If there's such a hoo-ha over the Archbishop's call for some aspects of Sharia law to be recognized by UK law, why shouldn't there be an uproar about this?:
A legally enforceable cinema-style classification system is to be introduced for video games in an effort to keep children from playing damaging games unsuitable for their age, the Guardian has learned. Under the proposals, it would be illegal for shops to sell classified games to a child below the recommended age....
Ministers are also expected to advise parents to keep computers and games consoles away from children's bedrooms as much as possible, and ask them to play games in living rooms or kitchens facing outward so carers can see what is being played.
The thing is, there are at least three parallels between this and Sharia:
1. Both believe the law should intervene in private life, in people's bedrooms. In this respect, both differ from the liberal conception of law, which recognizes a private sphere.
2. Both reject the clear liberal distinction between what's legal and illegal. Instead, some actions - such as letting one's children's play unsupervised indoors - though legal, are frowned upon (makrooh) by the authorities.
3. Both are founded upon a belief that is perhaps wrong but certainly doubtful (pdf) - in one case that there's a God dictating our actions, in the other that the causes of teenage violent crime can be managed away by state intervention.
So, could it be that New Labour is closer to Sharia - in its less barbaric form of course - than it is to liberalism? Threats to liberty don't just come from people with dusky skins.
"Threats to liberty don't just come from people with dusky skins." That may be the first time in my life that I've ever seen anyone deny a belief that nobody in the history of the world has ever held.
Posted by: dearieme | February 09, 2008 at 06:21 PM
I have a theory about this, which i did think of posting in responce to your 2nd feb. post about the arch-bishops views, if i had, i would have said that his use of the term 'dominant discourse' betrays the link between a post-modernist/post colonial studies perspective and a kind of gullable but self serving authoritarianism.
And his views on sharia law are surrounded by yet more terms that are routine in post-modernism ('face up to the fact','seems unavoiable' etc) but have wound up people who arent used to such an underhand rhetorical style.
i think post-modernism is actually a way of seeing things morally, and not really. And when you do that, you abandon principle: that which is universal (and rational perhaps), in favour of that which is arbitrary and peculiar. by seeing subjectivity as a higher form of truth the archbishop (or post-modernist) tries to place authority beyond critisism.
the link with nu-labour is spin: just like a post modernist historian, everything tony blair says is true;its just not true in the way you are supposed to think it's true. politicians have always lied, but this is worse, i think in 1997 we accidentley voted in the worlds first post-modernist politicians. they see things arbitrarily, morally, but never really. if they see any wrong, its moral wrong and its the people who are always to blame, always revealing their innate sinfulness, needing to be controlled by the establishment, the elects, concern for public morality.
Posted by: diggaway | February 09, 2008 at 07:09 PM
you're just being silly, aren't you.
Posted by: william | February 09, 2008 at 10:25 PM
who me? yeah i probably was, sounded ok in my head though before i wrote it down.
Posted by: diggaway | February 09, 2008 at 10:47 PM
Labour, a christian heir like all the 'progresive' politics, wants to change things. Like christians, it believes that 'the best is yet to come' and is never happy with the actual state of things.
Sharia, following the spirit of the muslim religion, does not pretend, nor wishes, to change anything in this world. The law is made once for all, not because it is good (e: alcohol is forbidden but paradise will be a non ending drunkness) but because is God's will, wich is fixed.
The fact that both have some illiberal behavors seems rather secondary to me.
By the way, by thinking to introduce some aspects of the sharia to the british law, the Archbishop has shown what a good christian he is, all willing to improve the society. A muslim would have never thought of that.
Posted by: ortega | February 10, 2008 at 01:38 PM
Ortega,
"By the way, by thinking to introduce some aspects of the sharia to the british law, the Archbishop has shown what a good christian he is, all willing to improve the society. A muslim would have never thought of that. "
Because I doubt that any sensible muslim would agree that sharia will improve society.
Posted by: Cleanthes | February 10, 2008 at 07:20 PM
Although I'm an atheist, I might be prepared to accept certain aspects of Sharia law in British society.
Living in small-town Scotland, I often wish that the women round here had to wear the veil!
Posted by: Allan MacBarr | February 10, 2008 at 08:13 PM
Plus, I already wear the beard.
Posted by: Allan MacBarr | February 10, 2008 at 08:17 PM
Cleanthes,
I was meaning he was willing to improve society, not that the sharia way is the right one.
A sensible muslim will never accept 'partition' of the sharia, it does not make sense to him.
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