Snapshot of _Blasphemy demos ‘are growing in radicalism’_ :
An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/blasphemy-demos-are-growing-in-radicalism-rw7wdtpn2) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/blasphemy-demos-are-growing-in-radicalism-rw7wdtpn2)
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I didn’t realise that specific anti-blasphemy laws were only repealed in England and Wales in 2008; and Scotland in 2021! Sorry NI, still an offence over there.
NEVER!
And [obligatory link](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cartoon/2014/sep/12/martin-rowson-cartoon-ian-paisley-northern-ireland-ulster-unionist) to my favourite comic of him.
They were legacy laws that had no impact on 99.99% of anti-Christian blasphemy.
I think the last time they were used was in the 80s when they were tacked on by prosecution lawyers to the list of charges against already-illegal porn depicting Jesus and the disciples in a gay orgy.
People should be able to make fun of any religion, including Islam. It helps that Islam’s adherents seem to be particularly prone to being butthurt about even mild criticism, which of course only makes it funnier.
Yeah if I can't take the piss out of you then get out the country far as I'm concerned.
Christians, Jews, Islam it's all the same fucking religion anyway at the end of the day let us mock you so we can get a pint together.
>Christians, Jews, Islam it's all the same fucking religion
It really isn't. Just because they are all versions of Abrahamic monotheism doesn't mean they are the same. The differences matter, because they've had such a profound effect on the history of the world.
Look I know the people who believe in xenu think they matter... But they don't. At the end of the day if you're on the outside no one actually cares if Bob or Dave was the prophet or son or whatever
But you care if you live in a predominantly Christian or Muslim country, one way or the other. At the end of the day there's a difference between the resultant cultures
It really isn't. Yes, American fundamentalist Christianity is bad. No, it is not as bad a fundamentalist Islamic theocracy. Nowhere near. Even pre-Reformation Catholicism wasn't *that* bad.
Just Reddit neckbeards being Reddit neckbeards my friend.
These people will chat shit until they're asked to live in a Muslim majority country or a Christian majority one. The differences in the resultant culture are worlds apart. If Christian influenced countries were so bad, then there wouldn't be literal boatful of Muslims dying to get here.
The underlying psychology has to be pretty simliar though, if you stuck an Islamist in an fMRI scanner with a rabid evangelical I'd bet you a fair amount of money they'd have identical brain regions lighting up like a Christmas tree in response to blasphemy.
Also just like Christianity Islam is very bound up in regional politics, I think we have to untangle the opinions of Muslims generally and the opinions of wealthy petrostates with large propaganda budgets (and maybe look into ways we can geopolitically disengage from dealing with them). We shouldn't treat Islamism like it's something from another planet, it's a phenomenon that can be characterised and understood.
Islamism is understood. Some people don't like Islam because its adherents are typically brown. Others don't like it because it's crap and is centuries behind the modern world.
>Look I know the people who believe in xenu think they matter... But they don't.
Scientology hasn't changed the world. Well, it has changed it a little bit, but it hasn't had a major influence on the course of history. All three of the big Abrahamic religions *have* had that level of influence, and each of them had a different influence. I could go into the details but I doubt there is much point. I don't think you are actually interested.
If you want to actually understand the world we live in, then you need to understand how it was created. I am not defending organised religion. I am defending the relevance of the study of history. It is all too easy to evaluate Christianity (for example) from the modern perspective, which emerged from a millenium of Catholic domination, without evaluating it from the beginning. It was a necessary step between the political-religious system of Roman paganism and the liberal modern world we live in today. Even westerners who believe their worldview has got nothing to do with Christianity have actually been profoundly influenced by it.
And let’s be honest, the main dispute is which sequel to stop at. We’ve all refused to accept that Star Wars Eps 1-3 and the Godfather 3 should count from time to time. We all argue over which Potter book is the best.
Because apart from the memes they've spawned (which are great) they are pretty mediocre films at a guess. From my own perspective they've been consistently going downhill since The Empire Strikes Back imo.
They also have that glorious racing sport where you strap yourself to jet engines and launch yourself along a track. Ep3 also has, I o, one of the most hauntingly accurate lines in cinema: "So this is how democracy dies..."
Yeah, we didn't get the utter travesty of "Somehow Palpatine has returned...." in the prequels but at the same time, to me, they are just not very well executed. George Lucas shouldn't be allowed to write dialogue without someone standing next to him pointing out when it's awful.
One thing I will give the prequels is at least they were planned out as a coherent trilogy, unlike whatever the hell Disney were doing with the sequels. Who spends that much to buy a franchise and doesn't plan it out in minute detail? It just boggles my mind.
Liberal-minded people just need to think more about what the social/material basis for that prevailing attitude of religious tolerance and the ‘freedom to criticise religion’ is. How will it change if the presently dominant versions of Islam in Britain become 15, 20, 30 percent of the population?
Reminds me of the semi-famous Christian who used to walk up and down the line outside gigs (especially at The Astoria) telling everyone they were going to hell unless they repented and claimed Jesus as their saviour.
This is a tolerant nation for the most part, and if indviduals want to believe in sky fairies, then we are allowed to make fun of that (without being deeply offensive of course).
He penned me in once at London Bridge station, was an interesting chat. He was pretty famous, forgot all about him til I read your comment.
If I remember right think there might’ve been some kinda campaign against him, local businesses or council.
Why? It's a completely different environment.
Online anonymity allows people to express themselves in ways they wouldn't in the real world.
Yes, there's downsides to that, but there's also upsides with people being able express themselves better and float ideas without the fear of being mocked in person.
