Big Sticks and Small Carrots

I don’t often write about my own life here but the most extraordinary thing happened to me yesterday afternoon and I want to share it with you. It was a lovely crisp sunny day, the sort of day which reminds you that spring is on the way, so I went for a stroll around town. With the light twinkling off the granite buildings, Aberdeen city centre looks good in the sunlight.

Passing by HMV, I decided to pop in and pick up some Blackadder DVDs. I’d been meaning to get the full set for a while now so I was pleased to see that they were all available. They also had the Planet Earth DVD box set so I got that too. All things considered, it was turning out to be a thoroughly enjoyable afternoon. (It’s the small things in life…)

Unfortunately, my good mood wasn’t to last long. As I attempted to leave HMV, I appeared to trigger their security alarms. As the  beeping and flashing continued, two rather burly security guards hurried over and blocked my path. With forced politeness, one asked whether I’d paid for the DVDs I was carrying. “Yes, of course” I replied, “now if you don’t mind…”

That didn’t satisfy the security guards though; they demanded that I produce a receipt for the DVDs. A receipt? Why on earth would I have a receipt? Are the BBC going to charge us twice for watching their programmes now? First the license fee and then again for the DVD?

When I told the security guards that I didn’t have a receipt but could go home and then return with my TV licence if it was absolutely necessary, they laughed in my face. When I argued that Iain Dale said I shouldn’t have to pay again for something I’d already paid for, they said they didn’t know who Iain Dale was and didn’t care either. They accused me of shoplifting and called the police. I was arrested. Arrested! All because I didn’t want to pay for the same thing twice. I can think of nothing more outrageous!

If there was ever any doubt that the BBC is run by Stalinists, Leninists and Trots, this travesty of justice surely proves the point! These leftists are destroying our way of life and must be resisted at every turn. Next thing you know, there’ll be a tax on totally spurious blog posts. I remember when this country used to be great, you know…

PS, Iain really was caught stealing from the BBC. Maybe if he understood that bandwidth costs money, he’d be on his way to answering the question in his update*. He might even spare himself further embarrassment instead of causing even more.

* A I understand it, there are other reasons why iPlayer programmes are only available for seven days. As well as bandwith costs, there are storage costs to consider. Without the limit, what would soon become an essentially infinite archive would have to be stored in a format which would allow for streaming; the costs would soon mount up.

There is also the issue of licensing and repeat fees (or rather the avoidance of repeat fees). Similar fees are certainly an issue when the BBC sells permanent copies of programmes. When content is made available to download from the interwebs, the introduction of a small charge might help to cover these costs…

Last week, as you might remember, the Sun published a story about the RAF’s ability to  intercept radio traffic in Afghanistan. The consequences of publishing such a story were unwittingly revealed in a caption accompanying the article:

Unaware… terror mobs don’t know their words can be heard by RAF

It’s a stunner, alright.

If the story is true, the Sun have revealed an important military secret and consequently put the lives of British troops in Afghanistan at greater risk for the sake of a Muslim bashing headline and Rupert Murdoch’s bank balance. If it isn’t true, that opens up a whole other set of questions.

My attempt to raise these issues by submitting a comment under the story on the Sun website was not successful. Many other comments were published but mine was not. As yet, my attempts to find out why my comment wasn’t published have been equally unsuccessful. My email was apparently passed to the relevant department a week ago but that’s as much as I know at the moment. I’ve sent them another email. Just in case they forgot about the first one. I’m sure I’ll be receiving a satisfactory reply any day now…

To have your views airbrushed out of existence by the supposedly free speech loving media is unpleasant but not unexpected. It’s a common tactic in the “battle of ideas”.  You could say they’re fixing the playing field. You could say that they’re choosing to engage with only only those opponents they think they can beat. (The Sun did allow a couple of not very well considered critical comments through; these easy targets were then attacked by other “right thinking Sun readers”.) You could say this is cowardly, dishonest and unscrupulous.

Others will argue that it’s the Sun’s website so they have the right to maintain it as they see fit. True on the face of it, but having the right to act like a bastard doesn’t automatically mean that you should act like a bastard. It also doesn’t provide a free moral pass.

Anyway, I was wondering what could be done to get the media to more fairly my views and decided that some sort of organisation to promote them is the answer. In this media savvy world where people are constantly bombarded with information, the name is going to be all important. After spending £500,000 on consultants and PR firms, we’ve finally come up with a winner. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you:

An Influential Think Tank 

Guaranteed media coverage, no matter what dross we come up with.  ”An Influential Think Tank said today that multicoloured swapshop has eroded our cultural moustache in the jellied eels”.

