Iran condemns Britain over Rushdie knighthood
 

Iran condemns Britain over Rushdie knighthood
Says award is an insult to Islam

So, Britain finally gets a spine when it comes to Islam... now, apply it to the schools please.

The thread I posted this in died pretty soon after I responded, so you may not have seen it. Basically I was questioning your assumption that British schools refused to teach anything about the Holocaust from fear of offending Muslims.

In fact, here is Snopes on the subject. I can't seem to cut & paste from there but it basically confirms what I wrote above - there was only ONE case, ONE school that removed Holocaust teaching from its history curriculum.

The Satanic Verses is a great book.

It's title is misleading in the same way that the Grateful Dead would appear to be a hard rock band (the skeletons, etc.) ...

Even if Rushdie did write a good book, and that the subject matter put his life at risk, I don't quite get the relevance of bestowing him a knighthood. But then the whole honours programme can leave you scratching your head wondering in too many instances...

If I were a British subject, you fuckers would totally knight me. :)

CF - he's been knighted for his lifetime contribution to literature - don't fall into the trap of believing a furore nearly 20 years ago is the reason for his knighthood. Although I agree with you it seems random sometimes. I'd far rather see Sir Ian Hislop :)

[Not CF]Crikey me - it wasn't even the same Government, unless the Iranians believe the Queen has held a grudge against Islam all this time and has finally revealed her Islamophobia in a topical and dazzling display.
Because once a knight's enough?

Ahh, they only knighted him because he appeared on the Colbert Report and they didn't want to seem like they were behind the times.

There is no such thing as too much Sycamore. :)

This is a Fuck You over the whole kidnapping their soldiers deal.
A good one too, smart.

There are a lot of other people who've been knighted for contribution to the arts. Sir Elton John for one. The list is long.

Knighthoods aren't very special really.

You'd be better off with an Order of Australia. ;)

Once and for all, British schools are not pandering to Moslem sensibilities in their teaching. One school, in which a teacher felt unable to tackle a contentious issue was used as an example of how not to approach the teaching of history. It was mentioned in a report which was penned to offer schools best practice advice on History teaching: included within that report were examples of potential pitfalls and potential solutions, along with examples of good practice and examples of poor practice.

thats pretty dumb, it's funny how everyone assumes all Muslims hate Jews and vice versa. The only instance of real turmoil is the whole Palestine / Isreal cluster-fuck and thats over land not religion.

if they wanted to be smart about it they would have issued the fuck you to iran and it's 65 million people directly and not the Islamic world and it's 1.3 billion followers.

This has nothing to do with any kidnapped soldiers.

Salman Rushdi is a highly respected writer. He has been honoured for his services to writing and culture. The honours list often includes such literary figures.

What would be entirely unacceptable, would be if we debarred someone who is considered to be a literary giant, from receiving such an honour on the grounds that his books offended a faith.

I'd be the first to admit that there is a problem in this country with Islamophobia......but this is nothing to do with that.

Apparently, some folks in Pakistan are none too happy with Rushdie's knighthood as well...from the BBC: The UK's envoy to Pakistan has expressed "deep concern" over comments by a Pakistani minister about Sir Salman Rushdie's knighthood.

Religious Affairs Minister Mohammad Ejaz ul-Haq had said the honour meant a risk of suicide attacks because Muslims believed Sir Salman had insulted Islam.

But High Commissioner Robert Brinkley said it was untrue that the knighthood was intended to insult Islam.

Sir Salman's book The Satanic Verses in 1989 sparked protests around the world.

There really is rather more to Salman Rushdie, than 'blasphemy'.

These Islamofascist quibblers should shut the hell up and take it like men, not hyenas.

I'm sure there was more to Hitler than just "killing Jews" too, but Volkswagen commemorating him on Holocaust Remembrance Day probably wouldn't be too wise.

Okay. So you have now officially Godwined the thread.
But for the record:
You may already have known this (it's generally understood in Britain but Salman Rushdie is a naturalised Brit, so we may have paid more attention to the details nearly 20 years ago when it was published). I'm willing to accept it upset people. It didn't kill them though.

I think you just blew my mind.

The problem is not that Rushdie wote offensive material. The problem is that lots of people took offense at what Rushdie wrote.

That's what I would expect from craven scumbags.

yea 1.3 billion people. maybe it's not offensive to you but the majority see's it that way.

How about, just don't read it if you don't like it?

That'd be the ideal situation...but look at how up-in-arms people here get over some religious issues. As weird as this may sound, perhaps some folks have too much faith.

How about, when you post a completely incorrect statement about something and are corrected three times you acknowledge it?

who me?

Sorry. I was referring to RK posting twice re British schools refusing to teach about the Holocaust.

The world's population exceeds 6.5 billion. How does 1.5 billion constitute a majority?

And how can it be argued that the majority of Muslims were actually against it?

The problem is that he did not write offensive material.
People who choose to believe in fairy tales do not have a right not to have those tales altered, mocked, looked at in a different light, etc.

Writing those things are not offensive to those who believe something different than what is written, they just believe something different, not what that person wrote. They are separate.
Simple.
Nothing offensive.

If there was proof that the story was true, then one could argue that someone was altering history, etc, but that is a silly argument and I don't even know why I brought it up.. true..LOL!

And it spreads:

The funny part of this article is at the end:
Emphasis mine. The calculus of political correctness is getting more and more difficult, eh?

More difficult and like a disease, more difficult to cure.

Great, they need to call in the charge' and tell him to go back to Iran and go fuck themselves. Since their so called Revolution in 1979 they have proved themselves to be nothing more than misguided zealous idiots.

Did it happen?

Ugh, Britian should have known they would have gotten a reaction but it wasn't a dirty move and they were completely justified in it.

Hopefully this just dies off, these types of arguments never go anywhere but bad quickly.

I would fully support bombing their one and only gas refinery. Send it to the shitter.

One teacher, in one unnamed school felt uncomfortable about tackling what she considered to be a contentious topic. It was referred to in a paper about teaching history, and in particular about teaching potentially contentious topics and how to best promote historical debate amongst pupils. To in any way characterise that as 'British schools' not teaching the holocaust, is disingenuous.....and lo and behold the 'story' was 'broken' by a right wing tabloid with an axe to grind.

So.....no it didn't happen. British schools weren't and aren't refusing to teach the holocaust.

i think the world would be a better place if everyone just watched family guy:

Wait, I thought we weren't supposed to intervene in foreign affairs?