Aatish Taseer tells us via the NY Times that the right-wingers currently calling the shots in India are going after the universities.

The R.S.S., a Hindu nationalist organization, was founded in 1925 as a muscular alternative to Mahatma Gandhi’s freedom movement. Its founder admired Adolf Hitler, and in 1948 the organization was blamed for indirectly inspiring Gandhi’s assassination. The B.J.P. has not always had an easy relationship with the R.S.S. With its fanciful ideas of Hindu purity and its sweeping range of prejudices, the organization is dangerously out of step with the realities of India’s political landscape. When the B.J.P. wants to win an election, it usually distances itself from the R.S.S.’s cultural agenda.

Mr. Modi’s 2014 election had very little to do with the R.S.S. and everything to do with his personality and promises of development. But the R.S.S. doesn’t see it that way. Like a fairy-tale dwarf, the group has sought to extract its due from the man it helped into power. As payment for the debt, the R.S.S. wants control of education. Specifically, it wants to install its men at the helm of universities where they will wreak vengeance on the traditionally left-wing intellectual establishment that has always held them in contempt.

Sandeep Pandey is one they’ve managed to get thrown out.

This is the background to Mr. Pandey’s dismissal. His new boss, Girish Chandra Tripathi, the vice chancellor, is an R.S.S. man. The Ministry of Education helped push through his appointment after Mr. Modi’s election. One B.H.U. professor, who wished not to be named, described Mr. Tripathi as “an academic thug with no qualifications.” (He was previously a professor of economics.)

The new vice chancellor soon turned on Mr. Pandey. “It was all engineered,” Mr. Pandey said to me. First, the professor said, he was denounced by a student. Then a local news website printed a bogus story accusing him of being part of an armed guerrilla movement. (Mr. Pandey, a Gandhian, opposes all violence.) Soon after, the technical institute’s board of governors decided, on Mr. Tripathi’s recommendation, that he be fired. He is an alumnus of the university and a mechanical engineer with a degree from the University of California, Berkeley. He has won awards for his social work. None of this made a difference. He was given a month to clear out.

I thought I should speak to the vice chancellor. He was out of town, but came on the telephone. The mention of “Sandeep Pandey” was like a trigger. He told me that Mr. Pandey had questioned whether Kashmir was an integral part of India and he had tried to screen the banned documentary “India’s Daughter,” which deals with the infamous gang rape and murder of Jyoti Singh, a physiotherapy student in New Delhi in 2012.

Not sufficient cause.

The problem with the vice chancellor is not just that he is right-wing. It is that he is unqualified for his position. This was never more apparent than in his total inability to grasp the value of dissent at an institution of learning.

Mr. Pandey has spent a lifetime working among some of India’s most voiceless people. It was sinister in the extreme that he should be dismissed for being “anti-national.” And that term is being bandied about far too much by the R.S.S. and its allies these days. The R.S.S.’s student wing at the University of Hyderabad recently smeared a 26-year-old doctoral student from a low-caste background as “anti-national” for his activism. The university decided to ban him from all public spaces. Earlier this month he committed suicide.

Unity is not the only value.

The FBI arrested three more of the trespassers yesterday.

The FBI set up a perimeter around theMalheur Wildlife Refuge and established a series of checkpoints earlier in the day, as militia members continued their occupation.

In a statement, the FBI said the containment was to “better ensure the safety of community members.” Only Harney County ranchers who own property in specific areas were allowed to pass after showing IDs.

Since Wednesday morning, a total of 8 people left the refuge, the FBI said. Five of them were released and 3 were arrested.

Duane Ehmer, 45, of Irrigon, Oregon and Dylan Anderson, 34, of Provo, Utah were arrested at 3:30 p.m. Jason Patrick, 43, of Bonaire, Georgia was arrested on probable cause at 7:40 p.m., the FBI said.

From left to right: Jason Patrick, Dylan Anderson and Duane Ehmer were arrested leaving the Malheur Wildlife Refuge, January 27 2016. (MCSO)

Oddly enough, these guys are subject to the same laws we all are.

