IN what looks suspiciously like an attempt to ape the activities of the Islamic world’s Commissions for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice, the Vatican has extended the powers of its Swiss Guard to impose a modesty dress code across the entire city state.

Improperly-dressed Vatican visitors receive a stern warning, but men in frocks are saluted by the Swiss Guards

Tourists entering St Peter’s Basilica have long been required to dress modestly, but from early this week Ratzinger’s private army appeared to have extended the rules to cover all of Popetown.

The guards – who wear ridiculous striped blue and gold uniforms, carry halberds and trace their service to the papacy back to 1506 – have been targeting men in shorts and women with uncovered shoulders and short skirts, telling them that they were improperly dressed.

Some of the female visitors bought shawls and scarves from nearby hawkers, while a few men had to wander off to the nearest shops to buy long trousers.

The tough dress code also applies to Romans using the Vatican’s pharmacy, supermarket and post office.

Others were refused entry altogether, and accused the authorities of double standards. Said one woman in her seventies, identified only as Maria:

Given all the scandals the Church has been involved in, what possible right can it have to be preaching about the morality of sleeveless dresses?

The crackdown on inappropriate clothing comes at a time of almost unprecedented crisis for the Vatican, with senior figures, including Pope Benedict XVI, accused of failing to act against priests who sexually abused children.

Hat tip: PaulEd

ANSWERING questions from MPs on the Commons education select committee today, Michael Gove said:

One of the most striking things that I read recently was a thought from Richard Dawkins that he might want to take advantage of our education legislation to open a new school, which was set up on an explicitly atheist basis.

Education Secretary Michael Gove

Prof Dawkins, author of The God Delusion, did not, in fact, say he wanted a specifically atheist school.

In June, Prof Dawkins said in a conversation on the Mumsnet website:

I like the idea very much, although I would prefer to call it a free-thinking free school. I would never want to indoctrinate children in atheism, any more than in religion. Instead, children should be taught to ask for evidence, to be sceptical, critical, open-minded.

Under Mr Gove’s “free schools” plan, parents, teachers and others will be able to set up their own schools.

According to the BBC, Gove said he would not choose such a school for his children, but:

One of the principles behind our education reforms is to give people the maximum amount of choice so that those people, and they may not themselves necessarily have a very strong religious faith, but who believe that the ethos and values of faith-based education are right for their child, have that choice but others who want a different approach can take it as well.

Coincidentally, we have just been contacted by Bwambale Robert, founder and Director of the Kasese United Humanist Association in Uganda, which last year established the Kilembe Valley Humanist Nursery & Primary School, the first secular school in the Kasese district.

With a curriculum based on humanism and science, the fledging school is being run alongside a public library, also set up by the association, and Bwambale Robert is appealing to freethinkers across the globe to donate books, magazines, periodicals, scientific journals etc to support both projects.

Books needed for the school should suit young people aged below 13 years on subjects such as English, science, arts & crafts, geography, mathematics, and free thought.

Atheist Alliance International is supporting the school by providing volunteer teachers for a period of three months, beginning in September.

If you are able to help, please send your donations to the Kasese United Humanist Association Plot 31, Matebere Road, Kiteso Upper, PO Box 58
Kasese, Uganda, East Africa.

Hat tip BarrieJohn (BBC report)

A NEW Jersey judge’s decision to refuse a restraining order sought by a young Muslim woman who had been raped and abused by her husband has been overturned on appeal.

While recognizing that the husband had engaged in sexual relations with his teenage bride against her expressed wishes in November 2008 and on the night of January 15 to 16, 2009, the judge at the original hearing did not find sexual assault or criminal sexual conduct to have been proven.

Islam gives abusers of women a free pass

The judge ruled that the husband, who had come from Morocco to the US with his arranged-marriage bride of 17, had been acting on his Islamic beliefs:

This court does not feel that, under the circumstances, that this defendant had a criminal desire to or intent to sexually assault or to sexually contact the plaintiff when he did. The court believes that he was operating under his belief that it is, as the husband, his desire to have sex when and whether he wanted to, was something that was consistent with his practices and it was something that was not prohibited.

