Columnists
Zero Tolerance
James Cary
Ishout at the TV. It's partly a function of being a dad, and
turning forty. But it's also because I'm a sitcom writer. The kind
of thing I shout is 'No one would ever do that!' or 'Just call the
police!' It's infuriating when characters behave oddly for no
apparent reason or a plot contrivance means a character pursues a
goal way beyond a point that is reasonable. My life is a constant
stream of trying work out who characters are and what motivates
them, so my audience don't shout at my show. We rarely hear these
motivations spoken aloud because most sitcom characters are
deluded, or in denial. We only see their actions. But their actions
must have a reason. The way they behave is entirely dependent on
how they see the world, and what they hold most dear. I mention
this because the motive of politicians has been questioned in the
latest round of the 'religion and politics' debate. This was
sparked by the election of the new LibDem leader, Tim Farron, a man
with a personal vibrant grown-up Christian faith. The worst kind.
Or so the media would have you believe. John Humphries was very
bothered by the idea that Tim Farron might pray about his politics,
as he was when Tony Blair said he prayed with George W Bush. How
dare either of them do something that is simultaneously
presumptuous, stupid, pointless and dangerous? The suspicion of
Farron is also because most journalists and pundits are unable to
grasp the basic idea that one is able to personally disapprove of
something or think it a sin, but think it should not be made
illegal and reclassified a crime. But the bizarre world in which we
now live has reclassified tolerance. Tolerance - or being liberal -
is no longer putting up with the behaviour of others with which you
disagree. It has become applauding the behaviour of others doing
that thing you don't like. Or pretending to. This is not progress.
The great irony is that religious people are seen as intolerant
hotheads, determined to impose their dangerous views on others, but
it is the secularists who have all the coercive power on their
side. They have the law-makers, magistrates, police and prison
guards all enforcing a particular brand of post-Christian, large-
state, liberally-aggressive morality. If you don't agree with that
brand of popular morality you're out of luck. If you don't bake
cakes in favour of it, you will be fined. And if Theresa May gets
her way with her jaw-droppingly ill-conceived anti-terror
legislation, you'll be arrested for not being British enough. If
being British means being a collaborator with the thought police,
book me into the East Wing of Strangeways. The debate about whether
faith has any place in politics rumbles on, but surely it is a
non-question? How can faith and politics be separate? Politics is
religion by other means. They are both answering similar questions
about how we should live, and what is right and wrong. It is absurd
to have to point out that the law and the welfare state are
profoundly moral. But on what is that morality based? The real
question is how this enforced morality is originated, maintained
and amended: by the interpretation of the word of a deity? Or by
the votes of an electorate? The will of the people may be
democratically legitimate. But it doesn't make it right or just. It
just makes it legal and enforceable. Politics is religion, only
more so. Religions declare certain practises sins, or even
abominations, an offence to God. You may invoke his wrath in the
next life, or excommunication from your faith group in this. But if
you don't agree with a priest's theology, you can walk away. Your
choice of religion is your decision (disregard for a moment that
I'm a Calvinist). Disagree with a politician's theology and you may
find yourself unable to walk anywhere. The politician can declare
your sin to be crime for which you can be arrested, questioned,
fined or imprisoned. Far from being worried, we should be happy
that we know what Tim Farron believes and on what he bases his
politics. And rather than single out Farron, we should be asking
every MP about the origins of their moral framework. How would his
secular colleagues fare? We would discover that we should not be
worried about religion but those who wield the sword of the state
with views far more bizarre, unsubstantiated, incoherent and
contradictory than those of Mr Farron.