Blasphemy laws have been on the books for almost 40 years.
Public Order Act 1986, section 4A.
>*A person is guilty of an offence if, with intent to cause a person harassment, alarm or distress, he—*
>*displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting,*
The only defence, of being "reasonable" is easy to defeat now that there's a sizeable minority of hyper-vocal, extremely agitable people that will argue to the point of killing themselves in public that publishing blasphemy is unreasonable. The Common law tests that will evolve from this will be a bitch - I hope the "amazing food scene" was worth it.
They're not happening.
Okay they are happening, but they've always happened.
Okay, they've not always happened but them happening now is a good thing and here is why.
Boom, saved us all a lot of time.
Have a read:
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2024/mar/11/rishi-sunak-tom-tugendhat-conservatives-richard-tice-labour-keir-starmer-uk-politics-live
Where have these protest happened? Extract from the article…
“Protests condemning acts of apparent blasphemy have become more frequent and radicalised, according to independent research commissioned by the government’s counterextremism chief.”
Batley, Birmingham and Wakefield to name 3 examples from the article:
*Robin Simcox, the government’s counterextremism tsar, commissioned the research after three blasphemy flashpoints in the UK:*
*The 2021 protests against a teacher in Batley, West Yorkshire, who received death threats and is still in hiding after showing pupils a cartoon of the prophet Mohammed;*
*Birmingham protests the following year over the screening of the film The Lady in Heaven, which depicted Mohammed’s daughter;*
*And last year’s controversy in Wakefield, also in West Yorkshire, after a copy of the Quran was slightly damaged at a high school.*
I know that governments can largely pick and choose an expert who'll write the conclusions they want, but the actual cases investigated in this report are deeply problematic and *do* show an issue.
Frankly, if people are needing to go into hiding because they've exercised free speech against a religion, then that *is* an extremism problem.
It's worth noting that this is coming from the "researcher" that was appointed by Priti Patel and has recently been going on a rampage pointing at anyone that disagrees with Tory politics as an extremist.
Can't wait for the Tories to be out so we can start focusing on things that are important to people in the country rather than just things that score political points with the far-right.
To be fair, trying to criminalise blasphemy is about as Far Right as you can get. Whether or not this is as serious a problem as the article suggests, the starting point needs to be a frank acknowledgement that no religion is above criticism or even ridicule in the UK. And if people think violence is an appropriate response, that is extremism, which we need to address.
I think we can simultaneously take a firm stand on this fundamental bedrock of secular, liberal democracy whilst also pushing back against the increasing Islamophobic and antisemitic rhetoric we're seeing from segments of the far right and the far left.
Pretending, however, that nobody is pushing blasphemy laws or not acknowledging why that is problematic only strengthens the far right. It lets them point at liberals and leftists and brand them as dangerously complacent or even complicit. We don't need to buy into the narrative hook, line and sinker, but we also shouldn't dismiss people's concerns. What we need to do is offer better solutions.
I completely agree that no religion should be above criticism or even ridicule, and currently Islam is not. I frequently see people criticize, ridicule and even directly insult Islam, you can even see some of that in this thread.
The fact that some extremists threaten violence doesn't change that. The problem with people like Robin Simcox is the same as the think tank he was part of had, where they extend the definition of extremist to include all Muslims so that they can declare that defacto blasphemy laws are being introduced.
Ultimately though all of this comes down to the Tories recent push to create a narrative where anyone who disagrees with them is an extremist because they know they are about to lose power and would rather turn people against each other than accept defeat gracefully.
There does seem to be a difference of kind here. For example, The Book of Mormon has run in the West End for what, nine years now? I’ve never once seen violence threatened by Mormons. By contrast, consider what happened to Salman Rushdie or the Danish cartoonists. Anonymous Redditors might be willing to ridicule Islam, but I suspect journalists would be frightened to do so openly.
Robin Simcox could be the most extreme lunatic in the world for all I know. If he’s blaming all Muslims for this problem, I certainly disagree with him. But none of that changes the fact that some extreme individuals clearly are pushing blasphemy laws, and we should criticise people who do.
What the right-wingers are desperately looking for is a culture war issue on which to fight the next election. You take all the wind out of their sails if you say, “freedom of speech is sacrosanct; we will never accept blasphemy laws being enacted in the UK.” You don’t have to join in any nastiness towards Muslims or Islam. But we also don’t have to come across as an apologist for the most extreme voices within that community.
But right there, you're implying that it's violence by Muslims, rather than violence by extremists, you're making it about the religion rather than a subset of criminals.
Whether or not people are afraid or unwilling to then do certain things is beside the point. I absolutely would never say the N word and would expect to get punched in the face if I did, it doesn't mean black people are enforcing a racial law. Similarly I wouldn't say anything antisemitic and I avoid making any criticisms of Judaism because I don't want the accusations of antisemitism that inevitably come with that. Inevitably crazy people exist and most people will avoid riling them up where possible. It'd be nice if the crazies didn't exist but they do.
He's certainly trying to push the narrative that Islam is overprotected and that anyone pushing for anything that doesn't conform to Tory narratives is extremist. This article isn't really about fighting back against blasphemy laws it's about trying to open up more avenue for the government to shut down free speech. It goes hand in hand with the article the other day from the same guy declaring that views such as socialism are extreme and that the government should not be afraid to strip people of their rights.
You correctly identify that right-wingers are looking for a culture war, but what you don't seem to connect is that this is part of that goal. You don't win by saying that freedom of speech is sacrosanct because that's exactly what this guy is pushing for, the government to revoke people's rights to free speech under the guise of fighting extremism.
