Decolonize Queer has an important statement on the so-called East End Gay Pride march.
Category Archives: Resisting Islamophobia
Sharia threat bandwagon just keeps rolling on
The Peter King hearing is a showcase for the cottage industry of conspiracy theories about Muslim destabilisation of America, Sarah Posner argues.
East End Gay Pride march cancelled
East End Gay Pride has been cancelled, the organisers have announced. In a statement this morning, they blamed “personal attacks” and a “personal vendetta” against them by local gay campaigners.
The march was due to be held on April 2nd as a response to anti-gay stickers plastered around London’s East End. But it quickly became controversial, as local groups Rainbow Hamlets and Out East accused the march of being a front of the English Defence League (EDL) and claimed that it would cause tensions between gay people and Muslims in the area.
Yesterday, one organiser, Raymond Berry, resigned after gay Muslim group Imaan revealed he had been a founding member of the EDL, a far-right group. Imaan said it was about to publish evidence to show that other organisers had “right wing and fascistic associations”, although organiser Mark Bourne said that they were simply “patriotic”.
This morning, gay rights campaigner Peter Tatchell called for the march to be postponed and said he was withdrawing his support for it. Pride London had supported the march but said yesterday it had been “misled” by Mr Berry, who had not declared his past support for the controversial group.
Fox falls for ‘Islamic ban on padded bras’ hoax
A Fox News website has picked up a hoax story about an Islamic council in Pakistan protesting the use of padded and colorful bras and presented it as fact.
The story was illustrated with a picture of a woman’s mid-section and carried the headline “Pakistan: Islamic Clerics Protest Women Wearing Padded Bras as ‘Devil’s Cushions’.” The lead of the Fox Nation story, which sources the piece to the Indian news website sify.com, reads:
“The Council of Islamic Ideology in Pakistan has protested the use of padded and colourful bras by Muslim women, and recommended that Pakistani Muslim researchers should try to invent an innerwear that makes female assets unnoticeable.”
The problem is, if one takes the time to track the story back to its source, the whole thing is an obvious Onion-style satire – a fact first pointed out by Arif Rafiq of the Pakistan Policy Blog.
Fox Nation is an openly conservative news and opinion aggregation site that is part of the Fox News network. It’s not clear what sort of editorial standards are applied to the site, which carries a mixture of hard news and catnip for conservative readers (sample headlines: “Democrats politicize tsunami” and “The President’s afternoon: A round of golf”).
Fox Nation commenters, for their part, reacted to the bra story with outrage. “If I was a woman – anywhere in the world, I’d be taking a close look at Islam and what it meant for me,” wrote commenter rebubinca.
A “louisiana_mom” replied: “How can anyone in their right mind defend this religion/cult is beyond me. The silence of NOW and other women’s rights organizations speak volumes as to where their true loyalties are (and it is not for the rights for women). I cannot believe anyone in the 21st century would even entertain the thought of allowing Sharia Law into any Western county.”
Understanding Islamophobia
In a piece for the Ballots & Bullets blog on the University of Nottingham website Matthew Goodwin, author of the forthcoming book New British Fascism: The Rise of the BNP, draws our attention to his exchange of views with former Tory MP Paul Goodman at the ConservativeHome blog, which began with Goodwin’s defence of Baroness Warsi and moved on to a more general discussion of Islamophobia and the views British Muslims (see here, here, here and here).
As anyone reading through this debate will find, Matthew Goodwin’s analysis proves superior to Goodman’s in two respects. He actually knows what he’s talking about, and he’s not an anti-Muslim bigot.
Islamophobia by PowerPoint
Julie Ingersoll reports on a Tea Party-sponsored presentation by one William J. Federer, author of What Every American Needs To Know About the Qur’an.
Mideast expert: Fox News panders to Muslim-bashers
John Esposito talks to Media Matters.
‘East End Gay Pride’ march organiser resigns after EDL past is revealed
One of the organisers of East London Gay Pride resigned today after it was revealed that he had been involved with the English Defence League. Raymond Berry helped found the far-right group and remains involved in groups including Stop the Islamification of Europe, it was claimed.
According to gay Muslim group Imaan, Mr Berry, a transport worker, fell out with officials at the Rail and Maritime Trades Union (RMT) last September over his political affiliations. Imaan said it had seen correspondence in which Mr Berry declared he had helped found the EDL but was no longer involved with the group because of a dispute over leadership. But Mr Berry allegedly said that he continued to hold firm beliefs against Sharia law and the “Islamification of Britain” and was involved in other anti-Muslim groups.
Orange County Republicans urged to act against Councilwoman who called for Muslims to be killed
The longtime leaders of Orange County’s Republican Party were given a rude awakening in January when Villa Park Councilwoman, and self described “blended” Tea Partier, Deborah Pauly, bested establishment candidate Jon Fleischman in the election for first vice chair of the GOP Central Committee.
Just how rude this awakening could end up being for the party’s establishment became apparent in mid February when Pauly stood outside of a Muslim charity event in Yorba Linda and said to cheering protestors: “Make no mistake my friends, these who are assembling are enemies of America.” She added: “I know quite a few Marines who would be very happy to help these terrorists to an early meeting in paradise.”
Such vitriolic comments made by Pauly can be heard in a video put together by the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), that, in a matter of days, went viral.
Appeals court reinstates case by Californian Muslim woman forced to remove headscarf in courthouse
A federal appeals court unanimously reinstated a lawsuit Tuesday filed by a Muslim woman who accused Southern California jailers of violating her religious freedom when they ordered her to take off her head scarf in a courthouse holding cell. An 11-judge panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals also said plaintiff Souhair Khatib had the right to wear the scarf unless jailers can show it was a security risk.
Khatib filed the lawsuit in 2007 against Orange County. She had been jailed for several hours in November 2006 after a judge revoked her probation for a misdemeanor welfare fraud conviction. A trial court judge and a three-judge appeals court panel previously dismissed the lawsuit, saying holding cells aren’t covered by a federal law protecting the religious practices of prisoners. They held it was impractical in transitory settings such as a holding cell to honor religious practices normally allowed in more permanent institutions such as prisons.
But the 9th Circuit judges rejected that argument while allowing the case to proceed. The court did say the county can still argue that security concerns required Khatib to remove her head scarf, if it can prove the order “was the least restrictive means of furthering a compelling government interest.”
Khatib and her husband had appeared in Orange County Superior Court to ask for an extension of a deadline to complete community service, which was a requirement of their probation. They were jailed in a cell adjacent to the courthouse. During booking, jailers ordered a tearful Khatib to remove her head scarf, and she spent the rest of her time in the cell covering her head with a vest.