Signs Of The Times

Standard :

Street adverts featuring women in bikinis have been defaced in apparently targeted attacks. Most show women in swimwear by chain store H&M but another features a couple kissing to promote the Bollywood film Kites. Residents in affected London areas suggested the images, which were daubed with black paint, could have been targeted by religious conservatives or radical feminists. Police have not linked the campaign to any religious group but the damage is similar to attacks in Pakistan on billboard ads branded "un-Islamic" and "obscene" by hardliners. Today women's rights and anti-censorship activists joined Muslims and Christians to condemn the vandals. Police said 14 bus shelters around Tower Hamlets, including many in Limehouse, were hit last month.

Tower Hamlets is a hotbed of radical feminism, I hear.

Charles le Gai Eaton 1921-2010

The original canary and author of Islam and the Destiny of Man has died. I blogged his take on "The Wishy-Washy Standards of Contemporary Christianity" and also linked to this snippet of biography.

But the half was not told me. He really was a poor little rich boy :

The book tells how, for 10 years before her son was born in 1921, Eaton's mother Ruth – a feminist, Ibsenite, Wagnerian and Nietzschean by his account – had been the mistress of Francis Errington, an eminent ecclesiastical lawyer many decades her senior. Errington was unhappily married to a "lady of title" with whom he already had a grown-up family. When Ruth became pregnant with their only child she refused an abortion, but agreed to collude in an elaborate deception that would preserve them both from scandal.

This involved her making a short trip to Canada where (after a whirlwind romance) she would "marry" a fictitious husband – the "father" of her child. The phantom was given a name, Charles Eaton (after a department store in Montreal); a face (a photograph of a handsome young officer friend of Errington's who had died in the trenches); and a cover story that would explain his absence.

Eaton, the story went, was a mining engineer who would be offered a wonderful job in Italy. Shortly after the birth of his child there on April 5 1921, he would die of a ruptured appendix, leaving Ruth a "widow" with a baby in tow.

As the Italian doctors who "failed" to diagnose appendicitis were "not to be trusted", her child would be born at a hotel in Lausanne. That element of the story was true at least. But Charles Le Gai Eaton was born not in April but three months earlier, on January 1 1921, with his real father, Francis Errington, dancing attendance nearby.

After a period in Switzerland, Ruth and her baby returned to the family home in London, where Gai was brought up in an almost entirely female household, the object of his mother's possessive and eccentric devotion. He shared her bed until he was six and learned nothing at all about religion, Ruth having warned a succession of nursemaids that they would be dismissed if they ever mentioned God.

Apart from the elderly gentleman Gai knew only as "Uncle", outside the family they had few friends – Ruth having advised her son that the English in general were "cold, stupid, lacking intellect, lacking culture, and either sexually repressed or perverts".

In 1933 Errington's wife died, and three months later an astonished Gai wrote in his diary: "Maman is going to marry Uncle... Uncle is no real relation of ours. He was a great friend of my father." When his mother suggested the boy address her new husband as "father" and change his name to Errington, Gai demurred, confiding to his diary that it would be unfair to the memory of his "real" father who had died so tragically young.

It was when he was 16 and at Charterhouse that his mother finally told him the truth, although she made him promise never to let Errington know that he knew. So began an elaborate charade: "On April 5 each year [Gai] received a birthday gift from his father, both of them knowing this was not his birthday, and each year in the Christmas holidays his father took him to a Swiss resort to skate and ski so that they were constantly together. Still his lips were sealed."

Blimey. Poor kid. It's true that children are adaptable, but all the same ...

The upshot of such a complicated web of deception was that Gai "became obsessed with the need to discover Truth".

Well you would, wouldn't you ? His mother sounds like a "woman of character" - a.k.a. utter pointy-head. I wonder what her maiden name was - from the above it sounds as if it may not have been Eaton ? In fact (the wonder of google and genealogy) she was born Ruth Frances Muddock.

"There were long periods when she was so infuriated with the English that she forbade English to be spoken around the house, only French and Russian were acceptable"

Hmm.

It was not long before he was reintroduced to an old acquaintance, a Jamaican artist, Corah Hamilton, who was living in London. They married in 1956 and she soon gave birth to the first of their three children.

Their happiness, however, seems to have unhinged his mother, Ruth, who became viciously abusive about her new black daughter-in-law, and it was with some relief that in 1959 Eaton accepted an offer of a post as director of the Colonial Office's information office in Jamaica.

Hmm. One knoweth not what to say. But he had a robust view on Muslim immigration :

Eaton decried the despots and human rights abuses in the Muslim world, and, closer to home, held a hard line on Muslim immigrants: "It is time for the Muslims in Britain to settle down, to find their own way, to form a real community and to discover a specifically British way of living Islam," he noted. "The constant arrival of uneducated, non English-speaking immigrants from the subcontinent makes that more difficult. This is no curry island."

