The makers of Georgi Vodka have staged a demonstration complete with bikinis, booze, and a lawyer crying constitutional foul. They paid a handful of scantily clad babes to rally outside a bus depot on Manhattan's West Side.

The purpose of the protest, says the vodka company, was to shame the Manhattan Transport Authority (MTA) into reversing it's policy of accommodation when religious groups request racy ads be removed from buses in Hasidic Jewish neighborhoods.

At issue in this case are 2 ads featuring vodka bottles nestled next to buxom butts covered by white bikini bottoms. Georgi Vodka distillers say the ad is tasteful and the MTA ban is censorship and an infringement their First Amendment rights.

The bikini ad ban applies to buses at three depots in Brooklyn which have been accommodating the borough's Hasidic leaders for a decade now.

Following the recent dismantling of his Tiga Mojang (Three Ladies) statue in Bekasi, Nyoman Nuarta has called on members of the public to explain claims that the statue is obscene and blasphemous.

 Nyoman said the groups' interpretation of the statue was silly and utterly misleading. I made the statue by considering aspects of local [West Javanese] culture and never thought about attaching any religious symbol to it.

Why did I make it three [ladies]? It was simply because the statue would be put in the center of a boulevard circle so it could 'welcome' motorists from all surrounding three streets.

He also denied that the statue had shown obscenity: I am a master of beautiful statues. If someone feels offended by such works of art, please ask them which part of the statue makes them feel sexually aroused? he said.

On Saturday, the Bekasi municipal administration decided to take down the statue, which resembles three ladies standing in traditional West Javanese attire, after a series of protests from local hard-line Islamic groups which have considered the statue obscene and symbolizing the Christian Trinity concept.

Update: Religious Tit for Tat

23rd June 2010. Based on article from thejakartaglobe.com

The ludicrous removal of the Three Ladies statute has revealed on ongoing religious tussle in Bekasi, a city neighbouring Jakarta.

The congregation of the HKBP Filadelfia Protestant church in Bekasi, has been holding services on the roadside after the city prohibited the church from holding religious activities. Needless to say that this has resulted in angry muslim demonstrators demanding they pray elsewhere.

Rev. Palti Panjaitan, leader of HKBP Filadelfia spoke of one such incident: Around 6:30 a.m., there was an announcement at the mosque next to our church calling people to demonstrate. Half an hour later around 200 people crowded in front of our church with drums, shouting statements about jihad. He called the police, who drove the protestors away at around 8:30 a.m. When the protesters saw some members of the congregation they hurled terrorizing statements. A lot of my members cried and immediately went home, refusing to come back to church. The protesters called us names, calling us haram [forbidden by Islam], and threatened to kill us, he said.

In view of the increasing religious tension in Bekasi, members of hard-line muslim groups gathered to discuss a coordinated response to bring the city more in line with Islamic principles.  Habib Rizieq Shihab leader of the Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), gave a speech claiming that: the phenomenon of 'Christianization' is happening not just in Bekasi but all over Indonesia.

Abdul Qodir Aka, a local official with the FPI, told the Jakarta Globe that the congress's objective was to create recommendations for the Bekasi administration on what steps it should take in the wake of recent incidents of defamation of Islam.

Abdul Qodir was referring to Abraham Felix, a 16-year-old student of SMA 5 high school in Bekasi. Pictures of Abraham stomping on a Koran, the Islamic holy book, and one of him allegedly putting it in a toilet were posted on a blog, enraging the local Islamic community. Police arrested Abraham in May on suspicion of creating the blog. He was charged with Article 156 of the Criminal Code for religious blasphemy.

Abdul Qodir said that the Islamic Congress was supported by the Bekasi administration, and was the culmination of talks between members of the local FPI chapter and Mayor Mochtar Mohamad.  Abdul Qodir said: We also demanded the removal of the Tiga Mojang [Three Girls] statue.  The statue in the Harapan Indah residential complex was taken down on at 12 a.m. on Saturday by the Bekasi administration, following pressure from the FPI, which deemed the statue at odds with conservative Muslims' views.

Update: War against Christianization

30th June 2010. Based on article from thejakartaglobe.com

In a move that could add to already simmering religious tensions in Bekasi, a new group calling itself the Bekasi Islamic Presidium is planning a roadshow aimed at persuading every mosque in the city to prepare for the possibility of war against Christianization.

The group, consisting of nine members representing different Islamic organizations in the city, was formed on the last day of the Bekasi Islamic Congress at Al Azhar Mosque that was convened to address the so-called Christianization problem.

Among its recommendations is the formation of Islamic militant groups, or laskar, within each mosque and the drafting of Shariah-based policies by the Bekasi administration.

All Muslims should unite and be on guard because … the Christians are up to something, Murhali Barda, head of the Bekasi chapter of the hard-line Islamic Defenders Front (FPI), told the Jakarta Globe: Apparently they want to test our patience. We are planning to invite them for a dialogue to determine what they really want. If talks fail, this might mean war.

Abdul Qadir Aka, secretary general of the proselytization board at FPI Bekasi, said the militant groups were important: When the need arrives we will have units that can be mobilized. We cannot just depend on the FPI. We have hundreds and even thousands of mosques in Bekasi. Imagine what we can do together.

The units, he said, would also serve as morality police targeting activities such as drinking alcohol, prostitution, casual sex and gambling, all forbidden in Islam.

Feminists at US publication Ms  have accused Toy Story 3 of being carelessly sexist and argue it may damage children.

The magazine claims that the seven-to-one male-to-female character ratio is unfair and that women are depicted negatively in the movie, from toy owner Andy's nagging mother to the overly emotional Barbie.

The plastic doll is also called a traitor in the film for leaving the gang to live with Ken in his dream house.

What's more, writer Natalie Wilson  points out that Ken is depicted as a closeted gay fashionista with a fondness for writing in sparkly purple ink...(making) this yet another family movie that perpetuates damaging gender and sexuality norms.

Pairing homophobia with misogyny, the jokes about Ken suggest that the worst things a boy can be are either a girl or a homosexual.

According to writer Natalie Wilson: Kids who grow up watching sexist shows are more likely to grow up internalising stereotypical ideas of what men and women are supposed to be like.

Mrs Potato Head does nunchakus

And thanks also to goatboy who adds:

Good job James Ferman isn't head of the bbfc these days, the pre credits sequence of Toy Story 3 would have had to go due to nunchakus use- By Mrs Potato Head no less. Ferman would have had a fuckin' aneurysm if he had seen it!

Comment: Perpective

30th June 2010 from IanG

"According to writer Natalie Wilson: Kids who grow up watching sexist shows are more likely to grow up internalising stereotypical ideas of what men and women are supposed to be like."

Oh yes, 1.5hrs a day watching a movie will completely override the other 22.5hrs the child spends watching how mom and dad and all their friends and siblings function in society.

A Kiwi horror film that shows an unconscious girl being raped by a man wearing a pig's head should be banned, say nutter campaigners.

Wound is described by its creators as a shocking supernatural tale of mental illness, bondage, incest, revenge and explicit graphic violence.

It features disturbing scenes including a pregnant woman being hit on the stomach with a bat to induce a miscarriage.

Wound is due to premiere at the New Zealand Film Festival in July if approved for release by the chief censor Bill Hastings.

But it has 'enraged' the nutters of Family First. National director Bob McCoskrie said: Research clearly shows that explicit sexual content of this nature contributes to an increase in sexual violence. I can't see how incest and graphic violence can be presented in an entertaining way.

Director David Blyth defended the use of graphic violence, saying it was a social commentary on New Zealand: It's about sexual abuse in this country, no one else is talking about this. All my films have had a female theme and they all deal with the disenfranchised. I think it's important to find a place for movies of all kinds, and not just what the Film Commission approves.

Update: Nutters Wounded

26th June 2010. Based on article from 3news.co.nz

Calls for a ban on cult Kiwi filmmaker David Blyth's new movie have fallen on deaf ears. Lobby group Family First wanted the release of Wound stopped.

It is set to debut at the Incredibly Strange Film Festival next month, and is billed as a supernatural tale of incest, bondage, mental illness and graphic violence.

But the film censor's office says the impact of some of the more shocking content of the movie is limited by it's low budget and unrealistic special effects. The censor's office has rated it R18: contains graphic violence and sexual violence.

Pakistan's High Court has banned nine leading websites in response to allegations that the websites were posting blasphemous material.

It also directed the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) to make sure that the websites are immediately blocked.

The nine websites targeted in the court order include Google, Yahoo, MSN, Hotmail, YouTube, Bing, In the Name of Allah and Amazon.

A petition filed by a citizen, Muhammad Sidiq, claimed that the websites were publishing and promoting sacrilegious material while twisting facts about the Quran.

