:00:00. > :00:07.Today on The Big Questions: Fuelling the fires of terrorism and breaking
:00:08. > :00:31.Today we're live from St Edward's School in Oxford.
:00:32. > :00:40.Welcome, everybody, to The Big Questions.
:00:41. > :00:46.Since Wednesday afternoon our screens, newspapers and social media
:00:47. > :00:48.have been dominated by just one story ? the mayhem wreaked
:00:49. > :00:51.by Khalid Masood on the streets of Westminster with a hired car
:00:52. > :00:59.50 people were injured, seven of them critically.
:01:00. > :01:02.Five people have died, including Masood, who was shot by the police.
:01:03. > :01:06.It was an appalling and devastating crime.
:01:07. > :01:09.But so far nobody actually knows why Masood did this.
:01:10. > :01:12.He didn't say anything, he didn't post any messages on social media,
:01:13. > :01:19.Islamic State claimed responsibility, hailing Masood
:01:20. > :01:22.as a soldier of Islamic State but there is no evidence he was
:01:23. > :01:26.He had a criminal record for assaults, he had
:01:27. > :01:28.served time in prison, and that may be where
:01:29. > :01:34.MI5 investigated him some years ago but he wasn't
:01:35. > :01:39.Yet everyone has assumed Masood was an Islamist
:01:40. > :01:47.And acres of newsprint and hours of television every day since have
:01:48. > :01:51.been devoted to speculating on the motives behind his actions.
:01:52. > :01:57.If it was attention and publicity he was after, he got it in spades.
:01:58. > :02:01.Back in 1985 Mrs Thatcher said, "We must try to find ways to starve
:02:02. > :02:04.the terrorist and the hijacker of the oxygen of publicity
:02:05. > :02:12.And she banned us from hearing the voices of the IRA
:02:13. > :02:14.or Sinn Fein politicians, like Gerry Adams
:02:15. > :02:23.Are we right to give terrorists the oxygen of publicity?
:02:24. > :02:30.Peter Hitchens, from the mail on Sunday, you have written a column
:02:31. > :02:36.today and you have said we have become a nation of weepers laying
:02:37. > :02:41.flowers, lowering flags, writing candles, while not thinking at all.
:02:42. > :02:47.What do you mean? Well, I mean that we immediately put a grid on
:02:48. > :02:52.something and so this is what it is. Within minutes of the outrage, the
:02:53. > :02:56.police were saying the act was inspired by Islamic State. They had
:02:57. > :03:00.no objective evidence of that at all. So far as I know they still
:03:01. > :03:04.don't. My own view of this is that there is an enormous number of
:03:05. > :03:09.possible explanations but one thing is consistently ignored. If you put
:03:10. > :03:18.the class of events wider than just Islamic ones, you take in and is
:03:19. > :03:22.bearing brave it, the school shootings, the rampage killings that
:03:23. > :03:27.happen frequently in United States, with no Islamic influence what at
:03:28. > :03:32.all, what you invariably find is that the person involved has a past
:03:33. > :03:36.of petty criminality involving the use almost invariably of mind
:03:37. > :03:40.altering drugs illegal or legal. It seems to me that this is an
:03:41. > :03:47.important subset of crime. I am not saying that all people who take
:03:48. > :03:51.drugs do this, and people like about what I say and I have got to protect
:03:52. > :03:55.myself. I am not saying that all people who take drugs become
:03:56. > :03:58.terrorists and I am not trying to excuse Islamist fundamentalists from
:03:59. > :04:01.evil intent where they have it, because that would also be observed.
:04:02. > :04:06.I am saying that if we look at something like the record of Masood,
:04:07. > :04:10.you see a petty criminal who began early in his life to take mind
:04:11. > :04:16.altering drugs. You might find a better explanation of why he did
:04:17. > :04:19.this, rather than clamping onto it immediately the grid of Islamic
:04:20. > :04:24.extremism and going into top panic mode. He converted. But what about
:04:25. > :04:27.the coverage itself? The coverage is invariably useful on the point of
:04:28. > :04:30.the media is to uncover things and huge numbers of things have been
:04:31. > :04:34.uncovered about Masood in the past few days which we wouldn't have
:04:35. > :04:38.known, all thanks to media diligence. The point is whether we
:04:39. > :04:42.make sense of it or not. I called Scotland Yard when they named Masood
:04:43. > :04:51.and I said can you give me his full criminal record? And they wouldn't
:04:52. > :04:54.tell me. He is dead. To this day, his full criminal record has not
:04:55. > :04:58.been revealed because they were not interested in that. They were
:04:59. > :05:01.interested in the Islamist connection rather than his record of
:05:02. > :05:05.crime. It may be that he is just a criminal committing a horrible
:05:06. > :05:12.crime. Maybe he is just a criminal committing a horrible crime. There
:05:13. > :05:15.was this assumption that he was somehow linked to Islamic State, and
:05:16. > :05:17.they clearly made a big amount of that saying he was one of their
:05:18. > :05:22.soldiers. Aren't we playing into their hands? The reason why people
:05:23. > :05:25.assume that he was doing this or was at least inspired by Islamic State
:05:26. > :05:29.is because it is something that Islamic State has called upon people
:05:30. > :05:34.around the world to do, using exactly this kind of methodology.
:05:35. > :05:37.Islamic State have said for some years that since various cells in
:05:38. > :05:42.the west have found it hard to get hold of the technology to make bombs
:05:43. > :05:46.in recent years, they have been disrupted from doing so, and in the
:05:47. > :05:49.UK it is very hard to get hold of Kalashnikov rifles for example, Isis
:05:50. > :05:53.have called on people who follow their message to carry out attacks
:05:54. > :05:59.using vehicles, very low grade attacks with nice, this sort of
:06:00. > :06:04.thing. That is why. It fits the pattern of Isis inspired attacks and
:06:05. > :06:09.we will find out some more of what motivated him in the days and weeks
:06:10. > :06:12.and months to come. As for the question of publicity, this is a
:06:13. > :06:16.huge question which we are always wondering about. This was a good
:06:17. > :06:22.week to wonder about terrorism and our attitude towards it in general.
:06:23. > :06:28.Martin McGuinness, responsible for more depth than anybody else in the
:06:29. > :06:32.UK in recent decades, -- more deaths, he died and he was eulogised
:06:33. > :06:35.in the House of Commons and 24 hours later the House of Commons was
:06:36. > :06:39.attacked by another kind of terrorism, but I think this is a
:06:40. > :06:42.very bad sign for this country, that the way in which we treat the
:06:43. > :06:49.terrorists of the past tells us how we will treat the terrorists of the
:06:50. > :06:54.future. I am glad that was such a powerful point in the studio! You
:06:55. > :07:00.have got your fans! This should really worry us. During the IRA
:07:01. > :07:03.campaign people said we would never give in to terror. All MPs and
:07:04. > :07:06.policemen and all the others said the same thing again this week but
:07:07. > :07:14.the record shows in this country that we can give into terror and we
:07:15. > :07:18.have. So the whole issue of media coverage, as it were, by comparison
:07:19. > :07:23.with that fundamental societal problem is relatively easy to solve.
