Regular news readers may be overcome with a sense of gay ja vu yesterday at the news that yet another “member of the hospitality community” thinks that the Equality Act (Sexual Orientation) Regulations 2007 which outlaws discrimination against gay people doesn’t apply the them.

They can't come to my house either...creepy bastards

Homophobic hoteliers Peter and Hazelmary Bull, owners of the Chymorvah Hotel, were found by a judge to have broke the law when they refused a gay couple a room in their hotel.  They claimed that this was OK because their website explicitly stated that double rooms were only for married couples.  Humilated and without anywhere to stay the couple took the Hotel to court and won.  Mr and Mrs Bull were forced to stump up £1800 to each man.  The hotel owners are now in despair according to the Daily Mail – who suggested the whole thing was a plot by Stonewall.  If that is true then Stonewall have gone way up in my estimations.  But its doubtless bollocks.  Both the Daily Mail, and the couple believe this is suppression of their Christian faith with our favourite paper going as far as to claim (let’s hope correctly) that, “The ruling by a judge in Bristol sealed the supremacy of gay rights over Christian belief.”

But what Biblical context can the pair claim for their attitudes?  The Bibles main man had this to say on homosexuality. Sweet FA.  It seems strange that in 32 years of parables and ramblings Jesus wouldn’t deem it fit to comment on the matter.  Sure Mosaic Law – abolished by Jesus -  and in particular the book of Leviticus is a bit hell fire and brimstone on the old gay thang.  It would also strongly condemn the eating of “Pork with Madiera and Cream” (Leviticus 11:7) being served at the aforementioned hotel.  Lets also hope the property was free of mildew (particularly the kind with reddish of greenish spots outlined in Leviticus 14: 33-54) otherwise the couple will have spent their lives emptying their hotel, having the priest inspect it, closing down the hotel for 7 days then having the priest come back to declare it ritual clean.  And that would be a pain in the arse if you have lines of gays to turn away.

Jonathan & David: Shows Yer Girdles!

But hey fairs fair, they weren’t, as the rules of the Hotel stated, a married couple.  It is unlikely the Bulls would have thoroughly interrogated straight couples, demanded marriage certificates etc.  And Steven and Martin couldn’t be married anyway but they were in a civil partnership.  Which may not be quite marriage but is still a kind of…covenant.  So what does the bible say about a covenant?

“Then Jonathan and David made a covenant, because he loved him as his own soul. And Jonathan stripped himself of the robe that was upon him, and gave it to David, and his garments, even to his sword, and to his bow, and to his girdle.” (1 Samuel 18:1-4)

Mmmmm….Kinky.

Biblical context aside the ruling does set a legal precedent by confirming “There is no material difference between marriage and a civil partnership.”  The ruling also confirms (again) that when you run a business you lose your right to discriminate.  The Orwellian claim by the Bulls that “some people are more equal than others” is astounding giving that they wanted a right to discriminate based on their own belief system.  This Christian belief again is more equal than any other system.  If we want everyone to be equal here are a few suggestions:

• Abolish the two tier system and let gay and lesbian couples get married and straight couples have civil partnerships
• Scrap laws which exempt the Church and religious organisation from being able to discriminate based on sexual orientation or religion.
• Abolish all “faith” schools and implement an integrated, secular education system.

Until then I leave you with the words of Mike Judge of the Christian Institute who stated, “This ruling is further evidence that equality laws are being used as a sword rather than a shield.”  It seems if biblical homos King David and Jonathan want a bit of sword (and girdle) action then they should avoid the Chymorvah Hotel for a while.

"I've come to assess your disability claim"

From the Benefits and Work newsletter:

“Thousands will lose benefits as harsher medical approved

Tens of thousands of claimants facing losing their benefit on review, or on being transferred from incapacity benefit, as plans to make the employment and support allowance (ESA) medical much harder to pass are approved by the secretary of state for work and pensions, Yvette Cooper.

The shock plans for ‘simplifying’ the work capability assessment, drawn up by a DWP working group, include docking points from amputees who can lift and carry with their stumps.  Claimants with speech problems who can write a sign saying, for example, ‘The office is on fire!’ will score no points for speech and deaf claimants who can read the sign will lose all their points for hearing.

Meanwhile, for ‘health and safety reasons’ all points scored for problems with bending and kneeling are to be abolished and claimants who have difficulty walking can be assessed using imaginary wheelchairs.

