You're having a mosque whether you want one or not

People wrote letters complaining and the local council decided against it. But the politically correct Planning Inspectorate (possibly, but we don't know, bowing to some political pressure) has decided that the good people of Dudley are to have a huge £18 million mosque, whether they want it or not.

And it's to be on land that had been earmarked for employment purposes, too.

The BBC tells us that the West Midlands town's Muslim population appealed against the council's decision to turn down the huge building (pictured as an artist's impression), and won.

Religion wins out again – and gets to erect an out-of-character building to boot. If Muslims see so much as a mere image they don't like – even on a postcard used for advertising purposes by a police force – they complain, and get their way. Residents complain about what they probably perceive is going to be an eyesore in architectural terms, and one many of them will have to pass each day, and they get nowhere.

"The council received hundreds of letters from residents opposing the mosque," says the BBC, which continues, "A statement issued by the council said: 'The planning inspectorate has today allowed the appeal by Dudley Muslim Association over its application for a mosque and community centre in Hall Street, Dudley.' "

Stick your arse in the air five times and day and develop a disliking for pork and poofs, and who knows what you can achieve?

Christian registrar: the pressure mounts

I knew this one would run and run. The Christian registrar in Islington, Lillian Ladele, now has a Commons Early Day Motion (EDM) in her honour. In short, it calls for a recognition that she's a bigot. All right, it doesn't say that exactly – but it amounts to the same thing.

Islington Council, you may remember, has said it will appeal against the ruling of an employment tribunal that found that Ladele was right to refuse to register civil partnerships because it went against her religion (see also here and here).

The wording of the EDM is this:

That this House notes that an Islington registrar has won an industrial tribunal case giving her the right to refuse to officiate at civil partnership ceremonies for homosexual and lesbian couples on the grounds of her religious beliefs; further notes that civil partnerships are legally not the same as Christian marriage; further notes that the Holy Scriptures are entirely silent on the question of civil partnerships; notes with concern that the case could set a precedent for any public servant refusing to treat all members of the public equally because of self-defined religious beliefs; believes that no public servant should be allowed to discriminate on this arbitrary basis; and, should this case not be reversed on appeal, calls on the Government to clarify and, if necessary, amend the law to guard the public against discrimination and prejudice by public servants in the future.

It's been put by Diane Abbot, the Labour MP for Hackney North and Stoke Newington, and has been signed by five others. Early Day Motions are rarely debated on the floor, and remain open for signatures for the rest of the parliamentary session.

So don't hold your breath, but it's a sign that the pressure is mounting for a clarification of conflicting laws that seem to forbid discrimination in goods and services to people on the grounds of (inter alia) sexuality and yet allow just that on religious grounds.

Ms Ladele hasn't won yet. Not quite.

Discrimination: it's still an issue

Since our story earlier today about Stephen Price (pictured) and his award from an employment tribunal, we've had a statement from Federico Podeschi, managing director of the LGBT Excellence Centre Wales, who represented Stephen Price. Federico has today left this as a comment on the story we linked to, but since that story was published some weeks ago, we've decided to publish it here, where it'll get a better airing. Here it is:

We are extremely delighted by the Employment Tribunal’s decision to uphold Stephen’s case. Stephen, as well as many other service users of our Helpline, is a clear example of how you can still be discriminated against simply for being gay.

This case particularly showed that, regardless of whether people want to “come out” or not, simply ignoring that people can be gay, lesbian, or bisexual, as well as heterosexual, is not acceptable. It also shows that once a grievance is raised, employers have a responsibility to investigate it as a potential case of unlawful discrimination or harassment on the grounds of sexual orientation.

The Presbyterian Church of Wales failed to both acknowledge Stephen’s claim and to investigate his allegations accurately. The Employment Tribunal’s judgement described some of the behaviour that Stephen had to endure as grotesque and inappropriate. This should be a reminder that people can still carry prejudice and bias regardless of having a religious background or faith. Discrimination on the grounds of sexual orientation is unlawful and must be addressed. It is as simple as that.

We urge people to contact us to tell us their experience and to get advice and representation if they feel that they have been discriminated against because of their sexual orientation or gender identity. Only through raising the issues that people still face, can we really raise awareness around what still goes on in the discrimination closet!

Thanks, Federico!

The Price of bigotry

We reported in June how a 25-year-old man was teased and humiliated for being gay, and his boss even sent him a toilet roll holder with fairies on it as a gift.

