The LSE Students’ Union has put out a statement on its quarrel with the LSE Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society. It’s a horrible little document.
On Monday 16th January it was brought to our attention via an official complaint by two students that the LSESU Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society posted cartoons, published by the UCLU Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society, depicting the Prophet Mohammed and Jesus “sitting in a pub having a pint” on their society Facebook page. Upon hearing this, the sabbaticals officers of the LSESU ensured all evidence was collected and an emergency meeting with a member of the Students’ Union staff was called to discuss how to deal with the issue. During this time, we received over 40 separate official complaints from the student body, in addition to further information regarding more posts on the society Facebook page.
Why? Why did they bother to collect “evidence”? (Meaning they looked at the Facebook page and nodded solemnly – yep, there it is – ?) Why on earth was an emergency meeting called (and who called it?)? An emergency? Because of a cartoon of Jesus and Mohammed having a beer? Why did they call an emergency meeting to discuss how to deal with the issue? What issue? Why did they think there was an issue? Why did they think it needed dealing with? Why on earth did they think it was up to them to “deal with it”? Who do they think they are? The Stasi? The Inquisition? The Taliban? What makes them think it’s any of their business that somebody has a harmless image on a Facebook page? Not images of women being raped and torn in half, mind, but of two guys having a beer. Who cares that they got “over 40” complaints? No doubt there was a little knot of people running around in a frenzy of joy because somebody was listening to their pathetic bedwetting “complaints” but so what?
It was decided that the President and other committee members of the LSESU Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society would be called for an informal meeting to explain the situation, the complaints that had been made, and how the action of posting these cartoons was in breach of Students’ Union policy on inclusion and the society’s constitution. This meeting took place on Friday 20th January at 10.30am. The society agreed to certain actions coming out of the meeting and these were discussed amongst the sabbatical team. In this discussion it was felt that though these actions were positive they would not fully address the concerns of those who had submitted complaints. Therefore the SU will now be telling the society that they cannot continue these activities under the brand of the SU.
Oh doesn’t that sound like a festive occasion. The ASH members called in to be told that a harmless cartoon is in breach of Students’ Union policy on inclusion. The members bullied into agreeing “to certain actions.” The bullies, sexually aroused by all this power to tell people off, deciding it’s Not Good Enough and they’ll just jolly well demand more; so, now they will actually get to tell the society that they cannot. Ooh ooh ooh ahhhhhhhhhhhhhh. That’s those members told. How was it for you?
The LSE Students’ Union would like to reiterate that we strongly condemn and stand against any form of racism and discrimination on campus. The offensive nature of the content on the Facebook page is not in accordance with our values of tolerance, diversity, and respect for all students regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality or religious affiliation. There is a special need in a Students’ Union to balance freedom of speech and to ensure access to all aspects of the LSESU for all the ethnic and religious minority communities that make up the student body at the LSE.
Yes we get it you self-important puffed-up little shits: you’re good and they’re bad; you’re against racism and they’re totally racists; the content is offensive and you’re good; you’re for tolerance, diversity, and respect and they’re for offensiveness. We get it. You think free speech needs to be “balanced” with self-admiring “concern” for self-aggrandizing complainers about worked-up “offendedness” about a cartoon that’s about as “offensive” as an Eccles cake.
Pfui.
Update: I forgot to say: h/t Alex Gabriel.
Could we at least hope that all future episodes in which group A or group B decide to quote from some holy book are treated in much the same manner?
“You’ve quoted from the Bible/Koran/Torah, a patently offensive, collection of myths–please cease immediately!”
Sure, they aren’t (usually) in cartoon form, but I’d suspect that their believers find them even more powerful (if you can believe that) than a web cartoon.
You know it seems like a fairly positive message to me that Jesus and Mohamad can get along and share a beer (-alcohol?). Its almost an interfaith message but now how dare we show people of different religions getting along take that from our sight! 😛
All right, this is not even spinelessness, the LSESU is in denial now. Aren’t there law students in this union to check up on the status what constitutes or not incitation to religious hatred in England?
Or they should just read this comment on B&W!
As for the “40 separate complaints”: separate, about a Facebook page? Don’t tell me some Islamic group didn’t organise a protest. It wouldn’t be the Internet – heck, the Social Network – without quickly organised “spontaneous” expression.
The complainers may be careful for what they ask because this could easily blow back on them. The next speaker the Muslims bring in should be vetted by potentially aggrieved parties for their previous speeches for any hateful rhetoric. Evidence of calls for jihad, death or attacks of any sort should be brought forthwith along with demands that this sort of meeting cannot be allowed.
