Why is secularism seen as such a threat?

[technodad]

Why is secularism seen as such a threat, when the very idea is based around protection of the rights of the individual?

Just to be clear before we start, secularism is about making everyone equal, no matter what their belief - simple as that really. It means that no one group (or individual) has greater rights or power in society than everyone else and that everyone has freedom of expression.

So what is it about this concept that is so difficult for some people to accept and support?

Nightlurker - well I'm glad to hear that.

As i guess you've picked up the debate is on exactly what you have said - whether religious groups should have reasonable exemptions to protect their 'religious rights'.

Personally no I don't think so. People have the religious right to do what their conscience tells them in relation to their own practices e.g. if you think homosexuality is wrong then no bum sex for you. But not the right to discriminate against others who don't share their religious views. Why would someone's 'right' to worry about what someone else does in bed interfere with that person's right to non-discrimination in employment?

Nightlurker - so I presume you would be in favour of having separate public toilets for homosexuals and "straight-only" cinemas and busses too.

Well I suppose that is fair enough. Churches can discriminate on all kinds of grounds that other employers can't - religion for one. I don't think even the most die hard secularist is going to say churches have to hire a Hindu if they apply for the job of bishop.

That some churches disallow practicing homosexuals, women or married men from being clergy is IMO their hang up. One for the faithful to sort out.

Where is the line?

Can a B&B owner ban homosexuals because they my get jiggy under their roof?

Can a state funded religious school (which we have in the UK) ban the recruitment of homosexuals as teachers?

What is the limit to this "acceptable" discrimination?

"may" not "my"

Td, the line should be between private and public, as agreed before.

If a religious school isn't state funded it can be as bigoted discriminating as it likes. There shouldn't be state-funded religious schools anyway, precisely for this reason - the overlap between church and state compromises both.

We kinda did the B and B thing.

On churches and 'practising' homosexuals, presumably these are also called sinners? In the RC and orthodox churches, sinners who are unrepentant may be denied the sacraments, but absolutely would NOT be denied entry. As for sinful priests and pastors, que voulez-vous? All priests are sinners. Orthodox Judiasm, same deal. Islam, pretty similar.

The buses are a rather hysterical red herring. I don't know of any ecclesiastically-run buses, or buses which are somehow also people's homes

Thanks sieglinde, I was hoping for an answer from Nightlurker.

Sieglinde -

Yes I agree state funded services in particular shouldn't discriminate or be in the business of paying for religious worship and instruction.

But I don't think religious based institutions should get an all-out exemption to discriminate. People who work for religious based institutions also have employment rights, and you can't just throw these out of the window wholesale.

There are very limited situations where employers are allowed to discriminate e.g. if you need a male actor, a female bra fitter, a christian chaplain etc... I think male priests and bishops come under this category where it is seen as a defining characteristic for the job to have a penis for some reason.

Religious/faith based institutions - schools, housing associations, care homes, hospices etc..employ all kinds of people - physics teachers, builders, nurses, caretakers etc.... Where actively providing a spiritual service is not a core part of the job I don't think it is relevant at all to their employment what they believe in or what they do in their personal life.

It would be wrong for a school to employ, or promote one physics teacher (say) over another because they were a practicing catholic/muslim whatever, or because one was married and the other was living in sin. no?

Nightlurker can still answer if she likes, TD

Himalaya, I can see no reason why it would be preferable to have a practising member of a religion as a physics teacher, but some schools want all members of staff to be practising members of that religion. Is this ok if the institution is not state-funded? For me it is. Tjis would mean that there was no competition between agnostic physics teachers and religious physics teachers.

What do you mean by 'actively providing a spiritual service'? For some a 'menial' job might def. be part of spiritual service, and also the goal might be to create a unified community. It's not my goal, anywhere, but if it's not state-funded I think it could be a perfectly legitimate goal. (wonder why people who aren't of the relevant faiht would want to work there anyway...:))

Sieglinde -

Loads of Christian schools have muslim, or non-religious catering staff and so on. Its a job that involves making food for children, no religious/pastoral role involved. If the job of head dinner lady was given to a Christian staff member in preference over equally good members of the catering team this would be discrimination. Do you see what i mean?

