If I were asked to name the most vicious, ignorant, and jealous person among all the New-Atheist-hating atheists, there would be no contest: C. J. Werleman wins the gold, silver and bronze trifecta. With Werleman’s career now derailed because of his serial plagiarism (see below), one would think that he’d dial back his invective, but, afflicted with Acute Maru’s Syndrome, the man simply can’t. In fact, exposure of his plagiarism seems to have only intensified his craziness. After all, he was exposed not by religious people but by his fellow atheists.
Here’s a series of tw**ts Werleman was involved in yesterday (thanks to Heather Hastie for calling them to my attention). Werleman has accused the entire United States of being a “rapist,” presumably to show that we’re just as bad as any Muslim country. Agent Number 67 and Godless Spellchecker, who uncovered several instances of Werleman’s plagiarism, call him out.
Where did Werleman’s data come from? I suspect from this Wonderslist page written by one Ejaz Khan, since that page makes not only the same assertion about the U.S. (“The super power of the world is at the first position in the race of rapes. Males are majorly the rapist holding a proportion of 99%” [sic sic sic]), but also has the very same picture that Werleman used. Yet that page also says this:
Note:- These stats are two years old. Here are recent stats for the countries with highest rape cases.
And when you go to the link with “recent stats”, also on Wonderslist, you find this statement, completely contradicting what Khan (and Werleman) say:
The countries with highest rape cases are Lesotho (91.6 per 100000), Trinidad & Tobago (58.4 per 100000), Sweden (53.2 per 100000), Korea (33.7 per 100000), New Zealand (30.9 per 100000), United States of America (28.6 per 100000), Belgium (26.3 per 100000), Zimbabwe (25.6 per 100000) and United Kingdom (23.2 per 100000).
The Wikipedia page on “rape statistics” gives this figure for a 2012 survey of reported rapes, which again puts the lie to Werleman’s claim:
Clearly, Sweden is the “world’s #1 rapist”! But of course Werleman could still claim that the highest rates occur in non-Muslim-majority countries, so that the U.S. is, say, still worse than any Muslim land (his obvious point). But isn’t he curious why there are no data for those Muslim-majority countries (except for Indonesia and the UAE in the chart above)? Does he not realize that, as Agent Number 67 does, that reporting rapes is a dangerous thing to do in many Muslim-majority countries, and that, in fact, the police often don’t take action even if they are reported? As we all know, in many Muslim lands a woman can be ostracized or even killed for having been raped, since it supposedly brings shame on the family. Under such circumstances, don’t you think there would be a strong onus not to report it?
Finally, lest we forget, this is what Werleman did (from Wikipedia):
In October 2014, Werleman was shown to have plagiarized the writing of Fareed Zakaria, Vali Nasr, William Broyles Jr., Robert Pape, Eduardo Porter, and others as was documented on The Godless Spellchecker Blog.[8][9] Whole sentences and passages from Werleman’s published articles in Salon Magazine and AlterNet[10] were published previously without any citation or attribution.[8] Upon learning of this discovery, reporter Michael Luciano of The Daily Banter and atheist author and philosophy professor Peter Boghossian began searching for more instances of plagiarism, unearthing several examples.[11] Werleman addressed the allegations in a Facebook post, admitting some instances of plagiarism.[7]
AlterNet went on to remove all of Werleman’s articles from their archives and issued an apology to readers and those who had been plagiarized.[12]Salon also addressed Werleman’s plagiarism in their “Corrections” section, telling readers that plagiarized passages will be emboldened and hyperlinks to the original material will be included.[13]
It must be really galling to know that every time someone Googles you, they’ll find a list of your transgressions. And let us not forget that Alternet did the right thing by removing Werleman’s articles, while Salon, eager for clicks, did not.
Can we infer something from the way Werleman spelled “#interational” in his tweet?
He’s turned over a new leaf – he’s going to great lengths not to plagiarize the hash tag!
It appears that without cutting and pasting, spelling can be a bitch!
This is what I’m saying.
Sweden?
Really?
No I mean. REALLY Sweden?
I think you will find that some of those countries with high numbers of reported rapes are those that have made great efforts to support women through the process, where they generally feel safer, and where there is not such a stigma attached. NZ is making a lot of effort in that area too, although it’s not that long since we weren’t very good at it.
