We have been discussing the surge of Islamic extremism in Bangladesh, particularly targeting secular writers. This week we have another tragic victim: law student and secular writer Nazimuddin Samad, 26. For simply espousing secular viewpoints, Samad was hacked to death by three or four men on his way back home from classes. Samad and other victims have appeared on a list of 84 “atheist bloggers” published by Islamic extremists.
Continue reading “Sixth Secular Writer Murdered in Bangladesh”
I have previously criticized the nonprofit People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) for its over-the-top commercials. While (as many here know) I am a big animal rights advocate, PETA often goes for sensational and shocking publicity that undermines the cause, in my view. One such example is the latest message from PETA to mothers that “eating chicken can make your kid’s dick small.” The video ends with, “Worried about the size of your kid’s pecker, moms-to-be? Don’t eat chicken!” Given the currently debate over the size of Donald Trump, PETA appears to be pitching the same basis for refusing to eat poultry.
There is another story of an employee fired over her exercise of free speech in her private life. The speech itself is vile and upsetting. Erica Walker is a radical activist associated with the the New Black Panthers Party and extremist Eric Sheppard Jr. Sheppard is on the run after organizing a protest at Valdosta State University Campus in Georgia where he stomped on an American flag. A gun was found in his backpack and he is wanted by the police. Walker has staged her own protests in walking on the flag. However, after she was identified, her employer, 1380 WAOK The Voice of the Community, reportedly fired her. As we have previously discussed, there is a trend where private and public employees are being disciplined or terminated for their exercise of private speech. There is no indication that Walker associated her disgraceful action with 1380 WAOK The Voice of the Community.
Saudi Arabia has produced almost weekly stories of grotesque and medieval sentencing out of its Sharia court system. The Sharia courts apply Islamic law that can be both brutal and primitive in flogging and beheading people for crimes against the faith. The latest is the sentencing of a man to death for renouncing Islam and allegedly posting a video ripping up a Koran and hitting it with his shoe. Saudi Arabia still enforces death sentences for apostasy for those denying their Islamic faith. It is crime that places the Kingdom well outside of the most basic guarantees of human rights and civil liberties.
Continue reading “Saudi Arabia Sentences Man To Death For Renouncing Islam and Ripping Up Koran”
There is an interesting story that has been raging on conservative sites on the Internet but suddenly popped up on national television in a CNN interview. Conservatives are criticizing CNN host Carol Costello for abruptly ending a segment on Tuesday after a guest raised Hillary Clinton’s 1975 legal defense of an accused child rapist. I recently condemned an attack ad against Judge Jane Kelly (a widely respected former public defender) for representing a criminal defendant. The attack on Clinton is equally low grade and unfair.
Continue reading “Clinton Under Attack For Serving As Counsel In Rape Case In 1975”
We recently discussed how Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has turned his suppression of critics to other countries and was demanding action from governments against his critics. At the time, I was relieved to report that Germany had held the line on free speech. My relief of premature. German ZDF public television said Monday it had deleted a poem recited by presenter Jan Böhmermann from last Thursday’s edition of “Neo Magazin Royal” after pressure from the German government. Böhmermann’s poem, containing numerous sexual innuendos, accuses Erdogan of repressing minorities, including Kurds and Christians. German government spokesman Steffen Seibert said Chancellor Angela Merkel in a telephone call on Sunday evening with Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu had agreed that Böhmermann had recited a “deliberately abusive text.” Merkel has done precisely what civil libertarians feared: feeding Erdogan’s desire to suppress speech and affirming that he can indeed silence critics abroad. In the meantime, Merkel’s call did not take Erdogan away from his signature work in suppressing any and all critics. Erdogan’s government was busy this week with the arrest of dozens of political opponents.
Continue reading “Germany Moves To Remove Anti-Erdogan Poem And Merkel Calls Turkey To Apologize”
There is a controversial measure introduced in Tennessee by State Sen. Kerry Roberts to make the Bible the official book of the state. Roberts insists that this is just a recognition of the historical importance of the book and not any elevation of the Bible over other books of faith. That is less convincing to many who view the measure as an official endorsement of, if not an entanglement with, Christianity.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan basically called President Barack Obama a liar this week after Obama said that he spoke to Erdogan about his concerns with the crackdown on journalists in Turkey. Erdogan said it never happened and accused Obama of essentially speaking behind his back. As we discussed last week, Erdogan has moved beyond his arresting of critics in Turkey to seeking the prosecution or censorship of any critics abroad. His comments further reflect his authoritarian definition of free speech as speech that by definition excludes any criticism of him.
