Yes but what was he doing?
What are we talking about here?
A police trainer who was sacked for believing that officers should use psychics to solve crimes is going to court to prove he was the victim of religious discrimination.
Was he sacked – is he claiming he was sacked – just for believing that? Or was he sacked for practicing it? Surely that makes an important difference – yet, oddly, the piece nowhere makes it clear which possibility is at issue.
Alan Power, who has been a member of a Spiritualist church for 30 years, argues that his belief in the power of mediums should be placed on a par with more mainstream religious and philosophical convictions…At a tribunal in London, Mr Power will claim that Greater Manchester Police broke the law by sacking him for believing that mediums should be consulted in criminal investigations.
But did they? Did they sack him just for believing that, or did they sack him for putting it into practice? Come on, Telegraph, obviously that’s a crucial bit of information; why did you forget to provide it?! Surely it’s quite right that employers shouldn’t be firing people just because they believe X Y or Z; surely that’s none of an employer’s business unless the employee is acting on the beliefs. If this police trainer was actually wasting public time and money by consulting psychics, or training cops to do so, then that would be a good reason to fire him – yet the Telegraph never says a word about that. Bad journalism.
The judge however said something truly ridiculous.
The judge wrote: “I am satisfied that the claimant’s beliefs that there is life after death and that the dead can be contacted through mediums are worthy of respect in a democratic society.”
No, they aren’t – respect is exactly what they are not worthy of, in a democratic society or an oligarchy. Forebearance, other things being equal, yes, but respect, no. Tolerance, in the sense of not being interfered with, yes, but respect, no. I know this is familiar territory – I seem to spend my life making the distinction between tolerance and respect – but since the coercive slide keeps being made, one has to keep pointing it out. Employees should be free to believe anything they want to, but that doesn’t mean they should be free to do anything they want to merely because they do it as a matter of ‘belief’; we should all tolerate each other’s beliefs, which does not entail never questioning or criticising them, but that doesn’t mean we should all respect each other’s beliefs, which perhaps would entail never questioning or criticising them.
“The judge however said something truly ridiculous”
Sadly, he was reading from a script we’ll be hearing all too much of in the future…
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/6494213/Climate-change-belief-given-same-legal-status-as-religion.html
“Alan Power, who has been a member of a Spiritualist church for 30 years, argues that his belief in the power of mediums should be placed on a par with more mainstream religious and philosophical convictions”
They should certainly be put on a par with mainstream religion, but not in the way Power wants.
Of marginal relevance: when someone claiming to be a psychic contacts the police with information, the police have to take such information seriously until proven otherwise, on the basis that the informant might actually be someone associated the crime and having genuine knowledge. Senior officials might be seriously annoyed by a policeman who encouraged psychic fantasists to waste their time.
He must have acted on or spoken about it, otherwise how would they have known?
Even in Saudi Arabia or North Korea, you are free to _believe_ whatever you want.
Anyway, whatever he did could have led him into the territory of bringing the police into disrepute, or indeed into wasting police time. (Of course he is wasting the tribunal’s time anyway.)
For some reason “police trainer” makes me think of “police dog trainer” which may have been his true vocation.
It looks as though the lack of any reference to Powers’ actual actions is because that was beyond the scope of the hearing – which was purely to deciode whether or not his beliefs qualify under the appropriate legislation. The case will now come return to the employment tribunal.
Personally I agree that no philosophical or religious belief should be guaranteed respect, but if we’re going to have such daft legislation it’s hard to see how spiritualism can be excluded – just as it’s hard to see why more evidence-based beliefs (as in the global warming case) should be.
Protecting ‘respect for religious and philosophical beliefs’ doesn’t just mean ‘provided that they’re neither founded in evidence nor so wacky as to make ordinary religion seem rational,’ it’s all or nothing. And the legislation’s on the books, so it looks like it’ll be the former rather than the latter…
Oh, and money quote from Powers:
“I haven’t claimed any costs. I’m not claiming compensation. It’s about hurt feelings.‘
Poor ickle bunny.
It’s not legislation though, is it? It’s a judicial decision – the one just the other day about global warming.
I suppose I should look up that decision and see if it bothered to make the distinction between belief and action.
It’s hard to believe anyone with legal training would have failed to notice the distinction…
Well, from what I’ve read the judicial decicion only extended to the question of whether or not Powers’ Spiritualism qualifies as religious belief under the law – not whether he was dismissed for holding those beliefs:
An employment tribunal has rejected an appeal from the police authority which says his beliefs do not amount to religious views, reports Police Professional.
A ruling on whether Power was unfairly dismissed is scheduled for November 23.
At a previous hearing, a judge ruled that Power’s views were “capable of being religious beliefs” and were therefore covered by the Employment Equality (Religion or Belief) Regulations 2003.
It’s a ruling on a point of law, not on the case of the dismissal itself. It was the same for the Green Philosophy guy: the court merely ruled that ‘”a belief in man-made climate change … is capable, if genuinely held, of being a philosophical belief for the purpose of the 2003 Religion and Belief Regulations”.’ The ruling in that case did not say whether or not he had been dismissed because of his philosophy, it merely gave him the go-ahead to sue. He’ll still have to prove in court that he was in fact dismissed over his beliefs.
After that, it comes down to what is in the legislation – which is a particularly crapulent piece of work in some critical respects.
Oh that legislation – right. I forgot about the act that preceded the decision!