-Caveat Lector-
Begin forwarded message:
From: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Date: June 12, 2007 5:02:43 PM PDT
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED], [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: "Non-Christian Religious Texts Encourage Violence" (Like
the Old Testament?)
Book-banning raises specter of
religious discrimination in prison
Karen Franklin, Ph.D.
Karen Franklin, Ph.D. is a forensic psychologist in the San
Francisco Bay Area and an instructor at the California School of
Professional Psychology (Alliant International University). She
specializes in the evaluation and treatment of criminal defendants.
Her research on the psychosocial motivations of hate crime
offenders has been awarded with the Monette/Horwitz Trust Award and
the Harry Frank Guggenheim Fellowship. Her peer-reviewed
publications have appeared in the American Behavioral Scientist,
the Journal of Interpersonal Violence, the Encyclopedia of
Violence, the Encyclopedia of Criminology, the Journal of Forensic
Psychology Practice, and other venues. A former criminal
investigator and legal affairs newspaper reporter, she received
postdoctoral training in forensic psychology through the University
of Washington. Her bog, "In the News: Forensic Psychology,
Criminology, and Psychology-Law," is available at:
June 11, 2007
http://www.americanchronicle.com/articles/viewArticle.asp?
articleID=29311
Federal prisoners in New York have filed suit over the sudden
disappearance of hundreds of religious texts from the chapel library.
Religious books are being removed from prisons nationwide as part
of a 2004 federal directive aimed at quelling the spread of Islamic
fundamentalism in prison. The directive also suggests audio and
video monitoring of worship services and heightened screening of
religious service providers.
A U.S. Attorney said the directive stems from concern that prisons
are being radicalized by Islamic prisoners. He said officials will
create a new list of permitted religious books.
Although prisoners at the Otisville federal prison camp reported
that some Christian texts were also removed, the book banning
appears to be part of a wave of anti-Islamic discrimination in
the wake of Sept. 11, 2001.
A Justice Department investigation two years ago found mistreatment
of Muslim prisoners at multiple lockups inside the United States.
The anti-Islamic discrimination coincides with growing federal
support for Christian ministries in prison. With links to the White
House, a politically powerful evangelical Christian group, Prison
Fellowship Ministries, has assumed outright control of prison wings
and corrections budgets in Kansas, Iowa, Texas, Minnesota, and
other states, according to a 2003 expose in Mother Jones magazine.
Despite this massive federal sponsorship of Christian ministries,
the proportion of Muslim prisoners continues to grow. While the
vast majority of prisoners are still Christian, Muslims make up
about 20% of the incarcerated population in some states, according
to a 1999 article in the Wall Street Journal. Some Christian
ministers perceive this as a threat.
Ironically, research suggests that anti-Muslim crackdowns will
backfire, contributing to increased militancy among Muslim prisoners.
Based on a four-year research project in British prisons,
anthropologist Gabriele Marranci reported that experiences of
religious discrimination made Muslim prisoners more vulnerable to
recruitment by militant organizations.
"I found no evidence to suggest that the Muslim chaplains are
behaving or preaching in a way that facilitates radicalisation,"
Dr. Marranci reported. "On the contrary, my findings suggest that
they are extremely important in preventing dangerous forms of
extremism. However, the distrust that they face, both internally
and externally, is jeopardising their important function."
-----------------
Book Ban:
Federal directive to remove religious books from libraries misdirected
The Lufkin Daily News
http://www.lufkindailynews.com/opin/content/news/opinion/stories/
2007/06/12/editorial.html
Tuesday, June 12, 2007
According to the Justice Department, it isn't just escape plans
that prison officials have to be vigilant in thwarting — now
they've got to keep inmates from being inspired to commit acts of
terror by reading religious and spiritual books in prison chapel
libraries.
Prison officials began removing hundreds of books from a New York
prison library on Memorial Day weekend as part of a nation-wide
federal directive intended to prevent "radical religious texts,
specifically Islamic ones," from being accessed by violent inmates,
according to an Associated Press story Monday.
However, many of the books that were removed have nothing to do
with Islam, according to a lawsuit filed by three Otisville Prison
inmates. They're seeking an injunction against the removal, saying
that the books removed affect all religions.
Although we're not certain by what standard a book would be
considered "radical," we'd assume that violent inmates would
already have been denied any reading material — even religious
material — that advocates or encourages the commission of a crime
or justifies criminal acts. After all, those who are convicted of a
crime are not entitled to the full benefit of the First Amendment.
However, we've read one of the 600 books pulled from a New York
prison's library's shelves — "When Bad Things Happen to Good
People," by Harold S. Kushner — and if there is anything in that
book that justifies committing acts of terror in the name of
religion, we missed it.
Apparently, so did Norman Vincent Peale, who has described it as "a
book that all humanity needs."
Like so many of the government's efforts to protect us from
terrorism, this one is not only ill-advised, but impossible to
enforce. The assistant U.S. attorney in the case told the court
that since inmates are permitted to order books on their own and
bypass the chapel libraries, "this is not a case about what books
the inmates have the ability to read," an AP story said.
The attorney, Brian Feldman, told a judge that the problem was some
of inmates who were "practicing or espousing various extreme forms
of religion, specifically Islam, which exposed security risks to
the prisons and beyond the prisons to the public at large."
We'd think that if that were the case, the solution would be to
deny prisoners access to those who espouse extreme forms of
religion instead of books that might contradict those extreme views.
And since the review that exposed the security breach was conducted
in 2004, we'd hope that the justice department would have already
taken steps to do that.
If they haven't, they should.
See what's free at AOL.com.
www.ctrl.org
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