:07:24. > :07:28.So we are playing their game? Why is it wrong, Mohammed? Let's go over
:07:29. > :07:33.the basic principle. Two men behind bars. One looked down and saw mud
:07:34. > :07:37.and the other looked up and saw stars. What you will find with
:07:38. > :07:47.organisations like the right wing organisations, they always pick up
:07:48. > :07:50.the worst, like Douglas. What we had this week was a fantastic unity of
:07:51. > :07:55.every community coming together and reflecting the grief of a nation and
:07:56. > :08:01.innocent people being murdered. We had bravery from police officers and
:08:02. > :08:05.we had passers-by helping out. We can focus on the bad or the good and
:08:06. > :08:12.the good is that if this is all they can do they are not getting very
:08:13. > :08:19.far, the terrorists, are they? There is something else that seems to
:08:20. > :08:26.match the tempo of Isis, which was the killing of Jo Cox. He actually
:08:27. > :08:30.killed an MP and only two MPs said it was an attack on democracy and
:08:31. > :08:34.nobody else echo that. Lots of people said it was an attack on
:08:35. > :08:42.democracy. From MPs and prominent individuals, I think mostly the
:08:43. > :08:46.Labour Party said so. The point here is that many individuals come out to
:08:47. > :08:51.do acts of terrorism, and there was not as much focus on Thomas Mair as
:08:52. > :08:57.there was an other terrorist attacks that have occurred in the UK. That
:08:58. > :09:02.is quite simple why that was, because there was an impending court
:09:03. > :09:08.case. In this case there is no impending court case because he was
:09:09. > :09:14.shot dead. There is a lot of speculation. Do you think they are
:09:15. > :09:21.comparable, the murder of Jo Cox and what happened the other day? No, and
:09:22. > :09:24.we are doing it again. We are avoiding the common denominator in
:09:25. > :09:29.these attacks. Of course terrorism comes from all different areas. But
:09:30. > :09:32.we are talking about Islamic terrorism in its own right and there
:09:33. > :09:40.is nothing wrong with that and we should be able to. Thomas Mair is
:09:41. > :09:43.Islamic? You said the comment nominator. I am talking about the
:09:44. > :09:47.apparently random attacks like the one we saw in London last week that
:09:48. > :09:51.we are putting down to a random criminal. How many random criminals
:09:52. > :09:54.of the same faith are we going to have before we look at the elephant
:09:55. > :09:58.in the room and it has been in the media all week? We will never know
:09:59. > :10:01.what can possibly have driven him and the only thing not a possibility
:10:02. > :10:06.is religious belief and the fact that a person has been involved in
:10:07. > :10:12.crime or taken drugs does not exclude them... Lots of people have
:10:13. > :10:14.said it is Islamic. They have not. The Prime Minister in the comments
:10:15. > :10:19.this week told is very matter that this was a perversion of great
:10:20. > :10:22.faith. She didn't offer scriptural backing for that and you said it
:10:23. > :10:33.with no analysis or investigation of Scripture. But we are looking at the
:10:34. > :10:38.motivation of the individuals. In the past couple of years we have had
:10:39. > :10:41.two events in this country, one the Leytonstone tube station stabbing,
:10:42. > :10:45.and the other the Russell Square stabbing in London, which were
:10:46. > :10:47.initially attributed to Islamic fanaticism and it was later
:10:48. > :10:55.perfectly clear beyond any doubt that the person involved was
:10:56. > :10:58.actually crazy. The Leytonstone stabber according to psychiatrists
:10:59. > :11:04.actually believed that Tony Blair was his guardian angel. This is not
:11:05. > :11:13.a person who can be taken seriously as a political act. And if you look
:11:14. > :11:24.also at various events attributed to Islam, particularly the Nice killer,
:11:25. > :11:29.he never attended the mosque, he at pork, he was an atheist according to
:11:30. > :11:32.his brothers, who was a boozer and a petty criminal, and the same or
:11:33. > :11:37.similar of the man who drove the truck in Berlin. An arsonist, petty
:11:38. > :11:42.criminal and a thief. If you are looking for the origins of these
:11:43. > :11:45.things, it doesn't mean that none of his adversaries is Islamic but some
:11:46. > :11:52.of them are not. Other people want to come in. Isn't it hugely
:11:53. > :11:56.counter-productive for what you want to say about this religion and what
:11:57. > :12:02.you believe this religion leads to if you all the sudden jump on single
:12:03. > :12:06.atrocity and say it is because of this religion? I am not suggesting
:12:07. > :12:09.we jump on every atrocity. I am saying we need to include religion
:12:10. > :12:15.in the list of possibilities of what drives these people. They are not
:12:16. > :12:18.all the same, but we cannot honestly discuss this without an examination
:12:19. > :12:23.and an analysis of the religious scriptures. I also want to know what
:12:24. > :12:29.these people are saying themselves. Police in Germany declare somebody
:12:30. > :12:32.to be mentally ill but why? What are they doing to conclude they are
:12:33. > :12:35.mentally ill? We have a right to know this and what these people are
:12:36. > :12:50.saying and doing before they carry out these acts. We haven't heard
:12:51. > :12:56.from Rashad Ali, but I am bearing in in mind your contributions for the
:12:57. > :12:59.future! This conversation demonstrates the issues. Nobody has
:13:00. > :13:05.a problem with discussing the issues. The issue is the editorials.
:13:06. > :13:09.It is the way the facts are presented by people with a
:13:10. > :13:16.particular agenda. They can horseshoe anything into that agenda.
:13:17. > :13:19.Or the speculation. We saw the media responses and we saw good responses
:13:20. > :13:27.from the BBC this time, measured and weighted responses to what happened.
:13:28. > :13:32.We have seen people speculating about who this person was. Channel 4
:13:33. > :13:35.News? And others released information without fact checking
:13:36. > :13:39.simple things. They literally rang up solicitors to verify if this
:13:40. > :13:43.person was around and it turned out the individual named is in prison.
:13:44. > :13:48.Other people contacted the family and they said he is definitely in
:13:49. > :13:51.prison. Not him. We had a phenomenon where people with a particular
:13:52. > :13:55.agenda wanted to pursue it and other people reacted on social media,
:13:56. > :14:00.which is way quicker than institutional medias. That is
:14:01. > :14:04.because it doesn't do any checking. You actually have really poor
:14:05. > :14:09.journalism coming out, which is what the problem is. When you remove the
:14:10. > :14:14.journalistic instinct, people Will Satch rack and verify things before
:14:15. > :14:18.putting them out, and when we did have that, it is less
:14:19. > :14:23.sensationalist. -- people will fact check. It is less emotionally
:14:24. > :14:27.driven. It is much less emotionally charged. But it was an emotionally
:14:28. > :14:31.charged event given the tremendous amount of tragedy that came from it
:14:32. > :14:37.but also the inspiring acts of humanity that we saw as well and the
:14:38. > :14:41.nature of the attack on democracy and then all the human stories
:14:42. > :14:45.emerging over the following days. It is good to know about those act of
:14:46. > :14:50.humanity and the human beings behind the tragedy. Those who were
:14:51. > :14:55.slaughtered. That is an important part, don't you think so? I actually
:14:56. > :14:59.agree with Rashad Ali's point of view as somebody who works in the
:15:00. > :15:08.media. I am evidently Muslim and I am both -- of both words. It is
:15:09. > :15:13.really important that you do your job as a journalist and you do it
:15:14. > :15:16.well and that goes back to accuracy. There was misinformation put out
:15:17. > :15:20.this week and the problem is that social media is so quick. So when
:15:21. > :15:26.certain outlets and networks have taken their time to fact check and
:15:27. > :15:31.get the accuracy and they have delivered to the public that news,
:15:32. > :15:38.that is our duty first and foremost as journalists to do a job and do it
:15:39. > :15:42.well. It is across all sectors, broadcast, print, digital, online.
