The View from Number 80

January 29th 2009

No Mandate - Stephen Timms is a British Member of Parliament but he is hardly in tune with the public mood. In this piece in the Guardian he calls for more involvement of "faith communities" with the Labour government to help combat the myriad problems we all face. Quite why he thinks those with irrational beliefs have more to bring to the table than those unencumbered with faith is not, in 80's view, at all clear. As an example of his thinking look at this sentence, "Because faith communities believe in a better, more just world, they work towards it." Whereas those of us who are non-believers hope for a worse and unjust world? Such a statement is not only stupid but actually offensive. Other pearls of wisdom include "The faith communities have not always been seen as the natural allies of progressive politics." Damn' right they haven't. Progressive politics and dogmatic religion, particularly those faiths that espouse misogyny and homophobia (ie all the major ones) are natural enemies. Examples of faith communities involved in public service include those such as the Roman Catholics who have fought tooth and nail against having to comply with legislation mandating equal rights for all citizens - the "gay adoption row" being one recent example. Timms has obviously not read the survey, mentioned below, by the Government's Equality and Human Rights Commission which shows that 60 per cent of the population thinks that religion is the most divisive issue in Britain. The majority obviously want less involvement by godbotherers faith communities, not more. Perhaps the voters in Timms' constituency will bear in mind his call for more religion in government at the next election - and boot him out.

Poll shows religion is perceived to be the most divisive issue in Britain today -
A new poll for the Government's Equality and Human Rights Commission shows that 60 per cent of the population thinks that religion is the most divisive issue in Britain. This rises to 64 per cent among British Muslims.

Muslims were also least likely to be happy for their children to marry someone from a different religion. Only a third would be content, compared to 70 per cent of the general population, 65 per cent of black or African Caribbean and 65 per cent of non-Muslim Asians.

In general, Muslims were happier for a child to marry someone of a different race than religion. Some 61 per cent suggested they would be content with this. They were also more likely than the general population to agree that 'different communities should be free to develop along separate lines and should not be forced to integrate into British society'.

Dr Anna Behan, Vice-President of the National Secular Society, who has done much work on the government's equalities agenda, said: "This is an interesting insight into how religion is being perceived in this country. The resurgence of Islam and the Government's panic-stricken response to it has caused other religions to try to follow suit and become aggressive and demanding. What we have now is an assumption among religious leaders that they have a special place in society and are entitled to privileges."

Dr Behan commented: "No wonder religion has such a bad image – people are witness to religious conflict at every turn. Whether it's the terrible images of death and destruction in the Middle East or fighting over possession of a prayer room at the local hospital, the impression arises that religion is never happier than when it is at war. They see parents' scrapping over entitlement to education in 'faith schools' or young women being forced into marriage or murdered in 'honour' crimes – this completely overwhelms any positive impression that religion tries to promote."

Dr Behan said that the danger was that the ECHR would interpret these results as a need for even more religious education or more emphasis on religious demands. "What it really says is that people are tired of domineering religion. They want an emphasis on what we have in common, not what divides us. Constantly pandering to the bullying and threats of 'faith leaders' is counter-productive, and this poll proves it. It is time for religion – yes, even Islam – to be returned to the private sphere where it belongs. Only then will we be able to live in some kind of tolerant peace with each other."  Courtesy of Newsline produced by the National Secular Society.

"We are a nation of Christians and Muslims, Jews and Hindus – and non-believers." President Barack Obama's Inaugural Address

You Have Made My Shed A Den Of Prayers - here is some helpful, hard-headed, practical advice from the Church of England on how we can all cope in these worrying and straitened times. "You might like to create a space in your home to encourage quiet reflection and prayer. This could be: A corner of one room; an understairs cupboard (it has been tried!); a shelf; a corner of a shed or garage; or make a 'prayer den', using furniture and blankets! You might want to add objects, such as a piece of cloth, a cross, a candles, pictures of Jesus, postcards, or natural objects such as pebbles, shells or feathers." Thank heaven for such wise advice - 80 is off to convert the garden shed into a prayer den. Now where did I put those feathers?

Bad Faith Awards 2008 - do click on over to the New Humanist to find out the result of the competition. The contenders included Anne Coulter, Adnan Oktar AKA Harun Yahya, Sarah Palin and some other nonentities. The original nominations from PZ Myers, Robin Ince, Natalie Haynes, Johann Hari and other entities  are still available to hear in podcast form.

Vine Whine - Jeremy Vine is a presenter on BBC Radio 2, a lightweight and popular music channel. Today Vine is in the news for saying "...that he feels unable to talk about his faith on his show because he fears how people would react." Given that the usual British reaction to those who wear their religion on their sleeve is a mixture of embarrassment and boredom he is quite sensible to shut up and think of his ratings. We are told "He argues that society has become increasingly intolerant of the freedom to express religious views. "You can't express views that were common currency 30 or 40 years ago," he said." Which is a good thing - these days if he wants to tell people about his beliefs he shouldn't be surprised to be called on them. The days when religion was ringfenced from criticism are over and if Mr Vine wants an uncritical audience perhaps he should consider employment with a Christian station where he will be safe preaching to the choir. He is of course entitled to believe whatever he wants but this doesn't automatically allow him to use his position as a public broadcaster to promulgate his beliefs over the air. The description of Radio 2 on Wikipedia says it "...is one of the BBC's national radio stations and the most popular station in the UK. Much of its daytime playlist-based programming is best described as Adult Contemporary or AOR, although the station is also noted for its specialist broadcasting of other musical genres." The BBC already transmits an inordinate and apparently unwanted amount of religious programming on other channels - any further input from Jeremy Vine on Radio 2 is not required.

Trivial Telegraph - The Telegraph newspaper's apparently inexorable slide into the tabloid toilet continues apace. Read here an entirely uncritical report about a palm reader, one Lori Reid, who claims to be able to talk knowledgeably about the character and future of President-elect Obama based on things like the length of his fingers, "The middle section of his fingers are very long which shows he is a good manager - he has excellent psychology and listens to what people say, although he prefers to come to his own conclusions." The paper reports this nonsensical drivel without comment, as it does  the revelation that his long thumb " ...is stretchy and bendable, which reflects his flexible nature but when push comes to shove, this is a man who knows his own mind". The reporter, if the clod that wrote this rubbish can be described thus, doesn't even ask how Reid knows about the pliability of Obama's digits - had he consented to a reading? Has he had his palm subjected to palpation by this woman? It is hardly information that could be gleaned from photographs. (See here for more on palmistry)

The latest instance of the Telegraph's toiletward trajectory is this piece (unbelievably in the Finance section) on how city workers in London are "...turning to clairvoyants for guidance". Not once in the entire column is the reality of psychic powers doubted or even discussed. The only reference is in the sentence "Despite the sceptical way in which the industry is often perceived, many psychics believe they have an important role in a time of economic turmoil." Well they would say that, wouldn't they? The writer doesn't bother to ask any skeptics for their take on this, preferring to quote Jackie Towers, a clairvoyant and president of British Astrological and Psychic Society (BAPS). "People are scared. I have one client whose husband is on suicide watch. She doesn't know who to turn to for help. It's a difficult time for a lot of people and it's our job to put them at ease – to give them that bit of guidance or clarity that they are looking for." That this woman considers herself and her fellow psychics qualified to advise someone who is suicidal is very worrying indeed. In 80's view the fact (if it is indeed a fact) that "Bankers and accountants who used to put their faith in spreadsheets and complex formulas are now turning to clairvoyants for guidance." is a sad reflection on their intelligence. It may also go some way toward explaining why the financial world is in such a bloody mess. (See Fields of Fancy and A Little Thought for more evidence of the Telegraph's dumbing down)

CLAIRVOYANT, n. "A person, commonly a woman, who has the power of seeing that which is invisible to her patron, namely, that he is a blockhead."  Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary

Arrogance, Thy Name Is Ratzinger - if you believe that you are god's sole and, on occasion, infallible representative on Earth then a little arrogance is understandable. Pope Ratzinger has demonstrated this trait several times, the latest instance being the current Holocaust denial row involving a reinstated bishop. An earlier example of his apparent disregard for the negative impact of his words and actions was a quote he employed in a speech he gave at Regensburg University in 2006. The words belonged to 14th century Byzantine Emperor Manual II Paleologos who said that Muhammad, the founder of Islam, had brought the world only "evil and inhuman" things. Is it possible Ratzinger, supposedly an intelligent man, was unaware of the effect these words would have on modern day Muslims who, let's face it, already seem to spend an inordinate amount of time looking for offense? One thing that can be said about Ratzinger is that he is at least even-handed in those he chooses to slight because the next group in his sights was the Jews.

Very much a conservative even by Vatican standards Ratzinger obviously hankers after the days of papal temporal power and the old ways of doing things. This is demonstrated by his authorization of the Latin Tridentine Mass which was dropped "...as part of reforms instigated after the Second Vatican Council in the 1960s." The Tridentine missal's Good Friday liturgy contains a prayer "For the conversion of the Jews" which reads, according to BBC news "Let us pray also for the Jews, that the Lord our God may take the veil from their hearts and that they also may acknowledge our Lord Jesus Christ." It refers to their "blindness" and prays for them to be "delivered from their darkness."  This looks like nothing more than a deliberate insult. The Pope's authorization of the use of the rites is part of his wish to bring back into the fold clergy who left or were excommunicated for not complying with the somewhat liberal changes made after the Second Vatican Council. (It may also tell of his concern at a shortage of priestly recruits.) Lest you think it is just other faiths that Ratzinger is out to diss don't forget the recent fuss over his treating homosexuality as a threat to humankind on a par with worldwide environmental degradation and climate change.

