Motes, beams and whinging Christians

Here is the story that has caught the attention of Christians around the world, especially the right-wing types. As usual there is more than meets the eye and their accounts are not entirely truthful.

A fundamentalist Baptist was standing on the street in England yelling out one of his typical sermons to people who found themselves within earshot of the man. Among his content was the usual rant that fundamentalists have against those demonic homosexuals, their favorite scapegoat for all that is wrong in the world today. He was then arrested under Section 5 of the Public Order Act for causing "harassment, alarm, or distress." He was told that he couldn't do this in public again. Keep the words "harassment, alarm, or distress" in mind.

Right-wing websites are in an uproar. One site falsely claimed that the same sort of arrest could happen in America because of hate crime legislation. There is no truth to that claim. The right-wing Melanie Phillips claimed that the minister was arrested merely for "preaching Christian principles," and that this is proof that "the attempt to stamp out Christianity in Britain appears to be gathering pace." According, to Phillips this is being done "under the rubric of promoting tolerance and equality—but only towards approved groups" and "some people are more equal than others." Phillips seems quite clear that while gays are protected Christians are not.


Phillips tried to tie this into unrelated cases to prove her claim that poor Christians are being oppressed in England. She lies about the actions of one "poor pensioner" who she says merely complained to her council about a gay parade. I covered this case and the "poor pensioner" was an antigay campaigner who went to a gay event and intentionally insulted people and then demanded they be censored by the law when they were rude to her in return. That, as we shall see, is fairly typical for Christian conservatives.

Phillips also wrote of government employees who were fired for being Christians. In fact they were fired for refusing to do the job they were hired to do. These were civil servants who refused to give services to gay people that are routine for others. If a Christian won't do their job they should be fired just as any employee who refuses to do their job should be fired. Religion is not an excuse for failure to perform according to the job contract. Phillips apparently thinks it is. In another case she laments how someone could lose a job for wearing a cross. Again that is the typical distortion of the Religious Right. In that case the employer had a rule against all employees wearing any jewelry, regardless of the content. Christians weren't being singled out.

The Christian Institute, in the UK, which always get involved in these cases, has come to the Baptist's defense claiming his rights as a Christian are being violated. Catholic conservative Cristina Odone made reference to "inquisitors" fuelled by "a vicious secularism that allows no tolerance for views based on Christian values." I guess as a Catholic she would be an expert on the Inquisition, after all, they invented it.

Make no mistake about it, I don't condone the arrest. It was wrong. But it is not an example of Christians being singled out for persecution, as they would have you believe.

The law is question is bad. Unlike all the Christians who have whinged about this case I actually support freedom of speech for everyone. None of them do. They are merely a special interest group wanting to protect their turf. They want the right to criticize and condemn others but equally wish to deny others the right to criticize or condemn Christianity.

Here is some evidence. While we all have read about the Baptist bigot who got arrested, how many heard about the atheist arrested on the exact same charge? His crime, however, was insulting Christians. According to the BBC, Harry Taylor, was "found guilty of causing religious aggravate intentional harassment, alarm or distress" because he left anti-religious leaflets in the Liverpool airport "prayer room." (Why do airports need prayer rooms but bus stations don't?)

These two incidents were only a few weeks apart. Yet the one got hardly any notice while the Christian Right has been bleating about the other endlessly.

Taylor had leaflets with cartoons. One showed Jesus on the cross smiling as he advertised "no nails" glue. Another showed Islamists at heaven's gate being told: "Stop, stop, we've run out of virgins." According to the BBC the chaplain at the airport was "severely distressed" by the cartoons. Really? What a wimp! Taylor was banned "from carrying religiously offensive material in a public place," and given a suspended six month jail term, 100 hours of unpaid work and a £250 fine.

Notice that Taylor was charged with precisely the same offense. But his punishment was far more severe than that inflicted on the Baptist. The Baptist stood on a step-ladder shouting at people. Taylor left leaflets sitting around. But I can't find any prominent right-wing columnist lamenting the death of free speech in Taylor's case. These right-wing hypocrites are selective advocates of freedom of speech. Their view is: "Free speech for me, censorship for thee."

