the image of a burning Koran in his film, the Dutch people will be held responsible and possible attacks against Western public interests are not out of the question.

The various governments are not the only ones to be apprehensive about such threats.

Earlier this week Network Solutions pulled the plug on a promotional
website for the film and YouTube removed the first part of the videoclip, citing "terms of use violation". Wilders was also turned down by all Dutch broadcasters.

Despite these setbacks Wilders is committed to releasing the film which he sees as alerting people to the true nature of Islam which he sees as a threat to Western freedoms. How the West handles the reaction to this film may well prove instructive as to how much will the West has in the struggle against Islamofascism

UPDATE: The film has just been released and can be seen in above.

Cross-linked at Liberty Pundit

A Legal System That Shouldn’t Be Shari’a-ed

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This article by Libyan-European liberal thinker and entrepreneur Muhammad 'Abd Al-Muttalib Al-Houni is a response to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williamson's recent statements on allowing Muslim Sharia'a law to share authority with British law, at least in some parts of Britain.

Williamson, who is known for working tirelessly to apologize to Islamic radicals and showing a kind of understanding to killers that will surely lead to the eradication of his own religion and culture is the perfect example of the modern liberal: forgiving the worst in all cultures but his own, which is not to be forgiven for anything. Al-Houni says that the implementation of Shari'a would do the following:

"1) Permit polygamy for European Muslim citizens, and not punish them for it - [even though] this is considered criminal under European law;

"2) Permit European Muslim citizens to beat their wives to discipline them, as the Koran urges;

"3) Allow men to unilaterally decide to divorce without requiring any court proceedings, as this is a right guaranteed [to men] by shari'a;

"4) Give daughters [only] half the inheritance rights that sons have, while widows receive only an eighth of the inheritance;

"5) [Not] consider women's testimony the equal of men's in shari'a courts;

"6) Deprive a divorced woman of custody of her children if she remarries;

"7) Allow European Muslim citizens to marry in traditional marriages without the need to officially register these marriages;

"8) Eliminate adoption, since it is contrary to shari'a;

"9) Force a woman whose Muslim husband converts to another religion to divorce him, because he is an apostate;

"10) Prevent European Muslim women from marrying non-Muslims…"

The rest of the article is equally instructive and well worth reading.

Cross linked to Liberty Pundit

Boomtown Bush - Geldof on GWB

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In Time Magazine's online presence, Time.com there is an interesting interview posted 2/28/08, Geldof and Bush: Diary From the Road in which now occasional rocker and full-time activist Bob Geldof documents his experiences on the road with President George W. Bush during the President's recent pan-Africa trip. It is interesting for more than the fact that a fading rock star should have such access to the leader of the free world but is actually worth reading for Geldof's conversations with and observations of GWB.


Geldoff, not maintaining what is the usually de rigueur Bush-is-Hitler mantra, is actually quite complimentary of the President, at least on the subject of Africa. Geldoff finds him "curious and quick" and has high praise for his African policies which he says, with no sign of squeamishness, have "saved millions of lives." Geldof paints a picture that we've seen before of Bush from most of those who've had contact with him; very much the Texan, loose in conversation but disciplined and smart, "an emotional man" possessed of a great capacity for compassion for his fellow man. This is not the image of heartless rube warmonger who launches massive military campaigns to line the already overstuffed pockets of his buddies that most on the Left imagines and try to popularize.


Aside from the interesting character observations, Geldoff does elicit some comments from the President that are worthy of deeper analysis. At one point Bush says, "See, I believe we're in an ideological struggle with extremism,"..."These people prey on the hopeless. Hopelessness breeds terrorism. That's why this trip is a mission undertaken with the deepest sense of humanity, because those other folks will just use vulnerable people for evil. Like in Iraq." Now while this particular trope has some validity, as most cliches do, there is still something troubling about it. The idea that Islamic terrorists must troll through the ranks of the poor and disaffected to find followers creates an impression that is not just wrong, but is actually helpful to those same terrorists.


The fact is many terrorists have little, if any, experience of poverty and deprivation at all. Osama Bin Laden is the scion of famously wealthy family. Many of the 9/11 hijackers were middle class or better, college educated and familiar with the West. The attack on the Glasgow. Scotland Airport in 8/07 was carried out by a PhD Engineer and a physician. The four 7/07 London suicide bombers were homegrown, middle-class Brits. What drew them all into terrorism wasn't poverty and therefore you won't won't eradicate terrorism by eradicating poverty. Modern-day terrorism is motivated by Islam. Period. To blame anything but Islam as the animating force behind it is to cut Islam a break that is counterproductive. In order to defeat terrorism we have to confront (and terrorism is just a tactic after all) it where it is born; in the teachings of Islam. Islam won't confront its own failings if we let it off the hook. We have to point out with vigor and in detail the ways that Islam is failing the world. Islam is in need of a major reformation and we do it and ourselves no favor by being bashful about pointing out that fact.