So we come to the latest row which is about his reinstatement of members of the ultra-traditionalist Society of Saint Pius X (SSPX) namely four bishops one of whom, Bishop Richard Williamson, is a Holocaust denier. (He also believes the 9/11 attacks were an inside job, but that's another story). If Ratzinger has deliberately chosen to piss off as many Jews, religious and secular, as possible in one go he could hardly have done better than this. This Newsweek op-ed memorably described the SSPX as "...vocal enthusiasts of a medieval religious anti-Semitism that gives the Islamist imams in Pakistan some serious competition." When the shit hit the fan and the complaints rolled in from the Chief Rabbinate of Israel and others we are told Bishop Williamson apologized, not, mind you, to the Jews but to Ratzinger for having caused "...the Holy Father so much unnecessary distress and problems." The Pope has since "...condemned any denial of the Holocaust..." but the seeds have been planted that the current pontiff, like the members of SSPX, is an anti-semite. This pope, this humble man of god, has also accused President Barack Obama of "arrogance" for reversing a ban on US funding for family-planning groups which facilitate abortions overseas, often for women who have suffered rape, incest or medical emergencies. (The Vatican had already withdrawn funding to Amnesty over abortion in such cases) With regard to Obama perhaps Ratzinger should reflect on the words of his own, possibly mythical, godman "And why behold you the mote that is in your brother's eye, but consider not the beam that is in your own eye?".

Update - now comes the news that Ratzinger has promoted "...to the position of bishop an Austrian pastor who said Hurricane Katrina was God's punishment for homosexuality in New Orleans." This is the same nutter that condemned the Harry Potter books as "satanism". The big question now is what will wacky Ratzi do next? 80's money is on him elevating Hutton Gibson to a bishopric. Also see this from the Freethinker. Further Update - it now seems Ratzinger was ignorant of the views of the Holocaust denying bishop (yeah, right) and has asked him to recant. This may prove interesting.

Further Reading - Here is an interesting page from the SSPX American branch called Against the Sound Bites and subtitled "A listing of articles that refute modern errors and reinforce Catholic principles". These gems include "The Devolution of Evolution - Dr. Terry Jackson demonstrates how the theory of evolution is atheistic and has not been proven as fact", "Defense of the Inquisition" and "Are the Jews Guilty of Deicide?" Can we say barking? I rather think we can.

"I have as much authority as the Pope, I just don't have as many people who believe it." George Carlin, Brain Droppings

"At least two-thirds of our miseries spring from human stupidity, human malice, and those great motivators and justifiers of malice and stupidity, idealism, dogmatism and proselytising zeal on behalf of religious or political idols." Aldous Huxley

Wilders and Free Speech - 80 is no fan of Gert Wilders the right-wing Dutch politician who made the film Fitna which contended that Islam was a repressive and violent religion but he has every right to present his views. (see Alien Twins?) It was ironic that Live Leak, a web site that hosted the film in March last year had to withdraw it after threats were made to staff - no doubt by non-violent Islamists. Now Wilders is facing prosecution for exercising his right to free speech. BBC news tells us "A Dutch court has ordered prosecutors to put a right-wing politician on trial for making anti-Islamic statements. Freedom Party leader Geert Wilders made a controversial film last year equating Islam with violence and has likened the Koran to Adolf Hitler's Mein Kampf." The court has chosen to define Wilders' comments as "hate speech".

The BBC piece continues "The Amsterdam appeals court has ordered the prosecution of member of parliament Geert Wilders for inciting hatred and discrimination, based on comments by him in various media on Muslims and their beliefs." Do take a look at Fitna which can be seen here - if you don't think it is hate speech but fair comment please sign the petition here. This is yet another attempt by religionists to place their beliefs beyond criticism by stifling anyone who "offends" them, in this case by a threatened boycott of Dutch goods. In the UN repeated attempts have been made by Muslim countries to muzzle those who "defame" their religion. This unhealthy tendency is not confined to Islam with the Roman Catholic church keen to hop onto the bandwagon bleating about "Christianophobia". If any religious group wishes to be represented in the public square it must be prepared for the rough and tumble of free debate and robust criticism. As the old saying goes, if you can't stand the heat get out of the kitchen. Update - see Shame On The Netherlands on You Tube by the excellent Pat Condell, who points out just how serious this situation is. Also see this characteristically well-argued piece from Ophelia Benson on the limits to free speech and the right to insult.

Groundhog Day - One of the annoyances of debating religionists is that despite refutation of their assertions and/or arguments such assertions and/or arguments are offered again and again in almost monomaniacal fashion. Perhaps there is a point where the brain is full and incapable of digesting any new information - especially if that information contradicts a dearly-held belief. Every day is like the movie Groundhog Day. Here is a recent exasperating example from Simon Barnes, writing in the Times, "But what of the legions of self-trumpeting atheists? What of Richard Dawkins, who had the arrogance to write a fat book about God without troubling to read up on theology, a discipline that includes many writers as subtle-minded as himself?"  If Barnes imagines he has come up with something original he is sadly mistaken. This particular nonsensical objection crops up far too often and is little more than hot air.  Imagine that many people believe in the existence of a marvellous pink unicorn but can offer no objective evidence whatsoever for its existence, not one hoofprint, not one dropping, nothing. You would then feel free to discount the existence of such a beast and certainly feel no need to immerse yourself in unicorn lore with its endless debates regarding which side its mane is combed or the chirality of its horn. 80 is not sure how Barnes defines theology but it can be described as the study of the existence or characteristics of a god or gods which unlike, say, religious studies, is carried out from a personal perspective, ie the perspective of an adherent. If you are not convinced of the existence of a unicorn (or a deity) why waste your time immersing yourself in a field of study devoted to it? No unicorn, no point. (Also see what jesus and Mo' have to say on the matter)

Another annoyance is the repetition of what are, in the final analysis, lies, and what's more, lies that have been thoroughly discredited. An example of this is a piece posted in the comment section below an article in the Telegraph by Charles Moore called Charles Darwin wasn't an enemy of Christianity. Before addressing the comment it is worth mentioning that while Darwin personally was not an enemy of Christianity (he had too much love and respect for his devout wife) his theory of evolution by means of natural selection definitely is - if by Christianity you mean that strain which espouses biblical literalism. The comment, or more appropriately canard, in question was posted by one "Ollamh Fodhla", not once but twice. Unfortunately repeating a lie doesn't make it any truer than it was the first time, the lie being that Darwin recanted on his deathbed. The whole story gushingly recounted by Lady Hope of Northfield, England and quoted by "Fodhla" is a fabrication from start to finish, made even worse, if such a thing were possible, by being couched in a nauseatingly religiose tone. Minimal research reveals the story to be twaddle as the aforesaid Lady Hope was not present at the man's bedside, moreover she " ...never visited during any of Darwin's illnesses, ... Darwin probably never saw her at any time, and that he never recanted any of his scientific views." This information comes from Darwin's daughter Henrietta, who definitely was present.

This is far from the first time this recantation story has been aired and unfortunately it is unlikely to be the last. To cap it all "Fodhla" manages, in a subsequent post (which fails to address other commenters' refutation of the Hope fabrication) to come out with an oft-repeated objection to natural selection "...no scientist has ever OBSERVED one species change into another..". Note the use of capitals, an affectation of those who think that shouting makes their point better. "Fodhla" has obviously mastered the complexities of a computer well enough to post comments on a web page but apparently has yet to appreciate the huge amount of material available on the web detailing the evidence for speciation - including fossils that do indeed catch nature "in the act". A good starting point would be an item that appeared today, in which we learn how "Fossils from two early whales -- a male and a rare pregnant female -- shed light on how these ancestors to modern whales made the leap from walking on land to ruling the sea."

Look At Me, I'm Praying - anyone following the UK news will be aware of the story of the nurse, Caroline Petrie, who is facing a disciplinary hearing for offering to pray for a patient in her care. The patient, a woman in her 70s, declined and apparently reported the incident. Naturally the more rabid end of the press (in this case the Daily Mail) has reacted with apoplectic outrage claiming this is persecution of Christianity in "diverse" Britain and it wouldn't happen to a Muslim blah, blah, blah. More reasonably in the Telegraph Liz Hunt makes the point that Petrie overstepped the bounds of her job and offering to pray is no part of being a healthcare professional. Petrie herself has said "I became a Christian 10 years ago after my mother died. My faith got stronger and I realised God was doing amazing things in my life. I saw my patients suffering and as I believe in the power of prayer, I began asking them if they wanted me to pray for them. They are absolutely delighted."

In 80's view, however there is an important point that has not been addressed. If Petrie is convinced that her prayer helps patients why bother to ask them? Why not just pray for their wellbeing, quietly and humbly asking her god to help without calling attention to it? Surely her patients don't have to know for it to work? It would seem that there is more than an element of attention-seeking in Petrie's behavior. Look at me, see how caring I am.  If Petrie is such a devout Christian she should be familiar with this piece of advice from her godman Jesus - "And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you." (Matthew 6,5:6 if you were wondering. It's a pity TV evangelists seem to have skipped these verses as well.)

"The least welcome among the many gate-crashers at Darwin's birthday party are the philosophers. When it comes to God, I am an untheist rather than an atheist: I have no interest in the topic, particularly in its supposed overlap with science. Who cares about the wrangling of silly old men in frocks as they argue (often murderously) about who has the best dress designer? And when theologians try to explain what Darwin really thought, I roll my eyes in despair."  Steve Jones in a piece called (presumably not by him) Can we please forget about Charles Darwin?

Lawyers, Measles and Misinformation - The one thing that stands between the UK population and a measles epidemic is the level of people vaccinated against the disease within that population. Great damage has been done in the recent past by scaremongering about a hypothesized connection between the MMR vaccine and the onset of autism. This has now been discredited but the damage remains as many parents have avoided the MMR jab. Why would they want to endanger their own children and those of other people? The answer is they don't but lingering doubts about the safety of MMR have been kept alive by irresponsible and ignorant people with access to the media. One such is a presenter, Jeni Barnett on LBC 97.3, a London radio station.

Ben Goldacre, of the excellent Bad Science blog and Guardian column took exception to this woman's misinformation but made an error in going about it. He tells us "Two days ago I posted about a broadcast in which their presenter Jeni Barnett exemplified some of the most irresponsible, ill-informed, and ignorant anti-vaccination campaigning that I have ever heard on the public airwaves. This is important because it can cost lives, and you can read about the media’s MMR hoax here.To illustrate my grave concerns, I posted the relevant segment about MMR from her show, 44 minutes, which a reader kindly excerpted for me from the rest of the three hour programme. It is my view that Jeni Barnett torpedoes her reputation in that audio excerpt so effectively that little explanation is needed. LBC’s lawyers say that the clip I posted is a clear infringement of their copyright, that I must take it down immediately, that I must inform them when I have done so, and that they “reserve their rights”." Goldacre may now be in legal trouble but the internet is a marvellous thing - copies and transcripts of that portion of Barnett's show have popped up all over the place. Scroll down Goldacre's article to find myriad links so that you can judge for yourself whether Barnett is effectively abusing her position as a broadcaster. Or just Google "mmr scaremongering barnett".