What these cases show is the totalitarian nature of England's laws on speech. I've argued that before. It is not merely an attack on Christian values, as the Right wants to pretend. It is an attack on the most fundamental secular right of all—the right to express an opinion, even an offensive one. This is an assault on classical liberal values, not on Christian values. Christians don't value freedom of speech.

What is especially irksome in these hypocritical rants is that some of the same groups lobbied for legislation to prevent criticism of religion. The Vatican lobbied for laws restricting the right to criticize religion. When the controversy over the cartoons of the alleged Prophet Mohammad started in Denmark, Vatican officials were out in public demanding censorship and special laws restricting freedom of speech. Cardinal Ersilio Tonini said "Freedom of the press, including satire, must stop where religious belief begins." Cardinal Achille Silvestrini said: "Western culture must find a limit to its goal of making freedom an absolute. We too, here in Europe, should rebel against the idea of mocking religious symbols."

According to one Catholic site Cardinal Silestrini "said Christianity has similar sensitivities." Aldoo Giordano, general secretary of the Council of European Bishops' Conferences, said on Vatican radio that the satire used regarding Mohammad "goes against human rights" and that "the entire Christian world is very saddened and pained by satire of this type, aimed at the brothers of another religion."

Cristina Odone didn't utter a peep about that, but then it was the actual source of the Inquisition demanding the censorship, so she was fine.

The Vatican itself issued a statement regarding the cartoons that expressly said that censorship ought to be the law. "The right to freedom of thought and expression... cannot entail the right to offend the religious sentiment of believers."

On the one hand we have Christians weeping and wailing when the law is used to silence their anti-gay sentiments. When the same law is used to silence an atheist not a single one of these Christians uttered a peep. And when the cartoons "insulted" the alleged prophet of Islam we saw religious leaders demanding censorship. They said the law should not allow people to cause distress to others. Unless, of course, those others are gay, then the law should support unlimited bigotry because that's what Jesus would do.

Once again we see the Religious Right refusing to support freedom as a principle. To them freedom of speech is a special privilege bestowed on them, but denied to others. Equality of rights, in their mind, is "special rights."

As a classical liberal or modern libertarian, I argue that what is good for the goose is good for the gander. The Baptist bigot should be allowed to shout until horse, if he wants. But the offensive atheist shouldn't be banned from handing out "offensive" leaflets either. These Christians need to be a little more honest and a little more rational—I know the latter request goes against everything they believe.

When they lobby for laws that ban speech for causing "distress," as they did during the Danish cartoon controversy, they have no right to complain when those laws bit them in the ass when they cause distress to gay people.

This is what really irks me about the Religious Right, they are totally Orwellian in the use of language. When the law censors critics of religion that is "respecting religious values." When the laws censors critics of homosexuality [which is as sensible as criticizing blue eyes] that is an assault on Western values. When gay people have the same rights as Christians that is "special rights" but when Christians have rights that gay people don't have, that is just peachy keen.

Rights are the same for everyone. So yes, the Baptist should be free to say all the silly things that Baptists are prone to say. They can't help it, it's in their nature. And critics of Islam or atheists with offensive leaflets, have the same rights as well. Gays can be called sinners and the Vatican can be ridiculed for all the various atrocities it has been involved with. Free speech is for everyone.

The same law in England was used against a Christian last week, and against an atheist a few weeks ago. The law was wrong both times. And while I condemn both applications of the law, the Christians who are now weeping about persecution, were silent when an atheist was the victim of the law. And just a couple of years ago these Christians were demanding legislation to protect people from the sorts of free speech they are now demanding.

Many years ago a minor figure in Christianity—after all he never became Pope or even a bishop—named Jesus said: "You hypocrite, first cast out the beam out of your own eye; and then shall you see clearly to cast out the mote out of your brother's eye." Of course, as a libertarian I'd reply: "Hey dude, keep you damn fingers out of my eyes unless I ask you to help." But he was much closer to a reasonable view than these whinging Christians today.

Knife weilding fanatical Muslims attack church property or not?