"Stephen Price's ordeal began almost as soon as he began working at the Coleg Trefeca centre with, 40-year-old Mair Jones, his manager," this Pink News story tells us.

The centre is a 37-bed retreat run by the Presbyterian Church in Wales and used by church groups from all over the country.

Well we're happy to report that a tribunal has now awarded Price £11,924 for constructive dismissal. The tribunal judge, Dr Rachel Davies, said, "He started as a cheerful and enthusiastic young man and there is no evidence of a vindictive side to his nature nor that his claims were fabricated. Mair Jones treated him less favourably than if he were a heterosexual man. She subjected him to considerable harassment.

"We are satisfied this came within the most serious category. We have found that Mr Price suffered grotesquely discriminatory conduct on the part of Mair Jones for 10 weeks followed by seriously incompetent discrimination on the part of the church."
__________
Hat tip: Freethinker

Islington will appeal against Christian bigot

Islington Council's said it will appeal against the ruling of an employment tribunal that found that Christian bigot Lillian Ladele (pictured) was right to refuse to register civil partnerships because it went against her religion (see also here and here).

The online Pink News tells us that the decision was taken after "careful consideration of the legal ruling made by the London Central Employment Tribunal".

Forty-seven-year-old Ladele initially swapped with colleagues in order to avoid having to join same-sex couples, but there were complaints, which led to an internal inquiry. She complained she was being discriminated against on the grounds of her religion.

Pink News quotes the gay rights lobby group Stonewall as saying it will "seek to intervene formally in any appeal process if the opportunity arises".

Let battle commence

Well, there promises to be a battle as the ten-yearly shindig that is the Lambeth Conference gets going today, and there's already a war between the Episcopals on the one hand, who dared to consecrate a gay bishop (after he'd been elected, moreover, which is what happens in the States) and the bigots who have set up their own organisation.

This is the conference at which the world's Anglican bishops get together to reinforce their prejudices, while some, no doubt, look for ways to reconcile differences.

But a quarter of the world's bishops aren't attending, because they have a thing about gays. Those who are attending will have the subject of sexuality not far from their lips, because, if one subject will dominate this decade, that will be it.

And the Archbishop of Cant, Rowan Williams, has launched the party with a published letter to Muslims, which says, according to a story in the UK's Daily Telegraph, that some Christian doctrines are offensive to their superstition (well, the Telegraph doesn't use that word).

Well diddums, then! Of course they are. Some aspects of Islam are offensive to Christians. Some aspects of both (and all the other) religions are offensive to right-thinking people. That's what religion is about: difference; we're right; our god is the true god; your religion has false prophets; you're talking bollocks.

If any religion is right, it can be only one religion. If one is right, the others are wrong. That's an irrefutable point of pure logic. Get used to it, guys.

He takes as one example the Trinity. "Discussing differences between the religions," says the Telegraph, "Dr Williams acknowledges that Christian belief in the Trinity is 'difficult, sometimes offensive, to Muslims'."

It goes on to explain that the Trinity is the Christian doctrine that states God exists as the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit and this conflicts with Islamic teaching that there is one all-powerful god.

Well tough shit, Archbishop! Let it go. You'll never agree, anyway.

Glass houses, stones and Lillian Ladele

It really doesn’t matter that Lillian Ladele had a baby “out of wedlock”, while “living in sin” some 27 years ago. It really doesn’t matter. It’s not the sort of thing this blog and many others of a similar flavour would want to report.

But what makes Lillian Ladele different (see here and here) is that she has refused to do the job the local taxpayers reward her for doing, but instead kicked up a fuss about same-sex unions and how they were sinful and how her Christian beliefs could not permit her to join two people of the same gender in civil matrimony. You’d think, therefore, that these fundamental Christian beliefs would have ensured she was “married in the sight of God” before she opened her legs.

Her revelation comes in an interview with yesterday’s Daily Mail, reported in Pink News.

“The revelation”, says Pink News, “has led to accusations that she was not properly cross-examined at the tribunal about the nature of her religious faith – details of her extra-marital sexual activities only came to light at the weekend.”

It then quotes the judment of the tribunal she won, when she claimed Islington Council had discriminated against her on the grounds of her superstition – sorry, religious faith – thus:

Ms Ladele is a Christian. Her unchallenged evidence was that she holds the orthodox Christian view that marriage is the union of one man and one woman for life to the exclusion of all others and that marriage is the God-ordained place for sexual relations.

