Lib Dems being illiberal and undemocratic?

[SteveH]

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/other/former-archbishop-warns-it-may-be-impossible-to-represent-the-lib-dems-and-be-christian/ar-AA1qA2EZ

[Nearly Sane]

It's not a problem confined to the Lub Dems, or just religious beliefs. The concentration on Kate Forbes beliefs in the SNP leadership election, with the Scottish Greens refusing to support a govt where she had a senior role, though they had already done that for a couple of years makes that obvious. That she was in competition with a Muslim, in Humza Yousaf, who may well have arranged a meeting to avoid a vote confirming same sex marriage, throws up other complications.


It's only a couple of days after the Greens got told to pay cosr in the case of Shahrar Ali, and that's more related to their 'religion' than his.

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c2dgd9d9503o

[ProfessorDavey]

https://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/other/former-archbishop-warns-it-may-be-impossible-to-represent-the-lib-dems-and-be-christian/ar-AA1qA2EZ

I don't really see the issue here.

The LibDems have a set of values and principles that ultimately drive into policy. They will also have a breadth of views in their membership and candidates and most political parties are pretty broad churches. However there will be some views that would be deemed incompatible with being a LibDem candidate, which is let's face it, a position in which you are representing and reflecting the party's positions.

And this seems to have nothing to do with 'christianity' per se, but about the specific views of a specific individual. There are plenty of christians who do not hold to the 'traditional' christian views on abortion, homosexuality etc and these folk would have no problems being a LibDem candidate. However if your flavour of Christianity is more Westboro baptist then I think the LibDems would have a problem. But again this is about specific views rather than being a christian per se.

And of course it cuts both ways - there are plenty of religions who will have issues with specific views of potential adherents and therefore would not allow them in positions where they would be representing that religion.

The bottom line is whether an individuals views are compatible enough with an organisation for that organisation to be comfortable with that person officially representing them. And that is for the individual to contemplate and for the organisation to decide.

[Nearly Sane]

I don't really see the issue here.

The LibDems have a set of values and principles that ultimately drive into policy. They will also have a breadth of views in their membership and candidates and most political parties are pretty broad churches. However there will be some views that would be deemed incompatible with being a LibDem candidate, which is let's face it, a position in which you are representing and reflecting the party's positions.

And this seems to have nothing to do with 'christianity' per se, but about the specific views of a specific individual. There are plenty of christians who do not hold to the 'traditional' christian views on abortion, homosexuality etc and these folk would have no problems being a LibDem candidate. However if your flavour of Christianity is more Westboro baptist then I think the LibDems would have a problem. But again this is about specific views rather than being a christian per se.

And of course it cuts both ways - there are plenty of religions who will have issues with specific views of potential adherents and therefore would not allow them in positions where they would be representing that religion.

The bottom line is whether an individuals views are compatible enough with an organisation for that organisation to be comfortable with that person officially representing them. And that is for the individual to contemplate and for the organisation to decide.

So if the current approach of the Lid Dems would mean that Charles Kennedy and/or Shirley Williams could not be candidates even if they acted in line with general principles, you don't see that as an excessive narrowing of the 'church'?

[jeremyp]

I don't really see the issue here.

The LibDems have a set of values and principles that ultimately drive into policy. They will also have a breadth of views in their membership and candidates and most political parties are pretty broad churches. However there will be some views that would be deemed incompatible with being a LibDem candidate, which is let's face it, a position in which you are representing and reflecting the party's positions.

And this seems to have nothing to do with 'christianity' per se, but about the specific views of a specific individual. There are plenty of christians who do not hold to the 'traditional' christian views on abortion, homosexuality etc and these folk would have no problems being a LibDem candidate. However if your flavour of Christianity is more Westboro baptist then I think the LibDems would have a problem. But again this is about specific views rather than being a christian per se.

And of course it cuts both ways - there are plenty of religions who will have issues with specific views of potential adherents and therefore would not allow them in positions where they would be representing that religion.

