Magicoreligious Madness

The recent story of the Sikh girl who won the right to wear a piece of jewellery in opposition to school rules was always going to get a comment out of me.

As evident by the prominent link to a certain Church on my blog front, I don't hold religion is particularly high regard. Not to say I don't have faith, which I do, or I don't see a point in believing in something or than deterministic, reductionist science. I don't consider faith the be all and end all of existence in the same sense that science does not explain everything, however some people on either side of this invisible border between the two continue to have irritating effects on society. A society which is, apparently, looked after by a secular government.

The school in question was running a 'No Jewellery' policy. This in itself is not uncommon from schools I have both attended and worked in. I gather such policies are conducted for several reasons. Firstly, jewellery can cause jealous and envy, which have further follow on and side effects. Secondly, jewellery can cause problems with local health and safety policies (hoop earrings being pulled out - not pretty). Thirdly, some schools employ a uniform policy in an attempt to make children feel smart and equal to each other. Accessories put a dint into this, unfortunately. I don't agree with taking away people's individuality ala uniform policy, but it is a rule in many schools and was in this one, for (debatably) good reason. Rules are rules, and - made to be broken or not - are enforced, and should be if that's what the school board has agreed. Furthermore, the student in question signed a contract saying she would abide by said rules. I'm sure it wasn't a blood-legal document, but still an agreement.

Thus, she was breaking school rules. And anyone breaking rules is usually reprimanded. She continued to break the rules, she continued to be reprimanded. Until she went into the Court system and received what could be described as special dispensation to break the rules of the school. This special dispensation happened because what she was breaking the rules wearing is an accessory of magicoreligious importance. Despite the fact that it is going against the grain of all three of the above points of the rule.

This is particularly annoying. Schoolchildren comprise a diverse mix of cultures and subcultures who are different in physical appearance and psychological standpoint and belief, including any spiritual or magicoreligious standing. For some children, music is king. It's the most important thing in their lives. Listening to it, reading about it, following the tenets set out by the leading stars. And yet they are not allowed to express this through accessories on uniforms. Piercings and eyeliner, for one example, are disallowed. Yet a Sikh bangle has been given special dispensation (thankfully, the Fundamentalist 'SilverRingThing' was thrown out of the courts last year. I almost had a little party in celebration).

So, the crux of the matter is: where do we draw the line? This is not a secular society, so one belief should not receive more privileges than an other. Clearly, Sikhism has existed for a much longer duration and has a larger following than some Gothic music subculture, as hinted at in the example above. But does that automatically make it more important? What about a young black child who is celebrating his or her ethnic or racial links or roots by wearing a certain accessory to their uniform? Is this aspect of colonialism and it's aftermath less or more important than a religion. Where is the line drawn?

My standpoint is that mentioned above. As long as Britain remains a secular country then religion should not get any leg-ups. There are many schoolchildren who believe in fashions or trends just as vehemently as a religion, and yet they're not allowed to express themselves within the gates of a school. Their treatment shouldn't be so unfair.

Hate Crimes

Is the current era a bit dramatic, do you think?

I was reading, within the massive organ of investigative journalism that is The Metro, that Stonewall, a pro-homosexual group, has recently found that hate crimes against homosexuals is relatively common. I can't remember the figures, but they were something like 1 in 3 people have suffered a hate crime due to their preference of sexual partner.


The day after this article, a man wrote in shrugging off the study, suggesting that some of these 'hate crimes' could simply be a little bit of name calling. And that name calling occurs in many walks of life, for many reasons (although I assume all these reported 'hate crimes' involved some kind of homophobic slur). A cavalcade of letters followed the day after, lambasting the guy for voicing his opinion.

It got me thinking about this day and age. By now, you may have picked up my general dislike for the term 'hate crime'. It's too emotive for me, personally. Not clinical enough, like many other crime titles. Grevious Bodily Harm is quite descriptive. A Bloody Good Kicking is less so.

Today a patient made a joke about me being a good nurse "for a boy". This is clearly discriminating against me due to my gender. And this is not unusual. Some kind of similar comment is made probably once weekly. Is this a hate crime?

I'm pretty impervious to such jokes. And they are jokes. Light-hearted, if a little ill-considered. And I rebel against most gender stereotypes anyway, so I don't mind. But someone else might mind, and to this someone else such jocular gesticulation could count as a hate crime. To them, I mean. So is hate crime in the eye of the beholder? Where do the boundaries lie?