NZers are getting much better at reporting domestic violence too because of new attitudes.
Yes these data do nothing to normalize on reporting rates, they are just raw report counts, which doesnt tell the whole story, not by a long shot.
My first thought was: Well, women in Sweden can report rape and expect proper action to be taken and to be protected and supported.
Indeed, think of Julian Assange (now hiding in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, as I recall) and his travails.
Though, to be fair to Assange, his real concern seems not to be that he will have to answer to charges of rape in Sweden, but that once he’s in Swedish custody he will face rendition to the US to face charges related to Chelsea Manning’s leaking of US documents to the world.
No sympathy for Assange if he did rape someone, but a lot of sympathy if that is merely an excuse to get him into US custody.
Bradley Manning, I think.
It is appalling that Sweden would ever contemplate allowing Assange to be extradited for a political ‘crime’ that is not (presumably) even an offence in Sweden.
That would involve a far greater offence against human rights than anything Assange is accused of.
I’m also saddened and ashamed (as a British citizen) that Assange isn’t safe from the US spooks in England.
Bradley when a soldier in Iraq leaking the documents, Chelsea now (at least that’s her preference).
It wasn’t clear that Sweden would extradite Assange to the US if asked, but Assange was/is concerned that they might do so.
Oh yes of course. Pardon my forgetfulness.
“Great efforts to support women through the process” is one way of putting it. Another would be that Sweden has loony tunes rape laws. Or “great efforts to explain to women that they really were raped even if they don’t think they were”. Sweden is what happens when radical feminist ideology takes root in government. Their laws are inspired by the notion that sex outside of marriage is an exercise of patriarchal power over women. The whole thing is set up to give women the power of sexual freedom with the added power of severely punishing a man if they retrospectively decide they made an error in judgement. Unfortunately “progressives” (smug, narcissistic word) in Western society appear to suffer some form of mind control when these issues come up, maybe out of a desire not to appear backward and out of an assumption that this is a conspiracy theory. The ideology on display is exactly the same ideology that has caused such acrimony in the atheist world and it is not much more tolerant at the state level than at the Social Justice blog level.
For more background, google “konigskriget” for a series of subtitled yoochoob vids on the subject.
To get back, somewhat, on topic, the list of rape stats isn’t worth the toilet paper it is printed on. Sweden and the UK having higher rape stats than South Africa! Not on your life. A Western Samoan guy once said to me “there probably isn’t a woman on the island who hasn’t been raped”. Assuming he wasn’t having me on, that should put these UN stats in perspective.
Oh, nearly forgot to add that CJ Whirlyman is a toxic little wassock.
Sorry. Correction, google “konskriget”, not “konigskriget”. No kings involved at all.
I don’t know anything about Swedish law, but I have no time for the idea that there is some kind of radical feminist conspiracy to take control of world government.
The statistics are flawed because women aren’t treated equally in any society as a whole. Therefore, rapes (and violence against women and children in general) simply aren’t reported in the same way other crimes are.
The World Economic Forum produces an annual report on the gender gap. At present Iceland is #1 in the world, Sweden #5. I wrote a bit about it in my piece on International Women’s Day, and there is a link there to the WEF report: http://www.heatherhastie.com/international-womens-day-8-march-2015/
Bear in mind that in Sweden prostitution is not illegal – that is, selling sex is not illegal – BUT paying for it is. Which is kinda weird, does prostitutes no favours at all, and suggests a rather skewed doctrinaire view of sex. So its rape stats could well be similarly skewed, compared with more typical countries.
Yes. I’ll explain below, where the same question reappears.
I’d imagine that the countries who, like the United Kingdom, are actually concerned by a low rape-conviction rate as opposed to proud of it, and on that basis bring in sensitivity training and rape recognition for police, introduce more female officers and higher-ups and legislate a whole host of other measures designed to make reporting rape seem less pointless and onerous for the victim, are also likely to have higher rates. This is only news to Werleman, who, like Johann Hari before him, seems to have reacted to his public humiliation by jumping the shark.
