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"We live in a fascinating, beautiful and, let's face it, dangerous enough universe without complicating matters with gobbledegook."
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THE VIEW FROM
NUMBER 80 |
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Site Search What is Islamophobia? What is secularism?
Backwards Glances 2002
Backwards Glances 2003 part 3 Backwards Glances 2004 part 1 January 7th to March 31st Backwards Glances 2004 part 2 April 3rd to May 30th Backwards Glances 2004 part 3 June 1st to July 31st Backwards Glances 2004 part 4 Aug 2nd to Sept 30th Backwards Glances 2004 part 5 Oct 1st to Dec 30th Backwards Glances 2005 part 1 Jan 1st to Feb 14th Backwards Glances 2005 part 2 Feb 15th to March 31st Backwards Glances 2005 part 3 April 1st to July 30th Backwards Glances 2005 part 4 July 1st to Sept 30th Backwards Glances 2005 part 5 Oct 1st to Dec 31st Backwards Glances 2006 part 1 Jan 7th to Mar 14th Backwards Glances 2006 part 2 Mar16th to May 15th Backwards Glances 2006 part 3 June 19th to Dec 24th Backward Glances 2007 part 1 Jan 6th to May 16th Backwards Glances 2007 part 2 May 19th to Aug 20th Backwards Glances 2007 part 3 Sept 5th to Dec 21st Backwards Glances 2008 part 1 Jan 6th to May 1st Backwards Glances 2008 part 2 May 6th - Sept 16th Backwards Glances 2008 part 3 Sept 4th to Dec 27th Backwards Glances 2009 part 1 Jan 17th to May 29th Backwards Glances 2009 part 2 June 1st to Sept 23rd Backwards Glances 2009 part 3 Sept 30th to to Dec 21st Backwards Glances 2010 part 1 Jan 1st to Apr 29th Backwards Glances 2010 part 2 May 6th to Sept 1st Backwards Glances 2010 part 3 Sept 8th to Dec 28th Backwards Glances 2011 part 1 Jan 1st to Mar 22nd Backwards Glances 2011 part 2 March 22nd to May 30th Backwards Glances 2011 part 3 June 2nd to Aug 31st
Backwards Glances 2011
part 4 Sept 1st to Dec 29th
LINKS PAGE (the above is seriously out of date) BAD ARCHAEOLOGY COMMITTEE FOR SKEPTICAL INQUIRY (formerly CSICOP) THE COUNCIL OF EX-MUSLIMS OF BRITAIN SCIENCE, REASON and CRITICAL THINKING PROFESSOR TANGENT - Nutrition for the mind BRITISH MUSLIMS FOR SECULAR DEMOCRACY JAMES RANDI'S EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATION BLOG the user manual for your brain, in comic-form Space News Historical Jesus or Jesus Myth: The Jesus Puzzle
The European Human Rights Centre (EHRC)
represents over 100 non-governmental and other not-for-profit
organisations interested in the promotion of Human Rights throughout
Europe and beyond
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Issues of the original newsletter, Past Views, run from December 1999 to May 2005. The email link at the bottom of the page is for feedback and comment if you think it may help. Please note correspondence may be published on this site unless you stipulate otherwise. Should correspondence be deemed abusive or threatening, any such stipulation will be ignored. If you place a link to Number 80 on your own website could you please link to this homepage - thanks. Faith-Based News - check out Faith-Based News, a collection of links, updated (almost) daily, to news and comment reflecting the influence of religion/superstition/pseudoscience/irrational beliefs (this now includes so-called "alternative or complementary medicine") around the globe, with some occasional observations and asides.
No, Thank You - "The National Secular Society has condemned a secret plan for a twenty foot high replica of the Rio de Janeiro statue of Christ the Redeemer near the summit of the iconic London landmark Primrose Hill. It will be funded by the Brazilian government to celebrate the end of the London 2012 Olympics and mark the moment Rio takes on the Olympic mantle for the 2016 Games." Well it's not secret any more. What a bloody silly idea. What has the fabled Christian godman have to do with the Olympics? Zeus would be far more appropriate. "Living in a free society means that we have the right to offend people, and in turn be offended by others. A free society does not ban books, nor does it stop people from voicing their opinions, nor allow people to be blackmailed and intimidated. In a free society we can, and should, challenge each other’s beliefs, through free and open debate, and rely on rational argument and reason rather than threats and censorship." British Humanist Association (courtesy of Jesus and Mo)
Quote - "I have mixed
feelings about J&M being at the centre of it all. A lot of people
imagine that I am deliberately insulting them, when in fact I am not
even talking to them. They are, in effect, eavesdropping on another
person's conversation and acting outraged at what they overhear."
