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Causing offence to religious believers |
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Saturday, 04 February 2006 |
An interesting post on the Your Views board picks up on the lyric for my 1965 song "It's Good News Week".
"Lots of blood in Asia now; they've butchered off the sacred cow; they've got a lot to eat".
Rather like Everyone's Gone To The Moon, this was teenage undergraduate King commenting on the differences between belief and decency, dogma and reality.
Decades later - centuries later - the topic raises its ugly head again.
From the BNP offensive remarks about Islam to the absurd Islamic protests about cartoons, from the Government's attempt to make causing offence a criminal act... I wonder if I could have written my song today.
And yet, back in the 60's, we thought we were opening people's minds and encouraging tolerance.
Experimentation with drugs? I never did but we fought for everyone's right to do what they wanted to do.
Sex? Ditto - as long as both parties were willing and wanted to do it.
Religion? Let anyone believe what they want... as long as it didn't damage anyone else's life.
And the problem is... the lines have been crossed.
False claims get inflated by the police and government (CPS) and media to make a bigger and better story and fictions become facts without a shred of evidence... and people go to jail for crimes that they didn't commit but worse... for crimes that never actually even took place.
And the world panics about dramas that are not, in fact, happening as described by the media.
Make it worse; paint it brighter; exaggerate to lift the ratings; raise the circulation figures...
"Lots of blood in Asia now..."
And all over the world.
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