Exactly how would the Religious Right respond to the following story? A church puts up a billboard which questions some aspect of Islam. Within days the billboard is attacked three times. The church is inundated with unpleasant and threatening phone calls and emails from Muslims around the world. One fanatic shows up with a knife in hand and the church caves in and removes the billboard. What do you think conservatives would have to say about that?

Plenty I suspect. They would be outraged by the use of force to silence a religious institution. And they would be right to be outraged. All the above is true with the exception that the attacks were not carried out by Muslims but Christians. That may explain the relative silence from conservatives about this outrage.

St. Matthew-in-the-City is small Anglican church in Auckland, New Zealand. And it posted the following billboard on church property. Their purpose was the challenge the concept of a male God sending sperm to earth to impregnate a virgin. They don't buy that line at all and argue that the true meaning of Christmas is lost in all this mythology. It really doesn't matter whether or not what they say is right. The issue is their right to say it. I don't buy the mythology either but I suspect that their idea of the "true meaning of Christmas" is probably wrong as well. They said all they wanted was people to think about the story and it's meaning. Fair enough.
In less than a day the sign was attacked by a Christian who drove up to, then stood on the roof of the car and covered the sign with paint. A spokesman for the church commented after the first attack: "They are driven to give threats and abuse — and they say 'we love Jesus and he loves us'. I'm sorry, but they don't get the irony of their beahviour." Once news of the billboard got out "the church had spent yester answering hundreds of abusive emails and phone calls from around New Zealand and overseas." The billboard was replaced. Someone stole that billboard and it was then replaced.

Then yesterday the Vicar of the church, Glynn Cardy, said the billboard was "attacked by a knife-wielding Christian fanatic who was then apprehended by a group of homeless people who care about our church. Later in the evening another group of fanatics ripped it down.

I can't imagine the outcry if Muslims had done a similar thing to church property. I am sure it would be very loud, very vocal, very hysterical. Glen Beck would have fits for days about the actions of the fanatics. But it wasn't Muslims, it was Christians who acted this way. That explains the silence. And only that explains the silence. The outcry from the Right over the Islamic response to the cartoon controversy was phony from the get-go. The Right doesn't believe in free speech at all. What it came down to was that the Right hates Muslims more than it hates free speech. There are no principles involved just competing hates. And sinces they dislike Muslims more than free speech they used the free speech issue to beat up on Muslims (not that the Muslims didn't deserve it).

But now the controversy was over Christians attacking a cartoon image they found offensive. So all the moral posturing from the Right about freedom of thought and the sanctity of open debate has disappeared and they react to this attack with silence. You figure out why that is.

Silencing the heretics: the Holy Inquisition of the Warmers

The presumed hacking of emails and records from the Climate Research United at the University of East Anglia has drawn a great deal of attention. And there is even some speculation that the hacking wasn’t a hacking a leak.

Some of the coverage, especially from fellow travellers with the warming advocates, repeats the party line that “there’s nothing here to see folks, just keep moving.” But there is enough meat in the documents to attract the attention of some press outlets usually known for their uncritical acceptance of anything the warming advocates say.

The Washington Post is as “establishment” media as you can get, only bested by the New York Times. It tends to be a reliable ally for the warming advocates. Yet, even the Post found the emails worthy of a news story that was less than flattering. It described the emails as providing a “rare glimpse into the behind-the-scenes battle to shape the public perception of global warming.” I would have hoped it was a battle over the facts of science myself. But it is what it is.

The Post says that the emails revealed the defenders of the consensus as a circle of intellectuals “eager to punish its enemies.” And it describes them actively campaigning to stop studies from being published, if those studies do not correspond with their “consensus.” In one email, the center’s director, Phil Jones, writes to prominent warming advocate Michael Mann, concerning some studies that contradict aspects of his own theories. Jones tells Mann: “I can’t see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow—even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!”

The Post reveals:

In another, Jones and Mann discuss how they can pressure an academic journal not to accept the work of climate skeptics with whom they disagree. "Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal," Mann writes. "I will be emailing the journal to tell them I'm having nothing more to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor," Jones replies.

As warming skeptic, Patrick Michaels notes in the Post article, this sort of attempt to intimidate editors into refusing to publish papers contrary to the “consensus” is very troubling. Michaels said “these same academics repeatedly criticized him for not having published more peer-reviewed papers.” On the one hand the number of published papers are used against critics while the warming advocates are simultaneously working behind-the-scenes to make sure that they don’t get papers published.

