Dhimmitude in the UK. From icCheshire Online, with thanks to Fjordman:
LONDON'S suicide bombings were not the acts of terrorists but just an extreme Muslim demonstration, a Chester professor has claimed.The attacks that killed 52 people and threw the country into shock last July were part of a long history of demonstrations sparked by British Muslims, according to Professor Ron Geaves.
His controversial comments were made at a lecture given at the University of Chester that attracted dignitaries and members of the Muslim community from around the North West.
As part of his research, the professor's recent report looks at the history of demonstrations by British Muslims.
From the 1980s Salman Rushdie demonstrations to the anti-war protests surrounding the Iraq war, his work charts the changing nature of Muslim communities in Britain.
Prof Geaves said: "I have included, rather controversially, the events in London as primarily an extreme form of demonstration and assess what these events actually mean in terms of their significance in the Muslim community.
"The word terrorism is a political word which always seems to be used to demonise people."
Yes. We must not demonize these mass murderers. I prefer to call them what they called themselves, anyway: not terrorists, but mujahedin.
Britain's Ward Churchill
"- professor" is the new circling motion with fingers around the ears.
Well, nowhere is safe in this.
Has he forgotten nearby Warrington so quickly? Just 13 years? If the quiet market town, and the local gasworks was a target then, it could be a target now.
God preserve us from these idiots.
And I would prefer to call him sacked.
"The word terrorism is a political word which always seems to be used to demonise people."
Methinks they are demonised people.
Professor Ron Geaves
Yojimbo: thanks for the link. Note the amateurish and self-regarding tone of the self-description, more suited to a blogger than to a serious academic (no insult meant to bloggers). I am willing to bet that he graduated from SOAS.
Several good Qur'an-reading jihadists have quoted 3.151, et seq, and proudly proclaimed themselves terrorists. "Strike terror in the hearts of the unbelivers" appears quite a few times.
"I was made victorious with terror" - Mohammed, is another. That's a hadith.
It's insulting to me as a good Qur'an-reading infidel when these so-called professors come along and dismiss The Book.
How can the professor find time for his academic pursuits while having to look at the University of Chester's coat of arms? I would think changing that to a crescent moon would take precedence over anything else.
Paolo,
A first, no less - and an MA and a PhD. However, he doesn't say where he got these qualifications.
He writes very badly and pretentiously: "... assess what these events actually mean in terms of their significance..."
It is alarming that there are so many of these people. While they are not as smart as they like to think, they are probably not stupid; and yet they prefer to live in an alternative reality.
Here are his interests:
Sad person indeed.
The University of Chester is probably one of those ex polytechnics that aren't real universities at all. Even Bolton has a "university" now, but it's just a technical college where most of the students can't read without moving their lips.
Did he get a standing ovation? Applause? Loud sustained applause?
I am relatively sure that I would not want to coexist with a group of people who, upon deciding to demonstrate and while trying to decide what form their demonstration will take, would include mass murder on their shortlist.
People who murder innocents deserve to be demonised, as do defective cretins who apologise for them.
"My love of the idiosyncracies of human behaviour will always lead me to investigate. I find religious behaviour endlessly fascinating in its multi-faceted cultural manifestations—sad person!"
Well, that explains it...he is completely immersed, drowning even, in relativism.
No culture or "religion" is good or bad, even if violent, it is just "different".
We must understand these "idiosyncracies"...don't you know.
ex polytechnics that aren't real universities at all. Even Bolton has a "university" now, but it's just a technical college where most of the students can't read without moving their lips.
There is also a University of East London. That should fill me with pride. I should be looking forward to sprogface graduating there, how much have we come on in 50+ years. But no way!
Instead it is indeed the old technical college, with arrogant attitude, and an Islamic stronghold at that. In the 70s I did an external degree at a more distant technical college, and without boasting it was of a high standard. Husband did his degree in the 80s as a mature student at a poly. Again a good standard.
The polys were 1st rate and did more than degrees. Now as universities many are 2nd rate, too many degree courses competing for overseas fees. Which is why they had to call themselves "universities"
Help! I sound 70 odd ......
Granny W, I probably sounded like an intellectual snob in my last post. I have nothing against the old polytechnics - many were better in certain fields than some of the universities. However, in calling themselves universities they lost sight of their original goals and became pale imitations of the real thing.