After acknowledging that this was a case in which religious custom clashed with the law, and that under the law, the plaintiff had a right to refuse the defendant’s advances, the judge found that defendant did not act with a criminal intent when he repeatedly insisted upon intercourse, despite the plaintiff’s contrary wishes.

Reporting on this case, JihadWatch points out:

Muhammad said: ‘If a husband calls his wife to his bed [i.e. to have sexual relation] and she refuses and causes him to sleep in anger, the angels will curse her till morning’ (Bukhari 4.54.460).

He also said: ‘By him in Whose Hand lies my life, a woman can not carry out the right of her Lord, till she carries out the right of her husband. And if he asks her to surrender herself [to him for sexual intercourse] she should not refuse him even if she is on a camel’s saddle ’(Ibn Majah 1854).

In overturning the judgement, the Appellate Division of the Superior Court of New Jersey noted that the husband told his bride:

You are my wife, I can do anything to you. The woman, she should submit and do anything I ask her to do.

The appellate court reversed the judge decision, saying:

The trial court abused its discretion by finding that defendant lacked the requisite intent to commit sexual assault and criminal sexual contact based upon his religion …

As the judge recognized, the case thus presents a conflict between the criminal law and religious precepts. In resolving this conflict, the judge determined to except defendant from the operation of the State’s statutes as the result of his religious beliefs. In doing so, the judge was mistaken.

TWO Christian politicians are in the midst of a firestorm following remarks they made about Islam.

Australian Liberal Party candidate, David Barker, got himself dumped as the candidate for the safe Labor seat of Chifley after branding Prime Minister Julia Gillard an “atheist”, and accusing the Labor government of moving Australia closer to becoming a Muslim country.

Praise the Lard, it's David Barker, pictured as he is now, and as Humpty Dumpty in this earlier shot taken when larking about with mates

And Shahbaz Bhatti, Pakistan’s Federal Minister for Minorities, was accused at the weekend of “blasphemy” by a leading cleric after he blamed his country’s blasphemy laws for the recent death of two young Christians.

Barker – a “man of strong Christian faith” – got himself disendorsed after saying:

When I get in I will give my votes, all of them, to God who is on the side of the Liberal Right.

In a letter to local Christian leaders seeking their support in the August 21 General Election, he said Gillard was an “atheist”, and that his Labor opponent in Chifley, Ed Husic, was a Muslim.

A defiant Barker told the ABC no Muslim should be allowed in parliament.

I’m not anti-Muslim. I believe every one should have their own beliefs. But I don’t know if we want at this stage in Australian politics a Muslim in the parliament and an atheist running the government.

Barker said he does not understand why he been disendorsed:

I made a comment that I believe God is the only way to heaven and we shouldn’t have a Muslim candidate running in that area … I’m not attacking them [Muslims] on the basis of their faith, I’m attacking them on the basis of their ideology.

According to this blog, the lard-assed nutter also stated:

Someone get me into parliament…and watch me go.  They will see my talent as the voice of…God himself.

Bhatti infuriated cleric Allama Ahmed Mian Hammadi when he spoke out about the murder of Rashid Emmanuel, 30, and his brother Sajid, 27, by unidentified masked gunmen inside a courthouse in Faisalabad.

Shahbaz Bhatti

The brothers had been accused of blaspheming the Prophet Mohammad earlier this month, a charge they had both denied

In a statement, published in the Daily Jasarat, a Pakistani Urdu daily newspaper, the Muslim cleric said that Muslims cannot tolerate blasphemy against the Prophet Mohammed.

It is not a cruelty to kill blasphemers, rather blasphemy itself is such an enormous brutality that the one who commits it neither has got a right to live in this world nor is there any pardon for the blasphemer.

Muslims won’t tolerate even a slightest blasphemy against Prophet Mohammed. If Shahbaz Bhatti committed blasphemy he would be beheaded.

He added:

A Muslim loves the Prophet Muhammad more than anyone else … the Christian brothers were killed after Muslims became angry.