Claimants who have difficulty standing for any length of time will, under the plans, also have to show they have equal difficulty sitting, and vice versa, in order to score any points.  And no matter how bad their problems with standing and sitting, they will not score enough points to be awarded ESA.

In addition, almost half of the 41 mental health descriptors for which points can be scored are being removed from the new ‘simpler’ test, greatly reducing the chances of being found incapable of work due to such things as poor memory, confusion, depression and anxiety.

There are some improvements to the test under the plans, including exemptions for people likely to be starting chemotherapy and more mental health grounds for being admitted to the support group.  But the changes are overwhelmingly about pushing tens of thousands more people onto JSA.

If all this sounds like a sick and rather belated April Fools joke to you, we’re not surprised.  But the proposals are genuine and have already been officially agreed by Yvette Cooper, the Secretary of State for Work and Pensions.  They have not yet been passed into law, but given that both Labour and the Conservatives seem intent on driving as many people as possible off incapacity related benefits, they are likely to be pursued by whichever party wins the election.

We know that many people will find this news deeply upsetting and even frightening and we know that some people will condemn us for publicising the planned changes or for the language that we are using to do so.  But we also believe that it’s not too late to stop these ugly plans in their tracks if claimants and the organisations that represent them act now.

With 1.5 million incapacity benefit claimants waiting to be assessed using the work capability assessment in the next few years and tens of thousands of people already on ESA and set to be reviewed annually, these changes will be of great concern to many voters – if they find out about them before polling day.

So, please spread the word in forums and blogs and to people you know who may be affected. Ask any disability charity you have a connection with to speak out now, before election day, against these plans.  You might also want to contact local newspapers and radio to warn people about the proposals.

And above all, contact not just your MP, but the other candidates in your constituency, and let them know you will not be voting for anyone who does not loudly condemn this shameful attack on sick and disabled claimants.

These plans really are a potential seat loser, but only if enough people know about them.

Sources

Building bridges to work

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/building-bridges-to-work.pdf

Work Capability Assessment Internal Review

http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/work-capability-assessment-review.pdf

Addendum
http://www.dwp.gov.uk/docs/work-capability-assessment-review-addendum.pdf”

tesco's ideal employee

Young people are lazy, illiterate, untidy, useless and have an ‘attitude problem’, one of the most highly-paid people in the country revealed yesterday to a conference of supermarket executives. Lucy Neville-Rolf, who earned £1.6 million last year in her job as an executive director of Tesco, blames the ‘education system’ for its failings to create a perfect society of conformist minimum wage robot clones, in a speech which rolled out just about every clichéd anti-youth prejudice in the book. I mean, it is about time these pesky young folk were brought into line and started showing some fucking gratitude for their shitty minimum wage temp contracts, isn’t it?
Well, Lucy agrees, adding into her anti-youth tirade that ‘a society where people don’t feel the need to work to gain material possessions will not be a stable or successful society.’

Undoubtedly, Neville-Rolf hinted in her speech at serious issues in our education system, in her claims that  school-leavers “Cannot do reading. They cannot do arithmetic. They cannot do writing.”. There are tens of thousands of young people every year slipping through the system and leaving school lacking basic numeracy and literacy skills -- but the only reason this concerns Tesco is that it’s affecting their profit margins, not because they actually give a shit about the state of education in this country. If they really do care that much, maybe they could consider not going to such extreme lengths to avoid paying their taxes here…?
Tesco already employees 40,000 people under the age of 19, and seemingly want to see the whole school-system re-oriented to be a rolling production line of cheap labour to suit their own interests. In all their moaning about the state of education, something they’ve done in the past too, they seem to miss the point that education is important for education’s sake. This sentiment the education system purely acts to ready people for a live of wage slavery is pretty worrying at a time when schools and colleges are facing massive budget cuts from central government.

Lucy Neville-Rolf says that young people seem to think that the ‘world owes them a living’. Why the hell shouldn’t it? Everyone has the right to a job with decent pay and conditions, and  just because the bosses at Tesco would rather we lived in a corporate paradise of low-taxes and the conditions of cheap labour (ie. mass unemployment), doesn’t mean it’s suddenly acceptable to start shitting all over young people. After all, do you think Lucy Neville-Rolf would go into her work smiling, happy and looking forward to a fun day of shelf-stacking if she was on £5.86 an hour? I doubt it.

BONUS: TESCO INVADES DENMARK!!

