Man That You Fear

Sanity appears to have prevailed.  A man in Leicester who publicly tore pages from a Koran is not to be convicted of causing 'harassment, alarm or distress' to our religious friends.  Phew!

http://www.secularism.org.uk/news/2013/01/jury-dismissed-in-leicester-trial-of-man-accused-of-ripping-up-his-koran--no-retrial-planned

But, obviously, why the hell did this go to court?  What the hell was the CPS doing bringing charges?  Why the hell were the police involved in the first place?  Britain is no longer great if we cannot freely insult people who believe in medieval fairy tales.  It really, truly is that simple.  Religion is bollocks.  And people who believe in it are... generally... idiots.

The reason this piece particularly caught my attention was that I too have interacted with the Islamic Information Centre.  About 2 years ago in an idle moment I approached their stall in Leicester to peruse their wares.  I came away with a couple of pamphlets explaining how cosmology and modern science proves the existence of God... the God of their religion, natch.  The sort of rubbish that Jehovah's Witnesses will also hand you if you ask, but in that case the evidence apparently points to a different variant of God.  Strange.  Needless to say, the science and arguments in said pamplets are laughably childlike and prove only one thing - a major contributory factor in the propogation of the religion meme is utter ignorance of modern science.

While at the stall I had a quick chat with a nice chap from the IIC.  When I mentioned my interest in science he started telling me how the evidence supported his religious views.  When I demurred, he asked me something like 'so how do you explain how God created the Universe?'  To which I responded words to the effect 'oh, I don't believe in that nonsense'.  I didn't think much of it at the time, but in hindsight I could, at a stretch, have been charged with causing criminal offence.  This latest case suggests it is unlikely that I would have been successfully prosecuted, but that is hardly the point, is it?

Another thing.  At the same time as the IIC is handing out leaflets in the centre of Leicester, christian religious nutters can sometimes be seen and heard barking their dogmatic crap into a megaphone just across the way.  Presumably this is a deliberate response to the presence of the IIC.  Now, are these christians to be prosecuted for causing offence to their islamic competitors?  Personally I find their rants far more offensive than the low-key approach of the IIC and infinitely more offensive than the chap who ripped up a copy of the Koran.  So, an interesting idea - someone being prosecuted in an English court with causing criminal offence to muslims by publicly stating their christian beliefs.  A very juicy prospect for the sane amongst us!  Sadly unlikely to happen.  If it did, the sheer idiocy of it would bring the whole 'respect for religion' conceit crashing down around our ears.  And there are too many votes at stake for the current crop of spineless politicans to allow that.