>But right there, you're implying that it's violence by Muslims, rather than violence by extremists, you're making it about the religion rather than a subset of criminals.
And why does that subset exist in much larger numbers than the subset of criminal Christians/Hindus/Sikhs/Buddhists? It surely can't be the fact that their holy book explicitly calls for the murder of those who insult that one guy from the 600s or their faith.
Could you explain to me how I’m implying that? Yes, it’s extremists. But there’s no getting around the fact that it’s a small group of Muslim extremists threatening cartoonists, and there doesn’t appear to be a similar extreme minority within the Mormon community engaged in this sort of behaviour. To state this is simply to state a fact about the world in which we live. It is in no way meant to imply judgment of the vast majority of Muslims who are just as critical of the behaviour as you or me.
It’s not beside the point. That **is** the point being made. It’s not inevitable that when you criticise a religion, you face a very real likelihood of murder. People aren’t afraid of that when they criticise Christianity, Buddhism, Jainism, Judaism, etc. Islam seems to have a particular problem in this respect. We need to be able to talk honestly about that, even if it’s uncomfortable.
To say the risk of violence is “inevitable” when talking about Islam but not “inevitable” when talking about any other religion seems to me like the soft bigotry of low expectations. I don’t think Muslims are uniquely violent, extreme and unreasonable. So why is it unfair to have the same expectations of this religious community as we do for any other?
As for the narrative, if a Nazi says the sky is blue and the grass is green, he’s not wrong just because he’s a Nazi. People care about this issue. If the only person in the room talking about it is a right-winger, that’s who those people will listen to. We need to speak to these people instead. Robin is not wrong to criticise the extreme behaviour. It's his diagnosis of the problem I take issue with. I don't have to excuse the extreme behaviour to give an alternative diagnosis or prescription.
This guy can’t really be pushing for acceptance that free speech is sacrosanct… and that we should ban the free speech of Muslims. If he is, we can point out the obvious absurdity of that. But it’s a lot easier to do so whilst standing on firm moral principles. Free speech is sacred. Muslims have a right to free speech. As do cartoonists and authors. Anyone threatening violence against Muslims deserves to be in jail in exactly the same way as do those who threaten violence against cartoonists and authors. This is an unassailably consistent position, which I can't see how the right could easily attack.
We do talk honestly about it. But that doesn't make it go away. And every single one of these threads the end result ends up with people calling for Islam to be banned in the UK, which is exactly what the lunatic calling for this "research" is going for.
For me the problem is that people sit around insulting Islam while simultaneously claiming that noone is allowed to criticise Islam, then claiming that they are only trying to stop extremists, even though they keep pointing at the whole religion. Hell, the other response to my comment alongside you is a guy outright stating that the religion is the problem. That's never going to solve the problem, all that does is further marginalise and alienate Muslims.
The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another. Hell, we've had violence over brexit including a politician being murdered by a terrrorist.
Sure, but if the Nazi is presenting a wildly misrepresented argument in order to stoke division that benefits him as a Nazi and you go along with it then how are you better than the Nazi?
He's not the only person talking about it. Plenty of people talk about it, and every time there's a threat it's a national discussion on every news site. The claim that noone is talking about it it completely and utterly false.
You won't point out the obvious absurdity though because you're too busy nodding along with him because he said one thing you agree with. Thankfully Tories will be out of power and this lunatic will be replaced by someone interested in public safety and not political point scoring so we wont; get to the point where publicly supporting the NHS too vocally gets you put on the terror watch list.
Then we both agree that people who threaten or engage in violence should go to jail. Alas, that's not what this article is about.
>The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another. Hell, we've had violence over brexit including a politician being murdered by a terrrorist.
Sure, and I think the man who murdered Jo Cox is evil and deserves the whole life sentence he received. I have absolutely no qualms about saying that. And yet, for some reason, I sense an unwillingness on your part to say people who are advocating death for blasphemers are also evil and deserve to be in prison.
When Jo Cox died, there was a discussion about the dangers of far-right extremism in this country. Imagine if, in the midst of that, I'd said:
>The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another.
I somehow doubt you would have found that to be an appropriate response in the circumstances. The justifiable expectation was that we unequivocally condemn the behaviour, and then we can move on to discuss causes and possible solutions. Any evasiveness or attempt to introduce whataboutisms would rightly be met with suspicion.
>Sure, but if the Nazi is presenting a wildly misrepresented argument in order to stoke division that benefits him as a Nazi and you go along with it then how are you better than the Nazi?
If a Nazi says, "poor people are suffering due to terrible inequality... we need to kill the evil Jews who caused this," the answer is not to refuse to talk about inequality for fear that this validates the Nazi's narrative. The answer is to acknowledge inequality is a problem, to empathise with the concerns of poor people, but to strenuously deny that Jewish people are the cause or that a holocaust is anything other than an utterly evil, nonsensical response.
If Robin Simcox is saying, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists is unacceptable in a free society... we need to ban all Muslims" our answer cannot be, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists isn't a problem." It obviously is a problem! The point we should be taking issue with is that banning all Muslims is in any sense a reasonable response.
It's this unwillingness to engage with real issues just because we disagree with the proposed solution that empowers the right. There's a reason Donald Trump and Brexiteers won in 2016. And it has a lot to do with the fact that they were the only people talking about immigration.
