Interesting Links for 15-02-2012

[andrewducker]

• When will experiences replace movie theaters?
  I think people enjoy passive entertainment a lot, so I don't expect movies to go anywhere. It would be nice to see more "experiences", but I suspect that their cost is going to remain a chunk higher than a movie ticket.
  (tags: movies experience life fun museums culture )
• Some detail on what people who identify as "Christian" in the census actually believe
  (tags: religion uk census poll )
• Dutch government calls for loosening of copyright law. Could the tide be turning?
  (tags: copyright netherlands law government )
• Online RPGs WILL DESTROY YOUR RELATIONSHIP. Unless you play together, of course.
  (tags: relationships mmorpg )
• Some common sense on prayer and councils.
  What occurred to me, when reading someone else's journal, was that atheists are merely going to be irked by compulsory Christian prayers - but think about the effect it has on a Muslim, Sikh, etc. that in order to represent their constituents they have to sit through the prayers of a different religion.
  (tags: religion politics uk )
• Game of Thrones Valentine's Day cards
  (tags: gameofthrones valentines_day )
• The UK devolved rights to Antarctica to Scotland - by mistake. Now they want them back.
  (tags: scotland antarctic uk oil )
• The BBC replaces the word "Palestine" with the sound of breaking glass. No, really.
  (tags: bbc palestine israel censorship )
• Firefox Roadmap for 2012
  (tags: firefox web 2012 )
• This video is genius. Horrific, hilarious, genius. I can't say more than that without spoiling it.
  (tags: horror funny nsfw video )
• What If All the Cats in the World Suddenly Died?
  (tags: cats )
• Chocolate + Apple = best valentine's present evar.
  (tags: valentines_day apple chocolate ipad )
• Shitstorm 'best English gift to German language'
  (tags: english german language )
• Being left/right-handed affects your preferences
  (tags: handedness psychology )
• Game Developer Gives 7-Year-Old Best Birthday Present Ever
  (tags: awesome children computer_games )
• 9 Essential Skills Kids Should Learn
  (tags: children development )

Comments

The comment I left on the prayers & councils post

[azurelunatic]

(I come to this discussion as a US citizen, with no official state religion, although Christianity has a strong presence in the country.)

I happen to be a pagan, and while I can often find common cause with people of other faiths, I am generally none too happy to sit silently through prayers in the name of other religions when those prayers don’t directly speak to the reason I’m present. (I don’t so much mind Christian weddings, for example, as presumably the happy couple has made a deliberate choice to solemnize their partnership in this fashion.) Even when I agree with the topic of the prayers, if not the name in which it is offered, it is an uncomfortable reminder that I am a member of a minority religion. It does not give me a sense of peaceful purpose, it makes me angry, defensive, and prepared to give as good as I get. That is generally a counterproductive sentiment, and regardless of my personal work in trying to keep a clear head regardless, I would be much happier at college graduations, hockey games, and the like, if prayers were omitted. I cannot imagine attempting to usefully engage in government under those circumstances.

[naath.livejournal.com]

Baroness Warsi appears to think that mandatory Christian prayers for councillors are a good idea... AIUI she is a practising Muslim. I don't really understand where she is coming from on that though.

[andrewducker]

I've been assuming that she comes from a "Religion is better than not-religion" point of view, where she doesn't want laws brought in that would make life harder for religious people (including Muslims).

[philmophlegm.livejournal.com]

Did someone confuse "Scott of the Antarctic" with "The Antarctic of the Scots"...?

[andrewducker]

Hah!

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

‘implying that [Palestine] is not free is the contentious issue’

Who thinks this is contentious? Not to mention I'm sure this sort of commentary about other countries wouldn't face the same kind of censorship...

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

As an observant non-Christian religious person, I would much rather have to do DIY observance outside non-religious meetings than be forced to be present for the observance of the dominant hegemonic religion to be able to participate in government (or whatever)! That makes no sense!

[andrewducker]

The fact that they can hold the same religious meetings five minutes earlier in the same room makes it fairly clear cut to me.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

I’m not sure if the article on the Antartic being devolved to Holyrood is a spoof or not but…


… Given the doctrine of Parliamentary Sovereignty Westminster can just legislate to change the Scotland Act and return powers over Antartica to Westminster. The Scottish Government has pretty no come back to that at all.

The negotiaion over the Indepedence referendum arises because the Westminster government genuinely recognise the legitimacy of the people of Scotland having a referendum and the genuine but remote possibility that Salmond could place himself at the head of an angry mob / organised insurrection if the wishes of the people of Scotland were ignored.

I don’t see myself rioting over Antartica – no matter how much oil you could extract from penguins if you minced them finely enough.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

As an atheists (and speaking for my people) I might well be irked by formal prayers before procedings.

Perhaps not as much as a member of another faith group would be.

[a-pawson.livejournal.com]

… Given the doctrine of Parliamentary Sovereignty Westminster can just legislate to change the Scotland Act and return powers over Antartica to Westminster. The Scottish Government has pretty no come back to that at all.

I believe not. Westminster can amend the Scotland act, but the Scottish parliament would also have to agree to rescind those powers. That's sort of the point of devolution, you can't hand over powers but retain the ability to remove them whenever you feel like it.

The Express has a little more info. It seems that the Scotland Bill committee at Holyrood (under the previous government) agreed to basically undo that part of the legislation, but the current committee have decided to oppose it. The SNP have the means to make political capital out of this and it looks like they may do so.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

Politically it may be the case that Holyrood is asked to consent to amendments to the Scotland Act constitutionally Westminster can do whatever it wants.