Justice Mazher Iqbal Sidhu, of the Bahawalpur bench of the high court, also ordered the PTA chairman to appear in court on Monday with all relevant documents in this case

The Bahawalpur legal fraternity has decided to observe a day's strike in support of the historic court decision as well as to protest against the websites.

PTA officials maintain that they have received no instructions to block the websites. They had heard of the court decision only through media reports.

Update: Major websites restored but will be checked for blasphemy

26th June 2010. Based on article from news.bbc.co.uk

Blasphemy on Amazon!

Pakistan will start monitoring seven major websites, including Google and Yahoo, for content it deems offensive to Muslims. YouTube, Amazon, MSN, Hotmail and Bing will also come under scrutiny, while 17 less well-known sites will be blocked.

Officials will monitor the sites and block links deemed inappropriate. The new action will see Pakistani authorities monitor content published on the seven sites, blocking individual pages if content is judged to be offensive.

Telecoms official Khurram Mehran said links would be blocked without disturbing the main website.

New Zealand's TV3 is being accused of striking a new all-time low in broadcasting standards.

Nutters of Family First are lodging a formal complaint over an item featured on the late night news show Nightline. It featured naked men in training for the annual nude rugby game in Dunedin.

Family First's National Director Bob McCoskrie says the images were full-frontal, and there was no attempt to pixellate them. He says it is meant to be a news bulletin and not an R16 movie, and the network has crossed a dangerous line.

The owner of an Melbourne area adult bookshop has filed a complaint with police after his controversial shop window was plastered with stickers saying boycott sexism.

The stickers were authorised by the National Union of Students women's department as part of a national campaign to highlight demeaning and sexist images in the media.

Boutique Erotique owner Yuda Meitav said he was disturbed by the vandalism to his shop window, which features photographs of naked women and men.

Union spokeswoman Keelia Fitzpatrick said the campaign started last year and would continue. The stickers were distributed to universities around the country and could have been any student from any university or women's organisation who put them there.

She apologised to Meitav for the inconvenience.

Pornography Harms: A Briefing, sponsored by the Coalition for the War Against Illegal Pornography—apparently a front group for former Justice Department prosecutor Patrick Trueman and his supporters, who recently inaugurated the website pornharms.com was held on Capitol Hill with a panoply of anti-porn zealots as scheduled speakers.

First up was Donna Rice Hughes, who came to national prominence as the gal on then-presidential candidate Gary Hart's lap but then went on to co-found (with the late Andrea Dworkin) Enough Is Enough, which recently launched its Internet Safety 101 program to immunize kids against online predators, cyberbullying ... and, of course, anything remotely sexual.

Next was University of Pennsylvania psychotherapist Dr. Mary Anne Layden, co-author of the unscientific pseudo-study The Social Costs of Pornography.

Also up was Dr. Laura Lederer, a longtime anti-porn activist who in 1977 founded Women Against Violence in Pornography and Media spoke anout Pornography's Link to Sex Trafficking, and deals with the incidence of children trafficked to appear in child pornography and to become sex slaves—none of which, of course, has anything to do with the adult entertainment industry.

And of course, what anti-porn conference would be complete without Pink Cross Foundation founder Shelly Lubben, who's described as a former porn performer and now an activist against the illegally operating porn industry in California? Lubben claimed that she suffered much at the hands of the porn industry and their illegal activities and hazardous work conditions I was subjected to. Here, Lubben spoke on the Truth Behind the Fantasy of Porn.

The finale was PornHarms.com founder Patrick Trueman.

A Kiwi horror film that shows an unconscious girl being raped by a man wearing a pig's head should be banned, say nutter campaigners.

Wound is described by its creators as a shocking supernatural tale of mental illness, bondage, incest, revenge and explicit graphic violence.

It features disturbing scenes including a pregnant woman being hit on the stomach with a bat to induce a miscarriage.

Wound is due to premiere at the New Zealand Film Festival in July if approved for release by the chief censor Bill Hastings.

But it has 'enraged' the nutters of Family First. National director Bob McCoskrie said: Research clearly shows that explicit sexual content of this nature contributes to an increase in sexual violence. I can't see how incest and graphic violence can be presented in an entertaining way.

Director David Blyth defended the use of graphic violence, saying it was a social commentary on New Zealand: It's about sexual abuse in this country, no one else is talking about this. All my films have had a female theme and they all deal with the disenfranchised. I think it's important to find a place for movies of all kinds, and not just what the Film Commission approves.

Serbia's Islamic Community have protested against a photomontage published in the daily Blic and demanded a symbolic compensation of 100 million euros (124 million dollars).

Daily Blic ran a photomontage of the leader of the Islamic community Muamer Zukorlic dressed in an Orthodox Christian bishop robe.

We are demanding an apology from the editors and owner of Blic daily and a symbolic compensation of 100 million euros, the community said in a statement.

If Blic refuses, it will face charges and the Islamic Community will call all citizens to boycott the daily, the statement added. The Islamic Community said Muslims in Serbia were offended by the photomontage as it insults the deepest religious feelings of Muslims.

A controversy-courting Italian ice-cream maker has run an advert featuring a heavily pregnant nun with the strapline immaculately conceived.

40 people have complained to the advertising censors of the ASA saying that it is offensive to Christians because it mocks the birth of Jesus.

The ad, which is featured in magazines The Lady and Grazia, features a pregnant nun enjoying a pot of Antonio Federici ice-cream.

The Advertising Standards Authority has launched an investigation to see if the campaign breaks the advertising code on the grounds of taste and decency.

Matt O'Connor, creative director at the ice-cream company, argued that it is an intelligent, challenging and iconoclastic piece of advertising. O'Connor, who points out that he is an Irish Catholic himself.

Following publication of what Pakistan's government and religious leaders regard as blasphemous images on the Internet, the authorities successfully shut down Facebook access throughout the country. They are now moving to do the same with such sites as YouTube and Google. Last month more than 10,000 sites were banned on pretext of blasphemy.

On May 31st a High Court judge, Justice Ijaz Ahmad Chaudhry, ordered the government to take action in respect to alleged blasphemy on Facebook. On June 11th in consequence of this order, the Deputy Attorney General authorised and initiated the first stage of investigation and prosecution of Mark Zuckerberg, founder of Facebook.

The Deputy Attorney General on June 11th lodged with police a First Information Report (FIR) against the owner of Facebook.

A FIR is the document that Police register when a case is lodged against anyone. This document then becomes the prime source of evidence and on the basis the legal case will move.

The FIR refers to section 295-C of the Pakistan Penal Code, which reads Use of derogatory remarks, etc., in respect of the Holy Prophet. Whoever by words, either spoken or written, or by visible representation, or by any imputation, innuendo, or insinuation, directly or indirectly, defiles the sacred name of the Holy Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) shall be punished with death, or imprisonment for life, and shall also be liable to fine.

The actual FIR details the charge in respect of an offense under Section 295-C Pakistan Penal Code and punishment under this offense is death penalty or rigorous life imprisonment

The next hearing is scheduled for 12th July 2010. It is highly likely that this prosecution will be initiated in time for the 12th July hearing. At that point arrest papers may be issued and Zuckerberg will become a wanted felon.

In its recent attempt to capture that ever-important viral video demographic, Hyundai created a World Cup commercial which it first released on YouTube, in which, among other things, worshippers take Eucharist on their knees receiving slices of pizza rather than communion.

It's now been pulled by Hyundai after certain Catholic groups complained.

The ad begins with Latin singing in an Argentine church complete with a stained-glass window of a soccer ball. Worshippers (mocking the religious devotion some in Argentina have for the game) are taking Eucharist on their knees receiving slices of pizza rather that communion. The commercial also shows a soccer ball covered with a crown of thorns. It's all based, says Hyundai, on the Iglesia Maradoniana - the Maradona Church - in which followers worship Argentine soccer legend Diego Maradona.

The commercial aired on TV during the US-England game, provoking the largest uproar.  This ad is an outrageous affront to Catholics and a mockery of our most sacred beliefs and practices, said Fr. Marcel Taillon, a parish priest in Rhode Island.

It's one thing to gently poke fun at extreme devotion to sports, Deacon Greg Kandra wrote on Beliefnet.com: It's another to satirize Holy Mass by ridiculing its symbols, sacramentals and gestures.

It didn't take Hyundai long to apologise:

We take comments of this nature very seriously. Because of feedback like yours, we have removed the ad from all Hyundai communications and stopped airing it.

We credit the passionate World Cup viewers and Hyundai owners for raising this issue to us. The unexpected response created by the ad, which combined both soccer and religious motifs to speak to the passion of international soccer fans, prompted us to take a more critical and informed look at the spot. Though unintentional, we now see it was insensitive. We appreciate your feedback and hope you will accept our sincere apologies.