She could not reconcile her faith with taking an active part in enabling same-sex unions to be formed.

She told us that she believed this to be contrary to God’s instructions that sexual relations belong exclusively between a man and a woman within marriage.

As I say, it really doesn’t matter that a woman is not married when she first has sex or subsequently gives birth to a baby; and, thankfully, we live in an age when it matters only to religious fruitcakes.

But what does 47-year-old Ladele say? Not “Oh, I wasn’t religious back then” or “The Word of God hadn’t yet been revealed to me” but “I would never claim to be perfect.”

Well, nor would any of us, but you’d expect one of the basic religious so-called morals – that sex is for wedlock – to be intact in someone as morally upstanding as Lillian Ladele. Before people start preaching their perceptions of God’s ideas of perfection, they should just think of a well-known saying that involves glass houses and stones.

And may those who are without “sin” cast the first of the latter.

You can annoy Catholics after all

In a blow for common sense and against censorship, a court in Australia has overruled a new state law in New South Wales that said you couldn't annoy Catholics.

The law would have allowed police to fine people protesting over the nutty Vatican's nutty stance on issues such as women's rights over their fertility and anyone's rights over what he or she does with his or her choice portions and dangly bits.

The ruling, says this BBC story, comes at the opening day of World Youth Day, which Pope Ratzo will be attending later this week.

The challenge to the law was brought by a coalition of protest groups.

Activists say they plan to hold a rally on Saturday at which they will demonstrate against the Church's stand on homosexuality and birth control, by handing out condoms and wearing provocative T-shirts.

Civil liberty groups had denounced the New South Wales state law – which threatened fines of up to A$5,500 (£2,680) against anyone causing "annoyance" to pilgrims – as unnecessary and repugnant.

Quite right. There are, one assumes, laws to deal with unruly behaviour that don't involve blatant censorship. No one's suggesting that the world and its uncle should gather in NSW and heckle every Catholic, but there must be a right to protest when huge swathes of people can see the Catholic Church for the evil that it is capable of.

Anyway, once such a law is put in place, it's anyone's guess as to how the police will interpret it, and, once the event is over, it's too late to seek redress against them, because the damage to free speech will have been done.

Praise the Lord, and pass the ammunition

How do you get kids to come to your church event? You offer them a real semiautomatic assault rifle, that's how.

Well, that would have happened at an Oklahoma City church, but it has now called off plans to give away a rifle at its weekend gathering of teenagers, the church's pastor has said.

The KFI AM 640 radio station's website tells us, "Plans called for Windsor Hills Baptist to give away the weapon as a way of encouraging attendance at the gathering but plans changed when one the event's organizers was unable to attend, KOCO 5, Oklahoma City, reported Sunday."

When an event organiser was unable to attend, note, not that these are lethal weapons (go and shoot up a celebration of Holy Communion and you could call them weapons of Mass destruction – maybe not!).

The story goes on:

The church's pastor, Bob Ross, said officials anticipated hundreds of teenagers from as far away as Canada would attend.

"We have 21 hours of preaching and teaching throughout the week," Ross told KOCO 5.

The church Web site featured a video showing the shooting competition from last year's conference. A gun was given away last year, but this year organizers decided to highlight the giveaway in promotions for the conference.

Ross told the TV station the church was not "putting a weapon in the hand of somebody that doesn't respect it who are then going to go out and kill."

The gun giveaway has been taken down from the Web site, but Ross said the church will give the gun away next year.

Oh, goody! They'll get their guns after all.

Perhaps the Church Lads' Brigade can order a ton of semtex while you're at it. And how about some 44mm ground-to-air missiles for the church bazaar? Popping those helium-filled balloons is a hoot! And if you don't want yours you can always take it to the bring-and-buy sale and come away with an AK-47 Kalashnikov instead.

Tutu good!

It shouldn't surprise us that South Africa's Archbishop Desmond Tutu (pictured) supports gay rights and freedoms, but it's nice to acknowledge it, simply because he's one of the more acceptable and likable faces of Christianity.

He's now pleaded with the Anglican Communion to "show unity as it tries to reconcile the views of liberals and evangelicals over homosexuality", according to an article today in the online Pink News.

The story quotes Tutu as telling Sky News, "The Anglican church prides itself – and this is one of its greatest attributes – it prides itself on being the church that is comprehensive, meaning that it includes all kinds of points of view."

