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SWP supports blair's religious hatred laws...

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rednblack

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http://www.cpgb.org.uk/worker/594/rees.htm

Not unexpectedly, at Respect’s September 10 national council meeting, the SWP’s John Rees argued in favour of supporting the Blair government’s proposed laws on incitement to religious hatred...
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i'm assuming this story is true - and if john rees is going round saying this publically then he must be espousing the party line

would any swp members care to explain their party's reason for this?
 
It'll be something similar to their defence of faith schools (which was I think all about levelling the playing field for our muslim brothers, by keeping the field open for them to build competing schools to balance out christian ones), like saying that in practice British society is racist, and therefore only features incitement against the Muslim faith, therefore the anti-racist position is to outlaw all religious incitement, as this effectively means anti-muslim incitement.

(of course the whole thing is just a justification for placating their muslim constituents on these issues, and declining from using their majority voting powers for actually voting through SWP policy)
 
yeah i'm looking forward to another rebel warrior "moment"

we could actually just write it for him now and save her the bother
 
Would Marx have been locked up under anti-relgious hatred laws for his views on the "Jewish Question"?
 
Don't worry you rebel, I'll save you the bother and write it for you:

Anyone who opposes these moves is objectively in favour of religious hatred. While we are against the imperialist, neoliberal Labour party in theory, in practice we must a) call on the proles to vote for them to beat the "nazi" BNP and b) support them when they do anything which muslim community leaders approve of.

Socialists must take a principled position and defend those communities most demonised by the capitalist media and Blair and Bush's war on terror. If this means supporting those limits on free speech and the neoliberal governments we rail against, so be it.
 
The pro-faith school argument goes, as far as I am aware, that by supporting minority groups (be they religious, ethnic, gender based) with positive minorty rights actions, any effect of segregation from main stream society is offset by a general sense of inclusion that the minority group feels for being allowed to practice their minority culture freely within a broader society.

If they were banned from having, in this case, single faith school, it would create more resentment and more segregation.

I am not an SWP member, nor am I fully aware of the case for/against the new law banning incitement to religious hatred, other than a rather fuzzy case that it goes against freedom of speech. I think that case is pedantic, in that it is not the sentiment of the law to ban religious jokes,say, but rather to ban inticement to violence against minority (religious) groups.

If it ever got to the point that a case came to court for a religious joke being made (which I doubt) it would get thrown out of court and that would be the end of it.

I guess a parallel is the anti-smaking laws introduced in Alba - they are there to prosecute child abusers, not to imprison a parent who has given a rare smack to a child.

At this point in time the law seems reasonable to me, and I support it - however if it proves unworkable, or counterproductive I woud readily change my mind.

(why the incesant digs at the SWP? - leave the poor paper-pushers alone!)
 
niksativa said:
The pro-faith school argument goes, as far as I am aware, that by supporting minority groups (be they religious, ethnic, gender based) with positive minorty rights actions, any effect of segregation from main stream society is offset by a general sense of inclusion that the minority group feels for being allowed to practice their minority culture freely within a broader society.

If they were banned from having, in this case, single faith school, it would create more resentment and more segregation.
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Unity through Separatism?
Inclusion through Segregation?

Strewth. :rolleyes:
 
Are people on this thread argueing that there should be no alternative to mainstream state education? :confused:
'cos that would make them authoritarian tossers, wouldn't it?
 
rioted said:
Are people on this thread argueing that there should be no alternative to mainstream state education? :confused:
'cos that would make them authoritarian tossers, wouldn't it?
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When that current "alternative " is authoritarian religious education...
 
hibee said:
Don't worry you rebel, I'll save you the bother and write it for you:

Anyone who opposes these moves is objectively in favour of religious hatred. While we are against the imperialist, neoliberal Labour party in theory, in practice we must a) call on the proles to vote for them to beat the "nazi" BNP and b) support them when they do anything which muslim community leaders approve of.

Socialists must take a principled position and defend those communities most demonised by the capitalist media and Blair and Bush's war on terror. If this means supporting those limits on free speech and the neoliberal governments we rail against, so be it.
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I'll mark you a B+ for that.
It would've been a A+ but you didn't make gratuitous use of the word "totally" so I had to mark you down. :)
 
I was going to post a thread on this for discussion, because I haven't made up my mind yet.

