The “Right” To Offend

 Politics, Religion  No Responses »
Jan 172015
 

In the wake of the murders of the Charlie Hebdo journalists there is a continuation of the debate over free speech (and expression). Amongst those making a contribution are those who say things like “I believe in free speech, but …”.

As soon as someone sticks a “but” into a sentence like that, you begin to wonder if they are really in favour or not. Usually it turns out they are not.

And one of the points raised after the stereotypical “but” is the issue of offence. Which is a tricky area because who likes being offended? Or to be more precise, who likes their personal sacred cows to be offended? And perhaps that is the tipping point – if your intention is to offend someone or a group of people, perhaps you should re-consider.

But if you are intending to criticise someone’s beliefs – religious or otherwise – it is perfectly justifiable. And yes using humour to make fun of someone’s beliefs is just as much criticism as a long, tedious, and boring blog posting. Any offence caused is a byproduct of the criticism, so perhaps this blog posting should be “The right to criticise includes the right to offend.”.

And in most cases the criticism comes in response to offence caused – if you create a religion that requires human sacrifice, you can expect a Charlie Hebdo cartoon mocking your religion.

And all religions include ridiculous and offensive aspects. After all the depiction of a mythical sky-daddy and impugning the godless nature of the universe causes offence to atheists.

So if you want free expression like the cartoons of Charlie Hebdo banned because they are offensive, I’ll be asking for all those religious tomes like the bible and the koran to be banned because they are offensive – to me. Your rights as a believer in fairies, angels, and other imaginary and infectious friends do not trump my rights as an atheist. Just as my rights as a godless and amoral unbeliever do not trump your rights as a believer.

 

The Charlie Hebdo Killers Were Not Muslims

 General, Politics, Religion  No Responses »
Jan 102015
 

(Stolen from a Facebook posting)

Sounds daft doesn’t it? Because the killers themselves would have claimed they were doing it for islam. And of course there are plenty of feeble-minded bigots who are now attacking muslims and islamic places of worship.

Now don’t get me wrong: I have no patience with organised religion and think anyone who believes in an imaginary infectious friend in the sky needs their head examining. But they have a right to believe anything they want.

They just don’t have the right to inflict it on the rest of us.

Within any community (religious or otherwise), there are two sorts of people, and yes I’m being overly simplistic here. There are the majority who go along with the community and obey the dictates if they are not too inconvenient. And there are the zealots who take it to the extremes. And amongst the zealots there is a deranged minority who want to inflict the standards of their community on everyone. Some of them use violence to do so.

Now there was some idiot on the news today who claimed that despite Charlie Hebdo publishing a cartoon insulting to christians, that it wasn’t christians shooting journalists. True enough, but it there are christians murdering abortion doctors and harassing those entering abortion clinics, so it is not as if there are no christian terrorists.

Now comes a bit of a leap of faith: These terrorists whatever their faith, have more in common with each other than their co-religionists. They all espouse an extreme form of their faith, are compelled to inflict it on everyone, and resort to violence to pursue their goals.

Their most significant attribute is terrorism and not their religion. Their crimes overwhelm their faith and make their religion irrelevant.

An alternative way of looking at it is a quantitative approach. There were 3 killers involved in the attack on the offices of Charlie Hebdo and the kosher supermarket. The number of muslims in France is not known precisely, but a figure of about 3 million seems a reasonable approximation for this sort of calculation, which if you work it out makes the number of killers in this incident just 0.0001% of the muslim population of France.

So why were there only three killers? Because muslims as a whole are not terrorists.

Besides which, there is nothing we could do to annoy the killers more than to deny their islamic nature.

Special Treatment for Former Members of the Armed Services?

 General, Politics  No Responses »
Dec 212014
 

Yes.

But why? Apparently there is something special about serving in the armed forces – special enough for the mythical (it has no legal basis and so is in fact not a covenant at all) Military Covenant to be a popular phrase. And even a factor in determining government policy.

But why does someone who has served 20 years in the Army catering corp deserve more and/or better services than an NHS nurse who has “fought in the trenches” (including volunteering for work in the Ebola-stricken countries in West Africa)? And who is most likely to suffer from PTSD? A nurse up to his arms in blood and gore? Or an Army cook who is up to her arms in spuds?

And when you come down to it, anyone who suffers PTSD – even a banker who has smashed up his Ferrari – needs special treatment.

Perhaps those who have been in the armed services should be first in the queue for specialist treatments but those programmes should be open to all who need them.

And perhaps the “Military Covenant” should be extended into a “Public Services Covenant” to include those other public servants whose jobs put them in harm’s way – the police, fireman, ambulance drivers, nurses, etc.

Tories Misunderstand The Minimum Wage

 Politics  No Responses »
Oct 152014
 

In today’s news we learn that a Tory minister has apologised for being caught saying remarks which imply that the disabled are not worth paying the minimum wage. To be fair, it’s probably not just him – probably most privileged Tories have a basic misunderstanding of the word “minimum”. And are in dire need of a bit of basic remedial English remedial education.

As an aside, I’m going to use some words like “incompetent”, “lazy”, “useless”, etc. to refer to people but this is not intended to apply to disabled people. I’m making a point about the minimum wage and not about disabled people; most of whom I am sure are worth far more than the minimum wage.

The minimum wage is just that … a minimum. Which means that no matter how poor, any employee who is just about avoiding being fired is worth that wage. The minimum wage is not a full wage, it is a basic minimum that any employer should want to exceed.

Anybody who exceeds the minimum requirements for performing on a job – even if they are not “excellent” or even “good” deserves more than the minimum wage.

Let’s emphasise that: If you are a good worker and you are being paid the minimum wage then you are under paid. You are being ripped off.

On the subject of the disabled in the work place, perhaps we should be thinking of them as people with certain limitation – just like the rest of us. The overwhelming majority of people out there are not capable of doing my job as well as I can do it because of their limitations – limitations in experience and the ability to think in certain ways. I cannot think off the top of my head of a single physical limitation that would prevent someone doing my job.

Some disabled people may need “special” arrangements to be able to do my job – a special desk for wheelchair users for example. But so do I – I’m tall, so I need a taller desk than usual, and I need a special pair of glasses to read the computer screen for an extended duration. Where is the difference?

Spending a few hundred (or thousand) pounds to adapt a work place to the needs of the worker is hardly an excessive price to pay – it’s a tiny proportion of the cost of employing someone. And employers should be doing this for every worker – adapting the work place for the needs of each individual who works there will make them feel valued, will probably make them more productive, and is less likely to make disabled people feel uncomfortable about asking for their special needs.

We all have special needs.

Malala Yousafzai to Share Nobel Peace Prize?

 Politics  No Responses »
Oct 102014
 

I’ve not got a problem with Malala Yousafzai winning some sort of prize – she deserves to. But a peace prize?

Campaigning for women’s education is hardly likely to lead to peace – the neanderthals that oppose women’s education aren’t likely to take being opposed peacefully. And I’m aware that comparing Islamic fundamentalists to Neanderthals is vastly insulting. To the Neanderthals.

But Malala is saying something that needs saying. Espousing truth as it were.

The trouble is the title of the prize: The Nobel Peace Prize. It’s often awarded for actions that do not promote peace, but for more general humanitarian accomplishments. Perhaps it should be renamed to the Nobel Humanitarian Prize or even the Nobel Truth Prize?

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