Hat tip: Nicholas B (for the Barker report)

A SAUDI man spent six years chained in a basement apartment because his father believed he was possessed by an evil female genie, or jinn.

When the 29-year-old man, identified only as Turki, first began behaving bizarrely, his father  – according to this report – took him to local Muslim clerics who recited the Koran over him in a bid to banish the bad-ass jinn.

The father explained:

Most of them became scared when they heard the female voice telling them that she was a royal jinn (genie) and that no-one could exorcise her unless Turki dies.

Jinns are for real, as this photograph in a Turkish newspaper proves

One cleric advised him to truss his son’s arms and legs in chains and read the Koran to him. He agreed to do so:

My son became quiet but is totally unaware of what is happening around him. He does not talk and is now unable to harm anyone.

The insanity that is Islam claims that jinn can be sinister. The things are believed to be normally invisible but can assume human or animal form and are often said to be motivated by jealousy or revenge.

A Saudi human rights activist and professor in shariah who visited Turki found him to be in a “semi-coma”.

Muhammad Al-Suhali said Turki:

Did not know what was going on around him. He could not eat, drink or use the toilet without the help of others.

Suhali urged the Saudi Ministry of Social Affairs to provide the family with better accommodation and take Turki into care.

Note: Five years ago a Turkish newspaper, Yeni Safak, carried a world exclusive:

A first real picture for a jinn in the world and the jinn was mentioned in AL QURAN … in time they call it a ghost in other nations (sic).

In this blog, Turkish journalist and filmmaker Al Murat Guven claims that:

This is a simple sculpture made by hard-plastic in Cheddar Shovcave in Middle-England. Cheddar Chovcave is a kind of horror gallery built in early 1990′s and there are dozens of horrible sculptures inside. This world-wide hoax created by a young British bussinessman in 1996. He took the jinn sculpture’s picture and gave to some Arabic teens in a Suudi Arabian visit. And the legend was born in Saudi Arabia (sic).

One commenter on the blog said:

Jinns are real, period. Whether this picture is real or not is of no importance whatsoever. Fake or Real, its one own mind to decide. No need for further discussion (sic).

Incidentally, there is a serious discussion – I kid you not – over at Islam Awareness as to whether a human can marry a jinn. Quote:

The majority of jurists are of the opinion that such a marriage is not lawful, but some jurists consider it to be lawful.

Hat tip: BarrieJohn

The National Secular Society this week applied to the High Court to have council prayers declared  unlawful. If the society wins the case it would create a precedent that would be binding on other councils.

NSS President Terry Sanderson, left, and Executive Director Keith Porteous Wood are calling on supporters to contribute to the council prayer fighting fund

After weeks of exhausting preparation, the papers were lodged at the High Court for a “Judicial Review between the Queen (on the Application of the National Secular Society) and Bideford Town Council”.

The Council has until mid-August to decide whether to stop prayers or fight the case. Said NSS Executive Director Keith Porteous Wood:

We know that the Christian Institute and Christian Concern have been in touch with Bideford Council. So Bideford will be well supported financially, and the NSS is getting dug in for what could be a long and expensive fight – its initial budget is for £25,000 but this will rise with appeals, which are likely.

Even if Bideford do not fight, we will find quickly move on to a council that will – there are thousands to choose from. So the NSS is starting a fighting fund. We hope you will make a donation to the fund.

He added:

We would like to thank Brighton and Hove Humanist Society who unanimously voted for a £500 contribution to our fighting fund. We still have a long way to go towards our £25,000 target and would like to encourage other groups and individuals to match Brighton’s glowing example. This would be a tangible way of expressing your support for our work on this case which goes to the very heart of secularism in public life and, if successful will set a key precedent.  We get numerous letters expressing admiration for, and appreciation of, our work; contributing to the fund would be a tangible way of expressing your thanks, and it would be very much appreciated.

Please make a donation securely online here, or by sending a cheque to NSS at NSS Fighting Fund, 25 Red Lion Square, London WC1R 4RL.

NSS President Terry Sanderson added:

We must grasp this rare opportunity to make public life more secular and do our very best to win. Your contribution will go to help ensure that.