Anjem Choudary in happier times

Fundamentalist nutjob Anjem Choudary’s bottled it. After a week of hysteria in the British press over a planned Islamist march through Wootton Bassett, he has cancelled the demo – as many already predicted he would do. Choudary previously claimed to be organising a march for Shariah Law in London before bottling it, unfortunately not before the Daily Express ran with the story “Now Muslims Demand Full Sharia Law”.
In both cases the reasons for shitting it are obvious; Islam4UK has a membership base of only dozens and would be outnumbered in the hundreds if not thousands by far-right counter demonstrators.

Full credit must be given where it’s due however. While the Left and secular Muslims can hold sizeable demonstrations against war, terrorism and in defence of secularism they are lucky to get any coverage. Islam4UK on the other hand can picket a homecoming march with a couple dozen demonstrators holding placards and make national headlines.

People who demand that more secular Muslims speak out against Choudary, or that their voices are not being heard because they have sympathy for Islam4UK should remember how the media works. Choudary is given more publicity than any other religious Muslim leader (and possibly anyone of Muslim background in the UK) not because his ideas are popular but because they sell newspapers. A bearded lunatic raving about the flag of Allah flying over Downing Street, flogging drunks, attacking British Soldiers and generally acting like something Chris Morris would cook up is someone much more interesting to read about than some nondescript spokesperson for the Muslim Association of Britain – particularly when he’s on 25k of YOUR taxes Great Britain!

It’s this massive outpouring of hatred for Islam4UK that’s probably resulted in their banning. After being banned in their previous incarnation Al Muhjahiroun, they rebranded themselves as Islam4UK. Expect them to do the same in a couple of months – Jihad4Anglia? Scouser Muhjahadeen? Nice Cup of tea and a sit down Martyrs Brigade? The potential name changes for British Islamists are almost endless.

As much black humour Choudary and Islam4UK can provide with calls for a fundamentalist Islamic programme across the UK they are much more dangerous than their small numbers suggest. The coverage they obtain provides crucial justification for a variety of “think tanks” and a growing cottage industry of anti-Muslim bigots. Every time Islam4UK carry out a demo it can be used as evidence for massive, concealed sympathy for Islamist ideas among British Muslims. This is almost certainly Islam4UK’s strategy; punch above your weight with some mental slogans then when these are used to justify an anti-Muslim backlash pose as the defenders of Muslims.

One such organisation which has used Islam4UK to bolster it’s own anti-Muslim bigotry is the Centre for Social Cohesion. Their spokesperson agreed to debate with Anjem Choudary but then pulled out when he demanded the audience be divided into male and female. Who would have thought a religious fundamentalist would be so unreasonable. The Centre for Social Cohesion snatched headlines recently by conducting a poll claiming that one third of Muslim students supported killing in the name of religion.

The reality was that the poll showed completely different results. Only 4% of Muslim students thought it was acceptable to kill to “preserve and promote religion”. 28% thought it was acceptable to kill “only if that religion was under attack”. The second question was specifically designed to be vague enough to get the results the poll wanted.

In other questions asked, only 6% of Muslims believed that those who became apostates (converted from Islam) should be punished under Sharia Law. The poll reveals that there are only about 4-6% of British Muslims who support Islamist ideas. There were some disturbing results however – there were significant minorities who had “little or no respect for homosexuals” for instance. Also large sections of Muslims polled said they would welcome the introduction of an Islamic Caliphate, and Sharia Law in the UK. Unsurprisingly though the poll did not ask if they thought it should be forced upon non-Muslims through violence.

The only Sharia Law that is present in the UK has no legal standing whatsoever, where Muslims go to an Imam to receive a religious judgement on aspects of their lives. The Imam has no legal power and his authority is based on Muslims deciding to accept his judgements. This is not unique in the UK – Jewish Religious courts arbitrate on affairs in the Jewish community, but can only act when Jews recognise it’s authority.

Religious law shouldn’t be whitewashed – there is often pressure in marriages, families and communities to accept arbitration from religious figures even if they carry no official power. Deciding to reject it can come at a high cost in terms of personal relations with your friends and family etc. But the people who will suffer that will be Muslims and not non-Muslims in the UK, and Muslims won’t be able to challenge religious authority if there is a cloud of suspicion cast over all of them. Instead a siege mentality will develop, with these religious figures finding their authority in the community increasing.

