I find it slightly depressing that the only time we have a debate about something like this (ie something that matters) is when a politician whose star is fading sees it as an opportunity to make a run for the deputy leadership of his party. Sorry Jack, mate, I’ve always thought you were OK, but nobody’s fooled by the timing here. A whole party conference just passed and nobody even noticed you. It was time for you to stir something up to get noticed again.
We have become scared to debate anything that might offend people in this country. To illustrate, speaking as a gay man, I’m totally happy for people to tell me they think I deserve to burn in hell. I’m happy for them to express these (shit) opinions as long as they don’t start the process there and then with a petrol bomb. It remains my absolute moral right to do as I wish, no matter how much they voice their disapproval. Equally, Muslim women are thoroughly entitled to wear whatever they wish, but it remains our right to give voice to the self-evident observation that it’s an impediment to fully functioning in our culture and that, frankly, many of them look like an obese version of Darth Vader and thus plain silly.
As I understand the law of
If a person can’t do their job properly because of some traditional article of clothing, that’s unfortunate but surely just bad luck. She has to get another job which enables her to exercise her right to dress as she wishes, whilst still being able to perform properly in the job. Some jobs are incompatible with people’s traditions by their nature and denying this is the folly of dogma. All dogmatic politics and religion are, in my view, just institutionalised and ritualised cop outs from reality.
There’s something faintly disturbing about how a well reasoned, measured (if politically opportune or cynical) comment by one of yesterday’s men can cause such furore, followed by overwhelming support. What other latent views do we near universally share that could equally be ignited I wonder? I do hope that they’re benign.
I have a confession to make. This blog entry was originally posted as a comment on the very excellent ambulance driver blog http://randomreality.blogware.com/blog It’s worth a look at this blog if you haven’t already. The book of its previous entries “Blood, Sweat and Tea” is also a good Christmas gift.
1 comment:
I was thinking about this the other day, and came to the not-very-radical conclusion that anyone has the right to cover themselves up & avoid the lecherous gaze of men (and the lecherous gays).
As a lecherous man myself, anyone with anything out gets a good looking-at, and no one has ever objected to this publicly.
If you don't want me to look, cover it up - I'm not going to peer down your visor for a look at the forbidden fruit, and I doubt they're all mingers in there either.
But I do object to a religion forcing people to do so, and this brings me on to a train of thought I've enjoyed more.
Religion. It's a bit embarassing, isn't it? Surely in this day & age we should have got over this by now.
If we're going to believe in bloke with a white beard who judges all our sins & rights wrongs & responds to prayer then why not believe in Father Xmas or the Tooth Fairy?
There's much more evidence they exist & they come without all the guilt, shame, fiddling with kids & then covering it up.
But the way these medieval reactionaries have managed to link ethnicity & religion has given their knackered product a new lease of life.
A Middle-Eastern person casting off their superstitious mumbo-jumbo becomes a traitor.
We need to differentiate between race & religion.
To discriminate against someone because they're Asian is wrong, but we need to be less worried about upsetting the feelings of those who wish the earth was flat and will shout for their right to believe it.
The more religion is laughed at, mocked & generally introduced to the rigours of modern thought the better our country will become.
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