FitFinder, the popular social networking website for UK students, has been temporarily taken down due to pressure from universities over the perceived distraction to students, confirms the site’s creator and University College London student, Rich Martell.
Rich has been fined £300 by the University College London for ‘bringing the college into disrepute’ as his flirtacious website aimed at rating the attractiveness of students has apparently caused an ‘unwelcome distraction’ on campuses across the UK.
Fitfinder has been a phenomenon, attracting millions of visitors and serious interest from advertisers and investors. However, at the beginning of May, one week after launch, the Joint Academic NETwork (JANET), the UK’s education and research network blocked FitFinder from UK university networks over issues with the perceived level of distraction offered by the site. However, the ban was lifted within 24 hours following floods of complaints from students across the country.
Creator Martell has insisted, “It’s flattering to think that FitFinder is perceived as a threat to study time. But are students spending any more time on FitFinder that they would on, say, Facebook or Twitter? Not a chance.”
It’s interesting to note that you can access Facebook, Twitter, MySpace and all other forms of ‘distracting’ social networking sites from on campuses, which would mean perhaps it’s not just the distraction that’s the issue for UCL and JANET here. It looks like the institutions are taking issue with the nature of the website itself, which asks members to rate the attractiveness of fellow students.
Student Rights note, “It’s not right for universities to be blocking websites like this and/or fining students for entreprenurship – even if the site did start off as a joke. It’s clearly turned into something of a web phenonmenon albeit locally thus far and UCL and JANET should take a step back and focus on more serious issues on campuses across the country.”
A petition has garnered over 6000 signatures so far and can be signed by clicking here.
It was reported this weekend that ‘preacher of hate’ Zakir Naik will begin a tour of the UK unless immediate action is taken by the UK Home Office to stop his entry into Britain.
In response to this, Student Rights Director Raheem Kassam has written an open letter to Prime Minister David Cameron, urging Naik to be banned from entry into the UK. A petition can be signed here and a video of Mr. Naik is available underneath the text.
Dear Prime Minister,
It has been brought to my attention that the Home Office is currently assessing the situation regarding Zakir Naik, who has been described as an ‘Islamist hate-preacher and truth-twister’.
I am writing to express my deep concern that this individual may be allowed entry to the UK in order to promote and glorify acts of terrorism — causing far reaching implications within the already divided Muslim community in the United Kingdom.
A few examples of Mr. Naik’s preaching reveal him to be a sympathiser with Osama Bin Laden. He stated, “If [Osama Bin Laden] is terrorising Americans… then I am with him,” while also asserting that “Every Muslim should be a terrorist.”
Given your previous stated desire in combatting this form of extremism and your voting record regarding opposition to incitement to terror in the United Kingdom, I urge you to act immediately and decisively to set a precedent. It must be made clear that the UK will not tolerate extremism and that we will do our utmost to promote plurality and peace in a modern, multi-ethnic Britain.
Yours sincerely,
Raheem Kassam
National Director
The video below shows Zakir Naik speaking in late 2006…
In this age of cuts, we would do well to accept that there are indeed areas where universities should be able to make savings and yet keep delivering and improving upon the standards of education. It can happen, but it requires a firm hand. Where I’d like to start is by asking you, do your Vice Chancellors earn an appropriate amount of money?
Recently, Douglas Murray from the Centre for Social Cohesion outlined in an article for the Telegraph how much University College London Provost Malcolm Grant earns. Between 2008 and 2009, it appears that Malcolm Grant earned a whopping £376,190. So much for the old adage, “Those who can’t… teach.”
Furthermore, it would appear as outlined by The Times Online, that ‘bidding wars’ have emerged at universities for the ‘best’ lecturers and managers – a private sector, market-based practice which should effectively have no sway in the public sector – which universities very much still are. About £200m has just yesterday been cut from the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills budget for universities.
An analysis of university accounts has shown that in 2008-9 the number of employees on six-figure pay increased by 17% and the pay of vice-chancellors went up nearly 11% to an average of £219,000. The highest paid included Malcolm Grant, provost of University College London, who received £376,190.
While Bristol University serves as an example by tightening their belts and freezing the pay of lecturers and Vice Chancellors, other universities blame 2006 agreements for the pay rises. So we ask you, are your lecturers, middle-managers and Vice Chancellors really worth six-figure salaries. Even if you agree, at a cost to the taxpayer and the fee-paying student – where on Earth does it stop?