Polling consistently shows tiny support for hardcore Islamist ideas in the UK – only 4-6% of the Muslim population support killing in the name of Islam even if its not attacked or punishment of apostates. And this is 4-6% of a religious minority. Across the UK Muslims make up 3% of the population. In Scotland it is only 0.8%. The base of support for turning the UK into an Islamic Republic would not be able to organise in telephone boxes – matchboxes would be more appropriate.

When people like Choudary are promoted throughout the media it’s not just to laugh at his ideas, or because of his sexist, and bigoted ideas. He is used by many anti-Muslim newspapers and commentators as a stick to bash all Muslims in the UK with, and to raise a nightmare scenario of Britain becoming an Islamic State. Once you have that nightmare vision you can go on to justify any kind of attack on Muslims that wouldn’t be suggested for any other minority in the UK. That makes Anjem Choudary very dangerous, but not in the way he or his opponents in the tabloid media would think.

This poster was used by the anti-Minaret campaign in Switzerland

Switzerland eh, the most peaceful country in the world – four hundred years of brotherly love and all they produced was a cuckoo clock and an overdraft for Pablo Escobar. Unfortunately today it looks like Switzerland isn’t as nice and neutral as folk thought it was.

Despite opposition from the Government, and previous polls showing opposition to the proposal the Swiss have voted to ban the construction of Minarets in Mosques across Switzerland.

This is despite the fact that Switzerland only has four Minarets in the whole country, none of which are used to call Muslims to prayer.

The proposal was initiated by the far-right Swiss Peoples Party, who have followed the rest of the European far-Right in attacking migrants but specifically Muslims. They called for a ban on Minarets as it resembled “Islamic dominance” and was a step towards Sharia law.

The People’s Party has led other initiatives in the Swiss Parliament against immigrants – for example proposing a law that would allow the entire family of an immigrant who had committed a crime to be deported, following the same principle of “kin responsibility” the Nazis used to attack the families of criminals.

Switzerland – and all countries – are right to try to defend a secular society, and not let religion interfere with the state. But the proposal on Minarets was only made relating to Muslim places of worship. There is no similar law regarding any other religious group in Switzerland. Muslims have been singled out for attack, because the war on terror has made them a convenient scapegoat.

This vote shows that unfortunately it doesn’t really matter what Muslims do in countries they stay to avoid being attacked – there were only four Minarets in Switzerland, and no history of extremist preachers in these institutions. Most Muslims in Switzerland emigrated from Turkey or Yugoslavia. As Derek Wall pointed out on Socialist Unity it’s likely many of these Muslim immigrants had their Mosques destroyed by Serb Fascists in the 90s. No doubt they will join with the Swiss Peoples Party in defending “Christian civilisation”.

Another anti-immigrant poster the Swiss Peoples Party has used, subtlety obviously isn’t their strong point

It’s important that while the Left can recognise religious fundamentalism and oppose it – as the SSP’s comrades in the Labour Party of Pakistan write about in the latest edition of the Voice – that we also recognise where a scapegoat has been made. The singling out of Muslim places of worship today is no different than when Catholics were singled out as a danger in Glasgow by bigots.

Image by John Lanigan

Almost two months of organising against the Scottish incarnation of the fascist English Defence League paid off yesterday – the SDL were outnumbered 50 to 1 by anti-fascist demonstrators, unable to march and spent most of the day kettled in a pub in Glasgow. Earlier fears of the SDL marching on Glasgow Central Mosque, attacking anti-war and pro-Palestine stalls on Buchanan St or assembling in George Square were unfounded thanks to the presence of well over a thousand anti-fascist demonstrators.

While the SDL spent their whole day stuck in the Cambridge Bar anti-fascist demonstrators had freedom to march all across Glasgow in what were effectively illegal marches. It was this presence which stopped the police from allowing the SDL any kind of demonstration in Glasgow, bar a pathetic 60 pace “march” outside the Cambridge Bar to police lines. The SDL themselves had to be taken out on double decker buses for their own safety.

Theres lots of things we could have done differently on the day – there was a split in the demo between those who wanted to stay at the Cambridge where the SDL were and those who went to Glasgow Green.

SSY members and GU Left Society members argued throughout the build up to this demo that we should have a mobilisation in the city centre early on in the day, as the SDL planned to demonstrate in the city centre well before the Scotland United rally. Having a rally away from the city centre and after the SDL were due to turn up therefore couldn’t be the only way to confront the SDL. At first UAF opposed the 10am kick off but later came round to supporting it.