Brand Thornton, one of Bundy’s supporters, said he left the refuge Monday and wasn’t sure what those remaining would do.

“The entire leadership is gone,” he told The Associated Press in a telephone interview. “I wouldn’t blame any of them for leaving.”

Thornton called the arrests “a dirty trick” by law enforcement.

Bahahahahahaha! Yes, how unfair of them, to arrest people just because they stole a national wildlife refuge and set about destroying it.

Even white guys sometimes get arrested.

Holy shit. For once someone actually did the right thing. NECSS has disinvited Dawkins from its upcoming conference because of that horrific video.

A Statement Concerning Richard Dawkins

The Northeast Conference on Science & Skepticism has withdrawn its invitation to Richard Dawkins to participate at NECSS 2016. We have taken this action in response to Dr. Dawkins’ approving re-tweet of a highly offensive video.

We believe strongly in freedom of speech and freedom to express unpopular, and even offensive, views. However, unnecessarily divisive, counterproductive, and even hateful speech runs contrary to our mission and the environment we wish to foster at NECSS. The sentiments expressed in the video do not represent the values of NECSS or its sponsoring organizations.

We will issue a full refund to any NECSS attendee who wishes to cancel their registration due to this announcement.

The NECSS Team

Well I’ll be god-damned. There is a too much, finally.

From Facebook:

Blitzen River at Malheur:

Marilyn Miller

And, speaking of the 71st anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz – Iran is holding another “Holocaust cartoons” contest.

Just in time for International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the Iranian government has announced that it will be holding another “Holocaust Cartoons Contest,” in which the cartoonist who most viciously mocks the Nazi genocide will be awarded $50,000.

71 years ago today, Soviet troops arrived at Auschwitz. Survivors commemorated the date.

Survivors arrived with wreaths at a former execution site on the grounds of what now is the Auschwitz-Birkenau Memorial and State Museum.

Flowers and candles were laid at the site where thousands were executed by firing squad, under the windows of prisoners’ living quarters, before methods of mass murder in gas chambers were introduced by the camp’s German administrators.

…

Around 1.5 million people were killed in Auschwitz alone, mostly Jews, but also Poles, Roma, Soviet prisoners of war, homosexuals and other minorities. The camp has since become a symbol of the horrors of the Holocaust.

Beware of inciting hatred. It’s so easy to do, and so disquietingly popular.

High on the list of things not to do while driving. The Detroit Free Press:

Police say a man who was watching a movie on his phone has died in a car crash on a Detroit highway.

Clifford Ray Jones of Detroit was partially ejected through the sunroof when his 1996 Toyota rolled in the wee hours Sunday.

Fox 2 News reported that Michigan State Police said the man had been watching pornography and masturbating while driving. MSP also said he was not wearing pants at the time of the crash.

Driving is one of those activities that really does demand full attention.

Amnesty International calls Iran on its bullshit.

Scores of youths in Iran are languishing on death row for crimes committed under the age of 18, said Amnesty International in a damning new report published today. The report debunks recent attempts by Iran’s authorities to whitewash their continuing violations of children’s rights and deflect criticism of their appalling record as one of the world’s last executioners of juvenile offenders.

Growing up on death row: The death penalty and juvenile offenders in Iran reveals that Iran has continued to consign juvenile offenders to the gallows, while trumpeting as major advances, piecemeal reforms that fail to abolish the death penalty against juvenile offenders.

“This report sheds light on Iran’s shameful disregard for the rights of children. Iran is one of the few countries that continues to execute juvenile offenders in blatant violation of the absolute legal prohibition on the use of the death penalty against people under the age of 18 years at the time of the crime,” said Said Boumedouha, Deputy Director of Amnesty International’s Middle East and North Africa Programme.

Isn’t it interesting how theocratic countries treat people like shit. Isn’t it interesting how theocrats worship a god who thinks human beings are shit. What a loathsome god it is, that prefers punishing people in horrible ways over making people better.

“Despite some juvenile justice reforms, Iran continues to lag behind the rest of the world, maintaining laws that permit girls as young as nine and boys as young as 15 to be sentenced to death.”