He was wrong about that last sentence, wasn't he ? The Telegraph obit also contains this wee factoid :

Until about 1990, Britain's white converts were reckoned to number 5,000; that number is now thought to have grown to between 10,000 and 20,000.

UPDATE - "A philosopher, author of genius and profound insight, Gai Eaton was widely revered by the community as the closest thing to a towering patriarch in articulating Islam for modern Britain", said Dr. Muhammad "Two million Muslim terrorists" Abdul Bari.

"reacting to the moral uncertainties of the Western world"

More canaries in the coal mine. I must confess I didn't know that Boris Johnson's first wife ("the Zuleika Dobson of his year" according to Toby Young - another portrait of the marriage here) is now a convert to Islam.

Let Yazza (for it is she) reveal all :

She was the first wife of Boris Johnson — clearly not a woman to shirk challenges. But then I find out that she has married a much younger Lahori man and imagines her future as an ageing wife who will happily accept her lot within an orthodox Islamic set-up and welcome a younger wife to produce children. It is her choice and one wishes her well.

Several of my close Pakistani and Arab friends are happily married to European wives, with both sides compromising on lifestyles and values.

That is not what Mostyn-Owen has opted for. First she has married a much younger, fit man and maybe feels excessively grateful. Then she is going for complete surrender, an uncritical acceptance of the most regressive practices of some of my co-religionists. The reactions of her family are subtly xenophobic and must hurt. But her actions are as inexplicable to Muslims like myself too. My mother's generation fought for equality and monogamous marriages, a struggle that carries on. To see the daughters of Britannia carelessly surrendering these rights is almost unbearable.

It is happening elsewhere in Europe too. Since 9/11, vast numbers of educated, privileged middle-class white women have converted to Islam, often the most restricted forms with tediously long rulebooks. Surveys suggest they are the fastest growing group of converts in the West. Here they include women at investment banks, TV stations, universities and in the NHS.

Four years ago, when the trend first became clear, Dr Haifa Jawad, of Birmingham University, said: “The women were reacting to the moral uncertainties of the Western world. Many convert out of conviction and not because they are in love.”

Mostyn-Owen says her husband is “untainted by the jaded confusion of western urban life”. Such images of contamination and purity are often used to explain the decisions. Three such converts told me last year their nun-like apparel makes them feel less objectified and they feel “cleansed”.

I get a distinct "wishy-washy standards of contemporary Christianity" vibe here, although to be fair in Mrs BoJo's case it's probably "the wishy-washy standards of contemporary liberalism". The Mail story linked above quotes her mother thus : "Boris is a man who needed someone very obedient and silent, who would be willing to stay in the background and create a soothing home life, while giving him space to build a glittering career. My daughter wasn't that kind of person." Slightly strange that she's opted for that yet again, or am I stereotyping ?

Talking of Charles le Gai Eaton, there's an interesting snippet of biography here, pinched from his 'Islam and the Destiny of Man'.

UPDATE - the lady herself, quoted in Readers Digest :

"I've never regularly attended church, yet I have been to this mosque, my mosque, more times than I can remember. It's a place where I sometimes feel spiritually transported. As I busy myself on the carpet sorting colours and papers after what is always an exhausting class, I am soothed by the azan of evening prayers, the haunting and sometimes pained invocations to the Almighty. I feel my humility, and then realize this is my act of worship, my submission, my Islam. Forget the fact that only men take part in communal prayers, I am a token Christian discreetly trafficking through the men's space with my bags of materials, pretending I'm not really there. I am there, I am accepted, and this is all that matters."

UPDATE 2 - from the comments to Yazza's piece :

In places like Morocco - there is a whole sub industry in marrying mainly older western women - to gain papers and passport to Europe, America - even Japan.

I don't mean to offend - but Muslim men are usually married to first cousins or other family members - before a Muslim girl marries - she must undergo a virginity test at the doctors -

I have spent time in the Muslim world - hard to call everyone who sees this thing for what it is - a racist. But there I was told that women who cannot produce a virginity certificate - are laughed at, called whores, and can remain unwed for the rest of their lives. Many turn to prostitution.

If one of these same man marries a western woman - who is older and not a virgin - then he only sees her as a way to escape his country's conditions.

How the game works - is these guys are prepared to enter into long term relationships with you - in one case - a young girl having a relationship with a young Muslim man - was meant to return there and bring the foreign marriage papers - when she turned up without them - the relationship was called off - she probably had some sense talked into her by her parents - but she was there after referred to as the 'stupid' girl who did not bring the papers. And I was approached to take money to marry this guy and bring him back to Europe.

Other cases EU ladies in relationships with these men have sent them money - the guy then took the money, brought a house and married a cousin as his family wished.

- Rebecca, uk

More Canaries

George Osborne's brother Mohammed (ne Adam), shown below reprising Kenneth Williams' unforgettable role as the ruler of Khalabar :

'Rahala explained to her three brothers and two sisters that she was deeply in love and wanted to marry Adam. I don't think they were too keen. Her older sister, who had an arranged marriage, was especially resistant.