Bolton tech wasn't even a poly. It was a tech. I used to go to discos there. These days that would probably earn me a degree in Life Studies. I certainly came across some "multi-faceted human communities", as this professor calls them.
This d(h)im(mi) wit is not worthy of our comments...we should just laugh at these fools.
Yes, they are mujahiden. Let us also call these mass murderers and terrorists "mujahiden."
From his profile:
Travel, travel and more travel! Both inwards and outwards.
Pass the sick bucket.
Inwards and outwards and shake-it-all-aboutwards.
Professor Ron Geaves, BA, MA, PhD, CertEd
[PROFILE]
Research: Islam, Sikhism and Hinduism, Transmigration of Religious Communities
Recent Publications:
(2004) Aspects of Islam, London: Darton, Longman & Todd
With Theodore Gabriel, Yvonne Haddad and Jane Idleman Smith (eds) (2004), Islam and the West: Post-September 11 th, Aldershot: Ashgate
(2003) ‘Peripatetic Mystics: The Renunciate Order of the Terapanthi Jains’, Mysticisms East and West: Studies in Mystical Experience, eds C.Partridge & T.Gabriel . Carlisle: Paternoster Press
(2003) ‘Religion and ethnicity: community formation in the British Alevi community', NUMEN, Vol.50. January pp.51-70
(2000) Sufis of Britain:An Exploration of Muslim identity, Cardiff: Cardiff Academic Press
(2001) The Continuum Glossary of Religious Studies. London: Continuum)
*** Hugh will be impressed by the prof's using the word "mysticisms" ***
Sometimes a baseball-bat beats conversation...
There are plenty of PHds out there that I wouldn't pay to count paperclips.
Melanie Phillips kicks the sh!t out of the gormless ones who buy into Professor Geaves's thinking in a recent blog entitled the Big Alibi. Read it all:
http://www.melaniephillips.com/diary/archives/001660.html
The word terrorism is a political word which always seems to be used to demonise people.
Ok, then how about the word Moslem, does that work for you, dear Professor?
And don't even get me going on the mystery word Islamist, cuz I'll go off the deep end and waste the day in a rant. Way I figure it, Islamist means averting one's eyes, flinching, dancing on hot coals, dissembling, and inching towards the truth at a slower rate than the immigration and breed rates of our sworn enemy, whom of course is verboten to identify by name.
I thought it was in France that Jerry Lewis lived on.
Actually there is one professor in England that has not fully submitted to dhimmitude -
Efraim Karsh, apparently one of the few university professors left in England that has not submittted to dhimmitude, has an article at WSJ Opinion Journal this week about Islam's imperialistic goals. It is an interesting article although he uses the word 'Islamist' which I and many others consider a copout. It will be interesting to see if the Muslims in England sue him for blasphemy, or 'hate speech' or being rude or whatever when his new book, "Islamic Imperialism: A History," goes on sale.
Islam's Imperial Dreams
Muslim political ambitions aren't a reaction to Western encroachments.
Extract:
In the long history of Islamic empire, the wide gap between delusions of grandeur and the centrifugal forces of localism would be bridged time and again by force of arms, making violence a key element of Islamic political culture. No sooner had Muhammad died than his successor, Abu Bakr, had to suppress a widespread revolt among the Arabian tribes. Twenty-three years later, the head of the umma, the caliph Uthman ibn Affan, was murdered by disgruntled rebels; his successor, Ali ibn Abi Talib, was confronted for most of his reign with armed insurrections, most notably by the governor of Syria, Mu'awiya ibn Abi Sufian, who went on to establish the Umayyad dynasty after Ali's assassination. Mu'awiya's successors managed to hang on to power mainly by relying on physical force, and were consumed for most of their reign with preventing or quelling revolts in the diverse corners of their empire. The same was true for the Abbasids during the long centuries of their sovereignty.
Western academics often hold up the Ottoman empire as an exception to this earlier pattern. In fact the caliphate did deal relatively gently with its vast non-Muslim subject populations--provided that they acquiesced in their legal and institutional inferiority in the Islamic order of things. When these groups dared to question their subordinate status, however, let alone attempt to break free from the Ottoman yoke, they were viciously put down. In the century or so between Napoleon's conquests in the Middle East and World War I, the Ottomans embarked on an orgy of bloodletting in response to the nationalist aspirations of their European subjects. The Greek war of independence of the 1820's, the Danubian uprisings of 1848 and the attendant Crimean war, the Balkan explosion of the 1870's, the Greco-Ottoman war of 1897--all were painful reminders of the costs of resisting Islamic imperial rule.
