Well, while I have been away it seems like our accelerating progress to the 1984 Utopian Ideal has been a pretty prevalent topic for this blog. Unfortunately this is simply a reflection of what is current “news” as almost daily we see more and more about how a socialist government is trying to turn us into a dictator’s fantasy land. In about two generations we (the UK) have gone from a shining example of a “free nation” to a state in which a stunning amount of state monitoring seems to be normal.

We can start with DNA databases. The news this week has been clamouring about how we need a bigger national database (see Heather’s previous post) – despite the fact the government already has the largest DNA database in the world. As always, there is a never ending stream of talking heads who say how the perpetrator of Crime XYZ would have been identified in a few seconds if we had a national DNA database. These commentators range from the understandably grieving relatives (who are always the WORST people to have opinions on a topic) to, in at least one case, the Association of Chief Police Officers (ACPO).

There is certainly a strong argument that recording the DNA of every person in the UK (including, I assume, all visitors and immigrants) would increase the detection rate of some crimes. On national news yesterday one senior police officer even went as far as to say that crimes were taking longer to solve because police had to use “traditional” methods to determine who the offender was. This is certainly the line taken by relatives of dead people and large portions of the right wing media.

However, it has (IMHO of course) some major fundamental flaws. The most basic of these is the overhaul of the presumption of innocence. If we had a national DNA database the police could turn up at a crime scene, sample any DNA found and then arrest who ever it matched in the database. The person whose DNA has matched is then put in the position of having to prove that they are innocent of the crime and give alternative reasons for their DNA being present. Now they must do the almost impossible task of proving their innocence.

In a similar vein, we (the public at least) have no idea of the accuracy with which a DNA match is made. If you think of all the steps required to collect a national database, store it, collect crime scene DNA and then compare it, there are numerous stages where an error can creep in. If we assume the process has an error rate as low as 1 in 1,000,000 (which would be bloody impressive) then it becomes really scary.  At any given time there are around 60 million residents and another 10 million transients within the UK. That DNA sample found at the crime scene could, through sheer accident alone, match any one of 69 innocent people. What is really scary is that it is unlikely anyone will ever actually know what the false positive rate is – does anyone know what the accuracy bars of a fingerprint match are? Will a jury be able to understand the statistics when the person in the dock is claiming they are innocent? Or will the CSI magic take effect and sentence innocent people?

Last (for now) but certainly not least, would you trust any government or private organisation with that much data? For a DNA database to work as a crime solving tool it needs to have details on who you are, where you live, how the police can find you (etc). This is a scary amount of information to put in one place. If you think ID fraud is rife as a result of people getting hold of your bank statements just think what can happen if all the data is housed in one place…

The most worrying thing about centralised data registries (such as national ID cards, DNA databases) is that no one wants to pay for them. The staff who maintain them are often the lowest grade in their organisation and quite often the ones with no prospects of advancement. It is trivial for Nefarious Individual X to offer poorly paid (and usually badly managed) person Y some money to either get access to the data or have an “accident” with it. When we establish the national register as the “Gold Standard” it becomes impossible for people to escape the consequences.

A tragic example of this was ironically headline news today as well. A couple lost their lives after a “gangland boss” infiltrated the “witness protection” scheme that was looking after them (quotes from the Guardian). More worryingly, this was not actually a case of gangsters infiltrating the Police Witness Protection scheme (which you would hope was one of the more secure government institutions) but the simple case of bribing BT employees to do lookups of confidential phone records:

The Stirlands [The couple killed] were ultimately betrayed by two BT staff misusing computer records at the request of the gang, without knowing or asking why they were wanted.

It really is that easy. This was nothing more than an act of revenge, so can you imagine how much bargaining power a gangster could bring if he wanted to, for example, get the national DNA register to point to an innocent person rather than him…

This blog has mentioned it many times in the past, but one of the biggest problems of total state surveillance is the significant shift in the balance of power. The government and public bodies serve the will of the people. They should be worried about the people. They should be 100% accountable to the public who grant them their rights and privileges. With the steady shift towards 1984 this is changing. The people will have to learn to worry about the government and what it is doing in “their” name.

When I was growing up I remember seeing TV programmes and news items about how Communist Russia was the great Evil and how oppressive regimes like Nazi Germany (and East Germany post WWII) were symbolised by how they oppressed the public – demanding “papers” on a regular basis, controlling who could travel and where and when, bugging everyone calls and monitoring their every movement. All my life I thought this was supposed to be teaching people what was wrong with some nations – I never realised it was a blueprint for the new millennium.

Once, Britain viewed itself as the cradle of democracy and home of freedom and civil rights. Even then it was probably a false impression, but in recent years it has really become ludicrous.