Brilliant! But there’s still a problem. If An Influential Think Tank’s first press release was about the damage done to society by irresponsible reporting in the media, it’d create a standing wave paradox which would threaten the very existence of the universe.

Drat.

At the bottom of this exclusive Sun report on there’s a caption which says:

Unaware … terror mobs don’t know their words can be heard by RAF

It may not be entirely accurate.

In a situation like this, it’s hard to be sure what’s going or where the story came from.

It might be possible to make some educated guesses by observing the government’s reaction. If they launch an enquiry and attempt to prosecute the leakers for compromising an important method of intelligence gathering, that would suggest that there was a leak and that it hadn’t been orchestrated by the government. This is certainly a possibility.

If that’s the last we hear of it however, the story is likely to be a Sun invention or a government approved leak. These are also perfectly possible.

Questions, questions.

Update

Somehow, I have a feeling you’ll be able to guess what happened when I tried to take advantage of the Sun’s “Have Your Say” feature under the article. I thought I’d try some Sun language for this one:

“Unaware … terror mobs don’t know their words can be heard by RAF”

You’ve just told them!

If this story is true, the Sun has now compromised an important method of gathering intelligence on the Taliban. This can only make it even more dangerous for our troops in Afghanistan.

Shows how much the Sun really cares about our lads. Shameful.

Hours later, and with plenty of other comments published in the meantime, there’s no sign of it. I told you it wouldn’t be a surprise. It’s not like they were going to be able to defend their decision to publish this story in a fair debate, is it?

Interestingly,  given the rubbish way the Sun’s comment system works, I suspect very few people would have bothered to have read my comment even if they had published it. This heavy handed approach to criticism does suggest that they’re worried about the fragility of the echo chamber they’ve constructed to hide behind. Let’s hope they’re right about that, at least.

Now, do you think I’ll get a reply to the polite email I’ve sent asking why the moderators have a problem with my comment?

Yes, it’s another post about the Archbishop. This is instead of the update I had intended to make to my previous post.

I should say that I don’t have particularly strong opinions as to what Williams said; that’s not what motivates this atheist to post about this. Williams’ view, a carefully considered examination of the relationship between law in a secular society and religious conviction, is complex, interesting and worthy of debate. If you like that sort of thing. I can’t say I know the answers to the questions he raised.

I do, however, have strong opinions on the reaction the Acrchbishop’s comments have provoked. As Jim Bliss comments on an excellent post by Justin, it “smacks of anti-intellectualism”. You could argue, as some have, that Williams is a fool for not anticipating the reaction and misrepresentations his comments would provoke. It is true that he isn’t what you’d call a great communicator. Greater clarity might have helped avoid some of the worst hysterical misrepresentations of what was said but British society at large is not well equipped to deal with nuance, especially when in comes to issues like this. Politicians and the media have to take a large share of the the blame for this state of affairs.

So, given that reality, should the Archbishop have kept quiet? No. The logic behind that suggestion, the idea that those in the public eye can’t make a nuanced argument because that argument is likely to be misrepresented, leads down a dark and stupid path. Reactionary hysteria, ignorant conviction and unthinking condemnation should not be accepted and accomodated in our society but challenged whenever possible. That is what Williams has tried to do and I’ll not be joining those laying into him for it. He would benefit from communicating with greater clarity, yes, but he absolutely should not be condemned for speaking about the issues he did.

For those reasons, I have made some attempts to defend Williams from knee jerk criticisms levelled at him. Specifically, I have done so on a couple of posts over at Iain Dale’s. I won’t do a “long and boring” analysis of the conversation because there is no need. (Also, despite knowing it to be futile, I found myself drawn into a conversation with “verity”. Not recommended.)

I wanted to establish a couple of things. Importantly I wanted to know whether Iain had actually taken the time to try to understand what the Archbishop actually said before launching into his condemnation of the man. Here’s the answer.

I asked Iain if he’d read Williams’ speech. He replied:

I didnt know he had made a speech until today [the day after the speech was delivered]. I heard his interview on the BBC and quoted from it in my original post.

That’ll be the interview about the speech then?  The interview in which he said “I noted in the lecture…”. (Transcript from the Wardman Wire.) Iain listened to an interview about a speech but didn’t actually notice that the interview was about a speech.  I think that’s useful guide as to the level of understanding Iain achieved before he started laying into Williams. This, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the UK’s top political bloggers.

