It’s even more of an outrage than I thought
Manic street preacher reports that
Mr Taylor seemed like a perfectly rational, intelligent and calm man who wanted to put his point across and was certainly not the “crackpot” that several bloggers, including myself to an extent, had presumed him to be. He was clearly still deeply affected by his horrendous childhood experiences of a strict Catholic upbringing by the Christian Brotherhood and was so distressed by the prospect of receiving a custodial sentence that he had to leave the courtroom midway through the hearing after nearly fainting.
He also quotes the Telegraph with more and even nastier details:
Judge James told him: “Not only have you shown no remorse for what you did but even now you continue to maintain that you have done nothing wrong and say that whenever you feel like it you intend to do the same thing again in the future.”…
He was sentenced to six months in jail suspended for two years, ordered to perform 100 hours of unpaid work and pay £250 costs.
Remorse – why should he show remorse for something so minor, so non-criminal, so victimless, so basically anodyne? What is all this monstrous bullying in the name of ever more abject “respect” for religion?
Isn’t it interesting that those of us educated by the Christian Brothers turn into the most remorseless, militant and awful atheists of all? Good on you, Mr. Taylor!
[…] and Comment Blog « It’s even more of an outrage than I thought […]
Atheist given Asbo for mocking Jesus
John Lennon: Liverpool airport: “Above Us Only the Sky’ Atheist’s sentence signals ‘a new and dangerous blasphemy law’ in the UK
English law has a lot of precedence but it is probably time to scrap the entire system and start from scratch.
SO ANGRY!!! *pop*
Yeah – this one really makes me furious.
I think we have to make a really big stink. Nag nag nag until their lives are not worth living.
What can we do to protest this?
What about anyone who passes through the airport – indeed any public building, i.e. one provided by taxpayers – leaves literature in the prayer room that argues against a religious POV or promotes a humanist or secular outlook? (assuming groups do leave literature there – does anyone know if this is the case?)
There are many essays and blog-posts that could be printed off and I am sure that authors would give permission for these if asked.
No cartoons, nothing inflamatory, but simply essays and arguments widely available in print, on the internet and in the public record.
Clearly some people will still take offence at this but I fail to see how such material could be construed as “religiously offensive” when it is widely available. If anything it will keep this in the public eye.
Another idea would be for people to sit in the prayer room when waiting for flights. Why not? Sure beats spending money in the shops or buying overpriced food. Again, nothing “disrespectful” just sitting reading (something like TGD ideally) or having discussions about philosophy.
How about groups passing through praying (loudly?) to FSM or Cthulu or whatever takes their fancy?
I’m sure we can come up with something.
How about printing out and leaving the words of “Imagine” – along with a report of how the “Christian” chaplain treated Mr Taylor? It is rather ironic that an employee the one airport named after an outspoken atheist is involved in prosecuting someone for not respecting religion enough.
A little while ago the ‘Railway Chaplain’ came to my place of work and tried to engage us in the usual sort of guff these people come out with, I told him I was an atheist and wasn’t interested to which his reply was ” well I suppose everyone has their faith”. I didn’t bother to reply to that but now I wish I’d reported him to the British Transport Police for causing me offence, after all he said himself that I have a faith so I’m sure the BTP would have prosecuted, wouldn’t they ? If he ever turns up again I shall be as in his face and offensive as possible just to see what happens.
I give blanket permission to leave copies of any articles of mine in airport “prayer rooms.”
The “Railway Chaplain”…? Urggggggh.
The defence must have been bungled, and an appeal should succeed. The alleged offence was under the Public Order Act 1986. Subsequent legislation increased the penalties if the offence is racially or religiously aggravated. It’s an offence if a person (a) uses “threatening, abusive or insulting words or behaviour, or disorderly behaviour, or (b) displays any writing, sign or other visible representation which is threatening, abusive or insulting, within the hearing or sight of a person likely to be caused harassment, alarm or distress thereby.” The chaplain claimed to be threatened and insulted, but he wasn’t.
I could be done for screaming at Ratzi to his face, if he had one, in public, that he’s an evil equivocator. I can’t be done for leaving in a Roman “catholic” church a tract pointing out that an institution run exclusively by supposedly celibate men is bound to get sex wrong.
(b) is very very…well, restrictive, but as you indicate, it is at least not as restrictive as whatever imagined clause resulted in the sentence on Taylor.
The BBC says
I can’t even read that sentence without quaking with rage. It makes me want to dress up in my SuperAtheist costume and go flying around shoving “religiously offensive material” into the face of every judge and prosecutor and “chaplain” in the UK.
