How did we get into such a mess.
I remember a time when things seemed rational. When the society I lived in had a view which represented the facts on the ground, when we understood ourselves and shared a common heritage.
Yesterday a Tribunal handed down a verdict fining a company for ignoring a persons human rights. Compensation was levied on the company and paid to a man, £6000, because he had been refused access to his "boss's office" to pray !
Obviously the man was a Muslim and had according to the dictates of his religion and it's instruction that he must pray 5 times a day, negotiated with his boss that he could use the managers office to prostrate himself according to practice. Unfortunately this particular day the managers office was in use with a disciplinary meeting being held and the man took umbrage and went to court suing the company.
A Discriminatory Court found for him and the company was fined.
Where do we start.
Since when is it a right for an employee to demand that a place is set aside for him to pray ?
As I interpret the matter It is purely on the grounds of not "discriminating" against a person of faith that company has to consider the use of an area for prayer. So whilst there is no compulsion to provide, there is a compulsion not to discriminate. Which comes first the hen or the egg.
The concept of discrimination is a minefield since one man's actions could always be held, by another to be discriminatory. If the "cause" is religious this is given priority over what might be considered secular discrimination.
The demand by Muslims to practice a code of prayer as part of their commitment to their God has implications that are not evident in other religious faiths and reading the Muslim Councils opinion on the matter is revealing. There is no common ground, simply a set of prerogatives, of rights, privileges and entitlements we, non Muslims should take on board for the sake of religious harmony. It appears in my reading of their text that harmony has to be granted by non Muslims in response to seeking cultural harmony.
It's a powerful message to us all. "Understand our unique needs and specialisms and we will coexist, otherwise we will seek redress through the Court".
It has to be remembered that the powerful lobby 'the Political Establishment' seeking to diversify our nation into a multicultural hotchpotch, have captured all the high ground (we were asleep whilst they were at it) and through immigration, much of which was economic, filling the quotas as industry tried to expand after the war, the ethnicity changed beyond all recognition.
The distillation of English values for those values and cultures coming from abroad was considered multi-culturally beneficial as if the more mixed up you are the stronger the breed. Much was made of the expanded selection of food outlets which adorn the high streets.
What we had failed to understand was that the largest minority the Muslim population had imported a strong, some would say a fanatical religion into these islands just at the time when the traditional religion on these shores, Christianity was becoming sidelined in a gathering sense of the population at large which were becoming immune to the religious argument.
The question is :-
Should we in the 21st century, when all signs lead to debunking the religious story, (it's time line and it's fables), should we be turning back the clock to allow a millennium old, Arabic, misogynistic faith, re-describe our society and subordinate values hard-won over the last hundred years and more ?
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