The bottom line is whether an individuals views are compatible enough with an organisation for that organisation to be comfortable with that person officially representing them. And that is for the individual to contemplate and for the organisation to decide.

I think the problem is the fact that the party is rejecting already selected candidates. It's one thing for a party member to say "I can't live with official policy on abortion, so I'm leaving the party."  It's another thing for the member to say "I disagree with abortion, but I will not contradict official party policy on it" and for the party to then say "you're fired".

[ProfessorDavey]

So if the current approach of the Lid Dems would mean that Charles Kennedy and/or Shirley Williams could not be candidates even if they acted in line with general principles, you don't see that as an excessive narrowing of the 'church'?

NS - the word 'if' seems to be doing a lot of heavy lifting in that comment.

It is pure speculation whether Charles Kennedy and/or Shirley Williams could not be candidates, without a shred of actual evidence. But more significantly you cannot judge what was deemed acceptable decades ago by current standards and vice versa. Back in the 1950s I image it would be perfectly acceptable for candidates of most major parties to have views that were racist, sexist and homophobic - as those reflected the norms of the time. Today I doubt any of the major parties would accept anyone as a candidate with openly racist, sexist or homophobic views. That is because times have changed.

So perhaps (again pure speculation) Shirley Williams in the 1980s might have opposed same sex marriage and that would have been acceptable to the early LibDems. However Shirley Williams time travelled to the 2020s as a 50 year old (as she was in 1980) Liberal firebrand - then I doubt she would oppose same sex marriage. So the fulcrum of views changes with time, but so does the norm for individuals.

And no - I don't see it as 'narrowing the church' it is simply moving the window of views. So perhaps someone who opposes same sex marriage might struggle to fit comfortably in the 2020s LibDems, but then someone who supported same sex marriage in the 1950s would probably struggle to be accepted in the 1950s Liberal party - they would have been considered an extreme crank. Times change and so does the range of acceptable views within political parties - that doesn't mean the church has narrowed, indeed it may well have broadened.

[Nearly Sane]

NS - the word 'if' seems to be doing a lot of heavy lifting in that comment.

It is pure speculation whether Charles Kennedy and/or Shirley Williams could not be candidates, without a shred of actual evidence. But more significantly you cannot judge what was deemed acceptable decades ago by current standards and vice versa. Back in the 1950s I image it would be perfectly acceptable for candidates of most major parties to have views that were racist, sexist and homophobic - as those reflected the norms of the time. Today I doubt any of the major parties would accept anyone as a candidate with openly racist, sexist or homophobic views. That is because times have changed.

So perhaps (again pure speculation) Shirley Williams in the 1980s might have opposed same sex marriage and that would have been acceptable to the early LibDems. However Shirley Williams time travelled to the 2020s as a 50 year old (as she was in 1980) Liberal firebrand - then I doubt she would oppose same sex marriage. So the fulcrum of views changes with time, but so does the norm for individuals.

And no - I don't see it as 'narrowing the church' it is simply moving the window of views. So perhaps someone who opposes same sex marriage might struggle to fit comfortably in the 2020s LibDems, but then someone who supported same sex marriage in the 1950s would probably struggle to be accepted in the 1950s Liberal party - they would have been considered an extreme crank. Times change and so does the range of acceptable views within political parties - that doesn't mean the church has narrowed, indeed it may well have broadened.

The concern is surely that the possibility is that mainstream religious views might, and that's another word doing the heavy lifting of considering there might be a problem rather than just dismissing it completely, lead to it being impossible for people to be candidates? Broad churches allow for different views, you seem happy for that to he reduced.

[ProfessorDavey]

The concern is surely that the possibility is that mainstream religious views might, and that's another word doing the heavy lifting of considering there might be a problem rather than just dismissing it completely, lead to it being impossible for people to be candidates?

Yet more speculation. And frankly I am (and I suspect political parties are) interested in the views of individuals - whether, or not those view may represent 'mainstream religious views' (which of itself is highly subjective) appears irrelevant. Not least because there are plenty of religious individuals who do not agree with the 'mainstream religious views' of the religions that they affiliate to.