The other thing I wanted to establish was whether Iain applied his principles consistently. Williams made it clear in his speech and interview that he was talking about already established principles. It was in this context that he used the word “unavoidable”. From the interview:

Interviewer: To begin with you’ve given this vision of if as a nation Britain wants to achieve social cohesion, that challenge is how to accommodate those of religious faith in relation to the law; and you’re words are that the application of Sharia in certain circumstances if we want to achieve this cohesion and take seriously peoples’ religion seems unavoidable?

Archbishop: It seem unavoidable and indeed as a matter of fact certain provision of Sharia are already recognised in our society and under our law; so it’s not as if we’re bringing in an alien and rival system; we already have in this country a number of situations in which the internal law of religious communities is recognised by the law of the land as justified conscientious objections in certain circumstances in providing certain kinds of social relations, so I think we need to look at this with a clearer eye and not imagine either we know exactly what we mean by Sharia and not just associate it with what we read about Saudi Arabia or wherever.

I tried asking Iain about the fact that “we already have in this country a number of situations in which the internal law of religious communities is recognised by the law of the land”. I asked specifically with regard to Jewish customs as Williams himself made several references to the Jewish situation in his speech and made it clear that he was talking about similar proposals for Muslim communities.

His response:

Garry, I disagree with so much of what you said. I have seen Dr William’s comments as reported on the World at One and they do not match your interpretation.

I also do not accept your analogy with what you reckon is a Jewish equivalent. While not being an expert in this, my jewish friends tell me there is no similarity at all.

What you say about Sharia Law having supremacy over English law is, I think, exactly what Williams was aluding to - maybe not immediately but it would be a slippery slope.

I am sure there are parts of Sharia Law which are fine, but there are also parts which are not, and fundemantally at odds with British values.

So there you are then. The Archbishop’s careful thoughts and comparisons are not accepted by Iain because his Jewish friend told him so. I tried asking for clarification but that’s all I got. This, ladies and gentlemen, is one of the UK’s top political bloggers.

Does he even know that the Archbishop specifically pointed out that there are some parts of Sharia law as interpreted in some countries which are fundamentally at odds with British values and explicitly said that these could never be adopted in this country? I doubt it.

In a sense, it’s not fair to single out Iain because he is just one of many who’ve condemned Williams without bothering to try to understand what he said. This is, however, a good illustration of the way in which Iain is able to isolate his opinions from proper debate and scrutiny on his blog while presenting the fiction that it is possible. Oh, and did I mention that I got a fair amount of idiocy thrown my way from some of Iain’s regulars and from anonymous commenters? It wasn’t unexpected but does make any attempt to question Iain’s opinions just that little bit more difficult. This sort of thing is, of course, common in parts of the US blogosphere and Iain and friends seem determined to build similar unchallengeable edifices in this country too. It only damages our ability to have reasoned and rational debate on issues which affect us all.

I don’t intend to press Iain further as we should all be aware by now that my attempting to do so will only lead to him calling me obsessive, a stalker, or a figment of Tim Ireland’s imagination.

To conclude, I just want to say something about the wider implications of the reaction we have seen over the last few days. Democracy, although far from perfect, is clearly the best system of government ever devised by human beings. In order for it to work effectively, citizens need to be able to make informed judgements on the issues of the day. In the modern world there are, sadly, an increasing number of barriers to this process.

The reaction to the Archbishop’s remarks have been a perfect case in point. We’ve had politicians and their supporters making misleading statements for their own ends and media outlets using misrepresentation to generate outrage as a means to boost sales, all, ironically enough, in supposed defence of “British values”. They do not seem to be aware of, or perhaps do not care about, the extent to which they are actually damaging the best of our values.

… What I think he said is an OUTRAGE!!!

If you felt a slight tremor sometime yesterday afternoon, it’ll have been caused by an enormous number of knees all jerking at the same time. Just the mention of the word Sharia is enough to cause many people to disengage their critical faculties and become subsumed by righteous indignation.

The BBC’s Have Your Say has been inundated with outraged comments (over 11,000 comments since yesterday afternoon, most still in moderation) and demands for the Archbishop’s resignation. There, and on blogs, a common theme is “I can’t believe he said that”. Unfortunately, this thought does not seem to have provoked any great desire to find out exactly what he did say. How many of those 11,000 people actually listened to the Archbishop’s 10 minute interview or read his speech? (Both available from the BBC article above.) How many bloggers offered their opinion based on nothing more than a badly written news summary of Williams’ views and their own deeply felt misunderstanding of the concept Sharia law? Too many to count.

