We pride ourselves on being a tolerant nation, but....

Apologies, posted in the wrong thread my comments above, so please ignore and I will post in the correct thread
Again apologies.

Anniebach, you state there is a thread on the Windrush generation, but I fail to see that in this section of the forum as I would love to post my thoughts on that situation. However, as this thread is about racism why not discuss those disgusting words and actions in regard to all who engage in such, be they organizations or individuals.

anniebach, you have stated that you have held membership of the Labour party for fifty years. In that, I can understand that you may not appreciate the policy changes in the party or like the leadership of Jeremy Corbyn, but you did state in a different thread that you wished to see him elected as our prime minister.

Therefore in the above, at the very least I would feel that you would wish to see balance in any discussion of the Labour leader. In that, would you would wish to run in support of any comparison of the direct policy actions of the Conservative party and its leadership in regard to the Windrush generation and the words of some who may not even be Labour party members in regard to the new Home Secretary.

I like many do not expect the Labour party to do well today (03/05/2018) in the council elections due to the anti-Semitism publicity and Corbyns lack of charisma in parliamentary debate. However, as both of us are subscribing members of the Labour movement (you anniebach as a Labour party member an myself as a trade union member) then our ambition should surely be to ensure balance in any debate on racism.

In the above, making direct comparisons with direct racist policy actions of the Conservative party with the words of some in (and not in) the Labour party can only benefit our organization in what could be a difficult night.

Nicely put Eloethan It could be argued that a lot of things where resources are inadequate end up pitching us one against another when what we should be doing is arguing for better provision. When religion is seen as a ‘trump’ card in the timely allocation of scarce resources then there is the extra dimension for conflict. It lets politicians off the hook whilst we argue amongst ourselves.

It's awkward isn't it. Personally, I don't feel that strongly about priority being given to families whose religious beliefs require them to be buried/cremated without delay. As a person of no faith, I am not at all concerned about when or how I am despatched but I can see that for some people it is important.

I suppose, though, that it could be quite distressing to have to wait several weeks - someone on here said they'd waited 6 weeks. When my uncle died last year it was a three and a half week wait. It didn't particularly bother me as I wasn't that close to him but it's possible it could be upsetting for close family.

As others have said, the problem appears to be a lack of appropriate provision in areas where this is likely to be more of an issue.

Stating what the outcome of an action is is about causation which does not necessarily equate with blame. I said upthread that maybe the coronial system in affected areas should look at its staffing rotas/practices. I don’t see why the solution should just be to make others not of that faith wait longer. Prioritising coronial time to release bodies of two types of faith means that others wait longer - just because they already have a long wait for a cremation slot doesn’t mean that it’s acceptable to make the delay for the slot even longer by putting them down the queue.

And you raised the issue of bodies being released earlier for burial if they were Jewish or Muslim. You said And if the coroner has to deal with the J/M families first, of course others are kept waiting longer
Which is effecively blaming them. However the long wait for a space at the crematorium has absolutely nothing to do with them and actually gives support to the bodies being released earlier. They can after all arrange the burial immediately.

trisher who is blaming Jews or Moslems? This thread was about tolerance of others intolerance. I raised the issue about the fairness or otherwise of the cab rank / first come first served rule at a coroners court re the release of bodies. I think it was a perfectly reasonable point to make. There is an issue about how far the different rules/ beliefs of other religions should be given precedence over the ‘main stream’ system if that disadvantages other groups.

Which neither Muslims nor Jews can be blamed for.

Just been googling - apparently burials are the.norm in NI but here the wait is often for a spot at the crematorium

The area covered by this coroner has a very high Jewish/ Moslem population which is one of the reasons it became an issue. It’s not about the organisation of the funerals per se but the release of the body if there is coroner input needed. I’d heard about how quickly funerals happen in NI - there does seem to be a real capacity issue here though.

I come from the North of Ireland and there bodies, unless needed by the police for further investigation, are usually buried within three days. It is a well oiled machine and perhaps Jewish and Muslim burials are equally well organised. There are presumably fewer Jewish and Muslim dead than most others in England as they are a small proportion of the population. An interesting aside to the OP.

It's a combination of things Joelsnan and the coroner can be involved in the death even though there is no post mortem. In my mum's case she had been hospitalised after a fall and although it was 3 months since the fall the coroner has to look at the cause of death if a fall was involved. In my case it was just a quick phone call to ask if I was satisfied with the given cause. But funeral directors, crematoria and cemetaries all have waiting lists. J/M usually have their own people to help with burial.