'Over time, however, and after meeting him on a few occasions, they came around to the idea. And when Adam announced that he was going to convert to Islam, it enabled everyone to accept the relationship.'

And perhaps at the other end of whatever spectrum there might be, Ibrahim (ne Maurice) Anderson, composer of 'A Means for Dawah' and currently facing trial on charges of using threatening, abusive, insulting words and behaviour at a homecoming parade in Luton for the Anglian Regiment.

Another frothing racist

" a determined Islamic attack"

"That is the type of evangelism they are doing: mass-production, so if you have four wives, four children, sixteen children, very soon you will be a village"

"surrounded by Islamic domination"

Who is this spittle-flecked, swivel-eyed chap ? Quite obviously one of those embittered types who's not cool with diversity and thinks that (parental advisory - the writer thinks that swearing is grown-up) "a significant portion of the babies being born are, apparently, the wrong sort of babies – babies from ethnic minorities, babies with immigrant parents and lone parents, black babies, poor babies".




Archbishop Nicholas Okoh, 56, was elected Primate of Nigeria last week.




Like his predecessor, the great Peter Akinola, the Archbishop seems to have the CoE hierarchy pretty well taped.

“Who is the leader in the Christian world? There is no leader”

That's you, Rasputin, that is.



While we're on the subject of the Church of England, here's another canary in the coalmine.

Lewis Bullock, an IT and business consultant in Dubai, was only 14 years old when he took the bold step of changing his faith from Christianity to Islam while growing up in the UK.

"I only had brief knowledge of Islam from our world religions class; in fact, we had the image that it's a religion for Indians and Pakistanis," Bullock said, who comes from a religious Christian background with his father and grandfather (a priest) belonging to the Church of England.

Obviously another one driven away by "the wishy-washy standards of contemporary Christianity".

"I have developed a new lifestyle different to the accustomed one in the UK and I tried to make my family understand this change by pointing to the irregularities in the lifestyle and high divorce rates as compared to arranged marriages," he said, adding that his marriage to an Arab UAE national has helped to strengthen his faith in Islam.

He's right of course. In fact, I've noticed recently a new trend on left blogs in the comments. When hideous righties talk about defending Western culture, the response is "what culture ? Binge drinking, high crime, family breakup ?" - all things which the left have been in the forefront of promoting - and things which once only hideous righties used to complain about.


Obviously no problems with the Bullocks' family life.

Bullock is a fluent Arabic speaker of the colloquial Emirati accent and enjoys his career and family life with his wife and five boys.

Two Cultures

As the Sixties and Seventies boomers, the generation when sex, drugs and rock'n'roll went mainstream, get older we see more stories of this nature :

Burnley magistrates were told how Lesley Anne Cassidy, 48, had had 127 tablets of valium which she had bought from a dealer. She had served a jail term for peddling drugs.

Cassidy wept as the court was told how she would take between 10 and 20 valium pills a day and her late husband would take the same. The defendant, of Smith Street, Nelson, admitted possessing a Class C controlled drug ...

The defendant was present and said she and her late husband had taken drugs. She said she had gone to sleep and had awoken to find him lifeless on the settee. Mr Hartley said Cassidy was admitted to intensive care, and after she was released she was arrested.

Police investigated and there was no evidence to show Cassidy supplied her late husband with drugs. There was evidence both had bought drugs. The defendant had 127 valium tablets which she had bought from a dealer. Jasmine Basnyet, for Cassidy, said she had taken valium for a long time and the number of pills she had had would only have lasted the couple for about a week or so.Both would take between 10 and 20 tablets a day.

Aye. 48 was once a respectable age for a man, a matronly one for a woman. As you get older you find that you can't do all the things you did when younger - not without a physical toll.

In the same neck of the woods, a younger woman takes a message on board :

In one of the shops I visited on a regular basis the assistants said he wanted to say something and hoped I would not take offence.

He commented on my attire or should that be the missing item not supported. He said he admired the work I was doing as a disabled person but I really should cover my head.

I instantly jumped to my defence declaring I prayed five times a day as required and even prayed the Quran on a daily basis.

The man praised this but said I would be questioned for not covering my head as it was a compulsory.

I again attempted to justify myself ‘I might not be wearing a head scarf but at least Iam decently covered, I am wearing loose clothing and nothing is showing. What’s better to dressing like this without a head scarf or covering your head whilst wearing jeans that fit like a second skin and a top that leaves nothing to the imagination’?

He replied that she would be questioned about this on the day of judgement but at least she was fulfilling the requirement of the head scarf which meant that it is one less thing to answer for.

Sometimes someone says something and it really affects you, for the first time I saw it differently. I had been asked to cover my head by various people but always said ‘Inshallah when I’m ready’.