It would be interesting to see the actual wording of the purported ASBO. It can’t ban him from carrying material lampooning one or more of the religions, because that is not an offence. It might purport to ban him from carrying material which can be shown to insult identifiable persons.
An ASBO can ban someone from doing anything. In a recent amusing case, a woman was successfully prosecuted for breaching the terms of an ASBO that banned her from having noisy sex. Google ‘noisy sex asbo’ for the coverage… One can easily be banned from carrying alcohol in public, something which is otherwise not against the law, or from associating with certain individuals. Banning someone from carrying certain kinds of material is easy.
They are a most ludicrous form of punitive legislation, made all the more insidious by the fact that imposing them requires a civil [‘balance of probabilities’] rather than criminal [‘beyond reasonable doubt’] level of proof, and breaching them is nonetheless a criminal offence. Once more, thanks, Mr Blair!
There’s a lot wrong with ASBOs, but they can’t, legally, be imposed arbitarily. See
http://www.crimereduction.homeoffice.gov.uk/antisocialbehaviour/antisocialbehaviour55.pdf
There is a criminal standard of proof. Worryingly, the authorities can claim that a victim might be insulted etc, without producing an actual victim. However, this is supposed to protect real victims from intimidation.
To return for a moment to my experience with the Railway Chaplain, I forgot to mention that he left us a railway themed calendar full of Bible quotations. I buried it in the recycling bin but could I claim that it was offensive literature ? It certainly offended me and what if I had been Muslim or Jewish or any other religion could I claim that this was a “religiously aggravated” offence ? Plenty of scope here for strident, trouble making atheists ( ie. me ) in future !
See
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2006/ukpga_20060001_en_1
Including the Protection of Freedom of Expression, keenly resisted by the bishops,
As a very open atheist, I strongly agree that this law, and it’s application are a horrendous threat to free speech. No one should ever be convicted under such a law.
He’s not totally off the hook, though because I also would argue that what he did was decidedly innappropriate. As foolish as the concept may be to us, prayer or meditation rooms are reasonably expected to be a no-confrontation zone. For whatever reason, including psychological fear of flying, people seek silence and respite there, and that is the purpose of that room (as opposed to the whole rest of the airport).
We would not accept a Christian posting anti-Islam materials there, or a anti Semite attacking Judaism there. The fact that this person was none of the above does not get him off the hook. That aspect (and that aspect only) was inappropriate and could be considered a kind of minor misdemeanor (as opposed to the draconian offense that was charged).
Yes, well I said in earlier posts, or comments on earlier posts, that there’s room for thinking he was rude and unkind, but the truly ridiculous and outrageous disproportion of his sentence caused that thought to shrink to invisibility.
Seeking silence and respite seems to me to be a neutral and secular activity; I don’t see why the room should be called a prayer room. Calling it a prayer room at best makes it useless for non-religious people; at worst it frankly excludes them.
I don’t think Taylor should have been legally punished in any way; the chaplain could always have sought a restraining order banning him from the “prayer” room.
Alas, UK airports are, by tradition, god-infested. BAA advertises it as one of Heathrow’s delights:
http://www.heathrow-airport-guide.co.uk/worship.html
Taylor should not have been prosecuted at all. His alleged offence was intentionally insulting people, aggravated because he was especially targeting religious people. The Blair government brought in the religiously aggravated nonsense as part of their toadying to the religious, on the false analogy with racially aggravated abuse: insulting people just because their skin is dark is worse than insulting them because (say) they have bad taste in music.
Taylor was not aiming to insult people. He was aiming – possibly clumsily and ineffectually – to criticise the existence of a ‘prayer room’ in an airport named after a hero who saw through (some of) the religions.
The chaplain (who I ignorantly and stupidly referred to as ‘he’) should not have called the police. She had no reason to have felt personally insulted. Ideally, she might have asked the police for help in finding Taylor, so that she could talk to him, and ask him to desist. According to the gospel legends, that is what Jesus would have done. If (which would surprise me) Taylor had refused to desist, she could then have tried to get him banned from the airport.
Once he had been brought to trial, the judge should have thrown out the case without putting it to the jury. Unfortunately, the judge and the jury appear to have been, ahem, bigoted. (Note for non-UK readers: this is a reference to Gordon Brown’s insulting of an elector in Rochdale. Bet we don’t see him in the dock.)
God-infested airports; this I did not know.