For Barnett's take on the affair see her blog. It is obvious that the whole concept of evidence-based medicine is alien to her thinking "I find it interesting that the vitriol that comes out of the pro MMR lobby is precisely why *Allopathic medicine is struggling. Most of us who seek alternatives allow others their position but often the 'others' have a real problem allowing us ours. Doesn't change my mind though. The fact that I decided not to have my child jabbed was my decision alone. And it is a lonely decision. To be singled out and held totally responsible for a measles, mumps or rubella 'epidemic' is clearly ludicrous." The reason she has been "singled out" is that she has access to the airwaves to plug her opinions. The epidemic that she so carefully places in quote marks comes a step nearer every time someone does not have their child vaccinated. It is not a "lonely decision" in that her irresponsibility endagers not just her own child but untold others. Is she really comfortable with that? (*Vocabulary note - allopathic is word coined by Samuel Hahnemann, founder of homeopathy. It is a popular term for scientific evidence-based medicine - but only with those who espouse so-called Complementary and Alternative medicine (sCAM). It is not used in real medicine and its use is a sign that we have left the real world behind.)

Update - to the above item. This is from the Times "The doctor who sparked the scare over the safety of the MMR vaccine for children changed and misreported results in his research, creating the appearance of a possible link with autism, a Sunday Times investigation has found. Confidential medical documents and interviews with witnesses have established that Andrew Wakefield manipulated patients’ data, which triggered fears that the MMR triple vaccine to protect against measles, mumps and rubella was linked to the condition."  Also see here.

"I was not; I was; I am not; I care not."  Roman epitaph

Looking On The Bright Side - Sarfraz Manzoor does not care much for the message on the so-called Atheist (actually agnostic) Bus. He is having an understandably difficult time as he comes to terms with intimations of his own mortality following the death of his uncle. He also blames another factor for his current depression saying, "This is not only because of the death of my uncle but also because of the intensely irritating posters I keep seeing on London buses that suggest that since there probably isn't a God I should stop worrying and start enjoying my life. There are few things less likely to cheer one up than musing on the fragility and finality of life so I am a loss as to why this not something to worry about. It is one thing to accept that there probably isn't a God – a view I can completely understand – and another to demand that one stop worrying and celebrate this. What on earth is there to celebrate? We're talking about death, about not existing, being wiped out for ever. And it can happen any time. If that's not a cause for worry what is?"  Fortunately there are some things he should consider that may improve his mood. Firstly, no living creature has ever escaped death so worrying about it is counterproductive and wastes the limited time we all have. (In fact it is the death of earlier generations that has allowed him his time in the sun.) Secondly, if there isn't a god of the judgmental, vindictive kind that Christians and Muslims imagine, Manzoor (and the rest of us) will not have to spend an eternity in torment for trangressing some ridiculous rules written down centuries ago  by superstitious tribalists. Just think, he doesn't have to live with the thought of constant divine surveillance - he can just be good for goodness' sake and not because he seeks a reward or wishes to avoid punishment. He can be proud of being in charge instead of in thrall.

Manzoor goes on to say, "Maybe the atheists are right and this life is all there is, but given a choice between believing that there is something else and thinking there is nothing else I would plump for the hope that there is more." So this humongous, incredible, complex, beautiful, gobsmacking universe isn't enough for him? There's no pleasing some people. As Douglas Adams put it "Isn't it enough to see that a garden is beautiful without having to believe that there are fairies at the bottom of it too?" It is obvious, at least in his present mood, that Manzoor is not keen on what he terms "militant atheism" but one individual who is often accused of this stance, Richard Dawkins, has something to say which 80 finds more uplifting than any amount of religious mumbo-jumbo. "We are going to die and that makes us the lucky ones. Most people are never going to die because they're never going to be born. The potential people who could have been here in my place, but who will, in fact, never see the light of day, outnumber the sand grains of Sahara. ...In the face of these stupefying odds, it is you and I, in our ordinariness, that are here. Here's another respect in which we are lucky. The universe is older than a hundred million centuries. Within a comparable time, the sun will swell to a red giant and engulf the earth. Every century of hundreds of millions has been in its time, or will be when its time comes, the present century. The present moves from the past to the future like a tiny spotlight inching its way along a gigantic ruler of time. Everything behind the spotlight is in darkness, the darkness of the dead past. Everything ahead of the spotlight is in the darkness of the unknown future. The odds of your century being the one in the spotlight are the same as the odds that a penny, tossed down at random, will land on a particular ant crawling somewhere on the road from New York to San Francisco. You are lucky to be alive and so am I."

Wrong Move, Wrong Message - 80, as has been said before on this page, is no fan of Gert Wilders but the British authorities are wrong to have turned him back at Heathrow Airport for several reasons. Wilders, a right-wing Dutch politician known for his criticism of Islam and for comparing the Quran to Mein Kampf, thrives on the attention he has received. He was due to show his film "Fitna" at the House of Lords today but is now back in the Netherlands. Had he been admitted he would likely have received a fraction of the publicity he is now enjoying - and enjoying is the right word here. All the British authorities have done is give Wilders a greater platform for his views. Wilders was sent a letter by the Home Office informing him that his presence in the UK "...would pose a genuine, present and significantly serious threat to one of the fundamental interests of society. The secretary of state is satisfied that your statements about Muslims and their beliefs, as expressed in the film and elsewhere, would threaten community harmony and therefore public safety in the UK."  Which, in 80's view, sounds like "We cannot let into Britain the maker of a film that accuses Muslims of being violent because of the threat of...um...of Muslims being violent if we do."

So, while Wilders himself has made no threats of violence he has been banned because the government seems to think that Muslims may react with violence and disorder to his presence. Banning him because of the threat of a threat of actions by others sets a very bad precedent and is craven. To ban an elected politician from a fellow EU country for exercising his right to free speech also sends a wrong signal to other governments in the union. The Dutch foreign minister has justifiably said he will press for a reversal of the ban. The British government has played into the hands of those who wish to criminalize the criticism of Islam. All in all this is a pretty stupid and ill-informed response to a freedom of speech issue from the Brown government. The Home Office said its actions would "...stop those who want to spread extremism, hatred and violent messages in our communities from coming to our country". Instead of banning elected politicians from other countries in the EU the Home Office should begin at home - there is no shortage of those within the UK who "..who want to spread extremism, hatred and violent messages in our communities...." (Also see Whatever happened to free speech? by Philip Johnstone. For Pat Condell's response to this sorry business see Freedom Go To Hell - an impassioned clarion call to defend freedom of speech)

"Offending fundamentalists isn't my goal -- but if it is an inevitable side-effect of defending human rights, so be it. If fanatics who believe Muslim women should be imprisoned in their homes and gay people should be killed are insulted by my arguments, I don't resile from it. Nothing worth saying is inoffensive to everyone."  Johann Hari, writing in the Independent

Freedom To Criticize Religion - is under attack all around the world, with cries of Islamophobia and Christianophobia from those keen to jump on the bandwagon of the offended. A recent and very worrying example comes from Calcutta, India where the "...editor and publisher of a top English-language Indian daily have been arrested on charges of "hurting the religious feelings" of Muslims." They committed the heinous crime of reprinting a piece from the Independent newspaper by Johann Hari, entitled Why should I respect these oppressive religions? which takes as a starting point the effort by Muslim countries to undermine the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, a move designed to stifle any attempt to criticize Islam. You cannot demand respect for religious beliefs. The only way to win respect of any kind is to earn it and this is not achieved not by gagging critics or threatening violence. (Even then respect for supernatural beliefs is beyond 80's capacity - especially if those beliefs are used to justify all manner of cruelty and oppression, which they so often are.)

Hari has responded to the dismaying events in Calcutta with an excellent piece called Despite the Riots and Threats, I Stand By What I Wrote. A stand has to be made and religion, like any other human ideology, must be subjected to scrutiny, criticism and where appropriate, condemnation. A BBC report notes that "Angry Muslims have been demonstrating in front of the offices of the Statesman since its republication of the article." If these individuals want a target for their outrage instead of attacking  journalists and their words they should look at real life violence perpetrated by Muslims on Muslims - such as this recent disgusting atrocity in Iraq where "A female suicide bomber killed more than 30 people and wounded 84 others south of Baghdad this morning when she blew herself up on a major Shi’ite religious pilgrimage route."  What is a little disrepect compared to that?

"We must respect the other fellow's religion, but only in the sense and to the extent that we respect his theory that his wife is beautiful and his children smart." H L Mencken

Secularist of the Year - The National Secular Society’s annual award for Secularist of the Year has been awarded jointly to Dr Evan Harris MP and Lord Avebury for their success in getting blasphemy laws abolished. The prestigious prize was handed over by Professor Richard Dawkins at a glittering awards ceremony at the Imperial Hotel in central London on Saturday. Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society (NSS), said: “The abolition of the blasphemy law in 2008 was a major coup for the NSS and a great victory for everyone who values free speech. The ancient laws had not been used successfully since the 1970s, but there were efforts by Christian evangelicals to revive them, and a case was being considered even as the law was abolished.”  See the rest of the report at the NSS web site.

Does the principle of the sanctity of life, whether or not it is enshrined in law, have such moral force as to override all considerations of compassion or common sense? No one in Italy or England or in any part of the civilised world would deny that human life is of enormous value - but there is no human life unless it is lived by somebody. It is not some abstract stuff called Life that we value, but the people who live and enjoy it. Life is nothing but in its being lived. When there is no hope of a patient's living his life any more, then other values must be weighed against the value of that life, including the suffering of his relatives." Mary Warnock writing in the Guardian on the disgusting tug of war between Berlusconi and Ratzinger (a marriage made in hell if ever there was one) and the relatives of Eluana Englaro over the right to end her "life". Also read here her father's story.

True Lies - here is an interesting and amusing piece on the various stories told about the origin of Valentine's Day - an event the celebration of which, going by 80's local store, begins immediately after Christmas and runs until February 14th. One explanation inexplicably missing from the list is brought to our attention by the Landover Baptist Church in The Satanic Origins of St. Valentine's Day.