Little did he know his good advice had sown the seed.

When I got home I was overtaken by a desperate need, the likes of which I had never experienced, to cover my head. I put on my scarf and called my mum...

It’s been about a month that i have worn it and to be honest i don’t even notice it’s there anymore. I am still the lively, bubbly, chattering Sarvat that is me.

The reaction from fellow Muslims has been a surprise. I have for many years been someone who practises my faith but now thanks to a cloth on my head it works as a visible statement that says I am a Muslim and am practising my faith.

What twisted irony, the head scarf was once used to aid me in my quest to impress, vanity. Now it is worn in the true essence of what it stands for - modesty. Allah Subhanatallah works in mysterious ways.

This little tale could have come straight from a Victorian newspaper. Righteous words, spoken in due humility, are never spoken in vain. Praise be !

NWOBJ - what did I tell you ?

earlier this month ....

"... the only jihadis who seem to fit the "weirdo loner" profile of yer average native pyrotechnician seem to be converts ..."

And behold ... poor little rich boy ...

Returning to Colston's, Andrew Ibrahim's weight and lack of sporting ability helped other pupils label him a "loser" and his increasingly unruly behaviour led the school to ask him to leave in December 2002, shortly before his 14th birthday...

Despite his increasing addiction, his parents stood by him, splitting the rent with him on a flat in Kingswood, a suburb in North East Bristol, with his mother doing a weekly food shop for him. At the flat, Ibrahim had videos of women's feet he had taken on his mobile phone at college without their knowledge, which he admitted were part of a "sexual interest" and he had searched for pictures of Kiera Knightley's feet on the internet.

He had become hooked on heroin and crack cocaine, using the drugs several times a day and stealing to fund his habit. He was reprimanded by police for possessing heroin in May 2006 at the age of 17 and warned for shoplifting on two occasions in September and October 2006.

Alongside his various addictions, Ibrahim had five tattoos done during 2005 and 2006, including "Hardcore" across his stomach and "HTID" on his right bicep to represent "Hardcore Till I Die" after a style of rave music. He also had a variety of hairstyles and colours along with a series of facial and intimate piercings.

Well, he did - and then he changed.


Before - a typical young Briton, expressing his individuality by copying loads of other people.



After - altogether a more serious figure. Grow the beard a little longer and buy a motorbike ! I digress.

Sunny once again looks at the press coverage of this kid-with-everything and sees the cancer of racism rearing its ugly head yet again - or is it the cancer of Islamophobia ? I forget.

"Let’s see – nutjob wants to take out other Britons. Is working alone. Gets caught. But one story makes the front page of the Evening Standard. Another story involving a white guy who was in a more advanced stage of bomb-making barely rates a mention in the back pages. "

He's referring of course to this somewhat sorry figure.

I can’t believe that Sunny is as daft as he pretends to be. I guess it's just that his target audience need their fill of such stories to balance his often cogent criticisms of the cultures of the subcontinent. He must know perfectly well that the ‘public schoolboy’ angle will hit the Mail, Telegraph and Evening Standard erogenous zones – they just love a ‘middle-class gone wrong’ story and this guy has the dream background. Whereas the soi-disant Waffen SS guy was an inarticulate working class drunk.

A better parallel would be to compare Neil Lewington, inarticulate white Waffen SS UK Member, with an inarticulate white working class jihadi convert. Google ‘Nicholas Roddis’ – of the fearsome Al Qaeda Organisation In Rotherham. He didn’t make much of a media splash- got reported, but never hit the front pages or radio headlines.

And as for Sunny's ‘more advanced stage’ of explosive manufacture – our Waffen SS chap basically had some firelighters – call them incendiary devices if you wish. I also have some advanced stage incendiaries - I put them in the grate, light them - and they burn at once ! Then I put coal on top.

Our public schoolboy had HTMD in his fridge – that’s stuff that makes quite a bang – and a suicide vest for it to go in.

“When they entered his flat in April last year, police found between 125-245 grammes of the unstable explosive Hexamethylene Triperoxide Diamine, also known as HMTD, in a Family Circle biscuit tin in Ibrahim’s fridge. He had also made an electrical circuit capable of detonating the explosive at short range and a half-made suicide vest … Ibrahim made the HMTD, the same substance used in the July 7 attacks, and suicide vest entirely through instructions from the internet.”

(btw, I don’t know if the 7/7 attacks actually used HMTD – you get different stories from different sources. After the attacks the story was that it was TATP as used in Gaza rockets, then it changed to being ‘organic peroxide-based’ i.e. flour and concentrated H2O2. For obvious reasons I’d reckon there was a lot of disinformation about. I note that the wikipedia entry for HMTD has been pruned to remove information about the easily-obtainable ingredients and a link to a 'how to make it' site, among other things.)


UPDATE - two other thoughts ... both Ibrahim and Lewington were nobodies with big hopes (or big fantasies if you like). Now they're somebodies, even if they're not somebodies we'd like to be ourselves.