In one email to Jones, Mann complains about a paper published by Climate Research. He complains that the paper “couldn’t have cleared a ‘legitimate peer review process anywhere.” But since the paper was published, in spite of Mann’s opposition to it: “That leaves only one possibility—that the peer-review process at Climate Research has been hijacked by a few skeptics on the editorial board.” Mann says that the hijackers presumably include “a member of my own department.”

Mann is upset that the skeptics “achieved what they wanted—the claim of a peer-reviewed paper.” He laments that once published, “there is nothing we can do about” it now. Instead he suggests pretending that the paper was never published saying it “will be ignored by the community on the whole.”

Mann refers to the strategy of attacking skeptics on the basis of peer-reviewed papers and says that the paper in question reveals of the “danger” of that tactic. He says that the skeptics responded by a “take-over” of the journal. It strikes me as a bit paranoid to assume that the only way ones critics pass peer-review is by a plot to take over a journal.

Mann then suggests that the journal in question must be punished. He says: “So what do we do about this? I think we have to stop considering Climate Research as a legitimate peer-reviewed journal. Perhaps we should encourage our colleagues in the climate research community to no longer submit to, or cite papers in, this journal.”

Jones writes back: “I will be emailing the journal to tell them I’m having nothing to do with it until they rid themselves of this troublesome editor.” He notes that his own organization has “a person… on the editorial board, but papers get dealt with by the editor assigned by Hans von Storch.” Jones says he tried to get von Storch to stop publishing critics: “I’ve had words with Hans von Storch about this, but got nowhere.”

In another set of emails Tom Wigley writes Jones, Mike Hulme (who we have covered in our previous post on this issue) and Timothy Carter. It appears to be about the journal edited by von Storch. Wigley says he is unsure of the “best way” way to handle the problem of critical papers getting published. He says: “Hans von Storch is partly to blame—he encourages the publication of crap science ‘in order to stimulate debate.’” Well, they can’t have that, can they?

Wigley says that perhaps the best method of making sure skeptics are not published “is to go direct to the publishers and point out the fact that their journal is perceived as being a medium of disseminating misinformation under the guise of refereed work.” Wigley goes further noting that it doesn’t actually matter if this is true or not. “I use the word ‘perceived’ here, since whether it is true or not is not what the publishers care about—it is how the journal is seen by the community that counts.” Wigley says he get a “large group of highly credentialed scientists to sign such a letter — 50+ people.”

Wigley says he added Hulme to the discussion because Hulme previously suggested they “get board members to resign,” but Wigley said that wouldn’t work. The board members they would get to walkout would be the ones on their side and they might get replaced with skeptics. Instead, he says they “must get rid of von Storch” and says that a mass protest to the publishers, aimed at von Storch “might remove that hurdle too.”

In another exchange, Wigley writes to Mann about the Geophysical Research Letters journal, another journal that deem too unreliable for their agenda. Mann says: “It’s one thing to lose Climate Research. We can’t afford to lose GRL.” This was over a paper the journal wanted to publish. Mann says they need to investigate and if “there is a clear body of evidence that something is amiss, it could be taken through the proper channels.”

Wigley responds that “GRL had gone downhill rapidly in recent years” but says “proving bad behavior here is very difficult.” But, says that if “you think that [the editor] is in the greenhouse skeptics camps, then, if we can find documentary evidence for this, we could go through official AGU (American Geophysical Union) channels to get him ousted.”

In another exchange Graham Haughton speaks of another climate journal that Jones considered unreliable. Haughton also feels it necessary to remind Jones that academic freedom includes critics. He says that when he next sees the editor he will try to “have a quiet word with her about the way the affiliation to us is used, but the moment she is entitled to use it in the way she does.” H tells Jones, “I want to protect another academic’s freedom to be contrary and critical, even if I personally believe she is probably wrong.” (Good for Haughton.)

While some are still trying to pretend that the leaked documents mean nothing, or only that one has to be intellectually challenged to take them seriously, one of the most reliable advocates for the warming crowd realizes the evidence is very damning indeed. Left-wing columnist George Monbiot has been a staunch advocate of the warming scare and he says he and his allies have a problem.