But it wasn’t just Joe Bloggs. Here’s a quick analysis of some of the responses detailed in this morning’s BBC report.

The prime minister’s spokesman said Sharia law could never be used to justify a breach of English law.

Indeed. Williams never suggested otherwise.

Home Office Minister Tony McNulty said: “To ask us to fundamentally change the rule of law and to adopt Sharia law, I think, is fundamentally wrong.”

He didn’t say that either. Nice double use of fundamental there though.

For the Conservatives, shadow community cohesion minister Baroness Warsi said the archbishop’s comments were “unhelpful”.

She told BBC News 24: “Dr Williams seems to be suggesting that there should be two systems of law, running alongside each other, almost parallel, and for people to be offered the choice of opting into one or the other. That is unacceptable.”

Slightly different problem here. This already happens to some extent as the Baroness would have know if she’d read Williams’ speech. Is it Conservative policy that Jewish Beth Din courts are unacceptable and should be closed down?

Liberal Democrat leader Nick Clegg said he had “an enormous amount of respect” for Dr Williams, but could not agree with him on this issue. He said: “Equality before the law is part of the glue that binds our society together. We cannot have a situation where there is one law for one person and different laws for another.

“There is a huge difference between respecting people’s right to follow their own beliefs and allowing them to excuse themselves from the rule of law.”

Williams did not suggest that anyone should be allowed to excuse themselves from the rule of law. In fact, he made a point of saying, in his customarily confusing way, that this shouldn’t be allowed to happen.

All in all, not an edifying sight. And I’ve not even touched on the idiotic “they’ll be trying to behead you next” stuff.

In reality, as the Global Dashboard rightly notes, the Archbishop’s view is “thoughtful, considered and nuanced” (via another good post over at The Wardman Wire). The same certainly cannot be said for the majority of reactions to his comments.

An update is likely later this afternoon.

Gordon Brown made his last major public appearance before the Christmas break at his monthly press conference earlier today.

Although it annoys me immensely that politics has become so shallow and trivial, this needs to be said: Gordon Brown should NOT smile in public. Ever.

To see Brown switch on and off that smile, if you can even call it a smile, is an unsettling and slightly frightening experience. I can imagine children all over the country scurrying behind the sofa in terror after catching a glimpse of the PM’s unique rictus on the Six O’Clock News. Either that, or they’ll be expecting Doctor Who to appear and unmask the alien imposter and rescue the real PM.

For the sake of the children if for no other reason, please don’t smile Gordon.

Anyway, Brown’s line today is that:

Many of the things that have been written about for the last few weeks would be forgotten quickly

Is it just me or is that very dangerous attitude to express publicly? It may be a cliché but isn’t it possible that this could be looked back on as his Jim Callaghan moment? Crisis, what crisis?

Brown didn’t say those exact words, of course, but neither did Callaghan. It woz the Sun whot spun it. It’ll be interesting to see how the Sun report Brown’s comments tomorrow.

On the plus side for Brown, for all the economic worries, the doom-mongering and the opportunistic spin from the Tories, the UK in 2007 is nothing like the UK in 1978-79. They had proper great big disastrous crises in those days. (And when we got home, our father would slice us in two with a bread knife. If we we’re lucky!)

All the same, Brown’s words, particularly with regard to the huge data loss and the economy, could come back to haunt him.

No blogging tomorrow as I’ll be down in that London protesting against Christmas (with permission from the Metropoliticians).

Over the last few days, there has been much said about Dean Godson, Policy Exchange’s “Research Director”. His appearance on Newsnight to defend P.E.’s report into extremist literature was quite extraordinary. Here are some interesting facts about Mr Godson.

Most notably, he holds the extraordinary distinction of having lost his position at the Daily Telegraph because of his political views. Back in 2004, Martin Newland, former Telegraph editor, explained to the Guardian:

It’s OK to be pro-Israel, but not to be unbelievably pro-Likud Israel, it’s OK to be pro-American but not look as if you’re taking instructions from Washington. Dean Godson and Barbara Amiel were key departures.

Dean Godson was too pro-Likud and too subservient to the US government for the Telegraph. Given the writers they happily still employ, you’ve got to wonder just how extreme his own views must be.

Mr Godson has also been reasonably open about the need for the US and UK government’s to deploy covert propaganda techniques. In an article for the Times in 2006, he wrote that:

During the Cold War, organisations such as the Information Research Department of the Foreign Office would assert the superiority of the West over its totalitarian rivals. And magazines such as Encounter did hand-to-hand combat with Soviet fellow travellers. For any kind of truly moderate Islam to flourish, we need first to recapture our own self-confidence. At the moment, the extremists largely have the field to themselves.

