National newspaper is prejudiced and skewing halal debate, says MP

Sun Halal Secret of Pizza ExpressMP Yasmin Qureshi has accused national newspapers of prejudice in the debate over the ethics of halal and kosher meat. The MP for Bolton South East spoke in parliament over the practice of slaughtering meat in line with Islamic law.

The issue hit the headlines last week after The Sun newspaper reported how restaurant Pizza Express serves halal chicken without stating it on its menu. In the House of Commons Ms Qureshi slammed the publication for “skewing the debate” without fully informing people about studies which show Islamic slaughter – via a deep incision to a vein in the neck – is less painful to animals than stunning them first.

Continue reading

Washington DC: Geller is back with another anti-Islam Metro ad

AFDI Islamic Jew hatred ad

In 2012, anti-Islam blogger Pamela Geller’s American Freedom Defense Initiative funded ads throughout the Metro system with a quote from the Quran next to a photo of the burning Twin Towers. Ads that cost Metro $35,000 over a failed effort to block them.

Now she’s back with another awful ad, this one claiming that “Islamic jew-hatred” is “in the Quran” as a response to an ad about “Israel’s occupation” from the American Muslims for Palestine. From Geller’s blog:

The DC Metro transit authority made multiple demands for the substantiation of every claim in our ads before they would accept the ad, and I, of course, happily provided that substantiation. The libelous American Muslims for Palestine antisemitic ad (below) did not have to provide substantiation. The MTA had no problem with their antisemitism. And you cannot provide evidence of a smear and a bigoted lie. But it is proof of the AMP’s hate.

Our ads are in response to the vicious Jew-hating ads that American Muslims for Palestine unleashed on Washington, DC Metro buses last month. And might I add, had we not sued and won in NYC and DC for violating our First Amendment rights when they tried to refuse our previous ads, our ads might never have gone up.

Continue reading

Draw Muhammad Day: collectively punishing Muslim Americans

“In the wake of the self-censorship controversy surrounding South Park‘s portrayal of the Prophet Muhammad, artists intent on defending freedom of speech have responded by organizing an event they call Draw Muhammad Day, to take place on May 20. The goal, according to the website hosting the endeavor, is to defend free speech by showing Muslims that artists ‘don’t back down’ when threatened.

“But the fact is that millions of Muslim-Americans – many of whom have known about South Park caricatures of Muhammad for years – behaved exactly the way free speech advocates wanted them to: by remaining silent or expressing their feelings peacefully. The handful of thugs at a New York-based site called Revolution Muslim – who, by the way, are unwelcome in every New York mosque for their extremist rantings – were the only exceptions. And now these Muslim-Americans are being subject to mass insult as thanks for their respect of South Park‘s free speech rights….

“Imagine for a moment if an African-American blogger complained about an unfair stereotype in a cartoon in the same crass manner as the Revolution Islam folks. Would free speech advocates respond by hosting a contest to draw as many vile stereotypes of blacks as they could? I can’t imagine that anyone would even propose such an idea. So why, then, are millions of Muslim-Americans who said nothing about South Park in the past decade being subject to this mass insult? To prove a point? What point would that be?”

Shahed Amanullah at the Huffington Post, 13 May 2010

Let’s be honest about Britain’s Islamophobia

It’s happening again. It never really goes away, but, for different reasons, it tends to come in periodic bursts.

What am I talking about? Britain’s latest frenzy of Islamophobic incitement.

The familiar elements are all present. Demands for communal apologies, for explanations and justifications. Come on, the crowd shrieks, convince us that you belong here! Assure us that we’re safe with you in our midst! Deny links to the Taliban, condemn Boko Haram, and publicly renounce Al-Qaeda for us all to see!

Ben White writes at the Huffington Post, 14 May 2014

US court upholds ruling against SIOA, Geller denounces appeasement of ‘Islamic supremacists’

SIOA logoA federal appeals court has rejected a controversial blogger’s attempt to trademark the name of a group she founded called “Stop Islamization of America,” ruling that the name is too offensive to Muslims to qualify for protection.

Pamela Geller has stirred controversy across the globe with her portrayal of Islam as a religion hijacked by violent radicals bent on imposing Islamic rule over America. She’s probably most identified as a leader of protests in 2010 against the construction of a mosque near the ground zero site in New York.

The case decided Tuesday was yet another dispute pitting Ms. Geller against a government agency making claims that her zealous critique of political Islam crosses the line into hate speech.

The case before the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit concerned a federal law allowing the government to refuse to register a trademark that disparages a “substantial composite” of a group.

A three-judge panel ruled that her group “Stop Islamization of America” isn’t eligible for a federal trademark because it said the name suggests an association between “peaceful political Islamization” and terrorism that many Muslims would find offensive. It affirmed an earlier ruling by the Trademark Trial and Appeal Board, which hears and decides trademark disputes.

Continue reading

Halal meat labelling plan rejected by MPs

MPs have rejected plans to make food outlets label meat from animals killed in accordance with religious practices, such as halal or kosher.

Conservative Philip Davies, who proposed the Commons debate, said there was a “huge public demand” to know more about where food came from. But consumer affairs minister Jenny Willott said the government did not think regulation was the best approach.

Mr Davies’ amendment to the Consumer Rights Bill failed by 264 votes.

Continue reading

British Veterinary Association warns against ritual slaughter debate being ‘hijacked by prejudice’

BVA logoCalls to label meat products with information about animal welfare at slaughter must not be hijacked by prejudice, according to the British Veterinary Association, which has been campaigning for an end to non-stun slaughter.

On the day that MPs debate an amendment to the Consumer Rights Bill calling for compulsory labelling of halal and kosher food, the President of the BVA has written to the three main party leaders asking them to support its call for food labelling to state whether the animal has been stunned in line with welfare legislation or not stunned under the legal derogation.

Recent media coverage about restaurants and supermarkets using and selling meat from halal and kosher slaughter has raised awareness of the issue of welfare at slaughter, but an enormous amount of confusion remains over how consumers can make an informed choice.

In the letters to David Cameron, Nick Clegg and Ed Miliband, BVA explains that labelling all halal and kosher products will do nothing to inform the public about the very proper concerns regarding welfare at slaughter but could fuel further confusion and potentially feed prejudice.

Continue reading