Slashdot Mirror
UK Politician Arrested Over Twitter 'Stoning Joke'
History's Coming To writes "The BBC is reporting that a Tory city councillor has been arrested over a 'joke' he posted to Twitter suggesting that Yasmin Alibhai-Brown, a UK based writer, be stoned to death. The full tweet read, 'Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan't tell Amnesty if you don't. It would be a blessing, really.' Following complaints he was arrested under the Communications Act 2003 and bailed. He has since apologized. This comes on the same day that a conviction for a Twitter 'joke' about blowing up an airport was upheld."
Bomb, Bomb, Bomb the parliament!
Obviously he should have phrased it "Won't someone rid me of this meddlesome columnist?"
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
Joking about killing a writer whose views you don't agree with? Surely they teach you not to do that in their "Politics: Good Manners 101" class.
This is somewhat ridiculous. I know its not the US, so the laws are different, but who really cares if this man says something like that, as long as he doesn't follow through with it. If I were him I would not apologize.
That brings me to an interesting point, / . is just "the ramblings of socially-inept, technology-literate news-mongers".
On one hand... it seems odd to get arrested, convicted, etc., for a joke.
On the other hand, saying "oh come on guys, it was just a joke!" seems like it could easily turn into the "insanity" plea. True in some cases, but easy to claim for pretty much anything.
Ridiculous. I can appreciate that talking about bombs while going through airport security is not appropriate, but a joke on Twitter? Come on already! Who says who says what. Don't like it, don't follow him - that's sort of the whole point of how these social networks work.
GWB,
BTW, that whole WMD in Iraq thing we told you about, yeah, that was a joke! haha!
~NSA, FBI etc...
Can someone please stone spammers to death? I shan't tell Amnesty if you don't. It would be a blessing, really.
I read the headline and thought it was something else about Prop 19. :b
The World Wide Web is dying. Soon, we shall have only the Internet.
The problem with political jokes is they get elected.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
....at the time the joke was made, but police didn't believe him since he had no Alibhai.
Some bring out the best in others, some the worst. Some bring out far more.
Mojo Nixon is charged with inciting violence against Don Henley.
What's the word for "hilarious but really scary all at the same time"?
Sent from my CR-48
A day doesn't pass that either one of the tabloids is blasting the government for not acting on a perceived threat or an official or government department coming out with what should really be considered an outrageous policy.
A nice one was (yesterday?) the stopping of the head of MI6 from boarding a plane to the US because she had a can of hairspray larger than the allowed 100 milliliters in her bag.
Yes it's outside of the allowance but hey she's not exactly your typical terrist!
In the UK common sense has been outlawed.
"The likes of Facebook and WhatsApp are free to those whose privacy is of zero value."
"Politics is perhaps the only profession for which no preparation is thought necessary."
-- Robert Louis Stevenson
Wait, it's a joke! Don't mod me troll/flamebait!
...and more specifically, how a law that on the surface seems perfectly reasonable can be so easily misused.
The law is against menacing, the statement -- made publicly, not directed at any given person -- is
"Crap! Robin Hood airport is closed. You've got a week and a bit to get your shit together otherwise I'm blowing the airport sky high!!"
Any sensible person can see there is no threat there, it's just someone being a drama queen. But it violates the letter of the law and it's politically expedient to ignore the obvious.
Similarly,
"Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death? I shan't tell Amnesty if you don't. It would be a blessing, really."
is not a serious solicitation to murder; it's just someone being an ass. Or making a point in an offensive way, given that he says he was responding to a comment by Alibhai-Brown that no politician has the right to comment on human rights abuses, including the stoning of women in Iran.
I would presume that this is the program in question, though I haven't listened to it so don't know.
My goodness! I can't believe you would seriously stone someone just for spamming. People like you should be shot.
Brain surgery - it's not rocket science!
He sings, "Everybody must get stoned!"
Inciting violence! Against everybody!
Schroedinger's Brexit: The UK is both in and out of the EU at the same time!
Both the twitter posts cited in the article are jokes in poor taste by frustrated people, but are they evidence of intent to kill someone or blow up a plane? People bent on that sort of act rarely advertise their intent on some public media.
