A radical Muslim who dressed his baby daughter in a hat with “I love al-Qaeda” on it tried to firebomb the home of the publisher of a controversial novel about the Prophet Mohammed. Ali Beheshti, 40, along with Abrar Mirza, 22, have admitted conspiracy to recklessly damage property and endanger life after they poured diesel [...]
By DeusExMacintosh
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Also posted in Books, England, Free Speech, Funnies, Law, Personal liberty, Politics, Religion, Terrorism
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Tagged crime, islam, jewel of medina
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Every year, British magazine The Bookseller runs a competition for the oddest book title. The winner for 2008 is “The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-milligram Containers of Fromage Frais”. It costs $795 on Amazon. I was wondering how there could possibly be a market for a book like this, or why anyone would write it? [...]
Those of you with any interest in Australian children’s literature would be aware of illustrator Kilmeny Niland. Like her mother Ruth Park, she played a significant and ongoing role in Australian literature, and in my appreciation of the various books she illustrated. I’ve long thought her beautiful artwork ensured that some books meant more to [...]
February 16, 2009 – 12:29 pm
Our “About Us” section says, “Pull up a pew, grab a beer (or three) and join in the conversation.” Helen wrote that, and I’ve always found it very evocative. I see our blog as reminiscent of the discussions I used to have with friends at uni, frequently over a cup of coffee or a bottle [...]
February 10, 2009 – 7:39 am
Kim at LP links to a post at Feminist SF – The Blog! which gives tips on how to spot if you’re reading bad sci-fi/fantasy: Are the characters’ names impossible to pronounce? Alternatively, when you pronounce them, do you realize that they are actually homonyms for scary-sounding English words? If the book is not written [...]
January 22, 2009 – 8:50 am
As I’ve had to explain to various people today (not just on blogs) — many of them complaining about the risible quality of Obama’s inauguration poet (she really did evacuate the National Mall; they may as well’ve set off an air raid siren) – this is how you do public poetry. Below is Kipling’s ‘Recessional’, the [...]
January 20, 2009 – 5:05 pm
Melbourne man Harry Nicolaides has been imprisoned in Thailand for committing the crime of lèse majesté, or offending the dignity of the sovereign. Nicolaides wrote a novel in which he referred to an unnamed crown prince in a way which was deemed to be insulting. The novel had a negligible print run, and was self-published. [...]
January 12, 2009 – 1:42 am
Yes, I found a cricket angle. Sad but true. The graphic at left was generated by the genius that is Tony the Teacher over at the After Grog Blog (and do follow the link; a beautiful funny awaits you there, quite apart from the picture). The cricketing point that Tony and his commenters make helps to [...]
January 7, 2009 – 5:12 am
I’ve got a great deal of other stuff on at the moment, so will only comment briefly. I’ll try to update this post in more detail when I’ve finished thesising. For now, a few thoughts: 1. Hoaxing only works when there is a pretension to expose/exploit. Sokal exposed the postmodern pretension to science; Ern Malley [...]
October 4, 2008 – 7:22 pm
A landmark case is being brought against a UK man in relation to a blog post allegedly authored by him which details his fantasy of the kidnap, rape, torture and murder of an all-girl band called Girls Aloud. I must say that I’d never heard of the band before (indeed, Wikipedia says their efforts to [...]