Today, on the Radio news bulletins there has been a few items about how the police are trying to get online video sharing services (i.e. YouTube) to prohibit people uploading video of themselves driving dangerously or excessively speeding. The articles finished off with an ominous threat that if it wasn’t banned, the government would be pressured into making it illegal.

I am confused.

Driving dangerously is an offence. Driving along the road holding a mobile phone in one hand to record both your speedometer and the road ahead is illegal. Breaking the speed limit is illegal. What difference will making a new law have? What advantage is there in creating a new law in our already burgeoning system?

In our current Orwellian-Britain, it is almost a daily occurrence for the tabloids to scream about how antisocial behaviour is out of control and call for “more, tougher laws” to curb it. Our intellectually lazy public laps this up and as a result our offensively fickle politicians (as well as the politically minded Chief Police Officers) pick up on this and agree we need new laws to make XYZ illegal. No one seems to notice the sheer madness of criminalising more and more behaviour, then complaining about more and more criminals…

Add to this, the weird idea that people seem to have about handing over more of our civil liberties to the police and you can see we are truly on the road to 1984. If you are in doubt about the weirdness then have a look at the BBC “Have your say” from Wednesday, 30 Jan 08. Titled “Will more stop and search powers reduce crime” it carries the following blurb:

The government is to announce an extension of stop and search powers for police to enable them to stop people without grounds for suspicion, the BBC understands. Will this help the police?

The government has been trialling routine stop and search powers for police in so-called gun and knife “hotspots” but the powers could shortly be extended to other parts of the country.

The Conservatives are also promising a major overhaul of police powers to stop and search suspects, with police being allowed to radio in the personal details of who they have stopped.

Rightfully, there is a mix of comments for and against the powers so I wont go into too many of them but this was one typical of the “tabloid-Britain” point of view:

In London it should reduce the number of youngsters carrying knives so it must be a good thing!

Wow. Working on the assumption that something may happen justifies the injustice. Amazing.

The very concept of stop and search without requiring even the farcical “reasonable suspicion” of the past is mind blowing. This legislation, is passed, would allow the police to randomly stop anyone they wanted and search them to see if they are carrying anything illegal or, worryingly, anything the officer feels may assist with a criminal act. This definition is very broad brush – a screwdriver can be considered in all manner of ways… Even more disturbingly, the new legislation seeks to remove the “paperwork” which accompanies current stop and searches. Quite rightly most police officers dislike having to spend time filling in forms explaining who they have stopped and under what grounds the stop was carried out – however, by taking away that paperwork there is no longer any protection of the innocent person who has been subjected to police harassment.

I am sure that 99.9% of police officers are fine, upstanding members of the community and have no goal but the greater good of society. However, there are a lot of police officers so that 0.01% represents a lot of “bad eggs.” When these officers decide to stop people because of their skin colour, or their dress or whatever and continue to stop a minority of people there is (currently) a system in place where the citizen has a record of the stop and evidence of excessive stops can be presented to the authorities. Removing that removes a vital safeguard for both the public and the police officer.

Are the British people so ignorant of our recent history that we wilfully refuse to acknowledge any of its lessons? I could understand it if we were talking about issues which happened 500 years ago, but in my lifetime we have seen the problems caused by internment, lack of police accountability, criminalisation of a segment of society based on nothing but their religion (etc). Over the last 30 years we should have learned that this sort of thing encourages people to turn to violence to make themselves heard or to get “restitution” for police oppression (real or otherwise). Did we learn nothing from Londonderry, Toxteth, Brixton, Belfast…

As an answer we have this bit of madness (comment on the BBC have your say page) which encapsulates the “average British person” and their point of view (if the media is anything to go by):

Stop and search is necessary, whilst crime continues.

What we have in Britain is the lunatics running the assylum.
we have already given in to many of the lunatics request for leniency. and what has improved in the last 30 years ?
Nothing thats what.

Forget all the figures about the crime rate being down.
most crimes now go unreported.
In any society, we need control.
we cannot have unelected voices demanding a change in law.

If you cant stand the heat, get out of the kitchen.

No, it doesn’t make any sense to me either. Crime will be with us (and every other culture) for as long as humanity survives. Most crimes do not go unreported (prove they do and I will be impressed). The bit about changes to the law really threw me and I gave up on this genius. Sadly, this is a tone which you can find on nearly all the national newspapers and pretty much every Television channel. Will the politicians be swayed by this?

Christians can’t help themselves. They really can’t. In a world where science is progressing day in and day out, they are stuck with the other bronze age religions, languishing in a pit that their invisible friend will never left them out of. It is easy to see why, then, that Christians are happy to tolerate all other forms of religion (no matter how at odds with their own one-true-god they may be) but save the real damnation for Atheists.