Earlier this year, the Anglican Bishop of Shrewsbury strongly defended Bideford council’s “right” to say prayers before its meetings.

Bishop Mark Rylands says councils have a "right" to pray

According to this report, the Rt Revd Mark Rylands said:

I fully support Council members in continuing to offer prayers before their meetings begin. Prayers are said at each day in business in both the House of Commons and the House of Lords. Attendance at these prayers is completely voluntary and no one is forced to actively participate. The saying of prayers before meetings is an integral part of the British system of government.

Prayers remind councillors that they are answerable not only to themselves but also to those beyond the Chamber. Those who pray remind themselves they are answerable to God.

Those who do not wish to pray can easily absent themselves from the prayers or merely remain silent while those around them pray. However, if prayers are not allowed then those who wish to exercise their freedom to have corporate prayers will have their freedom denied …

POLICE reinforcements were mobilised yesterday in the Pakistani city of Faisalabad a day after two Christians charged with blasphemy were shot dead outside court.

Clashes broke out in the city, home to a large Christian community, after the brothers were gunned down.

Pakistani police battle to restore order

Pastor Rashid Emmanuel, 32, and Sajid, 24, were accused of writing a pamphlet critical of the Prophet Muhammad; a rights activist said they were framed.

Pakistan’s controversial blasphemy law carries the death penalty.

A police officer who was escorting the brothers from a district court on Monday was critically wounded when the unidentified gunmen opened fire and then escaped.

At least ten people were reportedly injured as stone-throwing and rioting broke out in a Christian neighbourhood of the city afterwards.

Police reinforcements from nearby districts have been called in to restore order.

The brothers, from the Waris Pura area of Faisalabad, were arrested earlier this month.

The complainant in the case, a local trader, Khurram Shehzad, alleged that one of his employees was handed a pamphlet by someone at Faisalabad’s general bus stand.

He said the paper contained disrespectful remarks about the Prophet Mohammed.

Police told the BBC the pamphlet had apparently been signed by the two brothers, whose addresses and mobile phone numbers were also given.

But Atif Jameel, spokesman for the Pakistan Minorities Democratic Foundation, told the BBC:

No-one in his right mind would issue a derogatory pamphlet against the Prophet and put his name and address on it. This appears to be a conspiracy against peace and religious harmony in Faisalabad.

Earlier this month, several hundred demonstrators marched to the Waris Pura slum, which is home to nearly 100,000 Christians, and demanded the death penalty for the two accused.

Although no-one has ever been executed under Pakistan’s blasphemy law, about ten accused have been murdered before the completion of their trial, according to a BBC Urdu correspondent in Lahore.

Dozens more are living in exile to avoid punishment under the legislation.

Human rights activists want the law repealed as they say it is often exploited by Islamist extremists or those harbouring personal grudges.

THOSE smart cookies over at Ranker.com have created a Top Ten Comic Book Gods Worth Worshipping in response to the news this week that the world’s loopiest Christians – members of the Westboro Batshit Church in Topeka, Kansas – are to turn their wrath this week on a comic book convention in San Diego.

The extremist Baptist sect – best known for their comical God Hates Fags demos – have convinced themselves that God also hates comic book enthusiasts, or “nerds” as they insist on calling ‘em, and they are taking a message to the San Diego Comic-Con 2010:

They [the organisers? The fans?] have turned comic book characters into idols, and worship them they do!

Isaiah 2:8 Their land also is full of idols; they worship the work of their own hands, that which their own fingers have made: 9 And the mean man boweth down, and the great man humbleth himself: therefore forgive them not. It is time to put away the silly vanities and turn to God like you mean it. The destruction of this nation is imminent – so start calling on Batman and Superman now, see if they can pull you from the mess that you have created with all your silly idolatry.

Rich Johnston, over at the Bleeding Cool blog, says he is:

A committed Christian deeply offended by these morons.

And he suggests a counter-demonstration with folk waving “Superman Loves Fags” banners, or

Maybe have a bunch of Darth Vaders and Stormtroopers with placards reading I find your lack of faith … disturbing.