This moonbat fool does point us to a useful conclusion: the word "terrorist" is not very useful. Islam has a rich descriptive vocabulary, one that points to the canonical texts themselves, which should be used as much as possible. Calling someone a terrorist merely describes what tactics are employed, but saying "Jihadist" or "Mujahhadin" is specific to Islam, and is connected to many related concepts that are vitally important for everyone on the planet to understand. There could be no better result than having westerners who are ignorant of Islam start looking into it out of curiosity about the nomenclature people like us use to describe Muslims who use terror and intimidation. The alternative is for them to learn about Islam from CAIR and the army of apologists.
Just boys having a bit of fun, chaps.
Note that this POS has collaborated with Yvonne Haddad, the prominent protege of "Jihad" Johnny Esposito and a permanent fixture at the Center for Explaining Islam to Christians, at Georgetown U. in the heart of our great capital. The tentacles of Jihad Johnny and Georgetown reach far and wide.
" LONDON'S suicide bombings were not the acts of terrorists but just an extreme Muslim demonstration "
A lesson in semantics Professor Geaves?
Prof Geaves spin on terrorism sounds direct like words from Osama Bin Laden's mouth.
Did he study with the Taliban or Al Qaeda?
TO Prof Geaves terrorism is a " Muslim demonstration "
Please tell me the reason that sympathy is given to Muslims who committed these heinous acts against innocent civilians.
Prof Geaves would be welcome to teach at any terrorist training camp with these kind of theories.
I hope his theory about " Muslim demonstration" was not left unchallenged by the intellectual community in Britian.
I hope that the British people are not dumb enough to fall for Prof Geaves' nonsense.
Finally, the word terrorism is not a "political" term.
It is a real word in the dictionary.
According to American Heritage Dictionary, Terrorism means the following:
the use of terror, violence, and intimidation to achieve an end.
Call terrorism what it truly is.
Don't settle for anything less.
Is Professor Geaves merely 'whistling to keep himself from being afraid' (to paraphrase Dryden) or is he merely one neuron short of a synapse.
[Amphitryon, III.i]
Geaves joins a long list of mental masturbators (as opposed to critical and original thinkers) who have long held that no individual is ever responsible for the consequence of their actions. An individual only reacts to external influences.
In islam, all is predetermined by allah, this in the moslem mind being the greatest external influence of all. Thus, an individual can only react to the will of allah, as written in the koran, and not be held, especially by the infidel, responsible for the consequence. Geave's moslem audience, to which he so obviously pandered, was of course highly receptive to this message.
In accordance with that which I said on a different thread here - always email, always write, always 'phone, always protest and never let these kind of people away with anything - here is Professor Geaves's contact details:
E: r.geaves@chester.ac.uk
T: +44 (0)1244 511039
There has been much discussion above of both the professor and the University of Chester. I somehow remember reading an account of this institution and it's professors - I researched and here is an account of the research being undertaken:
"There was a most ingenious Architect who had contrived a new Method for building Houses, by beginning at the Roof, and working downwards to the Foundation; which he justified to me by the like Practice of those two prudent Insects, the Bee and the Spider."
" I went into another Chamber, but was ready to hasten back, being almost overcome with a horrible Stink. My Conductor pressed me forward, conjuring me in a Whisper to give no Offence, which would be highly resented; and therefore I durst not so much as stop my Nose. The Projector of this Cell was the most ancient Student of the Academy. His Face and Beard were of a pale Yellow; his Hands and Clothes daubed over with Filth. When I was presented to him, he gave me a close Embrace (a Compliment I could well have excused.) His Employment from his first coming into the Academy, was an Operation to reduce human Excrement to its original Food, by separating the several Parts, removing the Tincture which it receives from the Gall, making the Odour exhale, and scumming off the Saliva. He had a weekly Allowance from the Society, of a Vessel filled with human Ordure about the Bigness of a Bristol Barrel."
The traveller who wrote this account was named Gulliver and his full description can be found here:
http://www.jaffebros.com/lee/gulliver/bk3/chap3-5.html
Some things never change. BTW - this still remains my favourite book of all time - Swift truly was a genius.