The author of Jesus and Mo on another attack on freedom of speech, this
time at the Human Rights Watch - may have to consider a change of name. Executive director Kenneth Roth has said in a report that post-Arab Spring "The international community must ... come to terms with political Islam when it represents a majority preference...Islamist parties are genuinely popular in much of the Arab world, in part because many Arabs have come to see political Islam as the antithesis of autocratic rule. Wherever Islam-inspired governments emerge, the international community should focus on encouraging, and if need be pressuring, them to respect basic rights - just as the Christian-labelled parties and governments of Europe are expected to do." With unresolved and violent disputes in Egypt and Libya the Arab Spring, such as it is, has not brought stability or democratic government. What we are likely to see is autocrats replaced by theocrats. To act as if the regime changes are a done deal is, to put it charitably, overly optimistic. The suggestion that Western governments should throw women's and gays human rights under a bus in order to come to terms with political is totally unacceptable. The idea of "...the international community should focus on encouraging, and if need be pressuring, them to respect basic rights..." is laughable. Misogyny disguised as respect is a part of Islam at a very basic level. Roth's organization is called Human Rights Watch not Muslim Heterosexual Men's Rights Watch. Roth's proposal is reminiscent of that annually occurring farce of "Islamic Human Rights" which the Organization of the Islamic Conference keeps trying to foist on the UN. Human rights are for all humans and not just those selected through the distorting lens of religious bigotry. (see The Wrong Rights?) Roth is definitely correct in pointing out the wrongs of Western support for autocrats in the Middle East - in particular those that run Saudi Arabia - but any sense he makes here is counteracted by his embrace of political Islam. For all the fine words of the Muslim Brotherhood and others, Islam is fundamentally incompatible with democracy and true, universal human rights. (Also see this from Maryam Namazie) Update - this article from the Telegraph promotes engagement with the Muslim Brotherhood but has this important caveat "Make no mistake: the Muslim Brotherhood is not our friend. We do not share its values on the rights of women or religious minorities, or on foreign policy. We should not embrace it. But those who are unable to tell the difference between mainstream Islamists and the Taliban are doomed to lock themselves into an unwinnable and illusory war of civilisations." The aims of the Brotherhood are the same as they ever were, but are better concealed these days. From Wikipedia "The Muslim Brotherhood's goal, as stated by Brotherhood founder Hassan al-Banna was to reclaim Islam's manifest destiny, an empire, stretching from Spain to Indonesia.[18] It preaches that Islam enjoins man to strive for social justice, the eradication of poverty and corruption, and political freedom to the extent allowed by the laws of Islam."
Golden Row - "Freedom does not mean hurt the sentiments of others ..." Oh yes it does. Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Ravi has not got a grip on this freedom thing yet. The reason for his discomfort? A crap joke by Jay Leno on the "The Tonight Show" that's what. The Telegraph tells us "India is to formally object to a joke by US TV host Jay Leno in which he said that the Golden Temple, the holiest shrine for Sikhs, was a summer home for wealthy presidential candidate Mitt Romney." This rib-tickler had an effect in the US too "Angry members of the Sikh community in the US circulated an online petition protesting the "derogatory depiction" of the Golden Temple, adding that "Jay Leno's racist comments need to be stopped right here". Racist? Firstly the joke wasn't about Sikhs per se - it's more likely the temple was just the most gaudily ornate building in the NBC picture library. Secondly, Sikhs are no more a race than Christians or dare it be said, Mormons. Sikhism is now a fully-fledged member of the "We are offended" club - assuming the Muslims will let them in of course. Update - Brits climb on the offended bandwagon. In The Breach - the sub-heading for a piece by Karen Armstrong in the Guardian is somewhat hard to swallow. "The hajj, subject of a new exhibition at the British Museum, shows that a respect for other faiths is central to Muslim tradition". This seems at odds with the reality in Pakistan and Malaysia for instance. Whenever Muslims in a country are in the majority then other religions are inevitably persecuted to some degree. One is reminded of a line from Hamlet "...it is a custom more honor'd in the breach than the observance." To say that Armstrong's article is inaccurate is no overstatement. The condescension Islam displays to the "people of the book" cited by Armstrong is merely a milder form of the slavery extended to other religions not claiming descent from Abraham. Treatment of other religions, of the book or not, has varied in a capricious fashion over the centuries and currently the highly intolerant