Brace yourselves as we sally forth into the shadowy realms of the
Leicester Mercury's letters page, to bask in the gentle decency and intellectual rigour of Dr D R J Green. Dr. Green's letter is entitled 'Why We Need Censorship'. Oh dear.
Some highlights.
Any assault on the faith of the people of Leicestershire should be unacceptable in the same way that we have laws which aim to prevent, quite rightly, racially-motivated attacks.
No person should be allowed to be deliberately offensive to other members of our community, and I applaud Woolworths and Sainsbury's for the action they have taken.
Censorship is unfortunately a necessity in our modern society so that the impressionable and less discerning are not corrupted by the modern-day filth that we seem to experience more of.
There have been clear instances where some films and games have made such an impression that some of those who have watched or played them have transformed fantasy into reality and gone on to commit serious crime.
If censorship prevents even one crime, then it has made life in our society more tolerable.
His 'films and games' example shows what shaky ground he's on. What does the topic of violence in TV and video games have to do with censorship of material that's offensive to religion, such as JS:TO? Bugger all, he's just tried to move smoothly on to a different topic without admitting it. How many people have been incited to run amok after watching the Life of Brian? I saw JS:TO last year and have so far utterly failed to glass a pensioner in the face. In truth, the appalling reactions always seem to come from the 'offended' side - JS:TO and the charity blackmailers, the Bhezti riots, the Salman Rushdie fatwa, the murder of Theo Van Gogh. These are the people that wail about our lack of morality, the sad decline of religious faith, the disgusting filth we inflict on the "impressionable and less discerning" (nicely patronising, Dr Green, good job you're here to look after the dopey fuckers that make up the general public). He seems to favour a police state, with his "No person should be allowed to be deliberately offensive" and "If censorship prevents even one crime" bollocks. People have murdered in the name of God, would Green like us to ban the Bible, so that won't happen again? After all, if it prevents one crime...
He also fails to note that faith is a belief, whereas race is not - one has a choice about the former, not the latter. Does he think assaults on other beliefs should also be outlawed? What about Green's views on censorship? Personally I find them offensive, can we get him silenced? We'll just have to bin politics in general, to be honest, if we're going down that path.