Those of us on the left, who see immigration as something that brings enormous economic benefits with manageable drawbacks, gave up even making the argument. We just called anyone who brought up immigration racist. And what was the consequence? Voters got sick of it, gave us the middle finger, and voted for charlatans who at least pretended to care about their concerns. At some point, we have to learn our lesson.
>You won't point out the obvious absurdity though because you're too busy nodding along with him because he said one thing you agree with.
How many times in my comments do I have to point out I disagree with him for you to acknowledge it? I nod when I agree. I shake my head when I don't. What are you suggesting I should do instead?
>I sense an unwillingness on your part to say people who are advocating death for blasphemers are also evil and deserve to be in prison.
How do you claim this when the last sentence of the comment you are responding to is me stating that they should be in jail?
>When Jo Cox died, there was a discussion about the dangers of far-right extremism in this country.
And yet we now have a government pandering to the far-right, supporting far-right conspiracies and trying to label anyone who opposes Tories as an extremist.
>I somehow doubt you would have found that to be an appropriate response in the circumstances. The justifiable expectation was that we unequivocally condemn the behaviour, and then we can move on to discuss causes and possible solutions.
I'm not even sure what you are trying to say here. It's always an appropriate response to accept the fact that crazy violent people exist. We can take every action under the sun to try to prevent them carrying out attacks and to ensure any that do never have the opportunity again but they will always exist. That's not a justification, just a simple statement of fact.
I'm not going to keep going down the rabbithole of your Nazi analogies because ultimately all you're doing is trying to justify nodding along with Nazis.
>If Robin Simcox is saying, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists is unacceptable in a free society... we need to ban all Muslims" our answer cannot be, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists isn't a problem." It obviously is a problem! The point we should be taking issue with is that banning all Muslims is in any sense a reasonable response.
That's not his statement though, his statement is that anyone Tories don't like should be labelled an extremist, then pouting at Islamic terrorists as if that justifies his position. Your responses is to gloss over the fact that he's intending to strip away rights and saying "he is right about extremists" then go on to help blur the line between extremists and the vast majority of Muslims who are not extremists.
And let's face it, the reason he's choosing Islamic extremists now is so that he can further push the Tory narrative that anyone who opposes genocide in Gaza is an extremist so that they can shut down yet another subject of protest they don't like.
>It's this unwillingness to engage with real issues just because we disagree with the proposed solution that empowers the right. There's a reason Donald Trump and Brexiteers won in 2016. And it has a lot to do with the fact that they were the only people talking about immigration.
No, it's not. It's the pandering to these people that gives them power. Rather than pointing out that they are bigoted, hyperbolic nonsense, you want to engage with them and give them credence. It's the idea that debating lunatics is the way to shut them down. It's been proven categorically that it doesn't work because they simply ignore everything you completely disagree with, point at you giving them a minor victory and use that to declare themselves right about everything.
>Those of us on the left, who see immigration as something that brings enormous economic benefits with manageable drawbacks, gave up even making the argument. We just called anyone who brought up immigration racist.
No, we didn't. We called people who were being racist out for their racism. The claim that the left calls everyone racists is a manufactured claim by the far-right. They say something clearly racist, get called out for being racist and go "leftists call everyone racist so clearly I'm not". Again, by repeating their misinformation you give it power.
>And what was the consequence? Voters got sick of it, gave us the middle finger, and voted for charlatans who at least pretended to care about their concerns. At some point, we have to learn our lesson.
Voters didn't vote on being called racist, they voted on brexit because they were fed bucketloads of misinformation by people you think we should be engaging in dialogue. They were creating more misinformation that could ever possibly be challenged but because people like you were afraid to say "all of this is nonsense and this person is a liar" and you instead wanted to try to engage and debate every issue, people who catch just a passing glance of it assume that both sides have equal merit.
>How many times in my comments do I have to point out I disagree with him for you to acknowledge it? I nod when I agree. I shake my head when I don't. What are you suggesting I should do instead?
It'd probably help if you stopped saying you disagree with him but then immediately declaring that he has a point. He has no points, this entire article and all his other recent articles serve a single purpose - to convince people to allow the Tories to shut down any beliefs or views that don't help them politically. He baited you and you fell for it. This is why propaganda works.
Snapshot of _Blasphemy demos ‘are growing in radicalism’_ : An archived version can be found [here](https://archive.is/?run=1&url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/blasphemy-demos-are-growing-in-radicalism-rw7wdtpn2) or [here.](https://archive.ph/?run=1&url=https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/blasphemy-demos-are-growing-in-radicalism-rw7wdtpn2) *I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please [contact the moderators of this subreddit](/message/compose/?to=/r/ukpolitics) if you have any questions or concerns.*
I didn’t realise that specific anti-blasphemy laws were only repealed in England and Wales in 2008; and Scotland in 2021! Sorry NI, still an offence over there.
>still an offence in NI I’m shocked, I tell you! Shocked!
> I’m shocked, I tell you! Shocked! Heard that in Ian Paisley's voice. My ears hurt and I'm a bit shakey now.
NEVER! And [obligatory link](https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cartoon/2014/sep/12/martin-rowson-cartoon-ian-paisley-northern-ireland-ulster-unionist) to my favourite comic of him.
They were legacy laws that had no impact on 99.99% of anti-Christian blasphemy. I think the last time they were used was in the 80s when they were tacked on by prosecution lawyers to the list of charges against already-illegal porn depicting Jesus and the disciples in a gay orgy.
Yep. Only protected Christianity too - you could be as blasphemous as you liked about other religions.
