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Simon Singh at the RCJ

On Tuesday I was at the demonstration for Simon Singh outside the Royal Courts of Justice.  He is being sued for libel by the British Chiropractic Association, and the latest court appearance was an appeal over meaning.
Here’s a slideshow of my photos from outside the court, all with a Creative Commons Licence:

Inside the court, the judges apparently became quite exhasperated with some of the arguments put forward during the hearing. Padraig Reidy from Index on Censorship reported first-hand:

Lord Chief Justice Lord Judge said he was “troubled” by the “artificiality” of the case. “The opportunities to put this right have not been taken,” Lord Judge said.
He continued: “At the end of this someone will pay an enormous amount of money, whether it be from Dr Singh’s funds or the funds of BCA subscribers.”
He went on to criticise the BCA’s reluctance to publish evidence to back up claims that chiropractic treatments could treat childhood asthma and other ailments.
“I’m just baffled. If there is reliable evidence, why hasn’t someone published it?”
…
Rogers conceded that had Singh written that there was “no reliable evidence”, the defamation suit might never have happened.
But Lord Justice Sedley suggested “isn’t the first question as to whether something is evidence that it is reliable?”

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On Bias

A while back, I noted that everyone, everywhere, thinks that their culture is under attack:

The Islamic States fear the coming of Western Imperialism, while the Christian West complains that their time-honoured traditions are being undermined by an unjustified favouritism to alien minorities.

My theory was that this was an observational fallacy.  We are acutely aware of the depth of our own culture, and also changes and threats to it.  Conversely, we fail to percieve nuance and change in other cultures.
I was reminded of this mentality just now, when I read a True/Slant article on percieved bias in Israel/Palestine coverage.  Pro-Israeli and Pro-Arab groups were shown a news report and asked to comment on its bias:

The point is that these groups watched the same news and came to opposite conclusions as to which way it was biased. And each side thought it was biased against their side.

(via The Daily Dish).

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The Torture of 'Suspects'

I see that the assassins of the Hamas leader Mahmoud al-Mabhouh used fake British passports while plotting the deed.  The Daily Mail has an interview with one of the people who had his identity cloned.

A British man in Israel with the same name as an alleged member of a hit squad that assassinated a top Hamas militant in Dubai said his identity had been stolen.
Melvyn Adam Mildiner said he was ‘angry, upset and scared’ over what he called a misidentification.

During the recent debate about MI5 complicity in torture, I noted with dismay how many people used the phrase ‘terror suspects’ quite comfortably when discussing people they might put on a waterboard.  This incident in Dubai is a timely reminder that ‘terror suspects’ covers day-tripping British tourists.  Anyone who endorses torture due to a hypothetical ticking bomb scenario must also endorse the torture of innocent British holiday makers.  That a British tourist might be mistaken for a terrorist is also a hypothetical – but one that is just as probable, if not more probable, than the ticking bomb thought-experiments.
Endorsing the water-boarding of innocent tourist is the only consistent position for those who would justify the torture of other ‘suspects’ such as Binyam Mohammed.  It is this internal consistency, taken to its logical conclusion, which highlights the ultimate absurdity of the pro-torture posturing.

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Sleep Deprivation

I’m sick of people equating ‘sleep deprivation’ in the torture/interrogation sense, with the lack of sleep that many people suffer as as a result of their job. The two are incomparable.

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Fortress Academy

My speech at Goldsmiths was part of a wider campaign to make life easier for visiting artists and academics.  The Manifesto Club, who produced the report ‘UK Arts and Culture – Cancelled, by Order of the Home Office‘ have today published a sequel: ‘Fortress Academy‘. This new report looks specifically at the impact of the points-based visa system on universities and their students.

Students were rejected by the UKBA for a variety of trivial reasons, including having written ‘Malaysian’ instead of ‘Malaysia’ under country, or for the colour of the background used in their photograph.