OH, the irony! Just hours after the fool Iftikhar Ahmad, of the London School of Islamics, posted  – beneath this report – a rambling defense of “the most peaceful religion in the world“, and the respect Islam has for females, comes news from Egypt that a protest by hundreds of Egyptian women demanding equal rights and an end to sexual harassment turned violent yesterday.
Crowds of men heckled and shoved the demonstrators, telling them to go home where they belong.
Iftikhar Ahmad, of the London School of Islamics
The women – some in headscarves and flowing robes, others in jeans – had marched to Cairo’s central Tahrir Square to celebrate International Women’s Day. But crowds of men soon outnumbered them and chased them out.
Said Farida Helmy, a 24-year old journalist:
They said that our role was to stay home and raise presidents, not to run for president.
The Associated Press report pointed out:
Sexual harassment remains widespread in Egypt, where women often are afraid to report sexual assault or harassment for fear they and their families will be stigmatised. A 2008 survey by the Egyptian Center for Women’s Rights found that 83 percent of Egyptian women and 98 percent of foreign women in Cairo said they had been harassed — while 62 percent of men admitted to harassing.
At yesterday’s march, men berated protesters and said their concerns were not urgent in the aftermath of the recent uprising in Egypt. When the women argued back, some were verbally abused or groped. Others were beaten and had to be ripped away from the groups of men.
Mostafa Hussein, 30, said many protesters had to flee the area and hide in a park nearby.
They were running for their lives and the army had to fire a shot in the air to break up the mob chasing them.
Hat tip: Barriejohn
The Freethinker was founded in 1881 by GW Foote, an outspoken critic of religion. After the publication of 
March 9th, 2011 at 8:53 am
But I can’t understand it – Surely it is un-islamic to be so disrespectful to women. It must be that the Zionist forces are infiltrating the egyptian population with thousands of non-muslims with the sole purpose of groping our women!!!
March 9th, 2011 at 9:11 am
‘men berated protesters and said their concerns were not urgent in the aftermath of the recent uprising in Egypt’.
While religion is blatantly one of the main factors keeping these imbeciles in the Stone Age and stroking their prejudices, this type of argument is common to misogynists worldwide and is not specific to Muslims only. It’s even included in the parody site Derailing for Dummies: http://www.derailingfordummies.....mportantly
There’s always something More Important than ensuring that women’s rights are respected, and marchers like this are always the selfish bitches for not knowing their place and considering how much More Important than their concerns that other Important thing is. If there hadn’t been an uprising and Mubarak was still in power, yet women had done this march, there would have been something More Important then, too. It might have actually been religion, or it might have been resisting the ‘evils of Zionism’ or whatever.
March 9th, 2011 at 10:07 am
If you really want to grope lots of women I suggest supporting feminism. You’ll find after a while some may even come along and offer you the opportunity on their own initiatives.
March 9th, 2011 at 10:18 am
You forgot to file this under You couldn’t make it up, Barry!
March 9th, 2011 at 10:36 am
Time to airdrop tens of thousands of arabic-translated copies of Lysistrata
March 9th, 2011 at 11:06 am
So much for the revolution.
March 9th, 2011 at 11:16 am
http://www.newyorker.com/onlin.....quare.html
March 9th, 2011 at 11:34 am
But… but… but… they love women!
March 9th, 2011 at 12:17 pm
Forced marriages ‘at record high’
BBC News – Wales
South Wales Police say they are dealing with the
largest number of cases of forced marriage and
honour-based violence they have ever seen.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-wales-12669909
March 9th, 2011 at 12:32 pm
Ignorant bigots can’t bear the concept of their serf-like women wanting independence. Mind you that meandering, rambling confused clown, Iftikhar Ahmad isn’t going to do too well in open competition for a desirable women. If the marriage isn’t arranged he is going to struggle. Looking at him…………. Aaargh, a woman’s worst nightmare. And that is before his demented attitudes kick in.
March 9th, 2011 at 1:47 pm
All religions treat women as second class people but islam – which claims to respect women – is the worst. These childish and insecure tyrants want us to be covered, locked up baby factory slaves, rather than equals who could challenge them. These dunderheaded religious fascists are frightened of losing their power.
Thanks for the picture of Amhad the troll, now we know what a misogynist dickhead looks like.
March 9th, 2011 at 4:43 pm
@Angela_K. You got it right: power, that’s the core issue. They can bleat all they like about faith, religion and the Quran but, underneath all that, they experience, enjoy and, indeed, salivate at their power over women. Their women are serfs; they can beat them in their home; slice off the clitoreses of baby girls; stone them to death; flog them in public; hunt them down like wild animals in so called honour killings and use all this to be superior males. This superiority is regardless of intelligence, ability or determination on the part of the women.
This is what it is really about. The phony and enforced, though spurious, adulation that these groteques such as that Amhad clown are determined to keep. But the times they are a changing and freedom and independence, even for these repressed and abused women, are beginning to sprout. And the Amhad types are running scared.
March 9th, 2011 at 6:17 pm
I find it pretty amazing that this guy has some kind of official capacity at the London School of Islamics. Is this really the best he can do in the battle of words against the infidel? Sending copies of an irrelevant and untrue screed onto the comment section of an atheist blog? I sort of imagined that it was a teenager pounding his computer in his bedroom, just regurgitating shit that he had been brainwashed with since birth.
