The Case of the Cup Cake

This is going to be controversial. But what the hell.

It can be very confusing living in the Land of The Angles in this day and age, thinks Cicero.

In recent weeks there has been much debate about British values with the Nation’s Head Teacher, Michael Gove, admirably supported by the Two Caesars, creating, upholding and pontificating upon ‘fundamental British values’.

Do you know what these might be? Nope, neither did Cicero, but seemingly for the Angles and for those non-Angles who wish to live among the Angles, these have been defined as including ‘the principles of democracy, the rule of law, individual liberty, mutual respect and tolerance of those with different faiths and beliefs.

At least we should be grateful these say nothing about the need to protect polar bears, to comply with the demands of Health and Safety Gauleiters, or to ensure we all have access to cosmetic surgery. Let’s be thankful for small mercies.

But Cicero does wonder just how tolerant the Angles are, how free is speech, how much liberty the individual actually has.

Consider Exhibit One-The Case of the Cup Cake (and there are many more witnesses to call but we will illustrate the issue on this occasion with this one case).

In a corner of Angle Land a Christian-owned, -run and –managed bakery was asked to produce cup cakes with slogans promoting gay marriage. It politely declined the order as it conflicted with its deeply held religious beliefs. And now it is being taken to court by the Equality Commission for breaching equality law. (http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-28206581)

Now to be clear Cicero is not arguing the rights and wrongs of gay marriage here but he is arguing that if we are to be true to the ‘fundamental British values’ of the Nation’s Head Master, are the Cup Cake Makers not entitled to their views?

They are not acting out of blind irrational prejudice but from deeply held religious beliefs and principles. We should be as tolerant of these as we are of people’s right to promote gay marriage. Mr Gove and the Two Caesars say we ought to.

So why is the Equality Commission using Cicero’s and your hard earned bawbees to threaten and bully?

After all there must be more than one Cup Cake Maker in this corner of Angle Land.

Surely we must not lose sight of the axiom that while ‘I may not agree with what you say but I will defend to the death your right to say it’.

Should he ever hear about the Case of the Cup Cake, Voltaire would be spinning in his grave.

Do you agree, learned readers?

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.

Blackboard jungle

Once again I send greetings and profuse apologies for my absence from the airwaves for the past few weeks. I will not bore you with the details but suffice to say I was unavoidably detained and kept away from you. My excuse is genuine and substantive. You know wild horses would fail to keep me from my devoted fans and followers and seekers of the truth like you.

Now maybe it’s only me but…a wee bit more effort might have solved this problem.

While I was away from you I was following with great interest the row that has blown up over the marking for the GCSEs and the performance of our young people in these exams.

Now it occurs to me, as one who passed their exams when an A pass truly was an A pass, that it is not a God given right that the pass rate should continually rise.

And it also strikes me that if more and more of our young people are passing these exams as the data would appear to suggest, then why are the yoof of today not smarter than we were at their age? And if you really do think that these people have mastered the 3 Rs then you have not come into much contact with these people.

They can’t add up even the most basic sums without a calculator-see them in shops managing a till for proof of this; their understanding of the simplest of grammatical concepts is weak-like the use of apostrophes; and don’t even start me on their understanding of the use of gerunds and gerundives, the need for semi-deponent verbs or the ability to parse a sentence.

I am also shocked that there is such uproar over the marking scheme and whether or not they deserve a C or D grade in English. If the row had been over an important grade like an A or A Star I might have understood. But a C or D-talk about circumcising gnats.

Now it might only be me but surely if they had tried just a wee bit harder then this row could easily have been defused.

You got a D so get over it. It is not the examiners fault. It is not Michael Gove’s problem. It is down to you. Maybe if you had listened more in class or did your homework with a wee bit more diligence or spent more time with your books instead of being on Facebook in the run up the exam you might have got the marks to get a real C or even B or possibly an A.

And to the teachers moaning and whining about the markers, take a long hard look at yourselves. Maybe you should have put in a wee bit more effort to get your pupils away from the danger zone. Blaming the markers is a smoke screen.

I am so glad my schooldays are well behind me.

Have a great week.

Sis felix. Et sis fortunatus.