Articles

Yes, we should be questioning those who identify as Christian

If you missed it yesterday morning, Richard Dawkins appeared on the Today Programme on BBC Radio 4, alongside Giles Fraser.  I want to start by saying that I like and respect Giles Fraser, although I disagree with his religious beliefs.  In the same way, I like and respect my religious friends — but this doesn’t change my evaluation that their beliefs are categorically wrong.  I try not to deliberately offend anyone when taking about religion, but conversely, I’m not prepared to hold back on what I consider to be the truth.

The debate today concerned a survey, carried out by an independent agency in the week following the 2011 UK census.  The results suggested that the percentage of people who identify as Christian in the UK has fallen significantly since the previous census, down to just 54% — barely a majority, and certainly not enough to make any claims about this being a “Christian country”, never mind justify the inclusion of religious practices into public practices and governance. (more…)

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New court rulings expose Christians unaware of their privilege

If you’ve been following the news lately you might have seen the eagerly-awaited results of two court cases, both involving the role of religion in business and government.  Although small cases, it’s important to remember that the precedents set by cases like this can affect other cases in the future.  While both cases were a success for the secularist movement in the UK, the reaction by the Church, media and even politicians has been both enlightening and concerning.

The first case was one of two male partners who were turned away from a bed and breakfast, because the owners considered their homosexuality — and intent to share a bed — to be a sin.  Now, while the owners have every right to believe that, what they don’t have the right to do is apply that discrimination to their business.  In January 2011, a court found that they were liable and awarded damages appropriately.  They appealed and yesterday, the appeals court upheld the original ruling.  What was ultimately disappointing however was the näive and ignorant attitude expressed by the Christian Institute in its comments about the case: (more…)

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Corporations have no place in education

My friend Ivor alerted me to a scheme currently run by an American doughnut company, in collaboration with schools and community groups.  The scheme involves doughnuts being sold to the school or group at a discounted rate, which are then sold on, to the public or to pupils. While the scheme might sound like a good idea at first glance, there are some major negative points.

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What is God?

I recently came across an article, linked to by my friend Jason, that piqued my interest.  The whole article, Why I am an atheist, is well worth a read, but it was a statement at the end that drew my attention:

I could be converted to theism if… God, or a god, showed himself or performed an act that unambiguously proved both his existence and his attributes as an immortal, omnipotent being. As to what that proof would constitute: that god himself, if omnipotent, would be the perfect arbiter of what would conclusively prove to six billion people that he existed.

There’s several important points to consider here.  Firstly, just because human beings are not perfect beings does not mean they cannot evaluate some questions or problems perfectly.  Take tic-tac-toe (noughts and crosses) for example.  We know how to play the perfect game of tic-tac-toe.  I’m not talking about very good or even excellent, I’m talking about mathematically perfect.  It is possible to play a perfect game of tic-tac-toe so that one cannot lose — only draw, at the worst, if the opponent also plays the perfect game.  That doesn’t mean that every person on this planet knows the method to do so, but the potential is there.  What this illustrates is that in a game, or scenario, with finite parameters, one does not have to be perfect — only good enough.  Once that “good enough” is reached, being any better doesn’t help, right through expert to omnipotent. (more…)

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The Daily Mail’s portrayal of cannabis is textbook bad journalism

Generally speaking, I try not to get too hung up on the individual failings of articles in the right wing press.  I could spend from now until Christmas objectively criticising just one edition of the Express or Mail – and they are tame compared to their American counterparts.  Every so often however, they seem to lose the plot a little bit, drop their pseudo-moderate cover and output what can only be described as textbook, blatant propoganda, the likes of which Joseph Goebbels would be proud.  Every once in a while, the logical jumps made become so cavernous, that one is forced to consider the possibility that the Daily Mail is in fact a working proof of Poe’s Law; that their ranks are in fact filled with undercover liberals, pretending to hold conservative viewpoints, while deliberately presenting themselves as idiots, in order to discredit the conservative ideology.

Press editorial standards, including those supposedly upheld by the PPC, state that there should be a separation between news and opinion.  That means that the DM is free, within reason, to publish its racist, sexist, classist, homophobic, xenophobic, hysterical and illogical babble, so long is it is clearly portrayed as opinion.  It is also free, should it choose to make such a bold leap, to publish actual facts, about actual things, things that actually happened.  What it is not free to do, is to mix the two up.  Of course, this means that yesterday it went ahead and did exactly that, exploiting the death of a young man to push its anti-drugs message. (more…)

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Executive pay is just the symptom

Since the start of the financial crisis and the bank bailout, there has been a marked increase in public interest regarding executive pay.  It’s not that executives didn’t earn ridiculous salaries before then, but because we were in a boom time, the economy was something most people simply took for granted.  The only people asking questions back then were generally written off by the mainstream as “silly socialists who are jealous of success”.  We were all sucked into the American dream, that one day it might be us up there on the top floor, calling the shots and raking in the dough.  The fantasy was so lucid that even when we despised our bosses, we still dreamed of being in their shoes.  There was no question about whether people at the top should earn as much as they do.  With the crisis however, came the media attention on the banks, with both socialists and traditional conservatives demanding answers. (more…)

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Asda’s “Job Creation” should be met with scepticism

David Cameron has praised the announcement by Asda that it will be creating approximately five thousand new jobs, as part of an expansion drive this year.  The plans involve the opening of twenty-five new stores, three new depots and the refurbishment of existing stores.  The supermarket also announced that it would be allowing some of the new staff to work as part of City and Guilds apprenticeships.  According to Asda, half of its new employees in last year were young people, with a large number coming through the Job Centre.

Of course, all of the above sounds brilliant at face value.  It’s understandable why David Cameron is pleased by this; since his government came to power, their mantra has been to cull the public sector in the belief that the private sector would expand and create jobs.   It’s unsurprising that every time a private corporation creates a significant amount of jobs, he feels vindicated.  The problem with that is it leads to a lack of questioning.  When people believe they have been proved right, they don’t stop to ask whether that’s really the case.  Cameron, desperate to see growth in the private sector to prove him right, doesn’t stop to question the details when jobs are created. (more…)

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What ever happened to conviction?

Conviction.  Not of the criminal kind, but the act, the nature, of sticking to your beliefs.  What ever happened to it?

I may not be all that old, but I’m pretty sure there was a time when people had it – or at least, some people had it.  Yet it seems we’re at an all time low right now.   Looking at the commentary following the death of Steve Jobs a few days ago reminded me of how bad things really are.  People who I often agree with, who stand up and speak out for fair trade, localism, workers’ rights, environmentalism and against consumerism, mourning for the CEO of a company whose own actions are the complete opposite to all those ideals.  That isn’t to say that Apple are any worse than their competitors, but we don’t put their competitors on a pedestal.  People seem to think that it’s rebellious to leave Microsoft for Apple, which leaves me drowning in irony. (more…)

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Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

Life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.

The infamous words above, of course, from Macbeth.  I thought of these words in relation to the recent spate of protests, of the Occupy kind and otherwise.  Let me say first that I am greatly supportive of these protests.  I am also however, concerned. (more…)

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Trans-generational Mortgages in the UK?

Following my earlier comments on how we risk entering an age of neo-feudalism, I decided to investigate further the prospects of trans-generational mortgages; that is, mortgages that are taken out by one person and passed down to their children.

It has been the case for a long time that house prices have risen at a greater, almost exponential rate, in comparison to wages.  Prices rose particularly greatly between 1970 and 2000, but in the interests of projecting for tomorrow, I am going to focus on statistics for 2000 to today and project to 2025.  All of the historical figures used in this analysis come from the Office of National Statistics. (more…)

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