Bright backs Rushdie (and Pope found to be Catholic)
"The attacks on Rushdie from self-appointed representatives of the Muslim community this time around have been utterly predictable. But it has been useful to flush out the miserable Lord Ahmed for the out-of-touch Islamist he really is. It was, therefore, a pleasant surprise to see Inayat Bunglawala of the Muslim Council of Britain recanting on Comment is Free over his previous wish to see Rushdie dead. I only hope he can bring himself to do the same over the MBC's shameful position on Holocaust Memorial Day, homosexuality and declarations of the apostasy of Muslim sects of which it doesn't approve."
It appears that Bright is incapable of referring to representatives of the Muslim community without adding the qualifier "self-appointed", and this despite the fact that the MCB has 500 affiliates and elects its leadership every two years. Bright, of course, prefers the self-styled Sufi Muslim Council which represents nothing whatsoever in the Muslim communities and whose leadership has never been elected by anybody.
Meanwhile, over at Comment is Free, Oliver Miles offers a more thoughtful response to the Rushdie knighthood controversy: "Did no one really understand that far from being in the category of those who have made a positive contribution, Rushdie has deepened the divisions in our society, and this accolade was likely to deepen them still further?"
Martin Sullivan