Seventy-six-year-old Tutu, a veteran of South Africa's anti-apartheid struggle and the winner of the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize, said he felt the church should move together on the topic of homosexuality.

His words come as the Anglican Church continues to tear itself apart with wholesome Christian love we have become so familiar with in this worldwide organisation, because some of its number have a thing about sexuality.

I'd consecrate a gay bishop, but . . .

Just when you think you've stumbled on a Christian who really has no problem whatever with gay priests and bishops, he goes and spoils it. Well, to a large extent, anyway.

First the good news: the Archbishop of Wales, Barry Morgan, says he'd have no problem consecrating a gay bishop, such as the one whose consecration has sparked hissy homophobic fits in the Anglican Church, Gene Robinson of New Hampshire.

According to the BBC news website, Morgan says, "If I thought that a person who had been nominated was an excellent candidate in every other way and that he was in a faithful relationship – for me personally that would not present a problem."

Then there's the rub: "But of course it might present a problem for my church and I would have to alert the electoral college to that."

Whatever happened to unqualified acceptance? And what would happen if his church said don't do it?

"Anglican conservatives set up a splinter movement earlier this month, in rejection of the acceptance of gay bishops," the Beeb reminds us. "Members of the Global Anglican Future Conference movement established the Fellowship of Confessing Anglicans."

How politicians win votes

In a grubby, calculating move not to upset Catholics before the Glasgow East by-election, Prime Minister Gordon Brown has delayed today's planned vote on the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Bill.

He must think the Catholics in Glasgow East are pretty thick and stupid if he expects them to believe that merely postponing this vote means it won't happen at all. Unfortunately, there are all too many who do believe that politicians really have their best interests at heart, and that's why they continue to get away with it.

Brown knows there are Labour voters who may think twice about voting Labour if this thing – which he has declared himself in favour of – goes ahead. Brown postpones vote. Labour voters vote Labour. Brown's Labour colleague wins the seat. Brown then craps on the people he duped.

Fortunately, there are newspapers willing to show up the evil shananigans and outright deceit that politicans are capable of, such as the Scotsman, which published a story last Friday headlined "Brown delays embryo bill 'in bid to sway Catholic votes in by-election' ".

In a surprise announcement, the government said that a crucial vote on the embryology bill due to take place on Monday would now be delayed until the autumn.

This will help keep the issue – and the threat of changes to the abortion laws – off the agenda before voters go to the polls on 24 July. It also allows the legions of Labour MPs ordered to campaign in Glasgow to avoid having to make a speedy return to London.

Glasgow East, says the Scotsman, has "the fifth-highest number of Catholics in Scotland, with more than a third of its voters – some 23,185 adults – declaring themselves Catholics in the last census".

On the other hand, it could be true that Labour feels that there are so many clauses to debate that it's being put back for purely practical reasons.

Harriet Harman, the Leader of the House, has said that, because of the shortage of time left before the summer recess and the number of MPs who wished to speak and propose amendments to the Bill, it had been decided that "as much time as possible needs to be found for it".

And did they now know that a lot of MPs would wish to take part in such a controversial matter? Did they not know how many clauses there would be to deal with?

Meanwhile, poor old Opus Dei Catholic Ruth Kelly connived to get out of voting on this (see our link in the first paragraph), and now the poor dear will have to think of something else that she will just happen to have to attend rather than a whipped vote.

More taxpayers' money spent on Muslims

Another public body – funded by the taxpayer – is to be set up by the UK government for Muslims. This one aims to try to stop Muslims from blowing us up, suggesting that police methods of prevention and detection have failed.

This idea will be announced this week by Hazel Blears, the Communities Secretary, as part of a strategy called Prevent, which was set up after the 7/7 bombings.

According to the Sunday Times, this new "board of imams" will attempt to "refute the ideology of violent extremists". Quite how it will do that, considering that refute means not just to repudiate, but to prove wrong, is anyone's guess. How do you "refute" an ideology? Or is this just sloppy writing on the part of the Times Whitehall editor, Marie Woolf?

Anyway, this committee "will issue pronouncements on areas such as wearing the hijab and the treatment of wives and is part of a government strategy to counter radicalism". The Sunday Times story continues:

[The committee] will rule on interpretation of the Koran and promote the moderate strain of Islam practised by most British Muslims. It will also comment on controversial issues affecting Muslims living in Britain, including whether or not they should serve in the armed forces.

