Stop religious oppression in Iraqi Kurdistan

This video says U.N. Says Iraqi Women Are Worse Off.

From the Campaign against suppression of Freedom of Expression in Kurdistan:

29 May, 2012

Your support needed to prevent the suppression of Freedom of Expression in Iraqi Kurdistan!

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights: “Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression; this right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers”.

We call upon the entire international human rights organizations.

All those who defend the rights of journalists, all political parties, parliament members and freedom loving figures:

Support us in our campaign to prevent the suppression and violation of Freedom of Expression in Iraqi Kurdistan.

Earlier this month and after a preplanned scenario in Arbil by KDP

the ruling party in Iraqi Kurdistan

assisted by a number of religious clerics, the Prime Minster of the Kurdish Regional Government welcomed a suggestion from anti-freedom forces for a new law restricting freedoms of expression. The Committee for Endowment Affairs in Kurdistan Parliament immediately proposed a Bill (Protection for sanctities of religion) which imposes a prison term from 6 months to 5 years and a fine 10,000000 to 18,000000 Iraqi Dinars against writers and the publishers of any materials critical to any religion, as well as the closure of the media channel which publishes materials of this kind.

The aim of such proposals is nothing but to silence the voices of people in Kurdistan who began to protest since 17th February 2011 against corruption, poverty and unemployment. Furthermore this event coincided with the second anniversary of the murder of Mr. Sardasht Osman – a young journalist, who was kidnapped in Arbil and later found dead on 5th May 2010.

Such law is obviously oppressive and is an imitation of religious laws, which have been imposed under extreme religious Islamic regimes like Iran and Saudi Arabia. This type of law is reproducing dictatorship under the banner of protecting religion. Authorities in Kurdistan, who are challenged by growing objection by the people opposed to corruption and misusing of power, try to use this law to back up their anti-democratic repressive policies.

The under-signed organisations and groups representing thousands of freedom loving people in and outside Iraqi Kurdistan appeal to you to support our campaign in preventing any legal restrictions on Freedom of Expression in Kurdistan, and urge you to:

1. Send letters of protest to the Kurdish Regional Parliament, The Kurdish Regional Government officials, and the President of Kurdish Region in Iraq to stop their support and backing of such anti-democratic law.

2. Condemn the vicious attacks on writers, journalists and freedom loving people, and urge the KRG officials protect and respect basic human rights such as Freedom of Expression and political freedoms in Kurdistan.

Your support to this campaign in defending the right to Freedom of Expression for people in Iraqi Kurdistan will demonstrate your commitment to defend the Human Rights of all humans.

Please don’t hesitate to contact us for more information.

Thanks

The Campaign against suppression of Freedom of Expression in Kurdistan

Affiliated by:

International Federation of Iraqi Refugees
Freedom Umbrella – a Kurdish human rights action group in the UK
Organisation of Women’s Freedom in Iraq- Abroad representation
Nina Centre for Women – Sweden
Kurdish and Middle Eastern Women organisation – UK
Freedom Cell – a Kurdish human right’s action group in the Netherlands
17th February Group – a human rights action group in Sweden
350 journalists, politicians, human rights activists and freedom loving people in Kurdistan and abroad

Please send your letter to KRG representatives:

KRG Representation in the United Kingdom
Representative: Ms Bayan Sami Abdul Rahman
23 Buckingham Gate (4th Floor), London SW1E 6LB
Phone: +44 (0) 203 301 8340
Fax: +44 (0) 207 828 0257
Email: uk@krg.org

Web: http://us.krg.org

Contact the campaign:

Email: kampiny_azady@yahoo.com
Tel: 00447894252708 or 00447760131203
www.facebook.com/kampinyazady

From Arutz Sheva in Israel:

5/28/2012, Sivan 7, 5772

HU Research: Iraqi Women Worse Off than Under Sadam

Women in Iraq are worse off now, since the departure of allied forces,

more exactly: since the arrival of United States and other invasion forces, in 2003

than they were under Sadam Hussein, according to a book launched, Monday morning, at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Women in Iraq: Past Meets Present, written by Dr. Noga Efrati of the university’s Truman Institute, shows that Iraq‘s Personal Status Law of 1959 (which deals with issues of divorce, marriage and custody of the children) which Iraqi activists had worked on for fifty years, has essentially been canceled. While representing 60 percent of the population, women were granted only a quarter of the seats in the Iraqi parliament in 2005. The book reflects Dr. Efrati’s research between 2006 and 2011.