Its not about a distinction between menial roles and other roles, it is a distinction between jobs that can be done by anyone with the right skills (teaching, accounting, management, nurse, doctor etc...) and jobs that involve a religious pastoral/confessional/ministering role (leading worship, religious instruction, carrying out religious rituals).

Organisations like Christian Aid for example say something like you have to be supportive of their ethos, but choose development aid workers on their skills not their religious observance.

I don't think the argument of wanting to create a unified community by excluding people is legitimate. Plenty of employers have historically been unified communities of protestant white men with a culture around the golf club, pub etc... that they valued. They felt uncomfortable admiting women, jews, ethnic minorities, disabled people etc... because it broke up the unified community in which they felt comfortable.

Himalaya, of course I see what you mean, but not everyone would agree. Not all religions make that distinction. In Judaism and Islam, eating and food preparation, and cleaning, for example are very much religious matters. In RC monasticism and for lay people too, manual labour can be part of a charism.

Do YOU see what I mean??? If not, then I think I'd be inclined to suggest that you are imposing one-size fits all categories. There is no specific arena of 'religious' or 'pastoral' that can be defined... e.g for many Buddhists or Jains daily life is the point.

As for a unified community, it seems to me that e.g Chasidim should get to define that themselves and not be made to accept your values or mine. The comparison with golf clubs is frivolous and absurd, and suggests a failure to understand real differerence/s.

The test of tolerance - which has its roots in the Latin word to bear - is not when other people are obligingly conforming to most of your structural ideas, but when they work with and to completely alien structures. Of course I don't share Chasidic views about pollution, but I think they are entitled to impose them on me on their own private turf.

Sigelinde -

Yes I do see what you mean. But I still think that the norm in employment rights should be that what people believe, what they do at home, and what they do with their sex life is no business of their employer. And that gender, ethnicity,sexuality etc... should not be a basis for discrimination.

Yes there can be exemptions to this, where there is a genuine reason, but not a blanket exemption that anyone who works in any role for a religious organisation looses the normal employment rights that everyone else enjoys.

Hima, I think the problem I was trying to point out is that your original definition of 'a genuine reason' is too narrow for some religions. Much too narrow. I think it's just as blanket to say all religious organisations have no rights in this area.

nightlurker, eagerly agree about weaning faith schools off state funding. Problem is that they perform far better educationally.

But the reason for them performing better educationally is not necessarily down to the religious influence, but likely more down to social economic reasons.

Basically, poorer parents are less likely to lie and pretend that they are religious (by getting their kids christened for example) than middle class people. www.guardian.co.uk/news/datablog/2012/mar/05/faith-schools-admissions

It is not the religion that makes the schools perform better, but (ironically) a darwin like selection process.

Sigelinde -

I am not sure we are that far apart in practice.

I agree that if a religious organisation has a spiritual job to fill that would be fundamentally meaningless if done by someone not of that religion, then the individual's religious belief and practice can be part of the job description. It doesn't have to be a limited to my set of definitions, but I think it has to be case by case because it involves an exception to a fundamental human right.

Elimination of discrimination in employment is one of the core ILO conventions ratified by almost every country in the world. It is not a radical secularist idea, it is a really basic human right. Infringing on it is really not something to be taken lightly, and infringing on it in order to enable an employer to maintain their workplace as a 'unified community' is just not on.

This is not a blanket removal of an 'organisations rights'. Organisations have very limited rights. Taking away human rights and giving them to organisations is something to be done very cautiously.

It's not that there are loads of atheists wanting to storm the bastions and work in Hassidic schools or whatever, it is more about employees of religious organisations having the same rights as other employees everywhere (not to be harassed about their sexuality, discriminated against because of their sex, race or religion, or because of someone's interpretation of their lifestyle in relation to their religion etc..). Anti-discrimination rights and legislation are there because employers have more power than employees and often do these things if not held accountable. Allowing a blanket exception for religious organisations would be a massive get-out-of-jail-free card for employers practising discrimination, or covering up for poor management.

The problem is, that often (although not always), religious groups want to have their cake and eat it.