Cyprus is following the precarious path of countries like France and Russia in criminalizing one side of the historical debate over the genocide of Armenian Turks by Turkey. It is now a crime to deny that Ottoman Turks committed genocide against Armenian Turks a century ago, according to a resolution passed Cypriot parliament. While a French court later struck down its law, the addition of Cyprus among countries criminalizing historical debates is chilling and disconcerting.
Continue reading “Cyprus Criminalizes The Questioning Of The Armenian Genocide”
Given the Wall Street poll showing that one-third of Sanders voters are not willing to vote for Hillary Clinton in the general, the outburst by Clinton over the “lies of Sanders” is not going to improve those numbers. While Clinton dismissed the young person as a Sanders supporter, she is not. She is an uncommitted Greenpeace volunteer. Various media sites have challenged Clinton’s denial of receiving money from the fossil fuel industry and Sanders went on television to repeat the basic allegation. They say that she has received a great deal of money from people in the industry and her PAC has continued to take such money. They argue that she is again making a technical defense (direct contributions from companies to the campaign are not at issue because such donations would be illegal). At issue is the fact that Clinton has refused to sign the pledge of Sanders not to take fossil fuel money. Like the recent Clinton campaign demand that Sanders change “his tone,” this videotape will only likely cement the opposition of many Sanders supporters and prompt them to vote in the fall for Green Party candidate Jill Stein or other candidates.  Ironically, Clinton once attacked President Obama on this very point: for taking money from individuals in the industry.
The United States continues to give overwhelming support to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan as he continues his expansion of authoritarian power, the dismantling of secular government in favor of Islamic rule, and the destruction of free speech and the free press in the country. Now Erdogan’s insatiable appetite for censorship and sanctions of critics has extended to outside of Turkey where he is demanding that critics be silenced. Not only has his thuggish security details been criticized for roughing up protesters in Europe and the United States, but Turkey is demanding action from governments against his critics.
There is an interesting controversy out of Marquette University, which has moved to suspend and possibly fire Professor John McAdams after his criticism of a junior faculty member Cheryl Abbate in a free speech dispute. Abbate was recorded by a student in saying that his views against same-sex marriage were not appropriate to be voiced in her class. The response of the university has some problematic elements for a free speech perspective.
We have been following how universities across the country have seen an increase in claims of “micro aggressions” and impermissible “cultural appropriation” (here and here). Now that tension has become physical at San Francisco State University after student Bonita Tindle reportedly attacked a white student named Cory Goldstein for wearing dreadlocks. The claim seems to capture the race to bottom on campuses where an ever widening array of words or symbols are declared racially or culturally insensitive. However, this was so bizarre, I checked to confirm that it was not an early April Fool’s joke. Yet, various news organizations are reporting it and a YouTube video shows the attack.
The Saudi Arabian government is again reaffirming the extremist Islamic system under Sharia law this month in pushing not just for more severe punishment for homosexuals but more prosecutions of people who are viewed as espousing or encouraging homosexual views on social media. One such major victory for the Saudi religious police came this week with the arrest of a Saudi doctor for raising a rainbow flag outside his home in Jeddah. After his arrest, the doctor insisted that he had no idea that the rainbow was a symbol for gay rights. Yet those champions of Islamic purity in the Committee for the Promotion of Virtue and the Prevention of Vice still charged him.
There is a curious class action lawsuit filed in federal court in San Francisco that seeks an order to force movie studios to use a minimum of an R rating for movies depicting the smoking of tobacco. The lawsuit filed by Timothy Forsyth and others strikes me as entirely meritless. The lawsuit cites various movies like The Hobbit: The Desolation of Smaug as warranting an R rating. Not all that gruesome decapitations and gouging mind you. It is the fact that characters like Gandalf smoke.