Posts Tagged ‘debate’

I attended Leeds Atheist Society last week. At the event, they were screening the Intelligence Squared debate, “Islam is a religion of Peace”, which is available to stream online if you haven’t seen it.

Overall, though, I’m not sure I would bother. The arguments weren’t put particularly well on either side, although perhaps slightly better for the side against, which swung the audience from being slightly for the motion, to significantly against. I get the feeling that Ayaan Hirsi Ali, as great as she is, is primarily on there because she is an ex-Muslim who isn’t afraid to speak out, rather than the cogency of her arguments. Douglas Murray was a better speaker for against, but didn’t say too much. Despite the victory, I cannot help but feeling that if the late Christopher Hitchens had been with us, he could have delivered a simple unbeatable defence.

What was far more interesting was the discussion afterwards, in which I thought the arguments put forward were far stronger than those featured on the debate. I find arguments such as The Qur’an being directly the word of Allah and the fact that it’s very hard to misinterpret all 524 verses of intolerance in The Qur’an far stronger arguments than anecdotes about how a small minority of Muslims blew up the London underground or the Twin Towers.

Because of course, this is a very small minority. Yes, they were clearly Islamic extremists who perpetrated 9-11, but this was a handful of people in a country which has millions of Muslims – the majority of Muslims are peaceful people.

But it clearly isn’t because of Islam, it’s in spite of it. To understand this, you can’t judge the entire world population of Muslims by the actions of a small radical minority. You can only say this is accurate because when you go back to the core of the faith, you find facts like The Qur’an having 534 intolerant verses, and only 75 verses containing good stuff. Or look at Sharia law states which still have appalling treatment of women, homosexuals and non-Muslims.

It’s important to remember that when discussing such topics, we’re not talking about whether Muslims are peaceful. That is obvious – the overwhelming majority of them are, and although there is a radical minority, this is true of many groups. But the question of whether Islam is peaceful is a question and answer that is detached from the attitudes of the people that identify with it. Unfortunately, the answer here is far less reassuring.

Recently, I headed down to Leeds Salon for their debate on “The Big Society: A Clean-up for the Charity Sector?” The event was well attended and had a diverse range of people there. Though as the event was part of Leeds Summat, I’m not sure whether that was partly responsible.

The speeches were good, though as someone who only dips in and out of politics a lot of the time, some of the content went over my head. The discussions afterward were very interesting as well. I’m looking forward to attending their next event.

On Wednesday, we headed down to Sheffield Humanists for their talk by Dr Natalie Hammond, “Paying for Sex.” She had recently completed her PhD on the subject, specifically men who pay women for sex and the law surrounding it.

After the talk, there was a group discussion which took a while to get going, initially with people discussing the laws surrounding the topic, but finally someone got up and moved the discourse to where we really wanted it to be – the ethics.

Naturally, being a progressive group, most people were in favour of women having the right to do as they wish and rational enough to see that it is just the same as selling your body to any labour (I sold my body to McDonald’s, doing hard labour for far less money for example), and supporting decriminalisation so that victims are not afraid to come forward and the industry can be properly regulated.

A good parallel between this with the law surrounding abortion. Even if you disagree with abortion, it still makes sense to legalise it because of the harm caused by back street abortions and driving the practice underground.

Similarly, the harm caused in prostitution is nothing to do with any inherent problems in the industry, it’s the fact that we drive it underground and as a consequence the pimps, the human traffickers, the drugs, etc, etc get involved and that is what causes the problems.

Luckily, there were a few people in the audience with more regressive views, so some great debate got going :D.

A week later than normal, we welcomed Anthony Green to Leeds Skeptics. Anthony is loosely affiliated to We Are Change, though with it being a group which doesn’t have strict hierarchy or leadership structure, it’s probably a misconception to say he was speaking on behalf of them.

Anthony presented a talk entitled “An Introduction To Psychological Operations and False Flag Attacks” discussing the armed forces use of propaganda. It was an interesting talk although as one member pointed out – none of us actually disagree that this kind of stuff goes on – we’re just not sure it’s that much of a problem.

There was some strong willed debate though it all kept very civil, both sides were quick to apologise when they thought they had offended the other, and ultimately we all agreed that the important thing was that we all worked for a better, more open society. A great meeting in my books.

Last Saturday saw the April meeting of Leeds Skeptics in the Pub. There was no speaker this month but never the less it was a very involved meeting with an hour of news and discussion kicking things off.

Indeed, it was almost a feature length meeting given the in depth discussion we had about the future energy needs of the world and whether nuclear was a safe option or not.

