Grenfell Tower

As I write this blog post it as has been confirmed that the death toll has now risen to 30. It is such a sad and tragic incident which has left people, rightly so, wanting answers.

What does seem apparent is that residents were demanding that safety procedures should be put in place. People said that they had spoken to the council and they did not listen. How many times have we heard this? I can think of numerous times when residents have expressed concerns about something that’s happening in their area and they council have not listened. It’s all about the money and not about the people.

I have been amazed and taken aback at the the quick mobilisation of the local community. People of all religions and backgrounds working together to help those affected. I saw that and organisation called Islamic Relief were giving out water to those people who needed it.

Where are the far-right when these things happen? Do they muck in and help? Or do they try to divide, separate and keep communities from working together? Well they have failed. They have failed this time and they will fail again in the future. It will not stop people looking out for one another. It will not stop those, who are from all over the world, living harmoniously with each other. This is what they hate.

I said it on social media and I will say it again. I would rather have 1000 muslims living in my street that ONE EDL, BNP, Britain First sympathiser.

Tim Farron – God before politics

Tim Farron (the leader of the Liberal Democrats) resigned today stating that he couldn’t reconcile his faith with his party’s politics, which begs to differ why he entered into the party in the first place, know their views on abortion and gay rights.

He became a committed Christian in 1988 and has held evangelical views for a number of years. But after all this time, why does he feel the need to ditch politics? Does he feel now he has reached a tipping point? Or was it really the fact that the LDs need a leader who represents the whole of society, rather than restrictive views which aren’t reflective of 21st century Britain.

Regardless of what you believe in a religious context the great good has to precede your idea of what should be happening in society. This is more apparent with the DUPs belief that all abortion should be made illegal. It comes from religion rather than a rational viewpoint which takes into consideration the life and the circumstances of the mother. Black and white thinking and relative morality has its past in 18th-century beliefs the majority has moved on.

 

 

Ricky Dillon

I had to write this post basically because the minute I started to type anything that resembled words on someone else’s site I am immediately accused of things I am not.

I make it my policy not to argue with people on the internet as it’s entirely pointless. You’re shouted down before you can type the full stop on the keyboard

Yes the missing . is intentional. I have had to explain statements or jokes. You can’t leave a little quip without being questioned or having to explain what something is funny.

I come to my subject of a YouTuber who hasn’t a clue who he wants to be or what he had done or how he actually wants to live his life. This guy isn’t 12 or even 18 he is a man of 24 years which means he’s allowed to shape the political sphere with his vote or mortgage a house and get married. He’s a grown up.

That’s where reality seems to end and fantasy seems to begin. He recently “came out” (good for him!) “as an asexual” (oh okay). Not something that I have had too much experience. So I will dig around a bit and see what comes up.

Asexuality according to some definitions seems to be the lack of attraction to either sex. There is neither desire or want of physical need. A person will not seek out intimacy from another person. Nothing wrong with that I thought. There are millions of people around the world who are like this.

Then we come to Ricky Dillon. To me he is anathema. Someone who I think gives a bad name to the LGBT community. What he says in his videos is riddled with contradictions and sometimes outright lies. I find honesty, stability and articulation an attractive quality. Ricky doesn’t bring this to the table. His confusing ramblings seem to suggest a man who is unable to determine his life.

Someone’s sexuality is usually determined by the end of their teenage years. I know it can take some time to truly understand your sexual identity and people do have a lifelong struggle even to come to terms with it. Some don’t even fully accept who they are choosing instead to live a life trying to change who they are.

In my opinion, he is confusing not only himself and giving out the wrong message that gender identity is somehow fluid and come and goes like the tide. It doesn’t. You know if you are a puff or not if you then accept it.

Stop the world

What on earth is going on with our society and other countries?

• Two unarmed black men shot and killed in the USA
• Over three thousand incidents of hate crime reported to the police in the UK last month
• Five police officers killed in a sniper shooting in the USA
• Hundreds dead in Baghdad in a terrorist bombing
• Two dead at a music festival before its even started in Scotland
• New prime minister voted in who has a poor record on LGBT rights

These are just some of the stories I have been reading about this morning. What really is going on? Has the world turned in on itself?

Hate is the keyword in all of these. Hating on black people or gay and lesbian community. Lack of tolerance and education has caused this. Justification of religious freedom to deny decent equality laws.

Let’s get rid of proper education on relationships in schools as we are terrified to teach children to be aware of dangers that lurk in all areas of life. Terrified of standing up to people who spout hatred and bile about muslims or other religious groups.

I bet not many people know that the Mayor of London met with Archbishop of Canterbury and Chief Rabbi Ephraim Mirvis to discuss the rise in race hate incidents that a occurred since the vote to leave the EU. Mr Khan broke his fast during his time in Ramadan for Iftar.

