Thought for the deity..

It is with some amusement that I see the BBC has rejected a claim by the NSS that the exclusively religious Radio 4 slot "Thought for the day" is discriminatory. I would have thought that it is discriminatory by definition being exclusive to a particular segment of our population but that could probably be said of most broadcast content. Having content that is targeted at a specific topic or interest group is fine in my opinion, I often enjoy listening to "thought for the day" on my way to work or dropping the kids off at school, we all hear it. Often the messages are useful reminders of real injustice or suffering going on in the world, things like famine, war and crime are commonly discussed, on the other hand often the messages are just puerile wish thinking. It's only 2 minutes so hardly the end of the world and so long as these thoughts are presented as points of view and not fact, i.e. people say things like "as a Christians I believe x" or "Muslims believe y" then I'm perfectly fine with it. In fact it often gives me an excellent opportunity to illustrate to my children how to distinguish between ideas that have evidence to support them and those that don't, perhaps not the intended purpose of the slot but a useful public education service never the less.