Faith Kills? - there is an interesting piece in the Washington Post on the results of a new state by state Gallup poll that asked "Is religion an important part of your daily life?" The article is headlined To Feel the Spirit, Poll Says Go South for the opening paragraph tells us "Want to be almost certain you'll have religious neighbors? Move to Mississippi. Prefer to be in the least religious state? Venture to Vermont." 80 thought it better when considering such a move to compare the states' murder rates per 100,000 people. In 2007 Mississippi clocked up a figure of 7.1 - an improvement on the previous year, which was 7.7. The folk in Vermont may be less religious but they are certainly less murderous. In 2007 their rate was 1.9, the same as it was in the previous year. Now 80 fully realizes that correlation does not necessary imply causation and other factors are involved but it does give one something to think about, doesn't it?

Another Minor Rant - time for a whirlwind trip around the whacky world of religion. First up, in the Times, are the latest thoughts on the subject of Hell from those giant intellects in the Vatican. It seems that one Monsignor Wojciech Giertych, Ratzinger's personal theologian no less, has decided there is no sexual equality when it comes to sin. In a way this is no surprise as the Roman Catholic death cult church obviously doesn't believe in sexual equality in any other sphere either but, we are told, "..men are most likely to commit lustful sins whereas women are beholden to pride." This dichotomy  apparently dictates the kind of perpetual torment inflicted on them by a loving god. As the Times puts it "The men, it seems, are the ones whose souls end up being pelted with fire and brimstone, while the women's souls are more likely to be broken on a wheel."

It seems that a Jesuit priest called Roberto Busa, the nearest thing the Vatican has to a geek (he is, we are told, celebrated (not by 80) for his computerised study of the works of St Thomas Aquinas) has carried out an analysis of confessional data, which must have made for some pretty steamy reading for the 96 year-old celibate cleric. This "research" has enabled Giertych to compile a hit parade of sins for men and women, although whether these include the new ones recently introduced by Ratzinger we are not told. Meanwhile Bishop Gianfranco Girotti, of the Apostolic Penitentiary, (these people really are still in the Middle Ages) has chimed in that "...that two mortal sins which continued to preoccupy the Vatican were abortion and paedophilia." The Vatican and its minions can certainly lay claim to expertise on the latter ...

From the Roman Catholic church to its estranged offspring, the Church of England and the Archbishop of York, John Sentamu, an individual who typifies the unthinking arrogance of many religionists. His latest attempt to grab some exposure is his revelation that "Churchgoers are now "counter-cultural" because their values are so opposed to prevailing behaviour..." He is certainly right in that regard as most people have something better to do on a Sunday morning - but then he loses the plot. He assumes that his fellow religionists are more moral than the rest of us - a claim often made by these holier-than-thou types. Apparently the fear of Big Brother peering over their shoulder makes Christians kinder and more compassionate. The rest of us can choose to behave like that just because it is a good thing - with no need of the carrot of heaven or the stick of hell.

The writer of this Telegraph piece, Martin Beckford, then goes on a little tour of recent instances where Christians were "persecuted" such as the exhibitionist praying nurse, a primary school receptionist who whined about it when her child, at the tender age of 5, was admonished for telling a schoolmate that if you don't believe in Jesus you will go to hell, the registrar who wouldn't do her job, and the relationship counsellor who was sacked for not keeping homophobic bigotry out of his work. Sentamu says he wants Christians to bring their faith to work - apparently even when it is inappropriate and contravenes the terms of employment. He says "We bring to the table a particular perspective – the vision of justice and righteousness that comes from a creative and generous God. It is not as if we are the only ethically minded people on the block – far from it. But what we are called to in Christ often asks of us more, and beckons us to a bigger vision." This would be the same creative and generous god that condemns people to everlasting torment for infractions of his arbitrary religious code. At least Sentamu actually concedes that others can be ethically-minded - although they are, of course, not as good as those that have a "bigger vision" of a supernatural godman.

Finally, religionists are shit-stirring in the local library over the location of so-called "holy books". No, sadly the librarians haven't put them where they belong, in the fiction section. It seems some people must get up in the morning and think to themselves "Mmm, what shall I be offended by today?" In this case it is where the Quran is shelved in the library. The Telegraph tells us "Muslims have complained that the Koran is often displayed on the lower shelves, which is deemed offensive as many believe the holy book should be placed above "commonplace things"." The first reaction to such a statement is to ask which Muslims - they can't all be complaining surely? The article enlightens us - it seems the The Museums, Libraries and Archives Council, a quango within the remit of Culture Secretary Andy Burnham, has said that "... Muslims in Leicester had moved copies of the Koran to the top shelves of libraries, because they believe it is an insult to display it in a low position." So, instead of informing these people that library books are filed according to a well-established system so that everybody can access them these bureaucratic clowns of the Museums, Libraries and Archives Council have issued guidance that all religious texts should be kept on the top shelf.

80 at first thought this was analogous to the newsagents' practice of putting soft-porn mags on the top shelf so that children will not be corrupted - after all, religious texts can poison a young mind much more insidiously than a few smutty pictures (think of the primary school receptionist's 5 year-old daughter talking of hell - a place of perpetual and unbearably cruel torture) - but sadly this is not the case. It would seem the "commonplace things" referred to earlier include any religious text other than the Quran, as is made clear by the guidelines that all such texts should be placed on a top shelf "This meant that no offence is caused, as the scriptures of all the major faiths are given respect in this way, but none is higher than any other."  This is unbelievable - officials, whose wages are paid by taxpayers are wasting their time on distributing idiotic guidance in order to indulge some childish, pathetic idea of religious one-upmanship. Will all of these religionists, Christian, Muslim, Jedi and whatever superstition happens to be the flavor of the moment please keep their beliefs, prejudices and incessant bloody whining to themselves, so the rest of us can get on with our lives? Thank you so bloody much.

Genies and Bottles - the action of the Pakistani government in appeasing the jihadis of Malakand is worrying for many reasons, for the rest of the population and the wider world. Peace bought by capitulation is no peace at all. Implementation of barbaric sharia law is ghastly news for women who are considered of less worth than men under that system. Handing over the law to these misogynist primitives means an end to the education of girls. Some liberal folk in the West will say what's the big deal? The people want this system and it is an internal cultural matter for Pakistan. The problem is that once the government allows such a system in one area, can it stop it spreading? When other Taliban/jihadis see that violence brings concessions what's to stop them trying the same thing? Absolutely nothing. As for such things remaining internal, Pakistan has long been a haven for fighters from Afghanistan and its many madrassas and training camps are busy turning out the next generation of Islamist would-be murderers who will find havoc to wreak elsewhere. It is also a fact that Pakistan is a state with nuclear weapons - the idea of any of these religious maniacs having access to such weaponry is the stuff of nightmares.

If that isn't worrying enough there is an even more insidious threat from handing the administration of law to these people. They are against immunisation of children against disease, believing such humanitarian measures to be an American/Zionist plot to render them sterile. Pakistan's record in immunization programs has been good but it doesn't take much imagination to see areas such as Malakind becoming breeding grounds for epidemics* and plagues which, in a world that is now highly interconnected, will be able to spread far and wide. The other people of the planet simply cannot afford to co-exist with places that are still living in the middle ages with all the cruelty and disease that implies. Pakistan is already responsible for a nuclear plague spread by Abdul Qadeer Khan, who is viewed by many as a national hero. Soon it will be exporting death not just in the form of jihadists but also by disease. If ever a single country was a danger to everyone on the planet, Pakistan is certainly shaping up for the role. What can be done to keep the genie in its bottle? The many educated and cultured people in that country must be in despair watching their government make such a tragic error. *(The UK's recent performance is nothing to be proud of either) Update - see this piece by Kapil Komireddi which argues "It is dangerously delusional for the west to go on pretending the nuclear weapons in this imploding nation are perfectly safe". From Marie Cocco, writing in Truthdig comes Good News For The Taliban - "We seem to have spent our way—to the tune of $864 billion—into allowing our friends the Pakistanis to enter into a peace treaty, or something that looks like it, with the Taliban."

Loons for the Lord - it is possible that the UK is to have a visitation from the barking mad zealots of the Westboro Baptist Church. They are the ones that like to picket soldiers' funerals claiming "god hates fags" and is punishing the USA for tolerating gays. The Telegraph informs us that they "...have threatened to picket a sixth form college in Basingstoke, Hampshire during a staging of The Laramie Project, a play about an American youth murdered because of his sexuality." It seems an awfully long way to come - but then of course the vigilant UK authorities won't let them in because of the  threat to community cohesion. Oh, wait, that only applies to elected Dutch politicians who denounce violent Islam. The core of the Westboro whackos is the deeply unpleasant Phelps family. The Telegraph has published some correspondence with one of these loons, Shirley Phelps-Roper, about the threatened UK visit and it confirms what bitter, ignorant and twisted folk they are.

80 wonders if they will try and link up with Stephen Green of Christian Voice as they seem to have a lot in common, although perhaps even he might balk at the reference to "...your goofy queen and her adulterous whore of a son." It seems that we are in the very last days when Phelps-Roper and her fellow zealots will caper with glee as their loving god spreads death and destruction. Her hate-filled drivel is impossible to parody so here is some of the real thing "The antichrist is sitting now, in the Whitehouse, the time is SO SHORT - the Lord is coming and this generation is DOOMED! You see the destruction already before your eyes! As filthy america goes down, and The Beast Obama, That Son of Perdition, that Man of Sin gets his power grab on, you will all give over the power of your government to him and when you see that phony façade fall away, and he gets his war on and all your fawning over him turns to great fear, then you can remember these words." Imagine the nightmare for anyone unfortunate enough to be seated next to this deranged harpy on the flight over...  Update - It seems that Fred Phelps and his repulsive brood would not be allowed into Britain. Let them in - they can only make utter fools of themselves.

The Faith Of Britain - as you can see above March 7th is an important day for those who do not wish for religion to influence legislation. There is another event happening the day before, March 6th, that is of no relevance whatsoever except to those of us who marvel at human gullibility. Faith of Britain claims that "...together we can achieve anything". In this instance FoB are trying to focus "...all of the positive energy in the country towards achieving our hopes and aspirations." Ah, how nice, the power of wishful thinking. How are they going to do this? "For exactly two minutes on March 6th at 11.00am our consortium of psychics and healers will act as a channel for the positive thoughts of the entire country." Brilliant, a coalition of nutters no doubt fired by the incredible success of Yogic Flyers at reducing crime.

