Entries from July 2007 ↓

Indian doctor Dr Haneef was charged on the weekend — after being held without charge for twelve days — with “recklessly” supporting a terrorist organisation by giving his cousin a mobile phone SIM card around one year ago. Dr Haneef argues that he gave it to his cousin before departing the UK because he had unused credit remaining on his account. The government alleges that by giving the SIM card to his cousin, Haneef had recklessly supported a terrorist organisation although they do not suggest that he was involved in the act or had foreknowledge of the act.

As Peter Faris, QC, summarises today, four things now need to be established to prove his guilt:

First, that Haneef provided the card to the terrorists.

Second, that at the time he knew or believed they were planning a terrorist attack.

Third, that he knew or believed the SIM card might be used in the attack or the planning of it.

Fourth, knowing or believing all these things, he recklessly supplied the card.

The proof of all this will be difficult and the case is probably a very weak one.

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The Sydney Morning Herald published an interesting article on the celebrity faithful, which looks at the current sexed-up piety coursing through Hollywood. Whether it’s Christianity (Jessica Simpson and Britney Spears (!)), Scientology (Tom Cruise and some heavy psychology conspiracy theories) or Kabbalah leanings (Madonna makes red wristbands trendy while annoying Orthodox Jews), celebs are loud and proud about their born-againism (not a real word).

Even Christina Aguilera, known for her raunchy dance videos and explicit lyrics, was shown in a recent 60 Minutes interview praying before a concert (although, as reporter Tara Brown notes, this is a typically American practice).

Even the Middle East’s celebrities are joining the bandwagon of righteousness; I wrote about the rise in trendy piety in a review of Muhajababes several months ago.

Far be it for me to care whether or not a celebrity subscribes to any religion but I do find it a tad disturbing that religion is being used as a marketing tool. And while it’s not particularly new (it’s just more prevalent and glossy nowadays), there’s a veneer of hypocrisy to all of it.

Is it something in the Tinseltown water?

Do you now what the biggest nightmare of a secularist Turk is?  Turkish Daily News’ Mustafa Akyol explains.

The Times of London’s excellent Faith Central blog has very kindly listed us as one of their thirty most influential religion blogs. So a big thanks to Libby Purves and Joanna Sugden for the listing, and a special welcome to everyone arriving here via their site. We hope you stick around!

Televised ‘panel discussions’ on Islamic and Muslim issues have provided us with plenty of cringe-worthy material over the last few years but nothing — nothing — I have seen recently compares to this. After screening the Great Global Warming Swindle, the ABC (Australia’s public broadcaster) held a panel discussion on the question of whether global warming is anthropogenic. After the discussion, they go to the audience for questions and, as they say, hilarity ensues.

Video over the fold.
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According to the Amazon best seller list, Tintin in the Congo is currently number five. Although I must confess that, along with Asterix, I enjoyed reading Tintin books as a child, how can it be that a book first published in 1930 now finds itself suddenly catapulted into the literary stratosphere alongside Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows and Alastair Campbell’s biography of Tony Blair?

The West Australian has the answer:

Sales of a Tintin comic book have rocketed since Britain’s Commission for Racial Equality claimed it was racist, a newspaper has reported.

Sales of Tintin in the Congo have shot up by 3800 per cent after the CRE watchdog claimed it contained potentially highly offensive material, said The Daily Telegraph.

The comic has reached number eight on internet retailer Amazon’s most popular books list, the broadsheet reported.

A CRE spokesman accepted that its interjection could have sparked the rise in sales.

There is a lesson for us here.

(via Pommygranate)

In a shocking development, Ananova reports:

Police in Iran are reported to have taken 14 squirrels into custody – because they are suspected of spying.

We have footage of one of the suspected spies here.

Meanwhile, residents of Basra continue to fight giant badgers — allegedly released by the British — that stalk the streets at night, eating unsuspecting human prey.

Abu Aardvark asks:

Could the giant man-eating honey badgers compete with the insurgency or the Mahdi Army for kill counts? Could the giant man-eating honey badgers offer a common enemy for embattled humanity? Perhaps a reason to keep American troops in Iraq even if al-Qaeda is trounced?

Video footage of a captured badger over the fold.

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Bruce Schneier has an interesting article at Wired that looks at a cognitive bias known as correspondent inference theory and how it relates to terrorism. Correspondent inference theory is basically the idea that humans will always tend to make inferences about a person’s behaviour based on the consequences of that behaviour. So, in regards to terrorism, Schneier argues that we see the effects of terrorism, such as limitations on civil liberties, economic consequences, and so on, and assume that this is the intent of terrorism.

Schneier links to research by Max Abrams [pdf] that studied a broad range of terrorist groups, identifying 42 policy objectives, but finding that these were only ever achieved 7 percent of the time. In other words, he found that terrorism doesn’t work in terms of achieving the objectives of terrorists.

Applying correspondent inference theory to this observation, Abrams writes:

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It seems there is some controversy over the Hizb ut-Tahrir opinion piece published in the Daily Telegraph this week. The facts so far:

1. HT sent this press release to the Daily Telegraph;
2. The Daily Telegraph then published an edited version as an opinion piece;
3. Then this article was sent out via the popular Crikey newsletter questioning the publication of the press release as apparently the authors were unaware that it would be used by the newspaper;
4. Finally, the Opinion Editor of the Daily Telegraph responds on his personal blog.

If a newspaper receives a press release and then publishes it with what admittedly appear to be relatively minor edits for style and length, is this inappropriate?

UPDATE 2: Irfan Yusuf responds to Blair’s response.

Tim Blair offers us a free kick at psychologists (for which I thank him); those people who earn a living by examining the psychological entrails of other people and offer entirely useless suggestions (e.g. perhaps all your problems are caused by some sort of suppressed sexual weirdness, or perhaps you would be happier if your father bought you a red tricycle, or if you hadn’t named your pet ferret “Theodora”).

Psychology Today reports:

It is the combination of polygyny and the promise of a large harem of virgins in heaven that motivates many young Muslim men to commit suicide bombings.

and

What distinguishes Islam from other major religions is that it tolerates polygyny. By allowing some men to monopolize all women and altogether excluding many men from reproductive opportunities, polygyny creates shortages of available women. If 50 percent of men have two wives each, then the other 50 percent don’t get any wives at all.

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