Granny Weatherwax -
Neither 70 nor odd. Just spot on, as usual. Various people working in the older Universities, whom I have spoken with recently, entirely agree with you.
OT but not altogether. While the MSM give us daily accounts - heavily slanted against our friends and allies - of everything in Israel and Iraq that might even begin to be regarded as a crisis, the worst and most atrocious war since 1945 is being totally ignored - in spite of the fact that, 1, it really is something the West could help with, and, 2, the West - especially Belgium - really does have a responsibility for it, not just in the dreams of ideologists, but in sober fact. http://www.mercatornet.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=247 Now why is this? Let me guess. First, collecting news in that part of the world would require real effort and courage - not just sitting in five-star hotels sending your Arab stringers to do the work for you. Second, it is impossible to find who is the good guy and who is the bad guy, and the tragic complexities of this war stretch beyond the average hack's culture. Third, there are no Muslims involved - only Christian and Animist blacks. So nobody has a vested interest in playing up their massacre.
I think the professor is just trying to 'people-ize' demons.
Is he any relation to Lewis Carroll? This all sounds like "Malice in Blunderland".
terminology is frequently complicated and misleading, nothing new.
A UK version of that dhimmi Jens Byskov.
http://newportcity.blogspot.com/2006/02/jens-byskov-dhimmi-of-year.html
This is a prime example of why you should not deprive your brain of oxygen.
"My wife claims that I have no interests outside of my subject but that is because much of our spare time is spent travelling in obscure parts of the world where I inevitably come across human communities that follow little-studied religions. My love of the idiosyncracies of human behaviour will always lead me to investigate. I find religious behaviour endlessly fascinating in its multi-faceted cultural manifestations."
-- from a description of Ron Geaves, by Ron Geaves
Those "human communities that follow little-studied religions" will not be studied at all, will be wiped out, should Muhammad's insistent hope that "Islam is to dominate and not to be dominated" be realized. No "idiosyncracies of human behavior" allowed in the Total Regulation of Life that is Islam. No "religious behavior" to find "endlessly fascinating" under Islam; there will be nothing fascinating about it. as for those "multi-faceted cultural manifestations" -- a few local differences in food, and slight variations in dress, when Dar al-Islam covers the globe. But that's it.
Geaves has no idea. He's both very stupid and, judging by the way in which he discusses those responsible for the bombing in the London Underground, without any moral sense. A potent mix.
What's in a name???
A Terrorist act by any other name is still a Terrorist act.
Allah’s Apostle said, "I have been made victorious with terror."
--- Statement by Mohammed in Bukhari V4B52N220
I shall terrorize the infidels.
--- Commanded by God in Koran 8:12
If you gain mastery over them in battle, inflict such a defeat as would terrorize them, so that they would learn a lesson and be warned.
--- Commanded by God in Koran 8:57
The Prophet said, "I have been given the keys of eloquent speech and given victory with terror."
--- Statement by Mohammed in Bukhari V9B87N127
If you come upon them, deal so forcibly as to terrify those who would follow, that they may be warned. Make a severe example of them by terrorizing Allah’s enemies.
--- Statement by Mohammed in Ishaq 326
ILLAH ALLAH LA LA BLAH BLAH FATWA TA TA TERRORISM RAH RAH INSHALA HA
Prof. Geaves has it partly right: Terrorism is not terrorism when done by a Moslem. It's Islamic activism is all.
But, then again, Prof. Greaves has it partly wrong: There can be no extremism in Islam because Islam is itself extreme.
For the capital crime of denouncing Islamic scripture, ignoring God's commandment, and not emulating Mohammed's most excellent pattern of conduct, you, Professor, are hereby sentenced to death by sawing off your empty head with a steak knife on an Islamic Web site somewhere.
This is my fatwa.
Alarmed Pig Farmer, you must be an imam to declare a fatwa.
Imamma Freewoman
Actually, that crackpot is absolutely correct. The terrorist bombing in London was a Muslim Demostration, a demonstration of what those evil bastards are willing to do to achieve their goals. Too bad the lesson is lost on pseudo-intellectual idiots like him.
To apply his reasoning, if I went to whack him with a baseball-bat that would not be terrorism, but 'an extreme infidel demonstration...'
Gee, I'm so relieved. You had me worried there for a moment!
