Bans on freedom, then, now and back to Saudi Arabia again

This is a quiet time of year for bloggers and even where stories do afford an opportunity, others are ready to write before one hits the key board. Take the new film Exodus for example. A growing number of Muslim countries including Morocco  and Egypt have decided to ban it. Not much of a surprise really as Andrew Coates points out:

Bible criticised by religious authorities for inaccuracies.

Quite. 

Can't have Hollywood upsetting peoples beliefs in imaginary friends can we?

Meanwhile the Government has released some papers from the Thatcher years. Forget her secret plans to use the army to break the miners strike or build a chemical weapons arsenal, its her thoughts on banning sex toys that seems to have caught peoples attention. The Independent reports:

Margaret Thatcher considered banning sex toys using an anti-pornography law as part of a drive to clean up public decency in the 1980s.

Documents released by the National Archives reveal that the former prime minister was persuaded to consider a change in the law by the anti-obscenity campaigner Mary Whitehouse, whom she met on two occasions.

Leon Brittan, the home secretary at the time, wrote to Mrs Thatcher noting that there was a “strong case” to be made for banning sex toys under obscenity laws.

In September 1986 he wrote: “Some of the items in circulation are most objectionable, including some which can cause physical injury,” according to a report in The Times (£).

I am bemused at the thought of going on a demonstration to defend the right to use dildo's. I wonder what slogan the various Trotskyist groups would have come up with?

Thoughts anyone?

Finally on a serious note the news that two women are to be prosecuted under laws designed to prosecute terrorists continues to raise concerns. Their crime?

Driving their cars into the Saudi Arabia from neighbouring United Arab Emirates.

Saudi Arabia is the only country in the world that bans women from driving.

An international campaign is needed to draw attention to and defend Lujain al-Hathlool (25) and Mayasa al-Amoudi (33) from this barbaric regime.

Fight back against Gender Apartheid!