Don’t treat evangelicals like terrorists say MPs and Peers

A report from the Joint Committee on Human Rights this week has exposed the dangers to Christians from the Government’s approach to countering extremism.

Under the Government’s approach, there is a tendency for some officials to view people with socially conservative views on marriage and sexuality as somehow on their way to becoming violent extremists.

The report pulls apart such deeply-flawed thinking.

Read a summary of the report

Tasked with examining the Government’s planned counter-extremism legislation, the Committee was deeply critical.

Like us, it questions the whole basis for the plans:

“The current counter-terrorism, public order and equality legislation form a comprehensive framework which deals appropriately with those who promote violence. There is a danger that any new legislation may prove counter-productive.”

Its key attack focuses on the grossly inaccurate equation of strong religious beliefs with terrorism:

“The Government’s approach, set out in its Counter-Extremism Strategy, appears to be based on the assumption that there is an escalator that starts with religious conservatism and ends with support for jihadism; and that combating religious conservatism is therefore the starting point in the quest to tackle violence. However, it is by no means proven or agreed that conservative religious views are, in and of themselves, an indicator of, or even correlated with, support for jihadism.”

It warns that new laws lack coherence and precision and so:

Read here