In his article on the Salman Rushdie affair, Kenan Malik draws all the correct conclusions, but makes no reference to the role of British politicians (“The Satanic Verses sowed the seeds of rifts that have grown ever wider”, Comment).
In 1989, I was one of a small group protesting against a march of Muslims in support of Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini’s fatwa demanding the death of Rushdie. Standing on the pavement outside the old Army & Navy Stores as the marchers moved down Victoria Street on their way to Hyde Park. I saw from their banners and numerous placards depicting Khomeini that many came from a mosque in the district of Werneth in Oldham, where I was born and brought up. Since the early 1960s, many thousands of men from what were then East and West Pakistan had been brought to Britain to shore up the ailing cotton trade.
After reading an essentially very funny book, especially his lampooning of British customs officers, I was horrified to see that the author’s life was being threatened by people from my birthplace. These were unprecedented scenes. Muslims were openly calling for the murder of a British citizen and, in Bolton and Bradford, they were burning his book, Nazi fashion. Later that afternoon, I discussed the affair with the group Asian Women Against Fundamentalism, who seemed to be the only people in Britain at that time fully to appreciate the seriousness of what was going on.
Not a single perpetrator was prosecuted. In face of this challenge to the rule of law, parliamentarians and local councillors stayed supine, with some Labour members even urging that publication be suspended. Only the former Labour leader, the much discredited Michael Foot, asserted that, in the name of a shared humanity, religious bigotry needed to be constantly challenged.
The Satanic Verses continued to be in print in most countries, Iran included, bringing to a close a low mark in English public life and a lesson in what can happen when the importance of speaking freely is ignored.
Roland Barnes
Sketty, Swansea
Outsmarted by the phone
So Matthew Hancock wants GPs to consult with patients more over their mobile phones (“I’ll go round the world looking for the best technology to save lives”, News). He ignores the impact this will have on the ability of the most vulnerable to access a GP. He also wants parents to get their children to use their phones less. Meanwhile, your front page has two articles about mobiles (“Tories demand urgent action to curb children’s social media use”; “Security flaw in conference app embarrasses Conservatives”): is there a problem when phones are smarter than the politicians using them?
Michael Peel
Axbridge, Somerset
Culloden reappraised
One queries Kevin McKenna’s view that the Jacobite dead were defending their “land, language and faith’’ (“On Culloden’s hallowed moors, battle rages over luxury homes”, News). They were just defending their tribal leaders; it was the men’s customary on-call activity. They owned no land and had little concept of language or faith, knowing only one of each. My ancestors were there as Fraser Lovats.
Sir Duncan Michael
London SW20
Plus ça change…?
The comparison of the experience of Christine Blasey Ford to that of Artemisia Gentileschi may unfortunately prove to be prescient, given the misogyny and moral vacuum at the core of the current Republican party (“This was a gross spectacle: parading sexual assault victims has to end”, Catherine Bennett, Comment,). Gentileschi’s rapist, Tassi, was discovered at trial to have committed incest, planned theft and murdered his wife and still he got away with it.
Tom Hardy
London N5
More than a leisure park
Nell Nelson (“Better by bike”, Magazine) seems unaware that her delightful “no faster” than 25mph pedal round the top of Scotland on “switchback single track roads” in “delightful synergy between car, camper van and cyclist” is often a nightmare for a local doctor trying to reach a patient; crofter with sheep on the way to market; or mother stuck behind a queue of cars, bikes and camper vans.
The North Coast 500 is not solely for those who treat the Highlands as a leisure park. In the summer, traffic is now a nose-to-tail queue of born-again bikers doing 50; head-bangers doing 90; caravans doing 30; and among them poor residents trying to go about their business. We who live here know that, although we cherish it, we cannot live on the scenery.
Adrian Morgan
Ullapool, Wester Ross
Free market housing folly
Kate Andrews, associate editor of the Institute of Economic Affairs, finishes her comments about housing by saying: “The answer is clear: liberalise the housing market and build more homes” (“The experts’ view: what can Theresa May do to avoid another disastrous party conference?” Focus). Is she living in a parallel universe?
The liberalised market is where we are. Margaret Thatcher’s wholesale selling off of council housing has got the country in a position where there are not enough homes. What further liberalisation does she want – no planning controls at all? Private developers have totally failed to provide housing at prices people can afford and will not mend their ways by building more homes since they fully understand that more homes will cause prices to drop – much better to eke homes out to keep prices high.
I suppose if you always view the world through the prism of unfettered free market economics you are bound up with views such as those of Kate Andrews.
Robert Ashley
London SE9
Why I need my 4x4
If your correspondent Julian Boyce (“The curse of the SUV”, Letters) and Martin Love (Wheels) can spare a moment from their obvious menial employment, I’ll explain that I need a car that will haul and deliver hay across my fields, pull a two-ton trailer of building materials and a horsebox, take elderly people to the GP’s surgery and dogs to the vets, make the weekly visit to the supermarket and many short runs besides. And I am not unique.
Unfortunately, my husband won’t let me use the Ferrari for any of this and a Ford Escort won’t cut the mustard.
So weep away, Mr Boyce. Your lack of understanding of the real world, beyond your ken, makes me weep too.
Pat Notley
Hunston, Suffolk
Here, kitty, kitty
“Dogfooding” was originally “eating your own dog food”, a term that I encountered as a software developer more than 10 years ago (“May I have a word...”). It does indeed refer to the belief that developers should use the software they write before they inflict it on others. I thought it was a revolting expression then, and I still do, but perhaps that’s because I’m a cat person.
David Harper
Bar Hill, Cambridge
