Category Archives: tolerance

Are Students Required To Accept Islam Is A Religion Of Peace? The BBC Thinks So..

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Religion of Peace

The BBC is not unaccustomed to criticism. Some of it is merited; some is simply due to their stature.  People love to take a swing at a giant once in a while. I hold no agenda to single out the BBC as frequently as I have this year; it’s just that they seem to be going out of their way to mock the gods of reason.

From the censorship of satire in response to a chorus of bleating from a humourless Christian minority, to refusal to re-think the increasingly outdated and less than inclusive format of its ‘Thought For The Day‘.

There was also that nasty business whereby a ‘journalist’ was able to assert something as utterly irresponsible as “men are raised to hate women” on the flagship BBC news programme, without so much as a follow-up question. Poor editorial indeed.

Throw in the BBC’s unquestioning promotion of Atheism Plus’ odious Block bot and we have an organisation that has truly earned itself a spell on my naughty step.

Imagine then, the look of unrefined exasperation on my face, as I completed a “Practice exam” on their High School revision service, GCSE Bitesize.  You could have driven a school bus into the gaping negative space created by the rapid expansion of my oral cavity.  I still have jaw ache.

For the uninitiated, GCSE’s are qualifications awarded to high school students (age 14-16) in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. The BBC’s ‘bitesize’ service aims to provide revision tools and practice exercises relevant to the current school curriculum. In this instance, the subject in question is Religious Studies, with a focus on Islam.

Upon taking the two minutes required to answer the questions in question, it soon became clear that the BBC, or the relevant educational bodies do not give a flying horse about objectivity where the ‘Religion Of Peace’ is concerned.

As you can see from the below, two questions in particular, or more specifically, what the exercise deems to be the correct response, caught my eye:

RelOfPeaceIslamEquality

If you’re unsure as to my gripe at this point, it may be best to return to your bubble.

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Quinn Norton: Trolling, “Men Are Raised To Hate Women” and Other Confusing Statements.

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They See Me Trollin'

Twitter has been big news of late, with reports that they plan to implement an abuse reporting function.  I’ve been asked a few times what my thoughts are on the matter, and I’m all for it.

Threatening and unlawful behaviour is completely unacceptable and those who engage in such a manner should be held accountable.  I displayed my willingness to side with this sentiment recently by reporting a clearly threatening tweet (not to me) to the police.

My only concern is: how will this be regulated?  Will Twitter have the manpower (or women!!!!!) to efficiently distinguish abusers and trollers from genuine disagreement or attempts to engage in meaningful discourse? Given the vast numbers of Twitter users and the seemingly unrealistic task of policing it, is it likely to be an unmanned,  automated process?  An algorithm simply reacting to multiple ‘abuse reports’? Only time will tell.

‘Troll’ seems the buzzword of late.  The problem is, that “troll” in the context of the internet has no unified definition.  I personally take trolling to mean the act of intentionally making insincere statements to an individual, or individuals in order to provoke a response, or as they would call it,  a “victory”. Others use it simply to describe an individual who seeks out arguments online.

I’m trolled daily in the former sense. People will tweet me en masse with clearly disingenuous statements in the hope that I may respond.  Sometimes I do, sometimes I don’t.  It often depends on how dull my commute to work is that morning.

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Leigh Patrick Sullivan, The Truth About “Atheist Tolerance” and Other Self-Delusion

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I spend a significant portion of my time debating and exchanging views with fellow primates on Twitter.  I make a rule of never being abusive, hostile or assuming to know what someone else believes.  I frequently pose my responses as questions, in order to avoid being presumptuous.

I also never tell anyone they haven’t the right to believe what they want to believe, as this would clearly be wrong.  I think the most I am guilty of is sarcasm, mockery and ridicule.  I’m perfectly comfortable with this.

I make sure I deal with the actual statements put forward, whether they are made to me specifically or to the “Twitterverse” in general. I aim to do this as calmly as possible and in a civil manner, often pointing out logical fallacies, or citing sources to address failures to understand established scientific concepts or terminology.

I’ve sent more than 11,000 tweets, and when I receive responses they often take the form of glaring ignorance, foul language/abuse/hostility/threats. I have never responded in kind.  I simply don’t need to.  Once someone decides to engage in that way, they lose any and all credibility, and I chalk it off as a victory. #AnotherSatisfiedCustomer.

It is confusing to me that religion appears to be the only domain of discourse where the mildest form of criticism at its expense is labelled as “intolerant” or “aggressive”.

This is especially concerning given the influence religion exudes on society as a whole.  There seems to be a growing trend, born out of desperation, to label any criticism of religion, however mild as “aggressive atheism”, or “militant atheism”, often atheism is interchanged with secularism to the same extent, but the same fallacy remains. Read more