The Angry Exile: War of Rights.

The Hangman

Into our town the Hangman came,
Smelling of gold and blood and flame.
And he paced our bricks with a diffident air,
And built his frame in the courthouse square.
The scaffold stood by the courthouse side,
Only as wide as the door was wide;
A frame as tall, or little more,
Than the capping sill of the courthouse door.
And we wondered, whenever we had the time,
Who the criminal, what the crime
That the Hangman judged with the yellow twist
of knotted hemp in his busy fist.
And innocent though we were, with dread,
We passed those eyes of buckshot lead --
Till one cried: "Hangman, who is he
For whom you raised the gallows-tree?"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
And he gave us a riddle instead of reply:
"He who serves me best," said he,
"Shall earn the rope of the gallows-tree."
And he stepped down, and laid his hand
On a man who came from another land.
And we breathed again, for another's grief
At the Hangman's hand was our relief
And the gallows-frame on the courthouse lawn
By tomorrow's sun would be struck and gone.
So we gave him way, and no one spoke,
Out of respect for his Hangman's cloak.
The next day's sun looked mildly down
On roof and street in our quiet town,
And stark and black in the morning air
Was the gallows-tree in the courthouse square.
And the Hangman stood at his usual stand
With the yellow hemp in his busy hand;
With his buckshot eye and his jaw like a pike
And his air so knowing and business-like.
And we cried, "Hangman, have you not done
Yesterday, with the foreign one?"
Then we fell silent, and stood amazed,
"Oh, not for him was the gallows raised."
He laughed a laugh as he looked at us:
"Did you think I'd gone to all this fuss
To hang one man? That's a thing I do
To stretch a rope when the rope is new."
Then one cried "Murder!" and one cried "Shame!"
And into our midst the Hangman came
To that man's place. "Do you hold," said he,
"with him that was meant for the gallows-tree?"
And he laid his hand on that one's arm.
And we shrank back in quick alarm!
And we gave him way, and no one spoke
Out of fear of his Hangman's cloak.
That night we saw with dread surprise
The Hangman's scaffold had grown in size.
Fed by the blood beneath the chute,
The gallows-tree had taken root;
Now as wide, or a little more,
Than the steps that led to the courthouse door,
As tall as the writing, or nearly as tall,
Halfway up on the courthouse wall.
The third he took -- we had all heard tell --
Was a usurer, and an infidel.
"What," said the Hangman "have you to do
With the gallows-bound, and he a Jew?"
And we cried out, "Is this one he
Who has served you well and faithfully?"
The Hangman smiled: "It's a clever scheme
to try the strength of the gallows-beam."
The fourth man's dark, accusing song
Had scratched our comfort hard and long;
"And what concern," he gave us back.
"Have you for the doomed -- the doomed and Black?"
The fifth. The sixth. And we cried again,
"Hangman, Hangman, is this the man?"
"It's a trick," he said. "that we hangmen know
For easing the trap when the trap springs slow."
And so we ceased, and asked no more,
As the Hangman tallied his bloody score.
And sun by sun, and night by night,
The gallows grew to monstrous height.
The wings of the scaffold opened wide
Till they covered the square from side to side;
And the monster cross-beam, looking down,
Cast its shadow across the town.
Then through the town the Hangman came,
Through the empty streets, and called my name --
And I looked at the gallows soaring tall,
And thought, "There is no one left at all
For hanging, and so he calls to me
To help pull down the gallows-tree."
So I went out with right good hope
To the Hangman's tree and the Hangman's rope.
He smiled at me as I came down
To the courthouse square through the silent town.
And supple and stretched in his busy hand
Was the yellow twist of the hempen strand.
And he whistled his tune as he tried the trap,
And it sprang down with a ready snap --
And then with a smile of awful command
He laid his hand upon my hand.
"You tricked me. Hangman!," I shouted then,
"That your scaffold was built for other men...
And I no henchman of yours," I cried,
"You lied to me, Hangman. Foully lied!"
Then a twinkle grew in the buckshot eye,
"Lied to you? Tricked you?" he said. "Not I.
For I answered straight and I told you true --
The scaffold was raised for none but you.
For who has served me more faithfully
Then you with your coward's hope?" said he,
"And where are the others who might have stood
Side by your side in the common good?"
"Dead," I whispered. And amiably
"Murdered," the Hangman corrected me:
"First the foreigner, then the Jew...
I did no more than you let me do."
Beneath the beam that blocked the sky
None had stood so alone as I.
The Hangman noosed me, and no voice there
Cried "Stop!" for me in the empty square.

Maurice Ogden

Monday 3 May 2010

War of Rights.