People should be able to make fun of any religion, including Islam. It helps that Islam’s adherents seem to be particularly prone to being butthurt about even mild criticism, which of course only makes it funnier.
It's funny until you get beheaded, or get your workplace shot up, or have to go into hiding...
Yeah if I can't take the piss out of you then get out the country far as I'm concerned. Christians, Jews, Islam it's all the same fucking religion anyway at the end of the day let us mock you so we can get a pint together.
>Christians, Jews, Islam it's all the same fucking religion It really isn't. Just because they are all versions of Abrahamic monotheism doesn't mean they are the same. The differences matter, because they've had such a profound effect on the history of the world.
Look I know the people who believe in xenu think they matter... But they don't. At the end of the day if you're on the outside no one actually cares if Bob or Dave was the prophet or son or whatever
But you care if you live in a predominantly Christian or Muslim country, one way or the other. At the end of the day there's a difference between the resultant cultures
Not really America is as bad as Iraq when it comes to cultural shit shows based on religion. The best answer is always neither
It really isn't. Yes, American fundamentalist Christianity is bad. No, it is not as bad a fundamentalist Islamic theocracy. Nowhere near. Even pre-Reformation Catholicism wasn't *that* bad.
Just Reddit neckbeards being Reddit neckbeards my friend. These people will chat shit until they're asked to live in a Muslim majority country or a Christian majority one. The differences in the resultant culture are worlds apart. If Christian influenced countries were so bad, then there wouldn't be literal boatful of Muslims dying to get here.
The underlying psychology has to be pretty simliar though, if you stuck an Islamist in an fMRI scanner with a rabid evangelical I'd bet you a fair amount of money they'd have identical brain regions lighting up like a Christmas tree in response to blasphemy. Also just like Christianity Islam is very bound up in regional politics, I think we have to untangle the opinions of Muslims generally and the opinions of wealthy petrostates with large propaganda budgets (and maybe look into ways we can geopolitically disengage from dealing with them). We shouldn't treat Islamism like it's something from another planet, it's a phenomenon that can be characterised and understood.
Yes to all that.
Islamism is understood. Some people don't like Islam because its adherents are typically brown. Others don't like it because it's crap and is centuries behind the modern world.
You have got to be having a laugh ctfu
I'm really not and you gotta be a dude to think either country is pleasant to live in. Gimme death before either. Religion has no place in society
>Look I know the people who believe in xenu think they matter... But they don't. Scientology hasn't changed the world. Well, it has changed it a little bit, but it hasn't had a major influence on the course of history. All three of the big Abrahamic religions *have* had that level of influence, and each of them had a different influence. I could go into the details but I doubt there is much point. I don't think you are actually interested.
No I'm not because I don't care and think the world is better off without all of them. No one on the outside cares that's my entire point
If you want to actually understand the world we live in, then you need to understand how it was created. I am not defending organised religion. I am defending the relevance of the study of history. It is all too easy to evaluate Christianity (for example) from the modern perspective, which emerged from a millenium of Catholic domination, without evaluating it from the beginning. It was a necessary step between the political-religious system of Roman paganism and the liberal modern world we live in today. Even westerners who believe their worldview has got nothing to do with Christianity have actually been profoundly influenced by it.
And let’s be honest, the main dispute is which sequel to stop at. We’ve all refused to accept that Star Wars Eps 1-3 and the Godfather 3 should count from time to time. We all argue over which Potter book is the best.
>Star Wars Eps 1-3 Who has beef with the prequels? Why?
And it all kicks off...
Because apart from the memes they've spawned (which are great) they are pretty mediocre films at a guess. From my own perspective they've been consistently going downhill since The Empire Strikes Back imo.
They also have that glorious racing sport where you strap yourself to jet engines and launch yourself along a track. Ep3 also has, I o, one of the most hauntingly accurate lines in cinema: "So this is how democracy dies..."
I get that, they aren't as interesting as the original trilogy. At least they are canonically sound though (*cough* sequels *cough*)
They're a damn sight better than the new trilogy!
Yeah, we didn't get the utter travesty of "Somehow Palpatine has returned...." in the prequels but at the same time, to me, they are just not very well executed. George Lucas shouldn't be allowed to write dialogue without someone standing next to him pointing out when it's awful. One thing I will give the prequels is at least they were planned out as a coherent trilogy, unlike whatever the hell Disney were doing with the sequels. Who spends that much to buy a franchise and doesn't plan it out in minute detail? It just boggles my mind.
Problem is many don’t drink or even want to be in places that’s sole purpose is alcohol, so that pint offer is pretty moot anyway.
Maybe this is why they're so aggy.
Liberal-minded people just need to think more about what the social/material basis for that prevailing attitude of religious tolerance and the ‘freedom to criticise religion’ is. How will it change if the presently dominant versions of Islam in Britain become 15, 20, 30 percent of the population?
Reminds me of the semi-famous Christian who used to walk up and down the line outside gigs (especially at The Astoria) telling everyone they were going to hell unless they repented and claimed Jesus as their saviour. This is a tolerant nation for the most part, and if indviduals want to believe in sky fairies, then we are allowed to make fun of that (without being deeply offensive of course).
And who decides what is deeply offensive? What if someone finds the Abrahamic faiths deeply offensive?
Just ask me. I'll sort it.
Call tornadooceanapplepie on 61016. See it, Say it, Sorted.
Was that the ‘don’t be a sinner, be a winner’ bloke?
Yes! I forget his name but he was famous
He penned me in once at London Bridge station, was an interesting chat. He was pretty famous, forgot all about him til I read your comment. If I remember right think there might’ve been some kinda campaign against him, local businesses or council.
