By - - THE FREETHINKER
Updated: Mon, 16 Jan 2012 16:50:08 UTC

Update #3 15th Jan - Atheists have no right...

Atheists have no right to decide what is, or what is not offensive to believers

The Freethinker

THE University College London Union Jesus & Mo controversy rumbles on. Latest to join the fray is S M Tahir Nasser, Treasurer of UCLU Ahmadiyya Muslim Students Association (AMSA), who declared:

It is not for Atheists to decide what will or will not offend believers of different religions.

Responding to a petition deploring UCLU’s attempt to have a cartoon removed from the Facebook page of UCLU’s Atheist, Secularist & Humanist Society, Nasser said on AMSA’s Facebook page:

Numerous Muslims wrote in their individual capacities to the UCL Union, complaining of this depiction of Mohammed, citing grounds of religious offense.

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Update#2 13th Jan: Richard in The Guradian

Richard Dawkins backs student society over Muhammad cartoon

Secularists including Richard Dawkins have rallied to support a university society which was advised to take down a cartoon image of Jesus and Muhammad from the webpage advertising a social event.

University College London's Atheist, Secularist and Humanist society posted the title page from a comic book, Jesus and Mo, Volume 2: Transubstantiated, by a pseudonymous British cartoonist called Mohammed Jones, on Facebook last week. On Tuesday the society was advised by University College London's student union that it would be "prudent" to take it down, following complaints from other students, the identity of whom remains confidential, a spokesman said. The union's advice prompted an online petition to "Defend freedom of expression at University College London", criticising "attempts to censor" the society.

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UPDATE 13th Jan: UCL Union has acknowledged that it made mistakes in its handling of this issue and is no longer calling on the Atheist, Secular and Humanist Society to withdraw the Jesus & Mo image. However, it is now threatening the society with disciplinary action on the basis that 'posting the image might have constituted an act of bullying, prejudice, harassment or discrimination.' Read Alex Gabriel's update on this story here.

Original story:

Not long ago, atheists at University College London put up this page on Facebook to advertise their pub social. Note the image, taken from the Jesus and Mo online comic strip, used on the page:

Today, they were sent a message by a student union offical. The message, I’m told, is confidential and so can’t be reproduced here, but stated that ‘a number of complaints’ had bene made about the use of the image – partly because contrary to Islamic teachings it depicts the Prophet Mohammad, and partly because it depicts him around alcohol. The union then told the atheist society to remove the image immediately and inform them once this had been done.

Having heard about this from the society’s president, I’d be interested to know precisely how many complaints UCL Union have received; despite the unusually high number of Muslims in the society’s Facebook group, only one has contacted them with a serious request of the image’s withdrawal, who then threatened to involve the student union and presumably has done so. (Their entire correspondence with the society appears unedited beneath this blog post, save for the removal of personal details.) Who are the ‘many Muslim students’ offended by this? Why, if they feel so strongly, have they not spoken up as strongly?

Well, perhaps the one person who complained at length was speaking for all of them. But wait! Their final message to the society began as follows:

I don’t represent anyone. I speak on my own behalf. […] I am asking you not to misrepresent my faith as one which in any way condones the act of drinking, since it is an immoral act in Islam.

That’s right: what atheists have obviously missed about Jesus and Mo is that, far from removing two religious figures absurdly far their appopriate contexts for comic effect, its clear aim is actually to provide historical commentary on the Prophet Mohammad’s beliefs.

Of course this image suggests he condoned the consumption of alcohol! And how could we have overlooked so easily its explicit historical assertion that he and Jesus of Nazareth were casually acquainted, despite the several centuries between their lifetimes?

Not only, in fact, does the author of J&M believe these heresies about the Prophet. The same cartoon shows him either to have been capable of time travel, or to have been a drinker so innovative that his watering holes resembled those of the 21st century!

Should you want for more proof of this comic strip’s venomous heresy, look only to the other panels in the series.

Read on

Alex has posted this UPDATE to this story:
Update: the atheist society mentioned here has now set up this petition to defend free expression at UCL. Please add your signature to it, and share it online.

If you want to be of further help, consider writing to the UCLU reps mentioned on the petition site or using the cartoon below as an avatar on social networks - or, if you’re in London, attend the pub social tonight!

TAGGED: CENSORSHIP, ISLAM