:15:43. > :15:45.We abide by editorial guidelines and it is so important because when we
:15:46. > :15:50.don't it undermines our credibility and the work that we do. It really
:15:51. > :15:56.does. It makes a mockery of the job that we do. Our job is to serve the
:15:57. > :16:00.public and to give the correct information.
:16:01. > :16:05.There is a photograph of the woman with the hijab on social media
:16:06. > :16:09.crossing Westminster Bridge and from afar it looked like she was ignoring
:16:10. > :16:13.the tragedy. But if you actually looked at the close a photograph, it
:16:14. > :16:18.was of her face and she was extremely distraught, possibly
:16:19. > :16:25.falling for help, or to tell her friends and family. She has issued a
:16:26. > :16:29.statement. She has, and the photographer has released the other
:16:30. > :16:33.photographs. She had helped people. Anybody in that frame of mind at
:16:34. > :16:38.that position, I cannot imagine them walking away. Douglas, don't you
:16:39. > :16:42.think this is hugely counter-productive because then you
:16:43. > :16:46.are adding to the feeling in communities that they are being
:16:47. > :16:54.persecuted and being stigmatised and that adds to their agenda, the
:16:55. > :16:59.demonisation of Britain. So it is a feedback loop. I don't think we have
:17:00. > :17:07.got into that. Has it been happening? What are you talking
:17:08. > :17:12.about the EDL for? I am talking about our society as a whole. Our
:17:13. > :17:17.society, our media as a whole, there has not been any crazy response to
:17:18. > :17:22.this. The media, by and large, has done its job. It has been fairly
:17:23. > :17:26.restrained. I agree there is a time, definitely, for all of the
:17:27. > :17:29.discussions that have come up. But on this thing about motive, we
:17:30. > :17:34.should not attribute motives until we know. We should certainly look
:17:35. > :17:38.into the cases where drugs have been involved. I think it is long overdue
:17:39. > :17:42.to consider that. I also think we are long overdue to consider the
:17:43. > :17:45.role that religion can play in these attacks as well. These things are
:17:46. > :17:50.not mutually exclusive. Many people have carried out Islamist attacks
:17:51. > :17:55.and have been eating pork and drinking and so one, and they do
:17:56. > :18:00.what they do precisely as an act of religious purification. That is very
:18:01. > :18:03.common. The 9/11 hijackers went to strip bars and all that kind of
:18:04. > :18:07.thing. These things are not exclusive. It is a complex picture
:18:08. > :18:10.that leads somebody to carry out this sort of thing. We should be
:18:11. > :18:14.having a wide-ranging discussion on it and thankfully on this programme
:18:15. > :18:17.we can. Quite often in the media we do not have as wide ranging
:18:18. > :18:24.discussion and our politicians in particular are clearly terrified of
:18:25. > :18:28.aspects of this discussion. OK, we are open and honest, we have a frank
:18:29. > :18:35.exchange of views but what are our politicians are scared of saying?
:18:36. > :18:41.First of all, they are scared of seeing that actually, the amount of
:18:42. > :18:44.people claiming this week that we will not allow this to change our
:18:45. > :18:50.society, who thought it would? And thought that a guy with a knife in a
:18:51. > :18:55.car was going to bring down democracy? But Douglas, one of the
:18:56. > :18:57.things that has happened ever since the terrorist attacks during the
:18:58. > :19:03.Tony Blair Giroud is that the government have used attacks as a
:19:04. > :19:09.pretext to take away important liberties. Benjamin Franklin said
:19:10. > :19:12.long ago, if you sacrifice your liberty for temporary security you
:19:13. > :19:16.will end up having neither liberty nor security but the government has
:19:17. > :19:20.flagrantly ignored this. More intrusion, more snooping. That has
:19:21. > :19:28.changed our society. Politicians are very afraid of people discovering
:19:29. > :19:31.how very little power they have to prevent these attacks, less than
:19:32. > :19:38.they pretend they have, and they actually cannot do the things that
:19:39. > :19:42.they say they can. But what do you think about what we heard from so
:19:43. > :19:46.many people, we will not be cowed? I think it is a very good thing that
:19:47. > :19:50.people think and say that. But I think some of the response to this,
:19:51. > :19:55.this was not the Blitz. This was not a sustained night after night
:19:56. > :20:00.campaign. It was one attack, brutal, horrible, in the heart of London,
:20:01. > :20:06.but to that extent, emotionally, and I agree with what Peter says, we
:20:07. > :20:13.have to be careful to not overstate. But when a policeman is killed, it
:20:14. > :20:16.strikes at the heart of society. But Nicky, a lot of us here lived
:20:17. > :20:21.through the IRA bombing campaigns, and we remember piles of dead horses
:20:22. > :20:26.and dead human beings in Hyde Park and Regent Park on the same day.
:20:27. > :20:31.Actually, we didn't going into lockdown or half-mast or a minute's
:20:32. > :20:34.silence mode. We thought, OK, these people are our enemies and we will
:20:35. > :20:39.put up with that. Our government lets us down by giving in to the IRA
:20:40. > :20:43.bombers and giving them what they wanted, and going to the funeral of
:20:44. > :20:47.Martin McGuinness. They are contradicting what they're saying,
:20:48. > :20:50.Douglas, because on one hand you are saying we do not want to cower to
:20:51. > :20:54.the terrorists and singing their agenda and yet the first thing
:20:55. > :21:02.anyone uses is the word Islam. Listen, I was at Scotland Yard that
:21:03. > :21:06.date, and to qualify as an Islamist incident a pass to fit a certain
:21:07. > :21:11.criteria. It was discussed earlier on but no one mentioned why this was
:21:12. > :21:16.classed as an Islamic incident. Otherwise it would have just been a
:21:17. > :21:21.homicide. There are certain criteria. If he said the word Allah
:21:22. > :21:27.Akbar, that would clearly have been an Islamist incident. If he had had
:21:28. > :21:31.the flag of Isis, it would have clearly been so. He did not leave a
:21:32. > :21:35.note, he did not say anything. The only thing that makes this a
:21:36. > :21:40.counter-terrorism thing... He was a Muslim? Not even that. We do not
:21:41. > :21:44.know if he was a practising muscle. He was clearly not a very good
:21:45. > :21:50.Muslim. What does that mean? He was taking cocaine, he was into wife
:21:51. > :21:57.bashing, all of those things. If he was a muscle, he would not be taking
:21:58. > :22:08.cocaine Andrew King a goal. -- or taking alcohol. The reason he was
:22:09. > :22:11.attacked was because he had targeted the centre of government. You have
:22:12. > :22:14.given us your view, which is that it is nothing to do with Islam and
:22:15. > :22:18.other people will view that it is. But I am suggesting that as a
:22:19. > :22:22.society, we take time to work out people's motives. It is clear that
:22:23. > :22:26.in your case, you would not want it to be ascribed to an Islamic person,
:22:27. > :22:29.even if it turned out that he had a copy of the Koran in the car, you
:22:30. > :22:33.would say it had nothing to do with Islam. But there are people who
:22:34. > :22:37.would say that it is something to do with Islam, even if it clearly has
:22:38. > :22:40.nothing to do with Islam. But in this whole thing, my simple point is
:22:41. > :22:44.that we should be looking at motives and at the moment there are parts of
:22:45. > :22:47.the anti-terrorism and counterterrorism strategy where the
:22:48. > :22:55.government and politicians are very worried about treading on it, and we
:22:56. > :22:58.saw it in Theresa May's comments this week where she immediately
:22:59. > :23:01.ruled one aspect of this whole thing out. I want to go to the audience to
:23:02. > :23:09.get comments about the way that this has been covered. Good morning. I
:23:10. > :23:12.wanted to say, when it actually happened, I was almost, not in fear,
:23:13. > :23:17.but I wondered how quickly it would be that the word Islam or muscle
:23:18. > :23:25.would mentioned in the report. And it did not take long. -- Islam or
:23:26. > :23:32.Muslims. Does it give the oxygen of publicity to Islamic State, who
:23:33. > :23:36.claimed some connection? Is it counter-productive, the way the
:23:37. > :23:41.media covers it? Now we have the 24-hour media, so perhaps it is
:23:42. > :23:45.exacerbated. They do cover it, and all the papers cover it. I think
:23:46. > :23:48.with social media, they have to because it is all out there very
:23:49. > :23:55.quickly anyway. People are making comments on social media, that way.