Incidentally, one of the gods on Ranker’s list is Jeeeehovah himself:

Yes, THE God. The Judeo Christian God himself is an actual character in DC Comics mythology. The Spectre is his Spirit of Vengeance, after all, spreading his angry wrath to sinners of all shapes and sizes. The angel Zauriel, formerly of the Justice League of America, is a member of God’s Eagle Host of guardian angels in Heaven.
We never actually see this version of God in any DC books, no doubt to not piss off many of their more religious fans, but he (or she?) occasionally shows up as a booming voice from the heavens, kind of like in Monty Python and the Holy Grail.

So the Westboro Baptist Church can calm down, now, right? Or does this also count as idol worship? Hmmm…

IT’S been a day of disappointment. First, for a young Saudi, whose face grew as lugubrious as a camel’s after I patiently explained to him that there was no “magic bullet” – or pump, or cream, or pill – that would lengthen his 11cm penis to the 20cm he so desperately wanted.

Then disappointment came my way when I found that a tantalising internet headline – A Girl’s Guide to Saudia Arabia – would not take me to the actual feature in the latest issue of Vanity Fair, but to a summary of the piece, which sparked my curiosity even further.

Dowd on the shore of the Red Sea in a government-issue Abaya. Aaaargh! Photo: Ashley Parker

Ah well, the full article by New York Times columnist and Vanity Fair contributor Maureen Dowd may materialise later.

This much I learned from the summary:

Saudi Arabia is slowly cracking open its doors to embrace tourism, albeit only for small, ‘high level’, and ‘fully educated’ groups of visitors. (‘No backpacking stuff’, warns the Saudi tourism minister.) The Kingdom is likely to be a tough sell. It’s a fundamentalist-Islamic state—the Koran is the constitution—where alcohol is forbidden, and even Western women must cover themselves the way Saudi women do, and cannot move about without a male escort, much less drive a car. Sound like the perfect vacation spot?

Maureen Dowd found the allure irresistible, and was determined to see Saudi Arabia on her own terms – or as many of her own terms as she could negotiate. The resulting article in Vanity Fair is one part travel romp and one part history lesson—with a healthy dash of moxie [fortitude] thrown in.

Dowd explores Saudi Arabia’s historically “veiled,” closed-off nature. Big oil companies were allowed into the country in the first place, in the 1930s, only because the Great Depression had cut into revenues from the hajj. The Kingdom didn’t have widespread electricity until the 1950s; slavery wasn’t abolished until the 1960s; and ‘restrictions on mingling between unrelated members of the opposite sex remain severe’, and punishable in various unpleasant ways. The pace of modern transformation in Saudi Arabia is, in Dowd’s words, ‘akin to a snail on Ambien’.

When Dowd arrives at her hotel in Riyadh, she finds a gift-bag containing a government-issued abaya (which, she says, ‘makes you look like a mummy and feel like a pizza oven’).

She keeps her male enforcers on their toes at every turn—and manages to stay one step ahead of the feared religious police, known as the mutawa. Along the way she interviews eminent Arabians—mostly men, who proudly explain that Saudi society is inexorably changing. They may be right, Dowd admits. But one also wonders: How can they tell?

Wearing an abaya is not without its dangers, as this shopping mall sign indicates

At least one commenter on the site was outraged by Dowd’s piece. Said Faransa:

She trivializes the Saudi culture, belittles their traditions and customs with a Western supremacist attitude and has no respect for Islam … She complains about there being no alcohol available. She complains about wearing an abaya. She complains about being segregated in the mall. Personally, those are some of the quirks that I love about Saudi Arabia. You can’t get that anywhere else.

Note: My encounter with the Saudi gentleman took place in a (non-segregated, abaya-free) sex shop in Brighton, where I have a part-time job. I did not send him away completely empty handed. After delivering the standard “size doesn’t matter” spiel I flogged him some herbal potency tablets (which work a treat) and a spray to combat premature ejaculation.

Hat tip: Canada Dave, who actually sent me a link to a completely unrelated story about al Qaida’s Inspire magazine, which we originally reported on here. It contained the Saudi report in a sidebar.