Writing in the Times yesterday, the Rev Dr Peter Mullen (“Chaplain to the Stock Exchange” ffs) opened up with an attack on atheism that is so old and worn it is shocking anyone still tries it. It is shocking to people who are capable of learning, so it is actually less shocking that the theists demonstrate the complete inability to develop their thoughts…

Reading the article, I honestly think Dr Mullen lives in some bizarro world where he is scared the evil Atheists will climb into his bedroom and torture him for being a man of God (*). He begins his scare piece with drivel:

Far worse than the threat from international terrorism is the aggressive process of secularisation that has gripped our country, and most of Europe, and which is becoming ever more frenzied.

Erm, no. Appeal to fear noted and from there it just becomes nonsense and lies. Remember, lies make baby Jesus cry… This is actually the most sense you get from the madman so I can only assume the Times gave him space to rouse the rabble into responding. Well done The Times.

For example, I guess not many people are aware that it is against the law for state schools to teach the Christian faith as true. Teachers are allowed only to teach about religions. This is atheism by decree, for the only perspective from which one can teach about all religions is the secular perspective.

Wow. It really does make your eyes water as you try to follow this logic. But, Dr Mullen has made his point. I am offended that State Schools can not teach the truth of Odin, Thor, the Bifrost Bridge and Ragnarok. How dare they not teach the traditional religion of this nation…

“Atheism by decree” – what nonsense. I am amazed that clerics and theologians feel their belief is so fragile that unless children are completely, and continually, brainwashed they will stray to the Evil Atheism. Just goes to show that deep down they are all aware their crap is just crap and given time to think even children will realise this.

From this bad start, Dr Mullen goes on to talk about homosexuality and abortion with equal measures of idiocy and nonsense. There is nothing new, just the shameful regurgitation of old nonsense, vitriol, hatred and scare-mongering. The latter is something which appears to be a theme in Dr Mullen’s whole article. Basically he is trying to frighten people into the church. What a kind and nice deity these Christians worship.

Last point, as well as being the Stock Exchange’s chaplain, Dr Mullen is also the Rector of the Parish Church of St Michaels, Cornhill. If you thought his writing seems to be odd for a UK Anglican and felt more American Baptist, a clue may be in the Church’s webpage: (emphasis mine)

We are traditional Church of England – real Anglicans. We use the Authorised (King James) version of the Bible (1611) and the Book of Common Prayer (1662).

Hmm. Makes you wonder…

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(*) Interesting: given that Jesus sacrificed himself for others, isn’t it strange how many Christians are happy to sacrifice others for themselves…

It is wonderful, isn’t it. I go offline for a few days and the wonderfully strange concoction of people who make up our fair planet feel safe to come and comment here. Amazing.

Just over a week ago, I wrote a post looking at the insanity alternate world view that makes up a Bravenet board called “Rapture in the Air.” This seems to have resulted in a massive amount (for this blog anyway) of responses – oddly aimed at the related Shelly Corbitt post – including ones from the supposed founder of Rapture in the Air. They are almost as funny as the board. However, the pinnacle (for me anyway) of unintentional humour came in the form of a comment from Rita Cosby. I liked this so much, I felt the need to fisk it in full in a new post. Here goes…

WOW….

Thank you. We aim to impress.

you guys really are prejudice toward Christians.

Well, actually no. We aren’t even prejudiced against Christians. Generally speaking we are happy to challenge any line of nonsense, whatever its source. There is, of course, a larger amount of posts here looking at the illogical nonsense Christians throw about like chaff. The reason for this is not that we hate Christians more than any other fantasy religion, but we live in a Christian nation. The madness of Christianity actually has a direct impact on our day to day lives. It is basically, shoved down our throats on a regular basis so of course, it is going to get the most attention here. We have tried to include all religions though, and if you were actually bothered to spend more than a second looking you would see this. However, I suspect you have simply come here with this idea because some one in your religious group told you it was true, and you are conditioned not to question…

What if you find out in the near future that what your read at this site [assumed to mean RITA] is true, do you realize that by then it will be to late to repent and all of you will have to go through the tribulation.

An interesting variation on Pascals Wager. Interesting yet equally flawed. I do not for one second doubt that there is the possibility that the erm, future described on Rapture in the Air might come true. However, this possibility has to be weighed up against the possibility that the world will end in Ragnarok. What if you find out in the “near future” that the Giants have attacked Asgard and it is too late for you to take your place by Odin’s side in the final battle?

The future you anticipate is but one of an infinite number of possibilities. The chances of it happening are basically 1 divided by infinity. I am more likely to repeatedly win the lottery every week from now until the day I die.

Now, I am sure that the good fundies can simply refute any other end of times myth on the basis that the Bible tells them their one is true. However, this is poor reasoning. Even without having to worry about the Bible’s accuracy, the fact remains that “rapture” obsessed Christians are a minority of your own religion – most Christians do not believe in this nonsense, so it can’t really be viewed as doctrinally sound.