If ever an example were needed of why state defined and granted rights are a bad idea it's this.

A Christian street preacher was arrested and locked in a cell for telling a passer-by that homosexuality is a sin in the eyes of God.
Dale McAlpine was charged with causing “harassment, alarm or distress” after a homosexual police community support officer (PCSO) overheard him reciting a number of “sins” referred to in the Bible, including blasphemy, drunkenness and same sex relationships.
...
Mr McAlpine was handing out leaflets explaining the Ten Commandments or offering a “ticket to heaven” with a church colleague on April 20, when a woman came up and engaged him in a debate about his faith.
During the exchange, he says he quietly listed homosexuality among a number of sins referred to in 1 Corinthians, including blasphemy, fornication, adultery and drunkenness.
After the woman walked away, she was approached by a PCSO who spoke with her briefly and then walked over to Mr McAlpine and told him a complaint had been made, and that he could be arrested for using racist or homophobic language.
The street preacher said he told the PCSO: “I am not homophobic but sometimes I do say that the Bible says homosexuality is a crime against the Creator”.
He claims that the PCSO then said he was homosexual and identified himself as the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender liaison officer for Cumbria police. Mr McAlpine replied: “It’s still a sin.”
The preacher then began a 20 minute sermon, in which he says he mentioned drunkenness and adultery, but not homosexuality. Three regular uniformed police officers arrived during the address, arrested Mr McAlpine and put him in the back of a police van. [taking the opportunity to record his fingerprints and a DNA sample for the database, natch - AE]

Now the problem here is a clash of the rights culture. McAlpine has a right to practice his religion and hold his beliefs - it says so in Article 9 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which the UK made law in 1998.

15 - love to Mr McAlpine.

And he's also got the right to say so in public (Article 10). 30 - love .

The unnamed PCSO has a right to his sexual orientation and can point to legislation "outlawing inciting hatred on the grounds of sexuality" brought in by Jack Straw. 30 all. He can also point out that Article 9 of the ECHR says that religious freedom is subject to:

...such limitations as are prescribed by law and are necessary in a democratic society in the interests of public safety, for the protection of public order, health or morals, or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.

30 - 40.

But then McAlpine can say that the legislation that extends the hate crime law to include incidents where sexual orientation is involved has a clause that says:

... for the avoidance of doubt, the discussion or criticism of sexual conduct or practices or the urging of persons to refrain from or modify such conduct or practices shall not be taken of itself to be threatening or intended to stir up hatred.

Deuce, and as long as politicians and ministers continue to grant rights to both groups in the interests of freedom and fairness - admittedly perfectly noble goals - we're probably going to be stuck there more or less indefinitely.

What we have is a system of rights that are not only granted by the government, and are therefore subject to the whim of whatever party happens to be running it at the time, but are also liable to be mutually contradictory and conflict with each other. What we need is not more of the same but something far simpler. In such a system Mr McAlpine would be free from being persecuted for his beliefs and the PCSO would be free from being persecuted for his sexuality. Both can find the other's opinions or lifestyle offensive, immoral or even thoroughly repugnant. McAlpine would be free even to stand on his ladder screaming that the PCSO was going to hell for eternity, and the PCSO would be free to yell through a bullhorn that McAlpine's problem is that he lives according to what he thinks a non-existent god told Charlton Heston four thousand years ago, but as long as that's about as far as it goes then both must let the other get on with it. They might not like it, and they certainly might not like each other, but since there'd be no call on them to that doesn't matter, and each would have the same amount of freedom: to live, speak and do exactly as they wish up to the point they prevent the other from doing likewise, and no further.

The term for this is not 'rights' but 'liberty', and it's important not to get confused about which one of the two you actually have.

4 comments:

Rob F said...: When are you coming back? We need you as PM.

I'd do the job myself, but I think I'd get a bit carried away with the exploding Nokias and the piranha pool.; 3 May 2010 at 13:17
Angry Exile said...: Heh, flattery will get you nowhere but don't let that stop you trying. The answer is in older posts - I'll never say never, but probably never. I ended up in Oz as much because it was what my Aussie better half wanted, though if the UK hadn't become such a shithole over the last ten or twelve years she might have been more willing to stay. I always say that Oz isn't perfect but right now it's the better of the two.; 3 May 2010 at 19:08
JuliaM said...: That decision isn't likely to be proved wrong under iDave's rule, either...; 3 May 2010 at 22:21
Angry Exile said...: Give Kevin Rudd a chance. It took 13 years to ruin Britain, and Rudd's only been in for two and a half years. Rome wasn't burnt in a day.; 3 May 2010 at 23:55