But why March 6th? "Numerologically this date is symbolic because the 3rd month, the 6th day and the 9th year are all multiples of 3 which is about balance - which is what we strive to achieve as humans. The time, 11.00am is a master number, or a powerful 2 (1 + 1) which is the duality of the inner and outer self, encouraging us to look within to find solutions." Oh great, numerology as well as psychics. Naturally the date is equally propitious using calendars other than the Gregorian one (only kidding). Unsurprisingly the explanation given as to why this farrago of nonsense is going to work is, not to put too fine a point on it, more nonsense, "It is a proven scientific fact that thinking about something often causes it to happen. Some call this quantum physics. Others simply call it "faith..." Still others call it bollocks. Poor old quantum physics, it has become the phrase of choice to give a false cloak of scientific respectability to outright silliness from crap like What The (Bleep) Do We Know to the no doubt well-intentioned but gullible and ignorant people behind Faith of Britain. Will they wake up on the morning of March 7th to disappointment? Probably not, they will find an excuse for failure. But if they want to do something actually useful in the real world they could still go along and bodily support the One Law For All Rally - remote viewing doesn't count.

£600,000 of public money for religious groups - In response to a parliamentary question, the Government revealed that it will give £600,000 to "faith groups" in 2009–10 for activities and websites that promote "understanding and dialogue". The total amount available for the "Faiths in Action" fund over the next few years is £4 million.

Terry Sanderson, president of the National Secular Society, said: "It seems the Government is happy to shell out £4 million of taxpayers' money to try to stop 'faith groups' arguing and fighting with each other. Did anybody ask us whether we wanted our hard-earned and increasingly scarce money spent in such a way?"

But that's not the end of the millions Government is investing to try to stop "faiths" fighting. When asked what steps the Government were taking to increase understanding between religions, the MP Sadiq Khan, Under-Secretary of State in the Department of Communities and Local Government replied:

"In 2007 we announced a renewed commitment to community cohesion with a £50 million investment over three years and a new public service agreement to build cohesive, active and empowered communities. We continue to support local authorities in delivering improvements in cohesion by providing a framework of guidance and targeted local support.

"In addition in July 2008 we published the Inter Faith framework which aims to facilitate inter faith dialogue, thus building understanding and celebrating the values held in common by the different faith communities, such as integrity in public life, care, compassion and respect. The framework, which is supported by a funding commitment of over £7.5 million, is also intended to increase the level of collaborative social action involving different faith communities and wider civil society, so that people work together to bring about positive and concrete change within their local communities. Finally, it aims to maintain and further develop good relations between faith communities and wider civil society."

Anyone who claims we live in a secular society in Britain obviously has no idea of the true amounts of money that the Government is shovelling into the pockets of religious groups – some of which are extremely dubious. (The above piece is from Newsline, a free weekly email newsletter from the National Secular Society. You can subscribe here and join the NSS here.) 

Belief Map - the Guardian has produced an interactive "belief map" of the UK which you can mouseover parts of the country to find out the percentage of the population that subscribes to certain beliefs. These are listed as Creationism, Intelligent Design, (what's the difference?) Evolution Is Part Of God's Plan and Evolution Removes The Need For God. If you find those categories a little odd they were devised by the theology thinktank Theos (try saying that 3 times quickly). The map is based on a survey undertaken by Theos of "2,060 people across the country who were chosen to be representative of the adult population". We are told 80% don't hold with Creationism/Intelligent Design which is nice to see. More amusing were some other findings, such as 5% of adults think Darwin wrote A Brief History of Time and another 3% think Darwin wrote The God Delusion. (Darwin, Dawkins, Hawking - so easy to confuse) Most hearteningly "The survey suggests there is a widespread lack of religious sentiment across Britain."  which contrasts oddly with this statement from the About Theos page, "Society is embarking on a process of de-secularisation."  Perhaps they don't read their own surveys. (See here about another recent survey on religion which found "...that 60 per cent of the population thinks that religion is the most divisive issue in Britain." No shit.)

Bunty Bashes Ratzi - in this piece Madeleine Bunting frets about the impact on the Roman Catholic church of the Pope's gaffe over the return to the fold of Holocaust-denying weirdo nutter "Bishop" Richard Williamson. She is not happy with said weirdo's return to Britain in particular, saying "This may be uncomfortable for British Catholics and the episcopal hierarchy headed by Cardinal Cormac Murphy O'Connor. However, they have to make it very clear, very soon that Williamson's views have no place in the church, that they are to be condemned and that they are deeply damaging to a fragile relationship which had finally shown some signs of improvement in recent decades." Perhaps she would like to mull over which makes British Catholics more uncomfortable, Williamson's holocaust denial or their Cardinal Murphy O'Connor's enabling of a known pedophile? Mmm, tricky. Williamson is quite rightly disgraced but Murphy O'Connor was promoted and now there is talk of giving this hypocrite a peerage. It is, as they say, a funny old world. (80 has commented on Bunting's output before, see Cry Baby Bunting, Bye Bye Bunting and Defending Is Enabling. See here a piece about Murphy O'Connor from The Freethinker)

Randi On Sagan - do take a minute (7 minutes actually) to listen to James Randi talking about Carl Sagan. Then, if you have another 5 minutes watch the introduction to Sagan's Cosmos and appreciate the man's ability to communicate his sense of wonder at our amazing universe.

"We've arranged a civilization in which most crucial elements profoundly depend on science and technology. We have also arranged things so that almost no one understands science and technology. This is a prescription for disaster. We might get away with it for a while, but sooner or later this combustible mixture of ignorance and power is going to blow up in our faces."  Carl Sagan

Malevolent voices that despise our freedoms - to mark tomorrow's Convention On Modern Liberty (see below) Philip Pullman has written this powerful piece. (As of Saturday am this link is broken but it has been thoughtfully copied elsewhere. Despite some of the online chatter the broken link is more likely cockup than conspiracy)

Update - Sunday pm and the page is still inaccessible. Here, courtesy of the Guardian is Pullman's address to the Convention. For more see Liberty Central.

Which are the most irreligious nations in the world? - A recent Gallup study focused on the importance of religion for various nations around the world. The researchers asked the following question: "Is religion an important part of your daily life?" The five least religious countries according to this study are Estonia where only 14 per cent of people consider religion an important part of their daily lives, Sweden (17 per cent), Denmark (18 per cent), Norway (20 per cent) and the Czech Republic (21 per cent). Religion is also not so important in the UK, Finland, the Netherlands, Lithuania, Latvia and Bulgaria. Not everyone in the EU, however, thinks this way. For example in Italy, Portugal, Poland, Romania and Greece religion is traditionally regarded as quite essential. Generally speaking religion is according to the study more important for the third world countries.

The most religious people live in Egypt, where religion was an important part of daily life for every single interviewed person. Ninety nine per cent of surveyed people in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka answered the same. Also, numerous African and South Asian countries were among the most religious. In countries of the developed world approximately 38 per cent of people think religion is important. The Gallup analysts Steve Crabtree and Brett Pehlam say the level of religiosity is interconnected with the average standard of living. In rich countries with high literacy levels, low homicide rates, low poverty rates and so on, religion is not regarded as very important. In total all over the world 82 per cent of people consider religion important. (This item is from the National Secular Society Newsline, a free weekly email newsletter. You can subscribe to it here and you can join the NSS here)

Bobby Foolery - "While some of the projects in the bill make sense, their legislation is larded with wasteful spending. It includes $300 million to buy new cars for the government, $8 billion for high-speed rail projects, such as a magnetic levitation line from Las Vegas to Disneyland, and $140 million for something called volcano monitoring. Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, D.C." Governor of Louisiana, Bobby Jindal expressing his concern for those fellow Americans who happen to live near volcanoes - or not so near in the case of Yellowstone. Yeah, why monitor them, we'll hear'em sure enough when they go up. Idiot. (See Phil Plait for more and read the excellent Fruit Flies and Volcanoes: Why Bobby Jindal and Sarah Palin Should Run in 2012 from the decidedly Splendid Elles)

Jindal Is Anti-Palin? - Michael Gerson is the man credited by some for putting the phrase "axis of evil" into George W Bush's mouth. He now writes for the Washington Post where he has produced a puff piece about the Republican party's new bright boy, Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal. It was Jindal who was selected to reply to President Obama's speech to a joint session of Congress - a job he does not appear to have done very well according to many observers. Gerson, in his piece tells how Catholic Jindal has demonstrated his credentials to the religious right, "In Louisiana, Jindal is the darling of evangelical and charismatic churches, where he often tells his conversion story." This leads Gerson to hail "...the remarkable alliance between evangelicals and Catholics on moral issues such as abortion and family values against an aggressive secularism." Apart from this popularist side Gerson is also keen to point out that Jindal is also a policy wonk and fairly bubbles about his intellectual credentials.

In doing so Gerson contrasts Jindal with another Republican hopeful, a contrast that does not hold up under even cursory examination. He tells us "...Jindal's résumé, intellectual confidence and command of policy make him the anti-Palin. Fairly or unfairly, media and intellectual elites (including some conservative elites) regard Gov. Sarah Palin as an inhabitant of another cultural planet. Jindal, while also religious and conservative, speaks the language of the knowledge class and will not be easily caricatured or dismissed." Now either Gerson is being disingenuous here or he really doesn't know about Jindal's past. Jindal may well be a bright boy but not that bright - he is not only a creationist who helped put through pro Intelligent Design rules for teachers in the Louisiana Science Education Act but has also taken part in an exorcism - which he claims cured the subject's cancer. Creationism, religious conservative values and participation in an exorcism - it would seem that Jindal has plenty in common with the Governor of Alaska. Sadly for the Republicans they seem to have another nutter on their hands. 80 wonders how much the Washington Post pays Gerson for producing his arrant nonsense. Whatever it is, it is far too much.