What's next? Being prosecuted for threatening to kill someone's character in World of Warcraft?
When I was a cop there were dozens of times that angry and/or frustrated people made comments (to me or to others) like "I'll kill you" or "You're dead if you do that again" or something similar. You have to make allowances for frustration and understand it's only human nature to make threats. Of course, it's different if you think they might actually do what they say, but that's not the usual case - people who are going to attack you just do it, they don't threaten first.
The difference is that on twitter (indeed, the internet in general) there's a permanent record. That plus a stupid/malicious prosecutor plus a judge who doesn't understand human nature is a recipe for damn stupid legal decisions.
Stoning is far too good for spammers. They should be burned at the stake.
You left out the part about amnesty international! There goes the joke.
This weekend my black labrador retriever snarfed two bags of M&M's off the kitchen counter while I was out raking leaves. He ingested roughly a pound and a half of chocolate. On the way to the vet hospital, I joked that if my dog lived through the chocolate poisoning, I was going to kill him. My wife understood this to be my way of dealing with the stress and that I really was worried about my dog and was in no way inclined to actually kill him. In other words, she got the joke.
If my wife got the joke, what is so hard about seeing the "joke" behind what this politician said? Or is it possible that my wife is smarter than the people that arrested this guy?
>Where do you have greater freedom of speech and presumption of innocence: Britain or Saudi Arabia?
On balance I'd say Britain
>Where are you more likely to be harassed by police for trivialities: Britain or Saudi Arabia?
Not sure, do you have the figures that you could share with us?
>Every day the two look more alike.
Evidence from, say the last 5 days: could you give us five separate summaries to prove this point?
>And now I will commit a crime in the eyes of England:
I suppose you mean "in the laws of England". Are you aware that England and Britain are different?
Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death?
This is asking a legitimate non threatening question: Is anyone capable of stoning Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death?
The obvious answer is: Yes! Someone more than likely IS CAPABLE of stoning Yasmin to death (were the answer "no", then I suggest Yasmin be studied to determine the origin of her stone deflecting powers).
A threat would have been:
I will stone Alibhai-Brown to death.
However, this is not what was said.
When a child (or other semi illiterate) asks me, "Can I please do ____?", I frequently reply, "I don't know, are you capable of doing ____?" The correct question is: "Will you please let me..." or "May I please..."
you find the spammers and i'll bring the rocks..
'...if only "Jumping to a Conclusion" was an event in the Olympics.'
or arrested
I don't get the joke. can someone explain it?
did you forget to take your meds?
It cuts both ways. If a Muslim cleric calls for stoning unbelievers and we arrest him, we have to be equally heavy handed with non-Muslims making similar statements.
I feel sorry for "airport guy" who has suffered far more than the case warrants - but he has failed to think it through. I'm sure that if the airport was closed because of a fake bomb threat, he would be complaining. He hasn't realised that the world doesn't consist of just "him" who he sees as the good guy, and everybody else. To everybody else, he is one of "them". This is what equality under the law means; being white, male and university educated does not make you privileged any more.
I started out, by the way, thinking his conviction was quite wrong. But I've been persuaded otherwise, and this is why.
From scarped cliff or quarried stone she cries "A thousand types are gone, I care for nothing, no not one."
... for wishing real murder.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1328703/Remembrance-Day-Poppy-burning-Muslim-protesters-mar-Armistice-Day.html
Is Wendy Testaburger using your lunch money to buy heroin?
Will someone stone a journalist to death for me?
I'm just asking the hard questions.
Signing off, this is casey miller
All politicians should be subjected to the stupid laws they impose. The rest of us should carry stones.
I don't know what planet you are from, but "Can someone please stone Yasmin Alibhai-Brown to death?" is not a rhetorical question here on planet Earth. It is a direct request. In the USA said person could go to jail for life if somebody read the request and actually granted it. This is in fact quite appropriate. Blasting such a request across the internet to hundreds of thousands of people, any one of which could be an instable nutbag, is gross negligence at best, and any death resulting from gross negligence is and should be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
what was that medieval torture, the Press? where people would be slowly crushed by ever increasing weights?