Nice touch that girls have it so much worse.

So if a guy gets really mad at his wife because she says she’s leaving him for another man, then it’s not murder when he kills her, it’s manslaughter. He was really pissed off, you see.

Jonathon Cudworth, 36, of Northbourne, near Deal in Kent, was cleared of murder but found guilty of manslaughter at Canterbury Crown Court.

During the trial, jurors heard Cudworth killed Polish-born Mariola, known as Mijka, because he feared she was going to leave him for another man.

Judge Adele Williams told Cudworth it was a “brutal, callous killing”.

When Cudworth gave evidence, he told jurors the couple had argued after she was late home from work, he grabbed her by the neck to stop her pushing him and then picked up a knife and stabbed her.

Then he hid the body and reported her missing.

After the hearing, Det Insp Richard Vickery said the killing was “a senseless act on an innocent woman”.

He said the families involved had been through an incredibly emotional ordeal because of Cudworth’s actions, not least because he refused to reveal where he had disposed of her body.

But he was really really pissed off, you see.

Nothing’s too good for the Iranian president.

Italian officials keen to spare the Iranian president, Hassan Rouhani, any possible offence on his visit to Rome covered up nude statues at the city’s Capitoline Museum, where Rouhani met Matteo Renzi, the Italian prime minister.

Photographs of Monday’s visit show both men standing near a grand equestrian statue of Marcus Aurelius, the Roman emperor. Nude statues in the vicinity were covered by large white panels.

I think the Italian officials misunderstand. It’s not that the Iranian mullahs and government hate statues of naked women, it’s that they hate women – live women, women walking around and breathing, women who could cause trouble for them. The male theocrats aren’t prudes, they just want to control women. Statues are only statues, and besides they’re Italian, and in Italy.

The decision to cover the artwork was seen as a sign of respect for the Iranian president, according to the Italian news agency Ansa. Not everyone agreed.

“Respect for other cultures cannot and must not mean negating our own,” said Luca Squeri, a lawmaker in Silvio Berlusconi’s centre-right Forza Italia party. “This isn’t respect, it’s cancelling out differences and it’s a kind of surrender.”

In another placatory gesture by Italian officials, alcohol was not served at an official dinner held in Rouhani’s honour, abiding by a standard diplomatic gesture for visiting Muslim dignitaries.

That’s a whole different thing though. It’s not comparable. Alcohol isn’t a person. Alcohol doesn’t have rights that the Iranian regime violates. The hatred of non-muffled women leads to violations of the rights of living breathing walking talking women. That’s a great deal more important then whether or not alcohol is served.

Rouhani’s visit to Europe – his first since sanctions were lifted in Iran – was supposed to take place in November but was delayed following the Paris terror attacks. On Tuesday, he had a private meeting with Pope Francis and other top church officials where the two leaders held “cordial” talks, the Vatican said, adding that the two men shared “common spiritual values”.

Of course they do, especially the “value” that women are stupid and inferior and have to be suppressed.

Originally a comment by Bernard Hurley on All the women SPIEGEL likes to call the “old feminists”.

About 25 years ago I was a parent governor of a school in Ilford in East London. According to their statistics, the intake was 60% Muslim. Most were from Bangladesh but there were some Kurds. At the time, apart from language difficulties, I had no problem talking to any of the mothers and they seemed to have no problem approaching me about any issues they might have with the school. One of then told me that she likes living in England because she can have more of a say about how her children are brought up. Most of these people came to England because they wanted a more western way of life, not because they were trying to escape from anything and so had some sort of commitment to finding out how the society works and what its values are.

However things seem to have changed – I have been told by one of my Muslim friends who still lives in the area that this would not be possible today. He puts this down to the spreading of Islamist propaganda among younger Muslims. Although I hadn’t realised it myself, I had provided a small area in which these women could start to find a way out of some of the traditional misogyny of the communities they came from. Today the Islamists would simply not allow this to happen. Nevertheless most Muslims who live in the area would be shocked by what happened in Cologne.

