Even the once decent Daily Telegraph got in on the act, excreting a story about one of Dawkins' forebears a Henry Dawkins (1698-1744) who owned slaves in Jamaica (shock horror!); quite astoundingly the reporter actually asked Dawkins in all seriousness if he thought that since he was an ancestor of Henry that he might have inherited the gene for supporting slavery. I can only conclude that the Telegraph are running their own genetic experiments these days, crossing morons with idiots to breed the next generation of slime bearing reporters. If you wish to waste 5 minutes of your life reading drivel then the story is here. On Sunday Dawkins appeared on the "Big Question" TV show to talk about the survey, along with some Woman from the Telegraph who completely humiliated herself, claiming to be a "miracle believing" Christian she then went on to admit not knowing that the first book of the Bible is Genesis and that she believed the English language to be based on the Bible (how quickly I forgot all that Hebrew my native tongue is based on!) Watching this program it seemed that "Christianity" may be defined as anything one wishes. I think I'll start calling myself a "snooker player", having neither a table, cue, chalk, coloured balls or any knowledge of the rules of the game.
One thing that the Telegraph neglected to mention about good old Henry of course, was that it's a pretty safe bet he was a Christian, in the upstanding company of every other white slave owner in Jamaica at that time who were also good Christians. They also neglect to mention the good Christians who opposed Wilberforce and the 1000 years before this when good Christians condoned slavery without so much as a second thought; so much for "Christian" morality, they are welcome to it, not only do they cherry pick their Bible they cherry pick history too.
4 comments:
To be honest, the good Professor's poll would have passed most of us by if he'd not made a wally of himself on R4 with St Giles.
Many Christian fundamentalists are actually convinced that most so-called "Christians", including the C of E, aren't true believers at all. So all Dicky did, as usual, was gang up with the fundies against normal folk.
AE, The whole point of the survey was that it didn't pass people by, so in that regard it seems to have been quite a success.
Your point about the divisions within "Christianity" is kind of the point, how can legislation that applies to all of us be argued for on the basis that we live in a "Christian country" when no one can agree what that actually means, let alone what it stands for?
Steve, just as soon as we work out what everybody's Christianity means, then we can work out what it being a Christian country means!
But if someone calls themselves a Christian, that's fair enough by me. I know plenty of sell-describing Man Utd fans who've never been to Old Trafford. Or, indeed, Manchester. Or, frankly, outside the M25... but if that's what they call themselves, I guess that's what they are.
Mind, I wouldn't apply self-described allegiances to other areas of life - eg people claiming to be being brain surgeons or train drivers. And it might be a bit awkward if someone randomly decided to be Swiss.
AE, I do see your point and I would agree, people can classify themselves anyway they like, it's not the semantics that are being debated it's the consequences of those classifications.
Alex Ferguson doesn't have an uncontested seat/voice in the government so your analogy doesn't quite cover the real meat of this IMO, although the way things are going he may well actually be better at it that a lot of people who do!
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