Category: Living on the Hill

Stopping Olukoya and Witch hunting in UK Black Communities

September 6, 2016 | by | 1 Comments
Witchcraft related abuse is a very serious problem in African migrant communities in the UK. There is documented evidence that these abuses are linked to activities of African pastors and churches. Unfortunately efforts to address this problem are bogged down by concerns over racism, minority rights and abuse of religious liberty. Vulnerable members of the […] Read more

The Poverty of ‘Identity’

September 5, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
It is hard to overstate the impact of identity politics. The “new culture wars”, have engulfed social media and university campuses and the anti-globalisation tide continues to rise. Left and right have seen the development of hard-line identitarian wings, whilst the themes of intersectionality, community, and nationality have entered mainstream politics. Identitarianism is a rejection […] Read more

The Twofold Wrongheadedness Of The Burkini Row

August 30, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
“The burkini is like a uniform, a symbol of Islamist extremism.” These were the words of David Lisnard, the Mayor of Cannes, explaining why he was banning the use of ‘burkinis’ on beaches in his city – a city just a few miles away from Nice, which last month was the target of an Islamist […] Read more

The Left’s Jewish Problem Runs Deeper than Israel

August 29, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
Dealing with anti-semitism may require jettisoning more of the politics of envy, populism, and collectivism than the left is capable of. The debate over the left’s anti-semitism problem has continued unabated recently. The Labour Party continues to flip-flop over whether people who hate Jews are welcome in the party, and the student left continues to struggle to […] Read more

No Compulsion in Religion?

August 18, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
Canadian blogger Abdullah Sameer posted a video on Facebook last Thursday that picked up around 70,000 views in less than 24 hours. The topic was bound to attract attention; Sameer’s video was a video diary on why he had made the decision to leave Islam.​ Sporting a large and characteristic South Asian beard, Sameer looked […] Read more

An Intolerance of Democracy Has Been Unleashed Post-Brexit

July 27, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
The bigotry a number of Brits have shown towards migrants and ethnic minorities in the weeks since the EU referendum has been truly shocking. People have been shouted at in the street, they’ve been told to leave the country; pro-Brexit cards have been distributed around one community declaring “No more Polish Vermin”; racist graffiti has been […] Read more

The Evils of Rampant Religious Privilege

July 23, 2016 | by | 0 Comments
Criticisms of the Catholic Church, Islamist violence and religious intolerance are chiefly and sometimes exclusively championed by people well-known for their anti-religious sentiment. Rather than disparaging religion, it is more respectable to lack any strong beliefs, but also treat religious ideas delicately. However, a whiff of religiosity seems to protect the interests of sinister groups […] Read more