Even though most Muslims are not Islamists, the mere existence of Islamism as a political force will tend to make the traditional misogyny of some Muslim communities seem more acceptable. I should imagine that most of the perpetrators in Cologne were not in the West out of choice, had no idea what Western values are and, even if they rejected it, have been influenced by the Islamism that has affected the culture they were brought up in. Even so, even though there were many of them, they are but a small proportion of all the young male refugees to have come to Europe recently.

The solution, as always, is not to try to find groups to blame but to find out what exactly happened and why and to work out what to do about it.

BBC News:

Sweden’s prime minister has described as a “terrible crime” the stabbing of a female employee at a centre for young asylum seekers.

Prime Minister Stefan Lofven visited the centre for unaccompanied migrants in Molndal, near Gothenburg, hours after the killing.

The suspect, an asylum seeker aged 15, has been arrested for the killing of the employee, who was 22.

…

Police officers arriving at the scene found a “crime scene with a lot of blood”, said police press spokesman Thomas Fuxborg.

“The perpetrator had been overpowered by other residents, people were down and upset.”

The unnamed victim died in hospital of her injuries.

So that’s appalling.

Aw gee, that attempt to damage Planned Parenthood has turned around and gone the other way.

A county grand jury here that was investigating allegations of misconduct against Planned Parenthood has instead indicted two anti-abortion activists who made videos of the organization.

In a statement, the Harris County district attorney, Devon Anderson, said Monday that the director of the Center for Medical Progress, David Daleiden, had been indicted on a felony charge of tampering with a governmental record and a misdemeanor count related to purchasing human organs.

Well that backfired.

Another center employee, Sandra Merritt, was indicted on a charge of tampering with a governmental record.

The Center for Medical Progress had covertly shot videos of Planned Parenthood officials discussing the provision of body parts from aborted fetuses for research. Mr. Daleiden, 26, had posed as a biotechnology representative to infiltrate Planned Parenthood affiliates and surreptitiously record his attempts to procure tissue for research.

The activists have claimed that Planned Parenthood has engaged in the illegal sale of body parts — a charge the organization has firmly denied.

And the “activists” faked the video in hopes of framing Planned Parenthood.

Mr. Daleiden has been praised as a hero by some religious opponents of abortion. On Thursday, Mr. Daleiden was a featured guest at an Evangelicals for Life conference and was interviewed by Russell Moore, the president of the Ethics and Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention, and Jim Daly, the president of Focus on the Family.

Framing people for things they didn’t do is so heroic.

Oh gawd.

ZoéS on Twitter:

Zoé S. @ztsamudz
Even HE must’ve realized how bad it was because he deleted it. Not to worry, here it is screenshot for posterity.

This is how a good Muslim speaks. And how she dresses. And wears her beautiful hair.

Then a link to the World Government Summit.

God almighty.

Spiegel Online gives us a conversation with two feminists on what happened in Cologne.

Alice Schwarzer, 73, the grande dame of German feminism, and Anne Wizorek, 34, a prominent member of the new generation of feminists, often have different views about the direction the women’s movement should take. For decades, Schwarzer — as publisher of Emma, the country’s highly influential women’s magazine — has been at the forefront of women’s issues. In more recent years, a younger generation of feminists, led by Wizorek, has sought to challenge Schwarzer’s preeminence.

I wonder if that last bit is true, or just Spiegel’s way of saying they’re not the same person, or something. If it is true I find it very tiresome. Why is there any need to “challenge” anyone’s “preeminence”? How can any social movement get anywhere if people are always too busy trying to knock each other off perches? How, specifically, can feminism ever get anywhere if women over 45 are invariably treated with hostility and contempt? Feminism has never stipulated that it’s only for women ages 20 to 45, and it shouldn’t, so the whole re-hashed Battle with Mommy is a bad idea.

Both women are concerned about recent developments in Cologne that saw mass sexual violence against women perpetrated by Muslim immigrants. The following is an excerpt from a combative interview with SPIEGEL in which the two share their at times divergent views on the violence and the consequences.

SPIEGEL: Ms. Schwarzer, Ms. Wizorek, what happened in Cologne on New Year’s Eve? Was it a particularly extreme example of sexism or the consequence of failed immigration policies?

