How far can protected beliefs go?

[lechiffre55]

Asking for cool heads on this one please because it uses a current sensitive topic for an example.
e.g. who you would you vote for threads ususally degenerate quickly to tribal mud slinging. Only an xxxxx would vote yyyyy!

I'm very happy where all the recent tribunal results regarding discrimination and harassment against gender critical beliefs have gone. I hope the trend continues with those still in progress. I have my fingers crossed in particular for Roz after hearing the witnesses from ERCC.
However as with free speech it matters most that you support it not when you agree but when you disagree.
How does this result affect how you feel about the tribunal process? It's certainly making me have a think about how the whole process works and my own views.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-13049063/Zionist-tribunal-University-Bristol-professor-Islamophobia.html

I try as much as possible to matintain internal views that are consistent as much as possible if you substitute in different people. So for eample I want all people to have equal rights, including those I disagree with. If you read what this guy believes I think his views are quite extreme, but a tribunal has ruled his belief is legally protected in just the same way that gender critical belief is.
I'm only using this as an example. I don't want a who's right and who's wrong thread about a decades old conflict. I'm more asking for are there any beliefs that shouldn't be protected in law? Who gets to choose which beliefs should and shouldn't be protected.
How can large organisations avoid breaking the protected beliefs discrimination laws if they have a large number of people with vastly differing views, especially when some of those strongly held beliefs are in direct diametric conflict with other equally strongly held beliefs? It seems almost impossible to me.

Many people hold beliefs that are incompatible with human dignity. Many people believe that the death sentence is a good thing or that women are lesser than men.

You cannot reach into someone's mind and change their beliefs - they will continue to hold them regardless. They will continue to make personal decisions based on those beliefs.

What you can do is create law that makes it illegal to express those beliefs and pass them on to others, as this could be seen as incitement to violence or criminal behaviour.

This creates some limits on behaviour but ultimately can not stop one group who hold such beliefs acting in a way that they feel is justified towards another group.

It does mean that when they do this, if they act in a way that is illegal, violent or harmful they can be prosecuted.

I think I can see where holes might appear.

e.g. ii It must be a belief and not, as in McClintock, an opinion or viewpoint based on the present state of information available.

Yes, Grainger 2 essentially rules out all scientific beliefs, which gets rather silly.

Without all that having happened I might not be gender critical at all.

I’ve pondered on this a bit. Thing is we all know that sex is real, unchangeable and of social importance even before we put any thought into it at all. Does this mean our “belief” would have risked failing a different one of the Grainger criteria?

Would you have opposed Mighty Ira's ACLU defense of the Illinois Nazis right to march in Skokie in the 1970s?

Paradoxically by standing up for Nazis, ( not just people accused of being Nazis, but actual Nazis who called themselves Nazis ) Ira Glasser and the ACLU deeply cemeted civil rights in America. When even the Nazis have rights, everyone has rights. It's considered one of the finest victories in the history of the ACLU because it elevated the principals of civil rights above the emotional reaction towards the involved party.
Mighty Ira believed their views, no matter how repellant, deserved the same rights as everyone else. It goes back to who gets to decide what's allowed or not?
https://www.mightyira.com/

Agreed. Buckets are nonsense.

My view of the best version of Tayto is entirely unconnected to my beliefs about Brexit, and neither has a bearing on what I think about vaccinations or women's rights.

Let’s not take the wrong lessons from Skokie. It’s reasonable to believe that Nazis should have freedom of speech and the right to self expression, whilst also believing that an employee has the right to dismiss Nazis from particular employment if their beliefs cause harm to the employer.

In my case it would mean that because there was no inherent forced conflict, that I wouldn't have been forced to choose a side. If everyone had got along on this subject there would be none of the fallout. I would still believe in the immutability of biological sex, but it would be within the context of a less febrile society.
For me the inability of a human to change sex is best illustrated by Magritte's The Treachery of Images.
https://www.renemagritte.org/the-treachery-of-images.jsp#

Technically, my belief in the existence of defined sex classes might fail Grainger 2 - because science.

But without the current and recent happenings what I actually believe wouldn't be any different. I just wouldn't have a specific name for it other than 'feminism'. Or any reason to consciously connect belief A (there are 2 sexes) with belief B (gender roles are regressive and harmful).

Views don't have rights. People do. I know I sound pedantic but it's important to distinguish between the person and the belief. :)

The best thing to do with awful belief systems, imo, is question them forensically. This is why the recent court cases have been so useful - you can see the language mangling to avoid saying what the belief actually is.

