The post in question is here. It’s an announcement that that the Muhammad Art Exhibit and Cartoon Contest that Pamela Geller and I organized in Garland Texas in May 2015 was sold out, and an excerpt from a Breitbart article about the event. Why has Pakistan been so slow on the uptake here? The post has been out there for over seven and a half years. It could be, of course, because issues of “blasphemy” and the freedom of speech are once again in the news because of the Qur’an-burning in Sweden.
This notice, and that event, demonstrate the fact that there really is a clash of civilizations, for there are two irreconcilable perspectives at play here. One is the idea that the freedom of expression is an important right, even if one’s expression offends someone else, for to outlaw offending some particular group would be to set up that group as above criticism, and that would pave the way for tyranny. The other is the idea that because Muslims are offended by drawings of Muhammad, and some even become violent as a result of these drawings, non-Muslims must curtail their freedom of expression in order to avoid offending them, although no one is granting any other group the privilege not to be offended. The West continues to ignore the irreconcilability of those two perspectives and pretend that it can somehow come to some accommodation between the two, but it will only do so ultimately by sacrificing the freedom of speech, which is the way it’s heading now, or by standing up for that freedom even in the face of violent intimidation.
It’s also worth noting that the Garland event was the first Islamic State (ISIS) attack on American soil. To my knowledge, the government of Pakistan has never said a word about that attack. But it is very upset about images of Muhammad, and announcing that it’s blocking Jihad Watch as a result. If the assassins had succeeded and a large number of us at the event had been killed, the government of Pakistan would still have been unlikely to utter a murmur of condemnation. Its priorities are that Muhammad must be honored by everyone, Muslim and non-Muslim. For them, the value of human life is secondary to that. And consequently, as far as its demand that we take down the post goes, the government of Pakistan can go pound sand.
Ironically, Pakistan is here saying they’ll block the site unless we explain and defend our actions, which of course we have no intention of doing for them, as that would be a tacit admission that the government of Pakistan actually has some authority over what we do here. Ironically, we already block the site in Pakistan due to the abuse we see coming from there, and have done so for nearly ten years, so the government of Pakistan must have made particular efforts to see this “blasphemy.” But I do thank the government of Pakistan for sending us this warning. At least the government of Pakistan is more honest than the hopelessly corrupt and compromised government of Britain, where we are mostly blocked with no such warning ever being issued.
Anyway, our tech expert Marc has now unblocked Pakistan, so that anyone learning about this “blasphemy” there can check the site for themselves.
From: Web Analysis Cell <webanalysiscell@pta.gov.pk>
Date: Monday, January 30, 2023 at 5:39 AM
To:
Subject: NOTICE UNDER RULE 5(7)(i) OF THE REMOVAL AND BLOCKING OF UNLAWFUL ONLINE CONTENT (PROCEDURE, OVERSIGHT AND SAFEGUARDS) RULES 2021 READ WITH SECTION 37 (1) OF PREVENTION OF ELECTRONIC CRIMES ACT, 2016 – https://www.jihadwatch.orgDear Administrator,
The website https://www.jihadwatch.org is hereby issued Notice as under:
WHEREAS it has been reported to Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (the “Authority”) that the Website i.e https://www.jihadwatch.org (“Platform”) is involved in dissemination of content against religion of Islam/Muslims, caricatures of Holy Prophet Muhammad (PBUH) and circulating false rumors/reports against Muslims, which is outrageous and severely hurting the religious sentiments of Muslims. Sample Links are attached as Annex-A. It is informed that dissemination of such blasphemous content is a cognizable offence under sections 295-A, 295-C, 298 and 298-A of Pakistan Penal Code 1860 (“PPC”) and abuse of Article 260 (3) and Article 31 of the Constitution of Islamic Republic of Pakistan, 1973 (“Constitution of Pakistan”).
AND WHEREAS the Authority has been empowered under section 37 (1) of Prevention of Electronic Crimes Act 2016 (“PECA”) to remove or block or issue directions for removal or blocking of access to an information through any information system if it considers it necessary in the interest of glory of Islam or the integrity, security or defense of Pakistan or any part thereof, public order, decency or morality, or in relation to contempt of court or commission of or incitement to an offense under PECA.
AND WHEREAS as per section 1(4), PECA shall apply to any act committed outside Pakistan by any person if the act constitutes an offence under PECA and affects any person, property, information system or data located in Pakistan.
AND WHEREAS in accordance with section 37(2) read with section 51 of PECA, Federal Government has approved the Removal and Blocking of Unlawful Online Content (Procedure, Oversight and Safeguards), Rules 2021 (“Rules 2021”), which provide safeguards, process and mechanism for exercise of powers by the Authority under PECA for removal of or blocking access to unlawful Online Content through any information system.