The ad is gone. But the awesome idea of serving pizza during communion lives on.

Nutter groups and Australian senators are launching a legal bid to reinstate the ban on the Italian film Salo.

Last month the Classification Board approved a DVD of the film, with explanations of its context. The move overturned a refusal of classification in 1998. Salo has also been cleared by the Review Board after the Home Affairs Minister, Brendan O'Connor, asked for a rethink.

Now FamilyVoice Australia, the Australian Christian Lobby and the Not So Liberal senators Julian McGauran and Guy Barnett have started a Federal Court appeal against the film's release. They will argue that approving the film's R18+ rating defied proper process and the law.

Our chief censors, by releasing this movie, have redefined paedophilia and its acceptance, Senator McGauran claimed: The movie shows disturbingly strong depictions of torture, degradation, sexual violence, mutilation.

The Pier Paolo Pasolini film, made in 1975, tells of four Fascists in Mussolini's Italy who kidnap teenagers and subject them to sexual and mental torture.

The political satirist Rory Bremner has claimed that the chilling effect of fundamentalism means that every time he writes a sketch about Islam he fears that he is signing his own death warrant.

Speaking to Sir David Frost in a BBC documentary about the future of satire, Bremner argued that self-censorship was the biggest problem for practitioners of topical comedy today.

Bremner spoke of fears for his own personal safety: The greatest danger now is that one of the toughest issues of our time is religion.  When [I'm] writing a sketch about Islam, I'm writing a line and I think, 'If this goes down badly, I'm writing my own death warrant there.' Because there are people who will say, 'Not only do I not think that's funny but I'm going to kill you' – and that's chilling.

If you're a Danish cartoonist and you work in a Western tradition, people don't take that too seriously. Suddenly you're confronted by a group of people who are fundamentalist and extreme and they say, 'We're going to kill you because of what you said or have drawn.' Where does satire go from there, because we like to be brave but not foolish.

Frost ludicrously said he was surprised that Bremner felt that his life could be placed in danger by telling a joke.

 Frost on Satire will be broadcast on BBC 4 on Thursday.

Religious imagery in Lady Gaga's new Alejandro video has infuriated Bill Donohue, of the Catholic League in the US, who bashed out a press release slamming the promo.

Lady Gaga is playing Madonna copy cat, squirming around half-naked with half-naked guys, abusing Catholic symbols – they're always Catholic symbols – while bleating out Alejandro enough times to induce vomit… She has now become the new poster girl for American decadence and Catholic bashing, sans the looks and talent of her role model.

The promo, which Gaga has called a celebration and an admiration of gay love, sees the saucy singer in her underwear writhing on a bed with semi-naked male dancers in a bondage-style scene. The video also shows Gaga dressed in a latex nuns' outfit, suggestively swallowing a set of rosary beads, and appears to include references to Madonna's famous videos for Like A Prayer and Vogue.

P Z Myers, over at Pharyngula, commented:

Donohue does have a point, I hate to say. I watched the whole thing, with its muscular young men gyrating in jackboots and tight shorts and nothing else, the weird headgear, the sadomasochistic imagery, the black leather uniforms, the flaming homoeroticism, and I was thinking, yeah, all that does remind me of Catholicism.

Retailers are selling high-heeled shoes to young girls according to parenting groups who fear the new fashion trend is prematurely sexualising children.

The trend was sparked by pictures of Suri Cruise, the three-year-old daughter of actors Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes, who is regularly photographed in sparkly heels.

Justine Roberts of Mumsnet, the parenting forum, said: Some of the shoes I have seen on sale look more suited to a lap-dancing club than the feet of a young girl. The items in question are prematurely sexualising young children. We are saying to retailers, 'Have a look at your range and ask yourselves if these items are appropriate. Some of the school shoes Tesco sells have got a two-inch heel. You shouldn't have a high heel if your feet are developing.

It's not about being Mary Whitehouse...[BUT]..It's about not sleepwalking into a world where this is normal. Young girls always want to dress up and emulate adults, and that's fine. But when the bulk of the range on offer is like this, then it is making our children grow up too fast.

Nicola Lamond of Netmums, another parenting group, said: I went shopping with my daughter and was horrified by how many shoes came with a high heel in sizes to fit girls as young as three. These shoes will be harder to walk in than flat shoes so I'd be worried my child would injure themselves.

A spokesman for Asda, which is currently selling a pair of Disney Princess children's sandals with a 3cm heel, said the retailer had received no customer complaints. A Next spokesman said: Their popularity suggests many parents agree we've come up with a look that's special without seeming inappropriately grown up. GapKids said their child heels had been tested to ensure safety.

Street adverts featuring women in bikinis have been defaced in apparently targeted attacks.

Most show women in swimwear by chain store H&M but another features a couple kissing to promote the Bollywood film Kites.

London residents suggested the images, which were daubed with black paint, could have been targeted by either religious or feminist nutters.

Women's rights and anti-censorship activists joined Muslims and Christians to condemn the vandals.

Police said 14 bus shelters around Tower Hamlets, including many in Limehouse, were hit last month. Residents told of similar damage in Waltham Forest. One said: It seems to be a dedicated group who obviously have some serious issues with these adverts.

After finding the black paint could be easily removed, the vandals switched to a sticky, tar-like substance which is harder to scrub off.

Agnes Callamard, of Article 19, a London-based organisation combating censorship, said: While one may dislike some ads and find them offensive, this cannot be a basis for blacking out' the picture.

Avedon Carol, of Feminists Against Censorship, said: The idea that somehow the image of women being sexy spreads all sorts of horribleness is reactionary and anti-women.

Minor league nutters have accused Ofcom of giving broadcasters a green-light to swear after consulting almost 130 people who largely thought offensive language was acceptable.

A study by the watchdog, which included special input for minority groups like those who are transgender or travellers, suggested people were willing to tolerate various swear words on TV throughout the day.

While Ofcom insists there have been no rule changes about swearing as a result of the research, the likes of Mediawatch-Uk fear the report will pave the way for a more permissive attitude to the problem.

Vivienne Pattison of Mediawatch UK said last night the findings did not reflect what her organisation was hearing. She said: It just doesn't ring true. I find it really surprising because in all the conversations I have the general view is that swearing is not acceptable pre-watershed at all.

Also it is not acceptable in society per se, one can't go into a shop and say things like that. That's why it is does seem bizarre that people would think it would be okay on television. I have been totally bamboozled by the science behind the survey.

Don Foster, the Not So Liberal Democrat MP for Bath, who before the election was the party's culture spokesman said the report was bizarre. He said: Some of the things they are saying are acceptable is frankly amazing. I hope it won't be used to give licence to the broadcasters to totally ignore what I think are real concerns about good taste. We have a responsibility to set standards and I think it is important that broadcasters don't just operate at the lowest common denominator. Nobody but nobody has come to me saying we want to see more swearing, it is the reverse, they want to see less of it.

An Ofcom spokesman said: The research was conducted to ensure that Ofcom continues to remain in tune with public expectations of what they hear on TV and radio. Our research shows that audiences remain concerned about a range of language that they find offensive. For this reason we are not considering any changes to our robust rules which protect the public, and in particular children, from offensive material.'

Denmark's answer to Lady Gaga, decided to put on a free concert in the southern Copenhagen suburb of Ishøj, home to one of Denmark's largest muslim communities.

But Medina, whose real name is Andrea Fuentealba Valbak, didn't get to sing more than a few notes before a hail of eggs began to rain down upon the stage. The perpetrators, reports tabloid B.T., were a gang of between 10 and 20 youngsters between the ages of 14 and 17 all with an immigrant background.

Their reason for attacking the songstress? Apart from taking exception to Medina's hot pants and sexually suggestive song lyrics, it appears that the gang were provoked by the singer's stage name which is also coincidentally the name of the second holiest city in Islam and the burial place of Mohammed.

With the backing of most of the 3,000 strong audience, Medina ripped into the trouble-makers and told them that their behaviour was disrupting the concert for everyone else. But the strain took its toll, and the pop star ended up leaving the stage in tears.

Her official Facebook page received hundreds of messages of support in the wake of the egg attack, and Medina was also defended by the muslim Conservative MP Naser Khader. In his blog he wrote that he gets just as angry as the singer when a tiny minority of troublemakers with misogynist beliefs use infantile or violent means to highlight their point of view and ruin things for everyone else.

Thousands of mass killers enjoying Pattaya nightlife

Since Bird killed 12 people last week, there has been widespread incredulity that this mild-mannered (according to some accounts) man could have harboured such lethal rage. The search for his motive focused first on a supposed family feud, moved on to a row with other taxi drivers and has even encompassed being made a fool of by a Thai woman.

