Homophobia might be a sign that a child is becoming an extremist

[Pickman's model]

So what's the alternative to faith schools teaching children that sexism and homophobia are right?

ban faith schools, or those ones which won't move with the times, as centres of outmoded superstition.

 

[J Ed]

I just think, the tories are scummy enough for the most part now - it seems fairly irrelevant to bring up what they voted for thirty years ago. If tories now want to create a policy that explicitly tries to address homophobia in schools, then I'll take that. Victories like that are hard-won, especially when many of the tory party actively oppose them. I think we need to be positive about the positive things, otherwise our justifiable complaints are dismissed as blinkered whining.

The problem isn't the tackling of homophobia, which is unquestionably a good thing that should be done, its the weaponisation of that in order to justify the surveillance of children.

 

[youngian]

Remember how the majority of Tory MPs voted against gay marriage including the current equalities minister?

That'll be the ones who lower their flags at half-mast when Wahhabist despot rulers die. Which they may do for Isis one day. If Isis win they'll begin state-building out of swathes of Sunni Iraq and Syria. Today's terrorists become tomorrows 'moderate elements' bringing 'stability' to the region. Anyone who's called a terrorist by the British government ends up having dinner with the Queen.

 

[MochaSoul]

So what's the alternative to faith schools teaching children that sexism and homophobia are right?

Stop funding them for a start.

 

[frogwoman]

So what's the alternative to faith schools teaching children that sexism and homophobia are right?

Do you think the tories will do a great deal about what say a private orthodox jewish girls' school is teaching, given that such schools aren't subjected to full ofsted inspections etc?

 

[spanglechick]

It's not whining so much as wondering whether they've got an alterior motive.

Yeah - we're coming at this from different angles. I'm thinking about day-to-day teaching. Which is here and now and immediate.

 

[J Ed]

Do you think the tories will do a great deal about what say a private orthodox jewish girls' school is teaching, given that such schools aren't subjected to full ofsted inspections etc?

Or indeed private Islamic schools or private Evangelical schools. These people are alright with more or less whatever going on there because it is legitimised by the free market mantra which they pretend to believe in and fetishise.

 

[spanglechick]

ban faith schools, or those ones which won't move with the times, as centres of outmoded superstition.

Stop funding them for a start.

How is that not "top down"?

Do you think the tories will do a great deal about what say a private orthodox jewish girls' school is teaching, given that such schools aren't subjected to full ofsted inspections etc?

Private schools aren't state-funded (notwithstanding charitable status). The 'british values' stuff only applies to state schools.

 

[CNT36]

The French anti-terrorism agency said that someone who stops eating baguettes could be becoming a terrorist.

They're arresting anyone seen in public without a Beret and necktie.

Thing is tho, i think we can all agree that the problem of people supporting Daesh and so on, is real.

What do you do? Is there anything the state/schools etc can do under todays conditions to ameliorate the problem? What would we do about Daesh etc 'after the revolution' or in an ideal world, cos lets not kid ourselves these problems would disappear overnight? chilango etc

Scott Atran has done a lot of work on this actually talking to Jihadis. He doesn't deny ideology is important as both a motivator and in holding groups together but doesn't see it as the most important factor. He said somewhere that the best predictor of whether someone will commit a terror act is who their friends are. That may fit with Ash's experience of the brother getting excited over the New York skyline. One way would be to talk to/look into people from the same football clubs (he claims that most recruits are action orientated, they go out and do something rather than sitting around in a mosque) or cell mates rather than a grand one size fits all pursue any Muslim who thinks Eastenders is a bit gay.

 

[J Ed]

Yeah - we're coming at this from different angles. I'm thinking about day-to-day teaching. Which is here and now and immediate.

No argument from me that homophobia should be clamped down on in schools, but are we really going to label primary school children extremists and subject them to surveillance and monitoring for the rest of their lives because they might parrot something they have heard on telly, from their parents or other kids in the playground?

 

[spanglechick]

The problem isn't the tackling of homophobia, which is unquestionably a good thing that should be done, its the weaponisation of that in order to justify the surveillance of children.

weaponisation?

 

[J Ed]

Private schools aren't state-funded (notwithstanding charitable status). The 'british values' stuff only applies to state schools.

Which demonstrates how utterly stupid the whole thing is. If this whole issue is so important then surely a private school child blowing themselves up on the tube has the same effect as a comp school kid doing the same?

 

[Pickman's model]

How is that not "top down"?

you could of course get parents to take action against such centres of pestilence. which would be bottom up.

 

[Pickman's model]

weaponisation?

weaponisation

 

[spanglechick]

No argument from me that homophobia should be clamped down on in schools, but are we really going to label primary school children extremists and subject them to surveillance and monitoring for the rest of their lives because they might parrot something they have heard on telly, from their parents or other kids in the playground?

Nope - from the people on this thread who have actually recieved the new training for schools, what have we said that's given you any evidence at all that this is going to happen?