There are those who think that people of different faiths and nationalities cannot live side by side in harmony. There are those who are determined that their hatred will somehow win over the rest of the country. I have said it time and time again these people will NOT win. I prefer to live in a world where there isn’t fighting or death. Where people can share their differences and respect them.

There has to be reform of gun control. There has to be the continual stamping out of race hate and crime. Those who perpetrate these crimes should be punished. Those who use deadly force again another person without proper justification should be made to face the consequences.

 

The result

I woke up about 7am and looked at my phone to utter shock and dismay. The majority of the people in the UK want to leave the EU. It had been said at the beginning that it was going to be close but it would be the remaining vote that would get the overall majority. This wasn’t the case.

The simple claim that we could automatically funnel the supposed £350 million from the EU to the NHS has been proven to be false even Farage backtracking to claim he never said that in the first place even though it was a big decider in voting to leave.

Billions have been wiped from stocks and shares and I already have seen an advertisement on TV for those people who have lost money and how to claim compensation. This won’t last for today and the stability that we experienced before the referendum will not continue over the coming months and years.

What do we do now? I am a firm believer in democracy and freedom but when the country decides to vote in such a way that yourself might not agree with we have to respect the majority.

I will continue to fight inequality and racism where ever I see it. I will champion the immigrant who has left their country due to war and conflict. If they need somewhere to go I think our country should be welcoming. You won’t see closed borders despite what the leave campaign have argued.

I will roll my sleeves up and get on with life.

Decent world

I don’t understand it. I cannot understand it. No matter how many times I have mentioned on Twitter that I want to live in a decent society where far-right extremists are not compatible with a civilised society. Then I am inundated with people with bile and hatred. People trying to justify right-wing policies.

These aren’t people who are in politics as a chosen career but they are repeating the beliefs and words of things that have been said to them by the groups such and EDL, Britain First and the BNP.

I believe in free-thinking and the ability to challenge anything someone says or does. What is their motive? I said in a previous post, take way the establishments and organisations that these people are linked to and what are they like as a person?

These people are brain-washed. They have had lie after lie drummed into them for such a long time and they do not realise the harm that they are doing. It has now been stated that the accused has links to far-right organisations. They have had people commenting that the person who is accused of the murder is not the person they have seen in TV reports the claim he wouldn’t do that sort of thing. But really how well do we know those people we call friends?

I want to live in a decent world. That means everyone is equal. It shouldn’t mean that a certain group or religion should have first say on things. It doesn’t mean that we chose to feed and house just one race and forget the rest. We treat each other with respect and decency.

So I have decided I won’t comment and argue against these people as it’s futile it’s only when something terrible happens to them as a result of their hate and prejudice does it hit home. I am finding it is causing me to question my own sanity when I keep thinking what have we become as a nation when just being a normal human being in a good country is a struggle.

I really hope one day that they will see how hate and division cause so much pain to so many people.

RIP – Jo Cox MP

These are the headlines as I write on this terrible day. I am upset that she has lost her life doing the thing she wanted to do and help her constituency lead a decent life in West Yorkshire.

As with the shooting in Orlando over the past weekend we have seen claim and counter-claim from various sides of the political debate. People appropriating blame where it certainly does not lie.

I made a simple statement on the Britain First Facebook site and said that if the person who has been detained made the comment ‘Britain First’ numerous times then their organisation would be proscribed as a terrorist organisation. After about fifteen minutes I expected that it would be deleted as they don’t like people criticising their vile beliefs. I was right and getting just over a hundred likes the comment disappeared.

Britain First openly claimed that they will use “direct action” against Sadiq Khan to target where he “lives, works and prays”. The underlining racism that BF has and their hatred for Muslims and people who are seen to be colluding with them make them a dangerous organisation. I would rather have a Muslim living next-door to me than a member of Britain First. That is the level of distrust I have for this despicable organisation.

In all instances of any crime such as this, there has to be a full investigation and especially when there has been a murder it could take months. It is only a speculation at the moment that the alleged attacker has a disturbing motive for the crime but once it has been established the correct proscribing should take place.

Like others, I will continue to say that hate, division, and racist beliefs have no place in the UK or any civilised society. My thoughts are with Jo Cox and her family at this terrible time.

Blame

There is always someone who will want to proportion blame other than the person who pulled the trigger on the guns. So far I have heard that the police at the nightclub were to blame, the lack of guns in the club and even the gay people who murdered should share the responsibility for their own deaths.

The appalling politicians and right-wing groups that latch on to what has happened and use if for their own gain. They proportion the blame to an entire religion which is wrong. Within most belief systems that there are the radical parts that will use this as an excuse to create mayhem and murder innocent victims. Many political parties have murdered in the name of their cause and under-pinned it with the belief that what they are doing is from god. It’s not. True religion does not kill.

The key to getting to grips with this sort of violence has to be education and understanding. The Islamic faith does and has to condemn these sorts of atrocities that are undertaken in its name. The Muslim Advocates which speaks on behalf of Muslims in American has rightly condemned the killings of innocent LGBT victims. Something that does not get reported in the wider press and beyond.