Bird travelled regularly to Pattaya in southern Thailand and acquaintances describe him as in love with the woman, who is said to have accepted at least £1,000 from him before breaking off the relationship by text. I am far from satisfied with these accounts

...

Pattaya, the resort Bird visited regularly, isn't a beach paradise. It's a centre of Thailand's deeply exploitative sex trade, where foreign men go to pay for sex – it costs as little as £10 – with young Thai girls and women who have been forced into it by poverty. Here is the account of a barman, Chris Bulmer, who knew Bird and witnessed his transactions with women who worked as prostitutes:

He slept with a few of my girls upstairs and soon got a taste for it … But in the end he would only want to see one young lady in particular. She was about 22 and pretty. He became obsessed. He loved her and whenever he came back he would immediately find her, compensate the bar [probably he said 'pay the bar fine'] and take her away. She was his. And that was how he saw it.

The barman told the Sun that Bird was besotted and fell into a rage if the young woman wasn't available whenever he wanted her. In the end, according to Bulmer, she became terrified of Bird and ran away.

...

The widespread cultural imperative to normalise sex tourism by Western men in south-east Asia is a barrier to admitting how damaging the trade is to women. But it also does something else: prevent us from seeing at an earlier stage that there is something very seriously wrong with men like Bird.

 ...Read the full article

A Catholic priest at a Dominican Republic resort town wants to destroy artwork in his parish because the painting shows angels with a homosexual expression.

This confuses the faithful, he argues. The painting named Allegory of the Virgin of Carmen, was concluded 12 years ago by Dominican artist Roberto Flores.

The artwork adorns the interior of the church of Our Lady of Carmen. The priest argues that the church congregation feels uncomfortable by the painting and that the mural does not inspire religious sentiments because the angels there depicted have a diabolical, homosexual look in their faces. Further, he contends that it is not clear whether the angels are male or female.

A few weeks ago, Comedy Central announced that it had a new program in development called JC that is about Jesus Christ who moves to New York to escape his father's enormous shadow.

In response, a collection of Religious Right leaders have banded together to form Citizens Against Religious Bigotry.

The coalition of Jewish and Christian leaders are urging advertisers to boycott the show, based on Comedy Central programs, such as South Park, which have mocked or disparaged Christ and other religious leaders.

After we reveal the vile and offensive nature of Comedy Central's previous characterizations of Jesus Christ and God the Father, we expect these advertisers to agree wholeheartedly to end their advertising on Comedy Central and discontinue their support for unabashed, anti-Christian discrimination, said Brent Bozell, president of Media Research Center and founding member of Citizens Against Religious Bigotry.

Bowell said his group will publicize advertisers who agree to boycott the Comedy Central show and those who refuse.

Others joining the group protest are Family Research Council president; Michael Medved, syndicated talk radio host; Bill Donohue, Catholic League president; Tim Winter, Parents Television Council president; and Rabbi Daniel Lapin, The American Alliance of Jews and Christians president.

The group is sending a letter to potential advertisers, giving them two weeks to report on whether they will agree to boycott the program, warning that failure to respond will mean they support religious bigotry:

Oh here we go! Straight after a major violent tragedy the right-wing tabloid press go looking for something slightly controversial and try to link it with said major violent tragedy in order to milk the said major violent tragedy further.

When there is nothing more to say about the major violent tragedy let's go try to link the major violent tragedy with something else so we can say more about it and keep selling our newspapers and bleed as much out of the slaughter of innocent members of the public as possible!

Sickening anyone?

Shocked parents brand Lady Gaga's bloody stage show as sickening in wake of Cumbria slaughter

See article from dailymail.co.uk

She's not exactly known for her squeaky-clean image and has been no stranger to controversy during her rise to fame. But has Lady Gaga possibly taken things too far this time?

The singer was slammed by horrified fans after she she pretended to be murdered and eaten on stage by a crazed psycho killer, just hours after the horrific shooting spree across Cumbria.

Blood-splattered: Lady Gaga on stage in Manchester last night after acting out a scene in which she was attacked by a psycho killer which left thousands of fans horrified

Thousands of fans and parents who had taken their children to the concert at the MEN Arena in Manchester looked on in horror as the 24-year old singer, who was dressed in a skimpy leather basque, was ambushed from behind by a gothic man dressed in black, who then appeared to bite into her neck before fake blood spurted down the front of chest.

The scene on stage came just hours after cab driver Derrick Bird killed 12 in a gun rampage in Cumbria and just days after Crossbow Cannibal suspect Stephen Griffiths was charged with murdering three prostitutes in Bradford, West Yorkshire.

...

Controversial metal group Mayhem is playing its first ever New Zealand gig later this year and the nutters are predictably not happy.

The band is considered to be one of the most important in the influential Norwegian black metal scene, gaining notoriety early in their career with violent stage shows, the singer committing suicide and the bass player being found guilty of murder and church burnings.

Family First NZ says Mayhem should be avoided: Any band that glorifies issues such as drug use, suicide, and negative behaviours associated with Satanism should be given a wide berth, Bob McCoskrie of Family First NZ told 3news.co.nz: We would ask that the censorship board do a pre-approval of their performance and lyrics to ensure they're not breaking the law in encouraging illegal activity and containing offensive material.

3news.co.nz spoke to concert promoter Gareth Craze of RW Entertainment about the show, which takes place at the Kings Arms Tavern, September 21.

We asked should people be concerned for their safety if they attend the Auckland gig? Craze answered: Absolutely. If there is one show this year where one can reasonably expect one's safety to be compromised by the performing act, this is the one. With the history this band have, it would be flat out ludicrous for one to attend this show with an expectation of being safe, unmolested and unsubjected to offence.

Mayhem's 1994 album De Mysteriis Dom Sathanas is widely regarded as one of the black metal genre's greatest masterpieces, however its release was extremely troubled. Work on the album began in the late 80s, but was halted when singer Dead committed suicide in 1991 by shooting himself in the head. Band mate and Mayhem founder Euronymous took photos of Dead's body before calling the police, and allegedly made a stew with pieces of Dead's brain, and necklaces with fragments of his skull.

In 1993 Euronymous was stabbed to death by Mayhem's bass player at the time, Varg Vikernes, who performs as solo act Burzum to this day. Vikernes was sentenced to 21 years in prison for the murder, and was also found guilty of a string of arson attacks on Norwegian churches.

Javier Krahe is one of the most popular left wing singer-songwriters in Spain, but he also likes to express himself in other artistic ways. In 1978 he recorded a clip called Cooking Christ. Christ is taken off a crucifix and is cut up, spread with butter and put into the oven, before becoming a delicious dish!

On 15 December 2004, Spanish channel Canal+ showed the clip as a part of an interview with Krahe. According to right wing site HazteOir, Canal+ received more than 10,000 letters protesting about the broadcast.

Now the Thomas More Law Studies Center has presented a criminal prosecution stating that broadcasting such material goes against Article 525 of the Spanish Penal Code, which punishes offending religious beliefs. The court now asks Krahe to pay €192,000, and the TV channel to pay €144.000.

Government-run Jobcentres are offering unemployed women jobs on X-rated websites.

Jobseekers are told they can earn up to £700 a week if they strip naked on webcams and have sexually explicit conversations with customers.

Women looking for clerical work were given applications for sex line jobs when they went to sign on at Jobcentre Plus offices in Birmingham, Warwickshire and Shropshire.

The job adverts have sparked nutter 'outrage', with Birmingham MP Khalid Mahmood demanding an official inquiry.

A spokeswoman for Mediawatch-UK called for the adverts to be removed immediately and said: Can you imagine being the parent of an 18-year-old who is sent down to the job centre and offered that sort of job? It's just one step away from prostitution, and it's hardly a meaningful job for life is it?

When contacted by Sky News, the Department for Work and Pensions said it was now reviewing its procedures. A spokeswoman said: We are aware of public concern about advertising these vacancies. We have undertaken a public consultation on this issue and we are reviewing existing policy in light of the responses received.

Comment: Wanted: Nutter Campaign Spokesperson, Must be able to spout bollox on any issue at short notice

From Dan

The issue for Viv isn't really that jobs for these sex chat websites are being advertised in the Job Centre it's that she objects to these sex chat websites being available at all.

Mediawatch UK's campaign against sexual entertainment isn't about where it's being advertised but about trying to get rid of it completely!

"It's just one step away from prostitution."

Erm, not really though is it?

"It's hardly a meaningful job for life is it?"

Probably not but 95% of jobs advertised in the Job Centre aren't meaningful jobs of life!

Update: Moral Censorship

27th May 2010. Based on article from jarrowandhebburngazette.com

The recruitment ad looking for X-rated internet stars has been pulled. The Jobcentre Plus office, in Chapter Row, South Shields, was running a posting for webcam performers for adult website Faceclick, paying £700 per week .

