Rewarding any kind of religious extremism, even if it involves someone standing silently, would establish a precedent that no one ought accept.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

Here we go again!

She wasn’t arrested for standing silently in a public street.

She was arrested for deliberately breaking an exclusion order after being warned several times. The exclusion order was in place around a clinic that had been targeted by people like her, because they disagreed with the services provided , who indulged in behaviour regarded as intimidatory. Her beliefs are founded on religion and she is supported by an American “Church” who carry out the same type of activity in the USA.

There are thousands of public streets she can stand silently in without anything happening, other than being thought weird. Just not the ones where restrictions apply.

This was exteme behaviour by a religious fanatic. You simply cannot issue free passes on illegal behaviour just because that behaviour springs from a religious belief. Do that and you open the flood gates.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

The only one deliberately misrepresenting anything is you. She was arrested for deliberately flouting a “Public Spaces Protection Order”. Which is something that applies to you, me, her and everyone. Whether or not we agree with the reasons it has been granted or not is immaterial. We all must abide by its requirements. No excuses.

Isabel Vaughan-Spruce is an unapologetic “pro-life” religious extremist. What she, or you, think she was doing whilst breaking the order doesn’t matter to the police. They have an obligation to administer the order in the way they think fit. Any defence would then have to be raised with magistrates. In fact, having achieved their objective the police dropped any charges. She also achieved her objectives by getting a lot of publicity. Who videoed her arrest? Were the cameras there by chance or was this all staged?

Now it seems this issue, which has been due to be clarified by parliament, with general agreement being reached by MPs, is being tampered with by the government who are pandering to religious pressure. This isn’t healthy:-

[Link]

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

It’s not up to you, or me, to decide if there is a prima facie case of the order being broken. That’s the responsibility of the police, which they reluctantly accomplished having tried on several occasions to defuse the situation in other ways. The lady sought arrest. That’s why the cameras were there.

She is most certainly a religious extremist. She, and you, are as entitled to your opinions as I am to mine. I completely disagree with yours. What she is not entitled to do is break the law, or ignore the instructions of the police in their efforts to impose the law, in pursuit of those opinions. If she does, she will be arrested and removed. She holds opinions that are extreme, in that they have no room for compromise or respect for the rights of others. Other religious extremists reach their positions in similar ways.

There is nothing inherently right or left about this. Respecting the opinions of others and allowing them to take their own decisions is something we all ought to do.

This has gone on long enough and isn’t the first time you have tried to defend this behaviour.

It has nothing to do with the honours list. Only that someone introduced it again because they have fallen for the chicanery of a religious political activist.

I will leave it there. Attempting to convince you of the obvious is a waste of time.

For the avoidance of doubt any comments in response to a previous post are directed to its ideas and not at any, or all, posters personally.

It is the start of a new month, and having reflected on your wise words, I accept and agree with everything that you have said.

Furthermore I think we should arrest these Christians who voice their beliefs when they are in their own homes and certainly whenever they are in public.

We should also campaign and donate to research into scientifically detecting silent prayer, the existing laws against which should also be strengthened (only for Christians of course).

Meanwhile all restrictions of the termination of nascent life should be removed and a feasibility study made of termination with 30 days of birth, as a sort of 'returns' policy - you know like Aamazon.

I received an MBE in 2014 for services to my local community. Unexpected but very proud that someone put me forward and others supported the nomination. (And kept it quiet from me)
I was always against people receiving it for 'doing their job'. Bankers, Pop stars and actors for services to music or films etc.
I received mine from the Queen at Windsor. Thee were a few actors there as well and it was nice to see them, not just a bunch of us people that no one had heard of.
I think the awards should be decided on by a small committee of 'normal people' from all walks of life