Not just culture: It's religion!

It is a fact of the world that there exists a diversity in cultural practices surrounding all sorts of human behaviour; from how food is prepared and shared, to dress styles and rites of passage and one of the pleasures of travelling, either in reality or vicariously via television documentaries is being exposed to this diversity. It is also true that, in the main, such diversity adds colour and richness to the world and for that reason alone is worth preserving, at least as long as the people practicing it want things that way.
However, not all cultural practices are so benign that they can be experienced or enjoyed with total equanimity.

I’ve been following Chinese chef Ken Hom’s Exploring China: A Culinary Adventure the latest episode of which saw him in Yunnan province, Southwest China sampling the food of the ”minorities”. In particular Ken and his co-traveller Ching-He Huang were attending a celebratory meal with the local Hui Muslims. This Chinese minority group follow the same dietary laws as Muslims the world over and appear to share their misogyny and patriarchal pretensions too.
Ching’s reaction to be being shuffled off to a separate party with the rest of the women was at first one of mild but obvious surprise and offence, but then in the voice over, she excuses it as “their culture”, and no further reference to the implied status of the women is made, either within the context of the meal, or in the direct to camera portions of the program.
Immediately prior to this Ken and Ching were witness to the Halal slaughter of a goat, to be roasted for the meal. In this ritual preparation of food the animal is blessed in the name of Allah, its jugular slit and so bled to death. Now, I am aware that the jury is still out on whether this is a more or less humane way to slaughter meat animals than the western preference for stunning first with a captive bolt. The scientific evidence is conflicted at best. However the program managed to gloss over the controversial aspects, mainly by making the process appear much quicker than it is and not showing the reflexive struggle that the dying animal always displays when killed this way.
When Ching comments to their host that in her culture the blood (which is Haraam according to Islam) would be soaked up with rice and eaten, she was responded to with a terse “No!”
Of course people can choose what they are prepared to eat, but the finality of their hosts reaction brooked of no further conversation on even the possibility that other culinary options existed.
The reason the program doesn’t question these cultural attitudes is because, well, it’s not just cultural: Its religious. Almost any other quirk of indigenous or local behaviour could be politely commented on and compared and contrasted with what obtained elsewhere in the world. One could even imagine having a civilised debate about which if any of such practices were ‘better’ however that was defined. But once culture and religion become conflated conversation stops and even comment is seen as inappropriate.
It’s bad enough when this stops us criticising sexual segregation, or debating the merits of animal rights. But religion provides cover for the most egregious of cultural practices and discrimination from denying women’s rights to education or franchise, to genital mutilation, forced marriage, violent exorcism of ‘possessed children’ and stonings.
In twenty-first century Britain we should not let program makers get away with portraying discrimination as quaint and culturally relative without at least passing comment on whether this should be appropriate to any culture anywhere today. And we should not be shy of exposing the role religion plays in perpetuating such violations of basic human rights.

Pussy Riot:Theocracy:Putin:America

I'm going to assume, in the interests of my sanity and some brevity, that I do not need to give a detailed backstory on the events that lead the russian punk band, Pussy Riot, into court on charges of hooliganism for a protest staged in Moscow's main cathedral against the Orthodox Church's support for Vladimir Putin.
Today Maria Alyokhina, Nadezhda Tolokonnikova, and Yekaterina Samutsevich were sentenced to two years in prison.
Now anyone with an ounce of sense knows the real reason why this totally inappropriate sentence for an act of mild disrespect of “sacred space” was handed down; it is entirely political and intended to show that criticism of Putin's new autocracy will not be tolerated. So far, so much real politique. But the true injustice here is the abuse of religious indignation for state purposes.
Pussy Riot have been sentenced (ostensibly) for offending the religious sensibilities of Russia's orthodox believers, which is absolutely not the role of any credible democratic government. But it highlights, vividly, why those countries that still manage to maintain a reasonably healthy distance between church and state should be vigorously encouraged to keep it that way.
As soon as a government has the ability to exploit the ultra – sensitive nerves of the religious community to suppress criticism of its own regime what you have is full blown theocracy. This is the lesson for those who would accept that “religious freedom” includes the ability to define what is or is not a suitable forum for dissent. Allow the government to support the “rights” of churches, and particularly established ones, to demand penal retribution for acts of “sacrilege” and you open the door to suppression of free speech.
This is the power catholicism craves in America and the Pope must be creaming his vestments at the thought of this verdict. This is the assumption of privilege that the Anglican Church whines endlessly about losing, and desperately longs to regain. This; this travesty of justice in the name of baseless offences against religious sentiment is what government endorsement of religion leads to. It makes a mockery of any idea of religious tolerance and provides a smokescreen for state suppression of freedom of speech and human rights.
O.K, this is Putin's Russia and why should we expect any better, but it could be here tomorrow and the weak link in our defences is religious privilege and undue respect for the trappings that accompany it; don't grant either if you value free speech.