A spokesman for the Department for Work and Pensions claimed it was not removed due to its nature, but because they couldn't confirm it was genuine. He added: To make sure jobs advertised with us are genuine, we will approach employers for further information. If we aren't able to get the information we need, we will withdraw the advert until we can.

Ronnie James Dio's public memorial on May 30 looks set to be disrupted by nutters of the Westboro Baptist Church, who oppose his supposed links with the devil.

Dio passed away on May 16 after losing his battle with cancer.

The 'church' are already known throughout the US for their hatred of homosexuality and for picketing funerals. Their current website schedule sees them accuse Dio, who pioneered the so-called devil horn sign and was the frontman of Black Sabbath, of worshipping the devil, encouraging violence and hating god.

They are asking members to attend Dio's public funeral in Los Angeles to remind you who worship that old serpent, Satan, that your time is very short.

Driving my little girl to school the other morning, we had the radio playing in the background as usual.

But while I chatted to my seven-year-old about preparing her costume for the school's open day, I began to notice the lyrics of the song that was playing.

Hey rude boy, is you big enough? Hey rude boy can you get it up? sang American pop star Rihanna.

Had it not been for my daughter's presence in the car, I probably wouldn't have batted an eyelid. After all, it was a mainstream station and she's a mainstream singer.

So as I fumbled to change stations it hit me that this was just another instance of how desensitised we have become to the sexual language and imagery that pervades our everyday lives.

...Read full article

Perth's Town of Vincent is embroiled in a tiff over its decision to allow a play about the history of Israel to be presented at a town hall, despite the production being branded anti-Semitic by Perth's Jewish leaders.

Seven Jewish Children: A Play for Gaza is a 10-minute, six-page play by British playwright Caryl Churchill covering events over 70 years such as the Holocaust, Palestinian suicide attacks and the 2008 Gaza invasion.

Throughout the play Jewish adults discuss what, if anything, their children should be told of the events.

Plans by Friends of Palestine Western Australia to have a reading at the North Perth Town Hall have been attacked by the Jewish Community Council of Western Australia, which is petitioning the local council to cancel the booking.

Council president Tony Tate, who yesterday admitted he had not read the play, said it was offensive and in parts based on the libel that Jewish people killed children in order to use their blood for religious rituals.

But Friends of Palestine WA convenor Alex Whisson and director Vivienne Glance disagreed the play was racially vilifying, saying attempts to block the play were an attack on free speech and artistic liberty.

Town of Vincent chief executive John Giorgi, who said he had received threatening phone calls over the matter, said the production met booking requirements and it was not the role of local government to act as a censor.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (Peta) have whinged over the use of Pit Bulls as a fully fledged combat item. in the Mafia Wars online social game.

Developer Zynga has responded and now removed the dog as a fighting tool.

PETA noted that Countless social gamers stopped plowing their FarmVille fields long enough to voice their objections to Zynga about the game's negative depiction of this most used-and-abused breed, and the company quickly responded in just the right way.

Mafia Wars is obviously only a game, but the suffering endured by thousands of pit bulls who are treated as if they were nothing more than burglar alarms or fighting machines is very real, stated PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman: By removing Mafia Wars' virtual pit bull, Zynga is no longer perpetuating the mindset that it's acceptable to chain, neglect, and abuse real dogs.

The nutters of the All-Polish Committee for the Defence Against Sects is going singer Dorota Rabczewska.

Better known as Doda, she gave a TV interview last year in which she said of the Bible:

it is hard to believe in something written by people who drank too much wine and smoked herbal cigarettes.

This was too much for APCDAS. The chairman Ryszard Nowak said:

It is clear that Doda thinks that the Bible was written by drunkards and junkies. [...] I believe that she committed a crime and offended the religious feelings of both Christians and Jews.

If convicted, Doda faces up to two years in prison.

Egyptian Christians have called for government action against the author of a widely read novel they say insults Christianity, in an unusual case that puts freedom of expression in Muslim-majority Egypt under fresh scrutiny.

Government investigators are looking into the complaint filed by a group of Egyptian and some foreign Copts against Youssef Ziedan, a Muslim who wrote the 2008 award-winning novel Azazeel (Beelzebub).

Egyptian law prohibits insults against Islam, Christianity and Judaism, and Ziedan could be sent to jail for up to five years if prosecuted and found guilty.

They accuse me of insulting Christianity ... It's a serious crime and this is a big shock to people, especially since the novel has been so successful, Ziedan said.

Azazeel, which won the 2009 International Prize for Arabic Fiction, backed by the Booker Prize Foundation, tells the story of a 5th-century Egyptian monk who witnesses debates over doctrine between early Christians.

Mamdouh Ramzi, a Coptic lawyer who is among the group that have complained about Ziedan, said the novel is offensive to Christians: He insulted priests and bishops and said many things with no proof or evidence from books or history ... He is not a Christian man, what does he know about the Church?

The case has been joined by Coptic groups in the United States, the Netherlands, Canada and Austria.

In 1983, George Rekers joined James Dobson and a handful of others in founding the Family Research Council (FRC).

The FRC has featured on several Melon Farming pages for publishing anti porn propaganda research; campaigning against Marriott hotels having in room porn channels and speaking against gay rights legilsation.

Last month, Rekers was reportedly discovered returning from an overseas trip with a rent boy:

On April 13, the rent boy (whom we'll call Lucien) arrived at Miami International Airport after a ten-day, fully subsidized trip to Europe. He was soon followed out of customs by an old man pushing an overburdened baggage cart.

That man was George Alan Rekers, of North Miami — the callboy's client and, as it happens, one of America's most prominent anti-gay activists.

Rekers, a Baptist minister who is a leading scholar for the Christian right, left the terminal with his gay escort, looking a bit discomfited when a picture of the two was snapped with a hot-pink digital camera.

Reached by New Times before a trip to Bermuda, Rekers said he learned Lucien was a prostitute only midway through their vacation. I had surgery, Rekers said: and I can't lift luggage. That's why I hired him. (Though medical problems didn't stop him from pushing the tottering baggage cart through MIA.)

Apple have been pandering to the censorial nutters of the Parents Television Council. So perhaps no surprises that the PTC are singing the praises of Apple.

But of course the nutters now think that they get the same level of censorship from other platforms such as Android.

Parents Television Council targeted the App Store earlier this year over concerns that some apps could be accessible to children, that App Store pages had Web links that led to yet more supposedly objectionable content, and that in the case where Parental Controls were activated, kids could still browse and preview these apps.

Apple ultimately responded by cleaning out a number of these 'contentious' apps and started blocking screenshots in iTunes in addition to the blocks already present in the on-device App Store app.

PTC applauded Apple's actions. Apple has taken a positive first step towards eliminating kids' access to sexually explicit and pornographic content on its product lineup and we applaud the company's efforts, the group's president, Tim Winter, said in a statement.

PTC now thinks other mobile platforms need to take similar measures.

Steve Jobs recently dinged the Android platform as being a porn phone during Apple's iPhone OS 4.0 unveiling, partly by virtue of its ability to run any app from any source. You know, there's a porn store on Android and it has nothing but porn apps, Jobs told journalists during a Q&A session. You can download them; your kids can download them.

PTC agrees with Jobs that this is a problem, as no other smartphone platform offers a system like Parental Controls. We plan to draw attention to other platforms, such as Android, or Verizon's Vcast service, that aren't really doing anything, PTC's Gavin McKiernan told Ars. We definitely want to see progress from some of the other handheld devices.

The Daily Mail seemed to have gone a little over the top with a particularly sad rant about Dr Who.

Paul Revoir wrote:

It is billed as one of the BBC's most popular family shows. But Doctor Who fans have accused the corporation of cynically trying to sex up the programme to attract more adult viewers.

Dozens have complained about an overtly sexual scene in last Saturday's episode, which saw the Time Lord being propositioned by his new assistant Amy Pond. Sexed up? The Doctor will face a group of scantily-clad vampires in this week's episode

Karen Gillan's character was shown lying seductively on a bed, before lunging at the Doctor, trying to undress him against the Tardis and kissing him.

She then joked about how long it had been since the 907-year-old Time Lord last had sex and claimed she didn't mind if they had a one-night-stand.

Afterwards, a trailer for a forthcoming episode, to be screened on Saturday, revealed the plot centres around a group of young women vampires, scantily dressed in low-cut nightdresses.

Last night, fans reacted angrily to what they claim is the sexualisation of the show, saying the material was totally inappropriate for a family drama.