Do You Have Biblical Morals? - take the quiz to find out. 80 scored 85% and was rewarded with the following message "You are a good and moral Christian. Jerry Falwell would be proud! Now go sacrifice an ox for the sweet savour of the lord!" (Thanks to Pharyngula for the heads up)

The Idiocy of 'Defamation of Religion' - is an article by Russell Blackford on the Butterflies and Wheels site. "Anti-liberal actors in the international arena, such as the Muslim states of the Middle East, are pursuing a path of attempting to suppress what they call "defamation of religion". Their campaign is achieving some success, and I believe we must take it very seriously. The whole idea of defamation of religion is nonsense. Taken literally, it would mean that I could not utter any falsehood that is damaging to the reputation of a religion (so, it might lead people to leave the religion or doubt its doctrines, or fail to be convinced to convert to it). But a religion has no right to flourish, be believed, retain adherents, gain converts, or anything of the sort."  Read on... (Blackford's own site Metamagician and the Hellfire Club is well worth a look, in particular a piece in which Blackford shreds LibDem MP Chris Huhne's ineffectual justification of the ban on Dutch politician Gert Wilders)

About: Atheism - 80 has placed a link in the sidebar to Austin Cline's excellent and informative web site. Do take a look at some of the articles such as Top 10 Conversation Killers for Atheists: How Religious Theists Can Hurt Their Cause, Top Myths About Atheism & Atheists: Answers, Refutations, Responses and Why Not Believe? Reasons Why Atheists Don't Believe in Gods.

Quote of the Week - comes from a "senior Vatican official" commenting on his boss's remoteness from the world "People feel disoriented,...it’s a feeling common to both traditionalists and reformers. Our impression is that there isn’t anyone at the wheel.” Funnily enough this is 80's impression of the entire universe... 

Enjoy The Dosh - do read this piece by David Aaronovitch on the compensation awarded to preacher of hate Abu Qatada by the European Court of Human Rights.  Oh, the irony, considering that the concept of human rights is entirely alien to this zealot's world view. 

Living Among The Enemy - UK think tank, Civitas, has published a report (full pdf or press release) that found some Muslim school web sites had links that promoted extremism and "ghettoisation". In a foreword to the report, quoted in the Telegraph, Civitas director David Green said: "The schools that give cause for concern are being run by religious fundamentalists. Their aim is to capture the next generation of Muslims for fundamentalism and to turn children away, not only from Western influence, but also from liberal and secular Muslims, whom they despise perhaps with greater vehemence than non-Muslims." Rather than addressing the concerns raised by these worrying findings the chairman of the Association of Muslim Schools UK, Dr Mohamed Mukadam did the equivalent of a petulant child putting his fingers in his ears and saying "La, la, la not listening". His comment was "Contrary to what this report claims, Muslim schools provide an outstanding standard of education for thousands of young children across the country. The report contains rhetoric which is not only inaccurate but also breeds distrust and disharmony and adds nothing positive or constructive to the debate on the future of education or social cohesion in our country." Which is very odd because if everything is just ticketty-boo with these schools how come many of the controversial links have now disappeared and comments such as "Our children are exposed to a culture that is in opposition with almost everything Islam stands for." are no longer visible. Filling children's heads with misogynistic, anti-semitic, violent and bigoted nonsense is not education - it is abuse. It would seem that a lot more scrutiny is required of not only the 166 private and state funded Muslim schools in the UK but also the 700 part-time madrasas which by their very nature will be much harder to monitor. OFSTED? Do your damn job. The question has to asked, if the culture, values and mores of Britain are so irredeemably offensive to these people that they feel driven to set up their own religiously-inspired and enforced ghettos, what on earth are they doing here?

New Student Federation - in more welcome news from the world of education a new National Federation of Atheist, Humanist and Secular Student Societies has been launched. Chloe Clifford-Frith, 22, in charge of public affairs said "We live in a world where religious governments execute adulterers and homosexuals, deny women and minority groups basic freedoms, and circulate fraudulent claims about contraception and scientific research. We are privileged, in such a world, to live in a country where we can even have this debate and, as such, we have a duty to bring it into our universities and beyond." Read A Beacon In The Darkness by A C Grayling applauding the launch. One comment posted below Grayling's piece shows that some people just don't get it. Ebert wrote "The best way for an atheist to treat religion is to ignore it." The problem with this ostrich attitude is that religionists are now competing with each other for influence on society, calling for special privileges because of their faith, demanding their beliefs be placed beyond criticism and actively looking to be offended by either secular society or those of other faiths. Just run an eye down the items on this page. Ignoring such an assault is not an option. (Also see Atheism Under Attack)

NSS TV -  The National Secular Society has launched its own YouTube Channel to bring you information and entertainment about secularism. Our first programme is there for you to enjoy and it is an in-depth interview with Matt LaClair, conducted by Christina Martin. Matt is the young American who flew over from the States to take part in the Secularist of the Year celebrations. He made a big impression on the audience as he told the story of how he challenged a teacher in his school who was using the class as a platform for preaching. The reaction Matt got to his protest was not quite what he was expecting and his story exploded into a national cause celebre. You can hear him tell the story in his own words now on NSS TV. (from Newsline, the NSS free weekly email newsletter. You can subscribe here)

The Ratzinger File - John Cornwell, writing in the New Statesman, takes a devastating look at the beliefs and career of Joseph Ratzinger, aka Pope Benedict XVI, and finds him to be "...an ultra-reactionary. First he antagonised Muslims. Now he has outraged Jewish groups by favouring a Holocaust denier."  (For 80's view see Arrogance, Thy Name Is Ratzinger)

The Man Who Wasn't There - regular readers of these pages will know that 80 has commented several times on the San Diego Natural History Museum's Dead Sea Scrolls exhibition, in particular its representation of one particular interpretation of the scrolls' provenance and place of production. 80's interest was sparked by some pieces on the Now Public site by one Charles Gadda. In covering the story 80 was accused of being a "sock puppet", ie a mouthpiece, of Gadda's to further his particular agenda. This accusation was addressed in A Sock Puppet Speaks. Now painstaking and thorough research by Dr Robert Cargill has revealed Gadda to be but one of many aliases of Raphael Golb, the son of scholar Norman Golb. It would appear that he felt his father's views were being unfairly ignored and chose this strange way to support him. This might have just stayed as one of the odd things that are likely to happen on the web where people can post articles and other material under pseudonyms but things have now taken a decidedly unpleasant turn and Raphael Golb has been arrested "...on charges of identity theft, criminal impersonation and aggravated harassment."

Now 80 could fairly be called a pseudonym, but not a particularly impenetrable one as my name is on the copyright notice at the bottom of every page on the site and, additionally an email link is at the bottom of the home page. This has enabled many people to contact me over the 9 years this site has been in existence, some to congratulate and some to berate, but the point is they had no problem getting in touch. So it was with a degree of surprise that I found that The View From Number 80 was listed as an alias of Gadda/Golb on Dr Cargill's page. I have emailed him and pointed out this is a falsehood. All of the material on the Number 80 pages has been produced by myself and while I am always happy to receive pointers and tips about interesting items all views are expressed are my own. Looking at the pseudonyms employed by Golb I spotted Sarah Epstein - the author of several emails drawing my attention to new articles by "Gadda". Gadda/Golb/Epstein certainly had no input to any of the pieces published on my web site. For good or ill all opinions, prejudices, typos and insults displayed on these pages are entirely my own and I am no one's alias or sock puppet. Where another individual is quoted this is made perfectly obvious. That said, 80 can still feel the egg on his face - just read my praise for "Gadda's" dogged investigation. (It is still worth making the point that, Golb Jr's deceptions and conspiracy theories aside, the Essene-Qumran-Scrolls theory is still not the only game in town)

Update - 80 has received an email from Dr Cargill correcting the alias error. It would appear Golb had used the alias of "The View From Here" - too close to this site's name to be a coincidence and no doubt deliberately employed to create confusion. I am going to leave the Dead Sea Scrolls material unaltered on my pages but will add a link on each one pointing to the above paragraphs. Any quotes taken from "Charles Gadda" and "Robert Dworkin"  should be read in the light of these revelations. I recommend a visit to Dr Cargill's page to appreciate the scale of Golb's deception and see new developments, if any.

NSS raises alarm over new Islamist threat to free speech - the National Secular Society has warned government officials that a new resolution proposed by Pakistan at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) will define any questioning of Islamic dogmas as a "human rights violation". It will intimidate dissenting voices and encourage the enforced imposition of sharia law.

NSS Executive Director Keith Porteous Wood told top officials at the Foreign Office at a meeting yesterday that the new resolution would seriously undermine free speech, other human rights and, indeed, democracy around the world, and that its first victims would be the more moderate voices in the increasingly radicalised Islamic countries. Keith also drew attention to the intervention made at the UNHRC by Roy Brown of the International Humanist and Ethical Union (to which the NSS is affiliated) some of which was reported by Reuters.

The Human Rights organisation UN Watch had obtained a copy of the Pakistani-authored proposal after it was distributed this week among Geneva diplomats attending the current session of the UNHRC. The document, entitled "Combating defamation of religions," mentions only Islam.

"While non-binding," said UN Watch executive director Hillel Neuer, "the resolution constitutes a dangerous threat to free speech everywhere. It would ban any perceived offense to Islamic sensitivities as a 'serious affront to human dignity' and a violation of religious freedom, and would pressure U.N. member states — at the 'local, national, regional and international levels' — to erode the free speech guarantees in their 'legal and constitutional systems.'"

"This is an Orwellian text that distorts the meaning of human rights, free speech, and religious freedom, and marks a giant step backwards for liberty and democracy worldwide," said Neuer. "The first to suffer will be moderate Muslims in the countries that are behind this resolution, like Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and Pakistan, where state-sanctioned blasphemy laws stifle religious freedom and outlaw conversions from Islam to other faiths," said Neuer.

"Next to suffer from this U.N.-sanctioned McCarthyism will be writers and journalists in the democratic West, with the resolution targeting the media for the 'deliberate stereotyping of religions, their adherents and sacred persons.'"

"Ultimately, the very notion of individual human rights is at stake, because the sponsors of this resolution seek not to protect individuals from harm, but rather to shield a specific set of beliefs from any question, debate, or critical inquiry," said Neuer.