Use that, except instead of rocks, use printouts of their spam emails. It may take a while, but it would illustrate the point.
Wenn ist das Nunstruck git und Slotermeyer? Ja! Beiherhund das Oder die Flipperwaldt gersput!
.
Prisencolinensinainciusol. Ol Rait!
Pretend for a moment that a Muslim posted on Twitter that a UK politician should be stoned to death. Considering the attempted murder of a MP recently and the UK removing YouTube videos, I'm sure that they'd get arrested. I doubt slashdotters would stand up for him in the same manner as they're doing for this jerk.
Now look, no one is to stone anyone until I blow this whistle. Even...and I want to make this absolutely clear...even if they do say "Jehovah".
God, no! Have you SMELLED burnt spam?
My goodness! I can't believe you would seriously stone someone just for spamming. People like you should be shot.
Perhaps you should stone him with a shot of heroin or something.
Ezekiel 23:20
Theres a whole host of people id like to see dead. The presidents of a few countries (us included)
Random police officers in my local community and some douches i went to school with.
Anyone up for the challenge?
Yes. But the confusion between the words "England" and "Britain" seems to be common enough in the USA that it's worth pointing out the difference to trolls in the vain hope we might educate a few.
I know, I bit, my fail....
Funniest thing I saw was when I lived in Edinburgh and some touring hip hop acts did a gig, third act or so in came on stage to a warmed up audience and she shouted out "hey it's great to be here in England"... the whole place went silent and nobody said a thing through her whole act, she left to silence and folded arms totally puzzled. Lucky she didn't do that in Glasgow...
Muslims believe god speaks through the paedophile rapist mohamed
Well, I guess if anyone deserves to be raped by mohamed, it's pedophiles.
How can people vote the above comment as "insightful"? You've got to be joking!...
The placing of the word 'joke' in inverted commas in this 'story' shows that it is no story, but the ranting of one who couldn't detect a joke if it struck him on the forehead. Or maybe we should give him the benefit of the doubt and assume that he is not aware of what inverted commas signify.
It is applicable as an example of a general statement of displeasure being taken as a request for action. A rather well-known one. In England.
How you went from Henry II and Thomas Becket to the yammering weirdness above is beyond my ken.
because it is insightful.
Read radical news here
Jeuj another lie to excuse islam. I wonder, do you do the same for nazism ? Or socialism ? Or any other genocidal ideology ?
Even if this were true, does it somehow excuse islam's slavery practices ? It's genocides ? It's massive numbers of dead bodies, even today ? Does it excuse 9/11 ? Does it excuse ANYTHING ? Yes muslims are not, strictly speaking, the only moral abominations on the planet. That does not excuse their moral abominations in ANY way.
And Jesus did not, when ordered by a judge, and threatened by a mob of angry idiots, stone a woman. He also forbade anyone else from doing it. Is that somehow not clear enough for you ? Or are you simply lying ? Yes, Jesus still considers adultery a crime. Good thing, too, as it is a most grievous breach of trust.
shall continue indefinitely... It's a shame people can't tell the difference between such distinct and separate things.
For justice, we must go to Don Corleone
Apologized? What did he apologize for? Even if he meant it, whatever happened to freedom of speech? Forget it. I already know the answer. The corrupt governments of the world are abolishing it and/or never implementing it in the first place.
Filthy, filthy copyrapists!
Hmm. Just feed fanfold paper into the printer and position it so the output lands on top of them? Ingenious.
could make a catchy mod option!
i for one would welcome our new rock bearing overlords.
The statement of an opinion: "Blacks should be lynched" is protected by the first amendment. The request "would someone please lynch [name of black person]" is not a statement, and is not protected by the First Amendment.
Guns don't kill people; Physics kills people! - John Lithgow as Dick Solomon on Third Rock From The Sun
just a personal preference, but I'd rather you spam stoners to death.
...is that he used the word "shan't". In the 21st Century.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
we are paying for people to monitor our speech to make sure we don't commit a "speech crime"?