Now Bush must certainly realize this and it has to be admitted that he is confronted with a real problem in figuring out how to deal with Islam. As President, if Bush were to come out and say, "Islam is the cause of terrorism. Islam as it currently exists must be stopped" he would in effect be turning the very hostile eyes of most Americans on the Muslims living here, most quite peacefully, those who although they are Muslim don't have the violent inclinations of the more strictly devout. During WWII Roosevelt put thousands of Japanese into internment camps. It was not America's finest moment and not one most of us would like to relive.


Geldof's piece paints a generally positive picture of the President but it also reveals a man who, after all this time, is still having a difficult time getting a handle on this particular enemy.


Toward the end of his essay Geldof, apparently in an attempt to maintain at least some of his rock-buddies' respect, rips Bush for Iraq, Guantanomo, Abu-Ghraib and the usual litany of left-wing complaints. He does it without subtly or any new or particularly insightful thinking. No surprises here. The article is still worth reading however for giving a vivid picture of George Bush and, unintentionally no doubt, for highlighting how Bush is still struggling, unsuccessfully here, with the enemy we now face and will be facing for some time to come.

A Small Price To Pay

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A recent headline in the British press proclaimed, Archbishop of Canterbury calls for new law to punish 'thoughtless or cruel' words, and related how the aforementioned Archbishop is calling for new laws that will punish “thoughtless and cruel” speech, in an effort to protect religious sensibilities. His “thinking” here is that certain kinds of speech offend religious sensibilities, can intimidate and then silence arguments. In other words he is seeking to limit free speech in order to promote free speech. (?)

In Canada, the Canadian Islamic Conference, the self-proclaimed “voice of Canada’s Muslims” has lodged two complaints with Canada’s Human Rights Commission against Mark Steyn, popular columnist and author of the bestselling America Alone, and Canadian magazine, McLean’s which excerpted a section of that book which details how immigrant Muslims in Europe are literally out breeding native Europeans and within a generation will outnumber them, burying Western civilization in the process as the immigrant wave rejects assimilation, instead bringing their native culture and transplanting it in the West. Heavily researched, cogently and wittily argued Steyn’s work could land him in jail. Apparently in Canada writing anything that could be considered critical of Islam is potentially a “hate crime”.

In universities across the United States speech codes spell out what can and cannot be said, so as to insure that no person or group is offended. Penalties for violating these codes can, under some circumstances, include expulsion. Over the last forty years “diversity trainings” have popped up in colleges, corporations and government, wherein speech is examined for any hint of possible offensive content. If any is found, and not successfully addressed, punishments of varying degrees of severity are meted out. The objective behind these “trainings”, if not the setting is similar to the reeducation camps that sprang up in Vietnam after the War there; those being “reeducated” were subjected to intensive indoctrination into the “correct” way to think and behave. No trials were necessary for those subject to such “reeducation”, just as no specific offense is required for diversity trainings: they’re mandatory.

Which raises the question: What about freedom of speech? This relatively new emphasis on “offense” being a major criterion of what is and is not permissible is, in fact, a major assault on the longstanding Western tradition of freedom of expression established and promulgated since the time of Socrates up through the signing of the Magna Carta and the passing of the First Amendment. Logically, there would not even be a need for the protection of a First Amendment if not for the possibility of “offensive speech.” Freedom of speech only exists to allow each of us to say whatever we want even if someone else is offended by what we say.

There have always been reasonable limits on free speech, of course. You can’t shout “fire” in a crowed movie theater; you can’t libel another person, etc. But this current emphasis on “offensive speech” is different in that now the burden of proof seems to have shifted. It no longer matters if your intent was meant to offend or even that your “offensive” speech had some demonstrable negative impact. Now it seems to be actionable if someone merely feels offended no matter if the offense taken is reasonable or not. Even the truth doesn’t seem to be a sufficient defense. Previously the remedy to being offended by someone’s speech was limited to the private sphere. If you said something that was interpreted as being offensive you either apologized or didn’t and faced the ramifications on a personal, social level.

Much of this sensitivity seems to have appeared contemporaneously with the rise of multiculturalism, which ostensibly is about promoting diversity, a good goal until we see how it is being pursued. Multiculturalism as it is often actually practiced holds that all cultures are equally good…with the sole exception being the larger American/Western culture which is assumed to be oppressive by definition. Therefore anything that can be interpreted in any way as insulting to any other group, culture, sex, lifestyle etc is immediately understood to be an assault by the repressive dominant culture.

You then get such bizarre situations as a Turkish lawyer filing a lawsuit against an Italian soccer club for having a large red cross on its jerseys, apparently offensive to Muslims as it is reminiscent of the cross worn by Christians in the Crusades one thousand years ago. California has banned the terms "mom", "dad", "husband", and "wife" from public schools as it is potentially offensive to gays.

The road on which these kinds of surreal developments seem normal is one which leads to a world in which people can no longer speak their minds, in which ideas can longer be thrown against each other in competition so that the best one might win out. A world in which no one is offended is a sterile world, a world without dynamism. The price we pay for freedom, the ability to do and say what we want is that sometimes we may wind up offended. That really doesn’t seem like such a bad deal, when you think about it. Does it?