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Passport photograph of [5 year-ol] girl's bare shoulders rejected 'as it may offend (Guess who)'
The Daily Telegraph (UK) ^ | August 14, 2006 | By Paul Stokes

Posted on 08/13/2006 7:29:23 PM PDT by aculeus

(Filed: 14/08/2006)

A five-year-old girl's passport application was rejected because her photograph showed her bare shoulders.

Hannah Edwards's mother, Jane, was told that the exposed skin might be considered offensive in a Muslim country.

The photograph was taken at a photo-booth at a local post office for a family trip to the south of France.

Because of the way the camera was set up, the picture came out showing Hannah's shoulders.

The family had it signed and presented it at a post office with the completed form but were told that it would not be accepted by the Passport Office.

A woman behind the counter informed them that she was aware of at least two other cases where applications had been rejected because a person's shoulders were not covered.

Mrs Edwards, a Sheffield GP, said: "I was incensed. I went back home and checked the form. Nowhere did it say anything about covering up shoulders. If it had, I would have done so, but it all seems so unnecessary.

"This is quite ridiculous, I followed the instructions on the passport form to the letter and it was still rejected. It is just officialdom pandering to political correctness.

"It is a total over-reaction. How can the shoulders of a five-year-old girl offend anyone? It's not as if anything else was showing, the dress she wore was sleeveless, but it has a high neck." Hannah had her first passport when she was three months old. Her mother and her father, Martin, realised that it was due to expire during their holiday later this month and decided to renew it advance.

They aimed to complete the application on Saturday, the same day that Hannah was to be Sheffield Wednesday football team's mascot at Hillsborough stadium. Mrs Edwards was also on call from her surgery.

After the rejection at the post office, Mrs Edwards spent two hours taking Hannah for new pictures, filling in a new form and finding the necessary "responsible citizens" to endorse the photos.

"The people who had signed the original application were not available," Mrs Edwards said. "I had to chase around and eventually found a neighbour who was a teacher to sign the pictures.

"The Passport Office should set this sort of thing out in its forms if it is going to be so pedantic."

A spokesman for the Identity and Passport Service said it was not its policy to reject applications with bare shoulders.

"The guidance set out on the application form doesn't include it, this picture should have been absolutely fine," she said. "If people follow those rules there should be no problem.

"The Post Office obviously has its rules and we can't comment on that. We are aware of a case in the past where an error was made involving similar circumstances, although I don't know the exact details. Staff should be aware of the rules."

A Post Office spokesman said: "Our offices have a Passport Office template which says what the photograph should and shouldn't be.

"Bare shoulders don't come into that at all. We can't see any instruction to that effect so all we can do is apologise to Mrs Edwards. It was clearly a mistake made by the clerk at the post office.

"It is the first time we have heard of such a rejection and we will take it up with that particular office.

"We do around three million passport applications a year. It is one of our most popular services and it is normally extremely effective.

"We have a much lower rejection rate compared to applications submitted directly to the Passport Office."


TOPICS: Extended News; War on Terror
KEYWORDS: 21stcenturycrusades; dhimmitude; goatsex; ifthyeyeoffendsthee; islam; islamiclaws; islamiclunacy; islamism; islamonazism; itcanhappenhere; jihad; loonymuzzies; muslim; muslimsarelunatics; offendedmuslims; passport; passportphoto; pluckitout; sharialaw; whywefight
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To: aculeus
Offend a muslim? Who the frick cares?
41 posted on 08/13/2006 8:12:49 PM PDT by SlayerOfBunnies (The *only* problem with the Crusaders is that they failed to finish the job.)
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To: aculeus

Dhimmitude continues.


42 posted on 08/13/2006 8:16:25 PM PDT by Proud_USA_Republican (We're going to take things away from you on behalf of the common good. - Hillary Clinton)
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To: aculeus

So Photoshop a scarf or something in.


43 posted on 08/13/2006 8:18:38 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck
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To: ncountylee

lol.


44 posted on 08/13/2006 8:19:09 PM PDT by HarmlessLovableFuzzball
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To: Right Angler

"That child is an angel and anyone who is offended by her bare shoulders has latent pedophilia."

Latent?


45 posted on 08/13/2006 8:20:03 PM PDT by rogator
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu
What Muslim influence? In some poll, forty percent had reservations about all Muslims, not only violent ones.

. . .am guessing we may be on the same page...somewhere; but I don't understand your comment. . relative to mine, anyway.

46 posted on 08/13/2006 8:22:28 PM PDT by cricket (Live Liberal free. . .or suffer their consequences. . .)
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To: aculeus

Oh, puleeze. There's nothing wrong with the picture. Some folks need to get over themselves.


47 posted on 08/13/2006 8:29:34 PM PDT by mtbopfuyn (I think the border is kind of an artificial barrier - San Antonio councilwoman Patti Radle)
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To: martin_fierro
Martin, re that "goat diapers"-- I posted it last night. Before Sullivan.