Interestingly, one of the points brought up was that one of the most dangerous ways in which power can be generated is actually hydroelectricity. While it’s a very green way of generating power, a dam failure can lead to 100,000’s of people dying¹.

We finished off Reason Week in the traditional manner – with an all night debate outside the union, talking to people about the society and what we do. It might have been a cold night but never the less myself, James, Rich, Michael, Elina and Elletra braved the night air until 3am.

The Thursday event of Reason Week was hosted by the Humanist Society of West Yorkshire and featured a debate on Humanist Chaplains between HSoWY chair Dr Paul Dean (or Moz as he is generally known) and Gijsbert.

The event went well and while there were was no overall winner it did at least help people make up their minds – the undecided where exactly split down the middle when we took the second vote at the end.

When I first heard of the MDI (Muslim Debate Initiative) I thought, what an excellent idea for an organisation. A robust exchange of ideas is not only the basis of a strong, diverse society but also a sign of respect…

Last year, when ran the Perspective Course for a second time and as part of our session on Islam, Nicola had arranged a speaker from the MDI to come up to Leeds to present a talk.

Being a student society we are very restricted on funding so the MDI had agreed to pay the travel costs associated with sending someone but we set about providing a welcoming atmosphere, moving our social away from the pub and to a local sheesha bar.

Then, on the day before the talk, the speaker phoned me saying he was about to book his train and wanted to check that we were fine to pay all the costs. I explained that Nicola had already agreed with the MDI that they would pay the costs but he denied this and insisted we pay the £70 train bill. I reluctantly agreed, presuming the situation was sorted.

However, twenty minutes later I received another phone call from the speaker saying that actually because he was booking at the last minute, the train bill would come to £250 and were we alright to pay this? To which I, of course, said no and he decided he wouldn’t be able to attend after all. Thankfully, within a day, the Leeds Makkah Mosque were kind enough to provide us with a speaker.

Maybe this was a mix up. I can understand that sometimes this happens.

Earlier this year we began planning a big debate between Andrew Copson, chief executive of the British Humanist Association and an Islamic speaker, so we once again contacted the MDI, presuming on good faith that last time has been a mix up. They agreed to send a speaker and after many emails being exchanged, everything seemed to be in place.

Then, when we contacted them a week before the debate was due to take place to confirm all the final details, the speaker emailed us back saying he had been told the debate was cancelled and so would not be attending.

I then contacted the MDI to find out what was going on and they confirmed what their speaker had said – they had decided the event was cancelled and told him not to go. They then asked if they would like them to provide another speaker and I said yes – and then never heard back from them.

Another debate successfully avoided.

What is interesting, is the parallels between these incidents and the infamous February 2009 debate with the Islamic Society at Leeds in which they actually went out of their way to prevent the event from going ahead. After all of this, I find myself very nostalgic for the debates we had back in the day with the Christian Union.

On Friday, I was invited up to Durham Union Society to speak against the motion “this house has no faith in atheism.”

Durham is always a pleasure to visit as it’s a beautiful place and provides some odd quirks – for example after spending 18 months living in Leeds city centre it’s a novelty to go to sleep in a room with is dark, and quiet. Plus the company of DUHSS is always welcome (though my memory somewhat failed to live up to the occasion – I got half way through introducing myself to Ed before realising we had met just a month before when I spoke to DUHSS in October).

My fellow speakers were Paul Woolley, head of the Christian think-tank Theos, Malcolm Guite, a priest and chaplain based in Cambridge, and Professor Richard Norman, vice president of the British Humanist Association.

I met Richard in the bar beforehand so we could exchange notes. It was great to meet Richard as he is clearly deeply engaged in humanist philosophy while still sharing my passion for the get out there and make a difference approach.

The hospitality on DUS’s part was excellent as well. Not only did they put me up for the night but also provided a three-course meal beforehand where I got the chance to chat with the other speakers and Anna, the current president of the DUS. Anna is one of those people who I find somewhat irritating because they are clearly taking more than their fair share of both intelligence and looks.

I was somewhat worried about the speech itself – having run through it in my room beforehand, I can’t help feeling that everything I had written was nonsense though the feedback I received at the reception after the debate was very positive so it was either a reasonable speech or people being very polite (I suspect it was a cross between the two to be honest!).

Giving the wording of the motion, myself and Richard has concluded that such a debate may be somewhat of a lost cause (though fun all the same!). It was a very pleasant surprise then when we won the vote – apparently, this house does have faith in atheism. The question is, did we actually want that result? 😀

On Tuesday, Leeds Atheist Society held a debate on banning the burqa. Myself and John were speaking for the proposition which was an interesting challenge as I don’t support the idea of banning the burqa. Never the less though we managed to win over the house in the end and clinch victory.