Wizorek: The events were terrible and, given the scale, a new phenomenon. That’s why we need to take a very precise look at what happened. I really hope that the perpetrators are caught. The ensuing debate, though, unfortunately has had the wrong focus: It is wrong to only speak about sexualized violence if it is committed by migrants or refugees.

Schwarzer: The debate over sexual violence has re-emerged as a result of that night in Cologne. Even Germany’s justice minister, who for years allowed necessary reforms to tighten Germany’s rape laws torot in a drawer, has pulled them out again. But when you only speak using generalizations, you run the danger of denying the specific. In recent decades, millions of people have come to us from cultural groups within which women have absolutely no rights. They do not have a voice of their own and they are totally dependent on their fathers, brothers or husbands. That applies to North Africa and that applies to large parts of the Middle East. It isn’t always linked to Islam. But since the end of the 1970s, at the beginning of the revolution in Iran under Khomenei, we have experienced a politicization of Islam. From the beginning, it had a primary adversary: the emancipation of women. With more men now coming to us from this cultural sphere, and some additionally brutalized by civil wars, this is a problem. We cannot simply ignore it.

Wizorek hinted that perhaps we could, and should.

Schwarzer: Do you know what I just thought of, Anne? You were born in East Germany at the beginning of the 1980s, right?

Wizorek: Yes.

Schwarzer: It’s entirely OK that you missed certain things. In the 1960s and 1970s among the leftests in the West, one of the leading arguments against feminism was that it was only a subordinate issue. That’s what people said back then. The main issue was the class struggle.

Wizorek: I am familiar with the discussion.

So am I. We had it here, with class struggle replaced by struggle against racism. Women were told their struggle didn’t count.

Schwarzer: As soon as you opened your mouth and said the word woman, you were beaten down with the argument that you were betraying the class struggle. There are many poignant writings in which feminists first write pages about their class standpoint before getting to their actual issue. What was then known as class warfare is today called anti-racism. The threat of being accused of racism gave birth to false tolerance. Once, about 20 years ago, a police officer in Cologne told me, “Ms. Schwarzer, 70 to 80 percent of the rapists in Cologne are Turkish.” I was very upset and said: “Then good God, why don’t you bring the issue up?” Because only after you call a problem by name can you change it. And then he said, no way, that’s not politically opportune. So you see, the police have long been extremely frustrated by these hush-ups. I think that’s changing now, and that’s a good thing.

Wizorek: But that’s just another version of this terrible: “One should also be able to say …!”

Schwarzer: No, it’s the opposite. People aren’t stupid. They saw what was happening at the Cologne central station. A lawless space was created in the middle of a city of over a million. That has to be addressed and it has to be done so in a sober-minded way.

Then they agreed briefly, arguing that “groping” needed to be treated as a crime too, along with sexual harassment in general.

SPIEGEL: Ms. Schwarzer, what consequences will Cologne have?

Schwarzer: We need to finally be proactive in enlightening people from Islamic cultural groups. And this applies to immigrants already here as well as to current refugees. The German constitution stands above the Sharia. Schools need to offer classes on gender equality. You also have to offer an alternative to young men with a penchant for violence.

Wizorek: Only the young men? Education is important for all genders.

Schwarzer: Of course, because you have to tell girls what rights they have and you must stand by them as they assert themselves. We have to go into the relevant neighborhoods and do something to counter the campaigning Islamists. We failed to do that during the last 25 years. We also can’t be naïve when it comes to the refugees. Men who commit violence should of course be deported to their countries of origin. We already have enough problems here and we don’t need to import anymore.

Wizorek: Sexualized violence existed before the refugees — it has not been imported.

Schwarzer: I know that because I have been fighting against it since 1995, just like all the women SPIEGEL likes to call the “old feminists.” For us feminist pioneers, fighting sexual violence, which until then was totally silenced — be it abuse, rape within marriage or sex killings — has always been given top priority.

Remember those “slaves” in Saudi Arabia, whom it’s halal for their owners to rape.