The split in the demo between those who went to the Green and stayed at Cambridge is a lesson for any future demos the SDL or the far-right try to organise; many people did not stay at the Cambridge because the SDL presence there was tiny, and it was believed they would try to hold a larger rally later on in George Square. That made getting kettled outside the Cambridge an unattractive prospect, especially as there were rumours 100 SDL supporters would be coming in on the Trains at 12 to assemble in George Square.

As it happened the only SDL presence was in the Cambridge and in retrospect the demo could have stayed there for most if not all of the day. If part of the demo had to split off for speakers etc then in the future it should be somewhere much closer to the SDL – for example George Square.

Despite this the day was a resounding success, the SDL were totally unable to march or advertise themselves or their message. Just take a look at their comments on their Facebook group – http://www.facebook.com/group.php?v=wall&ref=search&gid=227558430152
The free march the EDL had in Luton was totally denied to the SDL.

SDL’s tiny “demo” kettled by the police

This wasn’t just down to a large anti-fascist mobilisation but a mobilisation which was committed to meeting in the city centre and confronting them – not simply going to the Green. SSY comrades played no small part in many of the meetings in the build up to this demo in arguing and promoting that city centre confrontation and we should be proud of our role in making sure the SDL had a bad day in Glasgow.

NO PASARAN!

If you fancy going mental and murdering your wife or girlfriend this weekend if shes been sleeping with someone else, but are scared you might face some significant jail time, breathe a sigh of relief as the Lords have sunk a bill that would have stopped men who kill their spouses getting away with a manslaughter charge if they were cheating on them.

There’s a lot of stuff Harman has come out with thats total nonsense – saying Lehman Brothers wouldn’t have crashed if it were Lehman Sisters, and that she’s much more concerned about getting women to the boards of directorships as opposed to getting women fair pay in hundreds of Labour-run councils where they have been ripped off.

But most of the attacks on her have been because she is a woman who occasionally tried to bring in some progressive measures for women, like the law above that was torpedoed, or trying to improve rape convictions. And most of the attacks have been part of a misogynist campaign against her.

This torpedoing of a law which would have stopped murderers escaping with manslaughter shows that the Conservative right are hypocrites when it comes to attacking stuff like the Human Rights Act for defending the criminal over the victim. They are quite prepared to make excuses for crimes men commit, whether its murder – “she cheated”, down to rape – “she was drunk”.

It also exposes the Lords for what they are, a group of the unelected old boys club totally unaccountable to anyone.

Hopefully in 2011 the SSP can return some feminist MSP’s to Holyrood to make the case for an independent Socialist Republic where an unelected medieval anachronism like the Lords can’t continue to excuse violence against women.

Every little bit of anti-youth prejudice helps

Tesco in Silverburn recently limited the number of schoolkids allowed to go into their shop at the same time, and has spied on them when they’re in there like kleptomaniac nazi war criminals.

Chelsea Toner reports for Leftfield below,

Silverburn Tesco are pleased to observe the rapid drop in crime since they stopped school children coming into the superstore at lunchtime.

Instead of charging in with their baseball bats and ‘chibs’ like they once did, Tesco security now firmly instructs delinquents to form an orderly line outside, confiscates their school bags and give them a basket each.

They then are allowed in only two children at a time and are followed by a security guard at all times. Security spokesman Joe McBloggs gives us a little insight: “These kids are thieves and don’t even deserve to be able to shop at Tesco. I see them with the glints in their eyes, waiting to pull a knife on a staff member or run off with a plasma screen. These precautions are for the good of the public.”

Watch out he’s nicking the fucking telly

Tesco insist that crime has fallen by nearly 100% since these saftey measures were enforced. They do not, however, continue these proceedings after school, as obviously school children are less likely to steal on their way homes than during lunch times.

An anonymous staff member’s words on the matter are: “School uniform? Might as well be a strippet jumper they’re all wearin’. Straight to Barlinnie is where they’re all going,”. Members of the general public agree that they feel safer now.

“We feel out numbered and threatened by school thugs. You never know what they might have in their grubby jacket pockets. I’m never sending my angels to a public school. I live in the Mearns you know…,” Comments Marjorie Spencer-Asdaire. “Infact, I think that any child in a school uniform should be followed by a police officer at all times,” Perhaps one day all shopping centres will come to their senses and ban all school children as they are a harm to the public and a threat to business.