A Defeat for Religious Liberty...

.... by which I mean our collective freedom from religion, and in particular the Dark Age bigots who arrogantly believe they have a right to impose their backwards 'values' upon the rest of us.

The case I am referring to is that of Lillian Ladele, newest addition to my long list of religious gits. Ladele is a civil registrar of weddings who has refused to conduct civil partnerships between same-sex couples, because it is 'against her religion' (details can be found here).

Much has already been written of this outrage, the blogosphere being filled with almost unanimous condemnation of Ladele - and rightly so. But looking into her reasoning in full, it does set quite a worrying precedent, not least from a legal perspective. After all, what is religious belief other than a set of 'values' or ideas which the believer holds to be true regardless of any evidence or opinion to the contrary. In short it is an ideology, and one that doesn't accept dissent at that.

One can only assume that the type of 'religious liberty' Ladele was on about was one wherein everybody is allowed to hold whatever moronic beliefs they like, under the umbrella defence of "but it's my religion!" Under such circumstances one would presumably obey all the laws of the land - unless of course you didn't really fancy one or two of them, in which case try the 'against my religion line'.

Now lets say I have a fundamental and devout belief in not being detained against my will. Presumably this would grant me freedom from arrest and inprisonment. A sort of theologically mandated opt-out if you like. Don't fancy paying any taxes? Blame it on a god/gods - you're really sorry but he/she/they aren't so keen on the true faithful paying for the support of the non-faithful. They don't believe you? Make up some silly rituals and wear a daft hat - that should do it....

Obviously such a scenario is ridiculous, but no more so than the decision made by the employment tribunal which decided Ladele could opt-out of UK law and the responsibilities of her job. A central pillar of good democracy should be that everyone is equal under the rule of law - whether they like those laws or not.

In fact.... especially if they don't like those laws.