Even the inevitable trivial sound bite from Mediawatch-UK didn't exactly support the Daily Mail nonsense:

Vivienne Pattison, of pressure group Mediawatch UK, who watched last Saturday's episode, which went out at 6.25pm on BBC1, said: I have to say the scene was slightly out of place in a children's programme. I thought it sailed pretty close to the wind.

But the Daily Mail can always fall back on a few internet forums to find a bit of nutter 'outrage':

One viewer told the BBC's messageboard: I wish to complain about the overtly sexual scene. This programme is designed as a family series, so showing Amy Pond trying to get the Doctor into bed was wholly inappropriate. As a life-long fan I thought the series was above all that. I trust this is not a trend that will continue.

Another added: Amy Pond literally wanted to have sex with the Doctor, on the bed, right there and then. It is totally inappropriate for what is essentially children's TV.

Viewers have also posted messages on parents' website Mumsnet criticising the episode. One read: Just watched this on tape and am very disappointed. Why on earth do they have to have her asking him for casual sex?

And at east the BBC get a chance to add a little perspective:

A BBC spokesman confirmed it had received 43 complaints, saying: Millions of Doctor Who fans watched and enjoyed last Saturday's episode, including the lighthearted and humorous scene in which Amy kissed the Doctor.

Christopher Tookey recently wrote of the somewhat strident internet criticism he received about his over the top Daily Mail Kick-Ass review.

Mediasnoops then commented on this piece and Tookey responded:

The attacks on me are all the more bizarre as many critics said almost exactly the same that I did.

One of the youngest national critics in the UK, Tim Robey of the Daily Telegraph, shared my view that the Hit-Girl character, a foul-mouthed, murderous 11 year-old, is a deeply icky fetish figure who should set all sorts of schoolgirl-porn alarm bells ringing.

In the Sunday Telegraph, Mike McCahill complained about the amount of cold, unfelt violence: clearly, at the Methusalean age of 32, I fall outside the designated demographic, but then again I am old enough to remember plenty of films based on comic books that didn't so obviously resemble instructional videos for sociopaths.

Reviewers for the Observer and Mail on Sunday also found the film despicable. Even Kevin Maher in the Times, who praised the film's action sequences, acknowledged that morally, Kick-Ass tends to drift into the abyss, and certainly the pig-tailed sexy-assassin poses of Hit-Girl are problematic.

...See full article

Don't be fooled by the hype: This crime against cinema is twisted, cynical, and revels in the abuse of childhood

Millions are being spent to persuade you that Kick-Ass is harmless, comic-book entertainment suitable for 15-year-olds.

Don't let them fool you. Kick-Ass has been so hyped that it is certain to be a hit. It is also bound be among the most influential movies of 2010. And that should disturb us all.

It deliberately sells a perniciously sexualised view of children and glorifies violence, especially knife and gun crime, in a way that makes it one of the most deeply cynical, shamelessly irresponsible films ever.

...See full review

Update: Certain to be a hit

21st April 2010. Based on article from myfoxmaine.com

Kick-Ass pulled in $19.8 million for its opening weekend to become the US box office leader.

That's not the $25-30 million the studio and industry thought it would pull in, but they'll take the No. 1 slot and hope good word of mouth fuels the buzzworthy flick.

Offsite: How I fell foul of the internet lynch mob

Thanks to Dan
30th April 2010. Based on article from dailymail.co.uk by Christopher Tookey

An unkind remark that most of us would never say to another person's face becomes much easier to express from the safety of a computer keyboard. Add to that the poisonous effect of anonymity - the ability to say anything you like without being held accountable - and, too often, any sense of proportion or civility is abandoned online.

I can say this with authority because I recently joined the ranks of the cyber-bullied, thanks to a review I wrote in the Daily Mail on April 2. It dealt with a film called Kick-Ass, by Jonathan Ross's wife Jane Goldman, which features a youth who decides to become a super-hero despite having no special powers.

The reason I found the movie so objectionable was that its most violent, foul-mouthed and sexually aggressive character, Hit-Girl, was an 11-year-old.

I called attention to the glaringly obvious sexual overtones in the deliberately glamorous, fetishistic way in which Hit-Girl and her startlingly violent behaviour is portrayed, and in her sexually explicit vocabulary. The movie's writers clearly wanted the audience to see Hit-Girl not only as cool, but also as sexy, like an even younger version of the baby-faced oriental assassin in Quentin Tarantino's Kill Bill. Paedophiles, I wrote, are going to adore her.

The Daily Mail often sets the news agenda, and I knew my review would provoke debate. What I hadn't anticipated is that it would result in an avalanche of vitriolic personal abuse - much of it simply too obscene to be repeated here.

Hundreds of bloggers, twitterers and Facebook fiends weighed in, creating websites dedicated to destroying my character and levelling the most outrageous accusations against me.

...Read the full article

A group of nutter Egyptian lawyers have filed a communiqué to the Prosecutor General in order to confiscate A Thousand and One Nights book and imprison its publishers.

They claim that the heritage script is offensive to public decency.

The lawyers filed their complaint as per article #178 of the penal code, which fines and punishes with imprisonment for a period of two years anyone who published literature, pictures, offensive to public decency.

The Arabic Network for Human Rights Information (ANHRI) has said that the failure of the Egyptian government to take a clear stance regarding the religious and political Hesba cases (private actions) has encouraged more religious extremists and publicity seekers to join the “Actio popularis” team.

Gamal Eid, ANHRI executive director said, Demanding the confiscation of a heritage book and a creativity piece , such as A Thousand and One Nights, is a crime in essence . We will not be silent regarding these cases . ANHRI legal aid unit for freedom of expression will lead the defense of these writers and intellectuals who are exposed to an unfair crackdown by those publicity seekers. These writers and intellectuals insist on handing over historical and cultural treasures to the Egyptian reader and making them accessible to the Egyptian citizen just like other citizens in other countries that respect freedom of expression and freedom of creativity.

Another analysis of modern films found that movies rated PG show cigarette use, with smoking also prominent in features granted 12 or 12A certificates.

The researchers also warned that active product placement may still be taking place, with British films more likely to feature specific tobacco brands than their US equivalents.

The analysis of the 15 most-popular films to screen in UK cinemas each year since 1989 was carried out by the UK Centre for Tobacco Control Studies. It scrutinised 300 films, recording how often tobacco use and smoking paraphernalia, such as cigarette packs, lighters, ashtrays, or a particular brand, appeared.

While it found that the prevalence of tobacco imagery has fallen dramatically over the past two decades, there remained notable exceptions. Tobacco, or tobacco by association, appeared in 70% of the films reviewed, over half of which had been given a 15 classification by the BBFC. Brand appearances were nearly twice as likely to occur in films with UK involvement, it added. It singled out two successful home-grown productions, Bridget Jones's Diary and About a Boy, for stern criticism.

Ailsa Lyons, a PhD student at the University of Nottingham who led the study, said the findings demonstrated the need for the BBFC to review its guidance on smoking in films in order to protect vulnerable youngsters.

She said: Although smoking imagery and branding images in the most popular films have become substantially less common over the past 20 years, it is apparent that children and young people watching films in the UK are still exposed to frequent and, at times specifically branded, tobacco imagery, particularly in films originating from the UK. More consistent application of BBFC guidance could dramatically reduce this exposure and protect children and young people from damaging imagery, and encourage film makers to avoid tobacco imagery without compromising artistic freedoms or factual accuracy.

Professor John Britton, head of the university's epidemiology and public health division and the report's co-author, added: It is well established that tobacco companies used films to promote tobacco products for many years, and adolescents who view tobacco use in film and who admire the lead actors whose characters smoke, were likely to view smoking favourably.

The BBFC said the idea of imposing an 18 rating on films which feature smoking was not going to happen, with the only exception being where a film actively promoted the habit.

The findings are published in the latest British Medical Journal's Thorax publication.

Christians are 'appalled' that Ottawa is giving the green light to a Canadian pay TV pornography channel that will encourage and sustain a homegrown adult entertainment industry.

The channel, called Vanessa, will begin airing Oct. 28. Montreal-based Sex-Shop Television licensed the channel in 2007 as a national pay TV service. The licence requires Vanessa to air 20% of Canadian programming. But it's only now launching the French-language adult subscription channel in Quebec for $14.95 a month, with an English-language counterpart promised for the rest of Canada in late 2011.

Don Hutchinson, director of law and public policy for the Evangelical Fellowship of Canada, is 'outraged' that the Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission (CRTC) is in effect, supporting a pornography industry that will lure young Canadians.

We have an official government body saying that a pornography industry must exist in Canada, Hutchinson said: Studies have shown that there are various levels of corruption, from organized crime to engagement in human trafficking and prostitution that are all affiliated directly with the pornography industry. The types of violent and explicitly sexual portrayals that are displayed in pornography reduce people to objects, Hutchinson said. [perhaps better to turn people into objects rather than turning them into paedophiles, which seems to be where church sexual repression often leads].