pan of the balance is fully laden. The only way people of all faiths, including Islam, are treated fairly is to have a secular government, otherwise, as Christopher Hitchens said, religion poisons everything. (The above in a slightly different form was posted in the Guardian. Perhaps the best comments so far are those by grueneKatze and DavidPavett) Race To The Bottom - “Before we marry the guy next door, don’t you think we ought to have a fling with a tall, dark stranger and see if he can support us in the manner to which we’d like to be accustomed?” Richard Land, a top figure in the Southern Baptist Convention, explaining to NPR the choice of Santorum over Mitt Romney. Now that's a strange kind of imagery for a godfearin' man to use. See For the religious right, faith without works an optimistic op-ed by Dana Milbank in the Washington Post. ...And In Happy News - we learn that the Iranian government propaganda channel has fallen foul of the regulator "Ofcom has revoked the licence of Press TV after the regulator failed to be satisfied the channel’s licensee had sufficient control over the programmes broadcast. It follows a series of meetings and correspondence between regulator and broadcaster." Wait for the squeals of censorship from the likes of the ayatollah's shills George Galloway and Yvonne Ridley. According to BBC news "...the media regulator formed the impression that editorial decisions on the channel were being controlled by the offices in Tehran, instead of the UK." No shit. Wikipedia says of Press TV "Press TV is a 24-hour English language global news network owned by the state-owned media corporation Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting (IRIB). Its headquarters are located in Tehran, Iran."
Nadine's Nadir part d'oh - the
Guardian carried
this early today about a scheduled debate in the House of Commons on
a sexual abstinence bill that targets girls. "The bill, proposed by
Nadine Dorries, the Conservative MP for Mid Bedfordshire, would require
schools to offer extra sex education classes to girls aged 13 to 16 and
for these lessons to include advice on "the benefits of abstinence"."
There is a lot of nonsense talked about the benefits of abstinence -
there don't really seem to be any, except in the minds of right-wing
Christians like Nadine. See this
report (PDF) from June last year "The American Foundation for
AIDS Research (AMFAR) has issued a new report on abstinence-only sex
education that reviews all of the studies so far and concludes that such
programs are not only a waste of resources, they can actually diminish
the sexual health of those who undergo such training."
Mistake? - no, this actually
could be a good move. Yellon didn't sign on for what has transpired. The BBC
tells us
"The president of a London university atheist society has resigned
over a row about an image of the
*Prophet Muhammad.
The society at University College London (UCL) published an image on its
Facebook page showing "Jesus and Mo" having a drink at a bar." The
reason being "UCL's Atheist, Secularist and Humanist society said its
president Robbie Yellon was stepping down to be replaced by former vice
president Michael Thor. "Robbie stepped aside because he signed up as
president to organise events and run a student society," said Michael
Paynter, secretary for the National Federation of Atheist, Humanist and
Secular Student Societies. "He did not appreciate the stress he would be
under when dealing with a controversy like this, so he wanted to make
way for someone else." Although Christians are by no means unrepresented it is the followers of Islam, the religion of blame and resentment, who have most wholeheartedly embraced the "I am offended" culture as a means of shutting down debate on the more obnoxious aspects of their beliefs. The nonsense word Islamophobia with its connotations of racism is used in the same way to stifle dissent. (See here for the background to the UCL story. Also relevant is Islamist Fanatics Make The Case For Free Speech) It is deeply ironic that the group that triggered the Jesus and Mo fuss by their hypersensitivity, the Ahmadiyya Muslim Youth Association, are from an Islamic sect that is persecuted by other Muslims as heretical. 80 wrote about this in 2010 - see Unwelcome Baggage. A secular society protects their right to worship as they choose. They don't seem to have absorbed this idea. The Ahmadiyya sect also featured in Islam's Internecine Hatred paying for ads on busses that proclaimed "Muslims for loyalty, peace and freedom". It's a nice concept but Islam has a very long way to go on the peace and freedom side of things. * A minor point, but why does the BBC report say the "Prophet Muhammad"? It doesn't, as far as 80 knows, say the "Lord Jesus" or the "Lord Shiva". Such honorifics are for the devotees of a religion and have no place in reporting an item of news unless in a quotation. For one daft moment 80 thought the corporation was, perish the thought, currying favor. Another thought occurs - the BBC describes this as a row over an image of Muhammad - it isn't. It is an image of a character in a comic strip called Mo' and not the inventor of Islam. The author of the strip made this clear years ago. So there.