And this strikes me as far more significant than Mr Little-boy-lost Ibrahim. The reporter is at Regents Park Mosque, listening to preachers instructing the faithful to kill apostates, adulterers, homosexuals, avoid the company of non-Muslims - you know, that stuff that would come under 'hate crime' were a Christian saying it. But it's not that, it's this :

I was amazed at how many young British women seemed to find this version of the faith attractive. One young girl told me that when she first attended the circle, she was dressed in jeans and that she had many non-Muslim friends. She now loves only those that are around her - "other sisters in the circle" - and only engages with non-Muslims to try to convert them. Many of the sisters had the idea of living as a separate community - a concept alien to me and many other Muslims I know.

More canaries in the coal mine. Like Peter Hitchens, I think it's likely that this country will see a great religious revival in this century - but that it may not be a Christian one.

Too Naive To Make A Good Politician ...

'I am shocked and upset that a member of the Labour Party in this day and age could even think something like that, let alone say it.

'People should not be allowed to make racist comments like that. If someone in the party feels I cannot represent them because of my colour or religion, that's ridiculous.

'I felt particularly aggrieved because I have worked across all sections of the community, particularly with the Muslim section, and have been on official visits to Pakistan.'

Elaina Cohen may well be a terrific Labour candidate for the East Handsworth and Lozells ward. But she does strike me as somewhat unworldly. The fates of Lorna Fitzsymons and Oona King seem to have passsed her by. In Mr Blair's immortal words 'the rules of the game have changed'.

I Believe That Children Aren't Our Future ...

New record abortion figures :

The number of abortions in all women rose by 2.5% to reach an all time high of almost 200,000.

Big increases in children killing children - to be fair, this only parallels what's happening outside on the streets.

The number of abortions among girls aged under 16 rose by 10% to 4,376 in 2007, official figures for England and Wales show. In the under 14s, abortions rose by 21% from 135 in 2006 to 163 last year.



I wonder what the solutions to this great problem are. They wouldn't by any chance involve more, earlier and compulsory sex education ? There are a whole lot of tax-funded types just itching to get the message across to younger and younger kids. After all, that's the classic liberal solution.

"Whatever you did before that didn't work, do more of it"

Let the BBC tell us about a few :

Gill Frances, chair of the Teenage Pregnancy Independent Advisory Group, said: "We know what works to reduce abortion amongst teenagers. We need high quality sex and relationships education at school and at home and effective contraception."

Ah, the old 'what works' mantra !

Ann Furedi, chief executive of the British Pregnancy Advisory Service, said: "Much more needs to be done to equip young people to deal with the complexities of their personal relationships and to empower them to ask for high quality, user-friendly forms of contraception without embarrassment.

Quite right, Ann. Double doses of empowerment to be issued to all schools, and a rolling programme of upgrades to the equipment needed to deal with the complexities of their personal relationships !

(I digress - but surely the relationships between young males and young females are some of the least complex relationships on the planet - at least as far as the young men are concerned ? Ann's mum obviously never told her that 'they're only after one thing !')

Julie Bentley, chief executive at the FPA (Family Planning Association) said sex and relationship education should be compulsory in every school. "Younger women are making different choices about their lives and choosing abortion over motherhood, but education and contraceptive services will stop them becoming pregnant in the first place."

"Choosing abortion over motherhood", eh ? Just like some young men choose rape over temporary celibacy ? I guess its just a "different choice", after all ... for the person doing the choosing.

The strange thing is that all this nonsense is contradicted by the evidence of one UK community. They are characterised by what Ann Furedi and Gill Francis would doubtless consider extremely low quality sex and relationships education - namely "don't do it" - the sort of sex education that worked remarkably well for the British for the last 500 years, even when contraception was almost non-existent. Somehow around the early 70s we decided that Gill Francis had the right idea after all - and bastardy, sexually transmitted infections and abortions have been rising ever since, in tandem with a falling birth rate.

What would be interesting to see is the way in which the changing pattern of numbers of abortions in a given age group compares with the changing patterns of numbers of young women in said age group. After all, if the numbers of abortions in U14s rises by 21% but the number of U14s rises by 25%, that would be a fall in the 'per 1,000 U14 females' figure. (that's an example - I think it unlikely that the numbers of U14 females could change so rapidly).

What would also be interesting would be a breakdown by ethnic group. We know that more than 23% of schoolchildren are ethnic minority. We know that the Indian and particularly the Bangladeshi/Pakistani communities have low rates of sexually transmitted disease and high rates of fertility. I think it highly unlikely that they're having many abortions - although their (native) girlfriends might.

We can probably expect more episodes like this as the desires of the people (whose children get STIs and have abortions) for more and more sex education clash with the desires of those (whose children don't - and they want to keep it that way) for less or none.

