In my last post I talked about the fear that Sharia laws would replace or subvert US Constitutional laws. The claim is that Sharia has creeped into the UK and, if we are not hypervigilant, will creep into the US. I said that the UK is not really tolerant of Sharia laws, it is mostly just indifferent to Arabs and Muslims. I argued that this is based on a lack of respect and that if Sharia laws should impact “proper” Brits, they would rise up in enthusiastic support of traditional British law. But as long as female genital mutilations and child brides are restricted to Arabs, no big deal (this is not my view, this is what I think is the attitude of most Brits and explains why there are zero child-bride convictions and few FGM convictions).
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Creeping sharia: a saner understanding
May 21, 2012 by 3 Comments
Second Fastest Way to Go to Jail in China
April 29, 2012 by 1 Comment
Yesterday I said that the fastest way to go to jail in China is to be come a civil rights lawyer. Now we know the second fastest way. Help a jailed civil rights lawyer to escape.
See the article in the Guardian.
Fugitive Blind Chinese Civil Rights Lawyer
April 28, 2012 by 2 Comments
I couldn’t have made up a better title. Chen Guangcheng, who has been blind since a young child, has somehow escaped house arrest in China. He has been in prison or under house arrest since 2006 for his work as a defender of civil rights (or, as officially reported by Chinese officials, for “damaging property and organizing a mob to disturb traffic”).
Chen defended women forced to have abortions or sterilizations.
There’s no faster way to end up in jail in China than to be a a civil rights lawyer. And the half-life of a Chinese civil rights lawyer is considerably shorter since Hu Jintao became President. The dramatic expansion of civil rights, such as they were, under Zhiang Zemin, the former President, has dramatically contracted under Hu.