And is this going to be then enshrined in public policy, something dredged up out of a book of desiccated scriptures? It goes on:

The government is concerned that extremist leaders who preach jihad have been able to radicalise young Muslims, partly because of the failure of leading Islamic figures to challenge them.

A committee of Muslim young people will try to ensure the policies are relevant to them and do not inadvertently lead to further radicalisation. The government also plans to support Muslim women by providing discussion groups and work placements.

Something called the Muslim Public Affairs Committee "questioned whether the board would address issues relevant to Muslims’ lives".

"To be successful," says a committee spokeswoman, "this initiative must have credibility with the Muslim community as a whole. What matters is what happens at the grass roots in someone's local mosque."

If Muslims wish to set up committees to regulate life in their communities, they're at liberty to do so, provided nothing that comes of their deliberations is expected to be legally binding. All sorts of organisations have their committees, with the power to recommend, decide, reprimand, hire, fire, kick arse. But Muslim committees should be paid for out of participants' pockets.

If the country can't handle those who want to bomb the hell out of us, what are the police and intelligence services doing? If such a committee can really prevent young people from being radicalised, why is it being suggested it rule on women's fashion and how men treat their wives?

And do they really think this is some sort of hearts-and-minds measure that will change the ideology of someone who's so Allah-soaked that he's willing to give his life in order to take those of others? That's a pretty unfaltering commitment.

Strikes me as just another way of seeming to be doing something instead of stopping kowtowing to religionists now, and imposing that clichéd "zero tolerance" of dubious activities. If religion didn't automatically and seemingly without exception receive such a good government ear and were not treated with such unwarranted reverence, what people do in its name might be treated with more suspicion by the public at large.

Instead, when journalism comes good for a change and creates something like Undercover Mosque, the police decide that's racist and seek to prosecute the programme makers. In that case, fortunately, the police were left with egg on their silly faces and had to issue a grovelling apology.

The religious control of marriage

"The point of civil ceremonies always was to end religious control of marriage." Thus speaks the Observer today in examining the case of Lilian Ladele, the homophobic Christian registrar who didn't want to marry gay people, so she stamped her feet and had a tantrum and won her right at an employment tribunal not to do the deed.

But it doesn't stop our religion-soaked, PC-pressured authorities and other officialdom from coming down on the side of religious nutcases. They clearly want it both ways. Civil ceremonies are there to end the religious control of marriage, so what do they do? They reintroduce the idea of the religious control of marriage.

"Did Lillian Ladele, the devout Islington registrar whose refusal to conduct gay marriages has, astonishingly, been endorsed by an employment tribunal, ever wonder if she was in the right job?" asks the Observer (emphasis mine).

Guided by Christian beliefs so powerful they will not countenance, even outside the church, the union of two women or of two men, Ms Ladele must have had cause to wonder, throughout her career, about the fitness of all the other unchaste sinners over whose civil unions she has presided. Yet not until partnerships for gay people were added to the town hall's repertoire did she decide that these ceremonies were incompatible with holy writ.

The implications of this judgment, says the paper, could be serious and troubling if it is upheld on appeal.

Employees flourishing their religious convictions will be able to challenge almost any job description, whether these involve an aversion to pork, to certain clothes, to abortion pills, to gay people or to working on holy days.

If we're not careful we'll be heading for a theocracy by the back door, as religion has to be consulted before decisions are made in the secular world, affecting people of religion and no religion alike.

This is what happens to dead atheists

Have you ever wondered what will happen to you if you're an atheist? A dead one, I mean. I came across this YouTube video (see below) via the Pharingula blog.

Incidentally, the article he links to there is on something called WikiHow, and the introduction to the article reads:

Dealing with a friend that [sic] has different beliefs than you can be frustrating for both yourself and the non-believer. Learning how to deal with it can be extremely difficult and you might want to try and [sic] convert them. If you do chose [sic] this route, however, you must always keep this in mind: be gentle and never force your ideals upon others if they don't wish it. If your friend expresses a deep, sincere wish for you to leave their beliefs alone, please respect that.

If you go through all the steps it then recommends and your friend hasn't given you a smack in the mouth and vowed never to speak to you again, then you can safely believe in God, because it'll be a holy miracle.

Anyway, here's the video I promised you. Enjoy.

