Monthly Archives: May 2011

Avon axes BNP candidate over racist Facebook comments

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Nancy Shaw-Farmer with Der FuhrerA BNP candidate has been axed as an Avon representative after making racist remarks on Facebook.

The company “terminated its relationship” with self-employed sales leader Nancy Shaw-Farmer, who stood as a BNP candidate in Blackburn’s Roe Lee ward, after complaints about her posts on the social networking site.

It launched an investigation after receiving calls about the offensive comments which were derogatory to Asian people. Her comments included: “4 P***s in a car near where I work asked for directions to a junior school. Sent them in the wrong direction.” She also wrote: “Bungee jumping! 25 per person. Muslims and P***s free. No strings attached and free transport. ha ha ha.”

Ms Shaw-Farmer, from the Bastwell area of Blackburn, lost after polling 175 votes in last week’s election. She had worked as an Avon sales leader for 12 months and had around 30 customers.

Blackburn Citizen, 10 May 2011

US court rules in favour of Muslim inmate

Posted on by Bob Pitt

A Muslim inmate at the Federal Correctional Institution in Loretto didn’t get a fair shake when he filed a lawsuit claiming religious discrimination, the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Friday.

Charles Mack, 52, sued in federal court in Johnstown. He wrote that a corrections officer slapped a label on his back reading “I love bacon.” The officer later told him, “there’s no good Muslim, except a dead Muslim,” according to the complaint. Mr. Mack complained, and was fired from his commissary job, he said.

He sued, claiming that his rights to free speech and exercise of religion were being violated, he was being subjected to cruel and unusual punishment, and he faced retaliation and a hostile work environment. Six weeks later, U.S. District Judge Kim R. Gibson dismissed his case.

The 3rd Circuit judges found that Mr. Mack’s claims met legal thresholds that warrant further review. It rejected Judge Gibson’s view that the “I love bacon” sign was a “junior high school level prank,” that spurred only “offended religious sensibilities.”

The appeals court ordered the U.S. District Court to take another look at the complaint and allow Mr. Mack to amend it if warranted.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, 7 May 2011

Toronto: anti-racists mobilise opposition to Wilders

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Protesters are getting ready for Geert Wilders’ first Canadian visit as the controversial anti-Islamic Dutch politician rolls into town for a private speech to local Christian groups Monday night.

The Freedom Party leader maintains that because Canada helped out Holland during the Second World War, it is only fitting to repay them by raising awareness the country is in danger of a hostile takeover and being “Islamicized”.

“Freedom is the most precious thing we have,” he said Sunday at a Toronto hotel. “(Canadian soldiers) didn’t give their lives to free Europe, (so that) not 50, 60, 70 years later we would face another totalitarianism ideology called Islam.”

Toronto’s invitation-only event is being emceed by the Sun‘s Ezra Levant, who will also interview him Monday on Sun News. London, Ottawa and Nashville are also on the schedule because Wilders said they are known as “the Bible belt” – areas with devout Christians.

“What happened in Europe will also happen here,” Wilders said. “We should wake up to the fact that Islamization means less freedom to us and our children.”

The Islamic Society of Toronto and the Canadian Islamic Congress could not be reached for comment on Sunday. However, Anti-Racist Action and the First Nations Solidarity Working Group are organizing protests in the cities Wilders is speaking in.

“As Muslims, racialized people and/or anti-racist allies, we are alarmed at this invitation extended to Wilders by the Canada Christian College and International Free Press Society Canada,” the groups said in a press release. “It is also very clear that after all the hysteria about free speech, the event has been organized so as to deter any dissenting voices or protest.”

In addition to being invitation-only, tickets cost $20 and must be purchased with a credit and proper name just to find out the location of the speeches.

Toronto Sun, 9 May 2011

Birmingham Project Champion ‘spy’ cameras being removed

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Birmingham spy cameraMore than 200 so-called “spy cameras” installed in largely Muslim areas of Birmingham are being dismantled.

The cameras in Washwood Heath and Sparkbrook, some of which were hidden, were paid for with £3m of government funds earmarked for tackling terrorism.

An independent report was highly critical of the Project Champion scheme and West Midlands Police. The force agreed in December they should be removed and said none of the 218 cameras had ever been switched on.

Assistant Chief Constable Sharon Rowe said: “The work starting today shows that we have listened to what our communities wanted and acted upon those wishes. We accept that mistakes were made and we are keen to learn the lessons that emerged from the review into Project Champion. The removal of the cameras is part of that learning process.”

BBC News, 9 May 2011

See also Birmingham Post, 9 May 2011

Two more Muslim religious leaders taken off plane

Posted on by Bob Pitt

For the second time in less than a week, two more Muslim religious leaders say they were not allowed to fly to Charlotte. “What we have here is a case of blatant discrimination,” said attorney Mo Idlibi, who now represents the Imams.

On Friday, two Imams were told to get off a flight from Memphis to Charlotte after going through TSA security twice. After they boarded the flight, the pilot decided to return to the gate and the Imams were told to get off the plane. Both were allowed to take a later flight but the Imams say they never got a clear understanding of why they were asked to leave the plane in the first place.