You must admit: that is a creative way of saying, “They would not accept our demands“.
I was enjoying your snarky commentary so much I almost overlooked how outrageous the statement and its sanctimonious concern for offended would-be totalitarians was. It really is a piece of work in its bland, impersonal tone and egregious betrayal of the values a university should stand for.
Though all the winds of doctrine were let loose to play on the earth, so Truth be in the field, we do injuriously, by licensing and prohibiting, to misdoubt her strength. Let her and Falsehood grapple; who ever knew Truth put to the worse, in a free and open encounter?
What’s next? The volleyball club being censured because they touch the ball with their hands while it is in play, and that offends the football (soccer) club?
~~~
I would try to make sure that ASH members were in attencance at all such events, and were armed with cell phones with the numbers of all the SU “sabbaticals officers” in speed-dial. Interrupt classes, meals, studying, sleep to make complaints without delay.
I would also demand, if the complaints were identifiable as having come from members of a U. Muslim group, that that group provide a written statement that “all students regardless of race, ethnicity, gender, sexuality or religious affiliation” could be members of the group with status fully equal to that of any other member of the group.
Crikey! LSE has a “lent term”!
Wasn’t the point of university that you didn’t have to walk on eggshells all the time?
This school takes paternalism to a whole new extent…
Irene @ #3:
Surely you are not suggesting that a religious society would attempt to make things appear other than they really are. Are you? There is a commandment forbidding that, and surely one or two of them at least must be aware of it. So for that reason, I think we must all reject that hypothesis.
But what about this angle: is it so reasonable to assume that Jesus and Mohammed never went on a pub crawl together? Jesus was only in that tomb for three days, then he came back to life, then ascended into Heaven. Many say that he lives on forever, and is present wherever two or three of his followers assemble. (That could likewise be in a pub.)
Mohammed did the same trick a few hundred years later, although I’m a bit hazy on the details.
Surely there’s at least one pub or bar in Heaven where they could get together and swap a yarn or two. Or for that matter, they are both perfectly at liberty to come back down the heavenly staircase, enjoy a night on the town, and then before morning disappear back up there again. Or whatever.
😉
This bothers me so much. I want to write a letter of protest at the very least.
This is disgusting. Not only for its content but also for its form. It is the Platonic expression—nay, it’s fucking parody—of the British use of the passive voice to convey Her Majesty’s Gravitas.
‘Actions were taken.’ ‘Complaints had been made.” ‘It was felt.’
Was it now?
Ronald Reagan may have made the phrase, ‘mistakes were made,’ famous, but he came by it honestly from bureaucratic UK Prats.
I still haven’t seen the purported offensiveness explained. It just seems to be assumed as given. Where are these people’s heads?
It also seems that there is a lot more fodder for offense-detection in the statements made by the Islamist student group.
Thefuq?
The statement talks about opposing “racism and discrimination” and valuing “tolerance, diversity, and respect” (hmm, Oxford comma). OK. I remember similar statements from my own uni days.
But when people complain about discrimination or exclusion they are usually able to say what the actual problem is. At length if necessary. The don’t just say “I’m offended” and think that should be the end of the conversation. In fact, if people really see someone’s words of behavior as discriminatory they usually want to explain exactly what the problem is.
Here, instead, we get:
“The offensive nature of the content on the Facebook page…”
The offense is projected on to the content and taken as objective fact, with no need for justification.
If you look, the glasses are actually full. So Jesus and Mo have got together in a pub to not have a beer together. How pro-religion and interfaith is that?
“You know it seems like a fairly positive message to me that Jesus and Mohamad can get along and share a beer (-alcohol?) ”
No self-respecting Islamist can stomach the thought of Jesus and Mohammed hanging out together as equals.
That’s brilliant, and if you ever find any do let us know, now – hang on! You are discriminating against atheists by seeking to deny their freedom of speech! You are not only supporting discrimination on canvas but the very means of its imposition!
(And they are one conjunction away from libel in that little bit of insinuation and guilt by association…)
Except for atheists. And “religious offence” isn’t an issue of race, ethnicity, gender, or sexuality. In fact it’s curious that it’s the odd one out on a list that doesn’t include politics or class. Or, more seriously and less incongruously, caste.
Aha. So the SU is not a place for free speech.
In a university.
I am gobsmacked.
What stupid and smug little useful idiots the good people at LSESU are.
If there’s one thing that all this Jesus and Mo crap has done, it’s done this: I now subscribe to Jesus and Mo. Minus one point for the Student Union…
How do we know that the LSESU Atheist, Secularist and Humanist Society intended to be offensive?