This doesn't mean public airtime should include anything and everything. Critical thinking is the best defence.

Yes. And the expression of beliefs is important, as was discussed in the Forstater case. There are different levels of permitted expression. For example, I have the right to racist beliefs and I can express them in my capacity as a private citizen without being arrested for it. But, if my beliefs are not protected, my employer can fire me for expressing them at work. Even if they are protected, I am not necessarily allowed to express them in all contexts and to any degree. So for example, an employer could still fire Miller if he used his anti-Zionist beliefs to harass Jewish students.

I am concerned about the expression of beliefs in private life being used by employers to get rid of people 'who bring the company into disrepute'. Especially where they have not actually done anything - but their particular beliefs are viewed negatively by particular employers.

If they have conducted their employment activities as per their contract and there has been no indication that their beliefs have affected the way they do their job then I do not think employers should be able to extend their powers into people's private lives.

Otherwise we are 'owned' by our employers and their 'values'.

None of this is easy. The one thing I would say (and this is about free speech in general, as opposed to religious or philosophical beliefs protected under the Equality Act) is that context does make a difference. Should racists be allowed to print books and leaflets expounding their views? My view is that they should. Should they be allowed to hold demonstrations in support of their views? Trickier, but probably yes. Should they be allowed to teach in a classroom and express those views to a group of 10-year olds? Definitely not. What about if they're a nurse and express those views on social media? Almost certainly not. What if they're a shelf-stacker and express those views on social media? Probably yes.

@RoyalCorgi Do you think nurses should be allowed to express any belief views anywhere? How about religious beliefs?

Nurses have a double whammy of employer contract and expectations and also the NMC Code of conduct (which is quite wide ranging and sometimes unrealistic or incompatible with employer's demands)

There is definitely a hierarchy of beliefs that you are allowed to hold and that will be accepted by employers - religious beliefs seem to be at the top of this and I find this unfair as many religious beliefs are violent, sexist and intolerant.

Yet a pharmacist can use their religious beliefs to withhold contraceptive care or nurses to 'opt out' of caring for someone undergoing an abortion.

For me it’s about what a democratic society is, we can disagree with someone’s beliefs whilst agreeing they have a right to their belief.

Where manifesting a belief steps over the line for me is violence or threats. People are free to be anti-zionists or TRAs etc. but threats of violence are not acceptable.

This is interesting. So the religion pushed by parents overrides the child's desire, but the diet ideology of the parents does not override the child's desire.

I would be of the opinion a child can do whatever the hell it wants as long as it doesn't harm itself. If it wants to eat something against the parents' wishes, who are the parents to demand the school monitors all kids to ensure it doesn't happen.

Thank you OP for raising this. It did give me a shock to see this decision, and made me worry immediately about the repercussive effect on public perceptions of decisions like Forstater, Phoenix, Meade etc. Already, when reporting on the issue, the Guardian managed (by quoting an 'expert') to misrepresent the cases as being about "people (who) ... find their colleagues’ views (are) completely obnoxious – but nevertheless protected because freedom of speech is something that … has been really promoted". When the ET had just very specifically found Jo Phoenix 's views to be not obnoxious (or at least, transphobic, which was what she was accused of). I think that actual transphobia (whipping up hatred, endorsing anti-trans discrimination or punishment) would not have passed the Grainger test.

The problem I have is that I do find Miller's views obnoxious, and antisemitic to boot. So I hope Bristol will appeal. Am I being inconsistent and irrational, because I am both GC and pro-Zionism? I hope not, but I'm afraid I'll have to say a little about his views to explain why.

I think the ET have fallen into a category error, or, just possibly, given Miller too much of the benefit of the doubt. Like GC views, Zionism (whatever you think it is) is a debatable political philosophy which has its pros and cons. I happen to think the pros outweigh the cons. Miller thinks otherwise, but he goes further, representing it as something that is inherently genocidal and an enemy to world peace, accusing the movement of using Jews outside Israel as pawns, and stressing the involvement of Jewish charities in pro-Zionist lobbying. Given the last two thousand years, you would have to have a tin ear not to hear 'Jews are bloodthirsty, Jews care nothing for gentiles, British Jews are traitors, Jewish money rules the world via an international conspiracy'.

Miller could have argued against Zionism, based on exactly the same facts, but without using the antisemitic tropes, and I would have listened (and argued back, obvs)

TLDR: Jo Phoenix wasn't trying to take away trans people's rights because she thinks they are stinky.