The Information Research Department was a secret Foreign Office propaganda organisation which operated mostly in the developing world during the Cold War. It’s practices were modelled on psychological warfare operations. Typically, it covertly spoon fed “slanted” anti-communist stories to journalists to achieve the desired effect

Encounter magazine, on the other hand, was funded by the CIA. Based in London and initially edited by Irving Kristol, it too was a covert Cold War propaganda tool. It’s primary function seems to have been to attempt to steer European left wing intellectuals down the “right” path (no pun intended). The “right” path was the path deemed most acceptable by right wingers in the CIA. The CIA funding was kept secret in order that readers wouldn’t know that attempts were being made to manipulate their views from across the pond.

Neither of the government funded organisations operated in a transparent manner. Quite the opposite in fact. Mr Godson, who worked for the Reagan administration, will almost certainly be aware of the covert nature of these organisations. In true neo-conservative style, this does not seem to bother him in the slightest.

This suggests rather strongly that Mr Godson is a believer in the idea of the political noble lie as a means to achieve social cohesion and national security.

And he is the “Research Director” of Policy Exchange, an organisation which purports to be “an independent think tank… committed to an evidence-based approach to policy development”.

Right…

I’m no expert but I’m not sure that Dean Godson is the best man for the job.

Given what I wrote about the Policy Exchange report into extremist literature in Mosques when it was published, I can’t say I was at all surprised to see Newsnight’s report on the subject last night. It appears that there are serious questions over the “evidence” used to construct the report. Osama Saeed has more on the Newsnight broadcast and on the implications of what was discovered.

I don’t think I’ll be having any second thoughts about my original post title on the subject.

Dean Godson, the Policy Exchange shouter sent to defend the report on Newsnight, adopted an all too familiar strategy to deal with criticisms of this so called academic report. He played the man, not the ball, accusing Newsnight’s editor of “disastrous editorial misjudgement” and of “appalling stewardship of Newsnight”. Textbook.

You might like to compare and contrast Godson’s approach to another response to criticisms of the report. Back in November, over the course of three posts, Dr Marranci of the University of Aberdeen raised a number of serious concerns regarding the methodology and ethics of the P.E. report. The report’s author, Dr MacEoin, responded. Here are the two quotations which illustrate the central theme of his response:

“I’ll read your remarks in more detail later. But I already see denial writ large on what is there.”

“As it is, you all seem to think this sort of thing is OK. You bring nothing but shame on yourselves by giving it even tacit approval. The materials are all entirely genuine, they are all available.”

In reality, anyone reading the posts on Dr Marranci’s blog can clearly see that these stock accusations are entirely without foundation. Dr Marranci’s primary concern, as an academic himself, is the fact that his study was being presented as an academic work when it is clearly nothing of the sort.

To conclude, I’ll repeat what I wrote last time round:

None of the above is to deny that there is extremist literature to be found in some British Mosques, of course. Nor is it to deny that the Saudi government actively seeks to promote its intolerant version of Islam in other countries including the UK. The point is merely that headlines generated by flawed reports masquerading as academic surveys should not be taken at face value.

Unlike almost all of the rest of the British media which reported the P.E. headline grabber unquestioningly, Newsnight actually investigated the veracity of what they were being asked to report. Like, you know, journalists. And the Policy Exchange study, unsurprisingly, came up short.

Respect to Peter Barron and Newsnight. Can we have more journalism like that please?

Rupert Murdoch has decided to put his son, James, in control of a large chunk of News Corporation. News Corp’s British newspapers, including the Sun, are part of James’s Christmas present.

Who says Murdoch is evil? He’s obviously a very generous man…

The Sun did report this on Friday but for some reason, the”Add Comment” and “Join Discussion” functions were not available on the article. I thought it was a bit sad that the Sun wasn’t letting their readers join in the celebrations so, after checking that their article was indeed listed under “news”, I submitted a new topic to their news forum:

Best man for the Job

James Murdoch is clearly the most qualified man to take over from Rupert Murdoch as chairman and chief executive of News Corporation. As his father said, “James is a talented and proven executive with a rare blend of international perspective and deep, hands-on experience in improving operational results”.

Glad to see the Sun’s parent company supporting the meritocracy of the market once again. Clearly, only the most deranged leftists would see any sort of nepotism in this decision.