Because they did not immediately remove the offensive content when informed that it was offensive!
Q.E.D.
Yes, the reality is that we British (and Europe in general) don’t respect individual liberty and freedom. That’s why we still have a monarchy, an official theocracy and a parliament soaked in absurd tradition.
America represents the great liberal project, and you are/were the great beacon of hope in the world. That America seems to have lost its way or failed is a great blow to liberty.
These poor bureaucratic hopeless fools require leadership, because they don’t understand freedom, and so once again America is going to have to lead the way and show how its done.
I know this is pretty outrageous but I wonder if people are reading too much into it?
On the face of it, it looks as if the LSE students’ union are just breathtakingly ignorant – of well trodden, even famous, philosophical and political argument – and too dim to wonder where this line of reasoning ends or to imagine if affecting themselves.
Disheartening, since these are purportedly amongst the brightest students in the country, but they clearly don’t have the wit to do worse.
The’re morons. Point at them, laugh and move on.
Be worried, be very worried, these fuckwits are tomorrows politicians, journalists and lobbyists, these craven self serving muppets will be writing our laws and forming opinions. Can someone please publish the names of the LSE students union board so that in the future when they make any pronouncement we know it comes from an idiot.
WTF? The layers of inconsistency, cowardice and hypocrisy behind this beggar belief. where to begin?
For starters, I would dearly like the LSE SU to demonstrate that they can articulate just how this cartoon is offensive. They don’t seem to have got around to that in their statement…
Then they state explicitly that they collected evidence. Did they collect any evidence whatsoever that the beliefs being defended have any grounding in reality? Would we all be up in arms if it had been a risqué observation about teetotal Jedi knights?
And in a blaze of PC, they announce the availability of halal and kosher food in their restaurants. So they’re upholding two codes of behavior that are mutually incompatible, and, yes, deeply offensive to vegetarians, or even those of us who prefer to eat meat but also prefer the animals to dispatched with a modicum of humanity. And what about those bars? Aren’t they offensive to Muslims?
Of course, they’ll insist, it is not a question of whether these beliefs are true. It is a question of respecting the views of others. As long as you’re not a humanist or atheist, of course.
The trouble is, once you’ve admitted the premises of one religion, let alone more than one, logic has already flown, and all you can do is dig a deeper hole. I think the SU of the LSE should be made an example of.
Did LSESU put the ASH on double-secret probation, too?
If the LSESU would like to cleanse the school of racism, perhaps they ought to start with certain of its faculty.
Kiwi Dave –
Well that’s no good! The whole point of the snarky commentary was to underline how very outrageous the statement is.
The NSS have a good angle –
http://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2012/01/lse-students-union-being-manipulated-by-determined-activists-over-mohammed-cartoon
It pains me to read this nonsense coming from within the first secular university created in England in 1826. Created by people like the philosopher Jeremy Benthem and Radicals like James Mill, the University eschewed the religious test required at all other universities in the interest of promoting an understanding of different religions without adhering to the Established Church of England. Part of the original charter also accepted women on an equal basis with men; certainly a novelty in 1826.
Perhaps these odious inhabitants of the “committee”should be given a strong lesson in the history and meaning of the University. So too should the complaining students.
It makes me wonder if sanity will ever prevail again.
It’s not *quite* the same thing, but the writer of ‘Yes, Minister’ (very funny UK 1980s satire) had this to say about student politicians back in 1980:
‘All of the main debaters there, aged twenty, were the most pompous, self-satisfied, self-important bunch of clowns that I’ve ever clapped eyes on. They were all behaving as if they were on the government front bench, and twenty years later they all were: Michael Howard; John Selwyn Gummer; Kenneth Clarke. I thought at that point that the only way that I could ever contribute to politics is making fun of the politicians.’
I’m curious do they have a campus newspaper (I know my campus had 3 or 4) do any of them have any cartoons or satires in them. If so I don’t see how they can support one but not the other without invoking special pleading.
Thomas @ 29 – this particular bunch of nonsense is coming from LSE, not UCL. Not that the UCL Union has done any better.
I just emailed the head of the LSE SU pointing out that if causing offence was against the SU rules then his/her demands that the ASH group remove the cartoons were a problem since that demand has caused offence. I also pointed out that pointing out his/her demand was offensive was also likely to be offensive to some, and that the infinite regression in offence this could lead to was going to be a problem.
What is the betting he/she will not understand my point ?
Well I had reply to email, but all it did was point me to the statement from the SU.
Not very impressive, and no answer to the points I raised in the email. I have sent a reply pointing out I find both the statement, and lack of proper reply, to be offensive, and that I wish to make a formal complaint.