European anti-austerity revolt

This video, from The Nation in the USA, says about itself:

Across Europe, people are vocally and actively rejecting austerity. But they’re not doing so as Europeans, Nation columnist Gary Younge points out. Global and regional solidarity has been limited, Younge explains in this video, even as people fight similar battles against income inequality and other forms of injustice.

Over the last thirty years, in parallel with deregulation and the rising power of money in American politics, significant portions of American academia have deteriorated into “pay to play” activities. No where is this more pronounced than in the realm of economics: here.

Keep London Women’s Library open

This video from Britain is called Sylvia Pankhurst Trailer.

From weekly Socialist Worker in Britain:

Tuesday 8 May 2012

Unique women’s library is facing closure from cuts

Librarians tell Judith Orr about a vital collection of women’s history that university bosses want to shut down—for the sake of just £1 million

The unique Women’s Library in east London could be shut by the end of the year if bosses at London Metropolitan University get their way.

There is no other collection like this in the world. You can find records of women war workers alongside original feminist magazines and political leaflets from the 1970s.

There are papers and archives from Mary Wollstonecraft, Sylvia Pankhurst and Sheila Rowbotham.

And 90 percent of the collection has been donated by supporters in the movement.

The joy of the library is that so much of the collection is on open shelves. But like the TUC library—with which it organises joint exhibitions—the Women’s Library is part of London Metropolitan University, where vice chancellor Malcolm Gillies is making wholesale cuts.

The library’s staff are very proud that it is open to everyone, but this obviously rankles with Gillies. He has said the university can no longer fund a service that is used by so many from outside the institution.

If funding is not found by December the library may close or be limited to opening only one day a week.

Staff are fighting to keep the archive together and the library open. “We don’t want some Russell Group university to cherry-pick this collection,” one librarian told Socialist Worker. “It would end up scattered in libraries where only academics may have access.”

The library has always had a close association with campaigning, noted collections manager Teresa Doherty. “It was founded in 1926 from what had been the Fawcett Society. The records of the suffrage movement from a large part of our archive. But really it’s all about the fight for equality.”

There are copies of Shafts, one of the earliest magazines for working class women. Where original sources have become too fragile to handle, they have been painstaking photographed and bound.

Alongside the books, pamphlets, and original documents the library also houses an audio collection.

“We have the biggest collection of women’s biographies—but oral history is also really important,” said Theresa Doherty.

These archives are full of gems that shed light on centuries of struggle by women and the working class.

There is still much to research among all the donated materials. As one librarian there put it, “This library has a lot of hidden history that is yet to be discovered”.

This makes it all the more important that it should be kept open as a resource for the people whose lives and struggle it celebrates.
From miners to matchgirls

All Work and No Pay is a joint exhibition by the Women’s Library and the TUC library archives—both of which are under threat.

It includes a carefully handwritten register of the names and ages of all those who took part in the 1888 Bryant & May matchgirls’ strike.

There are records and images of the Grunwick dispute and women who fought in the Miners’ Strike in 1984-85.

Another display case shows hammers used by the women chainmakers of Cradley Heath.

They waged a ten-week battle in 1910 winning the right to minimum wages across the industry.

Women’s Freedom League notebooks

The archive includes the original handwritten minutes of the political committee of the Women’s Freedom League.

The League was a group of socialist women who broke from the mainstream suffragettes to concentrate on organising among working class women.

Emily’s unused return ticket

“The smallest item actually carries the most weight for me,” said collections manager Teresa Doherty. “It is the little purse that belonged to Emily Davison, the suffragette who died in 1913 when she threw herself in front of the king’s horse to demand the right to vote for women. Inside the purse is the return half of her ticket.”

Sign and share the petition to keep the library open: here.

Sexism in British media

From daily The Morning Star in Britain:

Things get ugly for journo after beauty comments

Wednesday 02 May 2012

Self-proclaimed “beauty” Samantha Brick sparked outrage today after claiming that some women were “too ugly for TV,” writes Louise Nousratpour.

Journalist Ms Brick, who was recently ridiculed for claiming “women hate me for being beautiful,” defended sexist remarks by TV critic AA Gill that BBC2 Meet The Romans presenter Mary Beard was too unattractive for television.

“While Ms Beard is a supremely intelligent woman…the plain truth is that Ms Beard is too ugly for TV,” she wrote in an article for the Daily Mail.

Do Ms Beard or her co-thinkers ever ask whether men on TV, intelligent or not so intelligent, are good-looking or not?

Ms Brick then argued that “savvy” presenters would realise their looks is key to success and consider undergoing complete makeovers, including cosmetic surgery.