“Our weapons are the ironic mind against the
literal: the open mind against the credulous; the courageous pursuit of
truth against the fearful and abject forces who would set limits to
investigation (and who stupidly claim that we already have all the truth
we need). Perhaps above all, we affirm life over the cults of death and
human sacrifice and are afraid, not of inevitable death, but rather of a
human life that is cramped and distorted by the pathetic need to offer
mindless adulation, or the dismal belief that the laws of nature respond
to wailings and incantations.” Christopher Hitchens
Saucers And Triangles - the Daily Mail carries a report about a couple of UFO sightings in southern England. Apart from the "craft" looking thoroughly unconvincing they are very much old school in shape. How so? They are the standard "flying saucer shape" as promoted by George Adamski back in the 50s. There are, you may not be surprised to know, fashions in UFO shapes often dictated by the current crop of science fiction movies. Oddly enough the saucer shaped UFO is an exception to this. The first modern report of the things is down to Kenneth Arnold, a pilot, who actually said the objects he saw flying in formation were arrow or boomerang-shaped. It is likely the "flying saucer" moniker was coined by an imaginative newspaperman. "Arnold would later complain to famed CBS newsman Edward P. Murrow: “I said that they flew like they take a saucer and throw it across the water. Most of the newspapers misunderstood and misquoted that, too. They said that I said that they were saucer-like; I said that they flew in a saucer-like fashion.” Of late many UFOs have been of a triangular configuration, strongly reminiscent of real stealth aircraft - or Arnold's original sighting. (See Saucers Go Triangular) It is interesting to note that before heavier-than-aircraft people reported strange objects in the sky that looked like airships. Now the Daily Mail pictures bring us back to the "original" press-misconceived saucer shape. For more than you'll ever want to know about UFOs and how to photograph/fake them see here. Ian Ridpath's UFO skeptic pages are highly recommended especially his study of the Rendlesham Forest UFO case mentioned in the Mail article. Also look here for an painstakingly compiled database of UFO sightings from around the world. Update - see NASA Debunks Mysterious Triangular 'UFO'.
(Thanks to jesusandmo.net)
Islamist Fanatics
Make The Case For Free Speech - "This week I was due to give
a talk to students at Queen Mary College, London on sharia law and human
rights. Rather fittingly – and as if to prove my point - my human rights
were quashed by a person demonstrating one of the effects of sharia law;
the threat of violence for criticising religion." Ann Marie Waters,
of the One Law For All campaign in a
piece posted on the National Secular Society (NSS) web site. This is not some game - these people are despicable, dangerous, misogynist, racist, homophobic throwbacks who want the world to return to the middle ages - they have no place in a modern secular culture. They use the principle of free speech that they are so keen suppress in others to spread their primitive poison, often condoned by spineless authorities. The police need to be all over them like a rash. These religious fanatics are just as much fascists as any gang of neo-Nazis and need dealing with accordingly. The Telegraph carried this in June of last year "Theresa May told The Daily Telegraph that universities were not taking the issue of radicalisation seriously enough and that it was too easy for Muslim extremists to form groups on campuses “without anyone knowing”. Are things any better six months later? "The attempted intimidation that this society has experienced is shocking. Free expression, the free exchange of ideas and free debate are hallmarks of an open society; violence and the threat of violence should never be allowed to compromise that, especially in our universities. We will work to support our affiliate society at Queen Mary’s and look forward to a speedy police investigation and resolution of this case." Andrew Copson, Chief Executive of the British Humanist Association (BHA) Update - curiously the Independent is the only mainstream newspaper to cover the incident. We learn "Enquiries by Tower Hamlets police are ongoing. A Scotland Yard spokesperson said: “Police were called at approximately 19:00 on Monday 16 January to a building on Mile End Road following a report of a man being threatened by another man. Officers attended and the victim was spoken to.” This would be the same cops that dealt with the Tower Hamlets gay-free zone Islamist crap. They dealt with it by covering it up. It hardly instills confidence.