The idea that Islamic countries, the majority of which don’t even consider marital rape illegal, many of which consider being raped a capital offence(!?), are exemplars to which the west should aspire is just surreal. It’s Alice In Wonderland reasoning.
From what I can tell this is just desperate clicksturbaiting from a man whose fifteen minutes are nearly up.
In Sweden, they count rapes differently than most countries. The Swedish police registers one offence for each person raped, and if one and the same person has been raped on a number of occasions, one offence is counted for each occasion that can be specified. For example, if a woman says she has been raped by her husband every day during a year, the Swedish police may record more than 300 cases of rape. In many other countries only a single offence would be counted in such a situation.
This is important – places have different standards on what counts as sexual assault and so forth. Should we assume that any particular country has found the optimum understanding?
Oh, and yes, that is independent of the fact that with the different standards matters aren’t even comparable.
Even if the statistics were true and accurately reported, the implication is that somehow, Muslims are inherently less prone to rape because they are Muslims. Is this a case where it’s ok to be “racist” if you are positive about it?
And yet Saudi authorities fret that unaccompanied women in automobiles will be raped if they get a flat tire. You’d think this would be more of a concern in the rapey West. These are puzzlements!
What is the deal with Sweden? Is there something wrong with the stats here?
I don’t know, but it may be merely that the metric used to determine what qualifies as rape is more encompassing in Sweden than in most other countries and / or that a higher percentage of rapes that occur are reported to the authorities in Sweden. That might happen if, for example, there were less stigma associated with rape in Swedish society than is typical of other societies. I know that in the US it is still fairly common for rape victims to not report the crime to the police, even at the urging of medical and counseling professionals.
It could be that Muslim countries have defined rape out of existence. You know, like the
American TalibanGOP has been trying to do.I don’t think the lack of stats, and the low numbers from the rare few, from muslim countries is much of a mystery. I was thinking about variations between the other listed countries, primarily European and the US. And, of course, about Sweden’s top spot.
Sharia law requires a women to have four male witnesses to confirm a rape occurred.
A few days ago I detailed two cases from Saudi Arabia on my website where women who reported rapes were prosecuted for being out without a male relative. Both received prison terms and lashes. Both were gang raped. The offenders were not prosecuted for rape in either case because of lack of evidence, although in one case there was a cell phone video and in the other a resultant pregnancy. In one case the perpetrators received light sentences for kidnapping. One of the women, who was unmarried, was also convicted of adultery. The lashing part of her sentence was delayed until she gave birth – Allah is merciful!
Well it’s something to aspire to Heather. We obviously have a lot to learn about the worth of a woman’s word.
What an irredeemable tit Werelman is. There’s something of George Galloway in his sycophantic coddling, and anyone who thinks that chucking your lot in with Islamic apologism represents some kind of brave, I Am Spartacus sacrifice should take a look at the earnings Galloway makes from dodgy media organisations, Russia Today for example, that are desperate for western figures to appear on their stations and traduce the evil west. Galloway made more ‘second job’ money than any other British politician from his various extracurricular media appearances last year – I wouldn’t be surprised if that’s exactly the financial angle Werelman is aiming for. RT(Fox News for Russell Brand fans) and the various Al Jazeeras are lucrative employers if you’re willing to give up your right to your own opinion for a few hours a week.
It’ll be interesting to see where Werleman ends up – you’ll be able to say, “I told you so”. It’s certainly about the only place left for him.
Careful Saul, Gorgeous George’s expensive lawyers will be on your arse if you go too fa!
Here is a report of a young women in Saudi Arabia whose lawyers challenged her sentence of 90 lashes and received a harsher sentence. What was interesting about that is, the offenders, 7 men, also received harsher sentences semmingly because of this challange. I don’t know what to make of it, apart from the obvious, so I don’t try. I use it (jihadiwatch) to see what is going on in the anti world of Islam and I can only take it in small doses.
Here is the link,
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2015/03/saudi-sharia-court-sentences-gang-rape-victim-to-200-lashes?utm_source=Jihad+Watch+Daily+Digest&utm_campaign=ac4138c0a0-Daily_Digest&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_ffcbf57bbb-ac4138c0a0-123535225
It’s validity? I’ll leave that to the reader.