So if a political party strongly supports, as a matter of official policy, the right for women to access abortion services, then it would seem perfectly reasonable to me for that party not to choose to endorse a candidate who wants to campaign for a complete ban on abortion. But that would be based on the individual view of that individual person - that this view might be 'mainstream religious views' in the RCC seems completely irrelevant to me.

Broad churches allow for different views, you seem happy for that to he reduced.

But I don't accept that political parties are less of a broad church now than they were, say 40 years ago. Indeed in many respects they are far broader - back in the 80s it would be pretty difficult to be endorsed as a candidate if you were openly gay, or openly atheist, or muslim - indeed it was pretty difficult to get an endorsement as a candidate if you were a woman.

And sure there are some 'views' that would appear beyond the pale now, that would have been OK 40 years ago (e.g. racist, sexist, homophobic etc), but there are also 'view' which now would seem pretty mainstream now in the LibDems, but would likely have been considered extreme and not been welcome in the Liberal party of 40 years ago - e.g. support for same sex marriages, lot's of views on green issues, support for assisted dying, support for smoking bans.

Times change and the fulcrum of views changes also - that doesn't mean that political parties are any less 'broad churches' it is just that the range of views considered 'reasonable' has shifted.

[Outrider]

Oh, wow. Liberal party espousing liberal views with liberal in its name updates view of liberal in light of more liberal society. That's only news in the sense that it's an unusual sign of progress.

O.

[splashscuba]

I guess its irrelevent what politicians personal views are. Ultimately it only matters when politicians/parties are up for election. If they espouse anti gay/anti abortion sentiments then people may choose not to vote for them. If anti gay/anti abortion measures end up as policy for a party, people may choose to not vote for that party's representative. Politicians may also not be selected for positions if they also publically vent their anti gay/anti abortion views.

[Outrider]

I guess its irrelevent what politicians personal views are.

Of course it's relevant; but it's also relevant what the party as a whole choose to stand for, and as that changes over time so people will tend to find that either their sentiments change, or the party's centrepoint shifts, and some are no longer in the fold who were. If that weren't the case we'd be talking about Whigs instead.

O.

[ProfessorDavey]

Some interesting background on this matter and on the policy positions of the Christian People's Alliance (CPA), a political party that Campanale was previously president of before joining the LibDems.

https://libdemwatch.org/f/sutton-lib-dems-select-ex-president-of-hardline-christian-party

While he was president of the CPA their official policy positions (which he presumably approved of as he was ... err ... their president) included a complete ban on abortion, banning morning after pill, opposing same sex marriage, banning fertility treatment that involves creating an embryo in vitro, adoption restricted to opposite sex married couples etc.

These don't seem to be 'mainstream religious' views in the UK - these seem to be very extreme religious views.

The CPA had similar policies in their 2024 manifesto, but Campanale claims to have left them when they were taken over by extremists - seems strange that the current extreme policies are pretty well identical to the policies in place when he was president.

Seems that the LibDems may have failed to do a very thorough due diligence during their selection process as these views surely would be completely incompatible with the values and policies of the LibDems that any candidate would presumably be expected to agree with and uphold.

But as with so many of these 'christian martyr' cases the media reporting is very one sided. But as he has sued the LibDems presumably there will be a day in court for him and the party where both sides will be able to put over their positions and there will be a judgement as to whether he was deselected for being a christian, deselected for holding views that were incompatible with being a LibDem candidate or deselected for other reasons (e.g. not being candid about his background and views).

[splashscuba]

Of course it's relevant; but it's also relevant what the party as a whole choose to stand for, and as that changes over time so people will tend to find that either their sentiments change, or the party's centrepoint shifts, and some are no longer in the fold who were. If that weren't the case we'd be talking about Whigs instead.

O.

Its only relevent if they make those views public, then we get to choose.