 

[spanglechick]

Which demonstrates how utterly stupid the whole thing is. If this whole issue is so important then surely a private school child blowing themselves up on the tube has the same effect as a comp school kid doing the same?

sure. but then i'd ban private schools outright. It's a bit "top down" though...

 

[frogwoman]

That'll be the ones who lower their flags at half-mast when Wahhabist despot rulers die. Which they may do for Isis one day. If Isis win they'll begin state-building out of swathes of Sunni Iraq and Syria. Today's terrorists become tomorrows 'moderate elements' bringing 'stability' to the region. Anyone who's called a terrorist by the British government ends up having dinner with the Queen.

Moderate ISIS.

How is that not "top down"?



Private schools aren't state-funded (notwithstanding charitable status). The 'british values' stuff only applies to state schools.

That was kind of my point really.

 

[Celyn]

The French anti-terrorism agency said that someone who stops eating baguettes could be becoming a terrorist.

But what about eating croissants? Should croissant-eating be considered indicative of the wrong values?

 

[frogwoman]

That'll be the ones who lower their flags at half-mast when Wahhabist despot rulers die. Which they may do for Isis one day. If Isis win they'll begin state-building out of swathes of Sunni Iraq and Syria. Today's terrorists become tomorrows 'moderate elements' bringing 'stability' to the region. Anyone who's called a terrorist by the British government ends up having dinner with the Queen.

You can just see it can't you


'Today we pay tribute to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi who played such a great contribution to peace in the middle east through bringing the values of law and order to a troubled region and assisting our regional allies in the fight against kurdish seperatism' or something

 

[mauvais]

bus phone black hole double post

Using codewords like this is Classic Terrorist.

 

[MochaSoul]

How is that not "top down"?

Oh please! I did not say ban them. I said stop funding them. That's not top down regulation. That's just being true to exactly the kind of values they want to foster. Which, by their very nature, many religions don't agree with.
It's a question of coherence. If they want to instil, say, tolerance and freedom, then they let people do and say whatever they want, but don't pay them to do the exact opposite. If parents want religious schooling then let them get out of bed on Sundays and take their children to church.

 

[youngian]

You can just see it can't you
'Today we pay tribute to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi who played such a great contribution to peace in the middle east through bringing the values of law and order to a troubled region and assisting our regional allies in the fight against kurdish seperatism' or something

Definitely, international relations is a dirty business of making lousy shit decisions over even worse ones. But its better to jaw-jaw than to war-war.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

How is that not "top down"?
.

By saying that such schools should not be funded, you're asking for a particular top-down promotion of intolerance to be stopped. It's already 'top-down'.

 

[Pickman's model]

By saying that such schools should not be funded, you're asking for a particular top-down promotion of intolerance to be stopped. It's already 'top-down'.

good point well made

 

[Pickman's model]

Definitely, international relations is a dirty business of making lousy shit decisions over even worse ones. But its better to jaw-jaw than to war-war.

depends on the dentist

 

[SpookyFrank]

The French anti-terrorism agency said that someone who stops eating baguettes could be becoming a terrorist.

No tolerance for gluten intolerance!

 

[SpookyFrank]

You can just see it can't you


'Today we pay tribute to Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi who played such a great contribution to peace in the middle east through bringing the values of law and order to a troubled region and assisting our regional allies in the fight against kurdish seperatism' or something

I remember when Blair decided to make Gadaffi one of the good guys who was helping us fight terrorism. Although I did start to wonder if I hadn't imagined it, considering no politician or newsreader mentioned it when we started bombing Lybia. You'd think that the fact we were bombing one of the good guys would have been a big deal or something

 

[danny la rouge]

The legal framework doesn't paint any more of a scary picture, unless you're aware of something I've missed.

I perhaps should have said legislative framework. I'm talking about a Home Secretary using vague language to base her definition of what constitutes extremism. The government has defined extremism as "vocal or active opposition to fundamental British values, including democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty and mutual respect and tolerance of different faiths and beliefs". If fundamental British values include being against discrimination against gay people, then many churches and religious organisations fall foul of that by being actively and vocally opposed.

Much as we may disagree with such homophobic views, we don't arrive at shared values by criminalising what others believe. We arrive at shared values by engaging in debate.

As an anarchist, I don't believe that representative parliamentary democracy is either representative or democratic in a sense that I'd understand. I assume that this makes me an extremist. But despite that I probably share quite a few values with the mainstream of public opinion. As does the Catholic Church. And so on.

 

[danny la rouge]

So what's the alternative to faith schools teaching children that sexism and homophobia are right?

I'm having difficulty parsing that, but state schools should indeed be intolerant of sexism and homophobia. I just don't think faith schools should be state schools.

 

[SpookyFrank]

Not really sure how you can be in favour of individual liberty and still respect religious organisations which systematically oppose individual liberty but then I guess intellectual rigour isn't one of our core values.