Are there no real crimes for these law officers to pursue, crimes with actual victims?
Let people say what they want. If that speech causes a crime to be inflicted on a victim, then punish the parties involved.
I think there's a lesson in here somewhere...oh! Here it is! "Don't threaten to kill people or request others to do so in writing, in public!" I think I'll abide by that one for the rest of my days. Actually, I think I already was, because it's, oh, I don't know, common sense? I mean, what did these people think was going to happen?
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Amnesty International leaves out You!
(Sadly, probably true)
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Remember Remember the 11th of November, Gun powder treason and plot.
That is so right I mean come on its not like Catholics would ever believe that God speaks through a child rapist. Unless they go to church of course. But at least they could never use the bible to start any sort of crusade right.... umm never mind. But we all know that women are treated as equals in the church I mean look at all the... female...priests....around. Ok ok well at least the pope isn't a nazi... shit I'm bad at this I'm just going to go to bed.
Are you fucking kidding?
There's a hell of a lot wrong with this country but that's not one of the problems. The UK has been one of the most active in the world in dealing with the problem of arranged marriages, and other abuse. We've been pouring a fortune into it with a number of high profile convictions, as well as countless other cases of assisting people in getting out of those kind of situations. Our country even intervenes politically and legally as far as it can in situations where people have been taken to other countries, such as Pakistan to be married on.
Perhaps the reason you hear about the UK in this context is precisely because we're one of the few countries in the world that does deal with the problem rather than sweep it under the carpet. We even have specific precedent whereby if someone has been pushed into an arrange marriage they can have it anulled specifically on that basis without having to worry about the usual divorce proceedings-
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/teenager-wins-battle-to-annul-arranged-marriage-658001.html
If you were looking for a reason to slag off the UK, this wasn't it. Pick one of the thousands of other reasons, like, I don't know, perhaps the fact people are being arrested merely for saying something on Twitter as in TFA?
If he does not receive a criminal conviction for this, it will be further proof that there is one law for them and one for the rest of us here.
If you can get a criminal conviction for making a frustrated joke about an airport, then you should get the same for asking someone to be stoned to death.
What if everybody that was about to make a comment that could in any conceivable way be taken to be against the law, just prefaced it with "Joke:" ?
Of course, if this would ever take hold, it would be the best ironic comment on the way that the legal system has gone.
Free, as in your money being freed from the confines of your account.
> Stoning is far too good for spammers. They should be burned at the stake.
For consuming a few minutes of your day because you were careless with your e-mail address?
What about drivers that stop in the bus lane and delay my journey to work? What punishment for them would you suggest? Forty people on a bus, five minutes delay - that's a lot of lost productivity.
socialism ? Or any other genocidal ideology ?
Socialism is not a genocidal ideology, you unutterable arse.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
I know this is stupid nitpicking, but you shouldn't put a space before question marks (or, indeed any end punctuation). It reads like: sentence *pause* (that was a question!).
Bad news, sparky, turns out that this is 2010 and Catholics don't think that God speaks directly through anyone, the last time he did was about two millennia ago, and last time there was a holy war it wasn't just them doing it. But you're right about female priests, I mean, that's why we see female priests in who aren't restricted to just one other Christian sect as well as all those female leaders in Islamic and Jewish faith, with women being treated so well by Muslims in general, right?
You're right, though, it's definitely time for bed when you start to self-Godwin.
Was that, since the Iraq war and allegations of torture by British troops, she did not think British politicians were qualified to criticise human rights abuses in China. Anyone who reads this as approval of the stoning of women in Iran is a fucking idiot.
To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
You make a good point about Islam and Mohammed in particular. Jesus was basically a good guy, an agitator for sure but he mostly behaved morally. Mohammed on the other hand was a paedophile, a slave owner, a warmonger and a polygamist. His claim that the Koran is the literal word of god causes problems too because it makes it harder to criticise or revise, unlike the Bible which is written by people and thus much more open to interpretation and modernisation.
