Odone confuses a loss of advantage with an act of oppression. This is
the shock of those who are losing their divine right to dominate.
Odone confuses a loss of advantage with an act of oppression. This is
the shock of those who are losing their divine right to dominate.
the shock of those who are losing their divine right to dominate.
by Robin Ince Published
A tattoo of Jesus. Photo: Getty.
One of the prickly issues for a society that attempts to be liberal is how tolerant it must be of the intolerant. Writing in the last issue of this magazine, Cristina Odone says
that she feels her rights as a taxpayer, a citizen and a Christian have
been trampled on. She warns of a world around the corner in which
religion will be a secret activity behind closed doors.
So, what is this dystopian vision of the future? A world
where if you run a bed and breakfast, you cannot discriminate against
gay couples, and you have to abide by the rules of the job you are
contracted to do. That’s it, really.
No one in our society has it all their own way: as an
atheist, I am just as much of a trampled-on taxpayer and citizen as
Odone. I pay for the BBC, yet nobody non-religious is permitted on Radio
4’s Thought for the Day. Humanists are not allowed to lay a wreath
during the annual remembrance ceremony at the Cenotaph. (The 14 faith
groups that reviewed the ceremony decided this – the same groups that
have supposedly been pushed out of the public arena.) There are 26
bishops in the House of Lords, there solely because of their religion.
As for education, schools in England and Wales are mandated
to have daily Christian worship. What sort of state schools are
forbidden in England and Wales? Despite the presumed anti-religious
jackboot ruling over us, it’s not Catholic, Anglican, Muslim or Jewish
schools: it is secular schools. You won’t find parents pretending to be
atheists to get their children educated: “We had to go to lectures about
Bertrand Russell every Saturday to make sure that we could get Cyril
into our local atheist school.”
We can all play the victim game if we fancy it. Just as some
men bleat that they are the oppressed because of feminism, Odone
confuses a loss of advantage with an act of oppression. This is the
shock of those who are losing their divine right to dominate.
Religious people are not being pushed out of public life.
Instead, the presumed superiority of morality cherry-picked from ancient
books is no longer a given, nor is such morality held in the same high
regard it may have been a few decades ago. Evolution has supplied human
beings with minds that allow us to think for ourselves and rise above
the rigid dogma of a few prophets.
In her piece, Odone says that the organisers of a conference
on traditional marriage, who were turfed out by both the Law Society
and the QEII Conference Centre, were victims of anti-religious
prejudice. She fails to mention that one of the organisers’ websites
equates homosexuality with pornography and incest.
Meanwhile, the chief executive of its co-organiser,
Christian Concern – who wanted to sue the Law Society on the grounds of
intolerance – was recently at another conference in Jamaica lobbying
against the repeal of the law criminalising gay sex there. It’s a tricky
thing, this intolerance.
Whether you agree with diversity policies or not, you can
see how Christian Concern’s “sober” discussion of marriage might have
made the management a little edgy. I, too, do not have a given right to
perform at any venue. A venue can say “no” to me on grounds of my
opinions, but not on the grounds of my faith, race or sexuality. The
venues’ uncertainty was not about hosting Christians; it was about
hosting a political event covered in religious fairy dust.
Later in her piece, Odone writes: “I believe that religious
liberty is meaningless if religious subcultures do not have the right to
practise and preach according to their beliefs.” But she has not lost
the right to preach her beliefs or practise them. She regularly gets to
preach her beliefs in the Daily Telegraph and – like many
rabbis, imams and pastors – on television and radio, too. Religious
leaders frequently appear on the BBC, that broadcasting network of the
state oppressor.
As for practising her beliefs, Odone can do that, too.
Same-sex marriage is not compulsory; it is very much an opt-in scenario.
Cristina Odone will not be forced into a lesbian coupling, nor will she
be forced to have an abortion – nor, should it become law, will she be
made to embrace assisted dying, even if her death is agonising and the
pain impossible to relieve.
She writes that once there was a golden time where churches
dominated and tithes were paid. This was also a time when the bubonic
plague laid waste to villages, when graveyards were filled with babies
and mothers who had died in childbirth, and the marriage of young
children to grown men was an accepted part of existence. The past was
indeed different. I would debate whether it was better simply because
there were so many more churches where you could mourn your losses and
marry children.
As an atheist, I do not have any extra rights. I cannot run a
bed and breakfast that refuses Catholic couples, nor can Richard
Dawkins run a carvery that bans Mormons. If part of the deal for my next
stand-up show at Tunbridge Wells includes giving Communion to the
audience or saying grace first, and I refuse, I may well lose that job.
This is not “one-sided tolerance”, as Odone proclaims. Loss of
superiority is not loss of equality. It is true that the right to refuse
services based on a person’s race, sexuality or creed has diminished.
Yet does that make a more intolerant society? Let the faithful have the
right to express their faith but not to impose it. Most religious people
I know are more bothered by social justice than who has consensual sex
with whom.