Of course, you will still have one more opportunity to give your life to Christ, if of course you live through the chaos and destruction that will take place during the 7 years of tribulation.

Phew. I was worried things would get bad. If you die in the tribulation what happens? If you die before the rapture what happens? What has happened to the countless millions of people who were born and died before the “Born again” cult took off?

I just thought I would give you a heads up folks, you can either take or leave my advice,

I’ll leave it, but thanks anyway.

but ignoring Jesus and His free gift of salvation you are in for eternal life separated from God in a place call hell………..

Where is this “place call hell?” Can you point to it on a map?

this will not be a very nice place to be, especially for all eternity.

Yeah, this brings me to another point of interest. You claim to worship a loving, caring deity who has, basically, pushed the forgiveness idea quite strongly. There is a two thousand year tradition of your deity granting all humanity with free will and the right to choose their own actions. The New Testament is a tribute to forgiving those who wrong you, being kind to all humanity (etc). From a purely moral point of view, the NT is fairly good.

Then you present this evil, nasty spiteful deity who is not content with a bit of smiting those who have the temerity to offend his divine majesty but will condemn them to an ETERNITY of torment. Wow. That is amazing.

Shall we look at this in the manner of an analogy? I think so.

Imagine, a conversation between a man and his wife. The husband tells his wife he loves her and she means the world to him. One day, the wife goes shopping and forgets to buy the husband’s newspaper.

In the REAL WORLD, the husband – even if he is a bit upset – would be expected to say “Ok, I still love you.” If he punched her for this, he would (rightly) be open for some jail time. If he beat her repeatedly he would be (again rightly) be spending a lot of time in jail. If he killed her, well in some places he would be on death row.

Now, in the land of your deity, a similar infraction will result in not just a black eye or broken ribs but ETERNITY in hell.

Where is the love there? The loving, all good God is actually a monstrous dictator who commits acts so vile they would shock the world if a human did it. He is the ultimate terrorist.

Do you really not see the logical flaw in saying to people “You have free will to do whatever you choose, but if you do not do exactly what I tell you, you will be punished worse then you can ever imagine“? I think we can all agree that dictatorships are a BADTHING™. If God was called Saddam Hussein, America would have bombed heaven to the dark ages.

Think about it.

It may surprise you (but it shouldn’t) but I have thought about it. Have you really thought about it?

In light of recent campaigns by Christian or Islamic school children to be allowed to breach their chosen school’s uniform code so that they can wear their own weird religious symbols (isn’t it verging on idolatry for the monotheists?), it seems Sikhism has felt left out. Not any more.

Today, the BBC reports:

A legal challenge has been filed in the High Court on behalf of a 14-year-old girl excluded from a Cynon Valley school for wearing a Sikh bangle.

Oh please. Is this really what the education budget should be spent on? No wonder schools up and down the country are struggling to fund real lessons (allowing creationism to sneak in), when all their budgets are spent defending against petulant teenagers wanting to rebel against the school dress codes. Gone are the days of wearing your blazer round your waist, or a funny knot in your tie, now we have court cases over esoteric religious jewellery. Wonderful.

Sadly, the much maligned liberty gets in on the act here and (IMHO) damages is standing in future causes:

Campaign group, Liberty, has made the challenge, saying the school had breached race relations laws.

Well done Liberty, you just couldn’t pass up this chance to get in the news, could you? This is not a race relations issue, it is not even a religious freedom issue. The school is not discriminating against this school girl because of her religion, race, gender, shoe size or anything else. It is attempting to uphold a uniform standard. If the school had demanded she take off the bracelet and wear a crucifix instead, then yes, I would be up in arms about it. The BBC continues:

The school bans all jewellery and has said their policy ensures equality.

After filling the challenge, Liberty said the school has also breached human rights laws.

It really is enough to make you want to cry.

I have to wear a tie to work, will Liberty defend my human right to not do so? I doubt it. Will they pay my wages when my employer sacks me? I doubt it. This girl’s parents will have been aware of the school dress codes before she started there. Why did they send her to a school which prohibits jewellery if wearing a bloody bracelet is so important?

Sadly, the BBC article continues to show humanity at its worst. It provides paragraphs of ammunition for right-wingers and neo-Nazis to continue to argue that “these people” (i.e. intelligent people who dont follow their particular brand of hatred) shouldn’t be allowed in the country. It panders to the right-wingers who bemoan how “PC” we have become and that this is a bad thing. It weakens every other “human rights” argument because this is nothing to do with fundamental human rights. I feel sorry for the Welsh Assembly (unusual for me…) being dragged into this, but at least they say it is down to the school not them.

This is not political correctness, it is stupidity. Win or lose, every one pays the price for this.