They can be the first to jump on the outrage bus and sound the horn over the fact that someone can't wear a neckless at work (when it is a company wide policy), but they then feel that they should be able to pick which of the discrimination rules they wish to stick to and ignore the ones that don't fit with their religion.

So if you are happy to discriminate, then you don't have the right to complain when you think others are discriminating again you (especially if they aren't actually discriminating against you in the first place, which is usually the case).

To be honest, wanting to control who is allowed to work for your "private" organisation is just the same as the BNP membership policy (similarly bigoted organisation). And I take deep pleasure in reading about people stand up to it. For example, like the asian chap who joined the BNP after the organisation was forced to remove it's "white-only" policy by law. My only regret is that 1000 more asians didn't join and then vote the white members off the board then table a motion to turn the building into a community centre and make racism against the rules!

TD, I think you've lost sight of the point. You're comparing apples with oranges.

I'm trying to suggest a principle that could make for consensus; that people should be allowed to do and say and act as they wish in private, that is non-state-funded organisations. I can't see that the BNP could be exempt on religious grounds, and that's what we are discussing. Entirely secular organisations like political parties should never be exempt from normal laws of discrimination. To say that all discrimination is the same is to obviate the entire point of the discussion. My point is that all discrimination is NOT the same.

Hima, agree that we're not far apart. I agree too that all such issues must be resolved on a case-by-case basis, and that rights should always be a key part of the framework. However, I assume too that you see as I do that there can be a conflict of rights here?

Chasidim for example should have the right to maintain their ideas of purity, and this must and will involve an inability to work with certain kinds of goy, and this will naturally impinge on what might seem the ordinary rights of others. But you can't just sweep away the rights of the chasidim to resolve the issue, because that isn't a resolution at all. It's a victory for one side over the other.

Sieglinde -

Yes I do see the conflict but I am not sure it should automatically be resolved in favour of ideas of religious purity.

I can't help reading your last paragraph like this and wondering what the difference is:

White separatists should have the right to maintain their ideas of racial superiority, and this must and will involve an inability to work for a black manager.

White separatists should have the right to maintain their ideas of racial purity, and this must and will involve an inability to share facilities such as restaurants etc..with people of other races.

Do you see what I mean? Why are ideas of racial purity abhorrent, whereas ideas of religious purity are seen as important enough to make an exception to universal human rights?

I think in practice it is resolved by people whose religion disables them from normal contact with other human beings working in family businesses that never get big enough or formal enough to advertise for staff.

Even so, I still think the people who work in these businesses deserve the right to equal employment rights with others outside of their community. Even within religious groups there is diversity. So for example an employee should not be fired or harrassed because of something they do in their private life which is seen as being at odds with religious teachings (e.g. the choice of whether to circumcise your children or not - would your employer therefore be within their rights to say 'well, you are not really following the teachings of our religion, this could be very bad for your career....') . Women should not be paid less for work of equal value because of some religious tradition about what women should do etc...

Also Sieglinde, once you say that some kind of discrimination is perfectly legitimate and a normal business practice if it has a religious reason, then you oblige other organisations to be part of that, otherwise they would be practicing religious discrimination.

So for example if it is legitimate for Christian B&B owners not to rent rooms to gay couples, then it would be religious discrimination for the local newspaper, or Lastminute.com etc... to refuse an ad that said 'no homosexuals welcome'. In fact lastminute.com would be obliged to have some kind of heterosexuality check box to avoid making contractual agreements which the B&Bs were not obliged to honor.

If it is legitimate for a hassidic owned IT company to only employ jews, then it would be religious discrimination for job centers or recruitment agency not to carry their ad, or to not screen job applicants on religious affiliation.

Himalaya

You are completely right. The justification that religious groups use when discriminating against homosexuals, is no more meaningful or acceptable than that of the BNP and their discrimination of racial minorities. They both claim to discriminate based upon their personal view that a minority section of our national society are not natural (in their opinion) and so can some how be legitimately excluded from normal human rights.

Christians base this upon an old book that says it is a sin, and the BNP base it upon an outdated view that the "native" inhabitants of Britain should not be diluted by other nations. Both are offensive concepts and not fit for a modern world.

I think this probably sums it up:

PS, you have to watch the video to the end for the funny bit.