The DofE responds on creationist academy

In this post on the approval of more faith based free schools I said

"The groups applying for Free School status are noticeably more evangelical in nature and are unlikely to confine their religious content to the appropriate places in the syllabus. This is especially true in the case of the proposed Exemplar Academy, a rehash of a bid originally made by the Everyday Champions Church that was, quite correctly, rejected by the DoE. So, why Michael Gove should think that a change of name and the removal of the explicit link with the chuch should have actually changed this group’s creationist agenda is beyond my comprehension"

Well it was obviously beyond the comprehension of the BHA too as they launched a letter writing campaign to Michael Gove, in which I happily participated.
Here is the reply received from his office (emphasis mine):

Thank you for your correspondence, addressed to the Secretary of State, expressing disagreement with his decision to support the Exemplar New Business Academy Free School project with its links to the Everyday Champions Church. I hope you will appreciate the Secretary of State for Education receives a vast amount of correspondence and is unable to reply to each one personally. It is for this reason I have been asked to reply.No Free School is allowed to teach creationism. The Free School application guidance published by the Department now specifically says creationism, intelligent design and similar ideas cannot be taught as valid scientific theories.

Furthermore, the funding agreements for all Free Schools state that divine creation should not be taught as an 'evidence-based view or theory' (a scientific theory) in any lesson: so if a school did do this they would be putting their funding at risk. We are confident that the Free School project you mention will follow the rules, having explored these questions robustly with them at interview.
Prior to entering into a funding agreement, the Academy Trust is required to carry out a consultation about their plans to open a Free School. Consultations can be run in a number of ways including surveys, the launch of a simple website, meetings of key individuals and open public meetings. Academy Trusts also need to demonstrate that they have considered the views of their stakeholders. Most do this by publishing a report setting out the key findings of their consultation.
Every application approved has had to demonstrate that the new school will provide a broad and balanced curriculum. Free Schools are subject to Ofsted inspections in the same way as all other state schools, and the government has powers to intervene in a school where there is significant cause for concern.
Please be assured that the Department will be working with the project mentioned over the coming months to ensure that the assurances they have provided us with are honoured.

The rhetoric is encouraging (it is at least a relief to know that the Department of Education understand what a scientific theory is) but they are being very naïve if they think the Exemplar Academy won’t make it very clear to students what they are expected to believe about the theory of evolution. It is very easy to discuss evolution in a biology class in a “this is what scientists think happened” sort of way and even turn out children who correctly answer questions like “What is the scientific explanation for the diversity of life?” But it is equally easy to have the topic discussed in R.E or during assembly in definitive biblical terms, without claiming divine creation to be an evidenced theory.
What Michael Gove and the DofE need to realise is that fundamentalist Christians are intrinsically dishonest; they may well keep to the letter of the law, but they will not honour its spirit. He is expecting this academy’s staff to teach scientific theories, with which they profoundly disagree, in an independent minded and dispassionate way: Not - a - chance.

Tony Blair and his futile ecumenicalism

The Telegraph has an interesting interview with former Labour Prime Minister Tony Blair. Since leaving political office he has converted to Catholicism, the religion of his wife Cherie, and set up his Faith Foundation which “aims to promote respect and understanding about the world's major religions and show how faith is a powerful force for good in the modern world.”

His personal approach is unrelentingly ecumenical and he seems to me to have an almost naïve expectation that dialogues between moderate representatives of different faiths can achieve a rapprochement that will stifle religious extremism.

Under the benign influence at Oxford of the Anglican priest Peter Thompson, young Tony came to believe that faith and reason could be reconciled. From this he concluded that different faiths, especially the ''Abrahamic’’ religions of Judaism, Christianity and Islam, could build on what they have in common. Now he reads the scriptures of other faiths, and finds his own enriched. In particular, he reads the Koran. ''I see the Koran very much as an outsider. It stands in the great prophetic tradition of trying to return people to the basic principles of spirituality. Taken for its time, it was an extraordinarily progressive declaration of principle. It is also extraordinary for a Christian to read: for example, there are more references to Mary than in the Gospels. The tragedy is that it has been so warped and misapplied.’’