Veiled threat to Islamisation

A veiled woman has been denied citizenship by France because her brand of Islam is incompatible with French values.

"The case will re-ignite debate about how to reconcile religious freedom with other rights, which many in France feel are being challenged by the way of life of some Muslims," says this story in Britain's Daily Mail.

The Mail quotes Le Monde as saying it's the first time this sort of thing has happened because of personal religious practice.

The Mail continues:

Married to a French national, the woman arrived in France in 2000, speaks good French and has three children born in France.

Thought to be aged 32, she wears a burka that covers all her body except her eyes, and lives in "total submission" to her husband and male relatives, according to social services.

And it's that total submission that's worrying.

Should she be allowed citizenship? Is what she does with her appearance a not a private matter (provided she's not a threat to others)? I suspect it's not just her submission but the fact that she's wearing it like a badge of honour that's upsetting the authorities.

"The ruling", says the Mail, "comes weeks after a heated debate over whether traditional Muslim views were creeping into French law, prompted by a court annulment of the marriage of two Muslims because the husband said the wife was not a virgin as she had claimed to be."

It looks as though, if creeping Islam is to be halted, the process has to start somewhere.

Desecrating the sacred confectionery

If you liked yesterday's Pink Triangle story, "Corpus Crispi", which told the tale of a student who had the audacity to remove a little bickie from the communion-rail area of his church – effectively kidnapping the Body of Christ – you'll love this one.

An American professor is going to desecrate the Host. Quite how, I don't know, but he's appealing for some of the holy crackers – er, communion wafers – to commit his act of desecration on.

"Paul Zachary Myers, a professor at the University of Minnesota Morris, has pledged to desecrate the Eucharist," says the Catholic League story linked to above. It continues:

He is responding to what happened recently at the University of Central Florida when a student walked out of Mass with the Host, holding it hostage for several days. Myers was angry at the Catholic League for criticizing the student. His post can be accessed from his faculty page on the university’s website.

The story quotes him as saying:

“Can anyone out there score me some consecrated communion wafers?” Myers continued by saying, “if any of you would be willing to do what it takes to get me some, or even one, and mail it to me, I’ll show you sacrilege, gladly, and with much fanfare. I won’t be tempted to hold it hostage (no, not even if I have a choice between returning the Eucharist and watching [Catholic League president] Bill Donohue kick the pope in the balls, which would apparently be a more humane act than desecrating a goddamned cracker), but will instead treat it with profound disrespect and heinous cracker abuse, all photographed and presented here on the web.”

Donohoe says, “It is hard to think of anything more vile than to intentionally desecrate the Body of Christ. We look to those who have oversight responsibility to act quickly and decisively.”

Oh, crumbs! I can't wait for those photographs.
_________________
UPDATE: See the latest Jesus and Mo. It's about that bickie.

Stop digging

Did anyone see the first episode of Bonekickers on Monday night? It’s the new BBC (so-called) drama from Ashley Pharoah and Matthew Graham, the people behind the brilliant Life on Mars and its OK sequel Ashes to Ashes. Unfortunately, going by last night’s offering, Bonekickers is neither. And, yes, it’s full of fine actors and was directed by James Strong, who is one of the directors of Doctor Who – so why was it so bad?

According to the BBC hype, Bonekickers:

is a highly original six-part series about a dynamic team of archaeologists [and is set] against the backdrop of Bath, a city steeped in 3,000 years of history, [where] each week the team uncovers a compelling mystery from the past that tells viewers something profound and revelatory about the present.

After last night’s episode, hearing their claim that “archaeology has never been so dramatic” made me laugh out loud.

This episode was full of dire dialogue, religious references – including miracle cures, the cross that bore Jesus Christ – and modern-day religious nutters and psychopaths as well as very unsubtle references to the religious divisions between Christianity and Islam in Britain today. This culminated in a particularly gruesome, gratuitous and out-of-place beheading of a Muslim by some nutter who’d convinced himself that he was a modern-day member of the Knights Templar. I can’t help thinking that this is the sort of rubbish that would be produced by those responsible for (the brilliant) Waking the Dead if they spent too many Sundays inhaling too much religious incense.