There has to be a working together of ordinary people who will speak for all sides to condemn this violence. ISIS and its ideology are evil and that message should be broadcast throughout the world. Allowing the lunatics of the far-right and the homophobic part of the Christian church to use it for their gain should be stopped right at the beginning.

Orlando Terrorist Attack

The word ‘hate’ is often used in these circumstances. Sometimes we hear ‘ideology’ or ‘extremism.’ A lone gunman with ‘extremist tendencies’. Easy to hear but the actions are more difficult to understand. The actions of one man with a handgun and an assault rifle.

So far from what we have been told fifty people died in one place. Another 53 where injured caught up in the terrorist attack. Over a hundred lives affected and countless lives destroyed by the grief of losing someone in such a barbaric and senseless manner.

No religion teaches its followers to kill and destroy. Every established belief system would condemn and feel repulsed by the mass killing of any people.

The fact that the murderer chose the people from my community cuts deeper. The hatred he showed in destroying life in this way makes in more personal and more heartbreaking.

I don’t ask people to like gay people. I never expect people to even think that being gay is right. I do expect that others show the respect that they deserve by allowing them to be citizens that can go about their day without the hatred shown by this man. It takes a lot of courage to stand up and tell others who you are because we still live in a world where religions teach their followers that being gay isn’t just a sin but abnormal and a distortion of a human being. Because I will fall in love with a man instead of a woman I am somehow subnormal or something that can be cured.

Even now Christians still make a comment that it isn’t what god planned or what god intended and this same ignorance and hate permeates through into the minds of people like this terrorist. It is the same thread of hate that runs deep into the minds of people who want to destroy communities and make them hate each other. They want to see a divided country where people who are black, white, gay or straight are at war with each other. It will not happen.

The decent person sees beyond their differences and races and condemns all violence whether it is undertaken in the name of a warped belief or a political cause. I won’t pray but I will think before I sleep tonight the harm that hate causes and remember those people who have lost those that they hold dear. They should be comforting them not preparing for their funeral.

Leave it

There ‘s a cool breeze blowing throughout my house as I sit at my computer near to the front window. Something I know that would be very welcome to a lot of people who are stuck in offices with windows that open less than a cm due to health and safety rules. The irony is that it’s not okay to fall out of the window but practically a given that you should slowly cook confined in the space behind them.

What we desire, want and permissible are not usually things that we think about when we are content in life. To some it is money. To others, it could be the happiness in seeing your children and grandchildren grow up safely in a world of worry and hazards that are all too familiar once you look at the news each day.

I have had a privileged life in the fact that I have been able to get a decent education and afford to live in my own home. Now that both my parents have gone I feel I should be sensible and grown up in making life choices. After some thought and careful consideration, it is time to move on.

This decision I made was twenty years ago and not today or yesterday. I made it through hindsight and experiences I had in the years before. I gave up religion for good. I wasn’t a backslider anymore. Someone that may go back to church after a few weeks of absenteeism. I hadn’t had the spiritual flu or suffered a minor problem with my faith. It wasn’t there at all.

Each day I am reminded that the decision was the right one. Reading the updates about how a bakery in Northern Ireland has appealed a decision handed down by the courts in the fact that they discriminated against someone on the basis of their sexuality makes me realise I am better away from such organisations. I want nothing of them anymore. I have met my closest friends through church youth groups and I have some fantastic friends who would call themselves Christians. But your religion ends where my non-belief begins.

I have no problem with teaching religion. I did it for years in crappy school. But I taught it knowing that I would be talking about someone else’s religion someone else’s belief. If only there was more teaching of decent religious education would we have a more tolerant society? Less gullible in believing that if a handful of crazed idiots were to represent an entire religion then it would seem that everyone in that religion held the same views. I know and have met many Muslims who don’t think that ISIS is right just in the same way that the Christians in Northern Ireland don’t hold the same views as my Christian friends. I can distinguish between the two.

The faith that once I held has died. This means it cannot be revived by any means. I believe that once something is dead it’s dead. No amount of prayer, drugs or electronic stimulation will it allow it to live again. The story of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein to me is a story. Others might choose to believe it as a literal story. Others will see it as work of fiction.

I respect others and their faith. I have no problem in the talking about Islam or Taoism. I don’t see any problem in talking about it. I wouldn’t mind writing about or making a living discussing them it doesn’t break any rules. Even when I did have a faith I know that talking about others beliefs didn’t make a bad person.

Thank goodness I have left it behind. The petty arguments the church is having over two people of the same sex getting married is ridiculous. I do like talking and discussing religious and non-religious belief I have always been fascinated with belief systems. But to me they are stories. We will see more and more of these cases that I am sure. Where once the Church of England was a great moral bastion above reproach we will see more fundamentalist groups appear fighting their cause. The Church of England will become nothing more than a meeting group for the lonely. Something to wheel people into once a week and then wheel out again.