The problem with this is that the people who don’t share his particular view of the Qu’ran presumeably won’t think their understanding is “warped and misapplied”, any more than Christian fundamentalists believe that their literal interpretations are incorrect.
The fault lines in religion are immense; the only thing they have in common is the belief that a supernatural entity is in ultimate control of the world and that they alone have the key to understanding the rules it wants us to live by. Unfortunately they don’t agree on the rules which is where the problem lies.
Blair has experienced this himself:

Mr Blair cites a meeting at the Davos Economic Forum a few years ago. There were representatives of four different faiths on the platform, each with what he calls ''an exclusive truth claim’’ for their religion. He asked them if they thought that only their faith led to salvation. ''It was interesting to see them reacting as politicians react. I spotted all the techniques of walking round it.’’

The fatal flaw with ecumenicalism is exacty this. No religion will give up its exclusive claim to the truth and none of these truth claims can be empirically verified to anybody’s satisfaction. It is impossible to settle the dispute and there is no middle ground, even for the most moderate of faith leaders.
This is not to say that individuals cannot concede that many paths to salvation may exist and indeed liberal interpretations are lived within many faiths. Blair himself is avowedly one of these:

As a Catholic convert, he ''accepts the doctrine of the Catholic Church’’, but ''I’m not a doctrinal ideologue’’. He feels ''no great revulsion, quite the opposite’’ for the Church of England, which he left. He became a Catholic because of his Catholic wife, Cherie, and their family: ''I didn’t really analyse a great deal. I just felt more at home there.’’

But he has thrown in his lot with an organisation that under Ratzinger has become, if anything, more doctrinal, more entrenched and more out of tune with liberal religious sentiment than ever. His personal support for gay marriage for example will not find favour in the Vatican any more than it has with the Anglican Church.

Faith leaders know that paying lip service to ecumenicalism is a requisite for keeping their positions of influence in civil and political society, but they must also be mindful that accepting too much liberal theology weakens the unique selling points of their individual faiths. The C of E is constantly wrestling with this very problem as its creeping concessions to liberalism lead it dangerously close to schism time and again.

Tony Blair has, correctly, identified religious fundamentalism as one of the biggest threats to global society and to give him credit he is using his skill and reputation to try to effect a change. But he is seeing religion through the eyes of a liberal believer and what he sees is not the picture I get looking from the outside. Religions may have some beliefs in common but they posses no truths, merely claims they cannot substantiate and high minded and high level discussions only serve to lend unwarranted credibility to those claims. Secularism, the only possible solution that values individual belief while protecting society from sectarian oppression would be a better goal for him to apply his energy and experience towards, but unfortunately he has fallen victim to the “straw Dawkins” argument:

he also believes that the anti-religion, Richard Dawkins crowd make everything worse. The extreme atheists ''require religious fundamentalists’’ to make their argument for them, so ''We must push back against aggressive secularism’’.

None of the new atheists to my knowledge argue entirely from the narrative of religious fundamentalism; secularism is not dependent on the actions of terrorists, as though they were a ‘necessary evil’ for the movement to exist. Secularists, Dawkins among them, see reason and verifiable data as the route to a fair and decent society. This is not calling for state imposed atheism, people of religious conviction can still argue for the kind of society they want, but religion itself cannot be the raison d’etre because Tony Blair’s ecumenical vision is unattainable, an ineffable carrot offered by religion to match their claims of salvation.

GLBTQ, Christian and in holy orders, why?

One of the things that never fail to amaze me is that some GLBTQ individuals not only subscribe to Christianity (and Islam), they also want to be ministers in the Church. But in order to do this they must adopt such an extremely liberal interpretation of Biblical teaching as to make their beliefs completely at odds with the institution they belong to.

Dr Jeffrey John, the Dean of St Albans is a case in point. An openly gay clergyman living in a celibate same sex relationship, who has been twice denied ordination as a Bishop due to his sexuality, believes that the Anglican Church is mistaken in its opposition to gay marriage and has even considered suing them for discrimination, he still obviously wants to represent an institution that cannot, doctrinally, represent him. Dr John says on the Out4Marriage website…

"If you are gay, please don’t judge God by the Church. “The official Church doesn’t speak with integrity on this issue and so, frankly, doesn’t deserve to be listened to […]. If you are gay, then please understand that God made you as you are, and loves you as you are, and if you invite him into your relationship, then of course he will bless you and sustain your love just as much as he blesses and sustains any other marriage.