AND WHEREAS Rule 3(2) of the Rules 2021 provides that the direction, issued by the Authority under the PECA and under these Rules 2021, shall prevail and take precedence over any contrary Community Guidelines and such Community Guidelines shall be deemed to be of no legal effect.
NOW THEREFORE the Platform is hereby issued this notice pursuant to Rule 5(7)(i) of the Rules 2021 with the direction to remedy the contravention by geo-fencing the blasphemous content including but not limited to reported content and bar its viewership in Pakistan within (48) hrs of the issuance of this notice and explain in writing, as to why an order under rule 5(7)(ii) of the Rules 2021 may not be passed. The Platform is at liberty to clarify its position and satisfy the Authority within stipulated time either through physical appearance or virtual meeting as deemed appropriate.
This issues with the approval of the Authority.
For and on behalf of the Authority
Web Analysis Division (WAD)
Linde B. says
May the One True Holy and Only God
bless everyone who works for
JihadWatch. I will make my best
donation to the Freedom Center now.
I pray every morning that The Holy Spirit gets into the minds and hearts of
Muslims so they know about the One
True Holy and Only God of the Old and
New Testaments. +
somehistory says
If there had been a *crime* committed with the cartoon contest, wouldn’t the statute of limitations have run out by now?
And it is impossible to blaspheme a creature who was reported to be a raper of children, owner of slaves for sex and abuse, murderer, liar, thief, adulterer, and a son of satan the devil.
Any one of those things makes the creature unholy. All together and he’s nothing more than a sack of maggot castoffs.
To “blaspheme” means to say unholy things about God, showing disrespect for His Holiness.
mozlums say there is only their one god, but they treat the Truth about their fake prophet as blasphemy, which means to mozlums, the fake prophet is ‘god.’ And they treat the Truth about their unholy book of evil, demonic filth the same way…rioting and killing if it’s burned, torn, thrown in the dirt, etc., therefore, . mozlums have 3 ‘gods.’ All unholy to the nth degree.
Keep the Freedom of Seech going….blast away.
somehistory says
Speech….my record of typos stands strong 🙂
Jayell1 says
Is anyone really bothered about the Pakistan Government blocking JW in its own territory? It’s a bit like the managers of an irretrievably contaminated cesspit banning supplies of industrial antiseptics; you might as well just leave them to wallow in their effluent (to which they’re obviously addicted) since they’re clearly quite beyond hope. It’s when they try to block ‘antiseptic’ supplies to others that you should be concerned.
By the way, JW has not been blocked in the UK – I’m sending this from London without any trouble. However we’re all aware that Mr. Spencer and Ms Geller were banned from entering the UK some years ago because it’s equally common knowledge that the UK Establishment has also been ‘contaminated’ for quite some time now – but not irretrievably, we hope.
marc says
Many ISPs in the UK block Jihadwatch.org some listed here: https://freespeechdefense.net/2019/11/european-isps-cell-and-cable-providers-escalate-censorship-of-jihad-watch-and-other-pro-freedom-sites/
But I have seen both BT and virgin also block
Maybe you are using one of the others or already use a VPN / alternative DNS servers?
John ..Smith says
islam is negative masquerading as positive, darkness masquerading as light.
So the religion of hate, death and lies, will always try to block that of love, life and truth.
somehistory says
Right,, John. like the devil masquerading as an “angel of light.” And many are fooled.
Devasur says
Be on guard sir, these pakis will go to any lengths to protect their evil religion.
David M says
The same Pakistani government now groveling before the United Nations to give them a loan because they are about to go bankrupt & not be able to pay their bills? You’d think they would have bigger things to worry about than cartoons posted on a foreign web site.
Scotsman48 says
Trump cut back on the amount of money US taxpayer were sending Pakistan, even as they screamed death to America, and when they learned that Trump had cut back they came out of the mosques screaming that America is racist as their money had been cut back…
Ya cant fix this kind of stupidity.
USA Taxpayers money should NOT be sent to countries that despise us and in fact it is now 2023 and surely its about time these countries got their own shit together just as Europeans did after the end of WW2 without help from anybody except America.
So why are the countries full of people that worked very hard to rebuild their own countries are now supposed to be sending money over to countries in Africa or other islamic Nations that seemingly cant do what Europeans did..
NoLibsWelcomeHere says
Suppose someone were to point out that the pig-faced dog mohammed is a pig-faced dog? Perhaps the knowledge that the pig-faced dog mohammed actually shat the contents of the terror guide, the koran, into the arabian sands as a result of diarrhea caused by eating an uncooked pig that he had just had sex with would calm them down?
Have the terrorists at the terror org CAIR chimed in yet?