So it appears that the shrinking native population is having ever more abortions while the incomers are having ever more babies. Keith Ajegbo's "British Lessons For English Children" report tells us that "in 10 years time, 15% of the workforce will be Muslim".

Some marketing geek at Lloyds TSB has been looking at the data and drawing his conclusions. These guys are paid a lot of money to do the figures. Double click to see it full size.

Redditch ...

I was visiting the sick yesterday, and revisiting old haunts- up the M5 to Bromsgrove and along the old main road (now replaced by a hideous dual carriageway) through Finstall to Redditch, over the canal at Tardebigge. The Alexandra Hospital is where my mother was subject to unpleasant nursing care - not by all her nurses but a significant minority of the night shift - in her final months.

Parking's now £2.50 a throw - bad news if you're a pensioner visiting twice a day. It was about 80p five years back. The English NHS may not be able to afford drugs, but there's a new automated ticketing and barrier system for parking.

"Of course we don't pay at home" said my Welsh aunts.

On the way back I called in at Redditch's giant B&Q, built on the former site of a battery factory. There was a new construction on the roundabout. I wonder where the idea of naming the road after the founder of Pakistan came from ?



"Looks like a mosque" thought I. And it is. I don't know whether the application for lottery funding was successful, but it still needs a bit of money to make it look like this :



Well blow me down. The old place has certainly changed a lot since the early 60s. Prior to the building of the New Town it was a little market town, dominated by its church, and famed for its carnival - an annual childhood treat.

Which brings me, by a roundabout route, to this :

Prison officers at one of Britain's maximum security jails are losing control to Muslim gangs, according to a confidential report obtained by The Observer. An internal review of Whitemoor in Cambridgeshire warns that staff believe a 'serious incident is imminent' as several wings become dominated by Muslim prisoners.

The report, written by the Prison Service's Directorate of High Security, says there is an 'ongoing theme of fear and instability' among staff at Whitemoor, where just under a third of the 500 prisoners are Muslim.

It claims: 'There was much talk around the establishment about "the Muslims". Some staff perceived the situation at Whitemoor had resulted in Muslim prisoners becoming more of a gang than a religious group. The sheer numbers, coupled with a lack of awareness among staff, appeared to be engendering fear and handing control to the prisoners.' The situation has become so acute that white prisoners are routinely warned about the Muslim gangs by staff on arrival.

Now what we're seeing here isn't some great Islamic conspiracy. It's just what happens when a self-confident, expanding culture meets a cultural vacuum. Most prisons are already run by the forbearance of the prisoners. The addition of a strong bond between some of the prisoners simply ups that pressure and gives them extra clout.

Did I say a cultural vacuum ? Can a vacuum cringe ?

The report says that apprehension about Muslim prisoners has potentially damaging consequences and is in danger of 'leading to hostility and Islamophobia'.

You have to smile at that point. Apparently the problem is not the gangs, but the potential reaction of the evil natives. We have nothing to fear but fear itself.

Rasputin's At It Again

My contempt for Rasputin really knows no bounds.

Archbishop of Canterbury Dr Rowan Williams has launched a stinging attack on US policy, comparing it unfavourably with the British Empire. In an interview with Muslim lifestyle magazine Emel, he said the British Empire had put energy and resources into "normalising" lands it took over.

But the US had assumed a "quick burst of violent action" to "clear the decks" was it all had to do in Iraq. It thought it could then leave others to "put it back together", he said.

Dr Williams said the US, as the only "global hegemonic power", was trying to accumulate influence and control, rather than territory. But he said: "That is not working," describing the result as "the worst of all worlds". He told the magazine the US had lost the moral high ground since the 11 September attacks and needed to take steps including "generous aid" to "the societies that have been ravaged", a "check on the economic exploitation of defeated territories" and a "demilitarisation" of its presence in them in order to recover.

Now it may be that the whole interview (which is not available online) is somewhat more nuanced than the Beeb's excerpts. I hope so, because as presented it's full of lies. The US, for example, is the most generous aid donor in the world. But Rasputin, while an idiot, is not stupid. He'll be well aware of how this will be presented - as a dig at the Great Satan.

(I note that the enterview was with Sarah Joseph, editor of Emel, Catholic apostate, intelligent middle class English girl and another Brit convert. Her brother's a convert too. The twittering in the coal mine gets a little louder.)

UPDATE - The full waffle is at Ruth Gledhill's blog. Doesn't alas alter anything above. Thanks FW for the heads-up.

More Canaries ...

OPne always has to be wary of stuff in the CiF comments boxes. How do you know they're not just invented ? Of course the same can apply to some of the CiF articles ... in the end you just have to trust the instincts - which means the danger of picking the stuff that fits in with your theories/prejudices and ignoring the rest.

In which spirit, this comment from yet another 'root cause' debate.