Sharia, Neither Needed Or Wanted - should you need a barrister it would be unwise to engage Sadakat Kadri. This gentleman seems to have a reality problem - the Guardian informs us "A leading barrister has called for the UK to become more sharia-literate, while arguing that Islamic law can be compatible with the toughest human rights legislation." A capricious, patriarchal, religious legal system that values women less than men is not only incompatible with human rights but also incompatible with democracy. How Kadri can say otherwise is a mystery. A civilized country should have one secular legal system which applies equally to all. He told the Guardian "...that so-called "sharia courts", such as the Muslim arbitration tribunal, could serve "the community as a whole" by putting Sharia on a transparent, public footing and should be more widely accessible to those who want to use them. It's very important that they be acknowledged and allowed to exist. So long as they're voluntary, which is crucial, it's in everyone's interests these things be transparent and publicly accessible. If you don't have open tribunals, they're going to happen anyway, but behind closed doors." To say such a system would be
voluntary assumes informed consent. A women, for example, who comes to
the UK in an arranged marriage, lives in a close-knit Muslim community
and has no command of the English language may not even be aware of the
British legal system. If her father, husband, uncles and imam tell her
to seek arbitration in a sharia court she effectively has no choice.
Also note the implied threat in the last sentence regarding sharia
tribunals "...they're going to happen anyway, but behind closed
doors." It is up to all of us to make sure this does not happen. Kadri's claim that "...that Islamic law can be compatible with the toughest human rights legislation." and "...that so-called "sharia courts", such as the Muslim arbitration tribunal, could serve "the community as a whole" by putting Sharia on a transparent, public footing and should be more widely accessible to those who want to use them." is laughable and should be greeted with the derision it so richly deserves. The current religious courts should be shut down - and that applies to any religion, not just Islam. It is already unacceptable that "...under the Arbitration Act 1996, the rulings of religious bodies, including the Muslim arbitration tribunal, already have legal force in disputes involving matters such as inheritance and divorce." Those two areas in particular are ones where women can be particularly vulnerable and under sharia they are not guaranteed equal treatment with men. This is a scandal, an affront to modern, secular society and is certainly contrary to human rights. No amount of self-serving waffle can obscure this fact. See Sharia Law in Britain: A Threat to One Law for All and Equal Rights. and Telling Sharia From Shinola. Update - the BBC tells us "The use of Sharia, or Islamic religious law, is growing in Britain, with thousands of Muslims using it to settle disputes each year, but women's groups and some others are objecting." Too bloody right they are. "Jesus and Mo cartoons are wonderfully funny and true. They could offend only those actively seeking to be offended – which says it all." Richard Dawkins commenting on the ridiculous attempt to censor a Jesus and Mo image. Update - see New Humanist for the latest. "While debate raged online, however, both the UCL union and the atheist society have been working to resolve the matter, and the ASHS have this morning announced that progress has been made, with the union agreeing that they can not ask the society to take down the image." (courtesy Jesus and Mo) The Naked Truth - it is a standard article of belief for many Muslims and virtually all of the Arab world that events worldwide are manipulated by the tentacles of evil Jewry as part of its goal of planetary hegemony. This tired old conspiracy theory trundles on and on, recycling debunked crap like The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, blood rituals and the like. It is therefore amusing that when those who really lust to have dominion over the planet clearly state their nefarious goal the Western media take no notice. A recent example is a speech by Mohammed el-Badi, leader of the Muslim Brotherhood, which was reported not in the New York Times or the Guardian, but on the Coptic Solidarity web site. The speech was in Arabic which
may explain why it passed the mainstream media by. It is a typical
example of the practise of saying one thing to the home audience and
something completely different to the infidels. There is no reason that
this ploy should work, as the press must have translators available.
Perhaps it is at odds with the spin applied by much of the media to the
so-called Arab Spring. Next time you hear or read about how moderate the
Muslim Brotherhood have become, remember the following. Race To The Bottom - just when you think the depressing spectacle of the sorry bunch of clods in the Republican presidential race could not be any more pathetic along comes this. "Newt Gingrich has launched a new political attack advertisement against his Republican rival Mitt Romney – accusing him of speaking French. The advertisement by Mr Gingrich tries to draw an unflattering parallel with another Massachusetts politician, John Kerry, the Democrat who lost to George W Bush in 2004. "The French Connection" paints Mr Romney as another tax-raising, moderate, elitist who will "say anything" to get elected – "anything". Over Parisian accordion music, it continues: "And just like John Kerry he speaks French too." Newt, actually not a contraction of Newton but an indication of brain size, somewhere between that of a salamander and an axolotl. (Talking of Republicans, see this for the depth of hatred for Obama from Kansas House Speaker Mike O’Neal. He "...had forwarded to House Republicans (an email) that referred to President Obama and a Bible verse that says “Let his days be few” and calls for his children to be without a father and his wife to be widowed.") Update - John Huntsman withdraws from race for Republican presidential nomination. He was severely handicapped compared with the other contenders by the possession of a functioning brain.