But NUJ general secretary Michelle Stanistreet slammed Ms Brick’s inflammatory comments.

She said: “Women working in the media continue to face double standards, yet we know the public want to see, hear and read contributions from a diverse range of presenters, journalists and actors, not just – thankfully – the beautiful.”

Historian Mary Beard, who has been branded “too ugly for TV” by self-proclaimed “beautiful journalist” Samantha Brick, has said she will not lose any sleep over a “silly fuss”: here.

What We Look Like: A Comic About Women in Media. Anne Elizabeth Moore and Robyn Chapman, Truthout in the USA: “‘What We Look Like,’ with Anne Elizabeth Moore and Robyn Chapman, is a follow-up to Ladydrawers’ look at women’s participation in the labor force. This time, we look at why the diminished economic status of women isn’t popularly considered, even beyond media’s gendered hiring practices. The representations of women that do result are a far cry from the reality – compare for yourself!” Here.

Indonesian wayang theatre

This video is a Dutch interview with Indonesian dalang Ki Enthus Susmono.

From the International Institute for Asian Studies in the Netherlands:

Destroying or innovating tradition? The politics of authenticity in the Indonesian wayang puppet theatre

IIAS Lunch Lecture by Sadiah Boonstra

Date & time: Wednesday 10 May 2012, 12.30-14.00 hrs.
Venue: IIAS Conference Room, Rapenburg 59, Leiden, Netherlands

Ki [The Honourable] Enthus Susomo (1966) is one of Indonesia’s most famous dalangs or wayang puppeteers. He is widely regarded as a radical innovator for the incorporation in wayang of non-wayang characters such as Batman, Harry Potter, political figures like Barack Obama and Osama bin Laden, the use of innovative musical compositions, and the creation of Wayang Santri, dealing with Islamic daily life. These innovations make him extremely popular, but urge critics to see him as “Destroyer” of the “authentic” wayang “tradition”.

Combining historical and anthropological research, Sadiah Boonstra will focus on dalang Ki Enthus Susmono to show how processes of defining “authenticity” linked to “tradition” in contemporary Indonesia are the result of mutual interaction between individual, local traditions and (post)colonial and (inter)national heritage policies influenced by identity issues concerning appropriation and belonging, and in- and exclusion.

Following Sears (1996) I will demonstrate that “authentic” wayang is a colonial construction that turned wayang plays and puppets together with the sound of the gamelan into symbols of “authentic” Javanese culture with roots in a pre-Islamic past. Arguing that UNESCO has perpetuated this myth of “authentic” wayang in the context of the Indonesian nation-state with the enlisting of the wayang puppet theatre as a Masterpiece of Oral and Intangible Heritage in 2003, I will analyze the politics of “authenticity” and its negotiation in the context of the contemporary wayang performance practice, the creation of heritage and the concept of intangible heritage as a signifier in the cultural canon of contemporary Indonesia.

Ancient Roman women’s microcredits

In this video in Spanish, professor Carmen Lázaro tells of her research about ancient Roman women’s microcredits.

From Asociación RUVID, a universitary organization in Valencia, Spain:

Women of ancient Rome prompted a similar system of microcredits to overcome legal exclusion

26 April 2012

Some women in ancient Rome already implemented the concept of microcredit as a loan of small amounts of money that enables people without resources to develop work projects on their own. The study conducted by the professor of Roman Law at the Universitat Jaume I Carmen Lázaro shows how women managed to evade the legal rules that excluded them from activities related with the bank and exchange through credit contracts of small amounts of money made by and among women and guaranteed by pledge agreements in which they gave as collateral personal property of small value.

The existence of this microcredit system is known through various sources, mainly epigraphic, such as the inscriptions found in Roman Granio House in Pompeii, which reflect legal transactions as the ones carried out among the moneylender Faustilla and other women with an interest at 6.25%, remaining as collateral for reimbursement by way of endorsement (through pignus-pawns) personal items such as earrings or coats.

Today, microcredit interest for women, often poorer than the Roman ladies which the new research is about, is often more than 6.25%. 20 percent or higher.

That is one of the reasons why today women doubt whether microcredits are really the miraculous panacea for all the problems of women, and of poor people, that its propagandists claim.

In the Netherlands, microcredits are propagated by Princess Máxima. She and her husband, the crown prince of the Netherlands, are very rich. First they had a scandal with an expensive villa in poor Mozambique. Then they bought a villa in Maxima’s native Argentina. Now, they are buying a villa in Greece, which, if the banking fat cats have their way, will become as poor as Mozambique.