We mustn't be too hard on the good crackpot. Although Mo attributed terror with sending him victorious, 'terrorist' could mean 'non-muslim terrorist', ie Tim McVeigh [dec] who attacked his own kind. Although 'extreme Muslim demonstration' tends to 'people-ize demons' (as profitsbeard pointed out) at least it indicates the direction from which the danger is coming. I will stick with 'jihadist' or 'mujahedin' for economy of words reasons.
"LONDON'S suicide bombings were not the acts of terrorists but just an extreme Muslim demonstration, a Chester professor has claimed."
And what were those who were murdered in those bombings doing - playing extreme possum?
Also (Thanks Yojimbo) " My wife claims that I have no interests outside of my subject but that is because much of our spare time is spent travelling in obscure parts of the world where I inevitably come across human communities that follow little-studied religions. "
He really ought to ask his wife what she meant, don't you think?
Alarmed Pig Farmer, you must be an imam to declare a fatwa.
I anticipated this gambit some time ago, and so I began running Koran and Hadiths study classes for my flock. For effect, I even wear a white Kufi hat and use a stage prop to make it look like I'm missing a front tooth. I've noticed that a lot of your hot Imams have that look. To complete my get-up, I use a prescription nerve relaxant to make my left eye look down and out, for the cross-eyed effect seen so often in photographic reportage on the Jihad.
Anyway, depending on the market, the size of my mosque's flock hovers between 3,100 and 3,500 souls. How many Imams can say that? Now, you may sneer that my flock is a bunch of pigs, but I would answer pork meat, dog meat, whatever. Meat is meat, head count is head count, an Imam is an Imam, a fatwa is a fatwa.
I am legit as any other Imam, if that says anything. So my fatwa stands, it's every bit as legit as Osama's nascent Caliphate --- and that's a mouthful.
Alarmed Pig Farmer-
Nothing better than a fatwa little piggie.
Islam is lame is the name of the game.
Its 'mysticisms' built for schisms.
As sure as the Sunni shall rise over a pile of Shi'ite.
Alarmed Pig Farmer--Yes, yes, you sound alright to me, but do you have a beard? And do you trim it or not? All your good imans have beards, you know, and the really good ones don't trim.
Here's another appalling example of Muslim justice:
Bangladesh: Muslim Fatwa Sees Rape Victim Flogged
Perhaps Ron Geaves would like to observe this multi-faceted cultural manifestation of religious behaviour and make some field notes.
I my student years we had a competition to see if we could nominate a future "professor" from the undergraduate pool at that time. We had some extremely bright people there but only one of these has gained such a position. Almost all of those from the pool who did succeed were the "plodders" (no reference to Dutch movies): students of above average intelligence who were very industrious and userfriendly(re superiors). All of this latter group have far exceeded academic expectations but unfortunately while their teaching is "above average" their published work is of the very necessary but very average quality of the scientific labourer class.
So, I would not worry too much about what someone with a chair says although if you look carefully at what he says there is an element of truth re the nonfanatical and nonextreme but very disenchanted and alienated Islamic youth in GB. He is also right in that such a "demonstration" is a true example of islamic frustration but he is splitting hairs in the mujahedin/terrorist dichotomy and misses the overalll islamic threat totally.
So, just another probably SAaudi money funded and hence dependent, academic apologist whose limited and very localised insight into the problem blurs his panoramic view of the whole problem. Nothing wrong with that. However, the media often assume that such a person is a sage and this is very dangerous as well as stupid.
Oh sure, first you demonize the mass murderers who killed 52 people in London, then you demonize the mass murdereres who killed 190 people in Madrid, then you demonize the mass murderers who killed 202 people in Bali, then you demonize the mass murderers who killed 2986 people in New York and Washington, and pretty soon you've demonized all mass murderers. People, can't you see where this will lead? These mass murderers don't need demonization, they need dialogue. We need to encourage the moderate mass murderers to reform the radical mass murderers amongst them.
It is views like this that encourage young people to join left-wing organizations. When will colleges and universities start hiring faculty who do not use their positions to brainwash young people?
As a devotee of the once-well-known cult leader, Guru Maharaj Ji (a/k/a Maharaji a/k/a Prem Rawat a/k/a "Lord of the Universe"), Ron Geaves is well-practiced in ridiculous word games and dissembling. Here's a link to a page where some former members of Geaves' cult try to get him to discuss some of the nonsense he's written in defence of Rawat:
http://ex-premie.org/pages/ron_geaves.htm