How long do you think that post was visible for before it was deleted?*

I’ll give you a clue. It was less than three minutes.

* Note for the record. It didn’t fall off the bottom of the page or anything. It was definitely deleted.

The Policy Exchange report into extremist literature in British Mosques certainly got plenty of coverage in the media this week (as was the intention, no doubt).

Before looking at the report itself, it is worth taking a moment to highlight the general attitude of its author, Dr. Denis MacEoin.

Elsewhere, he has said:

Just as our parents and grandparents fought the dark ideology of Nazism in the 1930s and 40s, so I believe this generation has the heaviest of responsibilities face to face with this growing threat to all civilized values. Not just the West, but the peoples of the Islamic world too may see their way of life changed for ever should the totalitarian spectre impose itself and its deadening hatred of life on all we and they hold dear.

I don’t like to speak in terms of historic moments or symbolic conflicts, but I’m afraid that, as this struggle intensifies, I am bound to do so.

Civilization itself is at stake. The values of democracy, the rule of law, human rights, and the open society are as much or more at risk today than in the decades when we confronted, first German fascism and then Soviet communism.

He has also said:

I do not hold a brief for Islam. On the contrary, I have very negative feelings about it… I am pro-Israeli and involve myself in the defence of Israel…

To be fair, I should also mention that that second quotation was taken from a complaint Dr MacEoin made to Dhimmi Watch concerning the “gung-ho ignorance masquerading as informed comment” which appears in their comment threads.

Dr MacEoin’s attitude towards Muslims and his lack of any sort of ability to maintain perspective* is no reason to dismiss the findings of his report out of hand, of course. I include this merely as a context.

So let’s look at the report. Policy Exchange says:

The report is the most comprehensive academic survey of its kind ever produced in the UK and is based on a year-long investigation by several teams of specialist researchers into the availability of extremist literature and covers more than a hundred mosques and Islamic centres throughout the UK.

A comprehensive academic survey, they say.

Well, I’ve had a look at it (pdf) and I’m not sure that’s the description you’d want to use for it. For a start, can anyone direct me to the peer reviewed journal which published this “comprehensive academic survey”? I’m no scientist but I believe that’s the standard way in which academic surveys gain legitimacy. No?

As far as I can tell, it’s been published exclusively by Policy Exchange themselves, the same organisation which commissioned and funded the “research”.

And what of the methodology used in the report?

Methodology

In November 2006 four research teams (each comprising two people) were dispatched over a six month period to 100 Islamic institutions in a variety of locations across Britain… The focus for their research was on sites of religious instruction – which for the most part meant mosques… The teams’ brief was to investigate the extent to which literature inculcating Muslim separatism and hatred for the ‘non-believer’ was accessible in those institutions – both in terms of being openly available and also being obtainable ‘under the counter’.

There’s more but it really doesn’t get any more enlightening. It seems that this “comprehensive academic survey” specifically set out to find as many offensive pieces of literature as possible and that’s all it attempted to do.

The report claims to have found offensive material in 26% of the Mosques they investigated. Did the teams investigate the context in which this literature was available or the prominence given to these publications? Did they attempt to build a clear understanding of the situation by recording the number of publications containing counter-arguments available from the same institutions?

No, they did not.

In Edinburgh Central Mosque, for example, the report found one publication they deemed objectionable and that was enough for the Mosque to be included in the list of distributors of hate. Was that one publication sitting overlooked on a dusty bottom shelf while more moderate literature was widely available, prominently displayed and actively promoted? I suspect that’s the reality, as does Osama Saaed, but this is not something which Policy Exchange’s “comprehensive academic survey” concerns itself with.

If you were to visit libraries in the UK, you could find similar literature and get a very high headline figure indeed. Without context, this finding, while true, would be essentially meaningless.

It seems then that the survey was designed so as to allow as many Mosques as possible to be included in the headline grabbing figures. No attempt was made to investigate the full picture of the literature available at British Mosques or the way it is used and distributed. It was instead cherry picking on a grand scale; a comprehensive academic study into the literature being promoted in British Mosques, it most certainly was not.

None of the above is to deny that there is extremist literature to be found in some British Mosques, of course. Nor is it to deny that the Saudi government actively seeks to promote its intolerant version of Islam in other countries including the UK. The point is merely that headlines generated by flawed reports masquerading as academic surveys should not be taken at face value.

* If you agree with MacEoin’s contention that “the values of democracy, the rule of law, human rights, and the open society are as much or more at risk today… “, I’ve got three words for you: Battle of Britain. And another three: Cuban missile crisis.