The CRTC, Canada's TV watchdog, said the pornography channel must follow industry codes on violence and equitable portrayals of the sexes.

The new service, billed as Canada's Playboy Channel, promises a range of erotic-themed dramas, reality shows, documentaries and variety and magazine shows. The Quebec broadcaster also will broadcast its soft-core pornographic content in HD.

Canadian cable and satellite TV services already feature a host of XXX-rated pay TV adult content, but they source the programming from U.S. suppliers.

Hutchinson said the Canadian pornography station will be given some form of preference, likely a lower channel number that will result in higher viewership.

He also lamented that while the CRTC has approved new pornography channels, it also recently rejected two applications for Christian radio stations in the Ottawa area.

The Evangelical Fellowship of Canada will now try to convince Canadians not to subscribe to the Vanessa channel: If it goes on air and it doesn't have enough subscribers, then the channel will die of a natural death.

Late on a weekday afternoon and I'm sitting at my computer. On the screen in front of me are two small boxes - little video streams - one above the other. My face is in the bottom box. The face and bare torso of a man is in the one on top. Let's call him Gerry.

Beside Gerry's face is a box into which we can type, so that we can chat to one another. So he types hello and then asks where I come from. I say hello back and tell him I am from London.

Our exchange has lasted barely seconds, but suddenly another message pops up. He's asking me if I will remove my top so he can see my breasts. Olivia Lichtenstein and Francesca

He is a complete stranger, and one of the many crude and deviant men I have encountered in the past 30 minutes.

I quickly click a button to have him removed from my screen.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is the world of Chatroulette - an internet site that is turning into something of a phenomenon.

...read full article

Episode 200 of South Park has provoked the wrath of a radical Muslim group which took offence at the depiction of the prophet Mohammed.

In the episode entitled 200?, Tom Cruise and a host of celebrities previously insulted by the town of South Park threaten a class action suit against unless Mohammed is brought in. Cruise tells the boys that he has always wanted to meet the prophet, but he reveals the real reason for the demand to his co-complainants:

Mohammed has a power that makes him impervious to being made fun of. What if we could harness that power?

Now Revolutionmuslim.com, released a YouTube video featuring the words of a sermon by Anwar a-Awlaki played over images of the murdered Theo van Gogh, Salman Rushdie, Ayan Hirsi Ali, Lars Vilks, Kurt Westergaard, and South Park creators Trey Parker and Matt Stone:

We have to warn Matt and Trey that what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh for airing this show. This is not a threat, but a warning of the reality of what will likely happen to them

Update: Spooked by Islamic Death Threats

23rd April 2010. Based on article from entertainment.timesonline.co.uk

An American television network has blocked global internet broadcasts of an episode of South Park featuring the Prophet Muhammad after death threats from an Islamic group.

The 201st edition of the satirical animation was aired on Comedy Central last night but only after the channel had introduced a slew of audio and visual obfuscations in addition to the self-censorship applied by the programme's makers.

Trey Stone and Matt Parker, the cartoon's creators, were warned this week that they would be killed if they were seen to continue mocking the Prophet after an episode broadcast. It included a character representing Muhammad, who spoke from inside a giant bear suit to prevent the illustrators having to depict him — a blasphemous act according to some Muslims.

The latest episode also featured Muhammad, but not before it was sent to Comedy Central by Stone and Parker with a black silhouette marked CENSORED in place of the bear. Every mention of the Prophet was also bleeped out.

Despite the programme-makers' alterations, Comedy Central added more bleeps and have now stopped the original episode being played on the South Park website.

The dispute comes after a little-known American group calling itself Revolution Muslim posted a message on its website warning Stone and Parker that what they are doing is stupid and they will probably wind up like Theo Van Gogh for airing this show.

Update: Lining up to take easy offence at South Park

25th April 2010. Based on article from thesundayleader.lk

Sr Lanka's Sunday Leader has uncovered a 'shocking' new example of the West's contempt for Buddhist culture and values.

On two recent episodes of the popular American television show South Park, the Lord Buddha is depicted as a drug addict, graphically snorting several lines of cocaine.

When contacted by The Sunday Leader, Ministry of Religious Affairs and Moral Uplift Secretary H. M. Herath expressed his indignation over the show's contents. We are going to forward this to the responsible authorities, Herath vowed. We will take it to the Sangha and to the Buddhist Congress. This is defamation to every religion. It is a crime and hurts others' beliefs, which shouldn't be done by any person. We should respect other people's beliefs.

When asked what action the Ministry of Religious Affairs would take, Herath said that he would ban the show, and even the entire TV series from coming to Sri Lanka. However, Herath would not say whether he would attempt to prevent the sale of South Park DVDs, which are widely available in Colombo.

The Sunday Leader has learned that Lord Buddha is a recurring character on South Park. He is portrayed as member of the Super Best Friends, along with Jesus, Lord Krishna, Lao Tzu, and other religious leaders. In the television show's 200th episode last week, the Super Friends defend the fictional town of South Park, Colorado against a class-action lawsuit by a group of Hollywood celebrities led by Tom Cruise.

The show depicts Jesus scolding the Buddha for his drug abuse. The Buddha takes a rolled-up dollar bill and snorts several white lines of cocaine off the table. Buddha, don't do coke in front of kids! Jesus tells him.

In the most recent episode, the Buddha is again seen snorting lines of cocaine. Jesus tells him that his drug addiction is becoming a problem. The Buddha responds by pointing out that Jesus is watching internet porn. Jesus then says Internet porn isn't the same as doing coke, fag!

Switzerland's public television service TSR has agreed to the Catholic Church's request to remove what the church said were offending cartoons.

Cartoonist Philippe Becquelin, who goes by the name of Mix n Remix, had prepared a series of cartoons about priests and sexual abuse for the TSR Infrarouge programme, but the Catholic Church in Switzerland asked that they be removed from the Internet, which TSR did.

Family First New Zealand claims that 2/3'rds of New Zealanders are concerned about the level of 'foul' language, violence and sexual content during family viewing times and it is time that the Broadcasting Standards and Advertising Standards Authorities were made to reflect nutter concerns about what they are allowing.

In a poll of 1,000 New Zealanders, respondents were asked, Television broadcasters are obliged to protect children from sexual content, violent material, and language that exceeds current norms of good taste and decency. Are you concerned about the type of language used, or the level of violence and sex shown on TV before 8.30 pm when children are likely to be watching?, 65% said they are concerned, 29% said they aren't, and 6% didn't know or refused to answer.

Ironically, this comes just after a report by the BSA trying to argue that people are becoming less offended by foul language in the media, says Bob McCoskrie, National Director of Family First NZ.

The BSA and ASA argue that their standards are reflecting community standards. However, it is quite clear that as they allow broadcasters and advertisers to push the boundaries, the standards are lowered by default, offensive material becomes more mainstream, and are then used far more in the media. But now we know that NZ'ers are hugely concerned by this trend.

A Family First investigation of 15 programmes on four free-to-air channels between 6pm and 8.30pm in 2008 found a saturation of foul language, sexual innuendo, and promotion of Adult Only programmes.

Words featured during supposed family viewing times included bitch, fuck, ass, piss, bastard, bloody, and included expressions such as holy fuck, sex with your mother, shove bottle up his ass , and ass bitch . Among the worst offenders was Two And A Half Men which screens on TV2 at 7.30pm. Offensive language included son of a bitcg , damn hell, ass , and constant sexual talk including references to licking, stiffy, orgasms, and masturbation.

Also of huge concern was the number of programmes which are rated for Adult viewing only screening well after the watershed time of 8.30, yet were promoted between 6pm and 8.30pm.

The term 'broadcasting standards' and 'advertising standards' are complete oxymorons. Parents do not want their children bombarded with foul language, violence, and sexual content - yet broadcasters are pushing the boundaries with little to no retribution, says McCoskrie: The BSA and the ASA are the last places to look for a moral conscience and standards appropriate for families.

Alex Reid DOES act out rape in his horrific new film - despite him and his wife Jordan protesting he doesn't.

In the horrific movie Killer Bitch, Reid's character sickeningly forces the girlfriend of a man he has killed to have full sex twice in a wood.

As the first newspaper to have seen the straight-to-DVD shocker, we can reveal there are SIX other explicit sex scenes, including one of a stomach-churning group rape and another featuring a topless dwarf. But Alex, 34, and his spouse have always denied the film glorifies rape - with Jordan causing a furore last September when she told of her own rape ordeal.