I think Sullivan reads FR for ideas.

48 posted on 08/13/2006 8:30:35 PM PDT by grey_whiskers
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To: cricket

The comment was about Muslim influence in the United States (if you're American). There hasn't been an imposition of Sharia, clothing, halal. If you are British, however, they are turning more toward Islam (apparently halal food is readily available).


49 posted on 08/13/2006 8:30:42 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( http://www.answersingenesis.org)
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To: cricket

The comment was about Muslim influence in the United States (if you're American). There hasn't been an imposition of Sharia, clothing, halal. If you are British, however, they are turning more toward Islam (apparently halal food is readily available).


50 posted on 08/13/2006 8:31:01 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( http://www.answersingenesis.org)
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To: cricket

The comment was about Muslim influence in the United States (if you're American). There hasn't been an imposition of Sharia, clothing, halal. If you are British, however, they are turning more toward Islam (apparently halal food is readily available).


51 posted on 08/13/2006 8:32:48 PM PDT by Jedi Master Pikachu ( http://www.answersingenesis.org)
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To: aculeus

52 posted on 08/13/2006 8:35:54 PM PDT by BulletBobCo
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To: aculeus

Okay, so just take a black magic marker and draw in sleeves. What's the problem?


53 posted on 08/13/2006 8:36:23 PM PDT by BlessedBeGod
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To: aculeus
Because of the way the camera was set up, the picture came out showing Hannah's shoulders.

I thought it was her shirt. Those fiendish X-ray cameras!

54 posted on 08/13/2006 8:37:59 PM PDT by HiTech RedNeck
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To: HiTech RedNeck
So Photoshop a scarf or something in.

Yeah, you can have the picture reutered.

55 posted on 08/13/2006 8:40:50 PM PDT by CheneyChick
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To: aculeus

Wow, look at those eyes. She's going to drive her daddy nuts in a couple of years when the boys come calling.


56 posted on 08/13/2006 8:43:10 PM PDT by Not A Snowbird (Official RKBA Landscaper and Arborist, Duchess of Green Leafy Things)
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To: aculeus

When I visited Saudi Arabia years ago I had a paperback confiscated because there was a picture of a man and a woman on the cover. There wasn't anything lurid about the book cover but they took it anyway.


57 posted on 08/13/2006 8:47:48 PM PDT by peggybac (Tolerance is the virtue of believing in nothing)
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Hannah Edwards's mother, Jane, was told that the exposed skin might be considered offensive in a Muslim country.

The photograph was taken at a photo-booth at a local post office for a family trip to the south of France.

To those in this world who insisted that we must hold our tongues and engage in censorship to avoid the crime of blasphemy against muslims worldwide, this is what we get.

Thanks for surrendering to your muslim masters.

58 posted on 08/13/2006 8:50:59 PM PDT by weegee (Remember "Remember the Maine"? Well in the current war "Remember the Baby Milk Factory")
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To: Exit148
I belief where where women have to suffer for the men''s insecurity, vanity, and stupidity. You never hear a word from NOW.
59 posted on 08/13/2006 8:59:41 PM PDT by oyez (The way to punish a providence is to allow it to be governed by philosophers. --Frederick the Great)
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To: Jedi Master Pikachu; All
No Constitutional impositions of/by Sharia law here. . .yet; but one cannot follow the news without taking note of the law suits; the complaints. . .the efforts to change rules/regulations in public and/or workplace environs etc to suit the restrictive codes of the fundalmentalist Muslim.

The efforts to influence; to effect change- just as in Britain - are in the making; and it is not just the Muslims who are trying to influence as per CAIR or just the ACLU; but many authoriatative, PC-miinded/obsessed, Liberal Americans doing their best as well.

Stephen Hayes points out just such an effort in his critique 'Uncle Sam's Makeover/The State Department's answer to Osama Bin Laden's attempt to 'redefine America'. . .(Frontpage Magazine/06/03/02)

He begins with Charlotte Beers, who goes way beyond 'Muslim Outreach' in her efforts. . .

SHORTLY AFTER her confirmation as the State Department's top communications whiz last October, Charlotte Beers said she hoped to create among the world's one billion Muslims an "understanding that they don't need to kill us to get our attention." [. . .]

Beers, a top Madison Avenue advertising executive handpicked by Colin Powell to serve as undersecretary of state for public diplomacy and public affairs, summed up her task in an interview last fall with the Wall Street Journal. "It is almost as though we have to redefine what America is," she said. "This is the most sophisticated brand assignment I have ever had."

While much of this is supposedly no more than good Muslim PR; it goes well beyond. . .and where our State Department and CAIR and the ACLU. . .and Political Correctness end. . .there will be Sharia Law Centers just waiting to open their doors in America. . .

And who knows, maybe next week we will hear of new criteria being set for what may be the more 'appropriate' Passport photo. . .

60 posted on 08/13/2006 9:44:46 PM PDT by cricket (Live Liberal free. . .or suffer their consequences. . .)
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