In Pakistan, some cultural practices are being denounced as ‘haram’ by extremists. In a country with such a rich history of music and poetry, one man stands at the forefront of a battle against this perversion of Islamic history. That man will be joining the Quilliam Foundation touring UK universities and helping the fight against extremism on campuses. That man is Salman Ahmad, one of South Asia’s most successful rock musicians.
The Led Zeppelin inspired front man of Junoon will be playing this week at Oxford, Imperial and the London School of Economics in what he describes as ‘telling the truth through the power of a guitar’. Salman is dedicated to the counter-radicalisation cause and has himself, ’seen at first hand young Muslims being radicalised by the distorted message of Islam.’
Ahmad is a practicing Muslim who lectures part-time on Islamic music and poetry in New York. His aim, he states is to prevent students being brainwashed by “murderous thugs masquerading as holy men”.
We think the idea of promoting the true cultural values and history of Islam is inspired and deserving of great praise. The more brave, talented and educated people we have standing up to pernicious extremists; the safer and more culturally rich and cohesive our society becomes.
Click the image below for the Facebook event where Salman will be playing at the Imperial College London this Thursday, 20th May 2010.
There’s a video that’s being circulated around the United States and I think it’s worthwhile that it gets seen in this country. What’s happening at university campuses over there is very similar to the issues we face in terms of radicalisation and extremism. The video shows us precisely what runs through the mind of a Muslim Students Association (MSA-US) member at the University of California San Diego.
No matter what your opinion of the speaker, David Horowitz is – it should be glaringly obvious that the girl’s response to his question in this clip is a call to genocide, plainly and simply. She states that she fears being arrested by Homeland Security for supporting Hamas (as any glorification of terror is illegal) and flippantly dismisses Horowitz’s referral to Israel Apartheid Week as ‘Hitler Youth Week’. This may seem divisive from him at first, but when you see her answer to his last question; it’s more than a justified definition of what extremists are promoting on campuses.
Furthermore, while she asks about the accusation of links between the MSA and ‘jihad terrorist networks’ – she answers her own question with her response to the title of this blog post. Watch and see the full transcript below.
We face the same radicalisation issues here in the United Kingdom. Student Rights work to expose and counter the extremist threat on UK University campuses and we run entirely off private donations. If you are able to support us, please contact info@studentrights.org.uk or click here to donate via PayPal.
TRANSCRIBED (via Atlas Shrugs)
MSA member: Good evening, I just wanted to say thank you for coming to campus tonight and presenting your point of view, its always important to have to sets of, ah, views going on at the same time. Um, very useful. My name is [Jimena Imad Musa Ahmal Bahiri](sp) and I’m a student here at UCSD. Ah I was reading your literature, I found that much more interesting than your talk, and I found some interesting things about the MSA, which is an organization that is very active on campus and is hosting our annual “Hitler Youth” week, you should come out to those events. [DS: Horowitz had referred to the MSA's week as a Hitler Youth week.] Um, if you could clarify the connection between the MSA and Jihad terrorist networks, because last time I checked, we had to do our own fundraising, and we never get help from anyone. So if you could clarify the connection between UCSD’s MSA or if you don’t have such information, if you could connect other MSA’s on UC’s, because the connection wasn’t to clear in the pamphlet, just if you could clarify.
Horowitz: Okay. Will you condemn Hamas, here and now?
MSA member: I’m sorry, what?
Horowitz: Will you condemn Hamas?
MSA member: Would I condemn Hamas?
Horowitz: As a terrorist organization. Genocidal organization.
MSA member: Are you asking me to put myself on a cross?
Horowitz: So you won’t. I have actually had this experience many times. You didn’t actually read the pamphlet, because the pamphlet is chapter and verse. The main connection is that the MSA is part of the Muslim Brotherhood Network as revealed…
MSA member: I don’t think you understood what I meant by that. I meant if I say something, I am sure that I will be arrested, for reasons of homeland security. So if you could please just answer my question.
Horowitz: If you condemn Hamas, Homeland Security will arrest you?
MSA member: If I support Hamas, because your question forces me to condemn Hamas. If I support Hamas, I look really bad.
Horowitz: If you don’t condemn Hamas, obviously you support it. Case closed. I have had this experience at UC Santa Barbara, where there were 50 members of the Muslim Students Association sitting right in the rows there. And throughout my hour talk I kept asking them, will you condemn Hizbollah and Hamas. And none of them would. And then when the question period came, the president of the Muslim Students Association was the first person to ask a question. And I said, ‘Before you start, will you condemn Hizbollah?’ And he said, ‘Well, that question is too complicated for a yes or no answer.’ So I said, ‘Okay, I’ll put it to you this way. I am a Jew. The head of Hizbollah has said that he hopes that we will gather in Israel so he doesn’t have to hunt us down globally. For or Against it?