On Tuesday 24th January it was brought to our attention via an official complaint that when we were elected to out posts our backbones were removed. In addition it would seem that any ethical standards we possessed prior to taking office were forcibly removed. Thus we are no longer fit to hold the positions we do and have tendered our resignations with immediate effect.
Do you reckon the officers of the LSE SU have adopted the ethical standards of the officers of the University who thought it would be a good idea, with no possible downside, to accept money from the Ghaddaffi family ?
It’s not *quite* the same thing, but the writer of ‘Yes, Minister’ (very funny UK 1980s satire) had this to say about student politicians back in 1980:
I see all of these self-important prats as Rick from the Young Ones. Where’s Vyvyan when you need him?
Brilliant, Matt! You tell them what’s wrong with the statement so they point you to the statement.
Opehlia, it gets worse.
I complained about the original reply, and they just repeated the initial reply. They have now done that twice more. I am now now entirely convinced they are not just very stupid.
I have now sent an email to the “director” of the SU, rather than the Gen Sec. I will let you know what they have to say.
Well I have had a reply from the LSE SU Sec-Gen:
You get the impression that it is not the greatest of intellects behind those words.
I still intend to make a formal complaint though.
Egbert,
please don’t lump all of Europe together please.
– State religions in Europe: UK, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, Greece (ignoring the micro-states like Vatican City, Andorra, Liechtenstein etc)
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Map_of_state_religions.svg
That said, Christianity has retained a lot of privileges across the European nations, but still..
– Monarchy: there are only 12 monarchies left in Europe today. The EU alone has 27 member countries (and only 7 of them are in the EU). So fortunately, monarchies are in the minority.
– Parliament with absurd tradition: if you’re referring to the House of Lords, to my knowledge there is only the UK left. The Nordic countries all got rid of their Upper Houses and switched to unicameralism, there might still be the Irish Senate, which is not based on nobility, but still not democratically elected (Bavaria used to have a similarly composed senate, but they got rid of it in a constitutional reform 10 years ago).
so please don’t equate the UK with the rest of the continent (and Ireland). Thank you.
Matt,
Can you give us the email accounts for any of these folks please? I’ll follow up too. I’m UCL Alumni not LSE, but I used to drink in their bar so I have some mumble fond memories mumble mumble…
Cheers
Jimmy
These Unions are student-run government, right?
While I think its important to allow University-age adults to begin managing their own affairs and running their own organizations, once student-run government starts repressing student speech, its almost time for the experiment to be put on temporary hiatus. Hit pause, figure out what went wrong with the system, fix it, then restart.
I say almost because in today’s climate, I suspect there’s no guarantee that the professors/administration would make a better decision than the students.
Jimmy,
If you Google LSE SU you will find their website. The contacts list can be found under the About tab. I am not on the computer I used to send the emails so do not have access to the addresses via Outlook.
I certainly would not trust the management of the LSE to do any better.
After reading in the last couple of weeks about promising youngsters like Rhys Morgan and Jessica Ahlquist standing up unflinchingly and level-headed for their rights. Facing a deluge of hatred and threats as a result and yet don’t budge. And one thinks ‘great, with kids like that around humanity may have a chance after all’.
Immediately the rug of warm fuzziness is then pulled from under one’s feet upon coming across these numpties from the LSESU. As if the UCLSU stunt wasn’t bad enough (prompting me to change my fb profile picture to the ‘offending’ Jesus & Mo cartoon…courtesy of Madam Streisand) it now appears there must be a competition for which is the most disingenuous SU in the land. Can’t wait for the next one in series.
Walking upright is clearly wasted on some people.
I left a response to them on their facebook wall but they deleted it within 5 minutes, cowards. Here it is on my blog: http://bit.ly/xFaA4m
Given Moslems are not allowed to depict (or – as it seems – even view) images of the prophet Mohammed, how do they know that this, or any other image attributed to him, is actually The Mohammed, as opposed to one of the 500,000,000 odd other Mohammeds that are alive, or have lived since the name was first coined? How do they know what THE Mo actually looks like? Maybe he actually looks like a small emoticon on its side?
>:-(>
OMA! Have I accidentally depicted Mohammed? Is anybody offended? Should I remove the offending emoticon?
Matt Penfold @33:
It’s simple: Offense felt by oppressed religious/racial minorities trumps all other offense and ends the regression. Your complaining about it just shows your privilege and that arguing with you is pointless.
And people wonder why the skeptic movement has issues with racism.
Let me guess, ttch, you’re the sort who goes around saying, “But maybe it’s true that black people aren’t as smart as white people. Can’t we just consider it?”