News of the World movie critic Robbie Collin says: This is the shoddiest excuse for a film I've seen in my life. It's Alex's first acting job for eight years. Well, when I say acting. He's having a crack. Both he and co-star Yvette Rowland have strenuously denied the film is porn. You're telling me. The production values on Milfs Like It Big were much higher.

A prominent Roman Catholic bishop in Mexico blamed eroticism on television and Internet pornography for child abuse by priests, in the latest nonsense comments on sex scandals in the church.

With so much invasion of eroticism, sometimes it's not easy to stay celibate or to respect children, Bishop Felipe Arizmendi said during an annual meeting of Mexican bishops.

If on television and on the Internet and in so many media outlets there is pornography, it is very difficult to stay pure and chaste, said Arizmend: Obviously when there is generalized sexual freedom it's more likely there could be cases of pedophilia.

The bishop was in charge of the formation of priests for two decades in Mexico but said that loose morals in society had made it difficult to keep seminarians committed to the faith.

A Philippines Catholic bishop wants to knock the mixed martial arts sport, Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC), off the airwaves, saying it is destructive and un-Christian.

Bishop Leonardo Medroso of Tagbilaran, Bohol, said UFC is proving to be a negative influence on the youth: The people [are] becoming barbaric over this. It's makes us like animals, Medroso said over the Church-run Radio Veritas.

The bishop called on the Movie and Television Review and Classification Board to consider his call to ban UFC from television, saying it promotes violence. Christianity promotes civilization and the acts being shown in the UFC program certainly do not conform with it, Medroso said.

Medroso said he was baffled why many people enjoy the sight of two men pummelling each other until they are bruised and bloodied: The unfortunate thing about this UFC is the way people cheer when a player is bloodied and unconscious on the floor. It's as if a person is a plaything, that it would not matter if he is hurt or died, he said.

Primark, the clothing chain, ordered padded bikini bras for 7yo+ girls to be removed from sale after criticism that they supposedly sexualised children.

The company apologised for any offence caused by the £4 item and said profits from any bikinis already sold would be donated to a children's charity.

The Children's Society whinged at Primark for premature sexualisation and inappropriate advertising, while Shy Keenan, a child protection consultant called for a boycott of Primark until the bikini top was withdrawn.

David Cameron also intervened in the row and condemned sale of the item, which came in candy pink with gold stars or black with white polka dots, as completely disgraceful.

Justine Roberts, founder of Mumsnet, the parents' online forum which recently launched a Let Girls Be Girls campaign, to lobby retailers against sales of such adult items to children, was also pleased that Primark had removed the bra top from sale. It's a shame it was ever put on the shelves in the first place, she said.

Gordon Brown gave his backing to the Mumsnet campaign and said: All of us parents can recognise there's something wrong when companies are pushing our kids into acting like little grown-ups when they should be enjoying being children.

Professor Catherine Itzin, who has died of duodenal cancer aged 65, was a feminist academic responsible for more than 30 British government policy documents on the supposed effects of domestic and sexual violence on women's mental health.

Itzin worked for the Department of Health (DH) from 1992 until 2008 and was a key player in developing its role in implementing policies on sexual violence, abuse and exploitation.

Itzin was very much an activist, and, in 1987, founded the Campaign Against Pornography and Censorship (CPC). The Campaign Against Pornography (CAP) had been founded by the Labour MP Clare Short in 1986 and was best known for its campaign against pictures of topless models in British tabloids. CPC adhered more closely to the civil rights anti-pornography approach favoured by US-based feminists and, although it folded in 1992, it had an impact.

Itzin contributed to the report on the supposed harm caused by extreme pornographic material (The Evidence of Harm to Adults Relating to Exposure to Extreme Pornographic Material: A Rapid Evidence Assessment, a joint publication of the Ministry of Justice and DH, 2007).

Just over five years ago, in December 2004, a row kicked off in Birmingham over the play Behzti (Dishonour) by the playwright Gurpreet Bhatti. Sikh fundamentalists took to the Birmingham Rep to protest because it featured rape in a Sikh gurdwara and eventually managed to get the play shut down. They declared victory.

The writer is now back in the limelight as her next production, Behud (Beyond Belief) comes to theatre. It is also written as an attempt to recreate what happened over those fateful days. But any coverage of the new production, alongside with a review (which this isn't), raises the question: did the controversy change anything?

...Read full article

A performance by the French comedian Dieudonné in London has been cancelled following complaints from the Jewish community, the Jewish Chronicle reports. Dieudonné M'bala M'bala, who was last year fined by a French court for performing an anti-Semitic sketch, was due to perform in Kensington this weekend.

Dieudonné previously stood for the European Parliament as head of the Anti-Zionist Party, which he formed together with Alain Soral, an ex-member of the extreme-right National Front of Jean-Marie Le Pen.

After discovering that he was due to appear in London, campaigners urged the hotel where the comedian was due to appear to reject the booking and cancel the event.

A spokesman for the Millennium Gloucester Hotel and Conference Centre said: It's not going to take place. We had an enquiry from someone representing Dieudonné and then recently we had some calls from the Jewish community, telling us what the situation is with him. We decided not to pursue the booking and now it will not happen.

Update: Not Cancelled

19th April 2010. Thanks to Elodie

The show has not been cancelled, it rescheduled to the Savoy Theatre. here is the video

The current cover of the German magazine Titanic has provoked nearly 100 complaints.

The complaints were received by the Press Council and included two criminal charges from the Frankfurt prosecutor.

The cover artwork shows a Catholic priest facing a crucifix - but arranged so that it could be interpreted as a blow job. The Jesus figure's face is blushed red and bleeding from the wounds. The slogan reads: The church today

The idea came from Titanic editor Stephan Rürup, it was illustrated by the Munich painter Rudi Hurzlmeier. It is a satirical allusion to the abuse scandal in the Catholic Church, the last few weeks dominated the media.

The German Press Council on Meedia is now considering whether the cover constitutes discrimination against adherents of a religious group.

According to a report by Dwdl.de the Frankfurt public prosecutor's two criminal charges against the responsible editor are related to a possible violation of Section 166 of the Penal Code, which prohibits the abuse of confessions, religious communities and faith groups. The chief prosecutor Claude Joerg said that this will be decided next week

A Queensland senate candidate says she will run to ban risque billboards like the controversial Sexpo advertisement that caused 'controversy' in Ipswich earlier this year.

Family First senate candidate Wendy Francis said she would use billboards in Ipswich from the end of this month to push her Let's make outdoor advertising G-rated campaign slogan.

She said Family First and the majority of the community were sick of sexualised advertisements being seen by children on billboards: Our children deserve better; as adults it is our responsibility to provide a protecting and nurturing environment. I think some of the billboards out there wouldn't be allowed on television before 9pm because they are too over-the-top sexually.

She said because the Advertising Standards Bureau (ASB) was a self-regulatory industry body, it did not do enough to make sure billboards were censored to community standards.

The senate candidate said GOA Billboards refused to carry her G-rated slogan advertisement, but said she was in talks with other companies. GOA joint managing director Chris Tyquin said his group rejected Ms Francis' proposed advertisement because it lacked detail.

Self styled religious police in India have taken action against a Hindi play, Sara, based on the life of a Pakistani poet

Shiv Sena leader Anil Parab said: We received some complaints from local people saying that some of the dialogues in the play are very obscene. So we are demanding that they should be removed.

The party has also given a letter to local police station regarding the issue and asked the play producer Tarun Singh Negi to show its censor certificate.

We will agitate if the objectionable lines are not removed, Shiv Sena local leader Suresh Dube said.

However, the play director Mahesh Dattani said the allegations are baseless: Their complaint letter does not mention any specific dialogue. Initially, they objected to the play, saying it was written by a Pakistani, which is not true. None of the Shiv Sena activists have seen the play.

Threatening calls were also made to the producer and the director who have asked the police for protection.

The drama is written by Shahid Anwar on the life and time of Sara Shagufta, one of Pakistan's most controversial poets. Her life was troubled with personal conflict, which were expressed through her writings.

Private Lebanese TV channel NTV has refused to broadcast the feature film The Kite, directed by Randa Chahal Sabbag. Winner of the Silver Lion award at the Venice Film Festival in 2003, the film tells the story of an impossible love affair between a young Lebanese Druze woman and a Druze man in the Israeli army (the Druze religious community practice a form of Islam derived from Shi'ism, live in Lebanon, Syria, and Israel).

Two political leaders from the Druze community, Walid Joumblatt and Talal Arslan, as well as several of the community's religious authorities convinced the channel's executives to postpone broadcasting the film. Their efforts were motivated by what they saw as the film's potential to offend members of the Druze community. Earlier in the day, several dozen protesters had gathered near the home of the channel's owner and next to the channel's headquarters to demand the cancellation of the film's scheduled broadcast.