As God Said To Pat - The obnoxious Pat Robertson tells us that God has spoken to him, revealing the identity of the next president of the USA. Who is it? Robertson isn't saying. Then why mention it at all? He is in fact very coy in describing what he learned from his holy hotline. "I think He showed me about the next president, but I'm not supposed to talk about that so I'll leave you in the dark -- probably just as well -- but I think I know who it's gonna be." I think, I think - wasn't God very clear? Maybe he mumbles or Robertson's Hebrew is a might rusty. At this point it seems permissible to cry bullshit. Given his past abysmal record of prophesies his current reticence is understandable. One thing Robertson is sure of though and that is the solution to America's problems is prayer, or in 80's view, wishful thinking. He also said God told him "...the nation's downfall would be triggered by an economic collapse. He suggested that God told him this would come about if Obama was elected to another term." Oddly, this will not be the fault of the creator, the omnipotent, omnipresent, omniscient God, who is apparently powerless to stop such a calamity "And God said, this is not my judgment, they are bringing it upon themselves." So much for the little people being crushed by economic forces beyond their control - God doesn't give a shit about them - and neither does multi-millionaire Robertson. Also see Pat Robertson: A Failed Prophet. Also see Why religion matters in US politics.
Holy Filesharing - on January 5th a new religion
came into being in Sweden. "A "church" whose central tenet is the
right to file-share has been formally recognised by the Swedish
government. The
Church of Kopimism claims that "kopyacting" - sharing information
through copying - is akin to a religious service." says BBC news.
Basically this is one way of protecting illegal activity by giving it
the imprimatur absurdly accorded to religion the world over. This is
reminiscent of
groups that claim marijuana smoking is a sacrament and
therefore untouchable. We further learn "The church, which holds CTRL+C
and CTRL+V (shortcuts for copy and paste) as sacred symbols, does not
directly promote illegal file sharing, focusing instead on the open
distribution of knowledge to all." How very convenient. Petition - Hands off Jesus and Mo! "In response to complaints from a number of students, the University College London Union has insisted that the UCLU Atheist, Secularist & Humanist Society remove the following image from a Facebook event advertising a pub social. It has done so on the grounds that it may cause offence to Muslim students." Surely not? For the full story see this from New Humanist. "This is a gross infringement on its representatives' right to freedom of expression taken by members of the first secular university in England. All people are free to be offended by any image they view. This does not give them the right to impose their beliefs on others by censoring such images." To sign the petition click here or on the images above. Hot To Trot "No tongues, remember?" Jet Fuel (courtesy xkcd) Right To Surcease
- we
learn "The Commission on Assisted Dying, chaired by the former
lord chancellor Lord Falconer, says a choice to end their own lives
could be safely offered to some people with terminal illnesses, provided
stringent safeguards were observed." 80 has long supported the
campaigning group Dignity In
Dying. There is no reason why an adult facing painful terminal
illness should not only be able legally to take their own life, but
their relatives or friends who have helped bring peace not face
prosecution for murder or manslaughter. With the aforementioned
safeguards legislation permitting assisted suicide can only be a humane
step. As for the opposition, while they do not explicitly say so, the
main objectors to assisted dying do so on the grounds of their religious
belief and nothing else. Concerns about safeguards and the danger of
medical malpractice are nothing more than a smokescreen for their faith,
which tells them only their god can end a life. Never mind the agony for
the patient and his or her family, especially with conditions where
palliative care is insufficient. The idea that a loved one should endure
torment because of the irrational beliefs of others is little short of
obscene. What's That Smell? - the rank odor of anti-Semitism emanating from Revd Dr Stephen Sizer. See Harry's Place for the details of the clergyman who pals around with Islamists. His boss Bishop Christopher Hill should really do something about him - something other than just turning a blind eye to his unsavory connections and racism. "If Bishop Hill has seen nothing antisemitic in Sizer’s works, then he must have missed Sizer’s racist theory, that the US protects Gaddafi and lets him do evil, because of Gaddafi’s supposed Jewish blood. If indeed, Bishop Hill has seen nothing antisemitic in Sizer’s works, then he must have also missed Sizer’s racist theory, that US Secretary of State Hilary Clinton’s criticisms of Israel are based on her desire for revenge against Monica Lewinsky – the Jewish woman with whom Hilary’s husband Bill had an affair." So, not only racist but barking bloody mad to boot. Also see this damning article from Rev. Nick Howard, The Church of England must take action against Rev Stephen Sizer.
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