Likewise in ancient Rome, women’s microcredits did not succeed in bringing women equality to men. Or in solving poverty. Or slavery.

Marco Polo really was in China

This video is called Marco Polo ~ Inspiration of Exploration : A History Fair Documentary.

From the Universitaet Tübingen in Germany:

Marco Polo was not a swindler – he really did go to China

16 April 2012

A thorough new study of Chinese sources by University of Tübingen Sinologist Hans Ulrich Vogel dispels claims that Venice’s most famous traveler never truly went as far as China.

It has been said that Marco Polo did not really go to China; that he merely cobbled together his information about it from journeys to the Black Sea, Constantinople and Persia and from talking to merchants and reading now-lost Persian books. But in Marco Polo was in China: New Evidence from Currencies, Salts and Revenues, (Brill Verlag) Hans Ulrich Vogel, Professor of Chinese Studies at the University of Tübingen, puts paid to such rumors. He begins with a comprehensive review of the arguments for and against, and follows it up with evidence from relevant Chinese, Japanese, Italian, French, German and Spanish literature. The result is compelling: despite a few, well-known problems with Marco Polo’s writings, they are supported by an overwhelming number of verified accounts about China containing unique information given over centuries.

Doubts have been raised since the mid-eighteenth century about Marco Polo’s presence in China. Skeptics have pointed out that Marco Polo did not mention the Great Wall. Yet research in the East and the West have shown that the Great Wall as we know it is a product of the Ming Dynasty (1368-1644) and that earlier earth walls had long since disintegrated and had lost the military role they played in the Mongol Empire. Another argument often used is that Marco, his father and his uncle are not mentioned in any Chinese document. However, this argument overestimates the frequency of documentation and the intentions of Chinese historiographers. Even Giovanni de Marignolli (1290-1357), an important papal envoy at the court of the Yuan rulers, is not mentioned in any Chinese sources – nor his 32-man retinue, nor the name of the pope. Only the “heavenly horse” sent as tribute from the “Kingdom of Franks” in 1342 gets a mention.

Professor Vogel also examines an area so complex and which requires such a high level of historical expertise that it has largely been neglected – Marco Polo’s descriptions of currency, salt production and revenues from the salt monopoly. Vogel concludes that no other Western, Arab, or Persian observer reported in such accurate and unique detail about the currency situation in Mongol China. The Venetian traveler is the only one to describe precisely how paper for money was made from the bark of the mulberry tree (morusalba l.)

sic; Morus alba

He not only details the shape and size of the paper, he also describes the use of seals and the various denominations of paper money. He reports on the monopolizing of gold, silver, pearls and gems by the state – which enforced a compulsory exchange for paper money – and the punishment for counterfeiters, as well as the 3% exchange fee for worn-out notes and the widespread use of paper money in official and private transactions.

Marco Polo is also the only one among his contemporaries to explain that paper money was not in circulation in all parts of China. It was used primarily in the north and in the regions along the Yangtze, but not in Fujian and certainly not in Yunnan, where according to Polo, cowries, salt, gold and silver were the main currencies. This information is confirmed by Chinese sources and by archaeological evidence. Most of these sources were collated or translated long after Marco Polo’s time – so he could not have drawn on them. He could not read Chinese.

Marco Polo’s description of salt production is also accurate and unique. He lists the most important salt production centers known to him: Changlu, Lianghuai, Liangzhe, and Yunnan, as well as the authorities administering them. His report of the methods used to make salt in Changlu checks out with Chinese documents of the Yuan era. Salt in the Venetian monopoly was produced in a different way. This and other information, the accuracy of which has not yet been fully appreciated, all indicate that Marco Polo really did serve the Great Khan. Chinese sources show that he was not the only young man to be taken under the wing of Kublai Khan (1215-1294) and entrusted with important tasks. Marco Polo’s claims of the value of salt production – for instance, that the revenues from Kinsay brought in 5.8 million saggi of gold annually – can be checked against the exchange rate for paper money, bringing Professor Vogel to the conclusion that Polo knew what he was talking about. This book, based on work carried out in the DFG Research Training Group 596 “Monies, Markets and Finance in China and East Asia, 1500-1900” provides ample evidence that Marco Polo did go to China.

See also, in German, here.

Hungarian president resigns in plagiarism scandal

This video is called President Pal Schmitt Of Hungary Refuses To Quit Over Plagiarism Row 31/03/2012.

