The Metropolitan Police said there had been 60 crimes linked to faith in London so far this year. It saw reports double from 23 in 2013 to 46 in 2014.
Half of UK police forces do not record such cases and many local authorities are also unable to provide figures.
The NSPCC said authorities "need to ensure they are able to spot the signs of this particular brand of abuse".
London is unique in having a police team, Project Violet, dedicated to this type of abuse.
Its figures relate to crime reports where officers have flagged a case as involving abuse linked to faith or belief. Many of the cases involve children.
Here is one such case that was investigated by the task force:
Ibidapo was trafficked to the UK from Nigeria in 2007, to work as a servant for relatives in the North of England. They accused her of being a witch, stopped her going to school and physically assaulted her. She escaped with the help of a Nigerian woman living nearby.
"I started living with my aunty at the age of 10, to help her to look after the baby. If my aunty went to work I'd be left with the baby, to do all the housework, wash clothes, cook the food.
"Each time the children got sick my aunty would accuse me of being the one responsible for their illness, start calling me a witch, start beating me up, and there was a time that she took me down to church, to a pastor. They were calling me a witch, they were using a broom to beat me.
"Sometimes my aunty would look into my eyes and call me a witch. It made me feel rejected, like I'm nobody."
Religion of course is just a socially acceptable label for superstition, and superstition is the gateway to all kinds of abuse in the name of gods, angels, or demons, or punishment for those who do not share their particular superstitions.
Christians in this country are big on pointing the finger at Muslims in the Middle East who behead, stone to death, and mutilate in the name of their religion without acknowledging the many atrocities still being perpetrated around the world in the name of Christianity.
“With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion.” ― Steven Weinberg
Words to live by.
To the next god-botherer who attempts to save your soul --
ReplyDeletesay, calmly,
"You have your beliefs and I have mine: I believe that organized religion is Satan's most elaborate and cunning plan to own your mind and soul."
And watch them blanch and maybe, just maybe, gets them thinking differently.
In my experience - which I will admit is limited to the number of people to whom I am exposed - those in the category you describe are completely incapable of recognizing the truth - AT ALL. Facts don't matter to them, and any blanching you see probably comes from the recognition YOU are one of their "problems".
DeleteRegardless of the "evidence" (their quotes) I can provide them, they simply say stupid things and feel they have defeated my arguments. No amount of proof will convince them and what you have suggested - at least in my neck of the woods - would possibly get you attacked. Perhaps not right then, but these people keep "lists" of their "enemies" and are not above solving you as a problem by surreptitious violent means when "the need" arises.
There is a reason more and more people are calling the religious right in this country the Christian Taliban.
Heck, they don't even accept facts from the non-fundie or non-evangel religious, instead claiming if those groups aren't WITH them, they are against them.
I only hope I am dead before they reach the point of open violence using all the guns the gun nuts are collecting.
Senator Lisa Murkowski best not be supporting this shit.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.politicususa.com/2015/10/12/koch-republicans-eliminate-national-parks.html