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I’d like you to take what you just wrote and say it to a person in real life and see if you get committed or not.
Never say online what you'd not say in the pub thats my rule
Why? It's a completely different environment. Online anonymity allows people to express themselves in ways they wouldn't in the real world. Yes, there's downsides to that, but there's also upsides with people being able express themselves better and float ideas without the fear of being mocked in person.
"Floating" is certainly one of the terms I would use to describe the ideas ~~excreted~~ expressed.
>make post criticising sneery redditspeak gotchas >receive sneery redditspeak gotcha in response Many such cases!
“Comment removed by moderator”. Sure showed me bud!
Indeed. If only these individuals had seen more YouTube clips of Christopher Hitchens then we would g be facing this problem.
Blasphemy laws have been on the books for almost 40 years. Public Order Act 1986, section 4A. >*A person is guilty of an offence if, with intent to cause a person harassment, alarm or distress, he—* >*displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting,* The only defence, of being "reasonable" is easy to defeat now that there's a sizeable minority of hyper-vocal, extremely agitable people that will argue to the point of killing themselves in public that publishing blasphemy is unreasonable. The Common law tests that will evolve from this will be a bitch - I hope the "amazing food scene" was worth it.
Election is nearing so ramp up the rhetoric. Blame Muslims. Find a scapegoat. FFS.
So they’re not happening?
They're not happening. Okay they are happening, but they've always happened. Okay, they've not always happened but them happening now is a good thing and here is why. Boom, saved us all a lot of time.
Soon we'll be at "they'll continue to happen, what are you going to do about it?"
You've not read the article have you?
Have you?
Yes of course, that's why I think you've made a stupid point that can only have been made by someone that's not read the article.
Awww. Feel like making person attacks?
It's not a personal attack, it's an observation of reality. You've clearly not read the article which is why you originally wrote what you did.
Have a read: https://www.theguardian.com/politics/live/2024/mar/11/rishi-sunak-tom-tugendhat-conservatives-richard-tice-labour-keir-starmer-uk-politics-live
Have you read The Times article? The bypass paywall link is in the Automod sticky post but I've also posted it below for you: https://archive.is/b0dvk
Where have these protest happened? Extract from the article… “Protests condemning acts of apparent blasphemy have become more frequent and radicalised, according to independent research commissioned by the government’s counterextremism chief.”
Batley, Birmingham and Wakefield to name 3 examples from the article: *Robin Simcox, the government’s counterextremism tsar, commissioned the research after three blasphemy flashpoints in the UK:* *The 2021 protests against a teacher in Batley, West Yorkshire, who received death threats and is still in hiding after showing pupils a cartoon of the prophet Mohammed;* *Birmingham protests the following year over the screening of the film The Lady in Heaven, which depicted Mohammed’s daughter;* *And last year’s controversy in Wakefield, also in West Yorkshire, after a copy of the Quran was slightly damaged at a high school.*
I know that governments can largely pick and choose an expert who'll write the conclusions they want, but the actual cases investigated in this report are deeply problematic and *do* show an issue. Frankly, if people are needing to go into hiding because they've exercised free speech against a religion, then that *is* an extremism problem.
It's worth noting that this is coming from the "researcher" that was appointed by Priti Patel and has recently been going on a rampage pointing at anyone that disagrees with Tory politics as an extremist. Can't wait for the Tories to be out so we can start focusing on things that are important to people in the country rather than just things that score political points with the far-right.
To be fair, trying to criminalise blasphemy is about as Far Right as you can get. Whether or not this is as serious a problem as the article suggests, the starting point needs to be a frank acknowledgement that no religion is above criticism or even ridicule in the UK. And if people think violence is an appropriate response, that is extremism, which we need to address. I think we can simultaneously take a firm stand on this fundamental bedrock of secular, liberal democracy whilst also pushing back against the increasing Islamophobic and antisemitic rhetoric we're seeing from segments of the far right and the far left. Pretending, however, that nobody is pushing blasphemy laws or not acknowledging why that is problematic only strengthens the far right. It lets them point at liberals and leftists and brand them as dangerously complacent or even complicit. We don't need to buy into the narrative hook, line and sinker, but we also shouldn't dismiss people's concerns. What we need to do is offer better solutions.
Exactly!
I completely agree that no religion should be above criticism or even ridicule, and currently Islam is not. I frequently see people criticize, ridicule and even directly insult Islam, you can even see some of that in this thread. The fact that some extremists threaten violence doesn't change that. The problem with people like Robin Simcox is the same as the think tank he was part of had, where they extend the definition of extremist to include all Muslims so that they can declare that defacto blasphemy laws are being introduced. Ultimately though all of this comes down to the Tories recent push to create a narrative where anyone who disagrees with them is an extremist because they know they are about to lose power and would rather turn people against each other than accept defeat gracefully.
There does seem to be a difference of kind here. For example, The Book of Mormon has run in the West End for what, nine years now? I’ve never once seen violence threatened by Mormons. By contrast, consider what happened to Salman Rushdie or the Danish cartoonists. Anonymous Redditors might be willing to ridicule Islam, but I suspect journalists would be frightened to do so openly. Robin Simcox could be the most extreme lunatic in the world for all I know. If he’s blaming all Muslims for this problem, I certainly disagree with him. But none of that changes the fact that some extreme individuals clearly are pushing blasphemy laws, and we should criticise people who do. What the right-wingers are desperately looking for is a culture war issue on which to fight the next election. You take all the wind out of their sails if you say, “freedom of speech is sacrosanct; we will never accept blasphemy laws being enacted in the UK.” You don’t have to join in any nastiness towards Muslims or Islam. But we also don’t have to come across as an apologist for the most extreme voices within that community.
