Friday, November 30, 2007

What craziness is this?

It seems that an English teacher working in the Sudan was threatened with 40 lashes and a year's imprisonment for stirring up religious hatred.

What was her crime?

She had taken a vote among her mostly muslim 6-7 year old pupils on what to call a teddy bear. They ignored her suggestion and voted 20 to 3 to name it Mohammad, after one of the boys in the class.

Two months later a secretary in the school complains to the Education Ministry, and the teacher is arrested, and local Islamic clergy are baying for her blood. Before you know it, she is charged (Wednesday), and tried, convicted and sentenced (Thursday). She got 15 days, not one year and a flogging - but it's still absolutely daft!

I wrote it up for wikinews over here.

To be fair, the Muslim Council of Britain has roundly condemned this insanity:

This case should have required only simple common sense to resolve. It is unfortunate that the Sudanese authorities were found wanting in this most basic of qualities.
The Islamic Human Rights Commission was among Muslim groups to call for her immediate release, and some Sudanese bloggers are not impressed.

Picture by angelathesloth.
Not the real Muhammad.
I don't need a fatwah right now!

1 comment:

Paul said...

Two Muslim peers went over and persuaded the Sudanese government to release her. Good news!

I'd have written that up too, if I'd been in the country at the time.