Cristina Odone still has the right to live her personal life
openly by her own rules, and more people than ever have the legal right
to live their personal lives openly, too. That is progress, not
oppression.
that she feels her rights as a taxpayer, a citizen and a Christian have
been trampled on. She warns of a world around the corner in which
religion will be a secret activity behind closed doors.
So, what is this dystopian vision of the future? A world
where if you run a bed and breakfast, you cannot discriminate against
gay couples, and you have to abide by the rules of the job you are
contracted to do. That’s it, really.
No one in our society has it all their own way: as an
atheist, I am just as much of a trampled-on taxpayer and citizen as
Odone. I pay for the BBC, yet nobody non-religious is permitted on Radio
4’s Thought for the Day. Humanists are not allowed to lay a wreath
during the annual remembrance ceremony at the Cenotaph. (The 14 faith
groups that reviewed the ceremony decided this – the same groups that
have supposedly been pushed out of the public arena.) There are 26
bishops in the House of Lords, there solely because of their religion.
As for education, schools in England and Wales are mandated
to have daily Christian worship. What sort of state schools are
forbidden in England and Wales? Despite the presumed anti-religious
jackboot ruling over us, it’s not Catholic, Anglican, Muslim or Jewish
schools: it is secular schools. You won’t find parents pretending to be
atheists to get their children educated: “We had to go to lectures about
Bertrand Russell every Saturday to make sure that we could get Cyril
into our local atheist school.”
We can all play the victim game if we fancy it. Just as some
men bleat that they are the oppressed because of feminism, Odone
confuses a loss of advantage with an act of oppression. This is the
shock of those who are losing their divine right to dominate.
Religious people are not being pushed out of public life.
Instead, the presumed superiority of morality cherry-picked from ancient
books is no longer a given, nor is such morality held in the same high
regard it may have been a few decades ago. Evolution has supplied human
beings with minds that allow us to think for ourselves and rise above
the rigid dogma of a few prophets.
In her piece, Odone says that the organisers of a conference
on traditional marriage, who were turfed out by both the Law Society
and the QEII Conference Centre, were victims of anti-religious
prejudice. She fails to mention that one of the organisers’ websites
equates homosexuality with pornography and incest.
Meanwhile, the chief executive of its co-organiser,
Christian Concern – who wanted to sue the Law Society on the grounds of
intolerance – was recently at another conference in Jamaica lobbying
against the repeal of the law criminalising gay sex there. It’s a tricky
thing, this intolerance.
Whether you agree with diversity policies or not, you can
see how Christian Concern’s “sober” discussion of marriage might have
made the management a little edgy. I, too, do not have a given right to
perform at any venue. A venue can say “no” to me on grounds of my
opinions, but not on the grounds of my faith, race or sexuality. The
venues’ uncertainty was not about hosting Christians; it was about
hosting a political event covered in religious fairy dust.
Later in her piece, Odone writes: “I believe that religious
liberty is meaningless if religious subcultures do not have the right to
practise and preach according to their beliefs.” But she has not lost
the right to preach her beliefs or practise them. She regularly gets to
preach her beliefs in the Daily Telegraph and – like many
rabbis, imams and pastors – on television and radio, too. Religious
leaders frequently appear on the BBC, that broadcasting network of the
state oppressor.
As for practising her beliefs, Odone can do that, too.
Same-sex marriage is not compulsory; it is very much an opt-in scenario.
Cristina Odone will not be forced into a lesbian coupling, nor will she
be forced to have an abortion – nor, should it become law, will she be
made to embrace assisted dying, even if her death is agonising and the
pain impossible to relieve.
She writes that once there was a golden time where churches
dominated and tithes were paid. This was also a time when the bubonic
plague laid waste to villages, when graveyards were filled with babies
and mothers who had died in childbirth, and the marriage of young
children to grown men was an accepted part of existence. The past was
indeed different. I would debate whether it was better simply because
there were so many more churches where you could mourn your losses and
marry children.
As an atheist, I do not have any extra rights. I cannot run a
bed and breakfast that refuses Catholic couples, nor can Richard
Dawkins run a carvery that bans Mormons. If part of the deal for my next
stand-up show at Tunbridge Wells includes giving Communion to the
audience or saying grace first, and I refuse, I may well lose that job.
This is not “one-sided tolerance”, as Odone proclaims. Loss of
superiority is not loss of equality. It is true that the right to refuse
services based on a person’s race, sexuality or creed has diminished.
Yet does that make a more intolerant society? Let the faithful have the
right to express their faith but not to impose it. Most religious people
I know are more bothered by social justice than who has consensual sex
with whom.
Cristina Odone still has the right to live her personal life
openly by her own rules, and more people than ever have the legal right
to live their personal lives openly, too. That is progress, not
oppression.
Robin Ince is a comedian. His website is robinince.com
