Rename Your Teddy Now

Some Muslims wanted to kill her. Presumably by stoning her to death or inflicting a prolonged lashing.

Our politicians go out of their way to not offend the believers in such practices.

These are people we should offend. Immediately rename your teddy bear.

I suppose 15 days in a Sudan hellhole for renaming (after a child - not the prophet -and upon the childrens' democratic direction) a teddy is considered relatively mild by their standards!

Those are not standards we should aspire to.

The Oxford Protest Against Freedom: A Damp Squib

Libby Purves said everything necessary in her article in The Times yesterday. I will not repeat it. Just click on the title to go there.

Matthew Shearman also wrote a nice letter:

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/comment/letters/article2956695.ece

The simple truth is that these students at Oxford University who have no respect for ancient freedoms or for free speech are uneducated barbarians. They spit. They squeak. They hurl abuse. They say that supporters of free speech are fascists. They
do not deserve to graduate.

Why? They have no rational arguments to advance. They are just thugs.

Ooops, how will they earn a living? Their juvenile (indeed, infantile) views do not qualify them to work in a free society.

Only kidding. Hopefully, they will grow out of their fascist tendencies.

My daughter has recently graduated from Oxford. She is not anti free speech. I do not therfore blame Oxford University. But I find it extraordinary that any University can permit attempts by any of its members (students or faculty) to attack (by violent or intimidatory methods) the sole and only purpose of its existence and not be called to account.

That purpose is to encourage informed debate and understanding based on factually accurate research and scholarship. Or, have I missed something?

The wanted posters are above. They are idiots who hold delusional beliefs. So what? Free speech is more important than they are.

The Idiots Have Taken Over The Asylum

Oh well, this was entirely predictable.

The enemies of freedom have massed at the Oxford Union and are jumping barriers.

They do so in the name of freedom.

Do they not realise that they are imbeciles?

Continued Failure to Update

No excuses. I am busy and lazy at the same time.

I will update later. The editor of the Jewish Chronicle is now on air.

The Oxford Union, Griffin, Irving and Free Speech

Juvenile posturing? Maybe. A decision I may not have made? Probably. A decision the Oxford Union was entitled to make? Certainly.

It would come as no surprise to regular readers of this blog (if there were any, which there are not - as to which see next blog) that I regard free speech as an absolute. Give it up and you have participated in the destruction of civilization or, at the very least, you have rendered the society in which you currently live one that is fit only for slaves.

The reasoning is simple. You concur in the suppression of views which you entirely justifiably despise and one day others will believe it justifiable to suppress a view that you hold dear.

The protestors (on screen as I type) are therefore foolish and are, further, providing hostages to fortune. Their views may in years to come be suppressed by similar haters of liberty.

Eliza Manningham-Buller Says the Stones are Sexy

EMB has stated on Desert Island Discs this morning that she prefers rhe Rolling Stones to the Beatles because they are sexier. The revelation of this state secret (coming from our former head of security services) will no doubt have a major impact on the McCartney-Mills divorce settlement. Run and hide, Paul!