Denmark: "Muslim girls aren't human beings" (UPDATED)

Denmark: "Muslim girls aren't human beings"

The interview, via Snaphanen.

Update 6:

Uproar in Free Press Society


Update 5:

Lars Hedegaard says he does not regret his statements, and that the Free Press Society (FPS) has gotten more members. Hedegaard says they've gotten indications of solidarity, and he's gotten support from the administration, so he doesn't think this has hurt the FPS' work.

"I've always said that I'm not speaking about all Muslims, but Islam in its basic form with its attitude towards women. This can be read in the holy scriptures about the prophet's deeds. They're supported today by the leading scholars, the ulema. I don't think that all Muslims are aggressive, but the ideology behind Islam is," he says.

He says he's not a victim, but that this case shows that some journalists - Niels Krause-Kjær, Ole Birk Olesen and Rune Engelbreth - are against him and the FPS. He says they took out some passages out of what he wrote and portray it as if he's the Beast in Revelations.

Zubair Butt Hussein, spokesperson for the Muslim Joint Council, says he's used to engaging in dialog and heated debate with people, but this amputates any type of objective debate on which direction society should go in. He says it's deeply shameful that one can take all Muslim men as hostages, and he thinks it's beneath contempt.

Zubair Butt Hussein says he reads it as a deliberate stigmatization of a group of people, and it gives him unfortunate associations in history which he doesn't think are funny. When the board support this by saying it's a fact-based discussion, in which Hedegaard is an expert, it's really offensive.

Though Hedegaard says so, Zubair Butt Hussein says, we still can't lie or rape. It's so deeply perverted. And additionally there are no modern scholars, male or female, who say that we should stop in time and still take camels to Mecca on pilgrimage - we take planes. People create various stereotypes of Muslims, and lie which are repeated will make people believe that they're true. (DA, DA)


Update 4:

Søren Pind (Liberal Party) and Naser Khader (Conservative Party), announced that they're quitting the Free Press Society's advisory board.

"Lars Hedegaard's regret isn't good enough, since he's still not accepting the basic premise that one should make a distinction between Islam and Islamism. Islam is a religious, while the latter is a dangerous ideology we should fight," says Naser Khader. Khader adds that he also saw that Hedegaard's original statement were supported by DPP members, which shows that the Free Press Society is a branch of the DPP.

In his announcement Søren Pind pointed out that he's never actually been a member of the Free Press Society, but only served on its advisory board. (DA, DA)

Update 3:

Yilmaz Evcil, deputy chairman of Århus's integration council, lodged a complaint by the police against Hedegaard.

Evcil wrote in an email that Hedegaard was reported for his racist comment on Muslims on his blog snaphanen.dk and parliamentarian Søren Espersen of the DPP was also reported for racism.

Parish priest Katrine Lilleør demands that Hedegaard quit as head of the Free Press Society, or else she will quit the society's advisory board.

"I don't want to be a background group in a society where Muslims are being generalized in any way and shoved aside as an extremist group. Therefore I think that she should quit as chairman, and if he doesn't quit, then I will quit." (DA, DA)


Update 2:

Lars Hedegaard regrets his controversial statement that Muslim men rape their female family members and see women as less-worthy birth-machines.

"First, I will apologize, if I gave the impression that I wanted to accuse all Muslims - or most of them - of abusing their children. That of course wasn't my intention," writes Lars Hedegaard in a press release.

He emphasizes that his statements are 'about Islam and not Muslims', which he says is a crucial distinction.

"Muslims aren't responsible for being born into a certain religion, and I am completely aware that many of them would like to reform the religious practice and make it conform to Western norms. Unfortunately it's difficult, what one can convince himself by studying Islam's canon writings and listening to statements by Islam's authoritative interpreters - the imams and the ulema."

Hedegaard says that he's speaking on his own behalf, and is threatening to sue 180Grader.dk and Berlingske Tidende's blogger Niels Krause-Kjær, if they don't retract that he's calling for lynchings in the following quotes from the interview:

[…] Our leaders do not take this seriously and I am afraid that it will take a public uprising before they will take this seriously. But they must. After the German occupation of Denmark there were quite a few who had collaborated with the enemy who came into very hot water. The same thing could happen here… This cannot be solved with a compromise, it’s either our civilisation or their non-civilisation and barbarism. Our two ways of life are like fire and water. One of them must be victorious.” (DA)


Update: Naser Khadder, integration spokesperson for the Conservative Party, is threatening to quit the Free Press Society. Khadder says that he can't live with Hedegaard being so generalizing. He feels offended and says that when he started on the Free Press Society's advisory board, one of his conditions was that it would be more politically open, and not only have DPP members. (DA)

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Søren Krarup of the Danish People's Party (DPP) completely supports Lars Hedegaard's criticism of Islam. Lars Hedegaard, head of the Free Speech Society, said in a recent interview that Muslim girls were raped by their family.

"He's absolutely right, and the outrage is wholly because of the ignorance of you journalists," says Søren Krarup.

In the interview Hedegaard said as follows: "Girls in Muslim families are raped by their uncles, their cousins or their father [...] They are not human beings. They have a function as a a womb - they bear the offspring of the warriors and create new warriors, other than that.. well, they can be used for sexual purposes, but they have no value."

According to Krarup the evidence can be found in the book "Mødom på Mode". "It's a Danish immigrant girl who tells about how she was raped by her uncle, and how she didn't dare say anything to her own family. He's absolutely right," says Krarup.

Jette Dali of the Free Speech Society, who is also a candidate for parliament for the DPP, also agrees with the substance of Hedegaard's statements, but says that people shouldn't generalize.

"There's a kernel of truth in it. There's more which have been shown in the past," she says, and adds that there was once a study in Denmark which showed their [ed: Muslim girls and women] loneliness and isolation. It's obviously not only in Muslim community, but in addition to the attacks, they have to deal with it on their own and can't count on anybody's support. Also not from their own parents.

Q: But according to Krarup there's no issue of generalization

A: It's not generalizations, because he's not speaking about Muslims in general, he's speaking of what Islam says, and what Islam expresses, she says.

Source: Berlingske (Danish)

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