The Guardian is always a good place to find nonsense, and this piece by Tobias Jones from today’s paper is no exception. The writer has this to say:

There’s an aspiring totalitarianism in Britain which is brilliantly disguised. It’s disguised because the would-be dictators – and there are many of them – all pretend to be more tolerant than thou…They – call them secular fundamentalists – are anti-God, and what they really want is the eradication of religion, and all believers, from the face of the earth.

Oh come on.

I’m no fan of Richard Dawkins (I think he’s a religious maniac, in fact) but to suggest that Britain is now crawling with the successors to the old Soviet League of the Militant Godless is absolute nonsense. Mosts Brits, thank God, simply are not interested in the topic one way or the other. Sadly, Tobias is not alone making these claims. Back in England over the Christmas (no ‘Winterval’ for me!) holidays, I was very struck by the way that certain clergymen were trying to claim that rising objections to militant Islam (and the privileged status it now has in British society) were an attack on religion generally. For the most part, it’s nothing of the sort, and those clergymen know it. What they have done however is spot that militant Islam may, to quote bin Laden, be the ‘strong horse’ and they are angling to hitch a ride. I seem to recall that in another era and in another country, Marshal Petain and Pierre Laval tried a similar trick with another venomous ideology. It didn’t work out for them, and it won’t work out for these idiot vicars either.

But back to the article:

Britons are actually laissez-faire about such things. And so the [secularist] fundamentalists deployed an opposite tactic. Instead of pretending to protect religious sensibilities, they went on the offensive and sought to give offence. The subsequent reactions to the play Behzti in Birmingham, to Jerry Springer the Opera and to the Danish cartoons were wheeled out as examples of why religious groups are unable to live with our cherished freedom and tolerance.

Um no. The play ‘Behtzti’ was closed down because of fears of the reaction among some Sikhs, the BBC was threatened with prosecution by extremist Christian groups for showing ‘Jerry Springer the Opera’ and I shouldn’t need to say any more about the Danish cartoon jihad. But then Tobias continues, “In recent years the nastier side of this totalitarianism has become blatantly apparent. It emerged with the hijab issue in France. With the hijab ban in French schools, a state was banishing religion not only from its corridors, but also from its citizens.”

Totalitarianism? Hardly. Besides, the hijab was not banned in all French schools. It was banned in state schools. What’s more, unless I am missing something, the right of schools to set dress requirements for their pupils is hardly revolutionary. Quite why adherents to one particular ideology should be exempt from such rules escapes me.

Europe has a growing problem with militant Islam. How sad that some people of other faiths appear set on making that problem worse.