Christianity has done some horrendous stuff in its time but Jesus does at least set out a mostly moral way of living. Most of the crap about not using contraception is from later additions by saints and is ambiguous anyway. The Koran says murder infidels and that is the word of god himself.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
I hope you're not British, otherwise you may be getting a knock on the door pretty soon...
Yeah, it gives me insight into just how many frightened children there are on slashdot. "There are brown people in the world, hold me mommy!"
This wasn't a politician threatening someone with death, this was a politician joking.
And yet, that's EXACTLY the thing: King Henry II and Thomas Becket were good friends. Henry didn't intend for anyone to actually go kill Becket.
The only difference is that these days nobody swears their loyalty and their sword to a politician's honor anymore.
All I'm saying is that if you "joke" about killing someone, and that someone suddenly turns up dead, you'd better have your yellow pages out and turned to the L section because you only get one call from the slammer, and you'll want to make it count.
This is in mass reply to all those people saying "She said we can't criticize stoning! Therefore he's playing a clever joke!" This is simply not true. She said Politicians who voted for the Iraq war have no moral authority to criticize stoning by other countries. She specifically said that human rights organizations as well as politicians who opposed the war and private citizens can and should criticize stoning in the Muslim world. Check out this starting around 53 minutes to see what she really said.
"I don't care about the Constitution!" --Bill O'Reilly, November 17, 2009
Actually killing someone with your own hands and with obvious intent to kill, is a completely different scenario than joking about killing someone that someone else follows up on and does.
http://alternatives.rzero.com/
Can someone please stone torrent leechers to death? I shan't tell Amnesty if you don't. It would be a blessing, really.
You know what the Christian Bible says about slavery, right? It is in no way prohibited; indeed, moral, God-fearing Christians have been slave owners, with the full support of the Bible and their pastors behind them.
All religions hail from times when that sort of thing was appropriate; don't single out the Muslims simply because they actually follow their holy book's teachings, instead of conveniently forgetting about the nastier bits.
At least they're not hypocritical in their faith.
Hm. Thank you for educating me. I wasn't aware Stalin wasn't genocidal.
"They said I probly shouldn't fly with just one eye," "I am Bender. Please insert girder."
Your right its 2010 and the pope still says you must never use a condom under any circumstances even if your a poor African whose husband is HIV+. Still teaching that god put us directly on the planet the way we are and that evolution is 100% false. Also it doesn't matter if they weren't the only ones in the holy war. They were still in it murdering and raping in the name of the Holy Mother Church. 2 wrongs don't make a right. Just like the treatment of women in Muslim culture has nothing to do with the treatment of women in Christianity. You can't damn the horrid nature of one religion without manning up to the horrors of your own. So like you said "Can we please stop the hypocrisy ?"
change last line to like OeLeWaPpErKe said "Can we please stop the hypocrisy ?"
Why does the bus have to stop? They should mount huge bumpers like trains have on them and they just keep going. Problem solved!
It'll be like you ran over a beer can in your car.
Likening the above post to "There are brown people in the world, hold me mommy!" is akin to likening "There are blonde people in the world, hold me mommy!" with "The Third Reich is coming to kill everyone they deem unworthy."
Not every blonde is a Nazi, and not every "brown person" is a muslim intent on killing all non-muslims. Heck, not even all muslims are intent on killing all non-muslims, but there seems to be an inordinately large amount compared to the general population.
Those who directly follow the mentioned teachings of Mohamed are the problem. That has nothing to do with skin colour. You're the one that brought skin colour into it, so you're obviously the racist one.
You can drop the "polygamist" part... While I'm not for the practice myself, it should be noted that the practice back then was for multiple wives if you could afford to support all of them properly- and the Song of Solomon allegedly refers to the courtship of one of those wives in HIS harem. You can't hang that hat on anyone back then for our current practices because it wasn't wrong back then.
I am not merely a "consumer" or a "taxpayer". I am a Citizen of the State of Texas
Stalin's ideology is as far from Socialism as anything can be.
It is a classic form of theocratic ideology with the supreme ruler equated to god - omnipotent and omniscient. Just read on "Cult of the personality" and give some thought to the word Cult.