The court probably felt that since the victim was being so tiresome and annoying that the 7 rapists should be smacked for letting things get that far. It’s a message that if you are going to rape you better clean up your own messes, because if you burden the court with your mess you will get spanked.
Jerry has asked me to put a link to my story about the rapes I refer to above:
http://www.heatherhastie.com/the-injustice-of-sharia-in-saudi-arabia/
And there are those who write op-ed’s in U.S. newspapers telling us we ought not be concerned about the prospect of Sharia in the U.S.
Quite apart from anything else, Sharia does not treat women and men equally, so even if it was OK in all other respects, it fails the test there. It is not an acceptable system and we should be concerned about it gaining traction anywhere.
I think they accept “legitimate” rape…
I wonder if any of them ever try the “I am not a sociologist” gambit?
They might consider the “I’m not a woman” gambit.
I don’t know, but it’s worth noting that pretty much everyone who looks at that thinks, “Sweeden? That can’t be right!”
The swedish statistics are wrong in the sense that rape is still severely under-reported.
What has happened is that women, and especially young girls, are starting to report more cases of rape. (Which is still somewhat erroneous defined as ‘non-voluntarily’. The discussion now is to move it to the neutral ‘common agreement’.)
Mind that the courts are still victim blaming. (I.e. you can find questions about how the women were dressed et cetera.) But there has been some phenomenal efforts in social media which has prompted girls to be more open about what happens.
To return to the first point, it is believed that despite the rapid increase in reporting the problem is under-reported (say, 1 out of 10 rapes or so). But at least the statistics are starting to make sense. It used to be that rapes were an odd sort of (non-drug related) violence, that it seemed to happen more outside than inside relationships. Now the trend seem to put rapes as mostly done inside.
“move it” – move non-rape activities, I mean.
Ouch! I expected to easily find the recent articles I read on this subject, but no.
What I found is an early one when the reported rape frequency had started to rise, and it was then a controversial subject. [ http://www.aftonbladet.se/wendela/article11787786.ab ]
So I’ll leave it there, and have to put my description as unsupported.
I should also add that there is an odd sort of blind spot with in-relationship-rape. Those who are subjected tend to excuse it as expected pressure rather than being forced under duress. It is when the occurrences adds up, increase in severity (a common trend, I hear), or they read about how others (most often women of course) report it, that the chips fall down.
It all sounds a bit like NZ. Rape etc is still largely unreported, but continuing efforts are being made to improve the situation on multiple fronts. At least in our countries too, rape within marriage is a crime – it’s not in many countries, including all countries with Sharia.
What if it’s civil matters only, and participation is “voluntary”? I’ve heard feminists make the argument that outlawing sharia law to “protect” women’s rights is patronizing, and takes away women’s agency. I have a problem with the idea it’s voluntary given religious indoctrination, culture, and pressure from family, but then is anything voluntary?
Equality for all people should be the norm for both criminal and civil law and regulations. In my opinion it doesn’t matter, not even a tiny little bit, that some people might voluntarily accept less. They’ll just have to live with a little less inequality in their lives.
Something that is often overlooked, or merely not mentioned, in “reported cases” comparisons like this is the variation in what qualifies as X (rape in this case) between various legal systems. Add that to the point already made about variations in reporting instances of X to the legal authorities at all and comparisons become worthless without a good deal more information (which is sometimes nonexistent) that would be necessary to control for these variables.
These type of statistics drive me crazy. People like Werleman and Khan (and many, many others) are happy to use whatever arbitrarily concocted ranking to reinforce their own ideological views without the slightest bit of thought – really, reading that Wonderslist piece, how the hell is the US ranked over South Africa; given that all their info is true, SA sounds orders of magnitude worse than the US. It is well established that rape and sexual violence are two of the most difficult crimes to quantify due to underreporting, and that the motivation behind the underreporting is multifaceted.