Back in 1999 I was working with homeless young people, and a number of them converted to what seemed to me to be a fairly radical form of Islam. These were not young people from Muslim families, but white kids from Christian/ atheist backgrounds, mostly girls who then adopted veils ranging from headdresses to burkas or niqabs. I thought at the time the appeal was twofold. Firstly, they were being offered moral certainty and clarity for the first time in their lives. For many of the girls, they welcomed the veil because it gave them a chance to think of themselves as being defined by something other than their sexual attractiveness. The other appeal, however, was simply that it became fashionable. Those that were "in" formed an exclusive club, and those that weren,t felt they were missing out.

My point is that we can't address this issue until we recognise how little our desperately vacuous, morally empty, celebs'n'shopping culture offers to all our young people, and the powerful sense of importance and belonging conveyed by involvement in "jihad". By all means stop the hatemongers from preaching, but we also need to take a good look at our society, and the world we are making for our children.

I'm just remembering a couple I met twenty years back, hippy travellers who left a convoy to live in the sticks in their decorated caravan. Nice people, and she was a pretty girl who used to drive the local bikers crazy by turning up at the pub in a purple string vest top which made looking her in the eye during conversation a real test of will power.

One day they went off, pretty much on a whim, thirty-odd miles north to visit a Krishna community living in a stately home near Worcester. One of the other bikers had visited and said it was an interesting Sunday out. Next thing I know they're living there, and she's in a sari up to the neck, explaining to me why women are so much less spiritual than men, and her duty to serve her husband.

More Canaries In The Coal Mine

If you think about it, it was always likely that some of the pointy heads who would have been exploring Buddhism, Krishna, circle dancing or Goddess cults a few years back would turn to the hottest new religion on the block.

Via Another Green World, meet the Green-Green Alliance.

"Anne Gray is an academic researcher in social policy. She has been politically active for many years in the peace movement, solidarity with Palestine, the European Social Forum movement, and in the Campaign against Criminalising Communities, which works to oppose the abuses of civil liberties associated with the anti-terrorism laws. She is also active in the Green Party. Brought up as a Quaker, she practised no religion for many years but then turned to Islam in the last year"

"Mark Barrett originally trained in law but now works as a tour guide for an educational travel company. He has a strong interest in the relationship between art and politics. His main areas of concern are the question of constitution, community land rights and how to establish a democratic model of globalisation. He is an active member of People in Common which works to end government restrictions on protest within the vicinity of Parliament while exploring possibilities for a new constitutional model. Originally brought to religious life via Buddhism and Quakerism, Mark has also been much inspired by the poet Rumi. He is now exploring orthodox Islam and is particularly interested in the concept of ijtihad and its contemporary relevance."

"Ply Well The Knives For Hussain's Sake"

I've always been wary of people who deliberately harm themselves. From self to others doesn't seem a terribly long step. I disagreed strongly with the decision to allow Abas Amini to stay in the UK, after Mr Amini sewed up his eyelids, lips and ears in protest at a government decision to appeal against his asylum status. Do we really want people capable of such acts walking the streets of Britain ? If he'll do that to himself, what of others with whom he may come into conflict ?

I was reminded of this by a remarkable series of photographs. I've posted before about the Ashura processions.

During Moharram Shias mourn the killing of the Prophet's grandsons Hussein and Hassan, which led to the split between Sunni and Shia Muslims.

In Ashura commemorations the faithful carry tazias, replicas of the tombs of the martyrs, through the streets, just as Spanish Catholics carry statues of the Virgin Mary in procession during Holy Week.

The Ashura processions are described in Kipling's "On the City Wall".

"All the processions—there were two-and-twenty of them—were now well within the City walls. The drums were beating afresh, the crowd were howling ‘Ya Hasan! Ya Hussain!’ and beating their breasts, the brass bands were playing their loudest, and at every corner where space allowed, Mohammedan preachers were telling the lamentable story of the death of the Martyrs."

I hadn't realised that as well as the breast-beating (maatam - great singing on this video) some devotees like to perform maatam by scourging themselves with blades (zanjeer) or even cutting their heads with swords (tatbir). I also hadn't realised that we've got a fair number of devotees in the UK.

Brazilian photographer Eduardo Martino seems like a hip young dude - work for the Guardian and BBC features prominently on his cv.

One of his projects is a pictorial record of UK Shia Muslims, from which I venture to show a few images. (All photographs are the property of Mr Martino. You can see all his photos of UK Shia life here and here. Notice the odd native convert here and there.)

Here we see a zanjeer - a chain with blades attached.



Followed by "before" :



And "after" :



I'm a little concerned that this is happening in Manchester, rather than say Bombay. By the look of these guys there seems to be a lot of it about. As for this - well, isn't he a little young to be doing that sort of thing ?



