But the main point is banning teachers who belong to the BNP, or any dodgy extremist group and no matter how awful their views and until the group in question has been officially proscribed, is unquestionably illiberal. And not all PP feels that way, as Rumbold and Jai informed us in another thread.

I’m not sure why you are writing to me, about what and on what thread; but it seems odd to post it here.

Incidentally, I am neither young nor angry; rather middle-aged and deeply depressed by a lot of people’s views.

You might have missed the fact that during the Gita Sahgal-Amnesty brouhaha, Sunny Hundal of Pickled Politics and earwicga of earwicga gave their unconditional backing to Moazzam Begg and Cageprisoners. So much so, that Sunny has recruited earwicga with a blogging account on PP.

Now unless you live in a cave, you will know that Cageprisoners is a self-confessed and unapologetic champion of Abu Qatada, Abu Hamza and Anwar al-Awlaki who are…wait for it…clerical fascists.

Now you have to add PP and earwicga to the mix.

So I think Faisal is pointing at PP’s inconsistencies for the same reasons he is pointing to Bob Pitt. And he’s write to do this since they can both be regarded as “unreliable witnesses”.

http://www.pickledpolitics.com/archives/7847#comment-195908

My concerns are with the report, not with the reporters of the report (so to write) – and my concern with the report is that it is inadequate to the task of upholding the highest standards in the education service.

Bob Pitt’s inspired love for clerical fascism renders him an entirely unreliable witness. I did not mention anything about various Trots at all.

My point, latterly, is that you have to show such inconsistencies as you have indicated. As well as to point out that the report covers the BNP not Islamists. When HMG canvasses a report dealing with the latter, I shall certainly be watching for the reaction of these very sites.

In any case, I have reports of my own to write.

Faisal raises the same inconsistencies of motivation for protesting the banning of BNP teachers by Bob Pitt, some Trots and Pickled Politics. You admit there are inconsistencies in the first two which make you, in your words, “vomit” but discussing the third shows up Faisal’s “issues”?

WTF? To me, that’s just partisan, and shows that it’s you who has the issues.

Add to this the concerns of the elders who wanted to control the new British born generations, and the appeal of ‘Ummah’ Identity Politics, and their dogma became manifest. They were able to simply appeal to the rhetoric of ‘pluralism’ and ‘multiculturalism’ and ‘tolerance’ to have a disguise under the ill-thought out but well intentioned reflex of ‘diversity’ (even though those concepts are anathema to them)

However, unless you can show that the people who so object are inconsistent on the issue covered by the report, then it all rather looks like point-scoring.

The fact is this report covers the desirability of banning people who are members of the BNP from teaching. It does mention Islamist organisations. The story in PP covered the report. As far as I am aware it concentrated its criticisms on the same.

If you can show that the author of the article on PP has previously supported Islamist educators and their right to teach, then you might have some grounds for your position. If you cannot, it rather looks like you are creating for the sake of creating a conflict on the basis of speculation and – at best – views with which you disagree held by others about other issues.

My concern is standards in the education service and the good name of that service. I do not believe these are best served by employment of fascists (of whatever stripe); nor do I believe that the report’s recommendations concerning the monitoring of extremist political conduct in places of education on the part of staff are adequate or sensible.

Now the fact that these objections have also been raised by a blogger on Pickled Politics is of complete indifference to me. What is important, as far as I am concerned, is that I agree with these concerns, not their source in a site with which you clearly have, whether rightly or not, issues.

I thought the issue was the agreement or non-agreement with the banning of teachers on the grounds of their deeply offensive political persuasion, not the use of the story to score points against another contributor on another website.

Clearly, I was mistaken.

Such restrictions are not restrictions on civil liberties or liberal democracy. Quite self-evidently.

My agreement with the PP article included assent with the view that the argument presented by Smith’s report (that monitoring of political extremist conduct by teachers was adequately provisioned or covered by OFSTED inspection teams who visit most schools less than once every two to three years and the intervention of the GTCE) was to say the least risible.

In other words, my agreement was both non-partisan, unmotivated by point-scoring; and as I have been quite careful to flag, restricted to concerns surrounding the teaching profession and most importantly the education of young people. I hope this is clearer now.

I have not looked at the Islamophobia Watch report, as anything that has even passingly to do with Bob Pitt and his motley crew makes me want to vomit.

Incidentally, and OT, I received an uninvited iEngage email today calling on Muslims to organise as a bloc for the coming elections. Anyone else get the same?

If a shadow of a doubt exists that the allegiance of any member of staff is not finally to the task of enabling and empowering learners then I would be concerned about retention of such staff.

Repeatedly, members of such groups have shown themselves willing to sacrifice the education of those in their charge in favour of narrow political indoctrination.

Given the hostility of most of such organisations to the character and means of present education, it is suspicious that any of their members would wish to enter the teaching profession in the first place. It is entirely natural that many teachers should be suspicious of their motives and concerned about the presence of such people in positions of responsibility in our schools.

Membership of political organisations comes at a price. For most sane political organisations of the mainstream, this will be the time that political activity for the party, however desultory or menial, costs. For those who choose to be members of extremist, hate organisations such as BNP and HuT, I see no unreasonableness in demanding that part of the cost they bear be their disbarment from certain sensitive occupations.