Bunglawala steps towards the light
Inayat Bunglawala, and Assistant Secretary-General of the MCB, writes “in a personal capacity” in this comment piece in The Guardian. So, unfortunately, his words cannot be taken as the official MCB line.
Bunglawala admits he “used to be a book burner”, and took part in the anti-Rushdie demonstrations in 1989. However, he now admits he was misguided:
Looking back now on those events I will readily acknowledge that we were wrong to have called for the book to be banned. Today I can certainly better appreciate the concerns and fear generated by the images of book-burning in Bradford and the calls for the author to be killed.
[…]
Our detractors had been right. The freedom to offend is a necessary freedom.
Credit where it’s due. This comment piece marks a significant step in the right direction from a leading member of the MCB.
Now if only “Boo Hoo” Bari would stop referring to Rushdie’s knighthood as a “provocation”…
UPDATE: (21 June) Several people whose opinions I respect think I may be giving Bunglawala too much credit. Here’s one.
I don’t trust the guy. Could be a cunning ploy in a major news article to give the imp[ression that they aren’t a reactionary bunch of loons. Which will mean any other loony, knee-jerk responses they give in teh future will be given an air of respectibility.
Leopards and spots.
Hmm. I’m not sure we should give him all that much credit just for finally managing to think what he should have thought all along (we don’t give each other credit for it after all; giving Bunglawala credit is too much like giving a batterer credit for ceasing to batter). And he says such godawful things in the article (which I’ve detailed at B&W so I won’t take up your space with it here) that I really have a hard time thanking him too much.
But you would give a mentally handicapped person credit for putting on his own pants. 🙂