:23:56. > :24:00.That was my thing. I was waiting for it. It was amazing how quick it
:24:01. > :24:04.happened. I don't think you can ignore it as it is such a big event
:24:05. > :24:08.but the fact is, I was quite pleased with how the media reacted with a
:24:09. > :24:16.positive message. They showed individual acts of bravery and
:24:17. > :24:20.things like the cartoon of Big Ben with big muscles, rather than fear
:24:21. > :24:23.and cowardice. It was a positive message, the fact that it will not
:24:24. > :24:29.change the way that we act and London and the UK will carry on. As
:24:30. > :24:33.humans, it is innate to want to seek simple answers to incredibly complex
:24:34. > :24:36.questions. I think what happens in the media a lot is that people want
:24:37. > :24:42.to jump on one thing because that makes it easy to understand. If we
:24:43. > :24:46.as a media and as society looked on things as a mental health issue,
:24:47. > :24:50.mental health services are pulling in this country and it is difficult
:24:51. > :24:54.for people to access those services. That is somewhere where we need to
:24:55. > :25:04.look to make change in society and make things better. Abdulla, what
:25:05. > :25:08.did come out of this and it was a good thing to focus minds is that 13
:25:09. > :25:15.terrorist plots, serious plots have been thwarted since the killing of
:25:16. > :25:17.Lee Rigby. I'm sure you want to pay tribute to our intelligence
:25:18. > :25:20.services. Yes, but today's discussion is about the press and
:25:21. > :25:30.the media. One of the problems is these regulation and the constant
:25:31. > :25:33.reiteration that goes beyond how the IRA attacks were covered. I must
:25:34. > :25:37.remind everyone that the IRA killed more British people every year
:25:38. > :25:43.during the troubles than any Al-Qaeda or Islamic State inspired
:25:44. > :25:53.attacks. What you mean by quote unquote? They are Islamic State
:25:54. > :25:58.inspired. I mean to say ascribed to Muslim attacks. The ones that claim
:25:59. > :26:04.to be. This is the issue, because what is the objective of terrorists?
:26:05. > :26:09.The objective is not necessarily to kill all infidels. We do not see
:26:10. > :26:13.terrorism in South America or South Africa or Switzerland or the
:26:14. > :26:17.Republic of Ireland but we do see a desire to scare the British public
:26:18. > :26:22.and the French public and the American public to secure political
:26:23. > :26:25.goals. Al-Qaeda and Isis do not have the power to scare people in John
:26:26. > :26:31.O'Groats and Lands End, but the media, which reiterates these
:26:32. > :26:37.attacks and speculate... Were you not scared returning to the question
:26:38. > :26:45.I asked, by the fact that there have been 13 terrorist plots thwarted
:26:46. > :26:48.since 2013? And also thousands of people on the intelligence services
:26:49. > :26:51.watchlist up and down the country, in a publishing of 60 million that
:26:52. > :26:55.is not a lot but it is an awful lot of people who are inspired by this.
:26:56. > :26:59.Do you want to come back to what he is saying? I am happy that terror
:27:00. > :27:05.attacks have been prevented and I hope that we see no terror attacks
:27:06. > :27:10.from any group ever again, but today's discussion is really about
:27:11. > :27:14.whether terror attacks, or terrorists, should be given the
:27:15. > :27:17.oxygen of publicity. Publicity or infamy is only a form of celebrity
:27:18. > :27:24.and we do not want to give these terror attacks the celebrity that
:27:25. > :27:28.they should not enjoy. I want to speak in a minute about the IRA and
:27:29. > :27:33.your coverage of that, and the coverage of IRA atrocities in the
:27:34. > :27:37.past. What is the alternative to the oxygen of publicity? Are we expected
:27:38. > :27:41.to ignore these things altogether? What is it we are actually looking
:27:42. > :27:45.for here? I don't think we are giving it the correct coverage at
:27:46. > :27:49.all. It has been described as a single terror act in London, but how
:27:50. > :27:52.many attacks have been across Europe in the last couple of years? And
:27:53. > :27:57.what have they got in, Can we not use our common-sense
:27:58. > :28:06.and sit down and look at the religion that is possibly driving
:28:07. > :28:10.this. When the IRA were doing what they did, did everyone scramble to
:28:11. > :28:15.find an excuse? They were criminals, they were involved in drug abuse,
:28:16. > :28:17.they were mentally ill, or to the accepted they were Irish Republicans
:28:18. > :28:23.with an Irish Republican aim? If there is no problem with Islamic
:28:24. > :28:29.scripture inspiring bits, then let's look at it. Why are we not looking
:28:30. > :28:34.at it? If it is not Islamic structure, then we have no problem.
:28:35. > :28:38.Wait a minute, wait a minute. Surely the point is that you establish the
:28:39. > :28:41.facts, you get the facts right, you infer from the facts what may have
:28:42. > :28:45.happened and then you report what did happen. That is what I am asking
:28:46. > :28:50.for but I do not think that is happening. You are saying we should
:28:51. > :28:56.start with conclusions. I am not. I am saying we want the truth. You are
:28:57. > :28:59.making assumptions. I want religious fervour to be included in the list
:29:00. > :29:06.of reasons that made this man who he was. Peter, and a second. You were
:29:07. > :29:12.looking like you were not agreeing with that. I agreed to parts but not
:29:13. > :29:15.all of that. When you speak about journalism and accuracy, of course.