Keith Porteous Wood said that the new resolution was dangerous and shocking. "We call on all liberal democracies to resist this new attempt to close down legitimate debate about the place of religion in a human rights context. The resolution is a corruption of the concept of universal human rights and would give a free hand to every Islamic despot and tyrant in the world." (The above piece is from Newsline, a free weekly email newsletter from the National Secular Society. You can subscribe here and join the NSS here.) 

A Word About The Soldiers - from Pat Condell. Another excellent short piece to camera this time about the Islamist clowns and their protest at British troops in Luton recently. Also see here an interview with Condell that was originally published in an abridged version in a Dutch newspaper.

"The two fascist dogmas have a common enemy in secularism, which they rightly see as a threat. That’s why the Archbishop of Canterbury disgraced himself last year by advocating sharia law in Britain, and it’s why we’re hearing a lot more about interfaith dialogue between the two, where they agree to put aside their differences and focus on things they have in common, like prejudice against women and homosexuals, hatred of freedom, and a pathological fear of knowledge. In other words the basics." Pat Condell from the interview linked above.

What Price Community Cohesion? - Lord Ahmed, a Labour member of the House of Lords, the UK's upper chamber was quite rightly jailed for 12 weeks for breaking the law by texting on his mobile phone minutes before his involvement in a fatal motorway crash. Now the Court of Appeal has freed him after 16 days. Lady Justice Hallett described this course as "exceptional" and offered as one reason the fact that Ahmed had not tried to deceive the police - which sounds like he is being rewarded for not lying. There is another reason, as the Telegraph tells us, "It was claimed that a prison record would hinder his work building bridges between the Muslim world and others." This bridge building reportedly includes threats over the recent attempted visit to the UK by right-wing Dutch MP Gert Wilders. Hallett, in refusing to quash Ahmed's sentence as requested by his counsel said it was accepted there was “...not one law for the rich and powerful and one law for the rest”. To which 80's response can only be doubly affirmative - yeah, right. (It is worth noting that Wilders, whatever one thinks of him, was democratically elected to his position - unlike Lord Ahmed.)

One Law For All Update - March 7 was One Law for All's first warning to the British government and the political Islamic movement. As Maryam Namazie said on the day: "We won't stand idly by whilst the British government relegates a huge segment of our society to sham courts and regressive rules and appeases the Islamists here or elsewhere. And we will bring the political Islamic movement to its knees in Britain in much the same way that people are doing in Iran and elsewhere." She added: "We will keep growing in numbers and strength until we get rid of Sharia councils and religious tribunal's altogether." To see footage and photos of the rally, march and public meeting, click here.

...And Now The Happy News - The Program on Public Values at Trinity College in Hartford, Conn., has announced the results of a survey (synopsis pdf) that warmed the cockles of 80's heart. It found that "...the percentage of Christians in the nation has declined and more people say they have no religion at all. Fifteen percent of respondents said they had no religion, an increase from 14.2 percent in 2001 and 8.2 percent in 1990, according to the American Religious Identification Survey. Northern New England surpassed the Pacific Northwest as the least religious region, with Vermont reporting the highest share of those claiming no religion, at 34 percent. Still, the study found that the numbers of Americans with no religion rose in every state. "No other religious bloc has kept such a pace in every state."  (See a presentation of the survey in pdf format)

An interesting finding was that "... Surveys often report that No Religion people are unpopular in the U.S. and that Americans distrust non-believers more than other groups. This may account for the low rates of self-identification as Atheists and Agnostics ...compared with much higher levels when questioned about actual “belief”." There are a lot more of us out there than you think, all around the world.

The Truth About St Patrick - with the holy man's feast day fast approaching here is a timely warning from the Landover Baptist Church about what lies beneath this jolly, drunken celebration. 80 had no idea of the link between leprosy and leprechauns until the good folks at Landover put him straight. Praise be!

Darwin, Terrorism and the Defamation of Religion - see here a good piece by Christopher Hitchens on how Muslim countries in the form of the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC) are combining their efforts at the UN to outlaw criticism of their religion, labelling it "defamation". (see The Wrong Rights) This includes the association of Muslims with violence, intolerance and terrorism. Perhaps the OIC has had input from the preposterous creationist Adnan Oktar. In a recent interview in the Teheran Times Oktar, aka Harun Yahya, confirms that his view of the world owes nothing to reality. It would appear that acts of terrorism are not carried out by Islamists but Darwinists - "Muslims are generally unaware where the troubles are coming from. People in the world as a whole are unaware of the essence of the matter. When I investigated it I saw that Darwinism lay at the root of all this suffering, trouble, violence and pain as there would be no materialism without Darwinism. Darwinism is essential for materialist philosophy and without materialism there can be no communism, fascism, imperialism, savage capitalism, nor immorality nor terror." So when Islamists commit their next atrocity please be sure refer to them as Darwinists.

Oktar even knows who are to blame for the current global financial crisis, although a man who can afford to offer a prize of "ten trillion Turkish lira" for proof of evolution is more insulated from the financial debacle than most. "This economic crisis is proof of how powerless Masons and atheist Zionists are in the face of the might and power of Allah. Allah has shown them how the system they established fails to lead to success. They are at a complete dead end with no way out. And with His name of “Jabbar” (Compeller), Allah has made that system impossible to implement and is obliging them to implement Islamic moral values." These are the sort of values applied in Saudi Arabia where we learn that a "...court has sentenced a 75-year-old Syrian woman to 40 lashes, four months imprisonment and deportation from the kingdom for having two unrelated men in her house, according to local media reports." The ignorant mouthings of Oktar would be hilarious except that they are reflected to a degree in the moves of the OIC to put their religion beyond criticism. The upcoming Durban Review Conference on racism is the latest arena where a push will be made to outlaw "defamation of a religion". Such "...a concept ... has no place in Human Rights discourse." according to the International Humanist and Ethical Union. As Hitchens points out the OIC has hijacked the language of human rights and put it to a whole other purpose - the destruction of those very rights. People can be defamed - a religion cannot. It cannot be denied that more terrorists are Islamists than not, and examples of their violence can be read about in the press practically every single day. Attempting to outlaw discussion and criticism of the religion they claim as inspiration will not make this problem go away - shooting the messenger has never been a solution. (see here for  a CNN report including an interview with Hitchens by Lou Dobbs)

One Law For All Rally, Saturday March 7th, London - 80 has mentioned before the campaign against the introduction of Islamic religious law in the UK. Sharia is inherently unfair, capricious and heavily biased against women. There is no valid reason for its implementation other than perhaps the government's wish to garner more Muslim votes in marginal constituences. Here is part of a press release on One Law For All's latest activities. "In commemoration of International Women's Day join the One Law for All organised rally, public meeting and art competition award ceremony on Saturday, March 7, 2009 in London. This is your chance to voice your opposition to Sharia law and all religious-based tribunals in Britain and elsewhere, demand one secular law and full citizenship rights, demand an end to cultural relativism and racism, and defend universal rights. On the 7th, meet at North Terrace, Trafalgar Square, 3:30-4:30pm for a symbolic demonstration followed by a march towards Conway Hall from 4:30-5:30pm." For more details see the One Law For All web site where you can sign a petiton and also donate. In a secular society there is no room for any religious legal system. (Also see Stop Sharia Law In Britain and Muslim Women Lose Human Rights) Update - the Archbishop of Canterbury believes that society in Britain is coming round to the idea of sharia. If the fool believes that he'll believe any old nonsense - but then he already does...

A Rantlet - another day and yet more strange waffle from the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams. In a lecture called Faith and the Public Square he maintains that Britain is not a secular country but one that is "....uncomfortably haunted by the memory of religion". This memory would include no doubt the 26 unelected ghosts in the upper chamber of parliament who are given a public platform for being, well, for being bishops. In a country with a large and growing population of non-believers, those who belong to no established religion but still calling themselves "spiritual" and those of faiths other than Christianity Williams seems desperately keen to hang on to the privileged position of the Church of England (CoE) - a position that he has trouble in justifying. Even the Anglican Communion only totters along, not yet a ghost but certainly on its deathbed, riven with disputes over the role of women and gays (see below). Williams seems unwilling to accept reality, saying "I don't believe we are living in a secular society and I don't believe we are living in a deeply religiously divided society." British society today is more secular than not and attendance in William's church has been falling for decades. We also live in a more religiously divided society ever since the new kid on the block, Islam, or elements within Islam, discovered the gains to be made from being stroppy, short-tempered and overly sensitive. Islam is a very different beast from Williams' Anglicanism or Roman Catholicism in that it pervades the lives of its adherents to a much greater degree. The litany of stories in the press about Muslims is rarely about their contribution to society but more about their wish to ghettoize themselves, to remain apart from the mainstream culture of the country. And always in the background is the thought of violence - or more accurately the threat of the threat of violence.

The recent banning from the UK of Dutch right-wing MP Gert Wilders (see Wrong Move, Wrong Message) was occasioned by a fear of violence - or to use the jargon, a breakdown of "community cohesion". Just think, an elected member of the parliament of a fellow European Union country was refused entry to this country for that very reason. This Islamic cuckoo in the nest has brought forth at least two reactions from other religions. The first is to jump on the bandwagon with claims of persecution, whining to be exempted from legislation, and, above all, the tendency to be offended by anything and everything at the drop of a hat. The government's supine behavior of courting the Muslim vote and handing over taxpayer's money to unrepresentative groups to maintain "community cohesion" represents the other reaction. It is all of a piece with Williams' continued insistence, against all reason, that there is a place for an Arabian religious legal system in Britain. The answer to these problems and others is not more influence and status for religion but a truly secular state where people can follow the faith of their choice or none within a single legal system applicable to all. There should be no government subsidies for "community cohesion" or for faith (properly sectarian) schools whose raison d'etre is the enforced doctrination of children. If, as Williams put it, Britain is haunted by religion then answer is simple - it should be exorcized.