March 9th, 2011 at 6:56 pm
Not often I say this about a troll, but I’m almost hoping it comes back and tries to rationalise all this away. I could do with a laugh…
March 9th, 2011 at 7:05 pm
Stonyground: Google his first sentence and see on just how many other sites he has posted the selfsame thing. It must be a full time job for him!
March 9th, 2011 at 7:14 pm
I have a funny feeling – as the actress said to the bishop – that the London School of Islamics has much in common with an outfit known as Christian Voice. If you look at the material on the site a lot of it has been subscribed by “Iftikhar” – hahaha!!! They do have a poll asking whether readers think that there should be more Muslim schools, and so far over 60% of respondents say “No”. Isn’t life grandy dandy?
March 9th, 2011 at 7:18 pm
Barriejohn:
I get 160 returns on Google for the complete sentence. Some people obviously have more time than sense. Mind you, it was posted at 4pm. I wonder if that’s during working hours, and whether his employers know…
March 9th, 2011 at 7:21 pm
Daz: See my next comment. We are dealing here with a Muslim Stephen Green!
March 9th, 2011 at 7:44 pm
I suppose that I should have spotted that, it’s sort of obvious now that you have pointed it out. It actually reminded me of an old episode of Old Harry’s Game where Satan locks up a Christian Fundy and a Muslim Fundy in a room together with a couple of pickaxe handles. He calls in later to see how they are progressing and finds that they actually get on really well having found out how much they have in common.
March 9th, 2011 at 7:56 pm
Indeed. The name of the religion changes, and some of the details, but the monumental idiocy remains the same.
March 9th, 2011 at 8:12 pm
I wonder what he expected or hoped for in reply? Perhaps that we would all pile in with: “Damn, why didn’t we see this before? You are so right. I can’t understand how we could have been so stupid. What a terrific piece of luck that you took the trouble to explain at such length where we were wrong. Thank you. I now just cannot wait to become a muslim. My wife isn’t too happy but she will just have to put up with it. It’s nothing to do with her. I will be making all the decisons in future and she knows what to expect if she steps out of line.”
March 9th, 2011 at 8:51 pm
Daz,
Personally I love trolls, in theory they could be part of the enjoyment of discussion.
However when it comes to religion it really is a waste of time. Like yourself, some of the regulars on this site often post good, reasoned arguments on that waste of space Bob Hutton’s website. Do you get the frisson of good intelligent debate? Do you bollocks!
Like ALL religious trolls they either resort to scripture or delete your comments. As they have no argument.
So I challenge Iftikhar Ahmad. Either be a man and condemn the scum doing these attacks on women or be a waste of oxygen like all the other ‘moderates’ that are apparently out there. If you do I’ll happily admit I was wrong.
March 9th, 2011 at 11:18 pm
tony e:
Agreed. I actually came across one that made Hutton look good in comparison the other day. They don’t merely ignore posts, they actually edit them as part of the moderation process! Amazing what hypocrites can rationalise themselves into, ain’t it.
March 10th, 2011 at 2:01 am
Now, back on topic on THIS thread. Bjohn can back me up on this, that in the Paulism portion of the new testament, women are put in their place, subservient to their husbands, must cover their heads to pray. Divorce is only on the grounds of adultery.
The extrapolated idea is that if the bitch doesn’t do as she’s told, you are free to beat the shit out of her. And she has no recourse, no sympathetic ear, except whispering complaints to other wives. Any freethinker knows that just isn’t right. And western societies have been pushed to rectify this injustice and they have been trying, despite the fundamentalist resistance.
What is fascinating to me, though, is that as we creep our way toward equal rights for women, the more broken families become an epidemic.
Now, STOP!!! Before any of you accuse me of insinuating that women’s rights are against the plan of nature or of god, let me say that I put this forward because it is an undeniable fact. But, I recite it because I find it hilarious to watch humanity stumbling around in the dark, with the best of intentions, but, ignorant of the unintended consequences. Just as hilarious is how quickly we judge those who are slow to change their point of view. The damn trolls failed to follow us into chaos, what were they thinking?
Final thought, in 1972, America voted on the Equal Rights Amendment, which would make it a legal standard, that in EVERYTHING, men and women were equal. It failed, mostly because of women’s vote. Seems they didn’t want to get drafted into the military, nor lose their advantage in divorce court. Add that to the big picture.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E....._Amendment
NeoWolfe
March 10th, 2011 at 8:53 am
Here’s a good one!
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/new.....erone.html
March 10th, 2011 at 7:38 pm
24hrs ago, on this site, I challenged Iftikhar Ahmad to speak out against the muslims who attack women.
As expected this troll has not replied.
So I must be justified in assuming that he and all the other spineless, dickless, cowardly, inbred, illiterate tossers who follow ‘Mo’ are so scared of their breathern, that they cannot even speak out to protect women.
Well, what a surprise!
OT – Anybody else having difficulty accessing this site today?
March 10th, 2011 at 8:29 pm
http://tribune.com.pk/story/12.....g-doctors/
March 10th, 2011 at 8:34 pm
http://www.hrw.org/en/reports/.....heir-rules