Free speech UCU stylee.

There's a story doing the rounds about the Harry's place blog being dropped by its ISP following a libel complaint from one Jenna Delich. (Apparently the fact that the article in question referred directly to a post made by Ms Delich on the UCU activist list is irrelevant.)

The offending post was one drawing attention to a post by Ms Delich, linking in a positive fashion to a piece on David Duke's site. (For those unfamiliar, David Duke is a former Grand Wizard of the knights of the Ku Klux Klan and general all round tosser.)

Ms Delich followed the link with the comment

"No comment necessary. The facts are speaking for themselves"

which any reasonable person would agree is an endorsement of the article to which she was linking.

Harry's place have thankfully been able to find a more robust ISP, and will hopefully be able to continue operating free from harrasment. It is however a sad indictment of the hard left that when presented with a situation like this, the first instinct is not to appologise for the mistake (If it was such) but to attempt to shut down the site which embarressed them and to maliciously accuse their opponents.

Random Cowardice.

Random House have announced that they will not be publishing "The Jewel of Medina" for fear that it might lead to violence.

The book tells the story of A'isha from her betrothal to Mohammed at the age of six until his death.

This decision amounts to a pre-emptive surrender to the thugs who try to restrict free speech.

The author of the book, Sherry Jones, is quoted as saying "I have deliberately and consciously written respectfully about Islam and Mohammed", yet it is inevitable that some of the extremists would have sought to stir up hatred and violence against it. Instead of surrendering to this however we should stand up to it. Every time these people succeed in shutting down free speech they will be emboldened in trying again.

One day, we may regret that we did not stand up for freedom of speech when we had the chance.