It's no use pretending this isn't a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I'm dismayed and deeply shaken by them.

Yes, the messages were obtained illegally. Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public. Yes, some of the comments have been taken out of context. But there are some messages that require no spin to make them look bad. There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.

Worse still, some of the emails suggest efforts to prevent the publication of work by climate sceptics, or to keep it out of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I believe that the head of the unit, Phil Jones, should now resign. Some of the data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed.

Monbiot’s response after this is to note that these emails alone, don’t prove the anthropogenic theory of warming as false, but then no one said they did. He then concocts absurd satirical emails that would prove that. However, he does recognize that the real emails that have been released are a major blow to the political agenda that he, and the email authors, shared. It is no longer sufficient for the apologists to claim this was merely harmless banter. It is clear that these men were trying to figure out how to apply political pressure to silence critics of their own theories and shut down debate. I repeat my claim from my previous post: this is not science at work, this is politics.

One problem with the hack/leak is the massive volume of material that has been released. More and more eyes are going through the material every day. As more and more material is exposed concerns about the leak itself will diminish with most people and concerns about the content of the material will increase.

I will try to cover more angles of this story, including emails which show that data sets, used to calculate current global temperature trends, were hidden from skeptics. In the emails they discussed that the best strategy to avoid a Freedom of Information request was to claim that they lost the data. Coincidentally, when a request for such data was made, the CRU claimed that they didn’t keep the “original raw data” and couldn’t supply it, precisely the strategy planned in the emails. I suggest this story is just beginning.

Addendum: When this was posted I did not read the comments to Monbiot's piece at the Guardian. However, it was brought to my attention that Monbiot actually posted an additional comment there which is pretty shocking. One reader commented: "By now I suggest you review your file of correspondence and articles, and figure out who you need to apologize to." What was truly shocking was Monbiot's response: "I apologise. I was too trusting of some of those who provided the evidence I championed. I would have been a better journalist if I had investigated their claims more closely."

A little more comes out about the old bigot.

In my previous post I mentioned how Pauline Howe, of England, was demanding that the city council strip gays of the right to have a rally because she found them offensive. According to the news story that ran she wrote an anti-gay letter to the city council and was visited by the police, who filed no charges. They were investigating whether a hate crime had been committed by her letter, or so we were told.

But it seems Howe intentionally tries to agitate people. She didn't merely write a letter to the council while spending her days sitting at home, sipping tea and watching the telly. The gay rally she wanted banned was one she attended. She went with the express purpose of handing antigay tirades to gay people. This sweet old lady was not so sweet after all.

Howe said she went with other "Christians" to protest "the public display of such indecency on the streets of Norwich which is so offensive to God and to many Norwich residents." She handed out anti-gay leaflets to people at the rally. So she was intentionally offensive to them. And people responded, as you might predict. But no one violated her rights. She says that the people she attacked "were in our faces with aggressive verbal abuse." In other words, the people at the rally responded to her speech with their own speech.

And this old cow then sends a letter to the city council demanding that the speech of others be restricted while her own speech be allowed to flourish. But, she entertains the delusion that she is speaking for some god.

The Christian Institute is, as expected, defending Howe's demands that others be censored because apparently Howe's "rights to free speech and religious liberty under the Human Rights Act" were being transgressed.

I would say that is the case. But I still have no sympathy for this old woman. She believes in censorship. She demands it for others while claiming free speech for herself. By her own values there are no rights to free speech. Or, does she really want to admit that she believes only Christians like herself have rights and that other people do not.

She had the right to go hand out her narrow-minded, religiously-induced hate leaflets. And the recipients of those leaflets had the right to tell her off verbally. That is freedom and that is what happened. But it was then Howe who demanded that the State step in and ban one side of the debate, and only one side.

Yet, as predicted, the fundamentalist Christian Institute is making out that Howe was the victim. And, I can assure you that other fundamentalist groups will pick up on that distortion, probably magnify it several times over, and spread the falsehood around. Keep watching the web to see if that happens.

Free Speech Under Assault