While the mullahs of Iran aren't too cut up about the practice, I think I'm with the office of Grand Ayatollah Sistani of Iraq on this one :

As far as mourning is concerned and getting attention of entire world, then it should be done very nicely with "beating chests and heads with hands" and with complete discipline in procession. All the people should participate with fully dressed in black cloths. Then definitely it will impress the entire world and will force them to accept us as a peace loving people. On the other hand people fear from Shiites when they see them doing Zanjeer Zani crazily and from head to toe covered with blood.

Spot on - couldn't put it better myself. One can't resist the thought that if they're prepared to do this to themselves in the name of religion, what might they be prepared to do to others in that same cause ? Remember the sacrifices the Iranian basij were prepared to make during the First Gulf War - such devotion is awesome, but fearsome too.

These Bradford Shiites seem a much more sober crowd - even showing respect for the Shearbridge Hotel of (to me) blessed memory and mediocre beer. Admittedly they're outdoors - but so are these Lancashire lads.

While I respect the wish to show devotion, and admire the piety of the believers, England has always avoided excessive self-harm in the name of religion. When the flagellants were touring Europe during the Black Death, the English refused to beat themselves up about it. It never caught on here.

Whoe’er to save his soul is fain
Must pay and render back again.
His safety so shall he consult
Help us, good lord, to this result
Ply well the scourge for Jesus’ sake
And God through Christ your sins shall take
Woe! Usurer though thy wealth abound
For every ounce thou makest, a pound
Shall sink thee to the hell profound
Ye murderers and ye robbers all,
The wrath of God on you shall fall.
Mercy ye ne’er to others show,
None shall ye find, but endless woe.
Had it not been for our contrition
All Christendom had met perdition

One other unfortunate historical resonance. Flagellant processions in Europe would frequently end with an attack on any available Jews.

Your Friendly Prison Imam

"... for many years I served part-time as Imam at Woodhill High Security Prison in Milton Keynes ..."

Sahim Mustaqim Bleher is an ethnic German and convert to Islam who has moved from far-left student protest in those heady days of yore, to ... well, to this :



He's lived in England for 25 years, and views it as a place of dreary weather and mediocre lifestyle, which the natives flee on cheap flights to escape "the backwardness of England, which started to become a haven for migrants from Eastern Europe".

England is, of course, controlled by the Zionists.

He thinks that the Labour Party's "domestic and foreign policies are now no longer distinguishable from that of BNP leader Nick Griffins".

Just the chap to introduce the blessings of Islam to disturbed young criminals in chokey, wouldn't you say ?

The New St George

Written in 1971 by Richard Thompson, in the days when there were still factories and forges in England. Prophetic stuff.


The time has come for action
Leave your satisfaction
Can’t you hear St. George’s tune
St. George’s tune is calling you on
Freedom was your mother
Fight for one another
Leave the factory, leave the forge
And dance to the new St. George

Don’t believe pretenders
Who say they would defend us
While they flash their teeth and wave
The other hand is being paid
They choke the air and bleed us
These noble men who lead us
Leave the factory, leave the forge
And dance to the new St. George

The fish and fowl are ailing
The farmer’s life is failing
Where are all the backroom boys
You backroom boys won’t save us now
We’re poisoned by the greedy
Who plunder off the needy
Leave the factory, leave the forge
And dance to the new St. George




Thompson was prophetic in his spiritual life, too. He had always been searching for meaning in life, and converted to Islam in 1974. He obviously wasn't inspired by the wishy-washy standards of contermporary Christianity. He's still a Muslim.

Talking of which, read Peter Hitchens views on Islam and many other topics in these two Conservative Home posts, here and here.

"The Wishy-Washy Standards of Contemporary Christianity"

What a great title for a band. I digress.


I'd never heard till recently of Muslim convert (since 1951 - no bandwagon jumper he) Charles le Gai Eaton, a scion of old Britain (Charterhouse, Cambridge and the Diplomatic Service), but a lot of Muslims have. His book 'Islam And The Destiny of Man' is highly praised. In a Sunday Times piece on Muslim converts, he said "I have received letters from people who are put off by the wishy-washy standards of contemporary Christianity and they are looking for a religion which does not compromise too much with the modern world.”

Strange. According to the great and good of the Anglican and Catholic Churches, the thing is to be relevant, modern, progressive, forward-looking, spurning the dead hand of a 2,000 year old book in favour of an inclusive, user-friendly new brand of Christianity where Fair Trade Chocolate is more important than stuffy old 'thou shalt nots'. The kind of thing that Rasputin, Peter Selby, Richard Harries and now the new Bishop of Hereford are so good at.

"Sarah Jones, aged 43, has been a curate in the Ross Team ministry in Herefordshire for the past six months but until Monday night only her fellow clergy knew she had not been born female.
Her former life as a man was revealed to parishioners at an emergency meeting arranged at Ross Parish Church following inquiries by a national newspaper.
The Bishop of Hereford, the Rt Rev Anthony Priddis, who ordained Sarah in September, told parishioners that she had undergone a painful process to become the woman she believed she was."

More tea and oestrogen, Vicar ?