This of course is the reasonable position; the attitude of the loving God liberal Christians would like to believe exists. It is not however the God of Abraham’s position either in the Old or New Testaments as is easily demonstrated. Liberal Christians will point to the new covenant as established by St Paul who says that Christians have no need to follow the old laws, although Jesus himself is supposed to have had other ideas. Even so, Paul himself condemns homosexual acts specifically in his letters to the Romans.

Of course I am not pointing this out to suggest that the bible is morally correct in this: quite the opposite. Dr John is morally streets ahead of the Bible and the Church he represents, but he is deluded if he thinks that the Christian God is on his side. Personally if I found myself working for an institution so fundamentally at odds with my worldview and lifestyle I would leave it. Setting aside that there is no rational reason to believe in deities of any description, why endorse a church that worships one as bigoted as Yahweh?

On polygraphs and paedophiles

I was interested to hear this snippet of news on the radio today. The government have apparently been conducting a trial in the Midlands involving subjecting convicted sex offenders out on licence to lie detector tests as a way of monitoring their ability to adhere to their licence conditions. The trial, independently assessed by the University of Kent, has been hailed a success because offenders subjected to the test admitted to twice the number of breaches than did controls given standard interviews only.
There are obviously a few ethical issues here, one being that when this scheme is rolled out nationwide and adopted as policy, what will happen to offenders who are deemed by the machine to be lying as polygraph tests are notoriously unreliable. Although claims by the manufactures say that they can be correct up to 95% of the time, independent studies suggest 65% (not a lot more than chance) is a more likely figure.
Part of this is due to the fact that the physiological traits measured by polygraphs (blood pressure, pulse, respiration, and skin conductivity) are only partially indicative of the assumed stress brought on by lying. They can be indicative of stress for other reasons (not least being falsely accused of lying) and they can be absent if the subject is a practiced liar, which sex offenders notoriously are.
Regardless, the results of the trial convincing as they are still require some explanation and I suspect that ignorance of the true efficacy of lie detection is at the root of it. Those subjects who were interviewed under the polygraph probably believed that they could be caught out in a lie and therefore were more forthcoming with the truth, whereas, the controls were almost certainly behaving as they normally would. Which is, from a law enforcement and risk control point of view, still a good argument for using the technique. I just wonder how long its efficacy will last if offenders ever realise that the risk of being caught out is minimal.
Assuming the government and the probation service are aware of the dangers of relying on polygraph evidence and reaonable checks and balances are in place to protect offenders who are genuinely reforming and adhering to their licence, I see no harm in this policy. But the rational that is being presented to the general public for its utility is I think spurious and probably intentionally so.

More religious Free Schools approved

http://www.humanism.org.uk/home

My fears about  Michael Gove’s Free Schools initiative are proving to have been justified. In the recent round of approvals for 2013, thirty-three new ‘faith’ schools, one of which is openly creationist’, and a Steiner school have been included.
It was inevitable that given the opportunity to have access to young people and to appropriate state funding to proselytise, religions of all stripes would take advantage of the system. The breakdown according to the BHA is as follows:

Church of England (8) Greek Orthodox (1): Christian (12): Including one creationist. Sikh (5): Jewish (3): Muslim (3): Multi-faith/spiritual (1):

This constitutes a full third of the schools approved in this round and can only serve to increase divisiveness in a generation that will need more than ever to be free of religious and racial intolerance. As a trend I find it extremely worrying especially as there seems to be no clarity on the extent to which such schools can discriminate on religious grounds in respect of admissions or recruitment.
It is extremely unlikely that these schools will be as religiously benign as existing faith schools that have been under the auspices of the state and OFSTED can appear to be. The groups applying for Free School status are noticeably more evangelical in nature and are unlikely to confine their religious content to the appropriate places in the syllabus. This is especially true in the case of the proposed Exemplar Academy, a rehash of a bid originally made by the Everyday Champions Church that was, quite correctly, rejected by the DoE. So, why Michael Gove should think that a change of name and the removal of the explicit link with the chuch should have actually changed this group’s creationist agenda is beyond my comprehension.
I suspect that a certain blind respect for faith is a work here and the government is not seeing the potential for damaging worldviews to be inflicted on the pupils at these schools. It should be sufficient that the parents and faith communities of our country’s children are able to bring them up in whatever tradition they feel is appropriate, without the state reinforcing those beliefs via an education system that should be secular and inclusive.
Children have a right to be exposed to ideas that contradict and conflict with those they hear at home and school is exactly the environment where that should happen. Faith schools cannot be relied upon to deliver impartial information, particularly in respect of evolution and, perhaps more seriously, gender equality issues and even with OFSTED oversight we will never be sure what bigotry they are being fed.