To prohibit the desecration

How about no.

Labour MP Tahir Ali has today advocated for blasphemy laws during Prime Minister’s Questions.

The MP for Birmingham Hall Green and Moseley asked Keir Starmer if he would “commit to introducing measures to prohibit the desecration of all religious texts and the prophets of the Abrahamic religions”. Speaking in the Commons, Ali added that “November marks Islamophobia awareness month,” and that “last year the United Nations Human Rights Council adopted a resolution condemning the desecration of religious texts, including the Quran, despite opposition from the previous government.”

Then the UN Human Rights Council needs to have a word with itself. Goddy rights are the enemy of human rights. “Prophets” are the fictional goon squad that enforces bad retrograde misogynist religious laws and we have every right to say what we think of them. MP Tahir Ali has no right at all to impose his religion on anyone else (including his own children), any more than trans ideologues have a right to impose trans ideology on anyone.

The Prime Minister replied that the Government is “committed to tackling all forms of hatred and division”, including Islamophobia and antisemitism.

Oh did he now. Listen up, Mr Starmer: we get to dislike Islam as well as Christianity and Judaism. We get to dislike the “Abrahamic” religions. We get to say what we dislike about them. They’re all forms of illegitimate power, and it’s not a secular official’s job to put up a fence around them.

Ali said that “mindless desecration only serves to fuel division and hatred,” with the Prime Minister adding: “desecration is awful.” 

Oh shut up. Theocracy is awful. The imaginary Eternal Prime Minister we can never vote out, never dissent from, never correct, never tell to fuck all the way off, is not something secular heads of secular governments should be shielding from the people.

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