I recently attended a funeral where the family had to wait 6 weeks between death and internment, this without post mortem or other.. Are more people dying or are J/M jumping the queue? In all instances surely an early internment is better for the families. Now we have refrigerators there should be no issue with first come first served.
Is this length of wait commonplace?

The issue is how long you have to wait for the body to be released for burial so that does impact on a family’s ability to organise a funeral date and for mourners to arrange to be able to come. And if the coroner has to deal with the J/M families first, of course others are kept waiting longer. The funeral has different meanings in different religions and because of the speed of the average J funeral, there is a different attitude to not being able to attend and they have the stone setting ceremony later.

But what will happen to the bodies of non Jewish/Muslim people anyway? They will in most cases be held in funeral parlours until a time can be arranged for burial or cremation. That they lie instead in a mortuary really can't make that much difference surely. And arguably by arranging their burials quickly these people are preventing even longer waits for other faiths.

I know all about the Jewish and Moslem traditions and why they originated - the point I was making( clearly very badly) was that I felt uncomfortable about ‘queue jumping’. The coroner concerned works in an area with a very high Jewish population and through it unfair that the cab rank principle did not apply and that non Jewish families had to wait longer. In most areas of course this is not a problem at all and will depend on the local demographics. What I think would be a better solution is to have a different staffing system in such areas so that Jewish/Moslem families can be dealt with quickly without other families having to wait longer. That’s all

It is in very rare cases that the coroner is involved. When they are they do their best to process things asap. I know because they were recently involved when my mum died. She died very early on Sat morning, the coroner's office contacted me on Monday morning about clearing the death certificate and her body was released to the funeral director on Tuesday. Personally. I would not have objected to someone asking for a body to be released over the weekend before Mum. Her body lay in the funeral director's anyway until we were given a crematorium date.

Maryeliza in Muslim countries the body is always buried within 24 hours of death. If we introduced burial by religion surely some would never get interred.
This practice is another case where religion has absorbed tradition and if not curtailed may start demanding.
In hot countries before refrigeration it was a good idea to bury ASAP

Yes I know that trisher .But in this country, is it fair that a body is released first for burial on religious grounds and a non Jewish/Moslem family has to wait longer? I just wondered where this recent ruling fits into people being treated fairly?

"My intention was to illustrate that antisemitism did not appear in that small town and does not appear everywhere but that it is caused by certain social or environmental conditions."
My experience too, Alexa. Having lived in a Jewish community for many years.
The experiences of the Jewish MPs was awful, but not comparable to the general attitude to Jews in the UK.
Things are changing though, and it's the media who are stirring things up.

Iam64 wrote:

"I'm uneasy about the suggestion that because a poster went to school with two girls who came to the UK on the Kindertransport as well as believing"Jews as individuals are ok" that somehow precludes you from anti semitic beliefs. "

That was me who wrote it. I was trying to be brief. I should have said also that in that particular school class and in my own neighbourhood there was hardly a shadow of interest that the Jewish children were Jewish and therefore different from other children. At the time I had never heard the term 'Kindertransport' and I doubt if my parents and their friends had either. My intention was to illustrate that antisemitism did not appear in that small town and does not appear everywhere but that it is caused by certain social or environmental conditions.

maryeliza54 I thought that had always happened? The reason being that both religions require the body to be buried within 24 hours if possible. A sensible rule for those living in a hot climate.

Day6
I find this very puzzling contemporary Western society has embraced the ethic of tolerance to an extreme
I was trying to think of an instance where an incident or violent episode could be blamed on tolerance and couldn't think of any. I could site many instances where intolerance has led to violence and bloodshed, including N.Ireland, the Balkan states, Africa and the Middle East.
The problem with "drawing lines in the sand" is that different groups of people will draw lines in different places, even though sometimes those groups will be closer in beliefs than many others. They then begin to argue and even fight over whose line is right. Tolerance says you both have a point of view but no right to restrict the activities of others.
I do think there is a case that perhaps young people need education about how their rights to tolerance and freedom have been won. And arguably such education would develop in those living in western society the confidence to pursue freedom and tolerance. The problem for the government is of course that authority has not always behaved well and an education in the acts of violence and repression it has practised might arouse in some young people a spirit of rebellion.

I’m still feeling somewhat disturbed by the fact that a coroner has been told to drop the ‘cab rank’ rules for the releasing of bodies in favour of Jewish and Moslem bodies being released first.

Joelsnan - sounds like you've been reading too much Freud!
Seriously though, I think you're right. I once heard a talk on the radio about the story of Eve being tempted by the serpent to eat of the Tree of Life. Then persuading Adam to eat it, after which they were thrown out of the Garden of Eden.
The theory was that from that point on men have blamed women for leading them astray.