Going by the press reviews, the chatter on the Internet and everyone I’ve spoken to, most people agree it was bad. In just a few days, the Beeb has managed to give us Criminal Justice, which has got to be the best piece of brand-new drama so far this year, and then what can only be described as the worst. In the Guardian, Gareth McLean described it as “mind-bogglingly dreadful [with] lame characters delivering abysmal lines”, while the academic and critic Sarah Churchwell described it as “beyond silly”. On BBC2’s Newsnight Review, John Mullan (the University College, London, professor of English who specialises in eighteenth-century fiction) criticised the show's absurdities, saying that “hokum has to have its own logic”.

In my opinion, Bonekickers was baloney. It was truly bad. It was a load of cringe-making bollocks! Den of Geek is spot on when it says that it “is surely the BBC’s most spectacular and hilarious misfire since the dark days of Eldorado back in the early 90s”, but I don’t buy their it-was-so-bad-it’s-good line or that because 6.8 million viewers watched it, they must have enjoyed it. Let’s just wait and see how many people bother to tune in again next week.

They’re not very impressed on the Bonekickers fan site, either, and see this rather hilarious recap of the first episode on the Killed in a smiling accident blog.

I should have watched ITV2's The Skulls instead.

Christian bigot wins employment case

The registrar who refused to do part of the job she was being paid for because it went against her superstitions has won her case at an employment tribunal, and Christian groups are rubbing their hands.

Lilian Ladele is a registrar in Islington in London. She said she wouldn't perform marriage ceremonies (well, the authorities prefer to call them civil partnerships) for same-sex couples because some sky fairy is supposed not to like that sort of thing.

A story in Pink News tells us:

Islington council is considering an appeal after an employment tribunal ruled that a registrar was bullied because she refused to perform civil partnership ceremonies that she claimed were against God's will.

"It is an important case, which may have a wider impact than the dispute between the parties," the tribunal said. It added that it would be "wrong for one set of rights to trump another".

Islington Council rightly considered the importance of the right of the gay community not to be discriminated against, but did not consider the right of Miss Ladele as a member of a religious group.

Completely missing the point that Ms bloody Ladele can choose her religion or, if she didn't have a big God slot in her brain, could choose not to have a religion at all. To say someone has a "right" because they belong to a religious group suggests they have a "right" because they belong to any group, whether it's political, religious or Olympic yodelling.

I've been saving this piece from the Independent for when this story reared its head again. There are some good points made by Ben Summerskill of Stonewall, not least of which is his question as to what would happen if doctors refused to operate on gay people or gay registrars decided not to officiate at straight marriages because they thought they were patriarchal. To which I might add that the latter is only a belief system, just as Ladele's religion is.

What's in a word?

A Christian publisher is facing a US$60 million lawsuit over the word homosexual. Yup, it's the sort of thing that happens in America.

Zondervan publish translations of the Bible, and there's one in particular that a guy called Bradley Fowler doesn't like. The offending passage is Corinthians 6: 9.

"Fowler says Zondervan Bibles published in 1982 and 1987 use the word homosexuals among a list of those who are 'wicked' or 'unrighteous' and won't inherit the kingdom of heaven," says a story on WoodTV.com of Grand Rapids, Michigan.

Now he wants an apology and 60 million bucks, "to compensate for the past 20 years of emotional duress and mental instability".

I looked at a few versions – well, four – just to satisfy my curiosity. Here they are. First, the good old-fashioned King James version:

Know ye not that the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of God? Be not deceived: neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor effeminate, nor abusers of themselves with mankind.

Then the New Century version:

Surely you know that the people who do wrong will not inherit God's kingdom. Do not be fooled. Those who sin sexually, worship idols, take part in adultery, those who are male prostitutes, or men who have sexual relations with other men, those who steal, are greedy, get drunk, lie about others, or rob – these people will not inherit God's kingdom.

And here's the New International Reader's version:

Don't you know that evil people will not receive God's kingdom? Don't be fooled. Those who commit sexual sins will not receive the kingdom. Neither will those who worship statues of gods or commit adultery. Neither will men who are prostitutes or who commit homosexual acts.

And finally, this version:

Know ye this and be not deceived: only the righteous shall inherit the Kingdom of Heaven; and they that fornicate or lie with mankind as with womankind; they that are abusers of themselves or do wicked things shall be entered into this week's Heavenly Lotto for a chance to win a ticket to see Jerry Springer: the Opera in the company of my servant Stephen Green, he of Christian Voice, which is an abomination; while to him that cometh second shall be given a lifetime supply of exquisitely ribbed and flavoured condoms by my Vicar on Earth . . .

Not sure where that last one came from.