In light of that, countries at the top of any list that is constructed via police reports are going to be those where rape and sexual violence are less stigmatized, and where the social conscience of violence against women is markedly raised in general, thus removing many of the barriers to reporting. The Wikipedia graph Jerry showed above is particularly interesting in this respect. There is of course the possibility that rape is much more common in Sweden than in, say, the US, but those data don’t show this. They may in fact show how much rape still goes underreported in the US. I would suspect that instances of rape and sexual violence are comparable in places like these, and it is possible that Sweden’s report numbers are far closer to the reality of the situation than are its other Western counterparts. There’s no way to tell for sure from this data of course, but the point is that the situation is very complicated.
Regardless, pretending that nonreporting is not an issue here is absurd, and also extremely damaging to the progress of women’s safety and security in those areas where the reporting rate is virtually nil.
blockquote close fail.
Or, alternatively, what counts as rape (or sexual assault) is variable – Sweden perhaps is less lenient about things which would not count in (say) the US.
This is *independent* of the difficulty in reporting to whatever standard as well.
//
Why are self-hating accommodationist atheist serial plagiarists SO ANGRY?
A. In Werleman’s case coz he’s been exposed for the talentless, jealous, thieving hack that he is, and he’s really not happy.
Must admit it’s kinda fun watching the professional death throes of this pathetic turd – that tweet is the equivalent of the foamy blood oozing from the corner of his mouth, accompanied by a disturbing gurgling sound… Should we call a priest?
Really, Sophisticated Theology™ – if not plain old god-bothering – might be a better play for him at this point. In addition to the loss of his credibility due to his larceny, I think he’s painted himself into a rhetorical corner, anti-atheist-atheist-wise. The credulous do love them a good redemption story! If he’s going to leave the stage in ignomy anyway, why not at least make some scratch on the way out?
Gotta wonder which audience this dickhead’s chasing. Could be he’s trying to play the crude, Aussie shit-stirrer mirror image to SE Cupp’s atheist who hates atheists & atheism. Maybe that’s how he could revive his fortunes – hook up with her, get a gig on her show, marry her, pump out some little Werleman-Cupps, find the Lord in the process and grab a slice of that big ol’ born again pie. Think I should copyright that before we see CJ play it out?
Or at least earn some consulting fees for helping him get his career onto some kind of track. I could see your plan developing into a self-help program worthy of shilling during PBS fund drives: it’s pretty clear to me it’s more or less a working formula based on all those hucksters who have to be – some of them have to be! – consciously making it up.
A good con like that doesn’t just happen.
And said sh**t-stirring atheist bashing and irrationality is less cognitively dissonant coming out of the mouth of a believer.
All we have to do to dramatically reduce our rate of rape is to start flogging and jailing the victims.
Killing them to uphold the honor of the nation is even more effective.
I think the stats may be incomplete. India should be way up there.
Did anyone watch ‘India’s Daughter’ on TV or Youtube? Many of the rapes there go unreported, and oft times the police haven’t wanted to bother taking them seriously. This banned-in-India documentary could well bring about a sea change (if the term is ever apropos it’s here!). Keep trying to find a different version on Youtube if this one gets blocked:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dWwM3j6sx28
I am in general opposed to “bans”, and on that principle I oppose this one too. However,
I find this comment really amusing. Firstly, in order to claim that “India should be way up there”, you would have to make two independent claims: (1) that in a country like India, where an incident of rape anywhere in the country leads to a nationwide media discussion, the actual rate of incidence is about 15 times more than the reported rate, and (2), there are very few, if any, unreported cases in other countries (e.g. the USA).
Those would be extraordinary claims, and hence, following the popular maxim, would require extraordinary evidence. The other alternative, of course, would be to give in to the data and accept that the incidence of rape in India is not significantly higher than in the USA, and is likely much lower.
The second, more important point is the assertion that “This banned-in-India documentary could well bring about a sea change”.
Well, in the aftermath of the horrifying events of December 16, 2012 in New Delhi which the documentary discusses, there was a mass protest in New Delhi that lasted for weeks. None of this was censored, and every possible point that the documentary has made or could have made was discussed and debated in all sections of the media, especially the vernacular media (you should keep in mind that there is exactly one English newspaper in the list of top 10 most read newspapers in India, and even that one is in the bottom half of the list). What followed were changed laws, new police cells and helplines dedicated to the safety of women, new procedures for dealing with cases of harassment which have already netted some “big fish”, and an unprecedented media focus on highlighting crimes against women. Sheila Dixit was the Chief Minister of Delhi at the time. She had won her position in three successive elections and was widely believed to be the most popular political leader in Delhi. Yet, her poor handling of the protests and her lackadaisical attitude towards instituting change led to her party being wiped out in elections which followed after a few months.