Then on Saturday, two more Imams were prevented from boarding a flight to Charlotte for the conference on Islamaphobia. The father and son, both Imams, tried to board a flight from LaGuardia to Charlotte. The younger man, Abu Bakr Adul Latif, was initially allowed to board after passing through a security screening. However, his father, Al Amin Abdul Latif, was never allowed to get on the American Airlines flight. Later Abu Bakr Adul Latif and the other passengers were taken off the plane – apparently because of security reasons. Both Imams had cleared security more than once.

“Body frisks, excessive security checks and they were cleared every time,” said Idlibi. “Discrimination based on race, based upon national origin and religions and those are just unacceptable in our country.”

Idlibi said that he plans to seek damages in court and would like to see pilots undergo sensitivity training. He said he also wants answers. “My clients want to know why they haven’t received any explanation from American Airlines about why this took place,” he explained.

WCNC, 9 May 2011

Posted in USA

Sign next to mosque reads ‘Bomb making, next driveway’

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Bomb Making Next Driveway

AMHERST, N.Y. — There was no answer at an Amherst home, where a stenciled sign reads, “bomb making, next driveway.” The property is located next to a newly built mosque at the Jaffarya Center.

Across the street, patients of Dr. John Athans expressed shock upon viewing the sign, questioning the timing of it. It went up this past weekend, only days after the death of Osama Bin Laden.

WIVB, 9 May 2011

See also WNY Muslims, 7 May 2011

Update:  See WGRZ-TV, 10 May 2011

Further update:  See “Neighbor removes sign next to mosque”,WBEN, 11 May 2011

Posted in USA

Joel Titus banned from attending EDL protests and loitering outside mosques

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Joel Titus Harrow
Titus punching photographer Marc Vallée at a Stop Islamisation of Europe protest outside Harrow Central Mosque in December 2009 (Photo: Jonathan Warren)

An Eastcote teenager has been banned from attending protests by far-right group the English Defence League.

Joel Titus, 19, of North View, who has been violent at EDL protests, was slapped with an antisocial behaviour order (ASBO) at Uxbridge Magistrates Court on Friday. The court heard about the teenager’s involvement in a string of incidents between 2009 and 2010, which police say were overwhelmingly related to EDL protests.

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Dawkins ponders anti-Islam alliance with evangelical Christians

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Bakke anti-Islam mapRichard Dawkins is often described as a “militant atheist”. However, if this term is meant to convey that Dawkins maintains a uniform hostility to all varieties of religious belief then it is misapplied.

Dawkins makes no attempt to hide the fact that he is discriminatory in his opposition to different faiths. He happily describes himself as a “cultural Christian” – by which he means a cultural Anglican. After all, according to Dawkins, Roman Catholicism is “the world’s second most evil religion”. No prizes for guessing which faith is the most evil. Indeed, Dawkins holds the view that Islam is not only by far the worst of all the major faiths but is also arguably “the greatest man-made force for evil in the world today”.

Continue reading →

Another Wilders critic is denounced by the PVV

Posted on by Bob Pitt

Far-right Freedom Party (PVV) local councillors in The Hague have demanded an apology from writer Karel Kanits for comparing their party’s leader Geert Wilders to Adolf Hitler.

During Thursday’s Liberation Day festivities Mr Kanits described Mr Wilders as a “bleached Führer” – a reference to the anti-Islam MP’s trademark bleached hair.

“We are firm advocates of free speech,” said Freedom Party councillor Richard de Mos on Sunday. “But this sort of comparison, paid for out of Freedom Party voters’ taxes, is unwarranted. Of all days, on the day we celebrate the defeat of Hitler’s Germany in 1945, The Hague city council programmes a loudmouth who comes with this filthy and lowdown comparison.”

The Freedom Party councillors are demanding that Mr Kanits make a public apology and pay back his engagement fee.

In April, the annual Willem Arondéus lecture was scrapped because historian and writer Thomas von der Dunk planned to compare the rise of the Freedom Party to the rise of Nazism. The lecture is named after an openly gay Dutch World War II liberation hero and is supposed to tackle controversial topics.

The selection committee said the planned lecture was too party political, and Mr Von der Dunk refused to tone down the content. He went on to deliver the address anyway outside the provincial government building.

There were claims that provincial councillors from the ruling VVD and Christian Democrat parties had the lecture banned under pressure from the Freedom Party. The minority coalition relies on the support of Freedom Party MPs in parliament.

At a Liberation Day festival on Thursday, the organisers banned a band from performing a song describing Geert Wilders as the “Mussolini of the Low Countries”.

RNW, 8 May 2011

In addition, Utrecht University capitulated to pressure from the PVV and banned philosopher Rob Riemen from criticising Wilders in a Remembrance Day speech. And earlier this year the PVV bullied a public broadcaster into removing a cartoon that Wilders found offensive. Wilders himself, of course, demands the right to incite hatred against Mulims by comparing the Qur’an to Hitler’s Mein Kampf – but any attempt by his opponents to draw a parallel between Wilders and the Nazis is a “filthy and lowdown comparison” which the PVV insists should be suppressed.

Anti-Muslim incidents in the US follow the death of Osama bin Laden

Posted on by Bob Pitt

When he announced the death of Osama bin Laden, President Obama acknowledged and echoed his predecessor, telling the nation, “I’ve made clear, just as President Bush did shortly after 9/11, that our war is not against Islam.” Not everybody listened. While the incidents are for the most part isolated, several public expressions of anti-Muslim sentiment have occurred around the country.

ABC, 6 May 2011

Posted in USA