How extraordinary
He’s been a comedian or ironist for awhile, Umran Javed has. He was doing the playful postmodernist irony thing in Birmingham way back in 2003.
Posters have appeared around Birmingham describing the September 11 hijackers as the “magnificent 19.” The posters, which have been branded illegal by Birmingham City Council, also feature Osama Bin Laden, the twin towers on fire and advertise a political meeting to be held on the anniversary of the attack…A small radical Islamist group called Al Muhajiroun are featured on the posters. Al Muhajiroun spokesman Umran Javed said: “For us to air our views with regard to this issue, should in fact fall into the category freedom of speech. I don’t see how people should have a problem with it. We believe what these individuals carried out on September 11 was an extraordinary event.”
Extraordinary, yes, but was it ‘magnificent’? But that’s postmodernist wordplay for you, of course. Magnificent on the posters, extraordinary when talking to the press. And then of course there’s that same familiar irony of defense of freedom of speech coming from someone who shouted ‘bomb, bomb Denmark’ because of…cartoons. I just love postmodernist irony, I just can’t get enough of it. Which is good, because there’s lots of it around.
A whole bunch of those Magnificent 19 stickers appeared outside my house in 2003. They looked like they’d been put up in just one sticker run, so it need not have been anyone local. Nobody (local authority included) appeared to be taking them down so I had to do it myself. Took me ages to get one off intact for my fascist file, but I managed it in the end.
On the other hand, Javed and co ought to be able to stick them up without the state intervening: I’m wary of backing state powers of censorship unless it’s for statements which are rather more inflammatory then Javed’s: he shouldn’t have been convicted.
Like Irving, he’s scum, but that doesn’t mean he deserves to go down for this.
>Like Irving, he’s scum, but that doesn’t mean he deserves to go down for this.< I’m with Chris on this, on both counts. People who want to take up the violent jihad into Western countries aren’t going to be deterred by the prosecution of Javed and his like. They will (and are) just continuing working quietly behind the scenes.
But – he ( Javed ) wants to do this to express hos opinions, but we’re not allowed to make vaguely rude remarks about Nahmoud.
Shomething worng here shurely?
I’m not convinced he should have been convicted either, but it’s a lot of fun pointing out the contradictions.
I think Mr Javed was only expressing the anger felt by this oppressed minority,I myself blame all this on poverty,racism,George Bush and Tony Blair.
Richard and of course, the Romans.
‘I’m not convinced he should have been convicted either, but it’s a lot of fun pointing out the contradictions.’ – OB
Hm, but how far, and how is it to be judged, can one go shouting slogans such as these before it actually results in someone’s acting on your incitement. It’s hard to draw a line, but does a line have to be drawn? Perhaps it does. I can’t help thinking that if I marched through the streets inciting people to beat up Muslims I’d be arrested. There’s always the chance that someone will take me up on it.
I like the idea of giving him an essay to write.
Richard: ‘I think Mr Javed was only expressing the anger felt by this oppressed minority,I myself blame all this on poverty, racism, George Bush and Tony Blair.’ Assuming this is a serious comment, I think most people would point to these people’s and situations’ culpability in making people feel a certain way, but there are many minorities who feel a certain way by the way society, politicians, governments, the whole shebang, have treated them (gays, for instance, and I speak from experience). Not all who suffer poverty, hate Blair and Bush and what they’ve done, experience an ism and are oppressed go about calling on others to cut people’s heads off and go and bomb someone or somewhere. And of course he’s had a huge audience now. If it could be proven that a cell of idiots had made devices and plotted an incident as a direct result of this chap’s slogans (difficult, I know, but we’re talking the principle here; it’s a conditional), would that satisfy any law on incitement that he had indeed incited horrid stuff?
I was kidding Andy!