Galloway voted for this in Parliament. The main argument in the Weekly Worker is that there is enough legislation on this topic already, and we shouldn't rely on the state to sort out these problems.
 
poster342002 said:
When that current "alternative " is authoritarian religious education...
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Well, if it's a fight between an authoritarian state and an authoritarian religion, I suggest the correct line is "a plague on both your houses" :)
 
rioted said:
Well, if it's a fight between an authoritarian state and an authoritarian religion, I suggest the correct line is "a plague on both your houses" :)
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So when the Israeli state demolishes mosques you'd say "a plague on both your houses"?
 
rioted said:
Are people on this thread argueing that there should be no alternative to mainstream state education? :confused:
'cos that would make them authoritarian tossers, wouldn't it?
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I thought it was just a thinly veiled anti-SWP thread.
 
mattkidd12 said:
The main argument in the Weekly Worker is that there is enough legislation on this topic already, and we shouldn't rely on the state to sort out these problems.
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Except they say that about nearly everything. You can defend the legislation without relying on it to replace the real struggle on the ground.
 
From a weekly worker article on this subject:

Naturally, we oppose and condemn fascist and chauvinist attacks on mosques and islamic centres. We would gladly unite with muslim activists to physically guard such buildings with whatever forces and whatever weapons we have at our disposal...But when it comes to the law there is no need for new legislation to protect muslims or any other religious cult for that matter. Daubing vile slogans on the walls of mosques, arson and incitement are already criminal offences. Indeed since 2001 there have been laws on the statute books which specifically created religiously aggravated offences.
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What will this new law achieve? Dr Siddiqui, of the Muslim Parliament, argues that these laws won't protect muslims, and could become a "dangerous double-edged sword."
 
Weekly Worker's use of the phrase 'religious cult' sums up what's wrong with so much of the far left and the way it approaches religion. The religious views and practices of millions are dismissed as cultilike by a genuine, tiny cult. Tribunes of the People my arse.

"Double-edged" as in freedom of speech presumably? Well I can see how it might be used against the nastier wing of Islamism when it confuses anti-zionism with anti-judaism but other than that where's the issue? Oh and Gilad Atzmon...but that's a good thing :)
 
it's interesting to see that annas altikrit former respect candidate and former MAB president is very sceptical about these new laws according to the weakly worker - he sems to be taking a more progressive line about it than the SWP, maybe the muslims in respect will drag the SWP to the left :p
 
We should all note that the CPGB report has very little validity - as not a single member of the CPGB were present at the National Council (a fact that they omit to mention in their "report") and they haven't actually quoted anyone who was there as saying that John Rees argued in favour of these laws - just a quote that he apparently suggested that Respect (as a broad coalition) take no position on these laws.

This is the usual innuendo, speculation, distortion and conjecture that we expect from the state-sponsored Weekly Wrecker
 
rioted said:
Are people on this thread argueing that there should be no alternative to mainstream state education? :confused:
'cos that would make them authoritarian tossers, wouldn't it?
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If you'd grown up in the segreagated west of scotland, as I did, you'd realise you're talking total bollocks.

If you anarachos want to have your own berry-munching classes or whatever, go ahead and set them up. The rest of us might want nothing to do with a system that enrenches divisions in the working class while strenghtening the position of religious community "leaders".
 
Udo Erasmus said:
We should all note that the CPGB report has very little validity - as not a single member of the CPGB were present at the National Council (a fact that they omit to mention in their "report") and they haven't actually quoted anyone who was there as saying that John Rees argued in favour of these laws - just a quote that he apparently suggested that Respect (as a broad coalition) take no position on these laws.

This is the usual innuendo, speculation, distortion and conjecture that we expect from the state-sponsored Weekly Wrecker
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but shouldn't a party which seeks out and tries to assimilate moslems have a position on this question?

jlr-borg.jpg


lindsey german recently
 
As an example of typical CPGB "journalism", the article describes Alan Thornett of the ISG's reluctance to enter in to debate with the CPGB.

This the Weekly Wrecker argues is because he is secretive and doesn't want Respect opened up to democratic scrutiny.

A more plausible reason for Alan Thornett's "evasiveness" when speaking to a member of the CPGB could be just that he has better things to do than waste precious time talking to an irrelevant sect
 
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