Baker's Law: Misery no longer loves company. Nowadays it insists on it
http://www.sigsegv.cx/
By that definition of paedophile (married young girls), most men in that time were paedophiles, same goes for slave owner, warmonger, and polygamist - these were all accepted practices at the time, and not ones which Jesus specifically condemned, indeed in many parts of the Bible these practices are encouraged or at least condoned - see for example Colossians 3:22 for slavery. Your attempt to slander Muhammad for them is simply sophistry which attempts to compare modern mores with those of 1500 years ago. If you slander Muhammad in such a way, you should slander Jesus equally for condoning many acts of barbarity in the Old Testament (which he believed in literally).
Are you really so ignorant of the contents of the Bible and the way it has been interpreted in the recent past (as the literal word of God)? Here's an excerpt from the Christian Bible which gives the lie to your attempt to slander Islam:
Deuteronomy 20:16
But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth: But thou shalt utterly destroy them; namely, the Hittites, and the Amorites, the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, the Hivites, and the Jebusites; as the LORD thy God hath commanded thee...
The Bible advocates death to infidels, regardless of their age - even death to their animals - no living thing should be left alive in the cities of your enemy, according to the God of Deuteronomy.
I agree that Jesus was, it appears, a strongly moral man, and a very interesting thinker, though he should not be considered outside the social context and beliefs of his time, nor should one statement of his be taken out of context. The same could be said of Muhammad. Mainstream Islam is just as peace-loving as mainstream Christianity, and perhaps more forgiving of other faiths (Jesus is after all considered a prophet), and fundamentalists of both faiths are just as extreme, literal, and in my view, evil in their intolerance of others.
Okay, firstly I think you missed the point. Jesus, while not directly opposing many of the practices of the day that we no longer consider morally acceptable did at least not engage in them himself. He lead by example, and his example was mostly good. In fact it is better than many modern Christians in some ways, especially with regard to same-sex relationships.
The fact that what Mohammed did was somewhat normal at the time does not excuse it IMHO. He also went a lot further than many men of the time, and further than the Koran allows. For example Muslims generally regard 4 as the maximum number of wives a man should have, yet Mohammed had over 30. He even stole them away from his own sons.
Even his commandments, allegedly the word of god but clearly of his own fabrication, are far inferior to what Jesus taught.
Your point about the Bible is a fair one though. At least the New Testament is there to balance it out though. I don't know how Christians resolve the two entirely different personalities god seems to have - a vengeful, jealous, petty, spiteful and genocidal asshat of the old and the loving and caring but unwilling to intervene of the new testament.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
Okay, so "socialism is genocidal" is technically incorrect. Every socialist in power has, of course, comitted genocide. So you know, "socialism isn't genocidal", that's right up there with "the holocaust is not part of nazism".
Strictly speaking, both statements are accurate.
The fact that you have to lie to get even this small smear going, speaks volumes.
Christians are forbidden to own slaves. Kidnapping free people into slavery, like the paeophile mohamed did, that's not just "forbidden", that's punishable by death in canon law (which is why e.g. the slaves of america were kidnapped by muslims (ottomans specifically), then sold to protestant christians. Executing slaves for fun, again an islamic practice is murder and will get you incarcerated for life or executed even today.
And rightly so.
The fact that what Mohammed did was somewhat normal at the time does not excuse it IMHO.
And needless to say, it does not change the obvious fact that his followers in the present day are moral abominations.
Really? Pray tell, where in the Bible are Christians forbidden to own slaves? Because as far as I can tell, slavery isn't dealt with at length in the New Testament. Indeed, as that page points out, Paul even returns a slave to his master, despite the fact that that's apparently forbidden in the Old Testament. Further, the whole thing is generally relatively positive about the subject of slavery, with Jesus apparently even enjoining slaves to follow their masters the same way they follow God, which is what I meant about "the full support of the Bible and their pastors".
Of course, despite forbidding the return of runaway slaves in one section, another part of the Bible says that it's totally okay to have them (I guess you just can't go after runaways?) as long as they're not Israelites; Leviticus 25:39 - 55 lays this out. Israelis are not allowed to become slaves, but anyone else? They're totally fair game (Lev 25:44). Of course, bringing up Leviticus is kind of cheating, because it's just chock full of bullshit; even Christians only use parts of it to support their arguments, they don't pay attention to the mixed fibers or shellfish provisions.
