Headlines:
- UK: A New Home Office Report Admits Grooming Gangs Are Not a Muslim Problem
- Opinion: ECJ Ruling to Uphold Ban on Kosher, Halal Slaughter a Disastrous Decision
- US Can Stop Indian Interference, Says Pakistan
UK: A New Home Office Report Admits Grooming Gangs Are Not a Muslim Problem
This week marks a watershed moment in a decade of discussion of “grooming gangs”: a much-anticipated Home Office report has concluded that there is no credible evidence that any one ethnic group is over-represented in cases of child sexual exploitation. For many in Britain today the term “grooming gang” immediately suggests Pakistani-heritage Muslim men abusing white girls, but the Home Office researchers now tell us that “research has found that group-based offenders are most commonly White”. A powerful modern racial myth has been exploded. What started as a far-right trope had migrated into the mainstream, meeting little resistance along the way. In 2011, the Times and its chief investigative reporter, Andrew Norfolk, claimed to have uncovered a new ethnic crime threat, shrouded until then in a supposed “conspiracy of silence”. The racial stereotype gained credence when the Quilliam Foundation, a controversial “counter-extremism” group, claimed that 84% of “grooming gang offenders” were Asian. The two-year study by the Home Office makes very clear that there are no grounds for asserting that Muslim or Pakistani-heritage men are disproportionately engaged in such crimes, and, citing our research, it confirmed the unreliability of the Quilliam claim. The horrific and widely reported crimes committed in places such as Rochdale, Oxford and Telford were real: but racist stereotyping and demonisation deflected from that. It might be tempting to think that, if nothing else, a decade of outrage had stimulated wider concern about child sexual exploitation. In truth, it has diverted resources and effort into wasteful paths while opportunities to address systemic barriers to prevention and improve victim support have been missed. The claims that “grooming gangs” were not properly investigated due to “political correctness” and a fear of being accused of racism are heavily undermined by decades of research highlighting the consistent over-policing of minority communities. What’s more, the whole history of the UK’s responses to child sexual exploitation and abuse is littered with failings – as shown by the independent inquiry into child sexual abuse, Operation Yewtree and numerous other investigations and inquiries. There were also regrettable consequences for child protection, since victims and offenders who don’t fit the stereotype can be overlooked. This misdirected focus can be found in the Home Office report itself. Its title and executive summary both imply it covers “group-based child sexual exploitation” in the whole. But it fails to include a whole range of problems that might reasonably fit into that category, such as abuse that occurs online, and in schools, care homes and other institutions. Instead, it follows the crowd by dwelling on child sexual exploitation “in the community”. This construct is vaguely defined and poorly justified, although certainly more acceptable sounding than “grooming gangs” – the broadly equivalent term that has no legal meaning but plenty of racial and political baggage. It could have been worse: the report reveals that there was discord in its advisory group of experts, campaigners and others. Some members apparently wanted an even greater focus on Pakistani men, hinting at an appetite for producing policy-led evidence rather than evidence-led policy. In her foreword, the home secretary Priti Patel called the findings “disappointing because community and cultural factors are clearly relevant to understanding and tackling offending” and implied that, with better data collection “including in relation to … ethnicity”, the findings would have been different. This looks like a last-ditch attempt to keep a politically useful trope alive. Concerns with “cultural factors” seemingly do not extend to understanding what motivates white British abusers. [Source: The Guardian]
It is evident that grooming is a product of British values underpinned by liberalism, and widespread amongst the white indigenous community. Despite this, the Home Minister has left the door open to use grooming as a tool to vilify the Muslim community.
