Queen Mary’s Atheism, Secularism and Humanism Society, cowed into silence by Islamist extremists at University of London
To some of us it will come as no surprise that this incident happened at the University of London:
‘Five minutes before the talk was due to start a man burst into the room holding a camera phone and for some seconds stood filming the faces of all those in the room. He shouted ‘listen up all of you, I am recording this, I have your faces on film now, and I know where some of you live’, at that moment he aggressively pushed the phone in someone’s face and then said ‘and if I hear that anything is said against the holy Prophet Mohammed, I will hunt you down.’ He then left the room.
January 17th, 2012 at 6:44 pm
Two aspects of this debacle interest me.
Firstly for decades student unions have had ‘no platform’ policies for people whose politics they disapprove of. Hoist on one’s own petard springs to mind.
Secondly they are obviously not firm enough in their convictions to face potentially violent opposition. No potential heroes or martys amongst that lot, more a bunch of wet gasbags it seems to me.
January 17th, 2012 at 7:38 pm
In hoc signo vinces†
So where were the local multikulti useful idiots of Unite Against Fascism and the Hope Not Hate campus brigade when the Queen Mary’s Atheism, Secularism and Humanism Society were “shouting fire in a crowded theater”?
January 17th, 2012 at 7:53 pm
I had aimed to attend this but had to cancel. Sitting here in my armchair my initial reaction was that I’d wished I’d been there myself to challenge these idiots and their outrageous threats. But on sober reflection, I think the organisers made the right decisions. Confrontation would have achieved nothing useful, and would actually have offered the perpetrators exactly the platform they craved.
I think you’re a bit harsh on the attendees Gregg. They are ordinary decent people who do not seek to put their points across by engaging in a shouting match or resorting to violence. If the event was anything like other similar ones I have attended, there would have been a broad cross section from all faiths and none, and none of them seeks this kind of confrontation. Nor should they have to in a civilised country. Most atheists I know would agree that if you have to resort to violence to make your point, then you’ve already lost the argument…
The best outcome will be that the police apprehend the culprit(s) and they are dealt with appropriately in a court of law.
January 17th, 2012 at 9:28 pm
No Simian, I’m stating fact. They ran away, scared off by a gang of misfits.
January 17th, 2012 at 9:37 pm
This is a matter for the police. I hope they nail this creep.
I suppose it is futile to hope that this person is deported.
January 18th, 2012 at 3:33 pm
The President’s detailed account does not support at all what Gregg says.
January 18th, 2012 at 4:47 pm
To Hocus Pocus I say: Yes it does.
January 18th, 2012 at 5:26 pm
By a strange coincidence I am reading one of Schopenhauer’s essays – ‘On Human Nature’ – in which he writes the following:
The ancients reckoned Courage among the virtues, and cowardice among the vices; but there is no corresponding idea in the Christian scheme, which makes for charity and patience, and in its teaching forbids all enmity or even resistance. The result is that with the moderns Courage is no longer a virtue. Nevertheless it must be admitted that cowardice does not seem to be very compatible with any nobility of character—if only for the reason that it betrays an overgreat apprehension about one’s own person.
Left me wondering whether ‘courage’ is regarded as a virtue within Christian doctrine, or was Schopenhauer correct in his assertion?
January 18th, 2012 at 7:25 pm
In hoc signo vinces†
@Roger Pearse,
“This is a matter for the police. I hope they nail this creep.”
The Society attendees demanding action would probably be accussed of ‘islamophobia’ for making a complaint.