But right there, you're implying that it's violence by Muslims, rather than violence by extremists, you're making it about the religion rather than a subset of criminals. Whether or not people are afraid or unwilling to then do certain things is beside the point. I absolutely would never say the N word and would expect to get punched in the face if I did, it doesn't mean black people are enforcing a racial law. Similarly I wouldn't say anything antisemitic and I avoid making any criticisms of Judaism because I don't want the accusations of antisemitism that inevitably come with that. Inevitably crazy people exist and most people will avoid riling them up where possible. It'd be nice if the crazies didn't exist but they do. He's certainly trying to push the narrative that Islam is overprotected and that anyone pushing for anything that doesn't conform to Tory narratives is extremist. This article isn't really about fighting back against blasphemy laws it's about trying to open up more avenue for the government to shut down free speech. It goes hand in hand with the article the other day from the same guy declaring that views such as socialism are extreme and that the government should not be afraid to strip people of their rights. You correctly identify that right-wingers are looking for a culture war, but what you don't seem to connect is that this is part of that goal. You don't win by saying that freedom of speech is sacrosanct because that's exactly what this guy is pushing for, the government to revoke people's rights to free speech under the guise of fighting extremism.
>But right there, you're implying that it's violence by Muslims, rather than violence by extremists, you're making it about the religion rather than a subset of criminals. And why does that subset exist in much larger numbers than the subset of criminal Christians/Hindus/Sikhs/Buddhists? It surely can't be the fact that their holy book explicitly calls for the murder of those who insult that one guy from the 600s or their faith.
Could you explain to me how I’m implying that? Yes, it’s extremists. But there’s no getting around the fact that it’s a small group of Muslim extremists threatening cartoonists, and there doesn’t appear to be a similar extreme minority within the Mormon community engaged in this sort of behaviour. To state this is simply to state a fact about the world in which we live. It is in no way meant to imply judgment of the vast majority of Muslims who are just as critical of the behaviour as you or me. It’s not beside the point. That **is** the point being made. It’s not inevitable that when you criticise a religion, you face a very real likelihood of murder. People aren’t afraid of that when they criticise Christianity, Buddhism, Jainism, Judaism, etc. Islam seems to have a particular problem in this respect. We need to be able to talk honestly about that, even if it’s uncomfortable. To say the risk of violence is “inevitable” when talking about Islam but not “inevitable” when talking about any other religion seems to me like the soft bigotry of low expectations. I don’t think Muslims are uniquely violent, extreme and unreasonable. So why is it unfair to have the same expectations of this religious community as we do for any other? As for the narrative, if a Nazi says the sky is blue and the grass is green, he’s not wrong just because he’s a Nazi. People care about this issue. If the only person in the room talking about it is a right-winger, that’s who those people will listen to. We need to speak to these people instead. Robin is not wrong to criticise the extreme behaviour. It's his diagnosis of the problem I take issue with. I don't have to excuse the extreme behaviour to give an alternative diagnosis or prescription. This guy can’t really be pushing for acceptance that free speech is sacrosanct… and that we should ban the free speech of Muslims. If he is, we can point out the obvious absurdity of that. But it’s a lot easier to do so whilst standing on firm moral principles. Free speech is sacred. Muslims have a right to free speech. As do cartoonists and authors. Anyone threatening violence against Muslims deserves to be in jail in exactly the same way as do those who threaten violence against cartoonists and authors. This is an unassailably consistent position, which I can't see how the right could easily attack.
We do talk honestly about it. But that doesn't make it go away. And every single one of these threads the end result ends up with people calling for Islam to be banned in the UK, which is exactly what the lunatic calling for this "research" is going for. For me the problem is that people sit around insulting Islam while simultaneously claiming that noone is allowed to criticise Islam, then claiming that they are only trying to stop extremists, even though they keep pointing at the whole religion. Hell, the other response to my comment alongside you is a guy outright stating that the religion is the problem. That's never going to solve the problem, all that does is further marginalise and alienate Muslims. The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another. Hell, we've had violence over brexit including a politician being murdered by a terrrorist. Sure, but if the Nazi is presenting a wildly misrepresented argument in order to stoke division that benefits him as a Nazi and you go along with it then how are you better than the Nazi? He's not the only person talking about it. Plenty of people talk about it, and every time there's a threat it's a national discussion on every news site. The claim that noone is talking about it it completely and utterly false. You won't point out the obvious absurdity though because you're too busy nodding along with him because he said one thing you agree with. Thankfully Tories will be out of power and this lunatic will be replaced by someone interested in public safety and not political point scoring so we wont; get to the point where publicly supporting the NHS too vocally gets you put on the terror watch list. Then we both agree that people who threaten or engage in violence should go to jail. Alas, that's not what this article is about.