That was two days ago … this is today …

From New Europe paper:

Pál Schmitt resigns in-midst of doctorate scandal

April 2, 2012 – 1:35pm

Hungarian President Pál Schmitt announced his resignation during a speech in front of Parliament on 2 April in the midst of his thesis doctorate plagiarism scandal. He was stripped of his doctorate following an investigation conducted by the highest-ranking decision making body of the Semmelweis University which found that Schmitt had copied virtually his entire thesis.

On 30 March, Schmitt had said that he had no intention to resign because “my conscience is clear”. However, this had changed over the weekend after inter-governmental pressure was mounting for him to step down.

Rector Tivadar Tulassay had announced his resignation on 29 March reasoning that he felt such a loss of confidence by the cabinet could already be damaging for the university.

See also here. And here.

On May 2, the Hungarian parliament will elect a new president. The ruling Fidesz (Civic Union) party has a two-thirds majority and the election of its candidate, European Parliament deputy Janos Ader, is regarded as guaranteed. Ader is a close associate of Prime Minister Victor Orban. His assumption of the country’s highest office will invariably consolidate and advance the policies of Orban’s right-wing government: here.

William of Orange’s last words, a myth

There are lots of quotes, supposed to be from famous people in history, which, after scrutiny, turn to be myths.

Edmund Burke never wrote the words attributed to him “The only thing necessary for the triumph of evil is for good men to do nothing”.

King Louis XIV, absolute monarch of France, never said: “The state, that is me.”

A special sub-category of these non-historical non-quotes is supposed things famous people have been supposed to say just before dying.

Christian fundamentalists spuriously claim that Lenin on his deathbed said that because of all his sins he was going to burn in the Christian hell forever.

Another leader of another revolt (not against twentieth century Russian czarism, but against sixteenth century King Philip II of Spain and the Netherlands) was Prince William of Orange.

After his murderer, paid by King Philip, shot Prince William, the Stadhouder of the rebellious province Holland is supposed to have said in French: “My God, have pity on me, and on my poor people”, just before his terminal breath.

Now, however, Dutch experts have concluded that the impact of the assassin’s bullets was so strong that the prince would have been unable to say anything, dying instantly.

Another myth debunked.

Prince William’s nickname was William the Silent. So, a fitting nickname for the very last part of his life as well.

Fortune-tellers fail on the future

From the University of Hertfordshire in England:

Believing the impossible: academic report finds no evidence for the existence of psychic ability

15 March 2012

Research failing to find evidence for the existence of psychic ability has been published, following a year of industry debate.

The report is a response by a group of independent researchers to the 2011 study from social psychologist Daryl Bem, purporting the existence of precognition – an ability to perceive future events.

Professor Chris French (Goldsmiths, University of London), Stuart Ritchie (University of Edinburgh) and Professor Richard Wiseman (University of Hertfordshire) collaborated to accurately replicate Bem’s final experiment, and found no evidence for precognition. Their negative results have now been published by open access journal PLoS ONE.

Their report was rejected by the Journal of Personality and Social Psychology (JPSP), which originally published Bem’s findings along with his appeal to independent researchers to attempt replications.

“Our submission was rejected without being sent for peer review on the basis that the journal has a policy of not publishing replications,” said Professor Chris French. “Our paper has opened up the debate on the proper place of replication in the scientific literature.”

In Bem’s experiment, after completing a memory test on a list of words, participants were then shown a random selection of half the words from the original list. Results showed that participants were better at remembering the words they were about to be shown, indicating they had reached forward in time to ‘practice’ those words in the future.

Within parapsychology, there is a tendency to accept any positive replications but to dismiss failures to replicate if the procedures followed have not been exactly duplicated.

“We went to great pains to ensure we followed the same procedures as Bem,” said Stuart Ritchie. “Using Bem’s own computer programme and stats methods, we replicated his experiment three times, at each of our respective campuses, with the same number of participants as the original study.”

“By having our paper published, we hope academic journals and popular media alike will offer the same weight to negative results as given to eye-catching positive results,” said Professor Richard Wiseman.

The full report, “Failing the future: Three unsuccessful attempts to replicate Bem’s ‘retroactive facilitation of recall’ effect” has been published in the open access journal PLoS ONE. To view, visit http://dx.plos.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0033423

Usually, in December, in quite some media there are soothsayers’ predictions for the new year. It is quite interesting to save those predictions, in order to test how the new year’s reality compares to the “psychic” predictions for it. The predictions turn out to be not worth much.

Nevertheless, Tony Blair wasted British taxpayers’ money on ‘paranormally’ searching for non-existent weapons of mass destruction in occupied Iraq.