:29:16. > :29:24.We all want the truth. It is not just you, it is me. So let me tell
:29:25. > :29:27.you for myself, and I can speak perhaps on behalf of 99% of the
:29:28. > :29:32.British Mars in public, that generally none of us know the motive
:29:33. > :29:36.is behind people who carry out these acts. I myself are very much part of
:29:37. > :29:43.the society, I am born and raised a Londoner and I am and observant
:29:44. > :29:49.Muslim. You do not see somebody like me carrying out these acts inspired
:29:50. > :29:53.by my faith. And people are analysing scripture. It is not the
:29:54. > :29:57.crown of the biblical scripture, you seem to be quite hung up on the fact
:29:58. > :30:06.that this is a Koranic scriptural point. Scripture is open to
:30:07. > :30:09.interpretation. If they are not quoting scripture, why are we
:30:10. > :30:14.bringing scripture into this? Because a lot of them caught the
:30:15. > :30:22.verses that say find the infidels, root them out and kill them. Douglas
:30:23. > :30:30.wanted to come in. This is a great example of it right here. Saba
:30:31. > :30:33.thinks that none of the terrorists ever caught the Koran. Let me give
:30:34. > :30:38.you an example, the killers of Lee Rigby. Michael Adebolajo, on his
:30:39. > :30:42.body, when the police arrested him, he had a note in his pocket, to his
:30:43. > :30:47.young daughter, explaining why he did what he did. You can see a
:30:48. > :30:51.facsimile on the BBC website and there are footnotes of Koranic
:30:52. > :30:56.verses that he thinks justify his actions. That is the beginning...
:30:57. > :31:03.Let me finish. Everyone is talking... Let me just finished my
:31:04. > :31:06.point. That would seem to be there for a very clear occasion, never
:31:07. > :31:10.mind the thousands of others we could list, a very clear occasion in
:31:11. > :31:13.this country where one of our soldiers was murdered on our streets
:31:14. > :31:16.where clearly scripture had something to do with that. The
:31:17. > :31:20.problem that a lot of us have is that we are willing to discuss the
:31:21. > :31:24.drugs bits, we are willing to discuss the foreign policy bit and
:31:25. > :31:29.all this, but why are you not willing to concede that there is a
:31:30. > :31:35.religious element sometimes? Listen, here is my plan. I will speak to
:31:36. > :31:40.Peter in a minute but we will take it to what happened in Ireland over
:31:41. > :31:45.the troubles. I don't want to make it theological.
:31:46. > :31:51.It is not theological. The one point that we haven't mentioned which is
:31:52. > :31:55.crucial to all of this is the radicalisation of people in prisons.
:31:56. > :32:00.I have seen people that don't practice coming out of prison as
:32:01. > :32:03.red-hot radicals. I am sure you have seen people coming out of prison as
:32:04. > :32:08.convert and you celebrate their conversion as well. It can go either
:32:09. > :32:12.way. The point is what is happening? We have put them into a state
:32:13. > :32:18.institution that should be a safe zone. And they are coming out as
:32:19. > :32:26.Isis recruits. Some have got to be separated from the other prisoners
:32:27. > :32:29.so the toxicity doesn't spread. But hang on. We have not heard from
:32:30. > :32:37.Peter Bush. Good morning to you. Welcome! What do you think, Peter,
:32:38. > :32:40.of the coverage of this? The department of war studies at King's
:32:41. > :32:47.College London. Is it important over the days to hear the human stories,
:32:48. > :32:53.the tragedies and the heroism, which is what unfolded in newspapers apart
:32:54. > :32:56.from the analysis? Is it right, the way this has been covered? That part
:32:57. > :33:00.was certainly right, to tell both sides of the story and to get as
:33:01. > :33:04.wide a view as possible, but where you have got to be careful, I think,
:33:05. > :33:09.and we have listened to this discussion here so far, is when you
:33:10. > :33:12.think about oxygen and publicity, part and parcel of the idea of
:33:13. > :33:19.terrorism and what is really behind it is attention seeking. To affect
:33:20. > :33:27.more people with the act of violence and the people who were actually
:33:28. > :33:32.there -- than the people who actually there in that part of
:33:33. > :33:35.London. And when you talk about media coverage and the way you cover
:33:36. > :33:41.it, you have got to be careful not to follow some kind of script about
:33:42. > :33:44.the act of violence itself. It is not just the media action but the
:33:45. > :33:49.people who give voice in the media, who talk and want to talk in the
:33:50. > :33:55.media, be that from a political point of view or the politicians in
:33:56. > :34:03.general. For example, clearly something that many people would
:34:04. > :34:08.call a symbolic place was attacked. But we decide whether this place is
:34:09. > :34:13.symbolic. Parliament. Do we say this was an act of terrorism against
:34:14. > :34:17.democracy? That is our decision. Our reaction is very important in this
:34:18. > :34:21.case. It could have happened in Epping Forest or something. Would we
:34:22. > :34:30.have reacted the same way? This is the choice. We have got to step
:34:31. > :34:34.back, I think, and think about it and makes the decision whether we
:34:35. > :34:41.want to follow the certain script that this person wants us to follow.
:34:42. > :34:47.We talk about an attack on us all and so on and so forth. Or do we try
:34:48. > :34:52.to stick to the facts and the simple story and try to unravel what is
:34:53. > :34:56.behind it and then draw conclusions? Social media has changed the game.
:34:57. > :35:01.Peter, and more contributions from the audience in just a second,
:35:02. > :35:05.please. Social media has changed the game. But in Northern Ireland, I
:35:06. > :35:09.remember, and I have spoken to you about this before. You followed
:35:10. > :35:12.Gerry Adams around America and at every press conference that Gerry
:35:13. > :35:18.Adams gave you were his worst nightmare. There was Peter Hitchens
:35:19. > :35:26.at the back! You could see Mr Adams thinking, oh gosh! The thing is that
:35:27. > :35:31.we had that period when Mrs Thatcher said do not give them the oxygen of
:35:32. > :35:38.publicity and we had the ludicrous situation when actors were dubbing
:35:39. > :35:46.the voices of Mr Adams and Martin McGuinness, occasionally subverted
:35:47. > :35:51.by leaving in coughing that belonged to Mr Adams. It was a good job for
:35:52. > :35:55.the actors but it was ludicrous. It was futile and it illustrates the
:35:56. > :36:00.great difficulty of what wonders about this. One of the French
:36:01. > :36:03.newspapers, Le Monde, tried to stop using the names of the perpetrators
:36:04. > :36:07.and was turned on by the rest of the French media for failing to take the
:36:08. > :36:12.thing seriously. We all have a difficulty. We can't ignore this
:36:13. > :36:15.stuff. We have got to give it a lot of coverage because it is a big
:36:16. > :36:21.event but the question is how we cover it and whether we do so
:36:22. > :36:24.intelligently. And anything is a discussion -- another thing is a
:36:25. > :36:30.discussion of what is in the minds of other people. I was an extremist,
:36:31. > :36:35.Trotskyist, full of utopian garbage. I didn't kill anybody. The gap
:36:36. > :36:40.between being a fanatic and being a killer is considerable and what we
:36:41. > :36:45.are not looking at is this. When you look at Martin McGuinness, what he
:36:46. > :36:48.did personally, we don't know, but he certainly ordered large numbers
:36:49. > :36:53.of deaths. What happens to someone to make him do that? The roots of
:36:54. > :36:57.fanaticism are not just a matter of belief, they are matter of believing
:36:58. > :37:01.so strongly that what you think is right that you kill or in some cases
:37:02. > :37:06.being so disinherited by the collapse of your reason that he will
:37:07. > :37:11.do very violent things. The difficulty is in telling which is
:37:12. > :37:18.which. There is no question that Islamic fanaticism has been involved
:37:19. > :37:21.in a lot of terrorist attacks, 7/7 and 9/11, beyond any doubt, but it
:37:22. > :37:26.doesn't mean that all events have got to be fitted into that. Do you
:37:27. > :37:30.celebrate the peacemaker, Martin McGuinness? I celebrate that he
:37:31. > :37:33.changed and I don't think the British authorities gave in to the
:37:34. > :37:41.IRA. I think the IRA gave into the of law. Who dismantled their
:37:42. > :37:52.intelligent system? Who dismantled the RUC? Is prisoners were released?
