BBC: Teacher sacked over telling the truth

4 February 2007

Actually, the title of the BBC news article is “Teacher sacked over religion row“, but that’s not strictly accurate, is it?

A supply teacher has been sacked from a secondary school following complaints from Muslim pupils.

Andrew McLuskey was sacked from Bayliss (sic) Court Secondary School in Slough after a Religious Education lesson discussing the pros and cons of religion.

Pupils at the predominantly Muslim school claimed Mr McLuskey said most suicide bombers were Muslim.

To say that most suicide bombers were Muslim is not comparable to saying “most muslims are suicide bombers”, in which case they could have rightly said that this was unfair and discriminatory. But I would point out that walking — while wearing a vest covered in, or driving a truck full of, nail-engorged-plastique — into a crowded place before pushing a button to blow yourself and any other hapless bystanders to smithereens has pretty much been something that muslims have a near monopoly on in recent times. I’d be happy to be proven wrong on this count.

Either way, I’d opine that such actions should be considered a “con” in terms of religion, regardless of the flavour of the believer in question.

I don’t know the circumstances of what prompted McLuskey to say what he said in the first place, and I won’t comment on the appropriateness of the comment considering that he had muslim students in his class, but it doesn’t take a degree in journalism to comprehend that what he said and reality aren’t strangers to each other.

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765 Responses2007-02-04+16%3A02%3A21nullifidian to “BBC: Teacher sacked over telling the truth”

Why Dont You Blog? » Bad Education on February 4th, 2007 5:11 pm

[...] UK is getting worse as far as education goes. Following from a post I found on the Nullifidian Blog, I ended up at the BBC News page for Friday 2 Feb 07, with the title “Teacher sacked over [...]
TW on February 4th, 2007 5:32 pm

Thanks for posting the school link on my blog.

I wonder if it being a girls school had anything to do with the pupils reaction – or the schools reaction to the pupils.

It is a shame that this will provide all manner of ammunition for the extreme right wing.
nullifidian on February 4th, 2007 5:40 pm

No problem.

I doubt it was because it was a girls’ school – although I think he might have been less likely to say it in the first place if there were young muslim males in the class…

I think the most likely reason that they got shot of him out of the door as soon as possible was down to any potential negative reaction that this would have had from the less well-balanced muslims around the UK (and possibly the world, you know how these things spread), e.g. for precisely the reason that the comment was accurate.
TW on February 4th, 2007 6:06 pm

It is a shame, the truth of the statement means the guy gets punished. Still, such is the nature of “knee jerk” reactions round the UK now.
nullifidian on February 4th, 2007 6:08 pm

It’s just political correctness going mad. Again. :-(