Opinion: ECJ Ruling to Uphold Ban on Kosher, Halal Slaughter a Disastrous Decision
The European Union’s top court has deemed kosher and halal slaughter incompatible with animal welfare. This is a grim day for religious freedom in Europe, writes Christoph Strack. In Europe, leaders often laud the continent’s Judeo-Christian heritage. Not only that, 75 years after the industrial mass murder of European Jews in the Shoa, German and European leaders celebrate the return of flourishing Jewish life on the continent. They welcome the fact that liberal, conservative and orthodox Jews are once more part of Europe’s social fabric. But for how much longer, given the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruling that upheld a ban on kosher and halal slaughter in Belgium? The practice is only banned in two or three Belgian regions. Belgium’s top court had called on the ECJ to determine whether the ban on kosher and halal slaughter — i.e. without stunning the animal — is compatible with the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the EU and its enshrined principle of religious freedom. The bloc’s top court ruled the ban legal, dealing a blow to pious Jews and Muslims across Europe. For decades, there have been heated political discussions in Europe over whether to outlaw ritual slaughters. Several courts have ruled on the issue as well — including in Germany. Within the past 20 years, Germany’s constitutional court often examined the issue, reaching wise verdicts in favor of religious freedom. The court has upheld the ban on stun-free slaughter — but with exceptions that may apply for those who, for religious reasons, say they can only consume kosher or halal meat. This right, therefore, applies to Jews and Muslims alike, as this is a question of religious freedom broadly speaking. As European societies grow progressively secular, more and more people take offense to certain religious practices. This pertains to certain rituals, religious needs and sensitivities; religion is no longer taken as seriously as it once was. But back to kosher and halal slaughter. We should be able to tolerate people’s religious practices. In this instance, animal welfare advocates are at loggerheads with religious representatives. Germany’s top court, which has ruled on the issue, imposed strict limitations on ritual slaughters. It allows certain exceptions that allow religious people to be able to continue practicing their faith in Germany. Bans on such forms of animal slaughter in Belgium, and elsewhere, arose over debates over the way Islam is practiced in Europe. Individuals sought to impose tighter rules on Islam on the continent — yet also hit Europe’s Jews. Muslim and Jewish representatives joined forces in challenging the Belgian ban in court. And several months ago, Pinchas Goldschmidt of the Conference of European Rabbis (CER) and Muhammad bin Abdul Karim Issa of the Muslim World League even published a joint letter — replete with a joint letterhead — on the issue. [Source: Deutsche Welle]
Europe’s Secular fundamentalists have trounced on their freedom of religion to deny Muslims and Jews their ritual slaughter. In the age of Europe’s atheism, freedom of religion is under constant attack, which proves why progressive liberalism is no longer suitable for organizing human affairs, where religion is inseparable from society.
US Can Stop Indian Interference, Says Pakistan
The United States is perhaps the only country which can persuade India to stop its subversive activities in Pakistan, says the country’s envoy as a US scholar sees merit in Islamabad’s claim that India is supporting separatists in Balochistan. Asad Majeed Khan, Islamabad’s envoy in Washington, and James Dobbins, a former US special representative for Afghanistan and Pakistan, raised this issue in their interviews to The Christian Science Monitor, which published a story on Friday on the alleged Indian support to terrorist activities inside Pakistan. “We see the US as perhaps the only country in the world that is in a position to play an important and critical role on this issue,” Ambassador Khan said. “We are hopeful the engagement of the US could work to support peace and security for our region.” Mr Dobbins said that “allegations of Indian support for separatists in the Balochistan region might indeed have merit”. In an interview to Dawn, however, Ambassador Khan explained that while Islamabad wants the US to help stop Indian interference in the country’s internal affairs, “we do not want our relationship with Washington to be India-specific”. Pakistan, he said, was “large and important enough to have its own relations with any country, particularly with the United States, which is an old ally”. In his interview with the Monitor, Ambassador Khan noted that his country has successfully brought down the number of terrorist attacks inside Pakistan over the last decade and wrested control of large parts of the country from non-state actors. But over the last two years Pakistan has faced a resurgence of attacks and “unfortunately we see the Indian footprint and Indian fingerprints all over the place”, he added. [Source: The Dawn]
The sooner Pakistan’s political establishment accepts that America will always place India above Pakistan, the better will be the future of the country. However, the political establishment cannot see that America has ditched Pakistan for India, and the only salvation for Pakistan is to re-establish the Khilafah Rashidah (rightly guided Caliphate) upon the method of the Prophethood.