More Security Does Not Require Less Freedom: The Case of the NYPD Surveillance Program

Asma T. Uddin is a Senior Scholar at the Freedom Forum Institute and a 2019 Visiting Scholar at Brigham Young University.

A few years ago, the New York Police Department (NYPD) spied on a wide range of Muslims within a 250-mile radius of New York City, without any probable cause or reasonable suspicion of illegal activity. Leaked NYPD reports plus a series of Pulitzer Prize–winning articles published in 2011 by the Associated Press, revealed how it all worked: the NYPD used census information and government databases to map ethnic neighborhoods in New York, New Jersey, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania. The maps at times included groups other than Muslims (for example, Syrian Jews and Egyptian Christians), but the NYPD spied only the Muslims in those neighborhoods.

Undercover agents would infiltrate mosques and religious schools. These agents would sit among the Muslims and listen in on their conversations, sometimes engaging them in conversations of their own, all for the purpose of assessing their religious and political views and reporting them back to the NYPD. Inside the mosques, the agents would record the imam’s sermons and statements by congregants. (more…)

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Let Freedom of Religion or Belief Pave the Way to Peaceful and Inclusive Societies

Peter Weiderud is Special Envoy for Religion in Conflict and Peace Building at the Swedish Ministry for Foreign Affairs  

Listening to the morning news, we might get the impression that religion has grown as a source of violence and conflict. The reported difference between Shia and Sunni can serve as an example. It has been a theological schism for centuries, but before 2003 not necessarily perceived as a “casus belli“. Today, according to the Conflict Data Base at Uppsala University, more than half of the world´s casualties of wars can be found along this rift, primarily in Iraq, Syria and Yemen. However, this does not necessarily mean that it is a religious conflict.

I have had the opportunity over the last 40 years to reflect on the role of religion in conflicts from multiple platforms—as journalist, politician, diplomat, and conflict mediator, but also from peace movements and religious organizations. In my experience, I still have not found any conflict that I would define as entirely religious. The struggles in Northern Ireland, in the Balkans, and between Saudi Arabia and Iran are not purely religious. Not even the Crusades, the Byzantine-Ottoman Wars, or the 30-Years War would qualify, in my view, as purely religious. (more…)

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Beyond equality: How should we aid survivors of genocide?

Ewelina Ochab makes the case for why sometimes equality is not sufficient. The survivors of genocide require priority. The concept of human dignity can be a guideline in the application of equality or equity based intervention, and leads to emphasising prevention over subsequent humanitarian aid.

This talk was presented on 1st June 2019 at TEDxGoodenoughCollege – eQuality. (more…)

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