Sir, Tom French of the government-funded lobby group, the Equality Network, is not content with the government legislating for same sex marriage. He now wants schools to be used as indoctrination centres for this new, state-imposed morality.
In fact, he is so concerned that there might be those who miss out on this indoctrination that he raises the bogeyman of Section 28 being reintroduced by stealth into our schools. Why? If the Equality Network really were for equality and diversity then they would encourage different points of view and not encourage discrimination against those of us who believe that marriage is between a man and a woman and teach our children accordingly.
Tom French wants to vilify, ostracise and discriminate against those who dare to question the new absolutist state morality. This is because as Naomi Phillips, the chair of Labour humanists, admitted: “The campaign for equal marriage has arguably been as much a fight against religious privilege and the grip of the churches on our democracy, as it has been about equality.”
The new secular fundamentalists are using the cover of gay rights to ensure that their philosophy, and theirs alone, is allowed to be taught in any state school. Rather than being about equality it is about discriminating against any Christian teacher, family or pupil who would dare to swim against the secularist tide.
It will be yet another nail in the coffin of Scotland’s Christian education system.
David Robertson. Solas CPC, St Peter’s Free Church, 4 St Peter Street, Dundee.
We need a rest from all this
Sir, The recent arguments and counter arguments about Scottish independence have now deteriorated into a slanging match that does no one any credit. If even a quarter of the hot air blowing from the two camps was directed at improving the lives of the Scottish people we would all be the better for it.
Someone has to get a grip of the politicians and remind them they have a duty to serve the people who elected them and to start behaving with a bit more class. Apart from a tiny minority of activists and fanatics on both sides the vast majority of people I talk to are more concerned with making ends meet and worrying if their wages will stretch to the end of the month rather than if oil will be $90 or $130 dollars a barrel in 2016.
As someone who takes a keen interest in politics even I am approaching the stage when I switch over to another channel as soon as I hear the theme tune for Scotland Tonight or Newsnight Scotland. So, can I make a small suggestion? Would all interested parties for and against Scottish independence please keep their opinions to themselves for the next 12 months.
From next April to the actual day of voting we will have more than enough time to make a balanced judgement on the pros and cons of voting “yes” or “no”. Until then can we get back to the bread and butter issues that really do matter to the people of this great country?
John McGlashan. 22 Isla Avenue, Carnoustie.
People deserve much better
Sir, Brainstorming exercises to help provide ideas for regenerating Glenrothes Town Centre are no doubt worthwhile, but I can understand why there was some frustration about Fife Council’s consultation exercise in Rothes Halls on Monday (Courier, March 12). For a start the meeting was not open to all the public only those the local authority wanted.
The main block to progress is the protracted negotiations between the supermarkets, the council, CIS-AXA (the owners of the Kingdom Centre) and CISWO which has the lease on a crucial area of land.
The Glenrothes public are now totally fed up with it all and perhaps it was for that reason Fife Council wanted to avoid a heated encounter. It preferred to get people to list comments on bits of paper rather than face their wrath.
The Kingdom Centre does have a lot going for it. It is the only covered shopping centre in the east of Scotland which includes a major community facility (Rothes Halls) and its management win numerous awards for various things like customer care, cleanliness, disabled access and so on.
The number of empty units can be mainly put down to the dual challenges of the recession and the growth of online shopping. But while the lack of action among the big vested interests continues, the drift of spending towards shopping centres elsewhere will continue.
What is a major opportunity threatens to become a real disaster. The people in the Glenrothes area deserve much better.
Bob Taylor. 24 Shiel Court, Glenrothes.
Irrational to ban these crops
Sir, The Environment Secretary Owen Paterson has come out openly in support of genetically modified crops and rightly dismisses health scare stories as “unscientific nonsense”.
In 2010, the EU Commission suggested giving back control of GM crops to member states but this had to be abandoned after hysterics from the usual green suspects.
Only two such crops are allowed in Europe although they are used routinely in China and the US without a single reported health problem worldwide in more than 20 years.
The irrationality of the EU’s Luddite opposition to a technology which is a continuation of the plant manipulation humans have done for millennia is beyond comprehension.
Banning crops able to grow in dry, poor soils to feed the starving is as daft as our fuel-poor dying of hypothermia to stop global warming.
Dr John Cameron. 10 Howard Place, St Andrews.