FRANCE has declared the full Islamic face veil an affront to French values – presumably it is against the values of liberté, égalité and fraternité.
Sorry, but where is the equality, the égalité, in targeting a tiny group of Muslim women? Where is their liberty in not being able to choose what they want to wear?
France pretends it is a bastion of equality. This shows it is anything but.
To show it is not targeting poor Muslim women on sink estates, France exclaims it will also pick on the super-rich Muslim women who flock to designer shops.
Oh, good. So not prejudiced against poor Muslims, just ALL Muslims. That makes me feel better. Personally, I’m not a fan of the burka. No one in my family has worn one and I associate it with the women in villages back home who want to escape the prying eyes of lustful men.
But that’s back home. I agree that when I see women on the streets in Bradford in full black, flowing gowns I am taken aback.
I believe it probably doesn’t even have Islamic roots but was worn in the desert to keep the sand out of people’s eyes.
I can see why mainstream Brits find them offensive but, to be honest, I feel equally uncomfortable when I see people bearing neck-to-ankle tattoos or body piercings.
Or people who do the unthinkable… and wear socks with sandals.
Those who wear the burka don’t criticise me for wearing mismatched clothes, and I don’t criticise them for their interpretation of Islam. Of course, if there is a security issue, then that comes first. Veiled women understand that and are happy to show their faces when they need to.
I just think constant appraisal of Islamic dress exacerbated the problem. No one really cared before about what Muslim women wore but suddenly it became a big issue.
The more it became an issue, the more women decided to wear it.
And where it is banned, what are you going to do? Physically rip it off women as they walk down the street? Doesn’t sound very civilised.
Some women truly and honestly believe they are obeying God by covering their faces. They aren’t going to listen to anyone else.
And the more we make a song and dance about it, the more women will want to don the burka to show solidarity with their oppressed sisters.
Of course, they could always move to Japan. On a recent trip there I was struck by how many people – women and men – wore the face veil. Except it was white and they called it a “pollution mask”.
France has made its position clear – liberté, égalite, fraternité… so long as you’re not Muslim.
Student Rights welcomes responses and replies to this post. We value the opinions of our readers and would invite greater discussion on this subject matter. Please contact info@studentrights.org.uk if you are interested in writing an opinion piece for us, or have general comments.
No doubt the past week has been both incredibly busy and halted a lot of work that has gone on as the UK elections took centre stage. Post May 6th, however we find ourselves in a situation without a government but where we all need to get back to work. One of the things I’d like to address that may have been missed over this period is Azaam Tamimi’s piece in the Guardian Comment is Free section, on Tuesday 4th May.
What Tamimi attempts to express in this article is that:
1. He is not an extremist and is willing to sit down and have discussions with Jewish leaders in order to facilitate a greater culture of peace of campus – and yet he has endorsed suicide bombings against Israel?
2. He has been the subject of a campaign to stop him speaking at UK universities - as if he has not been complicit in causing campus divisions and repeatedly targeting areas to cause disruption
3. That there is a further conspiracy at work against him which travels to the Prime Minister’s office - although his delusions of grandeur are palpable he may be correct in assuming that our Parliament is concerned about extremists
This is of course, Tamimi’s attempt to whitewash his record, but it’s all too apparent what he’s doing. If he really wants to fly the straight and narrow from here on out, he’ll have to do a lot better than a defensive article in the Guardian in an attempt to garner sympathy.
If it wasn’t already clear by now what our issue with Tamimi is, you can find the details here, here and here. This man needs to do a lot more if he wants to start engaging against extremism on campuses and the first step is a complete and utter denouncement of suicide bombings and martyrdom tactics that he has espoused in the past. Secondly, Tamimi needs to distance himself from Hamas and prove that he in no way endorses these people’s approach to ‘democracy’ and ‘war’. The man so far as done neither of these things but wishes to be treated as a ‘moderate’.
As long as he stands by his comments on BBC HardTalk and an interview with a Spanish newspaper where Tamimi claimed that “everyone” in the Arab world celebrated the 9/11 attacks, he will continue to be viewed as a divisive and dangerous extremist.
So what is he trying to do when writing for the Guardian, claiming he is the subject of some kind of gagging attempt? Anyone who has bothered to research a little bit into this man sees the glaring hypocrisy in his attempts to exercise absolute freedom of speech, while those who he ’sympathises’ with would never allow this. Hamas would never allow this.
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