News and Opinion

Several years ago when I wrote in the Leicester Mercury concerning the wearing of the burqa, there was quite a lot of reaction, including letters from Muslim women. My most recent letter, (24 January) quoting the views of Taslima Nasrin on the need for women to cast off purdah, found no response at all. This lack of participation by the local Muslim community is very worrying for our democracy. It suggests that people are afraid to express their views. Two important meetings of Muslim reformers have taken place over the past two weeks. On 4-5 March a 'Secular Islam Summit', took place in Florida. Its aim was to counter the reactionary voices which have been speaking on behalf of Muslims, to foster solidarity for societal growth in Middle Eastern and South Asian countries, and to seek reformation in Islam. There were more than twenty speakers from across these areas. They advocated reform of education and promotion of human rights, maintaining that these values do not belong to ...

I've just put a page about Richard Carlile among the short biographies on our website. His name has come to mind since he was one of the many victims of the so-called "Society for the Suppression of Vice" founded by the sainted William Wilberforce, whose involvement in the abolition of the slave trade, 200 years ago, is widely celebrated (e.g. 'In Our Time' on BBC Radio 4 on Thursday 22nd), though his other less laudable activities, on behalf of evangelical christianity, tend to be forgotten. The Society began with King George III's 1787 Royal Proclamation 'For the Encouragement of Piety and Virtue, and for the Preventing and Punishing of Vice, Profaneness and Immorality', which Wilberforce suggested, and followed by setting up the Proclamation Society , which became the SSV in 1802. An interesting publication on the history of these issues is Making English Morals : Voluntary Association And Moral Reform In England, 1787-1886 by M. J. D. Roberts. ...

560 million and 50 year Birthday for Leicester's oldest celebrity Dr Mark A. Purnell of the Department of Geology at the University of Leicester has kindly invited us to the Annual Saturday Seminar to be held at the University on 10 March. LEICESTER'S FOSSIL CELEBRITY: CHARNIA AND THE EVOLUTION OF EARLY LIFE Tickets for the seminar and reception are £20.00 with a buffet lunch or £15.00 without - full details and application for tickets here ). Organised by Leicester Literary and Philosophical Society Section C (Geology) in conjunction with the Department of Geology, University of Leicester, & Leicester Museums and Galleries The reception will formally open an exhibition of local and international Ediacaran fossils called 'Charni@ 50' and will launch a new BGS map of the geology of Charnwood. The public exhibition opens 11 March - 15 April 2007.

This is the first of a series of occasional postings aimed at helping secularists and humanists to counter misrepresentations and misperceptions and build the political, social and moral case for secularism and humanism. We are winning the argument but we still need to convert this into political pressure and action. In Leicester we prevented a second Church of England academy. But in addition to preventing we need to project the idea of a better way, a secular way, forward that all can share in. Apathy is the big problem. Support http://petitions.pm.gov.uk/endfaithschools/ Allan Hayes (1)Religion not a basis for most ( http://www.humanism.org.uk/site/cms/newsarticleview.asp?article=2288 ) ( http://tinyurl.com/y2yejj ) In this poll: 62% chose ‘Human nature by itself gives us an understanding of what is right and wrong’, against 27% who said ‘People need religious teachings in order to understand what is right and wrong’. 62% said ‘scientific & other evidence provides the best wa...

Taslima Nasrin, the Bangladeshi writer, who currently lives in exile in Calcutta, India, calls for Muslim women to Burn the Burqa, and to do away with all other forms of purdah. Perhaps the Muslim women of Leicester could take a lead in bringing about this modernising and liberating reform. The article was published in Outlook India on 22 January. Taslima writes (page 2 of article): Irrespective of which book says it, which person advises, whoever commands, women should not have purdah. No veil, no chador, no hijab, no burqa, no headscarf. Women should not use any of these things because all these are instruments of disrespect. These are symbols of women's oppression. Through them, women are told that they are but the property of men, objects for their use. These coverings are used to keep women passive and submissive. Women are told to wear them so that they cannot exist with their self-respect, honour, confidence, separate identity, own opinion and ideals intact. When I first mo...

In chapter 7 of The God Delusion Richard Dawkins considers "the changing moral Zeitgeist ". He maintains: "...there is a consensus about what we do as a matter of fact consider right and wrong: a consensus that prevails surprisingly widely. ... With notable exceptions ... most people pay lip service to the same broad liberal consensus of ethical principles." He calls this "somewhat mysterious consensus" the Zeitgeist . However, after considering examples of changes in the Zeitgeist , such as attitudes to racism, sexual mores, votes for women, and so on, he says: "Where, then, have these concerted and steady changes in social consciousness come from? The onus is not on me to answer. For my purposes it is sufficient that they certainly have not come from religion." He then conjectures briefly about "changing meme frequencies" and "the driving role of individual leaders", but concludes: "It is beyond my amateur psychology ...

The following is an account of a Christmas Address at the Gilroes Memorial Service given by our member Eleanor Davidson who is a Humanist Celebrant. The Memorial Service happens each year, in memory of those who have died. It's in the form of a carol concert with addresses and bible readings by clergy. This year there were five Christian clergy taking part plus Eleanor as Humanist Celebrant. Eleanor's address was totally different to the other messages! Mince pies and refreshments were available. There were Christmas trees on which to hang a message for a deceased loved one, and donations were to Rainbow's Children's Hospice. Moving On It was deep in December. The blue-black sky hung low, laden with silent, twinkling diamonds and the far-off slither of moon shone coldly down upon the young family’s exhausted footsteps as they trudged despairingly through that crisp and even blanket of frosted ground. The man pulled up the grubby collar of his inadequate jacket and his y...