In short, the popular protests that erupted after the Nirbhaya case led to everything from a change of laws to the establishment of new procedures to a change of state government. But, we are supposed to believe that it would take an irresponsibly produced BBC documentary to cause a “sea change” in India. Indeed.
You might also like to read what Kavita Krishnan, a feminist activist who was actually involved in the protests, has to say on the subject. She was interviewed by Udwin for the documenatry, and is quite blunt in her assessment:
I’m glad you found it really amusing. (sarcasm) We should stop there now.
Yes, the documentary isn’t without some flaw.
What hasn’t changed since the 2012 protests are a change in the mindset of some of the population and true empowerment of the girls and women in the most vulnerable of positions. There are many more reports and videos out there taking a view opposite to the one you cited.
What I found amusing in the comment was the complete disconnect with reality. “India has to be up there”, no matter what the data says. The BBC documentary will cause a “sea change”, when all the points the documentary makes (or could have made) had already been made, are being made and will keep being made in Indian media, especially the vernacular media, for years.
India has a sexism problem, and social attitudes do need to change. Indeed, they are already changing, and have been changing because of the concerted efforts of “on the ground” activists like Kavita Krishnan and others. However, airing views of death row convicts whose cases are still under appeal (which, by the way, is the reason the government “banned” the documentary) in a documentary that most Indians would not have come across whether it was banned or not is hardly going to cause any “change”. They would not have come across it for the very simple reason that it is in English and not in Hindi, Tamil or Gujarati. I frankly find your comment disrespectful of the work of the activists who have and are at this very moment causing a “sea change” through actual work rather than irresponsible sensationalization.
Also, I would like to see these “videos” and “reports” taking the opposite views, but only if, like Kavita Krishnan’s interview, they are from people who have actually been involved in the movement in India or at least actually know what is happening on the ground.
What was “irresponsible” about the Storyville doc.? I haven’t seen it yet but I’ve heard that it’s a powerful and important piece of filmmaking so I’d be interested in hearing what you mean by that.
I think it is irresponsible in at least two distinct but very important ways. First, as Kavita Krishnan points put in her interview I linked above, the documentary made some rather questionable decisions about the “sources” they chose to analyze the situations. If they were making a documentary on race relations in the US, I hope they would not have all their analysts from China. But they seem to have done something similar here.
Second, the documentary seems to have reported on a sub-judice matter in a manner the courts in India find is detrimental to a fair trial. (This, by the way, is why the documentary is banned in India). You can read about the Court’s arguments here.
I agree that your second point has some validity. I worry that the public uproar could impact the appeal process.
However, the sources heard from included mostly Indian people, including the young woman’s parents. Her father wanted the documentary to be shown because it exposes the ‘bitter truth’. As for arguments that decent Indian men were not represented, the father, the tutor and a psychologist did that well, as did the footage of the protests had ample shots of men joining women, front and center, in condemning violence against women.
The Wiki ‘rape stats’ are incomplete. There is a vacuum of information, and furthermore Reported cases don’t equal actual cases. Women are far less empowered in India than in the US or Sweden. The rate of reporting in India and rate of conviction are dismal. Your assessment is what is disconnected with reality. Read this and weep.
blogs.wsj.com/indiarealtime/2013/01/02/are-women-safer-in-india-or-the-u-s/
http://www.thehindu.com/opinion/lead/indias-abandoned-daughter/article6979071.ece
http://news.nationalpost.com/2015/03/09/chandrahas-choudhury-india-more-upset-by-movie-about-rape-than-it-is-about-the-rape-itself/
You’d have to go back to Youtube and search for videos yourself, all the way back to when the doc was shown in Britain and on Youtube. There are lots of debates hosted by Indian TV news channels, including women’s rights panelists, and available for viewing. I don’t have time to do your homework for you. I did mine, and I’ll wish you good luck with yours.
http://www.firstpost.com/india/indias-daughter-didnt-banned-says-kiran-bedi-2148101.html
There was an excellent debate about the documentary, between Indian social activist Kiran Bedi and a female lawyer that was shown on Youtube. That video has now been blocked as have many others. So the muzzling and the silencing continues, to spare India its hurt national pride. While there is a grey area about judicial workings and the appeals process, note that last year the men were found guilty of the rape and murder. Four have already been sentenced to death IIRC.