:37:53. > :37:56.-- whose prisoners were released? The keyword here is proportion. We
:37:57. > :38:00.have got to report what goes on with the IRA and with Masood but we don't
:38:01. > :38:08.have to overindulge and yes it has been astonishing that there have
:38:09. > :38:12.been many more deaths than the four people on Westminster Bridge, even
:38:13. > :38:16.though that is horrifying. But it strikes that our hearts, doesn't it?
:38:17. > :38:21.Of course. But we don't need the back story of every single witness
:38:22. > :38:25.and have ten pages four days per week. One of the problems is the
:38:26. > :38:30.media itself. We used to have half an hour on the Six O'Clock News and
:38:31. > :38:33.Ten O'Clock News and now the media needs the terrorists feed into their
:38:34. > :38:40.news. There is some kind of unhealthy relationship between those
:38:41. > :38:46.who create the news and the media who actually need it to keep it
:38:47. > :38:50.going 24 hours. We can look at the media as the media of what people
:38:51. > :38:54.want. The truth is why does the media focus on certain stories for
:38:55. > :39:00.long periods of time? Because that is the British public is in. And
:39:01. > :39:05.partly it does shape attitudes but it is also a reflection of what is
:39:06. > :39:11.happening. We need explanations, we need somebody to blame. Yes, but we
:39:12. > :39:18.were having this conversation earlier. 200 people were killed in
:39:19. > :39:22.Mosul as the result of an attack and the US have said it was them but it
:39:23. > :39:27.did not have the same coverage and that is because there is not the
:39:28. > :39:32.same appetite for that coverage. It is still there for people who want
:39:33. > :39:38.to look at it. So it is a commercial consideration? Yes. Obviously 24
:39:39. > :39:42.hour news pushes this and there is a lot of speculation because of it.
:39:43. > :39:49.There are things about that which are unhealthy but it is nothing like
:39:50. > :39:54.as unhealthy as, looking back to the past and our attitude to terrorist
:39:55. > :40:01.activities in the past and present, when the IRA killed many soldiers,
:40:02. > :40:03.what did we end up doing? We put the people who orchestrated that
:40:04. > :40:07.campaign at the heart of government and that is much sicker than the
:40:08. > :40:11.idea that anybody 20 years from now associated with ragged back row
:40:12. > :40:20.could be put into power, which is much more of a societal sickness
:40:21. > :40:27.than 24 hour news. -- people associated with Masood could be put
:40:28. > :40:31.into power. Has this debate been self-defeating because it has given
:40:32. > :40:36.unnecessary oxygen to those people who would destroy us or has it been
:40:37. > :40:40.responsible and the right way to cover? I think overall it has been
:40:41. > :40:48.quite responsible however there have been some tabloids and the news that
:40:49. > :40:53.has gone out, as we are all aware, that has been misinformation. Things
:40:54. > :40:58.like Birmingham being the jihadist capital of England, that is not
:40:59. > :41:03.helpful, unless it is backed up by evidence. It is. It is not the
:41:04. > :41:08.capital, it is the second. London is the capital of terrorism in the UK
:41:09. > :41:11.and Birmingham is second. Debatable. No, if you look at the statistics
:41:12. > :41:16.released earlier this month, it proves that. I have got to come in
:41:17. > :41:20.on confession which we are going to discuss in a moment. If anyone has
:41:21. > :41:25.got anything to confess, that is coming up. Thank you.
:41:26. > :41:27.You can join in all this morning's debates by logging
:41:28. > :41:29.on to bbc.co.uk/TheBigQuestions and following the link
:41:30. > :41:32.Or you can tweet using the hashtag bbctbq.
:41:33. > :41:34.Tell us what you think about our last big question too.
:41:35. > :41:36.Should the secrecy of the confessional be sacrosanct?
:41:37. > :41:40.And if you'd like to apply to be in the audience at a future show you
:41:41. > :41:44.We're in Brighton next week and Cambridge on April 9th.
:41:45. > :41:46.Then, after a break for Easter and the London Marathon,
:41:47. > :41:49.we're back from York on May 30th for two shows, the usual live
:41:50. > :41:51.programme in the morning, plus we're recording a special
:41:52. > :41:59.So do email the audiencetbq address if you fancy taking part
:42:00. > :42:06.Confession is said to be good for the soul.
:42:07. > :42:08.Telling God your sins, perhaps through the medium of a priest,
:42:09. > :42:11.expressing contrition, and making amends for them
:42:12. > :42:15.is an essential part of faith and is as old as the Bible.
:42:16. > :42:18.And the same idea underlies modern psychotherapy too.
:42:19. > :42:21.If you can't come to terms with what you have done,
:42:22. > :42:24.you can never move on, or lighten the burden of your past.
:42:25. > :42:27.But where does this leave your confessor, the person you have
:42:28. > :42:33.If he's a Catholic priest, the answer is clear.
:42:34. > :42:36.He can never tell anyone - not his bishop, not the local
:42:37. > :42:38.police, not the partner you may have betrayed -
:42:39. > :42:45.But should all confessors follow the same rules?
:42:46. > :42:48.Are there times when the enormity of what they have been told requires
:42:49. > :42:51.disclosure, perhaps to a potential victim or to the police?
:42:52. > :42:56.Should the secrecy of the confessional be sacrosanct?
:42:57. > :43:05.Rabbi Romain, you have written a very interesting book on this and I
:43:06. > :43:15.will come to you in a second, and I want your response to Doctor Peter
:43:16. > :43:17.Petkoff, from Regent's Park College. If over the years some priests had
:43:18. > :43:22.taken information from the confessional and gone to the police,
:43:23. > :43:26.think of the misery that people would not have had to go through.