It's A Man Thing - if Rowan Williams would like to do something useful instead of disappearing into the smokescreen of his own fatuous verbiage he should deal with the vile bigot that is Archbishop Akinola of Nigeria who represents all that is despicable in African Christianity. Akinola's recent comments on homosexuality are an example of the poison spewed by this so-called man of god "Same sex marriage, apart from being ungodly, is unscriptural, unnatural, unprofitable, unhealthy, un-cultural, un-African and un-Nigerian. It is a perversion, a deviation and an aberration that is capable of engendering moral and social holocaust in this country. It is also capable of existincting [sic] mankind and as such should never be allowed to take root in Nigeria. Outlawing it is to ensure the continued existence of this nation. The need for doing this is urgent, compelling, and imperative." It is hypocritical that this deeply unpleasant and ignorant individual is part of the same group that produced the following resolution, "We continue unreservedly to be committed to the pastoral support and care of homosexual people. The victimisation or diminishment of human beings whose affections happen to be ordered towards people of the same sex is anathema to us. We assure homosexual people that they are children of God, loved and valued by him, and deserving of the best we can give of pastoral care and friendship." Akinola's ravings, his hate speech that should get him banned from Britain if this pathetic government is consistent, reminded 80 of another religious homophobe, Iran's poison dwarf, President Ahmedinajad. It has long been 80's contention that such violence-inciting, gay-hating types are in fact sublimating their own buried desire for a walk on the wild side - think Ted Haggard. It was no more than a surmise until this study was published on the physical excitement homophobic men exhibit when shown pictures of gay porn. Methinks the likes of Akinola and Ahmedinajad protest too much. They really should get in touch with their inner man.......

Even-handedness - "The British Government is threatening to cut ties with the country's most high-profile Muslim organisation, the Muslim Council of Britain, over allegations that one of its most senior members is a supporter of Hamas." If true this is welcome news indeed. Now what about George Galloway? Update - you can read more on the MCB story here.

The Defamation Of Religion - this resolution, which was to be put forward next month at a UN meeting on racism, has been dropped - at least for now. Reuters tells us "States preparing for a highly sensitive U.N. racism conference have removed references to Israel and religious defamation from its draft declaration, potentially clearing the way for Western states to attend." The latest draft declaration omits any reference to the defamation of religion. "The amended text, circulated on Tuesday, followed a European Union threat to boycott next month's "Durban II" conference in Geneva unless the declaration wording was changed to keep the meeting from becoming an anti-Semitic forum."  This is obviously good news although it doesn't help those in Islamic countries, many of them dictatorships, being imprisoned, tortured and killed for the "crime" of blasphemy. The authorities in these countries, civil and religious, should ask themselves if their god is so omnipotent why does he need his minions to mete out punishments for perceived slights? Surely the creator of the entire universe can cope with a little blasphemy?  Any god or religion that needs fanatics to enforce respect deserves none. (Also see Free Speech Is Sacred and from A C Grayling The Deification of Stupidity)

Everybody Wants to Go To Heaven, But Nobody Wants To Die - Joe Louis' words appear to be confirmed by a recent survey. Researchers from the Dana-Faber Cancer Institute "...followed 345 patients with terminal cancer up until their deaths. Those who regularly prayed were more than three times more likely to receive intensive life-prolonging care than those who relied least on religion." according to a BBC news item. It is possible that these patients are so into the "culture of life", particularly their own, that they will do anything to prolong it  - or perhaps they are not so sure of going to heaven and being with "all very nice people" to quote Father Guido Sarducci. One far from pleasant result is reported by the University of Pittsburgh School of Medicine which "...found that treatments such as ventilator support, resuscitation, having a feeding tube and non-palliative chemotherapy were associated with more psychological and physical distress". Which means the newly-deceased would enter paradise all grumpy and get off completely on the wrong foot. Some of this intervention may not be at the request of the patients themselves at all but to satisfy the demands of devout relatives. Such a pious hanging on at all costs attitude to satisfy outside interests was memorably demonstrated by two cases, that of Terri Schiavo in the US and, more recently Eluana Englaro in Italy where tragic circumstances were further complicated by grandstanding politicians as well as clerical busybodies.

Vatican Rewrites History - and not for the first time. While it is no Donation of Constantine this latest example is bad enough. Reports suggest that the text of Pope Ratzinger's idiotic and uncaring remarks concerning the efficacy of condoms in helping stem the AIDS epidemic in Africa have  been the subject of some retroactive editing by the Vatican press office. If substantiated, this clumsy attempt to rewrite recent history reflects the worldwide unfavorable reaction to Ratzinger's words. The lies about condoms did not start with the little anti-aircraft gunner but he seems happy to repeat them. His resistance to their use is as obdurate as that of Wojtyla, his predecessor, although some cracks are appearing in the church's stance. Some brave bishops are straying from the official dogma, asking which is the greater sin, using a condom or giving your spouse AIDS?. To ask such a question shows an empathy and understanding of human nature entirely lacking in the Pope's own pronouncements. 

This current furore follows on the heels of the disgusting business of the 9 year-old girl who had conceived twins following her rape. Instead of offering love and help the church excommunicated the girl's mother and the doctors who performed an abortion (It must be remembered that while excommunication is only mumbo-jumbo it is serious enough for believers). The child's life would have been endangered had the pregnancy continued but the church was concerned only with the twin fetuses, not the the little girl who had been abused. The AIDS condom business also closely follows the row over the loony holocaust denying bishop who was welcomed back into the fold until his views, views that were surely known to Ratzinger, were made public. There must by now be more than a few in the conclave of cardinals that elected this ghastly old man who are regretting their decision and waiting anxiously for the next gaffe - if gaffes they are. It is possible that Ratzinger knows exactly what he is doing and feels he has to answer to no one but his god. If so his arrogance serves one purpose, it weakens the hold he and his henchmen have over the flock, which, in 80's view, can only be a good thing. (Also see Arrogance Thy Name Is Ratzinger and see what Jesus and Mo have to say. This piece by John Hooper is worth a look too)

Free Speech Is Sacred - is the latest video from Pat Condell. Check it out here. Passionate, articulate and, above all, accurate. I've said it before but it bears repeating - this man is an (inter)national treasure. The main subject of his piece is the attempt by Islamic countries to subvert the Universal Declaration of Human Rights with some guff about making defamation of religion a crime. There is a report that the resolution has been dropped but so far only from one source (but see above). For more on the proposed resolution see this article by Agnes Callamard.

A Decade Of Universe Today - the excellent astronomy and spaceflight web site Universe Today is 10 years old as of yesterday, March 23rd. The site's founder Fraser Cain gave 80 encouragement when The View From Number 80 first started out as an occasional email newsletter. Read here the thoroughly deserved praise of Cain and his various projects from Phil Plait, aka the Bad Astronomer and president of the James Randi Educational Foundation. A permanent link to Universe Today can be found in the sidebar of this page - click on it for the latest space news and articles and to sign up for a daily free email newsletter. Highly recommended.

What Are The Odds? - "A teenage twin believes that her sixth sense helped her to save her sister's life as she was drowning in a bath. Gemma Houghton, 15, said she had a "feeling" that her sister, Leanne, needed help and ran upstairs to check on her. She found her lying lifeless and submerged under the water after suffering a fit in the bath and losing consciousness." What a great piece of luck. One wonders how many other times she has had such a presentiment and then forgotten it when nothing untoward happened.

Qibla Quibbles - it seems that over 200 mosques face "..in the wrong direction" according to this piece in the Telegraph. So concerned are some that the Qibla, or direction of prayer, should be accurate that there was a suggestion "...that laser beams be installed in the tall minarets of the Al-Haram mosque built around the Kaaba to help mosques and worshippers establish the correct qibla direction." What the Telegraph writer doesn't mention is that for a short time the direction of prayer was toward Jerusalem. Elsewhere we are told that this was because it was the location of the al-Aqsa mosque - except at that early period that building did not exist. The Jerusalem prayer direction would seem to have been borrowed from Judaism, along with much else by the founder of Islam, Muhammed. (See United)

There are different ways of calculating the direction of prayer, the South Pacific rules for instance lead to "Muslims living in the islands of the South Pacific generally pray with their heads facing the ground. As the South Pacific is antipodal to Mecca, this method allows prayers to reach Mecca with a minimum distance travelled. Conservative authorities believe that this method is flawed, as prayers are unable to pass through certain minerals in the Earth's crust." (The Islamic equivalent of green Kryptonite?)

Much deliberation was required when Muslims went into space. It is easy to see why. If your rules for praying several times a day in a specific direction come from an early medieval book that appears to assume a flat earth then you find yourself orbiting an oblate spheroid with sunrise and sunset occurring every 90 minutes things are likely to get a little confusing. (See Which Way To Mecca?) This and the problems of ritual ablutions using the limited water supply available to Islamonauts brought together "...150 scientists, astronauts, religious scholars and academics" for an "...two-day Islam and Life in Space seminar" back in 2006. What a sensible employment of time and scholarship. One would think that as Islam claims that Allah is the one true and universal deity he could receive prayers from any old direction. The need to pray toward Mecca shows that he is actually more Arab than universal. Besides he speaks Arabic, assuming, as is claimed, that the Quran is an exact transcript of his words.

It is always interesting to watch the scholars jump through hoops in their attempts to fit their religion in with modern knowledge or vice versa - and this applies to all three Abrahamic faiths and others. The only human construct that automatically adjusts itself to agree with observation and experiment is science, which has proved itself to be far more beneficial to humanity than any supernatural belief system. Scientists are often gleeful when an observation throws an accepted theory into doubt. It is when things don't fit into the existing paradigm that progress is made. With religion such new information is suppressed (heresy) or more and more complicated contrivances are invented to get over the problem. There is of course another way. Creationists for instance just ignore any evidence that contradicts their world view, all the while happily using vaccines, antibiotics, electronics and the other fruits of the scientific method. This rank hypocrisy seems to bother them not at all. Take a look at Quranic science and Biblical science to see how the deity seems to know no more about the cosmos than the humans writing down his words.

"There are no major errors but corrections have been made for some old mosques, thanks to modern techniques. In any case, it does not affect the prayers."  Tawfik al-Sudairy, Islamic affairs ministry deputy secretary commenting on the misaligned mosque muddle. Leading this infidel to ask, if it does not affect prayers then why bother with the Qibla rigmarole in the first place?

Religious Persecution Wolf in Anti-Defamation Sheep’s Clothing - is a piece on the defamation of religion nonsense at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva by Austin Dacey, UN representative for the secularist think tank Center for Inquiry, (CFI). Also recommended is Do Religions Have Rights? Further Pages from The Victim’s Handbook by R. Joseph Hoffmann at the excellent Butterflies and Wheels.