I personally agree with the first letter writer. There are degrees of jokes/insults. I'm from a regional background which takes a lot of stick for various reasons, but I wouldn't cry 'hate crime!' when someone did an impression of my accent or insinuated something about my character.

But I suppose someone else might.

Once again, it might be a case of me being white-middle-to-lower-class-reasonably-educated-male-trash. We're kinda overlooked by positive discrimination/affirmative action*. If the entire hiring process of nurses changes overnight to admit male candidates until the make-up of the nursing core is more representative of the general population, I'll take this point back. But I won't be popping down the bookies to put any money on that happening just yet.






*Note: Isn't the term AFFIRMATIVE ACTION awesome? It's so American. So much so you can imagine a high-kicking film of the same name. Not a good one, but a film all the same. You know what I mean. It might have Steven Segal in or something.

Do when in a good mood.

I'm pleased. Despite the fact that Final Fantasy Tactics A2: DS doesn't come out until tomorrow. I'm also amused by recent news articles.

Firstly, can't women wear ties? Enough said.

Secondly, the whole positive discrimination part of the Equalities Act being put through it's paces today. Highly amusing. Don't get me wrong, a lot of the Act is a good idea. Equal pay, for example, or lack of, is a fucking joke. The law shouldn't really mess with the policies of private companies, but the fact that some government jobs don't pay men and women equally is just a bit stupid. If the government kicks it's gender-pay-issues into touch, private enterprise might follow. The whole issue should be sorted out, if not for red tape. This much I agree with.

The idea of using positive discrimination to try and sort of these issues is unworkable false economy at best. The whole concept seems to revolve around: 'If two identically qualified candidates were up for the job, and performed identically at interview the employer could pick a woman/person from a ethnic minority if it'd make things more equal'. What the latter bit refers to, I hazard to think. I suppose they mean that if an area was populated by 60% Asians of Pakistani descent then someone who was of similar origin would get the nod to be police chief, or whatever.

The whole first part of this fictional scenario will never happen. Two candidates will never be identical, so surely the point of the legislation is to use ethnic background and sex to 'smooth out' any 'inequality'. But surely, this idea that someone got a job because of their biological background instead of their talent doesn't help anyone. In fact, does it not undermine the whole fight for equality?

Two wrongs don't make a right, as the saying goes.

Now, given around half the people in hospitals at any time are male, does it mean men will be fast tracked into nursing posts? I'm massively talented and don't really need a cheating opportunity from the government, but even so in two years, I certainly hope so.

Edit: It seems that this positive discrimination will operate before interview. So if there's a pile of similar CVs of people with identical experience then employers could pick the female and ethnic ones over white and/or male ones to fill any sort of quota supposedly towards equality. So what happens if you pick people on evidence of their CV and biological background and find they all interview terribly? Do another round of admission to interview without the filters on? Interesting idea.

Football Quotas

Right. My day wasn't too exciting, so I'll weigh on the idea of national discrimination within Football. Or, rather, Blatter's "5x6" idea.

If you're unaware, FIFA want to make it illegal to field more than 6 'foreign' players in a competitive football match. It's to stop the wealthy clubs (who keep FIFA and football itself alive, let's not forget) buying up all football talent from around the world.

Rich clubs = successful clubs and vice versa. If a club becomes rich and successful then it should be able to expand in whichever way it wants. Rich football is more like a free market economy than some kind of legislated socialism and so it shouldn't be treated as such.

The bottom line is: The Premiership is a honeypot, attracting all the biggest players. Other leagues are jealous. They try to blame rich owners, but how much are Real Madrid paying for players these days? Lots. They try to dress this new regime up as equality within football, but positive discrimination never changed anything.

Morons.

Equality

This story has crossed my internet desk recently.

The idea of giving someone a job regardless of gender, race or age is an amazing one. The idea of giving someone a job because their gender/race/age 'needs' to be represented is a silly one. That's as simple as it goes, for me. To say that 40% of a population is female therefore 40% of the government ministers should be female is highly naive. If you play those odds then surely you have to play the odds of age (baby ministers anyone?), race and religion? And those three just for starters.

Sexism is stupid. However, discriminating towards women to try and reduce sexism isn't going to get anyone anywhere. Education is key, and if the new Spanish cabinet pushes for education - good (although I'm not sure they need to be predominantly female to do that). If it's just a publicity stunt then they're nothing more than expensive role models without the important substance all role models should have.