:43:27. > :43:32.Think of the torture that people who were abused would not have had to
:43:33. > :43:37.live with all their lives. Think of all the people who would not have
:43:38. > :43:49.been killed by terrorism. To keep it in the confessional is surely, and
:43:50. > :43:58.unarguably wrong. Of course you can make this argument using a
:43:59. > :44:02.particular moral paradigms. If our moral requirement is the pursuit of
:44:03. > :44:04.truth and if that requires breaking a particular confidentiality
:44:05. > :44:11.agreement we therefore have got to break it, and this has been
:44:12. > :44:14.historically the position of utilitarians who have argued that a
:44:15. > :44:18.breach of confidence in certain situations should be allowed. It
:44:19. > :44:24.into the morality pretty simple? But there is the other argument that we
:44:25. > :44:27.maintain confidentiality because that is what gentlemen do. If we
:44:28. > :44:36.have promised to keep a secret, we keep it. But can the law in
:44:37. > :44:42.particular create a balance, not only in relation to confessionals,
:44:43. > :44:45.but in relation to a number of other things? If somebody comes to a
:44:46. > :44:49.priest and says I have got a sexual interest in children and I am acting
:44:50. > :44:57.upon it, I want your help on this, would you go to the police? I am not
:44:58. > :45:03.a priest. Should the police be told by the priest? If he had a Catholic
:45:04. > :45:10.priest and he has the choice between losing his priesthood and being as
:45:11. > :45:14.communicated for breaking a specific ecclesiastical law or to save a
:45:15. > :45:19.child, it is a personal choice he has, for me. It is not an
:45:20. > :45:24.institutional choice. With that be a difficult choice? I am quite
:45:25. > :45:26.appalled that it is even a choice in the first place. Obviously
:45:27. > :45:30.confession is about to be handled with care and sensitivity but
:45:31. > :45:33.actually if somebody is going to harm others or themselves then there
:45:34. > :45:39.is no religious doubt whatsoever that you do have to break
:45:40. > :45:54.confidentiality. Is a but those are made. You have to
:45:55. > :45:59.put human needs in front of rituals. There is a big difference between
:46:00. > :46:04.praying away a missed confession, and sins against human beings. They
:46:05. > :46:07.cannot be prayed away. You have to rectify them. If someone came to me
:46:08. > :46:10.as a rabbi and said I am a paedophile and I cannot control
:46:11. > :46:14.myself, I would say, you have to hand yourself then or I will come
:46:15. > :46:19.with you, or if you do not, then I will go on to the police. Frankly, I
:46:20. > :46:23.could not look the mother in the eye of his future victim and say, I knew
:46:24. > :46:31.what was going to happen but I did not tell you. APPLAUSE. Of course
:46:32. > :46:37.we're talking about different because what you are referring to is
:46:38. > :46:43.a confidential pastoral advice that you may giving private. What are you
:46:44. > :46:49.talking about? As far as conversion is concerned, in specific context,
:46:50. > :46:55.because not all Christian churches take the same view on confession,
:46:56. > :47:00.there are different degrees in which that is taken seriously. If we are
:47:01. > :47:07.talking about the Catholic Church, the Orthodox Church is, confession
:47:08. > :47:16.is central to the Christian identity. It is sacrosanct? Changing
:47:17. > :47:19.it, removing it requires such complex institutional and
:47:20. > :47:23.theological change that it would prevent Christians from being able
:47:24. > :47:30.to fully... I think lives come before institutional change.
:47:31. > :47:36.Sometimes religious leaders have to have the courage to change, when the
:47:37. > :47:44.rules of the past are no longer relevant. Let me bring Chris in. Is
:47:45. > :47:50.it sacrosanct, confession, what goes on in there? For the catholic church
:47:51. > :47:53.is because forgiveness depends on the intermediate and nature of the
:47:54. > :47:56.priest. But we discussed this at the General Synod a few years ago in the
:47:57. > :48:03.light of the issue of paedophilia. The issue is this confession
:48:04. > :48:07.backward looking. Confession is about people with troubled souls,
:48:08. > :48:10.concerned about things, they go to confession to unburden themselves
:48:11. > :48:15.and talk about it and to seek forgiveness. It seems to me that
:48:16. > :48:20.unless they could go to somebody with whom they have absolute
:48:21. > :48:24.confidence will not disclose it, to whom else so what these people go?
:48:25. > :48:27.They will go to nobody. It seems to me that the position the priest is
:48:28. > :48:34.put in is to withhold forgiveness and absolution unless that person
:48:35. > :48:38.then goes, and he says to them, as the rabbi said, you need to go and
:48:39. > :48:44.tell this to the police. And what if he says I am not going to? You have
:48:45. > :48:49.to remain confidential because... I am going to do it again, that has to
:48:50. > :48:52.remain confidential? That is forward-looking, and then you work
:48:53. > :48:57.with them in terms of counselling and other things, but you do not
:48:58. > :49:09.disclose. I cannot stop my urges and I will do this again. Unquote no
:49:10. > :49:11.disclosure? No disclosure. I find that a pretty appalling attitude. I
:49:12. > :49:22.agree that if children are going to be harmed and we can do something
:49:23. > :49:25.about that, then we should act. What is going on here, we will expect
:49:26. > :49:30.doctors and councillors to break confidential to the agreements is
:49:31. > :49:37.there is a good reason, and we legally require it. But strangely,
:49:38. > :49:40.it is one law, it would appear, for those who are operating in the
:49:41. > :49:45.secular sphere, and then there is another law, with other requirements
:49:46. > :49:48.placed on those who are working within the religious sphere. As a
:49:49. > :49:51.political secularist, my feeling is that the should be a level playing
:49:52. > :49:56.field, the should not be one law for the religious and another for the
:49:57. > :50:00.nonreligious. What I think is important is that when you were
:50:01. > :50:05.talking about the IRA, that was an hero of the past. There is no
:50:06. > :50:10.updated legislation. For instance, whether it is a priest, a rabbi or
:50:11. > :50:13.an imam, if a young man comes up and says, I am off to Syria or I am off
:50:14. > :50:17.to drive around Westminster Bridge and I'm going to knock over a load
:50:18. > :50:20.of people, the counterterrorism act requires that person discloses that
:50:21. > :50:26.information otherwise they will be arrested. I think things have been
:50:27. > :50:29.upgraded a little bit. What is the legal situation, Chris? This has
:50:30. > :50:32.been discussed for hundreds of years, particularly over the issue
:50:33. > :50:38.of treason. It came up over the gunpowder plot and things like that.
:50:39. > :50:44.It has always been the case that the law of the church has been regarded
:50:45. > :50:49.as foundational in this matter, except when a matter comes into the
:50:50. > :50:54.matter of criminal. If criminal law is involved, there are other issues.
:50:55. > :50:59.I understand that. But my understanding is that unless they go
:51:00. > :51:03.to somebody who they know will not confide, they will not confide in
:51:04. > :51:07.anybody. -- the matter of criminal law. We're looking at a very extreme
:51:08. > :51:11.case. It is not really going to happen that somebody says, I'm going
:51:12. > :51:15.to do this and I'm going to confess to a priest. Somebody confesses to
:51:16. > :51:22.the priest because they are troubled by something and if they know that
:51:23. > :51:26.the priest might share it to... But we know that the child abuse
:51:27. > :51:31.cover-up happened for decades in the church. For decades. That
:51:32. > :51:37.confessional conversation will, I'm sure, have happened on very many
:51:38. > :51:42.occasions. Let me put it to you, Peter, because you mentioned the IRA
:51:43. > :51:49.earlier on, what is in the confessional and IRA bomber were to
:51:50. > :51:52.have said, and we know about the label on the proverb priests, was to
:51:53. > :51:56.have said in the confessional to his priest, I'm going to carry out this
:51:57. > :52:00.atrocity, and I hope my Lord and Father forgives me, Hail Mary,
:52:01. > :52:05.whatever, should that priest had gone to the police? I am a
:52:06. > :52:09.Protestant and I have no particular interest in this. I do not subscribe
:52:10. > :52:12.to the sacrament of confession. Looking at the argument, we seem to
:52:13. > :52:19.be approaching it as some people approach torture, by producing an
:52:20. > :52:23.example which is not realistic. I am utterly and completely opposed to
:52:24. > :52:27.torture. I do not believe it is sanctioned under any circumstances.