Does the skeptic movement have issues with racism? Is it more prevalent within the skeptic community than the wider community? I had the impression that if anything, it was less so.
I’m sure that there are people who are skeptics who are also racist, but that doesn’t necessarily translate to the rest of the community as evidence of a problem. Surely?
Hoo boy – the LSE SU has another statement out – about an emergency general meeting to say OMIGOD NO TO ISLAMOPHOBIA!!11!
I wonder what brought that up.
Catnip67, while I haven’t heard as many rancid anecdotes about racism in the atheist/skeptic community as I have about sexism, it certainly exists.
“They do it, too!” — “they” referring to other communities — is a pretty poor excuse, especially when you consider that bigotries are forms of irrationality that should rightly be challenged by skeptics.
I am not saying “they do it too” is any sort of excuse. I’m simply saying it is a problem with the wider community (not other communities), and while it should be called out and challenged, I do not see it as a “skeptical community” problem. Yes we should point at racist/sexist comments and challenge them, irrespective of whether the perpertrator claims to be a skeptic or not. I don’t think we should label the “skeptical community” as having problems. The problem of racism/bigotry/sexism is orthogonal to those who identify as skeptical.
Ms. Daisy Cutter, Feral Fembeast @50:
When a member of a majority is learning about privilege, instead of taking the lesson that all situations require listening to the Other with compassion and also using one’s reason, it is far easier to take the lesson, “The Other complained. That means I’m wrong.”
How else would you explain the necessity of dealing with multiple complaints of offense from members of a religious/racial minority (as Muslims in England certainly are) by an “emergency meeting” with a predetermined outcome? How do you explain the equating of religious criticism, mild as it is in the “Jesus and Mo” cartoons, with overt racial insult?
The position taken by the Student Union is that feelings of the minority define the situation: Cartoon depictions of Mohammad are viscerally offensive to Muslims. The ASH group knows this since they received multiple complaints of offense, yet they chose to retain the cartoon. So it is clear that the offense was not given accidentally; it was deliberate. That is the only possible conclusion.
The feelings/opinions/rationalizations of the members of the ASH are of literally no value in this dispute. ASH members don’t get to define the “proper” feelings that Muslim LSE students should have. The best the ASH members can do is to admit that they were stupid and thoughtless, and apologize–and hope that the incident stops here and doesn’t end up in their academic records.
Arrant drivel, ttch. It may be true that ASH can’t do anything about the foolish irrationalities of some religionists, but they can say what they bloody well want on THEIR OWN GODDAMN FACEBOOK PAGE. There is a fundamental point of principle at stake here.
For crying out loud, this isn’t complicated.
platyhelminthe, I agree with you 100%. It’s the LSESU that doesn’t. I was just giving their probable reasoning.
just to clarify ttch, are you saying that your post at #55 was not your opinion, but an attempt to understand & articulate the rationalisation that LSESU must have gone through to reach the rather silly position they are currently in? I only ask, because after reading it, I was left assuming that it was your position & was about to write something similar to platyhelminthe.
catnip67: Yes. I thought I made that clear in my first paragraph, that the LSESU leadership took the easier lesson.
No, ttch, you were not AT ALL clear.
Loving the righteous rage at these d**ks in the last paragraph!
Not the least bit surprising.
I’m also wondering why Ms Benson refers to mohammed as “the Prophet Mohammed”
He’s not my prophet; in fact,he’s no prophet at all to most of the world’s population.
NO more so than Jesus is the “Son of God” for Jews
Jesus is just Jesus and Mohamed just Mohamed.
I don’t refer to Mohammed as the Prophet. I call him Mohammed in the post. I don’t alter quoted passages in which other people call him the Prophet, but I don’t call him that myself.
Thanks Matt. If I get anything new I’ll post it. Suspect they have battoned down the hatches and all I’ll get is the same old…
Ho hum…
I got pointed to the statement. And when I pointed out that it is offensive (why don’t they care about offending some groups when they care so passionately about not-offending others?) I got the truly inspired response:
“That is all I have to say on the matter at this time.
Best”
Well. Not much more to say really. Pretty sad day: ‘respect’ and ‘tolerance’ seem to equate to failure to discriminate intellectually, and mental laziness.
They’re practicing for being the next generation of Sir Humphreys and Ministers.
I was going to quip, “Nobody expects the Spanish Inquisition!” until I realized that that would probably be illegal in the UK today, and would certainly get the Python boys kicked out of university.
The new J&M is very much to the point..tremendous.
My God, you didn’t say Eccles cake did you? You have no idea how offensive I find that!
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