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Religions and cults on the streets of Brixton

Nutters all. Luckily living in the sticks I am insulated from them for now.

We do have the occasional big issue seller, in fact today I was rushing back to my car trying to keep my shopping dry in the rain and there was one, I could only say "not today sorry" .. as I rushed past. Felt a bit guilty, I usually make a point of buying it.
 
The man with the golden mic

Street Preachers of Brixton: the one with the golden microphone


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Street Preachers of Brixton: the louche one with the golden microphone

Seen leaning against the wall by Brixton tube station yesterday was this rather louche street preacher, clad in black leather and sporting a natty golden microphone/speaker combo.
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I just thought people might like to know that controversy about street preachers goes back a long way. Possibly further back than Urban75? This cutting is from the Gay Gazette 8th November 1995.
I am intrigued by the quote from Lambeth's Lesbian and Gay officer, Peter Woodward, who is supposed to have said that this was "a private matter between travellers and the preachers".
Turbulent priests.jpg
 
I happened upon a documentary about the Black Hebrew Israeites.
I think this was on Channel Four about 5 years ago, and is now preserved on the Vice section of Vimeo.
Its not very PC actually, the programme is fronted by Jamali Raddix - a black stand-up who seems to specialise in making his largely white audience choke on their drinks.
When it comes to the Black Hebrew Israelites -who he follows and interviews in Harlem, Philadelphia and Charlotte North Carolina, he seems to build a rapport based on them all being a bit eccentric.
The scene where they all pile into a firing range for a bit of weapons practice makes you wonder. Like Louis Theroux with Uzis.


Not Brixton - but gives the background to our lot.
 
CH1 said:
I happened upon a documentary about the Black Hebrew Israeites.
I think this was on Channel Four about 5 years ago, and is now preserved on the Vice section of Vimeo.
Its not very PC actually, the programme is fronted by Jamali Raddix - a black stand-up who seems to specialise in making his largely white audience choke on their drinks.
When it comes to the Black Hebrew Israelites -who he follows and interviews in Harlem, Philadelphia and Charlotte North Carolina, he seems to build a rapport based on them all being a bit eccentric.
The scene where they all pile into a firing range for a bit of weapons practice makes you wonder. Like Louis Theroux with Uzis.


Not Brixton - but gives the background to our lot.
Click to expand...


I'm not surprised I've seen local Black people arguing with them. The few minutes I watched of Vimeo and they were saying Martin Luther King was a traitor to Black people and that Black people should not vote for Obama as his African predecessors sold Black people into slavery.

Totally off the wall offensive stuff this.
 
Not Brixton - but an example of what might happen in Brixton if the police were more assertive in controlling street preaching.
This was tweeted out by Richard Tice, and attracted a variety of comments along the lines of why can't people preach against gays?
Didn't hear the guy doing that, maybe he did it earlier and that is why the police were called?
Then again maybe in Uxbridge the anti-covid regulations apply to town square preaching.
 
I wonder if this scholarly article is of interest? How Do You Distinguish between Religious Fervor and Mental Illness?

There is relatively little literature on whether street preaching is deluded .

The idea of evangelical busybodies who tell you what to do to be saved was satirised in Wilkie Collin's famous detective novel The Moonstone in 1868 Miss Clack - Wikipedia
Miss Clack was a great fan of giving people written tracts as an aid to salvation.
 
Apologies for not having a photo - but I rather unexpectedly saw a stall for Eckankar outside Iceland this morning. There were two stall minders, a black guy with a blue Eckankar sweatshirt, and a black woman companion - both attending to their stall as one would to a local charity at the Lambeth Country Show (of blessed memory).
I chatted with them as I had come across this organisation about 20 years ago in the Eastern region of Ghana, where they had a "church" or meeting hall.

They were enthused I had "met" them before, and the guy said he had been to the commemoration of their new building in Accra, Ghana.

This appears to be a new-age off-shoot of Hinduism, and the HQ is in the USA (where else).
en.wikipedia.org

Eckankar - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

The Wikipedia article point out that there is a death penalty for belonging to this group in Iran - which has been carried out.
I'm no expert in non-Abrahamic religions, but to me this seems like a late twentieth century version of Theosophy.

They have plenty of literature on their stall, more pamphlets than "Das Kapital" tomes. I didn;t ask if they were give-aways or for sale.
 
8ball said:
I wonder if this 'Dianetics' branding is an attempt to escape the attention of Anonymous and similar...
Click to expand...
Well you’ve blown their cover now.

We don’t get an awful lot here but London has a long and proud heritage of religious judgemental types and find it pleasant to engage when I am over.
It’s very amusing to agree with whatever they have to say.
I used to get told I was going to hell on my commute to work. Yeah. Well. Essentially we all are.

I actually got a fucking handwritten letter from the JW’s. But everyone in the flats got one. It was obviously someone who had gotten the JWs equivalent of a detention.
I get Scientology leaflets about the dangers of drugs. But I think that’s for the guys downstairs who smoke on their balcony. I’m not a moron.
 
Your latest chap seems intense in a WWF kind of way.
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Street preachers of Brixton: the hellfire and brimstone chap

Thankfully only equipped with a small amp, this chap was keen to press home the advantages of following Jesus, predicting the direst of post-death futures for non-believers.
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I don't want to pre-empt any theological discussion, especially as preaching hellfire knows no denomination (cf Girolamo Savanorola the Dominican Friar who persuaded the Florentine merchants to burnt all their art works in a "bonfire of vanities") but the populist approach to hell fire must be down to John Calvin.
1658833829173.png
Calvin was the "spitter" who started putting fellow protestants on the bonfire, including Michael Servetus, a Spanish Unitarian who unwisely sought refuge from the Church of Rome in Geneva - then ruled by Calvin, who had already denounced Servetus to the French Inquisition.

These "Ranters" are not all pussy cats - some of them are wolves in sheep's clothing [Matthew 7 v15]
 
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Two more!

1659435171957.png

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Street preachers of Brixton: the leaflet shunting, quietly serenading one

The clement weather has resulted in a bumper selection of street preachers taking to the streets around Brixton recently, and this chap was seen plying his religious wares outside Barclays Bank on …
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1659435186403.png

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Street Preachers of Brixton: the one going on about Jesus knocking on your door

There was a tag team of street preachers busying themselves outside Brixton Morleys last week, with plenty of leaflets being thrust in the direction of passers by.
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