I have no clear opinion on this topic. On one hand I think free speech is important (and not the 'progressive' type "free speech yes, but not free from consequences") but on the other things like holocaust denial being illegal or hate preachers (massive problem in some European countries that isn't taken seriously enough due to fear of being labelled racist/islamophobic) I would agree with being illegal. However, where do you draw the line? Are 99% of topics easily categorized by some rule and 1% of topics will have to be evaluated case by case? But who evaluates? What are the criteria?

I think the ET have fallen into a category error, or, just possibly, given Miller too much of the benefit of the doubt. Like GC views, Zionism (whatever you think it is) is a debatable political philosophy which has its pros and cons. I happen to think the pros outweigh the cons. Miller thinks otherwise, but he goes further, representing it as something that is inherently genocidal and an enemy to world peace, accusing the movement of using Jews outside Israel as pawns, and stressing the involvement of Jewish charities in pro-Zionist lobbying. Given the last two thousand years, you would have to have a tin ear not to hear 'Jews are bloodthirsty, Jews care nothing for gentiles, British Jews are traitors, Jewish money rules the world via an international conspiracy'.

This is what immediately struck me. I hope it is appealed, it sounds a bit like the first ruling in Maya's case in reverse.

This. It's WORIADS to think that Zionism is not the best solution to the problem, but not WORIADS to accuse it of being evil, antisocial, manipulative and sly, in place of proper arguments and research.

If I’ve read this case correctly, there is unlikely to be an appeal. Miller was sacked for anti Zionist views and those views have been judged to be ‘allowable’. Had his employer judged his views as being antisemitic, and sacked him for antisemitism the judgement may have been different. As understand it, the employer never argued that miller’s views were antisemitic.

As understand it, the employer never argued that miller’s views were antisemitic.

No, indeed, the employer had previously made a finding that they weren't antisemitic but nevertheless thought those specific views (as opposed to anti-Zionism generally) would cause upset.

The ET was free to find those views non-WORIADS on any grounds it liked though, and I felt the bar was set rather high.

I have downloaded the judgment, so that's my evening sorted...

I think the current laws on free speech and on protected beliefs are probably about right (though increasingly laws are really badly drafted) and - if followed with intellectual rigour, and without the total silliness that's the current zeitgeist - mean that the Miller decision is right too.
I'm fairly absolutist about free speech and I'm concerned about the drift to limiting it due to 'upset' and not simply limiting it by reference to criminal law and human rights law.
There will always be cases on the edge. But that is always true with law. Think of the contortions governments go through on things like self-defence or consent or when looking at the 'reasonableness' of various behaviours which comes up in all sorts of contexts.
There will also always be judgments or laws with which some individuals disagree - think the statues in Bristol, or rights to protest during Covid.
But if the Rule of Law is followed by the judiciary 'without fear or favour', mostly society can muddle along.
The problem is that there is so much power now outside of government and the judiciary. That should be a good and democratic thing but it's actually quite dangerous because if global corporations, say, start following TRA leads, they have the 'soft power' to influence the way millions of people think. That's one of the reasons America is always first to be captured by any madness - libertarian capitalism is so strong that govts of either colour are swept along on a sea of money rather than sticking to intellectual principles.

Yes, agree we must always err on the side of giving people the benefit of the doubt.

But doesn’t that make it extraordinary that we once had a first instance decision, that belief that sex exists, and is important, is not WORIADS? What were they thinking?

I'd certainly start from the position that everything is allowed and work backwards from there, rather than starting from the point of view that anything controversial or 'difficult' is circumscribed and needs to be tested in court before being 'permitted'. Which the EA protected beliefs thing seems to me to be in danger of creating.

We should say 'all beliefs are protected' and then very very carefully make rules about some specific ideas/expressions that aren't. In fact I'd suggest all 'beliefs' should be protected no matter how mad or morally wrong. It's the expression or acting upon them that is the point we can legislate for, surely?

(In a workplace or certain other contexts it's different obvs. )

I think there is a difference between holding the views and acting on them.
Holding the views is what is protected in law, as in employers can't sactjust because someone has them.

I've worked with some people who have been very intolerant of homosexuality on religious grounds. They would get sacked for it if they discriminated against those people but they can't be sacked for holding the view.

This particular article is what happens when you have freedom of speech and thought. It's right he has protection imo.