In the meantime, this just happened to an elderly nun:
http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/14/asia/nun-raped-in-india/
http://www.cnn.com/2013/08/15/world/asia/india-rape-problem/index.html
http://edition.cnn.com/2014/06/18/world/asia/shah-india-rape-crisis/
http://www.cnn.com/2013/07/11/world/asia/india-males-violence
http://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2013/11/world/india-rape/?iid=article_sidebar
http://www.cnn.com/2012/12/19/opinion/india-rape-anger-menon
IMO, the banned documentary is not irresponsible. The film maker is guilty only of ‘daring greatly’. People should watch the entire thing before they form opinions. There is nothing crude nor vulgar about it. What’s vulgar and irresponsible is the silencing of many, many thousands of voices of protest. We in the west should stand in solidarity with the women and girls of India who dare to speak out.
I watched the first half-hour of the doc and thought it was very well done. I would like to have seen the debate about it. The only reason I didn’t finish watching was the combination of anger and nausea evoked by listening to the completely uncontrite perpetrators – and their lawyers.
http://www.indianewengland.com/ME2/dirmod.asp?sid=&nm=&type=Publishing&mod=Publications%3A%3AArticle&mid=8F3A7027421841978F18BE895F87F791&tier=4&id=9848F187BB9B413BAD68CAB9C1C0FC8D
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gj8j9ClJH_4
This video (interview with the film maker and the parents of the murdered young woman and Kiran Bedi) and the one just above (interview with a prominent and outspoken male Indian poet and MP, Javed Akhtar ) s/b watched.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d673PcRg1IA
Heckuva job you’ve been doing here, paprika. Thanks.
In a related story, incidents of all crime have fallen to zero in states that have been overtaken by anarchy.
lolz.
The clown also known as Werleman probably didn’t mean that America leads the world in rape cases.
I think that tweet means that America is the best at “raping” every other country in the world. His M.O. basically is that all the problems in the world relate to America’s foreign policy and meddling in the affairs of other nations (e.g., imperialism, colonialism, etc, etc.). This is why the pseudo-liberal left love him.
I think, considering the context (International Womens Day), the interpretation taken by Jerry and all others on this thread is probably the right one.
But for that context, the political connotation (your interpretation) or the environmental one (‘raping’ the world’s resources) could be inferred. (That’s what I immediately imagined from the headline). But I don’t think so in this instance.
That was how I read it, too.
I’ve only just realised that a previous internet spelling of the guy’s name was wrong and I’ve been using that as a reference ever since. With anyone else I’d be embarrassed – in this case I might just keep misspelling it.
A quick search online shows that there are many sites insisting that a large proportion of rapes in Sweden are perpetrated by the immigrant muslim community. I can’t comment on the veracity of the information.
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It may violate the Roolz, but I ask if “full Cunk” can be reserved for instances of stupidity rather than malevolence or obsession.
Anything that comes within the “Darwin Awards” test – those who improve the gene pool by removing themselves from it, qualify absolutely.
Diane Morgan downing 7 gin-and-tonics and 3 Sambucas to play Lady Godiva comes close, but … .
CJ Werleman is sheer malevolence – he qualifies for something else, like “full Maru” – incidentally, Deepak would qualify for “full Maru” most of the time.
But maybe “full Maru” should be reserved for Deepak, Ken Ham, the Discovery Institute, etc. –
So what do we use for Werleman?
Hey, I *like* Maru!
Could we please find some other term of opprobrium for compulsive idiots and leave Maru alone to practice his entertaining but harmless obsession with boxes? 😉
As far as I know there is also some evidence that the rape statistics of Sweden don’t exactly paint an angelic picture of the country’s Muslim minority (bringing this up since that’s what Werleman seems to be trying to do).
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