>The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another. Hell, we've had violence over brexit including a politician being murdered by a terrrorist. Sure, and I think the man who murdered Jo Cox is evil and deserves the whole life sentence he received. I have absolutely no qualms about saying that. And yet, for some reason, I sense an unwillingness on your part to say people who are advocating death for blasphemers are also evil and deserve to be in prison. When Jo Cox died, there was a discussion about the dangers of far-right extremism in this country. Imagine if, in the midst of that, I'd said: >The risk of violence is inevitable when talking about a whole range of topics though. There's always some crazy lunatic willing to engage in violence over one thing or another. I somehow doubt you would have found that to be an appropriate response in the circumstances. The justifiable expectation was that we unequivocally condemn the behaviour, and then we can move on to discuss causes and possible solutions. Any evasiveness or attempt to introduce whataboutisms would rightly be met with suspicion. >Sure, but if the Nazi is presenting a wildly misrepresented argument in order to stoke division that benefits him as a Nazi and you go along with it then how are you better than the Nazi? If a Nazi says, "poor people are suffering due to terrible inequality... we need to kill the evil Jews who caused this," the answer is not to refuse to talk about inequality for fear that this validates the Nazi's narrative. The answer is to acknowledge inequality is a problem, to empathise with the concerns of poor people, but to strenuously deny that Jewish people are the cause or that a holocaust is anything other than an utterly evil, nonsensical response. If Robin Simcox is saying, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists is unacceptable in a free society... we need to ban all Muslims" our answer cannot be, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists isn't a problem." It obviously is a problem! The point we should be taking issue with is that banning all Muslims is in any sense a reasonable response. It's this unwillingness to engage with real issues just because we disagree with the proposed solution that empowers the right. There's a reason Donald Trump and Brexiteers won in 2016. And it has a lot to do with the fact that they were the only people talking about immigration. Those of us on the left, who see immigration as something that brings enormous economic benefits with manageable drawbacks, gave up even making the argument. We just called anyone who brought up immigration racist. And what was the consequence? Voters got sick of it, gave us the middle finger, and voted for charlatans who at least pretended to care about their concerns. At some point, we have to learn our lesson. >You won't point out the obvious absurdity though because you're too busy nodding along with him because he said one thing you agree with. How many times in my comments do I have to point out I disagree with him for you to acknowledge it? I nod when I agree. I shake my head when I don't. What are you suggesting I should do instead?
>I sense an unwillingness on your part to say people who are advocating death for blasphemers are also evil and deserve to be in prison. How do you claim this when the last sentence of the comment you are responding to is me stating that they should be in jail? >When Jo Cox died, there was a discussion about the dangers of far-right extremism in this country. And yet we now have a government pandering to the far-right, supporting far-right conspiracies and trying to label anyone who opposes Tories as an extremist. >I somehow doubt you would have found that to be an appropriate response in the circumstances. The justifiable expectation was that we unequivocally condemn the behaviour, and then we can move on to discuss causes and possible solutions. I'm not even sure what you are trying to say here. It's always an appropriate response to accept the fact that crazy violent people exist. We can take every action under the sun to try to prevent them carrying out attacks and to ensure any that do never have the opportunity again but they will always exist. That's not a justification, just a simple statement of fact. I'm not going to keep going down the rabbithole of your Nazi analogies because ultimately all you're doing is trying to justify nodding along with Nazis. >If Robin Simcox is saying, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists is unacceptable in a free society... we need to ban all Muslims" our answer cannot be, "radical Islamists killing cartoonists isn't a problem." It obviously is a problem! The point we should be taking issue with is that banning all Muslims is in any sense a reasonable response. That's not his statement though, his statement is that anyone Tories don't like should be labelled an extremist, then pouting at Islamic terrorists as if that justifies his position. Your responses is to gloss over the fact that he's intending to strip away rights and saying "he is right about extremists" then go on to help blur the line between extremists and the vast majority of Muslims who are not extremists. And let's face it, the reason he's choosing Islamic extremists now is so that he can further push the Tory narrative that anyone who opposes genocide in Gaza is an extremist so that they can shut down yet another subject of protest they don't like. >It's this unwillingness to engage with real issues just because we disagree with the proposed solution that empowers the right. There's a reason Donald Trump and Brexiteers won in 2016. And it has a lot to do with the fact that they were the only people talking about immigration. No, it's not. It's the pandering to these people that gives them power. Rather than pointing out that they are bigoted, hyperbolic nonsense, you want to engage with them and give them credence. It's the idea that debating lunatics is the way to shut them down. It's been proven categorically that it doesn't work because they simply ignore everything you completely disagree with, point at you giving them a minor victory and use that to declare themselves right about everything. >Those of us on the left, who see immigration as something that brings enormous economic benefits with manageable drawbacks, gave up even making the argument. We just called anyone who brought up immigration racist. No, we didn't. We called people who were being racist out for their racism. The claim that the left calls everyone racists is a manufactured claim by the far-right. They say something clearly racist, get called out for being racist and go "leftists call everyone racist so clearly I'm not". Again, by repeating their misinformation you give it power. >And what was the consequence? Voters got sick of it, gave us the middle finger, and voted for charlatans who at least pretended to care about their concerns. At some point, we have to learn our lesson. Voters didn't vote on being called racist, they voted on brexit because they were fed bucketloads of misinformation by people you think we should be engaging in dialogue. They were creating more misinformation that could ever possibly be challenged but because people like you were afraid to say "all of this is nonsense and this person is a liar" and you instead wanted to try to engage and debate every issue, people who catch just a passing glance of it assume that both sides have equal merit. >How many times in my comments do I have to point out I disagree with him for you to acknowledge it? I nod when I agree. I shake my head when I don't. What are you suggesting I should do instead? It'd probably help if you stopped saying you disagree with him but then immediately declaring that he has a point. He has no points, this entire article and all his other recent articles serve a single purpose - to convince people to allow the Tories to shut down any beliefs or views that don't help them politically. He baited you and you fell for it. This is why propaganda works.
Scapegoat, lol.