:52:28. > :52:32.The reply is always, what if there is a ticking time bomb. But there
:52:33. > :52:35.has never been such an episode. I do not believe, actually, that IRA
:52:36. > :52:39.terrorists went and told priests that they were going to kill people.
:52:40. > :52:42.I also believe that if someone takes the sacrament of confession
:52:43. > :52:45.seriously, you will also believe that you will burn in hell if you
:52:46. > :52:52.abuse a child. It is unlikely that such a person is going to... Stop
:52:53. > :52:57.right there. The whole thing is a hypothesis, designed to attack a
:52:58. > :53:00.particular church. But terrorists told the police after they committed
:53:01. > :53:08.the authority, we know that. Should the police have then gone... So we
:53:09. > :53:12.have to formulate that. But today, they would be arrested. I'm not here
:53:13. > :53:16.to defend the Roman Catholic Church to which I do not belong. Nor am I
:53:17. > :53:19.particularly interested in the sacrament of confession. What I'm
:53:20. > :53:24.saying is that what is being advanced here is an extreme and
:53:25. > :53:28.unlikely hardcase hypothesis to attack, if I can just finish, to
:53:29. > :53:32.attack the practices of a particular church. And I do not find it
:53:33. > :53:35.particularly convincing. Let me give you a simple everyday case that is
:53:36. > :53:40.less extreme. One of my congregants came home and found her husband in
:53:41. > :53:44.bed with his secretary. Confidentially, she told me she was
:53:45. > :53:48.delighted and the reason was because actually he had been abusing her for
:53:49. > :53:51.years and years. She had never had the courage to say anything and she
:53:52. > :53:54.did not want to go public and now she had a legitimate reason, a
:53:55. > :53:58.respectable reason for the divorce. The problem started three years
:53:59. > :54:02.later when he actually went out with somebody else, and got engaged.
:54:03. > :54:06.Confidentially, I knew that he was an abuser. This second potential
:54:07. > :54:10.wife was a very feisty lady and I thought she could look after herself
:54:11. > :54:17.but on the other hand, a person who had abused once could be abused
:54:18. > :54:21.again. Should I break the confidence and tell the fiance that he was
:54:22. > :54:25.actually a wife beater? In the end I decided that she had a right to that
:54:26. > :54:29.information so I broke confidence and I did tell the fiance. There was
:54:30. > :54:32.an example where I think that actually you have to put the
:54:33. > :54:38.interests of other people first. Did she marry him? In the end, a few
:54:39. > :54:43.weeks later they split up. Which is a very good example but it is
:54:44. > :54:47.actually a very different thing. You wanted an everyday example and I
:54:48. > :54:52.gave it to you. The gentleman at the back, good morning and welcome. When
:54:53. > :55:00.you look at the Scriptures if you look at Romans 13 in the Bible, the
:55:01. > :55:02.King James, it says you must submit yourself to society. In Acts five it
:55:03. > :55:07.tells you quite specifically that you have to follow the law of the
:55:08. > :55:10.land. Where you see criminality or someone is doing something wrong,
:55:11. > :55:16.you have to submit to that biblically. Really, I see it is
:55:17. > :55:19.quite benign. When you are looking at the case of terrorism or whatever
:55:20. > :55:25.it is, if someone is committing a crime you have a duty of care to
:55:26. > :55:34.your other fellow human beings to react in the correct manner. I think
:55:35. > :55:38.the level of criminality here is important. Where it is a personal
:55:39. > :55:42.thing, as we saw with the rabbi, that can be quite a constructive
:55:43. > :55:46.thing, but when we come to the point that you are breaking the law, I
:55:47. > :55:50.think that obviously you have a duty to report that. Actually, there are
:55:51. > :55:53.laws that say, for example, you could be perverting the course of
:55:54. > :55:57.justice, you could be an accomplice to a crime if you do not report it.
:55:58. > :56:01.There are aspects of terror legislation where again if you do
:56:02. > :56:07.not report it, you are part of the problem. At that stage, everybody, I
:56:08. > :56:11.think, has a duty to report it. Looking at a person who is possibly
:56:12. > :56:15.giving this confession, you actually are helping them by doing that. I
:56:16. > :56:25.think that is a very important stage. APPLAUSE.
:56:26. > :56:31.All religious figures have a duty to uphold the sanctity of human life.
:56:32. > :56:35.By withholding that information, they are not doing what they are
:56:36. > :56:41.there to do. And if they are putting their own faith before the sanctity
:56:42. > :56:45.of human life, that is selfish. It is a fascinating discussion. You
:56:46. > :56:48.have put a hard case of a priest in a confessional knowing about a
:56:49. > :56:53.paedophile. Two widen that out, consider the number of people in our
:56:54. > :56:58.society who do not, who have not sworn they will keep secrets but
:56:59. > :57:01.have done. For personal reasons, community or social reasons, look at
:57:02. > :57:05.the number of people who must've known about Jamie Savile's abuse,
:57:06. > :57:10.for example. They kept silence, not because they were sworn to but
:57:11. > :57:14.because they felt the pressure. It is quite easy to think of this as
:57:15. > :57:18.the hardest problem for a catholic priest but as a society, a lot of
:57:19. > :57:21.people in our society cover up things, whilst moralising about
:57:22. > :57:26.things like catholic priests. And as a practising Catholic, one wonders
:57:27. > :57:31.what might be revealed in the confessional when he was in church.
:57:32. > :57:37.Any other comments? At the back, the lady there. I am sure that hiding
:57:38. > :57:42.things makes you an accomplice and makes you a criminal as well. It is
:57:43. > :57:46.a very serious issue when it comes to child abuse and stuff like that.
:57:47. > :57:50.If I could have been saved, as a sufferer myself, I would have loved
:57:51. > :57:54.it. I was formally Hindu and I am not religious any more for the same
:57:55. > :57:59.reason. People hide things when the moral of probation is that you are
:58:00. > :58:06.supposed to save the child, save people who are dying, because the
:58:07. > :58:10.impact is way more massive than you may be burning in hell after you are
:58:11. > :58:14.dead. It is ridiculous, you are ruining people's lives and they will
:58:15. > :58:18.have to live afterwards. It is not acceptable. We are running out of
:58:19. > :58:22.time, Chris. The issue here is that if you remove that, there is nobody
:58:23. > :58:27.that people who are troubled by these things can go to. Nobody. What
:58:28. > :58:29.sort of society is that? We are out of time. Thank you all very much
:58:30. > :58:38.indeed. Thank you. APPLAUSE. . As always, the debate will continue
:58:39. > :58:40.online and on Twitter. Next week we're in Brighton,
:58:41. > :58:43.so do join us then. But for now it's goodbye from Oxford
:58:44. > :59:08.and have a great Sunday. I've not given myself that time
:59:09. > :59:11.to sit down