So let's look at Exodus, shall we? There, God apparently amended the whole "Israelis aren't allowed to be slaves" thing; now, they can be enslaved, but only for seven years. Of course, if your master decides to keep your wife and children hostage, they can force you to become a slave permanently (Exodus 21:2-6) - and female slaves don't have the whole "seven year escape clause" thing going for them (Exodus 21:7). Clearly, this means that slaves are A-OK in the OT, and even (effectively) hostage holding. Did anything change in the NT? Well, I think that's your side of the argument, isn't it?
But that's all Exodus and Leviticus and the Old Testament and shit - none of that matters to Christians, right? It was all just silly Jewish antics; Jesus changed everything, right? So clearly, Christians throughout history have refrained from owning slaves, right? Well no, not really; indeed, in the 14th century, Pope Nicholas V issued a papal bull legitimizing the slave trade in West Africa - he said basically "Okay Portugal (which incidentally was and is a Christian nation), you can go a conquerin' in West Africa, and anyone you defeat is slaves forever".
Would a Christian - and not just any Christian, but the pope himself - have said something like that if you couldn't make a good case for Christians being allowed to own slaves?
But please, feel free to make your case that Christians are forbidden to own slaves - make sure you cite your sources, though. I'm sorry I didn't do that in the first place.
If you're a poor African whose husband is HIV positive, you were probably raped by the idiot, who was hoping that fucking a virgin would cure it.
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Here's the first reference I can find. You may be technically correct that it doesn't oppose slavery as such, but it does outlaw treating slaves differently from free people.
The first epistle of Peter.
(so e.g. what the paedophile prophet did, raping slaves, or killing slaves, is not allowed)
The treatment that a Christian should give their slaves is equally obviously anti-slavery : manumission (ie. they should be set free, not just in practice, but they should be registered as free men and women so that the law can no longer come after them (in Roman times, if you were registered as a free man, the only way to become a slave again was to sell yourself, which, incidentally, was not as stupid an act as you might think, if unregistered at all, you could be kidnapped into slavery))
In short Christianity simply upholds 2 principles :
1) slaves should be free, and if that's not possible, they should be treated as if they were free. Any act against a slave will be judged by God and Jesus as if it was comitted against a free man
2) separation of church and state (so, if possible, a Christian should respect the law, even use the law itself to help himself and others respect the first testament)
Okay, Christianity does NOT advocate storming and destroying any slavery-supporting state. If that is your standard of anti-slavery then you're right.
It seems to me Christianity is just about as pro- and anti-slavery as current US law is.
How this compares to islam, when sharia : ...)
1) allows the kidnapping of free people into slavery
2) allows raping slaves
3) allows owners to kill slaves, even in the most ridiculously cruel ways (muslims killed slaves by letting them die of thirst or hunger FOR FUN, during several periods of muslim history (and are doing this *TODAY* in at least sudan and mauretania according to hrw). Muslims threathened slaves by exterminating part of their families,
4) denies *all* rights to slaves (including the right to life, or any form of legal help)
The sad truth is that slavery in the early roman empire was more-or-less similar to an employment contract. It's muslims (ottomans, specifically) that gave slavery it's bad name, and that created the massive draining of black slaves in Africa (a little stated fact is exactly WHO the dutch bought their slaves from, and who kidnapped them in the African inland).
That's a far, sad cry from the initial claim of "Christians are forbidden to own slaves". Also, you'll have to do better than citing the entirety of the First Epistle of Peter - how about some actual citations of passages, like in the grandparent post?
I would like to direct your attention to the thirteenth amendment of the Constitution of the United States:
Unless I am greatly mistaken, the thirteenth amendment still counts as "current US law". In order for your statement that Christianity is "just as" anti-slavery as current US law to be true, you would have to present something from the Bible (or some other authoritative source of Christian morality) that is as clear about the whole "No slaves guys, seriously now" thing as that.