Westminster consents to bound by the Scotland Act and the ECHR but, unless the constituation has fundamentally changed since I was at law school in the 90's the Queen in Parliament is sovereign and unbound.

[spacelem.livejournal.com]

It largely depends on whether I was forced to attend or (or even participate) in the prayers in order to be present at the proceedings. If I'm allowed to arrive late, then fine. If not, then I must whole heartedly show my encouragement, by providing background music to the prayer. With a kazoo.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

There was a comment kicking about somewhere about people using prayer sessions to bags seats.

Might not seem an important point most of the time but there could be occassions when you really want or need to sit with someone.

So, even if not compulsory one is at a disadvantage if one doesn’t want to sit through a formal prayer session.

[spacelem.livejournal.com]

A good point, although I doubt you could argue that being unable to have your choice of seat was necessarily something they were required to do anything about.

[danieldwilliam.livejournal.com]

No, but if there is going to be a free for all I'd like not to start at the back of the scrum on account of my religious affiliation.

[steer.livejournal.com]

It depends on whether you see this story as "mandatory prayers have now been made optional" or as "optional prayers have now been banned from happening". Without actually being in the sessions I guess it's pretty hard to tell. Different newspapers covered the story in different ways.

There's a world of difference between a few councillors quietly having a prayer before a meeting and between a few councillors praying and expecting the atheist one to join in.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Did you hear Dawkins being skewered on Radio four in an interview about that poll? Hilarious... he was huffing and puffing in his way about "not proper christians if" (which always winds me up as I fit his definition of "not proper christian" -- seriously, do I tell him how to be a biologist?)... and one of his points was "can hardly be a proper Christian if they don't know the name of the first book of the new testament"... in a brilliant moment the interviewer asked him if he knew the full title of "Origin of the Species". He replied that of course he did. The interviewer asked him what it was. There was a couple of minutes of spluttering sounds and vague guesses that there was some kind of subtitle (to be fair it's long and I can't remember it). I doubt it will dissuade him of the idea that somehow a lack of knowledge is the same as a lack of sincerity but it was a marvellous moment.

[andrewducker]

Nobody has been banned from having a prayer session before the council sessions - To quote the original BBC article:
Mr Justice Ouseley ruled the prayers were not lawful under section 111 of the Local Government Act 1972.

However, he said prayers could be said as long as councillors were not formally summoned to attend.

They just can't force others to attend by holding them during the council sessions.

[naath.livejournal.com]

I read the actual judgement; prayers have certainly not been banned.

Having not attend this council I am unclear on whether the prayers were previous optional or compulsory but they were on the official agenda. Now they must not be on the official agenda; but can happen pre-meeting (or post-meeting, or whenever else people like); they are even allowed to use the council chamber to hold them in.

[andrewducker]

It was funny, but not actually meaningful. The Bible is the source of truth for Christianity. It is their central religious work, from which all truth springs.

The Origin Of The Species was a groundbreaking work of science which will not add anything to the understanding of a modern biologist who has read the same (and updated) information elsewhere.

[steer.livejournal.com]

Sure... I'm familiar with the judgement. Now you can see that judgement as being a judgement that councillors are not forced to attend a session where prayers take place (excellent) or you can see that judgement as a judgement that informal prayers cannot now take place during the session but must take place before hand (not, perhaps, so excellent).

What I'm interested in was what was actually happening in that particular council chambers where the original debate took place. I can well see the possibility of pushy over-religious types forcing their prayers or beliefs on someone else. On the other hand, I can equally well see a few harmless people wanting to introduce prayers into the meeting if they take their job extremely seriously and believe it important.

I mean there are loonies on all sides in this debate. Take the lib dem bloke you linked to who, in all seriousness, said "My human rights were infringed" because he was asked to go into the chamber when prayers were being held. (I'd have had sympathy if he'd, say, made his objections clear and seen what happened, but his claim was that his human rights were infringed by simply someone asking him to go into the chamber and him doing it. Even though, we've no indication that, if he'd made clear his objection, the other people wouldn't have gone, "gosh, terribly sorry, how thoughtless of us, you take your time, we'll call you when we finish.")

[steer.livejournal.com]

Well, prayers have been banned during the council session itself but can take place before. See above. Whether you see that as a ban or not is really a matter of perspective.

[andrewducker]

I think that forcing people to engage in religious ceremonies is an infringement of their rights. I don't think it's a major one for most people - but if every morning in work I had to take part in a religious ceremony I'd be feeling really unhappy about it.

And we know that some people weren't happy about it, because they'd already had a vote on it, in which the prayer people had won. One assumes there was a debate involved in that.

[steer.livejournal.com]

It is their central religious work, from which all truth springs.

I'm afraid I find that sort of statement slightly offensive. I'm a Christian. I do not believe all truth springs from the bible. I'm pretty offended anyone would think I would believe something so patently and obviously daft. I imagine a fairly high percentage of Christians are in this position.

I happen to have read the bible. I can't remember even a high percentage of it. I wouldn't question the faith or sincerity of someone who hadn't. I guess it's not just relgion that gets this. The "if you were really sincere you would..." argument is prevelant in a lot of beliefs:

If you were a committed vegetarian you wouldn't wear leather shoes.
If you were a committed environmentalist you'd never take a car anywhere.
If you were a committed socialist you'd have read Das Kapital (actually I haven't).

I'm just always a bit doubtful of the reasoning behind someone who makes this kind of comment. Why are they trying to state that someone's declared beliefs are not their real beliefs. That's why I'm really dubious about Dawkin's "not a real Christian" crusade. It's all so similar to a telegraph column about people who don't really believe in the environment, equality etc etc...