Now I’ve seen everything – now that I’ve seen an editorial in the Telegraph saying how swell Islam is compared to those other timid religions that won’t stand up for themselves.
It’s another Warsi-flatter, saying how right she is to order everyone to be intrusively religious and to go urge the pope to be more intrusively religious along with her.
It is unsurprising that it has taken a Muslim member of the Cabinet to speak out clearly and forcefully on the importance of faith in the life of the nation; followers of Islam tend to be less mealy-mouthed about their beliefs than many Christians.
Why yes, yes they do. Some are so much less mealy-mouthed that they threaten cartoonists and novelists with death for failing to submit to their god and their prophet. Some actually try to do the killing themselves. Some actually succeed. Countries governed by “followers of Islam” are all nasty authoritarian places at best, vicious theocracies at worst. Is that really what the Telegraph is admiring and promoting?
…politically correct fawning by public bodies over the sensitivities of other faiths has left many Christians feeling inhibited about asserting and celebrating their own beliefs. It has also left many wondering exactly when it was that Britain stopped being a Christian country. Combine that with the aggressive intolerance of the militant secularists, and it is little wonder that the Church of England frequently feels beleaguered.
Diddums. It “feels beleaguered” while it has bishops in the House of Lords and quite a lot of air time on the BBC. It doesn’t get to shove people off the sidewalk the way it used to, but it has hardly lost all of its very real power.
Last week, we had the perfect illustration of this baleful process, when the National Secular Society succeeded in a High Court attempt to prevent Bideford Town Council doing something it had done for centuries – holding a short prayer service at the start of its meetings. The atheist former councillor who pressed the case argued that the council had no right to “impose” its religious views on him, conveniently ignoring the fact that no one had forced him to attend the prayers, and failing totally to see that it was he who was seeking to impose his views on others, not the other way round.
That atheist former councillor is “an evil little thing,” isn’t he. Theocracy speaks the same language everywhere. No one “forced” him to attend the prayers but it’s awkward and inconvenient to opt out. That’s how majoritarian bullying works. The Telegraph’s approval of majoritarian bullying is a squalid spectacle.
Such instincts, Baroness Warsi notes, are “deeply intolerant”, and have historically been the hallmark of totalitarian regimes. Her warning that the removal of faith from the public sphere is dangerous is, therefore, both timely and right, and all credit to her for sounding it. It is high time that many of our religious leaders were similarly assertive, and stopped seeming so apologetic about their faith.
Totalitarian regimes is it? You mean like Franco’s Spain? Like Saudi Arabia? Like Iran? For that matter, like Elizabethan Britain?
Does the Telegraph really want that? If it doesn’t, what the hell is it playing at?
The editorial is confusing being timid with acting like an adult and standing up for itself with throwing a temper tantrum. If he thinks every slight against him should be met with threats and violence, what would he say to people who are offended by him?
I saw recently the observation that religion is the diaper of humanity’s childhood.
Warsi uses the word “intolerant” in much the same way as spoiled children use the word “fair”.
There’s a similarly mendacious piece in today’s Independent: http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/no-secularism-please-were-british-6917549.html. It starts out ok but then drifts off into the same old claptrap about arrogance and totalitarianism.
And is he really insidiously suggesting that Christopher Hitchens was giving himself over to a “higher” power towards the end. Oh don’t they just hate it when one gets away!
“religion is the diaper of humanity’s childhood.”
And I thought that the whole sentence from PZ’s post should be on Atheist billboards.
All one has to do is look at Northern Ireland. Not exactly mealy-mouthed on either side, was it? How quickly one forgets.
“Countries governed by “followers of Islam” are all nasty authoritarian places at best, vicious theocracies at worst. Is that really what the Telegraph is admiring and promoting?”
Very probably. As long as the elites stay in place, and the rest of us are kept in our place, I’m sure they would see a ‘vicious theocracy’ as a small price to pay.
I think that modern UK Christians are reticent about stating their beliefs, not because they are being intimidated by militant secularists, but because they are fully aware that their beliefs are ridiculous. Of course we now know that most in the UK that call themselves Christians are not Christians at all. Their actual beliefs are completely at odds with Christianity and their knowledge of the Bible is non-existent.
And that’s why gnu atheism is needed. Gnu atheism is the bridge between the awareness that religious beliefs are ridiculous and what to do in light of that. Without gnu atheism there would just be the easy combination of awareness that religious beliefs are ridiculous and going along with them anyway. With gnu atheism that becomes more difficult.
This is a good thing.
I was about to write an Iran, Saudi Arabia etc comment but the article beat me to it. In fact, I cannot think of a single non-religious totalitarian regime in existence today (but I’m willing to be corrected on that).
Sorry if this is spammy but I started a petition against this level of reality denial being allowed in the cabinet: http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/29618
To be honest, I threw this up because I couldn’t find any other petition, I have no idea how to go about this stuff.
I was going to suggest North Korea, but the cult of Kim is so close to a religion as makes no difference.
I think the belief in the immortality of the president qualifies as religion. It certainly isn’t evidence based
mywall @ # 10: … I cannot think of a single non-religious totalitarian regime in existence today…
The Burmese regime arguably qualifies. Probably Vietnam too. Mugabe’s Zimbabwe and some of the other African dictatorships may fit in that basket as well.
Does post-coup Honduras meet the definition of “totalitarian”?
@13: I have read that the Burmese regime was driven by the desire for a “pure” form of Buddhism.
Completely forgot about Zimbabwe, there’s been so many other countries in the news recently that it slipped my mind. I’ll read up on modern Vietnam, I haven’t heard much in the way of reports from there and last time I checked it was considered a decent place to visit.
I’m surer than before that she is where she is because she’s a Muslim woman and not because of her ability.
Among many other points which could be made about the Telegraph article, the prayers _were_ obligatory because not participating meant being recorded as absent.
severn @ # 14: … the Burmese regime was driven by the desire for a “pure” form of Buddhism.
The claim has likely been made, but sfaict actual policies (& ideology) are indistinguishable from your garden-variety corrupt military junta.
mywall @ # 15: … modern Vietnam… last time I checked it was considered a decent place to visit.
I’ve visited Iran under the Shah, Sadat’s Egypt, and Spain under Franco, and found them all quite agreeable (so long as I avoided talking about politics). Hell, even that explicit total theocracy in the middle of Rome is a lovely tourist attraction.